face and figure filled out in rounder and softer curves; the lines and
contractions upon her young brow went away; the muddiness of skin which
she had looked upon as her lot by nature departed with a change to
abundance of good things, and a bloom came upon her cheek. Perhaps, too,
her grey, thoughtful eyes revealed an arch gaiety sometimes; but this
was infrequent; the sort of wisdom which looked from their pupils did
not readily keep company with these lighter moods. Like all people who
have known rough times, light-heartedness seemed to her too irrational
and inconsequent to be indulged in except as a reckless dram now and
then; for she had been too early habituated to anxious reasoning to drop
the habit suddenly. She felt none of those ups and downs of spirit
which beset so many people without cause; never--to paraphrase a recent
poet--never a gloom in Elizabeth-Jane's soul but she well knew how it
came there; and her present cheerfulness was fairly proportionate to her
solid guarantees for the same.

It might have been supposed that, given a girl rapidly becoming
good-looking, comfortably circumstanced, and for the first time in her
life commanding ready money, she would go and make a fool of herself by
dress. But no. The reasonableness of almost everything that Elizabeth
did was nowhere more conspicuous than in this question of clothes. To
keep in the rear of opportunity in matters of indulgence is as valuable
a habit as to keep abreast of opportunity in matters of enterprise. This
unsophisticated girl did it by an innate perceptiveness that was almost
genius. Thus she refrained from bursting out like a water-flower that
spring, and clothing herself in puffings and knick-knacks, as most of
the Casterbridge girls would have done in her circumstances. Her triumph
was tempered by circumspection, she had still that field-mouse fear of
the coulter of destiny despite fair promise, which is common among the
thoughtful who have suffered early from poverty and oppression.