load taken on towards Casterbridge.

The evening of the same day saw the empty waggon reach again the
spot of the accident. Prince had lain there in the ditch since the
morning; but the place of the blood-pool was still visible in the
middle of the road, though scratched and scraped over by passing
vehicles. All that was left of Prince was now hoisted into the
waggon he had formerly hauled, and with his hoofs in the air, and his
shoes shining in the setting sunlight, he retraced the eight or nine
miles to Marlott.

Tess had gone back earlier. How to break the news was more than she
could think. It was a relief to her tongue to find from the faces of
her parents that they already knew of their loss, though this did not
lessen the self-reproach which she continued to heap upon herself for
her negligence.

But the very shiftlessness of the household rendered the misfortune
a less terrifying one to them than it would have been to a thriving
family, though in the present case it meant ruin, and in the other it
would only have meant inconvenience. In the Durbeyfield countenances
there was nothing of the red wrath that would have burnt upon the
girl from parents more ambitious for her welfare. Nobody blamed Tess
as she blamed herself.

When it was discovered that the knacker and tanner would give only a
very few shillings for Prince's carcase because of his decrepitude,
Durbeyfield rose to the occasion.

"No," said he stoically, "I won't sell his old body. When we