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As everybody knows, fine feathers make fine birds; a peasant girl but very moderately prepossessing to the casual observer in her simple condition and attire, will bloom as an amazing beauty if clothed as a woman of fashion with the aids that Art can render; while the beauty of the midnight crush would often cut but a sorry figure if placed inside the field-woman’s wrapper upon a monotonous acreage of turnips on a dull day. He had never till now estimated the artistic excellence of Tess’s limbs and features.

‘If you were only to appear in a ball-room!’ he said. ‘But no—no, dearest; I think I love you best in the wing-bonnet and cotton-frock—yes, better than in this, well as you support these dignities.’

Tess’s sense of her striking appearance had given her a flush of excitement, which was yet not happiness.

‘I’ll take them off!’ she said, ‘in case Jonathan should see me. They are not fit for me, are they? They must be sold, I suppose?’

‘Let them stay a few minutes longer. Sell them? Never. It would be a breach of faith.’