Edmond

“ EDMOND. What, you could not? make me walk invisible, man! I should laugh at that, ifaith; troth, I’ll requite your kindness and you’ll do’t, good Captain conjurer.
CAPTAIN.
Nay, I should hardly deny you such a small kindness, Master
Edmond Plus: why, look you, sir, tis no more but this and thus
and again, and now yar invisible!
EDMOND.
Am I, ifaith? who would think it?
CAPTAIN. You see the fortune-teller yonder at farder end ath chamber: go toward him, do what you will with him; he shall ne’er find you.
EDMOND.
Say you so? I’ll try that, ifaith,—
[Justles him.] ”

“ Edmond, much embarrassed, drew near, she saw him not, he spoke a few words, but she heard him not. "Dearest," he exclaimed at length, "you kill me, you kill yourself! these powerful shocks will destroy your constitution." "And were it not as well?" said she in a feeble voice, without restraining her tears, "look on me, here on the ground, weep with me; all good men should now perish." "Rise, lady," said Edmond, while he assisted her, "if I must not believe that your reason has deserted you." ”

“ They sat down and as Edmond was silent, the Counsellor said, after a pause: "What do you think then of this priest and his manners? such as these, you see, are appointed to direct and instruct the people, the unfortunate people! these became combatants and murderers like this colossus. That my house is compelled to shelter such, that is it indeed which humbles me. All champions for a good cause may not be individually good," said Edmond. ”

“ An extraordinary resemblance to an old friend almost compels me to treat you as a beloved brother, nay, I may say as a son. It is long since any stranger has visited me in my solitude, here I learn but little of the world, and that is why such a visit as yours is so acceptable to me." "I too am delighted with your society," replied Edmond, "and I ask myself not without sadness, wherefore it should not be granted to man to spend his days in peaceful quiet, elevated and instructed by nature, enlivened and comforted by the simplest and most delightful enjoyments." ”

“ The venerable pastor replied but little. Neither did his exhaustion permit him, which was so great, that he was often compelled to rest. As the hours passed the more agitated he became and the more he wished to end quickly his days in the ruins of his beloved commune, for he did not know why he should still wish to live. Edmond talked to him filially and affectionately, as a son, and the old man heartily forgave all the evil that the youth had drawn upon him, "If I could, only see thy father once more before my death!" ”

“ Besides, be assured, my dear Edmond, the dungeon I am about to leave will not long remain empty; some other unfortunate being will soon take my place, and to him you will appear like an angel of salvation. Perhaps he will be young, strong, and enduring, like yourself, and will aid you in your escape, while I have been but a hindrance. You will no longer have half a dead body tied to you as a drag to all your movements. At length Providence has done something for you; he restores to you more than he takes away, and it was time I should die. ”

“ He sprang from his horse, and while Edmond was making his way up to him, impressed with the almost ludicrous appearance of the unbecoming attire, the so justly renowned Cavalier advanced towards him, and Edmond, in terror and in deep confusion, stepped back, for the young hero was no other than that miller-lad, whom he had a short time before in his father's house treated with so much contempt, nay even with cutting bitterness. ”

“ And this, Edmond, this is the man of business who purchased his game in the City, and vied with all in the excellence of his claret. The man who courted your aunt, begot hale and whole children, who sits in his pew and is respected. ”

“ I wish, for once, however, to be in the right, and you Edmond shall learn something; these are indeed a very singular sort of schools, and information is fetched with difficulty and in small quantities from over the mountains and rocks; all men cannot be wholesale dealers like you. In reality, however, it is my son who has persuaded me to this, and made me promise to bring you, Edmond, too. ”

“ The old man arose, and walked several times up and down the garden, to subdue the emotion, which these recollections had excited. Edmond remained behind in deep thought, and compared the narrative of the pastor with his own experience. Should he now view them in an other light, or wish them effaced from the career of his life? He would have been more satisfied, could he have heartily embittered his feelings against the old man, towards whom, however, inclination as well as the intercourse of soul in which he had spent his youth with his own parent attracted him. ”

“ She would indeed have voluntarily taken upon herself all the suffering and sorrows of the whole world, would have even suffered herself to be condemned, could she thereby have released from hell, and make the hungry and sick, rich and healthy."
"Even in your wickedness," said Edmond, softened, "you represent this girl as a noble one, who was well worthy of her heavenly origin." ”

“ The clergyman had also received the youth with the greatest cordiality; whenever Edmond returned from his rambles, such pleasure beamed on the countenance of the old man, that the stranger felt himself bound to his host by kindliness and emotion. ”

“ Indeed, the most beautiful body consists merely of earth, and dust; and yet beauty is more sublime than the moist clay of the fields."
Thus was Edmond compelled to hear from strange lips his former thoughts detailed. He was so affected by the presence of the old man, that he felt himself compelled to discover to him what a zealous catholic he himself had once been and had but a short time previously turned to the Huguenot faith; he was silent, however, respecting his alliance with the Camisards, and the purpose for which he had descended into the valleys. ”

“ THE REBELLION IN THE CEVENNES.
CHAPTER I. "Is Edmond not yet come home?" asked his father of the servant, as he walked up and down the great hall of his country mansion.
"No, my Lord," answered the old man, "and it were well that he returned before evening; for a storm is gathering over the mountains, which bodes us no good." ”

“ The English, who had been unable to defend their country, and maintain their independency, under so active and brave a prince as Edmond, could after his death expect nothing but total subjection from Canute, who, active and brave himself, and at the head of a great force, was ready to take advantage of the minority of Edwin and Edward, the two sons of Edmond. ”

“ That Edmond casts to worke his liberty,
Remove him still from place to place by night,
Till at the last, he come to Killingworth,
And then from thence to Bartley backe againe:
And by the way to make him fret the more,
Speake curstly to him, and in any case
Let no man comfort him, If he chance to weepe,
But amplifie his griefe with bitter words.
Matr.
Feare not my Lord, weele do as you command. ”

“ “Why, you see, Edmond,” replied the owner, who appeared more comforted at every moment, “we are all mortal, and the old must make way for the young. If not, why, there would be no promotion; ”

“ They were both silent for a long time, at length Edmond took his gun, and said, "what do you think of all this, and especially of this mysterious fellow, who can demean himself so innocently, and with so much naïveté?"
"I must not express my thoughts," answered his father, "perhaps they would sound too romantic. You will leave us again, my son? and probably will not come back to dinner?"
"You know," replied Edmond, "my passion for hunting and the delight I take in mountains and forests; nature elevates us above our suffering; she strengthens our feelings ”

“ However much they tried to imitate the looks and demeanour of the rest, there still lay concealed even in the very manner that they greeted Edmond, something of that reckless insolence and licentious freedom, which all well-principled young men had excluded from their society many years before. ”

“ “You well know, Edmond, that I am no longer a reasoning creature; I have no will, unless it be the will never to decide. ”

“ I began to read them in the cab on my way to the Avenue Montaigne. The first, which was of great length, reminded Edmond of his past faults and the hopelessness of his actual condition, and then indicated, without entering into any particulars, a possible means of at least partially repairing all these disasters and once more gaining a fortune. The first condition was that the outlaw should scrupulously obey the orders of his brother. ”

“ Edmond did not lose a word, but comprehended very little of what was said. ”

“ I think the air is infectuous, and renders insane, and thus it has happened to young Edmond and my poor son. Whom the devil rides, cannot certainly affirm that he possesses an abundance of free will to go and come ”

“ And we have heard that Edmond laid a plot,
To set his brother free, no more but so,
The Lord of Bartley is so pittifull,
As Leicester that had charge of him before.
Qu.
Then let some other be his Guardian.
Mor.ju.
Let me alone, here is the privy Seale,
Whose there, call hither Gurney and Matrevis,
To dash the heavy headed Edmonds drift,
Bartley shall be discharg'd, the King remov'd,
And none but we shall know where he lieth.
Qu.
But Mortimer, as long as he survives
What safety rests for us, or for my sonne? ”

“ “Why do you mention my father?” stammered he; “why do you mingle a recollection of him with the affairs of today?”
“Because I am he who saved your father’s life when he wished to destroy himself, as you do today—because I am the man who sent the purse to your young sister, and the Pharaon to old Morrel—because I am the Edmond Dantès who nursed you, a child, on my knees.” ”

“ Yet even you would use it, for your musical preachment.”
As he spoke, he became aware of Edmonds staring moodily and with pinched lips at Miss Van Arsdale. To the mind’s eye of the old stager had flashed a sudden and astounding vision of all that pride of womanhood and purity underlying the beauty of the face, overlaid and fouled by the inky vomit of Baal of the printing-press, as would have come to pass had not he, Edmonds, obstructed the vengeance.
“I can imagine nothing printed,” said the woman who had loved Willis Enderby, “that could in any manner influence my life.” ”

“ Edmondes came to England in January 1613–1614, but returned to Paris in the following July, with a view to aiding the marriage scheme, which came to nothing. Edmondes attended the conference between the French protestants and the government at Loudun in 1616, and recommended the former to accept the latter's terms, although his displays of hostility to Roman catholicism had often jeopardised his friendly relations with the French court. At the close of 1616 he was ordered to England, but directed to hold himself in readiness to return to France. ”

“ Paul and Milly Edmondson were both devout communicants in the Methodist Episcopal Church at Washington, and the testimony to their blamelessness of life and the consistence of their piety is unanimous from all who know them. In their simple cottage, made respectable by neatness and order, and hallowed by morning and evening prayer, they trained up their children, to the best of their poor ability, in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, to be sold in the slave-market. ”

“ But the young men who now come to the front, and who have no more brilliant representative than Edmond Rostand, belong to another generation. They have not known the pangs of defeat; the mutilation of the beloved Fatherland was an accomplished fact when they began to feel and to think. They viewed French history not as concentrated in its last and heart-rending episode, but as spreading through centuries of heroic deeds, oftener illuminated by the dazzling sunshine of victory than darkened by the gloom of defeat. ”

“ EDMONDES, Sir CLEMENT (1564?–1622) , clerk to the council, was born at Shrawardine in Shropshire. His parentage is not known, but he is described in the Oxford matriculation register as a yeoman's son, 'pleb. f.' (Oxf. Hist. Soc. xi. 152) . This disposes of the statement made by some of his biographers, that he was the son of Sir Thomas Edmondes [q. v.] , comptroller and afterwards treasurer of the household to James I. The latter, besides being only three years the senior of Clement Edmondes, was born at Plymouth, and there is no evidence of a relationship between them. ”

“ She said her dear lord had received so much comfort in his soul as he had never felt before in all his life, and such directions from Father Edmonds for the amending and ordering of it as did greatly help and further him therein. ”

“ Our Intendant thought to crush the affair with prompt violence, and appalling horror, that old and young needed only to be quickly reminded of their religion. People often think in reality, because they are themselves convinced of the matter, and that it is only carelessness in others: they wish to recall them to themselves, and often in the midst of their barbarity, they do not mean so badly towards them."
"Thou art right Mazel," interrupted Edmond, "I myself was of this belief a short time ago." ”

“ You prevent him now again by your fatherly authority; now, certainly, these indications joined to your indifference would with myself weigh heavier in the scale. Your answer, my Lord Counsellor of Parliament!" "My son," said the father with constrained displeasure, "is free; he may serve the king according to his wish if he sets his happiness upon it."
The Intendant bowed in silence, refused all refreshment and the afflicted father followed the carriage with tearful eyes, as it rolled away.—"Is it then come to this?" exclaimed he, "your have now Edmond, what you wished, I could not say no. ”