The calendar at Melchester had been light, occupying the court only a few hours; and the assizes at Casterbridge, the next county-town on the Western Circuit, having no business for Raye, he had not gone .  At the next town after that they did not open till the following Monday, trials to begin on Tuesday morning.  In the natural order of things Raye would have arrived at the latter place on Monday afternoon; but it was not till the middle of Wednesday that his gown and grey , curled in tiers, in the best fashion of Assyrian bas-reliefs, were seen blowing and bobbing behind him as he hastily walked up the High Street from his .  But though he entered the assize building there was nothing for him to do, and sitting at the blue baize table in the well of the court, he mended pens with a mind far away from the case in progress.  Thoughts of unpremeditated conduct, of which a week earlier he would not have believed himself capable, threw him into a mood of dissatisfied depression.  
He had to see again the pretty rural Anna, the day after the fair, had walked out of the city with her to the earthworks of Old Melchester, and feeling a violent fancy for her, had remained in Melchester all Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday; by obtaining walks and meetings with the girl six or seven times during the ; had in brief won her, body and soul.
 
He supposed it must have been owing to the in which he had lived of late in town that he had given way so unrestrainedly to a passion for an artless creature whose inexperience had, from the first, led her to place herself unreservedly in his hands.  Much he with her feelings for the sake of a passing desire; and he could only hope that she might not live to suffer on his account.
 
She had begged him to come to her again; him; wept.  He had promised that he would do so, and he meant to carry out that promise.  He could not desert her now.  Awkward as such unintentional connections were, the interspace of a hundred miles—which to a girl of her limited was like a thousand—would effectually hinder this summer fancy from greatly his life; while thought of her simple love might do him the negative good of keeping him from idle pleasures in town when he wished to work hard.  His circuit journeys would take him to Melchester three or four times a year; and then he could always see her.
 
The , or rather partial name, that he had given her as his before knowing how far the acquaintance was going to carry him, had been spoken on the spur of the moment, without any ulterior intention whatever.  He had not afterwards disturbed Anna’s error, but on leaving her he had felt bound to give her an address at a stationer’s not far from his , at which she might write to him under the initials ‘C. B.’
 
In due time Raye returned to his London , having called at Melchester on his way and spent a few additional hours with his fascinating child of nature.  In town he lived ev............