Time and again, Hardy highlights the theme of contingency, fate, and circumstance through conflicts between man and nature. A fire nearly destroys Gabriel’s cottage (bringing Gabriel and Bathsheba together for the first time). A second fire nearly levels Bathsheba’s farm in Weatherbury, and an electrical storm almost ruins the crops for the year:
Heaven opened then, indeed. [...] they could only comprehend the magnificence of its beauty. It sprang from east, west, north, south, and was a perfect dance of death. [....]Gabriel was almost blinded [by lightning], and he could feel Bathsheba’s warm arm tremble in his hand—a sensation novel and thrilling enough; but love, life, everything human, seemed small and trifling in such close juxtaposition with an infuriated universe.
The power of the storm is enormous; it is beautiful, terrible, deadly, and unstoppable. Gabriel and Bathsheba are thatching a rick (a small structure that holds their crops), and climbing up and down a ladder to reach it. When lightning strikes, they are aware that it could catch them easily (“perfect dance of death”). Yet they continue, knowing that they must take the risk to secure their harvest. Gabriel is thrilled by Bathsheba’s proximity as they cower from the storm for a moment. But he is also made aware of how “everything human” (his love for Bathsheba, his life) is small in the face of nature.
Here, as in the other examples above, the quick thinking of Bathsheba and Gabriel reflects their courage in the face of uncertainty. As the two grow older and more mature, their respect for and responses to nature change. The first fire is caused by Gabriel’s carelessness, and Bathsheba allows others to put out the second fire for her as she watches from a distance. In this scene, Bathsheba and Gabriel walk into the heart of the storm to protect what matters to them. Weather and fire act as symbols of uncontrollable circumstances, which Bathsheba and Gabriel learn to handle more easily as they grow into themselves.
