Jefferson Corporate Limit Sign (Location Key)

The metal sign at this location marks the boundary between the county of Yoknapatawpha and the town of Jefferson. Though in Go Down, Moses it is seen from the back, on the "reverse" it reads "Jefferson, Corporate Limit" (266, 364). At this point, the pavement vanishes, and the street slants away into another hill, becoming gravel. It is the spot at which the story and the novel end. The hearse with Samuel Worsham Beauchamp's body in it continues on its way to a homecoming of sorts at a cemetery near the McCaslin-Edmonds plantation; Gavin Stevens and the editor of Jefferson's newspaper turn around to head back to town. There are several intriguing echoes here - of the ending of The Sound and the Fury, when Benjy gets turned around on his way to the cemetery, and of the ending of Light in August, when Lena Grove and her baby, Byron Bunch and the furniture dealer keep going past the sign that reads Saulsbury, Tennessee. As Lena might say, bodies do get around.