244 THE LIFE OF RICHARD JEFFERIES 



woman, is such rest ever given. For the heart, and the 

 hand, and the mind of a man are for ever driving onwards, 

 and no profundity of rest ever comes to his inmost 

 consciousness. At dawn he looks forward to the noon- 

 day.' FeHse did not look forward, but ' her heart 

 brimmed to the full of love.' In this passage Jefferies 

 has divined one of the clearest divisions between man 

 and woman, whilst making a picture of great beauty 

 that completes the portrait of Felise's youth. 



The book is a portrait of Felise. Martial Barnard is not 

 as essential to the book, nor as interesting to Jefferies : 



' Comparatively his face was small for his height • he 

 was not aU face, as we see some men, whose countenances 

 seem to descend to the last button of their waistcoats. 

 His head was in just proportion, the summit and finish 

 of his shape, as a capital of a column. His hair had a 

 shade like the gold of Felise's, yet not in the least like 

 hers, for his was deeper, browner, as if the sun had burnt 

 it, as it had his cheek. Had it not been cropped so close, 

 his hair would have curled ; in the days of Charles II. such 

 hair would have been of priceless value to a cavalier, 

 curled locks flowing to the shoulder. 



' In outline his countenance was somewhat oval, his 

 features fine — a straight nose and chin weU marked, but 

 not heavy. He had a short beard, and his head showed 

 the more to advantage, because he had a good neck, not 

 too thick. His eyes were blue, and framed in firmly- 

 drawn eyebrows and long lashes. Though well built, he 

 was slender rather than stout ; his hands were brown, 

 but not large.' 



He is revealed in many ways, as when he talks of 

 Shakespeare with his sweetheart ; but he is the intellectual 

 side of Jefferies himself, the emotional having been ex- 

 hausted in the character of Felise. It is the Jefferies of 

 1883 who makes the bold speech against the Cornleigh 

 interest, saying that ' there does not exist a race of freemen 

 on the face of the earth who have been so completely under 

 the thumb as farmers ' ; that ' there never will be any 



