RELATIONS OF DOMINANCE AND EQUALITY IN D. H. LAWRENCE

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owner of the house for in the morning he starts a kind of
childish guessing game with Banford.
His purpose with the game
is only for the sake of telling Banford that March belongs to
him and so does the farm.
It is as if he were a child who
wants his mother to guess what he wants to say:
'Do you know what, Miss Banford?'
• • •
'Shall I tell her?' he said to [March],
•••
'Whatever's coming?' said Banford...
'Why, what do you think?' he said, smiling like
one who has a secret.
'How do I know?' said Banford.
'Can't you guess?' he said, making bright eyes
and smiled pleased with himself (p.116).
Henry wants to make Banford curious and angry at the same time.
When he finally tells her he is going to marry March the answer
he gets from Banford is exactly what he was expecting:, it
reflects Banford's anger and also the conflict between the two
girls:
✓
Banford looked at [March] like a bird that
had been shot: a poor little sick bird. She
gazed at her with all her wounded soul in her
face, at the deep flushed.March.
'Never!' she exclaimed, helpless (ibid).
Now Henry has got a fearful enemy with whom a new battle is just
beginning.
A battle that will last till the day Banford dies.
In this battle March seems to be as if out of context: she does
not participate in the quarrel between her two lovers.
cannot understand why March is moving from her to Henry.
Banford
She
becomes insulting.
For her, March is lowering herself because
Henry is a man.
To be with a man is disgusting, it implies loss
of self-respect:
'My word, she doesn't know what she's letting
herself in for,' said Banford, in her plaintive,
drifting, insulting voice.
'What has it got to do with you, anyway?' said
the youth in a temper.