Thomas Hardy

The Woodlanders Thomas Hardy

The rambler who, for old association or other reasons, should trace the forsaken coach-roadrunning almost in a meridional line from Bristol to the south shore of England, would findhimself during the latter half of his journey in the vicinity of some extensive woodlands, interspersed with apple-orchards. Here the trees, timber or fruit-bearing, as the case may be, make the wayside hedges ragged by their drip and shade, stretching over the road with easefulhorizontality, as if they found the unsubstantial air an adequate support for their limbs. At oneplace, where a hill is crossed, the largest of the woods shows itself bisected by the high-way, asthe head of thick hair is bisected by the white line of its parting. The spot is lonely. The physiognomy of a deserted highway expresses solitude to a degree that is not reached bymere dales or downs, and bespeaks a tomb-like stillness more emphatic than that of glades andpools. The contrast of what is with what might be probably accounts for this. To step, forinstance, at the place under notice, from the hedge of the plantation into the adjoining palethoroughfare, and pause amid its emptiness for a moment, was to exchange by the act of a singlestride the simple absence of human companionship for an incubus of the forlorn. At this spot, on the lowering evening of a by-gone winter's day, there stood a man who hadentered upon the scene much in the aforesaid manner. Alighting into the road from a stile hardby, he, though by no means a "chosen vessel" for impressions, was temporarily influenced bysome such feeling of being suddenly more alone than before he had emerged upon the highway. It could be seen by a glance at his rather finical style of dress that he did not belong to thecountry proper; and from his air, after a while, that though there might be a sombre beauty in thescenery, music in the breeze, and a wan procession of coaching ghosts in the sentiment of thisold turnpike-road, he was mainly puzzled about the way. The dead men's work that had beenexpended in climbing that hill, the blistered soles that had trodden it, and the tears that hadwetted it, were not his concern; for fate had given him no time for any but practical thing