Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy Return of the Native Summary. As the novel opens, the wild landscape of Edgon Heath broods alone, save for an old man walking home. The old man, Captain Vye, passes a reddleman, Diggory Venn. Diggory is discreetly transporting a distressed young woman. She is Thomasin Yeobright, humiliated that her wedding to Damon Wildeve was halted due to an issue with the marriage licence in a nearby community. The truth is more complicated, though. Wildeve is still infatuated with his former partner, the passionate and mysterious Eustacia Vye, who lives on the heath by circumstance but wants nothing more than to escape it. She lights a bonfire that evening to draw him to her. The fire attracts only minimal attention, since there are bonfires all along the heath to commemorate November 5th. Wildeve correctly interprets her signal, and meets her. When Diggory learns of their liaison, he plans to intervene on Thomasin’s behalf. He has long loved her, and though she once rejected his proposal because of his lower status, he is dedicated to ensuring her happiness, even with another man. Just as Eustacia’s affection for Wildeve begins to wane, an exciting prospect returns to Egdon. Clym Yeobright is a local man who has made his way in the world as a diamond merchant in Paris. His visit prompts Eustacia to facilitate a meeting between them, which eventually results in a mutual attraction. Eustacia makes her disinterest known to Wildeve, and he finally marries Thomasin. She is disappointed, however, to discover that Clym has rejected his cosmopolitan lifestyle in hopes of founding a school on the heath. Hopeful that she can change his mind, Eustacia agrees to marry him. Clym’s mother, Mrs. Yeobright, disapproves of both Thomasin's and Clym's weddings, and is further irked that her son Clym would refuse to exploit his intelligence and talent away from the heath. She refuses to attend his wedding. Clym's studies in schoolkeeping are so intense that his eyesight fails, and he is forced to take a job as a furze cutter to generate an income. Eustacia is further disappointed in Clym's choice of a low career, and realizes she might never escape the heath. Her feelings for Wildeve are reawakened, however, when she learns that he has inherited a fortune, and plans to travel the world. Wildeve visits the Yeobright house one day, but Clym is asleep. Eustacia is shaken by his visit, and then confused when Mrs. Yeobrght suddenly arrives on her own unannounced visit. Eustacia ignores her knocks, and, believing she has been spurned by her son, Mrs. Yeobright attempts the long journey back to her home, but passes out and dies on the heath from a snakebite. Clym holds first himself, then Eustacia, responsible for Mrs. Yeobright’s death. Spurned by his grief and hatred, Eustacia returns to her grandfather’s house, and Wildeve agrees to help her escape Egdon. She sets an evening for her escape, and does not cancel the plan even when that evening proves to be impossibly stormy. That night, Thomasin, Diggory, Clym and Captain Vye search for the missing couple, but discover only tragedy after Eustacia seems to drown herself and Wildeve dies in the rescue attempt. Clym, too, is wounded in his rescue attempt, but survives. Thomasin initially moves in with Clym and her daughter after the tragedy. Diggory Venn returns as a wealthy and dependable farmer, and she agrees to marry him. Clym never transcends his guilt and shame, and eventually turns to preaching to fill his solitude. The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy. The Victorians were influenced by the Romantic ideals of love, nature and expression of emotion, accentuated by poets such as Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats, as well as the Gothic horror stories like Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In these times, the novel was often serialised in magazines, very much in the same way that a television programme is done today, to keep the prospective reader hanging on tenterhooks to the end of the tale. One of the most successful authors of the 19th Century utilised this method to produce a work that encapsulated love, loss, disaster and drama in twelve highly popular instalments. The Novel. Thomas Hardy's The Return of the Native could be described as a Greek tragedy in six Acts. It was first published as a serial in Volume 37 of the magazine Belgravia in 12 monthly instalments, running from January to December 1878 inclusive, and then published as six books in three volumes. It tells the tale of Eustacia Vye, a tempestuous young woman who yearns for passionate love and freedom from the barren confines of Egdon Heath, a wild tract of land in the Dorset countryside. With only her grandfather for company, she finds herself bored with her life and looks for the cure to this in finding the ideal man to spend the rest of her life with, hopefully away from this 'prison'. However, when Damon Wildeve, the only other person out of the inhabitants of the Heath who fits Eustacia's ideals, decides upon marrying the meek Thomasin Yeobright, Eustacia sets her sights on Thomasin's cousin, Clym, who is returning to Egdon Heath from living a lavish lifestyle in Paris as a jeweller. The temptation of rich luxury and escape causes Eustacia to fall hopelessly in love with a man she is yet to see, or know - a fantasy. It sounds fairly cut and dried, but as per usual - all is not well. Clym Yeobright's decision to abandon the Parisian life for teaching, and later, becoming a Heath worker alienates himself from the entire community of Egdon Heath, compared to his rich beginnings. This also damages his relationship with his mother, the elderly and ambitious Mrs Yeobright, Wildeve and Thomasin's marriage and his own ill-fated relationship with the desperate Eustacia. Through unfortunate circumstances - due to the characters' non-consideration of the outcomes - The Return of the Native is a tale that reflects the inability of human nature to change to do the right thing, ending in tragic consequences for all involved. The Characters. Along with clever narrative techniques, another method that Hardy uses for moving the plot of The Return of the Native along is the diversity of the characters in the novel. From all walks of life, they all contribute to the cumulative tragedies as the story unfolds. Eustacia Vye. It is best to let Hardy describe the incredibly deep female protagonist of the novel, with an entire chapter or few devoted to her physical and personal descriptions: In short, Eustacia Vye is a luxurious dark beauty who commands a great deal of respect from the lower classes. The daughter of a foreign bandmaster, she lived in the nearby seaside town of Budmouth as a young child, but the death of both her parents brought her to Egdon Heath to live with her grandfather, the Captain. She is a well-educated woman and considers herself to be a ladylike character, despite her rather dubious parentage (of which Mrs Yeobright continually reminds Clym), her on/off love affair with Wildeve and her peculiar tendency to wander the wilds of Egdon Heath in the middle of the night, as well as cross-dress, causing the rest of the Heath Folk to label her idle and a witch. Seeming to believe that she is competing in I'm A Typical Tragic Literary Character - Get Me Out Of This Unhappy Circumstance! 1 , Eustacia would do anything to get away from Egdon Heath and find love elsewhere. The arrival of Clym Yeobright from sparkling Paris sounds like the right thing - until he decides that he prefers the old Heath life, and Eustacia has to think again when Wildeve, whom she spurned, seems to be coming into a bit of money. Clym Yeobright. Clym Yeobright was a precocious youth, and Mrs Yeobright saw fit to fulfil her ambitions and give her son the best education to ensure that he would live happily ever after. Therefore, with a good job as a jeweller surrounded by finery in the fashion capital of Paris sounded like the right way to go. On the other hand, Clym has other ideas. On his return to Egdon Heath at Christmas, he immediately makes it clear that he is here to stay. His primary intention is to become a schoolmaster and set up a school for the Heath Folk, who he considers to be uneducated due to their 'low' upbringing. His infatuation with Eustacia's looks and curious personality causes a rift between him and his mother, and Thomasin is left to pick up the pieces. As fate would have it, Clym ends up becoming a furze-cutter 2 , now a rather unattractive catch for Eustacia. Unlike her, though, Clym is happy with his circumstances. Mrs Yeobright. As the head of the primary family on Egdon Heath, Mrs Yeobright has the 'lady' status that Eustacia Vye clamours for. The daughter of a curate, the Heath Folk hold her and her family in high regard, and would do anything for her. She spent a lot of time and money on making Clym have the best life that she believes would be the best for him, but naturally, Clym disagrees. Despite her eternal dislike for Eustacia, the two are very similar in character when it comes to talking about Clym. She tries to dissuade him from staying permanently on the Heath, and almost has a fit when she finds that he has become a furze-cutter. She often confides in her niece Thomasin, though the front there is rather unstable too, with Mrs Yeobright's dislike for Wildeve as a suitable husband. She would have much preferred Clym and Thomasin to get together, to keep the Yeobrights 'Yeobright' 3 . Damon Wildeve. Damon Wildeve, by education, is an engineer, but circumstances find him as the landlord of the Quiet Woman Inn. He is described as the type of man who is aesthetically pleasing to women but not the paragon of masculinity to his own sex. He and Eustacia were formerly lovers, but now he is looking forward to marrying into the Yeobright family through Thomasin. Just like Eustacia, he despises the Heath, but he is also a gambler, and he gambles that he will find good fortune living there, if it was not for a certain reddleman that keeps foiling his plans. Thomasin Yeobright. The complete opposite to Eustacia, Thomasin is the quintessential English rose. Meek, mild and continually under the watchful gaze of Mrs Yeobright, Thomasin just wants to do the right thing when it comes to making her own decisions. Not one to complain about her situation, Thomasin and Wildeve are an odd couple, with Thomasin practically under the thumb of her gambling husband. Diggory Venn. The reddleman 4 is a curious character, used by Hardy as both a physical and metaphorical method of motioning the plot towards its tragic end. Physically, Diggory Venn is a person who is basically covered from tip to toe in the red stuff that makes his trade. He is not rated highly among the upper class members of the Heath due to his messy work, though he is actually the son of a rich cattle farmer, and beneath all the gunk, Venn proves to be a rather handsome chap. Hardy uses Venn as Wildeve's arch-enemy, due to Venn's love for Thomasin. Venn's method of foiling plans and just being a general annoyance to Wildeve causes the balances to tip in Thomasin's favour, without care for any of the other characters. At heart, Venn is a good-natured soul who just wants the best for his love - Thomasin. The Captain. The Captain is Eustacia's grandfather 5 , retired to Egdon Heath on a naval pension. He could be described as the Victorian version of Uncle Albert from the UK sitcom Only Fools And Horses . He is far from the parent figure that Eustacia so desperately needs, and is not very sympathetic when things do not go her way. He much prefers to sit at home or go for a drink with the other Heath Folk at the Quiet Woman Inn. The Heath Folk. The Heath Folk are used by Hardy as a Greek chorus. They are a great source of gossip and rumour, and move the plot along by the main characters either listening in, in the case of Eustacia, or joining into conversation with them. They are a varied lot, ranging from the jolly Grandfer Cantle, who is the head of the Heath Folk, to his simple grandson Christian Cantle, to the witchlike Susan Nunsuch, but their purpose is to reflect upon the decisions of the main protagonists, depending on how good or pathetic they are. Egdon Heath. Though not a living breathing person in the same way as the other characters, the Heath plays a major part in the plot as a backdrop upon which the players' fates are carved out, with the first chapter thickly dedicated to its description. It is the personification of Father Time, in the way that the Heath sees all that happens around it, from the pagan times to the present. Eustacia and Wildeve, as outsiders, both despise the Heath, seeing it as a symbol of imprisonment, whereas the Heath Folk and the locals see the Heath as their home and livelihood. Hold on. Eustacia who ? Even though it has such a diverse plot and range of characters, The Return of the Native is often hidden under the shadow of Hardy's more famous works like Tess and Jude . However, this may be because of how Hardy instills deep description into the persona of the Heath, which can startle the reader into boredom. Past this point, on the other hand, the reader will be moved into a dark world of tragic consequences and subliminally into the lost world of the English countryside. The Return of the Native by Thomas Hardy. According to Reginald Terry in Victorian Popular Fiction, 1860-80 , The growth of illustration in periodicals is . . . part of the pattern of popular fiction, although to what extent it increased readership is a moot point. Certainly it rapidly increased after the great era of wood engraving associated with the forties and fifties . . . . [Both book and magazine] . . . publishers found they could provide pictorial accompaniment to text more cheaply as mass production cut costs. Where in the forties and fifties a publisher might see roughly £120 of the £400 spent on a 30,000 run of a monthly serial going for illustrations, by the sixties his costs were cut by one-third. (27) In Illustration and the Novels of Thomas Hardy (1981), Arlene M. Jackson notes that in the 1860s and 1870s "The illustrations for Belgravia and other magazines . . . often cost £2-3 per square inch for drawing and engraving" (40). Given the relative costs of illustration versus text, it is perhaps not surprising that in its table of contents Belgravia gave prominence to its "List of Illustrations" (e. g., Vol. 34, iv): "The magazine was proud to announce to its audience that artists such as Fred Barnard, Arthur Hopkins, and R. Caldecott were among its contributors" (Jackson 40). Such illustrators of the realistic school helped the reader suspend disbelief and focussed on dramatic moments in the text, avoiding morally 'unsafe' scenes and issues. Thus, the mimetic illustrations tended to make even so daring a story as The Return of the Native , with its obvious parallels to Flaubert's Madame Bovary (1856), acceptable to the broad readership that Hardy had to address if he were to remain a professional writer of prose and turn his back forever on architecture. Having had his manuscript of The Return of the Native rejected by the prestigious Cornhill , which had carried the pastoral Far From the Madding Crowd in 1874 and which from its inception in 1860 had published such prominent writers Thackeray and Trollope, the even more illustrious Blackwood's and even its rival, Temple Bar , Hardy (wishing to avoid Tinsley's Magazine , which in 1872 had published A Pair of Blue Eyes ) now tried Belgravia, A Magazine of Fashion and Amusement (established in 1866). Dalziel notes. the incongruity of a story about characters described by contemporary reviewers as of "low social position" appearing in a magazine whose pretentious title was intended to attract lower-middle-class readers wishing to move vicariously in fashionable, upper-class society . . . . (86) Although by 1870 the British reading public by Terry's estimate numbered perhaps 200,000, Hardy had had little success in marketing his early novels until he had serialised Far From the Madding Crowd , which like many other Hardy stories bears striking resemblance in some respects (including bigamy, illegitimacy, and fraud) to the sensation novels of M. E. Braddon (who with her husband, John Maxwell, edited Belgravia ) and James Payne (whose By Prory ran in Belgravia in 1877). However, by 1888 Mudie's Catalogue listed eleven titles of Thomas Hardy, a number of works equal to those of George Meredith‹a respectable showing, though well behind R. Ballantyne's 39 titles. One may well wonder to what extent Hardy's being, as he once remarked to Cornhill editor Leslie Stephen, "a good hand at a serial" (letter, 18 February 1874) helped boost his popularity. Certainly being published in Belgravia , which also brought out in serial such works of Collins as The Haunted Hotel (like The Return of the Native , in 1878), must have led to his popular acceptance as an entertaining as opposed to a merely instructive writer. And an important part of that appeal to a mass readership must have been the illustrations accompanying the dozen or more serial instalments of novels running in Belgravia . As Meisel observes in Realizations (1983), these monthly illustrations must have "helped immensely to bridge the intervals . . . , and found a use, during the accumulation of monthly parts . . . , as a handy aide-mémoire" (53). The image is far more lasting, in fact, than the momentary impressions of scene and character derived from the initial reading, and may connote more than the text itself denoted. "The collaboration of picture and text in the art of the novel is thus ultimately an attribute of style [i. e., the artist's interpretation of the text], operating as a presence and influence in the language as well as in the narrative organization" (Meisel 56). These pictorial influences, however, have been weighed by only a handful of Hardy's modern critics, who have experienced his novels in volume rather than magazine format. Even when a modern attempts to experience Hardy as his first nineteenth-century readers would have done, reading the chapters in their original serial groupings and pausing to reflect and anticipate as the magazine reader would have done, without the illustrations that initial reading cannot be recreated. The difference between a part-reading in volume and an authentic serial reading is that the illustrations, published usually as frontispieces (in the case of The Mayor of Casterbridge in The Graphic for the first twenty weeks of 1886) or to face a particular page, condition the reader's response to the text, causing him to compare 'word- picture' to plate. In fact, out of the twelve illustrations for The Return of the Native , eleven are intended to depict specific moments, as the quotations which serve as the picture-titles suggest (the only exception to this rule is the frontispiece for Belgravia ,Volume 35, March 1878, "The reddleman re-reads an old love letter"). Although they set the scene, providing both background details and strong notions about the appearance and behaviours of certain characters, the serial illustrations do not necessarily curtail the imaginative experience. Rather, they fix certain scenes in the mind as benchmarks of the story's action, telegraphing to the reader what one sensitive reader (a graphic artist, whose perception has sometimes in turn been corrected or influenced by that of the writer himself) has felt is memorable in the coming instalment. Then, too, an initial illustration tends to provide the reader with a "realization" (in the sense that Martin Meisel uses the term); that is, the reader, having scene the picture, awaits its arrival in the lines of the text, so that the passage illustrated provides a moment of stasis, of reflection, and possibly even of comparison between the artist's and reader's conceptions the scene. The reader must then mediate between the two images. The graphic artist therefore was not merely complementing the work of the novelist, but was acting as co-presenter and interpreter. The collaborative project of an illustrated, serialised story required personal harmony and aesthetic agreement between the two. Whereas much is known about the relationships between certain nineteenth-century collaborative pairs‹for example, between Dickens and his illustrators (particularly Leech, Cruikshank, and the inimitable 'Phiz', Hablot K. Browne) from The Pilgrim Edition of Dickens' collected correspondence‹little is known about the connections between Hardy and his serial illustrators, owing to the limited number of Hardy's letters that have survived. However, the record of each artist's work affords certain clues about the relationship, as in the Christmas mumming scene, which Arthur Hopkins illustrated operating on certain cues that Hardy had provided. In the absence of information that would reveal the extent of collaboration between an illustrator and a novelist, one is forced to examine the relationships between the text (as published serially) and the accompanying pictures, just as the Victorian readers of such magazines as The Belgravia and The Graphic would. At the time of his brief collaboration with Hardy, Hopkins (1848-1930) was living at Notting Hill. In 1875 he had exhibited his first painting, "The Mowers," at The Royal Academy; there followed "The Call to Supper" (1876), "The Quay," and "The Plough" (1877). "Though still a relative newcomer at the time when Chatto and Windus first commissioned work from him in 1877, he had already established a reputation through his contributions to such leading periodicals as the Cornhill, Good Words , the Graphic , and the Illustrated London News " (Dalziel 88). An admirer of John Everett Millais, Hopkins possessed both the dramatic flair predilection for depicting scenes from country life that the illustrations for Hardy's novel would require. Jackson asserts that "he was not personally selected by Hardy but received the commission by virtue of his position as staff illustrator for Belgravia " (40). Since Hopkins has only one plate in volume 34 of Belgravia prior to the start of the Hardy novel, he was likely working on projects for other publications earlier in 1877. It is possible that the work he showed in 1878, "The Apple Loft," is related to his April, 1878, illustration for The Return of The Native , in which he depicts a melancholy Thomasin in just such a location. Hardy wrote Hopkins that he thought that illustration particularly good. The letters from Thomas Hardy to Hopkins in his capacity as Belgravia 's illustrator (8 and 20 February, 1878; see The Collected Letters of Thomas Hardy , I: 52-5) reveal that the artist was not familiar with the entire text of The Return of the Native, but was having to work with one instalment at a time. Hardy thus felt it necessary to explain to the artist the main threads of the plot and the relationships between the principal characters, and to provide sketches of a mummer's clothing and staff, which the artist subsequently employed to revise the May illustration, to which Hardy's second letter reacts. "I am glad to receive a letter from you," Hardy wrote Hopkins on February 8th, "for it is more satisfactory when artist & author are in correspondence" ( Letters I: 52). Consequently, even if Hopkins was hardly playing Phiz to Hardy's Boz, the two were in a collaborative relationship, although undoubtedly one arranged not by themselves, but by the co-editors of Belgravia . The Illustrations in Detail. Works Consulted. Dalziel, Pamela. "Anxieties of Representation: The Serial Illustrations of Hardy's The Return of the Native." Nineteenth-Century Literature 51, 1 (June, 1996): 84-110. Graves, Algernon. The Royal Academy of Art, A Complete Dictionary of Contributors and their work from its foundation in 1769 to 1904 . London: Henry Graves and George Bell, 1905. Rpt. Kingsmead Reprints, 1970. Vol. 2. Hardy, Thomas. The Return of the Native. Belgravia (London) vols. 34-37. Rpt. in Norton Critical Editions, ed. James Gindin. New York: W. W. Norton, 1969. Houfe, Simon. The Dictionary of British Book Illustrators and Caricaturists 1800-1914 . Woodbridge, Suffolk: Baron and Antique Collectors' Club, 1978. Jackson, Arlene M. Illustration and the Novels of Thomas Hardy . Towtowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1981. Mallalieu, H. L. The Dictionary of British Watercolour Artists up to 1920 . 2nd ed.Woodbridge, Suffolk: Antique Collectors' Club, 1986. Vol. 1-- The Text. Meisel, Martin. Realizations: Narrative, Pictorial, and Theatrical Arts in Nineteenth-Century England . Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983. Nodelman, Perry. First Words About Pictures . Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1988. Purdy, Richard Little, and Millgate, Michael, eds. The Collected Letters of Thomas Hardy . Oxford: Clarendon, 1978. Vol. 1 (1840-1892). Reid, Forrest. Illustrators of The Sixties . London: Faber and Gwyer, 1928. Rpt. as Illustrators of the Eighteen Sixties (New York: Dover, 1975) 269. Samuels, Peggy and Harold. The Illustrated Biographical Encyclopedia of Artists of the American West . Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1976. Seymour-Smith, Martin. Hardy . London: Bloomsbury, 1994. Terry, Reginald C. Victorian Popular Fiction 1860-80 . London: Macmillan, 1983. Waters, Grant M. Dictionary of British Artists Working 1900-1950 . Eastbourne: Eastbourne Fine Art, 1975. Who Was Who . London: Adam and Charles Black, 1941. Vol. 3 (1929-1940) 662. Wood, Christopher. Dictionary of Victorian Painters . Woodbridge, Suffolk: Antique Collectors' Club, 1978. 2nd ed. The Return of the Native. THE THREE WOMEN 1 A Face on Which Time Makes but Little Impression A Saturday afternoon in November was approaching the time of twilight, and the vast tract of unenclosed wild known as Egdon Heath embrowned itself moment by moment. Overhead the hollow stretch of whitish cloud shutting out. the sky was as a tent which had the whole heath for its floor. The heaven being spread with this pallid screen and the earth with the darkest vegetation, their meetingline at the horizon was clearly marked. In such contrast the heath wore the appearance of an instalment of night which had taken up its place before its astronomical hour was come: darkness had to a great extent arrived hereon, while day stood distinct in the sky. Looking upwards, a furzecutter would have been inclined to continue work; looking down, he would have decided to finish his faggot and go home. The distant rims of the world and of the firmament seemed to be a division in time no less than a division in matter. The face of the heath by its mere complexion added half an hour to evening; it could in like manner retard the dawn, sadden noon, anticipate the frowning of storms scarcely generated, and intensify the opacity of a moonless midnight to a cause of shaking and dread. In fact, precisely at this transitional point of its nightly roll into darkness the great and particular glory of the Egdon waste began, and nobody could be said to understand the heath who had not been there at such a time. It could best be felt when it could not clearly be seen, its complete effect and explanation lying in this and the succeeding hours before the next dawn; then, and only then, did it tell its true tale. The spot was, indeed, a near relation of night, and when night showed itself an apparent tendency to gravitate together could be perceived in its shades and the scene. The sombre stretch of rounds and hollows seemed to rise and meet the evening gloom in pure sympathy, the heath exhaling darkness as rapidly as the heavens precipitated it. And so the obscurity in the air and the obscurity in the land closed together in a black fraternization towards which each advanced halfway. The place became full of a watchful intentness now; for when other things sank blooding to sleep the heath appeared slowly to awake and listen. Every night its Titanic form seemed to await something; but it had waited thus, unmoved, during so many centuries, through the crises of so many things, that it could only be imagined to await one last crisisthe final overthrow. It was a spot which returned upon the memory of those who loved it with an aspect of peculiar and kindly congruity. Smiling champaigns of flowers and fruit hardly do this, for they are permanently harmonious only with an existence of better reputation as to its issues than the present. Twilight combined with the scenery of Egdon Heath to evolve a thing majestic without severity, impressive without showiness, emphatic in its admonitions, grand in its simplicity. The qualifications which frequently invest the facade of a prison with far more dignity than is found in the facade of a palace double its size lent to this heath a sublimity in which spots renowned for beauty of the accepted kind are utterly wanting. Fair prospects wed happily with fair times; but alas, if times be not fair! Men have oftener suffered from, the mockery of a place too smiling for their reason than from the oppression of surroundings oversadly tinged. Haggard Egdon appealed to a subtler and scarcer instinct, to a more recently learnt emotion, than that which responds to the sort of beauty called charming and fair. Indeed, it is a question if the exclusive reign of this orthodox beauty is not approaching its last quarter. The new Vale of Tempe may be a gaunt waste in Thule; human souls may find themselves in closer and closer harmony with external things wearing a sombreness distasteful to our race when it was young. The time seems near, if it has not actually arrived, when the chastened sublimity of a moor, a sea, or a mountain will be all of nature that is absolutely in keeping with the moods of the more thinking among mankind. And ultimately, to the commonest tourist, spots like Iceland may become what the vineyards and myrtle gardens of South Europe are to him now; and Heidelberg and Baden be passed unheeded as he hastens from the Alps to the sand dunes of Scheveningen. The most thoroughgoing ascetic could feel that he had a natural right to wander on Egdonhe was keeping within the line of legitimate indulgence when he laid himself open to influences such as these. Colours and beauties so far subdued were, at least, the birthright of all. Only in summer days of highest feather did its mood touch the level of gaiety. Intensity was more usually reached by way of the solemn than by way of the brilliant, and such a sort of intensity was often arrived at during winter darkness, tempests, and mists. Then Egdon was aroused to reciprocity; for the storm was its lover, and the wind its friend. Then it became the home of strange phantoms; and it was found to be the hitherto unrecognized original of those wild regions of obscurity which are vaguely felt to be compassing us about in midnight dreams of flight and disaster, and are never thought of after the dream till revived by scenes like this. It was at present a place perfectly accordant with man's natureneither ghastly, hateful, nor ugly; neither commonplace, unmeaning, nor tame; but, like man, slighted and enduring; and withal singularly colossal and mysterious in its swarthy monotony. As with some persons who have long lived apart, solitude seemed to look out of its countenance. It had a lonely face, suggesting tragical possibilities. This obscure, obsolete, superseded country figures in Domesday. Its condition is recorded therein as that of heathy, furzy, briary wilderness"Bruaria." Then follows the length and breadth in leagues; and, though some uncertainty exists as to the exact extent of this ancient lineal measure, it appears from the figures that the area of Egdon down to the present day has but little diminished. "Turbaria Bruaria"the right of cutting heathturfoccurs in charters relating to the district. "Overgrown with heth and mosse," says Leland of the same dark sweep of country. Here at least were intelligible facts regarding landscapefarreaching proofs productive of genuine satisfaction. The untameable, Ishmaelitish thing that Egdon now was it always had been. Civilization was its enemy; and ever since the beginning of vegetation its soil had worn the same antique brown dress, the natural and invariable garment of the particular formation. In its venerable one coat lay a certain vein of satire on human vanity in clothes. A person on a heath in raiment of modern cut and colours has more or less an anomalous look. We seem to want the oldest and simplest human clothing where the clothing of the earth is so primiti. The Return of the Native. Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. The Return of the Native , novel by Thomas Hardy, published in 1878. The novel is set on Egdon Heath, a fictional barren moor in Wessex in southwestern England. The native of the title is Clym Yeobright, who has returned to the area to become a schoolmaster after a successful but, in his opinion, shallow career as a jeweler in Paris. He and his cousin Thomasin exemplify the traditional way of life, while Thomasin’s husband, Damon Wildeve, and Clym’s wife, Eustacia Vye, long for the excitement of city life. Disappointed that Clym is content to remain on the heath, Eustacia, willful and passionate, rekindles her affair with the reckless Damon. After a series of coincidences, Eustacia comes to believe that she is responsible for the death of Clym’s mother. Convinced that fate has doomed her to cause others pain, Eustacia flees and is drowned (by accident or intent). Damon drowns trying to save her. In a later edition, to please his readers, Hardy made additions to his novel. Thomasin marries Diggory Venn, a humble longtime suitor, and Clym becomes an itinerant preacher. This article was most recently revised and updated by Kathleen Kuiper, Senior Editor.