Lacy

“ A STRIFE IN MAGNANIMITY
"Well, Sempland," said Lacy, with astonishing courtesy and forbearance under all the circumstances, as he overtook the other man plodding along the shaded street, "you don't seem to be in much greater favor with the young lady than I."
"Lacy," returned the other, "you did well this evening. You are not good enough for Miss Glen, I still think. Nobody is, for that matter, but you less than others. ”

“ One is our friend, and the other is not true.
Enter LORD LACY, SIR HUGH, and his Boy.
LACY. Hence, treacher, as thou art! by God's bless'd mother!
I'll lop thy legs off, though thou be my brother,
If with thy flattering tongue thou seek to hide
Thy traitorous purpose. Ah, poor Huntington!
How in one hour have villains thee undone!
HUGH. If you will not believe what I have sworn,
Conceit your worst. My Lord of Ely knows
That what I say is true.
LACY. Still facest thou?
Draw, boy, and quickly see that thou defend thee.
LEI. Patience, Lord Lacy! get you gone, Sir Hugh ”

“ Lady Lacy was fain to withdraw in some dismay and much regret.
Poor Letice, who had heard this offer made, had flashed into sudden brightness and a tremor of joy; when it was refused, she burst into a flood of tears and an ecstasy of rage. She ran up to her room, and took and tore to pieces a volume of Clayton's Sermons, scattered the leaves over the floor, and stamped upon them.
“Letice,” said Miss Mountjoy, when she saw the devastation, “you are a child of wrath.”
“Why mayn't I go where there is something pretty to see? Why may I not hear good music? ”

“ Then the thought struck the young swamp explorer that Philander Owens, clinging to a log, had preceded him down the turbulent stream but a minute before. Had Reginald Lacy stood upon the shore and watched him go whirling to his death?
As he looked at the man and saw the satisfied expression that gleamed from his eyes, he made up his mind that such indeed was the case.
“That is a splendid dog you have,” remarked Leo. “Had it not been for him all would have been up with me.”
“Yes,” assented Lacy. “There are few better dogs than Jupiter. He is the best friend I have got in the whole world.” ”

“ Quarren, Lacy, O'Hara, and Sir Charles Mallison sat by the window playing poker; the Earl of Dankmere, perched on the piano-stool, was mournfully rattling off a string of melodies acquired along Broadway; Westguard himself, flat on his back, occupied a leather lounge and dispensed philosophy when permitted.
"You know," said Lacy, dealing rapidly, "you're only a tin-horn philosopher, Karl, but you really could write a good story if you tried. Get your people into action. That's the game." ”

“ At the hospital, then, like Lacy, he too had fallen in love with Miss Fanny Glen.
By rights the hero—not of this story, perhaps, but the real hero—was much the handsomer of the two. It is always so in romances; and romances—good ones, that is—are the reflex of life. Such a combination of manly beauty with unshakable courage and reckless audacity was not often seen as Lacy exhibited. Sempland was homely. Lacy had French and Irish blood in him, and he showed it. Sempland was a mixture of sturdy Dutch and English stock. ”

“ Master Lacy was a merchant of Aisi, an owner of vessels. Like most of his fellows, when war came so close home, he was almost obliged to join the king's levy. Had he not done so it would have been recorded against him as a lack of loyalty. His privileges would have been taken from him, possibly the wealth he had accumulated seized, and himself reduced to slavery. Lacy, therefore, put on armour, and accompanied the king to the camp. Thus Felix, after all his aspirations, found himself serving as the knave of a mere citizen. ”

“ What did you say, Miss Glen?" continued Lacy, turning to that young woman.
"I told him it wasn't true!" burst out the girl, impetuously.
"Ah, but it is," said Lacy, softly. "I am all that he says, and more, too."
"But look at what you have done."
"But little, after all. I heard you reproaching Sempland for what he had not done when I came in. That isn't fair. No braver man lives than Rhett Sempland. Why, did it not take courage to defy me, to tell me to my face that I was a scoundrel, a blackguard? ”

“ But when Robert Lacy heard it whispered at the hotel that his master was in love, he woke up to a feeble sort of curiosity, coupled with vexation. He had a good place as valet to a bachelor, and he felt that he would be sorry indeed if the condition of affairs was changed. Life could not be half so pleasant for him should Lord Stuart marry. When he found out later on that his master was enamored of a married lady he did not feel much easier in his mind. There was no telling what would happen. They might take it into their heads to elope. That would be quite as bad as a marriage. ”

“ Lacy, still ill in temper, abused the poet for the nonsense he had put into the part of Captain Otter, which was the cause of all the mischief. Lacy further told Howard he was "more a fool than a poet." Thereat the honourable Edward, raising his glove, smote Lacy smartly with it over the face. Jack Lacy retaliated by lifting his cane and letting it descend quite as smartly on the pate of a man who was cousin to an earl. Ordinary men marvelled that the honourable Edward did not run Jack through the body. ”

“ De Lacy said good-naturedly.
"A most extraordinary tymbestere who refuses a Knight's caress," Dauvrey explained.
"But would not, you think, refuse a squire's?"
"Nay, my lord, what I think is that she might bear investigation. She is in disguise, I will stake my head."
"How does that concern us?"
"Only as every mystery concerns us now. To solve one sometimes solves another." ”

“ Harry," went on the other man, unconsciously dropping into the familiar form of boyhood, which caused Lacy's face to flush with pleasure, "I am sure she loves you. I thought it was I, at first, but since this afternoon I have changed my mind. Why can't you be different? You are not a fit man to marry any honest woman now, and when I thought of your record I doubted that you ever would be. I was sure you would not, but—see here, old man! Throw the past aside! A fellow that's got it in him to do what you have done for the South—why can't you control yourself? ”

“ Matthew, good man, was troubled when we told him Lacy's words.
'If the wretched fellow have the sickness indeed,' he said, 'he might die in a ditch for all his own people care;' and that same night he went to Lacy Manor, inquiring after its master.
It proved that, on leaving the Grange, the man went straight home, and up-stairs to bed, saying he was weary, and must not be disturbed for an hour or two; and there he now lay dead. ”

“ As Wrexler looked up at the portrait, an inward light illumined his countenance. "I am not afraid," he repeated.
"There are many deaths. There is the death of the spirit as well as that of the body. I beg you to go while there is time, friend of my lord." There was real feeling in de Lacy's voice.
I too felt afraid for Wrexler. The strange, unworldly feeling he had always had, the pulling toward something he knew not what, made me doubly fearful. Had the fair Helene been calling him all this time, across the world? For myself I had no fear. ”

“ Giraldus describes Lacy as a swarthy man, with small black sunken eyes, a flat nose, and an ugly scar on his cheek; muscular in body, but small and ill-made. He was a man of resolute character; for temperance a very Frenchman, careful in private affairs, and vigilant in public business. Despite his experience in military matters he sustained many reverses in his campaigns. He was lax in his morality, and avaricious, but eager beyond measure for honour and renown (Opera, v. 354) . Hugh was a benefactor of Lanthony Abbey, and also of many churches in Ireland, including the abbey of Trim. ”

“ LACY, WALTER de, sixth Baron Lacy by tenure and second Lord of Meath (d. 1241) , was elder son of Hugh de Lacy (d. 1186) [q. v.] , by Roysya de Monemue (Monmouth) , and was elder brother of Hugh de Lacy, earl of Ulster (d. 1242?) [q. v.] On his father's death he became entitled to the ancestral estates in Normandy and England, and to his father's conquest of Meath in Ireland, but the last was taken into the king's hands, and he did not obtain seisin of the English or Norman lands till 1189 (Eyton, v. 256–7) ; it is, of course, possible that he may have been a minor at his father's death. ”

“ Necessarily, the time I spent with de Lacy on such matters, Wrexler was alone. He had changed a great deal since we had come to Rougemont. He had come alive, and he threw himself into everything with a curious intensity. He was like a person who has been very ill, who suddenly finding himself better and fearing it is only temporary, clutches life with both hands. ”

“ After Lacy's death appeared, in 1684, at Dorset Garden Theatre, a comedy, entitled ‘Sir Hercules Buffoon, or the Poetical Squire,’ which was published in the same year. A prologue by D'Urfey describing Lacy as the author and an epilogue by Joe Haines [q. v.] were spoken by the latter. Genest speaks of the play disparagingly.
Lacy was praised in his own day. His dancing seems to have been his chief attraction until age disabled him. Downes commends his acting of Scruple in the ‘Cheats,’ Jonny Thump, Teague, and Bayes. Pepys seldom mentions him without praise, and describes, under date 19 Jan. ”

“ The churchyard of Inistubber is as lonely a one as you would wish to see on a summer's day, or avoid on a winter's night. Under the east window of the church is a mouldering vault of the De Lacys,—a branch of a family descended from one of the conquerors of Ireland; and there they are buried, when the allotted time calls them to the tomb. Sir Theodore De Lacy had lived a jolly, thoughtless life, rising early for the hunt, and retiring late from the bottle. ”

“ He made himself busy in the garden, too, and gave little Dick Lacy his accustomed lesson in writing and book-keeping as regularly as usual. But, through all his work and all his amusements, he carried with him a sense of discomfort. He never could forget that all was not right between him and his master, though he could not guess the reason. He seemed to see him oftener than usual these days. He sometimes overtook him on his way home; and, once or twice, when he was working in the garden, he saw him cross the bridge and pass the house. ”

“ I have heard Mr. Lacy, the player, say that he was wont to weare a coate like a coach-man's coate, with slitts under the arme-pitts. He would many times exceed in drinke (Canarie was his beloved liquour) : then he would tumble home to bed, and, when he had thoroughly perspired, then to studie. I have seen his studyeing chaire, which was of strawe, such as old woemen used, and as Aulus Gellius is drawen in.
When I was in Oxon, bishop Skinner (of Oxford) , who lay at our College, was wont to say that he understood an author as well as any man in England. ”

“ There were soon more than four hundred persons prophesying in different parts of the country. The clergy denounced them, and Calamy censured Lacy at Westminster in some sermons published as ‘A Caveat against New Prophets,’ London, 1708, 8vo. Lacy replied by going into one of his ecstasies in his own house in Calamy's presence, and rebuking him in the name of the Spirit. His formal answer appeared as ‘A Relation of the Dealings of God to his unworthy servant, John Lacy, since the time of his believing and professing himself Inspired,’ London, 1708, 8vo. Lacy was also attacked by Dr. ”

“ As I said, Miss Glen, it is a choice between us. Do not choose me, if you should be so fatuously inclined, because I happen to have had some chances for distinction, for I assure you, on my honor, all there is left of it, that if Sempland gets half a chance he'll do better than I. Choose because you love him—or me."
The girl stared from one to the other in indignant bewilderment. Lacy was an ideal lover. Sempland looked like a stern master, and she hated a master. She made a half step toward the handsomer and weaker man, and a half turn toward the homelier and stronger. ”

“ Sukie De Boos, whose firm, rounded bosom and strong square shoulders made a startling contrast, as they revealed their shape under her soddened blouse, to Mrs. Lacy's fragile figure, impulsively put her hands out, and taking Mrs. Lacy's face between them, kissed her twice.
"Dear Mrs. Lacy," she said, "don't be frightened, please. Now get Mr. Lacy's pipe, and I'll rummage the steward's pantry and get some food for us all to eat. Mr. Otway told me to tell you and Miss Weidermann to eat something, as maybe we may not get anything [pg 191] for some hours. ”

“ Thy machinations and thy counsel were the cause. By thine accursed arts Robert de Lacy hath left his patrimony to a stranger!"
"True, I counselled him thus. What then?"
"I and mine are barred from the inheritance!"
"Shall the word of the Hermit of the Rock fall to the ground? Have I not promised that thy blood shall be with those that inherit these domains?"
"Promises are slender food for an hungry stomach," cried the unbeliever.
"If the promise fail, blame thy dastardly fears, and not my power. Thou shalt see the promised land thou shalt not inherit. Thy son shall receive the blessing." ”

“ LACY, HARRIETTE DEBORAH (1807–1874) , English actress, was born in London, the daughter of a tradesman named Taylor. Her first appearance on the stage was at Bath in 1827 as Julia in The Rivals, and she was immediately given leading parts there in both comedy and tragedy. ”

“ Lacy said to Dankmere: "Now that you've learned how to get poor quickly you're better prepared for the study of riches and how to acquire 'em. Kindly pass the buck unless your misfortunes have paralysed you."
"The whole country," said his lordship, "is nothing but one gigantic poker game. I sail on the next steamer. I'm bluffed out."
"Poor old Dankmere," purred Lacy, "won't the ladies love you?"
"Their demonstrations," said the Earl, "are not keeping me awake nights."
"Something keeps Quarren awake nights, judging by his transom light. Is it love, Ricky?" ”