The Return of the Native

nd Where There Is

ld to go home alone on this part of Egdon Heath. The distance to the boy's house was not more than three-eighths of a mile, his father's cottage, and one other a few yards further on, forming part of the small haml

e a little song about a sailor-boy and a fair one, and bright gold in store. In the middle of this the child stopped:

ry, for they whistled gloomily, and had a ghastly habit after dark of putting on the shapes of jumping madmen, sprawling giants, and hideous cripples. Lights were not uncommon this evening, but the nature o

it, instead of Eustacia's solitary form, he saw two persons, the second being a man. The boy crept along under the bank to ascertain fr

egan to withdraw as silently as he had come. That he did not, upon the whole, think it advisable to interrupt

om discovery, he finally decided to face the pit phenomenon as the lesser evil. Wi

hing to alarm him till, coming within a few yards of the sandpit, he heard a slight noise in front, which led him

he said aloud. "I have never k

atures did not run off, and that each wore a clog, to prevent his going astray; this signified that they had been broken in. He could now see the interior of the pit, which, being in the side of the hill, had a level entrance. In the

than pains. Only a few inches of mud wall kept him and his family from being gipsies themselves. He skirted the gravel-pit at a respectful di

els-the man who had been Thomasin's friend. He was darning a stocking, which was red like the

and came out from the van. In sticking up the candle he lifted the lantern to his face, and the light shone into the whites of his eyes and upon his ivory teeth, which, in contrast with the red surrounding, lent him a s

as only a gipsy

s motion. The heather and peat stratum overhung the brow of the pit in mats, hiding the actual verge. The boy had stepped be

ern and turned it upon the

ye?" h

Nunsuch,

you doing

n't k

g me, I

, ma

you watc

ming home from Mi

st h

N

d is bleeding. Come under m

me look for

you come

to me for keepin

man went to the van, the boy b

wing materials, tore off a strip, which, like everything

like-please may I sit do

s enough to make you feel f

gash, and the boy said, "I t

fraid of me. Do y

figure up and down with much mi

l, w

leman!" h

tle children think there's only one cuckoo, one fox, one gian

your bags, will ye, master? 'Tis sa

u see all these bags at the back of my cart? They a

born a re

I should be white in time-perhaps six months: not at first, because 'tis grow'd into

he seed a red ghost here t'ot

ere t'ot

that dusty ligh

bonfire up there? I saw the light. Why did Miss Vye want a b

bide and keep up the fire just the same, whi

long did

rog jumped in

ly. "A hopfrog?" he inquired. "Hopfrogs

for I he

ain-s

n; and so I did. They say she's clever and

what

went back; but I didn't like to speak to her, be

What did she sa

d the other woman because he liked his o

entleman say to

, and how he was coming to see her

inst the side of his van so that the whole fabri

jumped clean

e. "I forgot you were here. That's only a curious way reddlemen have of going

Master Reddleman, may

may. I'll go a bit

mother's cottage. When the little figure had vanished in the darkness the re