Tess of the dUrbervilles | Page 4

younger inhabitants of Marlott, though
its real interest was not observed by the participators in the ceremony.
Its singularity lay less in the retention of a custom of walking in
procession and dancing on each anniversary than in the members being
solely women. In men's clubs such celebrations were, though expiring,
less uncommon; but either the natural shyness of the softer sex, or a
sarcastic attitude on the part of male relatives, had denuded such
women's clubs as remained (if any other did) or this their glory and
consummation. The club of Marlott alone lived to uphold the local

Cerealia. It had walked for hundreds of years, if not as benefit-club, as
votive sisterhood of some sort; and it walked still.
The banded ones were all dressed in white gowns--a gay survival from
Old Style days, when cheerfulness and May-time were synonyms--days
before the habit of taking long views had reduced emotions to a
monotonous average. Their first exhibition of themselves was in a
processional march of two and two round the parish. Ideal and real
clashed slightly as the sun lit up their figures against the green hedges
and creeper-laced house-fronts; for, though the whole troop wore white
garments, no two whites were alike among them. Some approached
pure blanching; some had a bluish pallor; some worn by the older
characters (which had possibly lain by folded for many a year) inclined
to a cadaverous tint, and to a Georgian style.
In addition to the distinction of a white frock, every woman and girl
carried in her right hand a peeled willow wand, and in her left a bunch
of white flowers. The peeling of the former, and the selection of the
latter, had been an operation of personal care.
There were a few middle-aged and even elderly women in the train,
their silver-wiry hair and wrinkled faces, scourged by time and trouble,
having almost a grotesque, certainly a pathetic, appearance in such a
jaunty situation. In a true view, perhaps, there was more to be gathered
and told of each anxious and experienced one, to whom the years were
drawing nigh when she should say, "I have no pleasure in them," than
of her juvenile comrades. But let the elder be passed over here for those
under whose bodices the life throbbed quick and warm.
The young girls formed, indeed, the majority of the band, and their
heads of luxuriant hair reflected in the sunshine every tone of gold, and
black, and brown. Some had beautiful eyes, others a beautiful nose,
others a beautiful mouth and figure: few, if any, had all. A difficulty of
arranging their lips in this crude exposure to public scrutiny, an
inability to balance their heads, and to dissociate self-consciousness
from their features, was apparent in them, and showed that they were
genuine country girls, unaccustomed to many eyes.

And as each and all of them were warmed without by the sun, so each
had a private little sun for her soul to bask in; some dream, some
affection, some hobby, at least some remote and distant hope which,
though perhaps starving to nothing, still lived on, as hopes will. They
were all cheerful, and many of them merry.
They came round by The Pure Drop Inn, and were turning out of the
high road to pass through a wicket-gate into the meadows, when one of
the women said--
"The Load-a-Lord! Why, Tess Durbeyfield, if there isn't thy father
riding hwome in a carriage!"
A young member of the band turned her head at the exclamation. She
was a fine and handsome girl--not handsomer than some others,
possibly--but her mobile peony mouth and large innocent eyes added
eloquence to colour and shape. She wore a red ribbon in her hair, and
was the only one of the white company who could boast of such a
pronounced adornment. As she looked round Durbeyfield was seen
moving along the road in a chaise belonging to The Pure Drop, driven
by a frizzle-headed brawny damsel with her gown-sleeves rolled above
her elbows. This was the cheerful servant of that establishment, who, in
her part of factotum, turned groom and ostler at times. Durbeyfield,
leaning back, and with his eyes closed luxuriously, was waving his
hand above his head, and singing in a slow recitative--
"I've-got-a-gr't-family-vault-at-Kingsbere--and
knighted-forefathers-in-lead-coffins-there!"
The clubbists tittered, except the girl called Tess--in whom a slow heat
seemed to rise at the sense that her father was making himself foolish
in their eyes.
"He's tired, that's all," she said hastily, "and he has got a lift home,
because our own horse has to rest to-day."
"Bless thy simplicity, Tess," said her companions. "He's got his
market-nitch. Haw-haw!"

"Look here; I won't walk another inch with you, if you say any jokes
about him!" Tess cried, and the colour