142 Gender and Space in Rural Britain, 1840–1920
To fi nd the source of the river you must fi rst pass through the towns, then the villages,
then the solitary huts of Indians; you must become the only person in your world;
you must be the fi rst to cut through the thongs of creepers; the fi rst who has ever
trodden upon the mosses by the river side, or seen trees which have stood since the
beginning of the world. No longer are the sounds of men and women heard ... only
birds cry, and trees come down, and the fruit can be heard slipping and dropping on
the ground; and now and then some beast howls in agony or rage.
As leopard and birds have been born of the forest, so have human beings.^40Th e river signifi es the fl ow of time as it passes through the history of human devel-
opment. Its substance originates in a primeval, prehistoric landscape, advancing
through huts, villages and towns. As the travellers journey towards the river source
they also enact a narrative of their own origins. Images of Eden overlap with a more
evolutionary understanding of human history, blending the slipping fruit and the
eternal trees with the primeval animalism of beasts howling. Gillian Beer has read
these references to the primeval in detail, suggesting that the mythical narrative
of Eden is replaced with a scientifi c one: ‘Evolutionary theory has made a new
myth of the past. Instead of the garden, the swamp. Instead of fi xed perfect species,
forms in fl ux’.^41 Yet the garden landscape is still very much present throughout,
combining its cultivated form with the primitive landscape to establish what
Froula has called a ‘post-impressionist Genesis’.^42 Both mythical and scientifi c ver-
sions of history combine to blend biological conceptions of human origins, with
the fi ctional origins that have sustained social and cultural ideologies.
Th e allusions to Eden become even clearer when Rachel and Terence leave
their fellow travellers by the riverbank and walk into the wilderness. As they
leave, Hirst tells them to ‘[b]eware of snakes’, and the increasingly claustro-
phobic and sensuous atmosphere – with its ‘languid puff s of scent’ and ‘dense
creepers’ – adds to the sense of foreboding. In Melymbrosia, Rachel’s desire to
pick fl owers as she walks alludes to Eve’s desire for the forbidden fruit: ‘when a
fl ower tempted her, Rachel pulled it’.^43 In Th e Voyage Out this is omitted, and a
red fruit is mentioned in its place. Terence picks it up and ‘threw it as high as he
could’, resolving to speak when it landed on the ground.^44 Terence and Rachel
fulfi l their likeness to Adam and Eve when they become lovers in the wilder-
ness, embracing and admitting their feelings for one another. Shortly aft erwards
Rachel physically falls, echoing the fall she had aft er realizing that she was in love
with Terence. When Helen is told about their engagement, her ‘hand dropped
abrupt as iron on Rachel’s shoulder; it might have been a bolt from heaven. She
fell beneath it’. Helen’s response, though it is supposed to be light-hearted and
jocular, is described as a punishment from God. In Melymbrosia, this act of ‘fell-
ing’ is followed by a physical fi ght between the two women, where Helen pins
Rachel to the ground and stuff s grass into her mouth. Rachel’s punishment for
agreeing to be married is thus to be gagged or silenced. Th e fi ghting is edited