Mayne

“ Nan had coaxed her friend to sit beside her fire for a few minutes, and then she had knelt down beside her, wrapping her arms round her in the most affectionate way.
“Dear, dear Mrs. Mayne, how nice all this is! and how good Mr. Mayne has been to me all this evening!”
“My Richard never does things by halves,” returned Mrs. Mayne, proudly. “People cannot always understand him, because his manner is a little rough sometimes; but I know, and none better, his real goodness of heart. Why, he is so pleased with himself and you and Dick this evening that he hardly knows how to contain himself ”

“ So much color—so much——”
“You know Robert Kingslake?” interrupted Mayne, with interest.
“We met here the other night, at dinner,” she said, fixing her wonderful eyes upon his face in an abstracted way. “What a charming man! He has a beautiful soul, I’m sure. There is poetry in his work, idealism——”
“He’s made a lot of money over this last novel of his,” remarked Mayne, a little brutally.
“Yes. Doesn’t that show that the world is waiting for a message? The poor sad world that longs to be shown the beauty it is missing.” ”

“ It was with a blissful sense of escape, that Mayne found himself seated in the car, and once more bound for Campfield station. The sensation was unusual,—for it was the first time, that he had ever felt glad to leave Maynesfort, and he was secretly ashamed of his joyful relief. The old man, accustomed to a life of constant outdoor activity, was putting in a dull time,—and it had enlivened his empty hours, to build castles in the air,—instead of model cottages,—and reckon upon the future of his successor's wife, yes—and children! ”

“ At this Mayne laughed so oddly that Campbell questioned him in surprise. "Isn't she charming?"
"My dear chap," said Mayne, "the red-haired one, as you call her, is the most remarkably charming young person I've ever met or read of. We've had a good many American girls here before now—you remember the good old Clamp family, of course?—they were here in your time, I think?—but we've never had any thing like this Miss Lulie Thayer. She is something altogether unique." ”

“ Of course the proposal was hailed with delight, Mayne only insisting that he should wake his wife and get her to prepare the spare bedroom. Of this, however, Beaumanoir would not hear, and he was trying to persuade his host to retire for the night when a dog barked furiously at the back of the house.
"That's old Tear'em; there'll be someone moving," said Mayne, going out into the passage and listening intently. ”

“ This beautiful song is the production of John Mayne, author of the "Siller Gun," "Glasgow, a poem," &c. Mayne was a native of Dumfries, but spent the early part of his life in Glasgow, where he served an apprenticeship as a compositor under the celebrated printers, Foulis. He afterwards removed to London, and was long connected there with the Star daily newspaper. He died on the 14th March, 1836. ”

“ Mayne. Francey Moore, the "dark man," with his sensibility, his eloquence, and his flaming rage, is not of the characteristic men of Mr. Mayne. They are men of slow ways all un-Celtic and with smouldering hearts like those of the Northmen we read about in the tales of "Origines Islandicæ."
In "Red Turf" (1911) Mr. Mayne turns away from County Down to the Galway bogs, admirably symbolizing the hot land feud between neighbors in his title. There are but five characters in the play, Martin Burke, farmer, and his spitfire of a wife ”

“ One of us ought to stand by and watch for the water to subside. Who's game?"
"It will mean that one of us will have to be in the dark," observed Mayne gloomily. "I'm not frightened of the dark, of course, but it's pretty miserable sticking about by yourself in a pitch-black hole."
"That's so," agreed Green. "I vote we all keep together."
"That won't do for me, lads," said Atherton. "I'll go. You keep what's left of the candle. When I find the level is sinking I'll shout and let you know. This tunnel is like a giant voice-tube: you'll hear me plainly enough." ”

“ In middle life Mayne definitely abandoned poetry. In 1639 he accepted the college living of Cassington, near Woodstock, but during the civil war he was chiefly in Oxford, and often preached before the king. ”

“ Mayne was not sure whether the greengrocer's wife now recognized her, but felt sorry that such a person was to be her companion on the voyage to Scotland.
"She looks as though her business had prospered," thought the lady, "to judge by her comfortable appearance and dress; and she has decked out her poor child in finery purchased by her ill-gotten gains. But how impossible it is to tell who is happy by mere outside show! ”

“ He only knew that he was partly angry, partly incredulous, and inclined to believe that Mayne was chaffing him.
"But Miss Dodge," he objected, "the little sister, she is older; old enough to look after her friend. Surely she could not allow a young girl placed in her charge to behave in such a way———"
"Oh, that little Dodge girl," said Mayne contemptuously; "Miss Thayer pays the whole shot, I understand, and Miss Dodge plays gooseberry, sheep-dog, jackal, what you will. She finds her reward in the other's cast-off finery. ”

“ Puritan America can understand these women and men because they are Puritan, too, with the ignoble that is in the Puritan as well as with the noble that is just as surely there.
It is in the first three plays of Mr. Mayne that we meet these people I have named, County Down folk all of them, and all Protestant but Francey Moore. They are the leading characters in "The Turn of the Road" (1906) , "The Drone" (1908) , and "The Troth" (1908) . The motive of Mr. Mayne's first play is the old call to wander, the unrest of the vagrant heart, here the heart of the musician. ”

“ Mayne was too intent on his purpose to notice it.
“If Dick had brothers and sisters it would not matter so much; but when one has only a single hope—eh, Lady Fitzroy?—things must be a little different then.”
“He will have plenty of choice,” she returned, with an effort at graciousness. “Oldfield is rich in pretty girls:” and she cast another approving glance at poor Nan, but Mr. Mayne interrupted her almost rudely.
“Ah, as to that,” he returned, with a sneer, “we want no such nonsense for Dick. ”

“ Ffinch had mapped out Nancy's future with a bewildering thoroughness, and continued her exposition, and arguments with unabated zeal. As for Captain Mayne, he would thankfully snatch at such a chance of liberty; for never had she seen a young man so alarmingly altered, and depressed. ”

“ But as they came nearer to the lights, the Indians all began talking at the top of their voices, and Mayne was obliged to call for silence. Presently the mounted redskin stopped his horse, and a halt was called.
“We had better go back, or wait for more warriors,” he said; “we are too few.”
268
“What are you talking about?” asked young Mayne sharply.
“It is not the white men’s camp that is burning, but our own. It is clear that our brethren have not come, as we had hoped. There are over seventy of the miners, and you are but eighteen. They will massacre you.” ”

“ If this young man had not been one of the irreproachable Maynes Appleboro might have set him down as a pestilent and radical theorist and visionary. But fortunately for us and himself he was a Mayne; and the Maynes have been from the dawn of things Carolinian "a good family."
I don't think I have ever seen two people so mutually delight in each other's powers as did John Flint and Laurence Mayne. The Butterfly Man was immensely proud of Laurence's handsome person and his grace of speech and manner ”

“ MAYNE, JOHN (1759–1836) , Scottish poet, was born at Dumfries, 26 March 1759. Educated in the local grammar school, he became a printer in the office of the ‘Dumfries Journal.’ In 1782 he accompanied his family to Glasgow, where he was engaged for five years in the publishing house of the brothers Foulis. In 1787 he settled in London, first as a printer, and then as proprietor and joint editor of the ‘Star,’ an evening paper, in which he inserted several of his poems. He had written poetry in Dumfries, and after 1777 he occasionally contributed poems to ‘Ruddiman's Weekly Magazine,’ Edinburgh. ”

“ De Wolfe well," said Mayne, "she and I come from the same part of the world."
"I am glad to hear it, and you can take over Nancy. It is not fair or respectable, that she should be going about as Miss Travers, turning all the men's heads,—when you and I know, that she's a married woman!"
Mayne made no reply, but accepted an empty teacup in silence, and Mrs. Hicks continued: "Of course, you will leave the service, and take a fine country place; for there's not only the Fletcher money, but the gold mine. I see! ”

“ He preached at Oxford 27 May 1662, when ‘his drift was to display the duncery of the university in the late intervall’ (Wood) , and in the same year he preached in London at the consecration of Herbert Croft [q. v.] , bishop of Hereford. Both sermons were published, the latter with a graceful dedication to Mayne's early benefactor, Duppa. In January 1663–4, at a supper given by Dean Fell at Christ Church after the undergraduates had performed a play, Mayne made a speech, declaring that ‘he liked well an acting student’ (Wood) . He died at Oxford on 6 Dec. ”

“ Instead of answering me at once, as he sat there so close beside me, supporting his bowed head on one hand, and with his free arm across my shoulder, he let the arm fall more heavily about me. Turning his troubled eyes once—so appealingly, so briefly!—on mine, he laid his face upon my breast. And then, I heard him murmur, as if not to me only, but also to himself:
"O, thou dear friend! Who bringest me, as none have brought it before thee... rest!"
Rest? Not rest for me! A few seconds of that pathetic, trusting nearness which another man could have sustained so calmly... ”

“ The amendment was dreary.
“Sometimes when I was at the back of [100] beyond,” continued Mayne, smoking stolidly, “I used to picture you as a celebrity, holding a salon—like those French women, you know. The charming ones—not the blue stockings. Madame Récamier—Madame de Sévigné—that sort of thing.”
“Instead of which I ride down to the village on my bicycle, and order the groceries. It’s Robert who’s the celebrity, you know.” She stooped to pick a long-stalked buttercup as she spoke. ”

“ Mayne—people like to think they think what they think themselves. They don't. They think what their home newspapers tell them to think. And this is your great big chance to get the town ear and shout into it good and loud."
A week or so later Mayne & Son surprised Appleboro by purchasing the moribund Clarion. They didn't have to go into debt for it, either. They got it for an absurdly low sum, although folks said, with sniffs, that anything paid for that rag was too much. ”

“ Kingslake regarded him with a curious expression for a moment; there was a look of dawning hope in his face, a half smile of pleased expectancy. Then it faded, and he resumed his former slightly sententious manner. “My dear Mayne,” he replied, “you’ve been out in the wilds for some years. You can’t be expected to know the spirit of the times. You don’t understand the modern woman.”
“My dear Kingslake,” returned Mayne, [89] with great deliberation, “if I’d been out in the wilds, as you say, for fifty instead of five years, I should still disbelieve in her existence. ”

“ Mayne said, that same evening, when, the rest of the boarders having retired to their rooms, he and Campbell were lingering over the hall-fire for a talk and smoke. "I've missed you awfully, old chap, and the good times we used to have here. I've often meant to write to you, but you know how one shoves off letter-writing day after day, till at last one is too ashamed of one's indolence to write at all. But tell me you had a pleasant drive from Hamelin?
What do you think of our young ladies?"
"Those American girls? But they're charming," said Campbell, with enthusiasm. ”

“ A hard player like Mayne, found it difficult to manage with less than three. Whatever the trouble was, he did not avoid society; he was popular with women; his good looks and good manners, made him a general favourite. He went to dances and picnics, was conspicuous in gymkhanas, and every afternoon, when nothing was "on," he played rackets or tennis at the club. Once or twice, when a particularly active girl happened to be his tennis partner, he recalled Nancy,—not one of the lot could approach her as far as play was concerned. ”

“ A very whimsical shape for a man's Chance to present itself in! He gave up the mystery of how Mr. Mayne had ever heard of him originally, but he hugged to his heart the thought that he must have conducted the Tiddes case with unexampled brilliancy. Only thus could he account for Mr. Mayne's persistent loyalty.
So, after lunch, back to the dog—the Harrogate dog, that Tichborne Claimant of a Pekinese dog!
Four o'clock struck. With a sudden return of fear, with a desperate resolve to seem calm and not over-eager, Arthur prepared to face Mr. Mayne. He wished to look as if cases like Crewdson v. ”

“ He rose, and stood leaning against the window-frame.
“In the face of that?” he jerked his head in the direction of Robert’s study, and laughed again. There was something in his tone, a savage irony, mingled with a kind of appeal, that made it very difficult for Rose to keep her head. Yet she managed to answer coolly.
“Oh, yes—quite. But, as I’ve often found, it takes one man to expect logic from another.”
“There’s something more important than logic that the average man surely may expect,” returned Mayne. He had thrown off all attempt at lightness of tone by now. ”