 A barrow was opened on the heath, and Yeobright attended the operation,
remaining away from his study during several hours. In the afternoon Christian
returned from a journey in the same direction, and Mrs. Yeobright questioned
him.
    »They have dug a hole, and they have found things like flower-pots upside
down, Mis'ess Yeobright; and inside these be real charnel bones. They have
carried 'em off to men's houses; but I shouldn't like to sleep where they will
bide. Dead folks have been known to come and claim their own. Mr. Yeobright had
got one pot of the bones, and was going to bring 'em home - real skellington
bones - but 'twas ordered otherwise. You'll be relieved to hear that he gave
away his, pot and all, on second thoughts; and a blessed thing for ye, Mis'ess
Yeobright, considering the wind o' nights.«
    »Gave it away?«
    »Yes. To Miss Vye. She has a cannibal taste for such churchyard furniture
seemingly.«
    »Miss Vye was there too?«
    »Ay, 'a b'lieve she was.«
    When Clym came home, which was shortly after, his mother said, in a curious
tone, »The urn you had meant for me you gave away.«
    Yeobright made no reply; the current of her feeling was too pronounced to
admit it.
    The early weeks of the year passed on. Yeobright certainly studied at home,
but he also walked much abroad, and the direction of his walk was always towards
some point of a line between Mistover and Rainbarrow.
    The month of March arrived, and the heath showed its first faint signs of
awakening from winter trance. The awakening was almost feline in its
stealthiness. The pool outside the bank by Eustacia's dwelling, which seemed as
dead and desolate as ever to an observer who moved and made noises in his
observation, would gradually disclose a state of great animation when silently
watched awhile. A timid animal world had come to life for the season. Little
tadpoles and efts began to bubble up through the water, and to race along
beneath it; toads made noises like very young ducks, and advanced to the margin
in twos and threes; overhead, bumble-bees flew hither and thither in the
thickening light, their drone coming and going like the sound of a gong.
    On an evening such as this Yeobright descended into the Blooms-End valley
from beside that very pool, where he had been standing with another person quite
silently and quite long enough
