The Fawleys were not made for wedlock: it never seemed to sit well upon us. There's sommat in our blood that won't take kindly to the notion of being… - Thomas Hardy

To find themselves utterly alone at night where company is desirable and expected makes some people fearful; but a case more trying by far to the nerves is to discover some mysterious companionship when intuition, sensation, memory, analogy, testimony, probability, induction — every kind of evidence in the logician's list — have united to persuade consciousness that it is quite in isolation.

but she remained more or less and ideal character, about whose form he began to weave curious and fantastic day-dreams.

Dazzled by brass and scarlet - O, Bathsheba - this is a woman's folly indeed!