For many days he haunted the cloisters and quadrangles of the
colleges at odd minutes in passing them, surprised by impish
echoes of his own footsteps, smart as the blows of a mallet. The
Christminster "sentiment," as it had been called, ate further and
further into him; till he probably knew more about those buildings
materially, artistically, and historically, than any one of their
inmates.
It was not till now, when he found himself actually on the spot of
his enthusiasm, that Jude perceived how far away from the object of
that enthusiasm he really was. Only a wall divided him from those
happy young contemporaries of his with whom he shared a common mental
life; men who had nothing to do from morning till night but to read,
mark, learn, and inwardly digest. Only a wall--but what a wall!
Every day, every hour, as he went in search of labour, he saw them
going and coming also, rubbed shoulders with them, heard their
voices, marked their movements. The conversation of some of the
more thoughtful among them seemed oftentimes, owing to his long and
persistent preparation for this place, to be peculiarly akin to his
own thoughts. Yet he was as far from them as if he had been at the
antipodes. Of course he was. He was a young workman in a white
blouse, and with stone-dust in the creases of his clothes; and in
passing him they did not even see him, or hear him, rather saw
through him as through a pane of glass at their familiars beyond.
Whatever they were to him, he to them was not on the spot at all; and
yet he had fancied he would be close to their lives by coming there.
But the future lay ahead after all; and if he could only be so
fortunate as to get into good employment he would put up with the
inevitable. So he thanked God for his health and strength, and took
courage. For the present he was outside the gates of everything,
colleges included: perhaps some day he would be inside. Those
palaces of light and leading; he might some day look down on the
world through their panes.
At length he did receive a message from the stone-mason's yard--that
a job was waiting for him. It was his first encouragement, and he
closed with the offer promptly.
He was young and strong, or he never could have executed with such
zest the undertakings to which he now applied himself, since they
involved reading most of the night after working all the day. First
he bought a shaded lamp for four and six-pence, and obtained a good
light. Then he got pens, paper, and such other necessary books as he
had been unable to obtain elsewhere. Then, to the consternation of
his landlady, he shifted all the furniture of his room--a single one
for living and sleeping--rigged up a curtain on a rope across the
middle, to make a double chamber out of one, hung up a thick blind
that nobody should know how he was curtailing the hours of sleep,
laid out his books, and sat down.