P.G.T. Beauregard

“ She was not only going alone with the man whom she loved into the wide world, with perils, changes, and events, surrounding them on all sides like a mist, through which the most piercing eye could not discover one ray of light, but she was quitting all old associations, breaking through every habit of thought, entering upon an entirely new state of being. ”

“ Here's Ned Hayward, the most deadly shot in Europe, whether with pistol, rifle, or fowling-piece, nothing escapes him, from the human form divine down to a cock-sparrow. The best angler in England, too; would throw a fly into a tea-spoon at fifty yards distance. He has come down for an interminable number of months to catch my trout, kill my game, and drink my Claret. Then there is my friend Mr. Beauchamp, more sentimentally given, a very learned man and profound, loves poetry and solitary walks, and is somewhat for musing melancholy made ”

“ Beauchamp, and Dr. Miles, lifted him up off the floor, and seated him on his chair again, though they undoubtedly expected to find one of those small holes which I should call a life-door, were it not that they never let life in, if they often let life out, yet no wound of any kind was to be perceived, except in the wig. Lights were brought, servants hurried in and out, cold water was sprinkled on the old gentleman's face, the butler recommended sal volatile, Sir John Slingsby tried brandy; and at length Mr. Wittingham was brought to himself. Every one was busy about him but Ned Hayward ”

“ Thus saying, with the landlord leading the way and Beauchamp, Ned Hayward, and one or two others following, he walked slowly upstairs and entered the room where Captain Moreton lay. The surgeon was bending over him and holding his head up on his left-arm. But the moment the old man heard the bustle of many feet, he waved his right-hand as if to forbid any one to approach. Every body paused for an instant, and in the midst of the silence that ensued an awful and very peculiar sound was heard, something like that made by a horse taking a draught of water, but not so long and regular. ”

“ Wharton's clerk told me that there was an execution going to be put in, so I came up to see if I could get my bill. But the lawyer was beforehand with us; and the matter is not so much, only forty pound or so, and I did not think it worth while, when I found how matters are going, to trouble the hearty old gentleman, who has spent a deal o' money with us all in his day."
"You seem a very respectable man," said Beauchamp, calmly, but still somewhat moved, "and you shall not lose by your conduct. ”

“ Beatrice, however, stopped him, and with an air of calm, stern dignity, exclaimed, "No more, Monsieur d'Aubin, I will hear no more; it is time, sir, that you should quit one whom you have so basely insulted. Your horse is in the stable, your health is restored; my servants will guide and guard you on your way, should you need protection; but never let your step cross the threshold of Beatrice of Ferrara again, as never again shall your image enter her mind." ”

“ I'll read the papers, first, however, if Wharton himself stood at the door; and he is a great deal worse than Satan. I like to hear all the lies that are going about in the world; and as newspapers were certainly invented for the propagation of falsehood, one is sure to find all there. Take a horse, take a horse, Beauchamp. Life is too short to walk three miles and back to speak with a gamekeeper."
"Well, Sir John, I will, with many thanks," answered his guest, and in about a quarter of an hour he was trotting away towards the new cottage of Stephen Gimlet, with a groom to show him the way. ”

“ The sweeter, gentler associations of existence now began to cling round him, and mellow the harshness of his character, like the green ivy twining round the rugged bark of the oak, and softening its rude majesty. Life took a new aspect. ”

“ After days of rain and greyness the weather had turned over a new leaf. The sun glinted among the bottles of Unfailing Lotion in the window, and everything in the world seemed to have relaxed and become cheerful. ”

“ Her last impression of London was of rows upon rows of mean houses, of cats wandering in back-yards among groves of home-washed underclothing, and a smoky greyness which gave way, as the train raced on, to the clearer grey of the suburbs and the good green and brown of the open country. ”

“ They have sprung up, new and young, while I have grown weary and old; and, in the midst of the world, I am like a withered leaf of the last year among the green fresh foliage of the spring. It is time that I should fall from the bough, and give place to brighter things. ”

“ Mary Clifford was darker in complexion, with the hair braided on her brow, there was deep but gentle thought in her dark eyes, and though the short chiselled upper lip could at times bear a joyous smile enough, yet the general expression was grave though not melancholy.
Beauchamp was a serious man, of a calm, quiet temper, somewhat saddened by various events which had befallen him, but which of those two faces, reader, think you he admired the most? The gay one, to be sure, the one the least like himself. ”

“ It is a pity to let such things revive; and there is something about that old fellow Wittingham which strikes me as odd. Another thing too was funny enough. Why should they pull the young lady out of the chaise? She could just as well have handed her purse and her trinkets out of the window!"
"That seemed strange to me also," answered Beauchamp. "But how do you propose to proceed?"
"Why, I think the best way will be to frighten the post-boy," replied Ned Hayward. "He's in league with the rogues, whoever they are, depend upon it; and if he thinks his neck's in a noose, he'll peach." ”

“ It very rarely happens that any one who is looked anxiously for ever does come; and of course, in the present instance, Beauchamp took the natural course and disappointed the two ladies.
"I have a message to deliver from Captain Hayward to your new keeper, Sir John," he said, "and therefore I will walk over to his cottage, and see him. An hour I dare say will accomplish it."
"It depends upon legs, my dear Sir," answered the baronet, looking up. "It would cost my two an hour and a half to go and come; so if I might advise, you would take four. ”

“ You may be as grave and demure as a cat before the fire, or as sad and solemn as the ivy on an old tower. I will be as light as the lark upon the wing, and as cheerful as a bough of Christmas holly, garlanding a boar's head on a high festival ”

“ If I had given a world, I could not have banished from my thoughts the violent death, the dying countenance, the bloody grave of the Count de Mesnil, the gentle looks, the melancholy fate of Madame de Villardin--the gloomy swimming down that fatal stream in the endeavour to find her, the long torch-light search for her body, and the terrible nights of watching I had spent by the bedside of her delirious and culpable husband. ”

“ Or thou, planet of love and hope, just climbing the hill of heaven!--wilt thou tell me whether the seeds which have been sown in our hearts under thine influence will bud and blossom into the flowers we dream of? Shall we go on hand in hand together, even unto the end, as hitherto we have lived, in deep affection? ”

“ One small city alone, like an altar to some sublime but nearly forgotten deity, upheld the flame of virtuous courage--simple, grand, noble, independent--enjoyed the smile of peace, but feared not the frown of war, reposed without softness, and rejoiced without debauchery. That city was Azimantium. Its youth, trained to the nobler amusements, only descended from the free mountain-air of their sky-surrounded dwelling to war with the wild beasts of the forests around, or to chase the swift deer over the Thracian plains. ”

“ We will go watch the rivulet that dances along, like the course of a happy life, sparkling as it goes, to find repose, at length, in the bosom of that vast, immeasurable ocean, where all streams end.--Nay, not a word more, if you love me!"
"I do! I do!" cried William Seymour, pressing his eager and burning lips upon her hand,--"I do! I do, Arabella! better than anything else on earth."
"Well, then, peace!" she said, "peace! for your sake and for mine; for nothing is so hopeless on earth as the love we feel." ”

“ Do you think because you happen to be a peer who has been skulking about the country under an alias, that you can come down and brow-beat us country gentlemen at your pleasure?"
"I never attempt to brow-beat a gentleman," replied Beauchamp, laying a particular emphasis on the last word, which called up a very unpleasant grin upon the faces of two or three of the men present, "nor do I brow-beat you, Mr. Wharton ”

“ At the sound of that voice, at the glance of that eye, the forms of many bright, and dear, and beloved, many who had been known and esteemed in times of innocence and of happiness, rose up as clearly before him, as if some magic wand had waved over the dark past, and brought out of the dim masses of things irrecoverably gone the images of the dead clothed in all the semblance of life and reality. ”

“ Wittingham.
Ned Hayward however, somewhat to Beauchamp's surprise, seemed determined to encourage their host in his light and rattling talk, and taking the latter up where Sir John had left it, he said, "Oh dear yes, I dare say we shall have capital sport down here. The old work of the 51st, Sir John; clearing all the fences, galloping over all the turnips, riding down the young wheat, forgetting the limits of the manor, letting the beasts out of the pound, making a collection of knockers and bell-pulls, fighting the young men, and making love to the young women--Mr. ”

“ Beauchamp, you say is such a kind man, too? I've heard Bill talk of him, and he tells me the same; but I can't well make out about him."
"Why, he is a friend of Captain Hayward's," rejoined the gamekeeper; "he has been staying a long while at the White Hart, and just the same sort of man as the other, though a sadder-looking man, and not so frank and free."
"But what looking man is he?" asked the old woman. "You can tell one what a dog's like, or what a ferret's like, Stephen, well enough ”

“ But Lancelot merely uttered a light laugh. He was young; it was summer; the sky was blue; the sun was shining; and the things in the world that really mattered were not cucumbers and vinegar but Romance and Love. Oh, he felt, for some delightful girl to come along on whom he might lavish all the pent-up fervour which had been sizzling inside him for weeks!
And at this moment he saw her.
She was leaning against the rail of a yacht that lay at its moorings some forty yards away; and, as he beheld her, Lancelot's heart leaped like a young gherkin in the boiling-vat. ”

“ Above, the trees hang, as if planted in the air, and throw a green, soft shade across the rich tints of the road, except where a gleam of sunshine breaking through, catches upon the salient points of the rock and chequers the deep shadows of the leaves with a dancing light. The silence to the ear has the same effect as the shade to the eye ”

“ There is no describing it; the soul is lost in the vastness that it contemplates, and it is long before the eye can comprehend the grandeur of the objects before it. High above the amphitheatre lies the mountain, pile upon pile, to the very sky, like gigantic steps carpeted, with snow. ”

“ Through those deep passes, too, clad with the fir and pine, whose evergreen garmenture bore no token of the approaching autumn, the long and dusky troops of barbarian horsemen poured on, lifting, with wild enthusiastic delight, to the mountain, the rock, the rugged precipice, the variegated foliage, and all the beauties of uncultivated nature, those eyes which looked with scorn or abhorrence upon all the productions of civilized art, and on the mighty master works of the human mind. ”

“ High above earth's habitations, nothing looked upon us but the clear blue sky and the bright calm moon, whose beams fell soft and silvery upon the tall mountain peaks around--poured into every valley--danced in every stream, and contrasted the broad, deep shadows thrown by each projecting rock, with the bright effulgence of those spots whereon she glowed with her full power. ”

“ I wish to Heaven you could catch him."
"Have you any idea of his name?" asked Beauchamp.
"None in the world," replied Ned Hayward; "but there are two people here who must know, I think. One is young Wittingham, and the other is Ste Gimlet, otherwise Wolf. I have a strong notion this fellow was one of those attacking the carriage the other night. But that puts me in mind, Beauchamp, that I intended to go up and talk to Gimlet, but I have not time now. I wish you would; and just tell him from me, I will pay his boy's schooling if he will send him to learn something better than making bird-traps. ”

“ There was the man who addressed his ball as if he were stroking a cat, the man who drove as if he were cracking a whip, the man who brooded over each shot like one whose heart is bowed down by bad news from home, and the man who scooped with his mashie as if he were ladling soup. ”

“ Although at good Sir John Slingsby's I shall have fishing enough, I dare say, yet one cannot fish all day and every day, and sometimes one gets desperately bored in an old country-house, unless fate strikes out something not quite in the common way to occupy one."
"Did you ever try falling in love?" asked Beauchamp, with a quiet smile, as he glanced his eyes over the fine form and handsome features of his companion, "it is an excellent pastime, I am told."
"No!" answered Ned Hayward quickly and straightforwardly; "I never did, and never shall. I am too poor, Mr. ”