with a map of wessex
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON
1920
COPYRIGHT
First Collected Edition 1894. New Edition and reprints1896-1900
First published by Macmillan & Co., Crown 8ov, 1903.Reprinted 1910, 1915
Pockets Edition 1907, 1910, 1913, 1916, 1919 (twice), 1920
Wessex Edition 1912
To the eyes of a man viewing it from behind, the nut-brown hair was a wonderand a mystery. Under the black beaver hat, surmounted by its tuft of blackfeathers, the long locks, braided and twisted and coiled like the rushes of abasket, composed a rare, if somewhat barbaric, example of ingenious art. Onecould understand such weavings and coilings being wrought to last intact for ayear, or even a calendar month; but that they should be all demolishedregularly at bedtime, after a single day of permanence, seemed a reckless wasteof successful fabrication.
And she had done it all herself, poor thing. She had no maid, and it was almostthe only accomplishment she could boast of. Hence the unstinted pains.
She was a young invalid lady—not so very much of an invalid—sittingin a wheeled chair, which had been pulled up in the front part of a greenenclosure, close to a bandstand, where a concert was going on, during a warmJune afternoon. It had place in one of the minor parks or private gardens thatare to be found in the suburbs of London, and was the effort of a localassociation to raise money for some charity. There are worlds within worlds inthe great city, and though nobody outside the immediate district had ever heardof the charity, or the band, or the garden, the enclosure was filled with aninterested audience sufficiently informed on all these.
As the strains proceeded many of the listeners observed the chaired lady, whoseback hair, by reason of her prominent position, so challenged inspection. Herface was not easily discernible, but the aforesaid cunning tress-weavings, thewhite ear and poll, and the curve of a cheek which was neither flaccid norsallow, were signals that led to the expectation of good beauty in front. Suchexpectations are not infrequently disappointed as soon as the disclosure comes;and in the present case, when the lady, by a turn of the head, at lengthrevealed herself, she was not so handsome as the people behind her hadsupposed, and even