feat_summary_path: finished_summaries/cliffnotes/Far from the Madding Crowd/section_53_part_0.txt
feat_book_id: Far from the Madding Crowd.chapter 54
feat_summary_id: chapter 54
feat_summary: {"name": "Chapter 54", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20201101052914/https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/f/far-from-the-madding-crowd/summary-and-analysis/chapter-54", "summary": "Boldwood, walking easily and steadily, arrived at the jail. He rang, said something to the porter in a low tone, and entered. \"The door was closed behind him, and he walked the world no more.\" When Gabriel heard of the catastrophe, he rushed to Boldwood's house, arriving some five minutes after Boldwood's departure. The scene was dreadful. Bathsheba sat on the floor beside the body, Troy's head pillowed in her lap. \"With one hand she held her handkerchief to his breast . . . though scarcely a single drop of blood had flowed, and with the other she tightly clasped one of his. The household convulsion had made her herself again. . . . Deeds of endurance which seem ordinary in philosophy are rare in conduct, and Bathsheba was astonishing all . . . for her philosophy was her conduct.\" She ordered Gabriel to ride for a surgeon. In town, Gabriel also stopped to notify the authorities and so learned of Boldwood's surrender. Meanwhile, Bathsheba had Troy moved home. Liddy admitted the doctor, telling him that Bathsheba had locked herself in the room with the body. She had left orders that the surgeon and Parson Thirdly were to be admitted. The surgeon found Troy's body lit by candles and draped in white. Returning to Oak and the parson, the doctor remarked in a subdued voice, \"It is all done. . . . this mere girl! She must have the nerve of a stoic!\" \"The heart of a wife, merely,\" Bathsheba whispered behind him. Then, silently, she sank to the floor. She had a series of fainting fits that for a time seemed serious, but the surgeon attended her. Liddy was told to watch over her during the night. She heard her mistress moan, \"O it is my fault -- how can I live!\"", "analysis": "Bathsheba's display of strength reminds the surgeon of the ancient stoics; it is also reminiscent of the great women of Greek tragedy. Then, having done what was required of her, Bathsheba can yield to weakness  and faint away. This was a common frailty in the women of Victorian times, both in literature and in life. Bathsheba's stern conscience, which continues to trouble her, is another typical Victorian characteristic."}
text: AFTER THE SHOCK
  
  
  Boldwood passed into the high road and turned in the direction of
  Casterbridge.  Here he walked at an even, steady pace over Yalbury
  Hill, along the dead level beyond, mounted Mellstock Hill, and
  between eleven and twelve o'clock crossed the Moor into the town.
  The streets were nearly deserted now, and the waving lamp-flames only
  lighted up rows of grey shop-shutters, and strips of white paving
  upon which his step echoed as his passed along.  He turned to the
  right, and halted before an archway of heavy stonework, which was
  closed by an iron studded pair of doors.  This was the entrance
  to the gaol, and over it a lamp was fixed, the light enabling the
  wretched traveller to find a bell-pull.
  
  The small wicket at last opened, and a porter appeared.  Boldwood
  stepped forward, and said something in a low tone, when, after a
  delay, another man came.  Boldwood entered, and the door was closed
  behind him, and he walked the world no more.
  
  Long before this time Weatherbury had been thoroughly aroused, and
  the wild deed which had terminated Boldwood's merrymaking became
  known to all.  Of those out of the house Oak was one of the first to
  hear of the catastrophe, and when he entered the room, which was
  about five minutes after Boldwood's exit, the scene was terrible.
  All the female guests were huddled aghast against the walls like
  sheep in a storm, and the men were bewildered as to what to do.  As
  for Bathsheba, she had changed.  She was sitting on the floor beside
  the body of Troy, his head pillowed in her lap, where she had herself
  lifted it.  With one hand she held her handkerchief to his breast and
  covered the wound, though scarcely a single drop of blood had flowed,
  and with the other she tightly clasped one of his.  The household
  convulsion had made her herself again.  The temporary coma had
  ceased, and activity had come with the necessity for it.  Deeds of
  endurance, which seem ordinary in philosophy, are rare in conduct,
  and Bathsheba was astonishing all around her now, for her philosophy
  was her conduct, and she seldom thought practicable what she did
  not practise.  She was of the stuff of which great men's mothers
  are made.  She was indispensable to high generation, hated at tea
  parties, feared in shops, and loved at crises.  Troy recumbent in
  his wife's lap formed now the sole spectacle in the middle of the
  spacious room.
  
  "Gabriel," she said, automatically, when he entered, turning up a
  face of which only the well-known lines remained to tell him it
  was hers, all else in the picture having faded quite.  "Ride to
  Casterbridge instantly for a surgeon.  It is, I believe, useless,
  but go.  Mr. Boldwood has shot my husband."
  
  Her statement of the fact in such quiet and simple words came with
  more force than a tragic declamation, and had somewhat the effect of
  setting the distorted images in each mind present into proper focus.
  Oak, almost before he had comprehended anything beyond the briefest
  abstract of the event, hurried out of the room, saddled a horse and
  rode away.  Not till he had ridden more than a mile did it occur to
  him that he would have done better by sending some other man on this
  errand, remaining himself in the house.  What had become of Boldwood?
  He should have been looked after.  Was he mad--had there been a
  quarrel?  Then how had Troy got there?  Where had he come from?  How
  did this remarkable reappearance effect itself when he was supposed
  by many to be at the bottom of the sea?  Oak had in some slight
  measure been prepared for the presence of Troy by hearing a rumour
  of his return just before entering Boldwood's house; but before he
  had weighed that information, this fatal event had been superimposed.
  However, it was too late now to think of sending another messenger,
  and he rode on, in the excitement of these self-inquiries
  not discerning, when about three miles from Casterbridge, a
  square-figured pedestrian passing along under the dark hedge in the
  same direction as his own.
  
  The miles necessary to be traversed, and other hindrances incidental
  to the lateness of the hour and the darkness of the night, delayed
  the arrival of Mr. Aldritch, the surgeon; and more than three hours
  passed between the time at which the shot was fired and that of his
  entering the house.  Oak was additionally detained in Casterbridge
  through having to give notice to the authorities of what had
  happened; and he then found that Boldwood had also entered the town,
  and delivered himself up.
  
  In the meantime the surgeon, having hastened into the hall at
  Boldwood's, found it in darkness and quite deserted.  He went on to
  the back of the house, where he discovered in the kitchen an old man,
  of whom he made inquiries.
  
  "She's had him took away to her own house, sir," said his informant.
  
  "Who has?" said the doctor.
  
  "Mrs. Troy.  'A was quite dead, sir."
  
  This was astonishing information.  "She had no right to do that,"
  said the doctor.  "There will have to be an inquest, and she should
  have waited to know what to do."
  
  "Yes, sir; it was hinted to her that she had better wait till the law
  was known.  But she said law was nothing to her, and she wouldn't let
  her dear husband's corpse bide neglected for folks to stare at for
  all the crowners in England."
  
  Mr. Aldritch drove at once back again up the hill to Bathsheba's.
  The first person he met was poor Liddy, who seemed literally to have
  dwindled smaller in these few latter hours.  "What has been done?" he
  said.
  
  "I don't know, sir," said Liddy, with suspended breath.  "My mistress
  has done it all."
  
  "Where is she?"
  
  "Upstairs with him, sir.  When he was brought home and taken
  upstairs, she said she wanted no further help from the men.  And then
  she called me, and made me fill the bath, and after that told me I
  had better go and lie down because I looked so ill.  Then she locked
  herself into the room alone with him, and would not let a nurse come
  in, or anybody at all.  But I thought I'd wait in the next room in
  case she should want me.  I heard her moving about inside for more
  than an hour, but she only came out once, and that was for more
  candles, because hers had burnt down into the socket.  She said we
  were to let her know when you or Mr. Thirdly came, sir."
  
  Oak entered with the parson at this moment, and they all went
  upstairs together, preceded by Liddy Smallbury.  Everything was
  silent as the grave when they paused on the landing.  Liddy knocked,
  and Bathsheba's dress was heard rustling across the room: the key
  turned in the lock, and she opened the door.  Her looks were calm and
  nearly rigid, like a slightly animated bust of Melpomene.
  
  "Oh, Mr. Aldritch, you have come at last," she murmured from her lips
  merely, and threw back the door.  "Ah, and Mr. Thirdly.  Well, all is
  done, and anybody in the world may see him now."  She then passed by
  him, crossed the landing, and entered another room.
  
  Looking into the chamber of death she had vacated they saw by the
  light of the candles which were on the drawers a tall straight
  shape lying at the further end of the bedroom, wrapped in white.
  Everything around was quite orderly.  The doctor went in, and after a
  few minutes returned to the landing again, where Oak and the parson
  still waited.
  
  "It is all done, indeed, as she says," remarked Mr. Aldritch, in a
  subdued voice.  "The body has been undressed and properly laid out in
  grave clothes.  Gracious Heaven--this mere girl!  She must have the
  nerve of a stoic!"
  
  "The heart of a wife merely," floated in a whisper about the ears
  of the three, and turning they saw Bathsheba in the midst of them.
  Then, as if at that instant to prove that her fortitude had been
  more of will than of spontaneity, she silently sank down between
  them and was a shapeless heap of drapery on the floor.  The simple
  consciousness that superhuman strain was no longer required had at
  once put a period to her power to continue it.
  
  They took her away into a further room, and the medical attendance
  which had been useless in Troy's case was invaluable in Bathsheba's,
  who fell into a series of fainting-fits that had a serious aspect
  for a time.  The sufferer was got to bed, and Oak, finding from the
  bulletins that nothing really dreadful was to be apprehended on her
  score, left the house.  Liddy kept watch in Bathsheba's chamber,
  where she heard her mistress, moaning in whispers through the dull
  slow hours of that wretched night: "Oh it is my fault--how can I
  live!  O Heaven, how can I live!"
  
  
  
  
feat_summary_name: Chapter 54
target: Boldwood, walking easily and steadily, arrived at the jail. He rang, said something to the porter in a low tone, and entered. "The door was closed behind him, and he walked the world no more." When Gabriel heard of the catastrophe, he rushed to Boldwood's house, arriving some five minutes after Boldwood's departure. The scene was dreadful. Bathsheba sat on the floor beside the body, Troy's head pillowed in her lap. "With one hand she held her handkerchief to his breast . . . though scarcely a single drop of blood had flowed, and with the other she tightly clasped one of his. The household convulsion had made her herself again. . . . Deeds of endurance which seem ordinary in philosophy are rare in conduct, and Bathsheba was astonishing all . . . for her philosophy was her conduct." She ordered Gabriel to ride for a surgeon. In town, Gabriel also stopped to notify the authorities and so learned of Boldwood's surrender. Meanwhile, Bathsheba had Troy moved home. Liddy admitted the doctor, telling him that Bathsheba had locked herself in the room with the body. She had left orders that the surgeon and Parson Thirdly were to be admitted. The surgeon found Troy's body lit by candles and draped in white. Returning to Oak and the parson, the doctor remarked in a subdued voice, "It is all done. . . . this mere girl! She must have the nerve of a stoic!" "The heart of a wife, merely," Bathsheba whispered behind him. Then, silently, she sank to the floor. She had a series of fainting fits that for a time seemed serious, but the surgeon attended her. Liddy was told to watch over her during the night. She heard her mistress moan, "O it is my fault -- how can I live!"
feat_summary_analysis: Bathsheba's display of strength reminds the surgeon of the ancient stoics; it is also reminiscent of the great women of Greek tragedy. Then, having done what was required of her, Bathsheba can yield to weakness  and faint away. This was a common frailty in the women of Victorian times, both in literature and in life. Bathsheba's stern conscience, which continues to trouble her, is another typical Victorian characteristic.