First Impressions and Hidden Depths — Far from the Madding Crowd

By daylight Bathsheba's Weatherbury farmhouse shows its history: a genteel front turned to farming utility, lively upper rooms above a mossy approach where trade has reversed the building's original purpose. She and Liddy sit on the floor sorting bottles and papers, too dusty to receive callers properly when Boldwood rides up the footpath and knocks with impertinent directness.

He asks only whether Fanny Robin has been found, hears William Smallbury is in Casterbridge, and leaves without glancing at Bathsheba's beauty. Mrs Coggan explains his kindness to Fanny and his hopeless reputation with women courted by sixes and sevens; Teddy Coggan reports Boldwood called Bathsheba staid. Bathsheba admits a man once wanted her and was not quite good enough, thinking privately of Gabriel Oak.

Before romance can develop, a crooked file of farm workers approaches the back door like a chain of salpae with one will. Liddy calls them Philistines; Bathsheba orders Maryann to hold them in the kitchen until she is dressed to receive them properly in the hall rather than appear among bottles in dust. Hardy ends on management, not courtship: the mistress must meet her men before she can measure the one farmer who ignored her at the gate.