Gabriel Oak was a sensible man of good character, who had been brought up by his father as a shepherd, and then managed to save enough money to rent his own farm on Norcombe Hill, in Dorset. He was twenty-eight, a tall, well-built man, who did not seem, however, to think his appearance was very important.

      One winter morning he was in one of his fields on the side of Norcombe Hill. Looking over his gate, Gabriel could see a yellow cart, loaded with furniture and plants, coming up the road. Right on top of the pile sat a handsome young woman. As Gabriel was watching, the cart stopped at the top of the hill, and the driver climbed down to go back and fetch something that had fallen off.

      The girl sat quietly in the sunshine for a few minutes. Then she picked up a parcel lying next to her, and looked round to see if the driver was coming back. There was no sign of him. She unwrapped the parcel, and took out the mirror it contained. The sun shone on her lovely face and hair. Although it was December, she looked almost summery, sitting there in her bright red jacket with the fresh green plants around her. She looked at herself in the mirror and smiled, thinking that only the birds could see her. But behind the gate Gabriel Oak was watching too.

      ‘She must be rather vain,’ he thought. ‘She doesn’t need to look in that mirror at all!’

      As the girl smiled and blushed at herself, she seemed to be dreaming, dreaming perhaps of men’s hearts won and lost. When she heard the driver’s footsteps, she packed the mirror away. The cart moved on downhill to the toll-gate. Gabriel followed on foot. As he came closer he could hear the driver arguing with the gatekeeper.

      ‘My mistress’s niece, that’s her on top of the furniture, is not going to pay you the extra twopence,’ said the driver. ‘She says she’s offered you quite enough already.’

      ‘Well, if she doesn’t pay the toll, your mistress’s niece can’t pass through the gate,’ replied the gatekeeper.

      Gabriel thought that twopence did not seem worth bothering about, so he stepped forward. ‘Here,’ he said, handing the coins to the gatekeeper, ‘let the young woman pass.’

      The girl in the red jacket looked carelessly down at Gabriel, and told her man to drive on, without even thanking the farmer. Gabriel and the gatekeeper watched the cart move away. ‘That’s a lovely young woman,’ said the gatekeeper.

      ‘But she has her faults,’ answered Gabriel.

      ‘True, farmer.’

      ‘And the greatest of them is what it always is with women.’

      ‘Wanting to win the argument every time? Oh, you’re right.’

      ‘No, her great fault is that she’s vain.’

      A few days later, at nearly midnight on the longest night of the year, Gabriel Oak could be heard playing his flute on Norcombe Hill. The sky was so clear and the stars so visible that the earth could almost be seen turning. In that cold, hard air the sweet notes of the flute rang out. The music came from a little hut on wheels, standing in the corner of a field. Shepherds’ huts like this are used as a shelter during the winter and spring, when shepherds have to stay out all night in the fields, looking after very young lambs.

      Gabriel’s two hundred and fifty sheep were not yet paid for. He knew that, in order to make a success of the farming business, he had to make sure they produced a large number of healthy lambs. So he was determined to spend as many nights as necessary in the fields, to save his lambs from dying of cold or hunger.

      The hut was warm and quite comfortable inside. There was a stove, and some bread and beer on a shelf. On each side of the hut was a round