Woodville family

“ You have served me at my need; and I would fain serve you; but I must first know how."
"Faith, sir, that is not easy," answered Woodville, "for I do not know how myself."
"Well, then, I must think for you, Richard," rejoined Hal of Hadnock; "what stays your marriage?"
Woodville gazed at him with some surprise, and then smiled. "My marriage!--with whom?" he asked.
"Nay, nay," answered his new friend, "waste not time with idle concealments. I am a man who uses his eyes; and I can tell you, methinks, all about every one in the hall we have just left." ”

“ We are a poor order," he continued, with a sly smile, "but yet we live in a rich country, and the people are benevolent to us, so that our board is not ill supplied; and strangers who visit us always remember our poverty."
"That we will do most willingly," said Richard of Woodville, "to the best of our ability, good father. But you see we have a lady with us. ”

“ It is but to tell me whither you go, and when, and how."
"That is easily said, my fair maiden," answered Woodville. "I go first to my own place at Meon; then to the Court of Burgundy, at the end of six days; and, as I would not cross through France, I go by sea from Dover to a town called Nieuport, on the coast of Flanders. But say, is there aught I can do for you before I send the man I told you of, to give you what little assistance I can?"
"Send him not, send him not," cried the girl; "I am now rich--almost too rich, thanks to your generous interference with our good King. ”

“ In the midst of a gay and martial household, always dignified, placid, and reserved, Lord Woodville seemed to him like some hero of romance, some knight-templar who had consecrated his life to God, and, unlike the common herd of monks, who withdrew from the world in timidity or selfish sloth, he remained in it to face the temptations, the pleasures, and the vices, and to face them not merely as an idle spectator, but as a splendid protest against the vanity of the world. ”

“ But say, good youth, is yonder light looking out of your uncle's hall window--there, far on the other side of the stream?"
"No, no," answered Woodville; "ride after it, and see how far it will lead you. You will soon find yourself neck deep in the swamp. 'Tis a Will-o'-the-wisp. My uncle's house lies on before, beyond the village of Abbot's Ann, just a quarter of a mile from the Abbey; so, as the one brother owns the hall, and the other rules the monastery, they can aid and countenance each other, whether it be at a merrymaking or a broil. ”

“ My father esteems him highly, though he is not always ready to follow whither he would lead. You had better be his friend than his enemy; and yet, when there is anything to be done, communicate with me direct, and not through him."
"I will follow your advice, sir, as far as may be," replied Woodville; "but I do not think there is any great chance of Sir Philip de Morgan and myself interfering with each other. I am a soldier; he is a statesman. ”

“ I did not learn that there was any violence committed; for, though they are usually hard and cruel men, they are even more avaricious than bloodthirsty."
"God send it!" exclaimed Sir John Grey. "I wonder that your noble kinsman, when he heard that you were about to cross the sea, did not charge you with Mary's guidance hither. It would have been more safe."
"But you forget," replied Woodville, "that I was ignorant of all concerning her. I thought she was an orphan till within the last ten days--or, perhaps, not so well placed as that. Besides, my uncle would not countenance our love ”

“ She will soon give it, when she knows that on it hangs Richard of Woodville's life. She has taught me herself, how to wring her hard heart."
"She shall give no such promise for me," replied Woodville, sternly. "I tell thee, pitiful scoundrel, that I would rather, with my bosom free of aught like guilt, lay my head upon the block, than force a grateful and high-hearted girl to wed herself to such a vile slave as thou art. If your insinuations should be true, and she has done for me all that you say, full well and generously has she repaid the little I ever did to serve her. ”

“ I want his services for three days, if you will lend him to me--You are not yet ready to set out?"
"Not yet, Sire," replied Woodville; "but, in one week more, I hope to be on the sea."
"Well, then, send the man up to me, and he shall rejoin you in four days," answered Henry; "but let me see you tomorrow, my good friend, before you go home, for I would fain talk farther with you. It is seldom that a King can meet one with whom he can speak his thoughts plainly; and I find already a difference that makes me sad. ”

“ We poor women have but little power, even over our own fate and persons; but I will love none but you, Richard, wherever I go; and you will not doubt that love, though it be spoken so freely?"
"Nay, Heaven forbid!" said Richard of Woodville; "and were it not that you are my uncle's ward, I would put that love, dear Mary, to the proof, by asking you to fly with me and seek out some friendly priest who would bind our fate so fast together, that it would take greater power than any one in the land can boast, to sever it again. But I would not be ungrateful to one who has been a father to me." ”

“ After J. M. returned to deserted Middletown, he could not keep out of his mind the vision of the village he had just left, and the thought of the village like it which he had loved so well in his boyhood. It seemed to him that if Woodville kept its old aspect at all, he would find it a comfort to try to inspire the people now living there to preserve the old-timey look of it, as the president was doing for his old home. ”

“ Seating himself on a coffer of arms, Woodville ate sparingly, and drank a cup of wine, asking from time to time, "Where is Sir John Grey?--Where is my good uncle?--He will not be absent from an enterprise like this, I am right sure."
"Here, here; both here," answered Sir Henry Dacre; "and Mary and Isabel are even now at Calais,--but be advised, my friend. Do not show yourself to-night. The whole court is crowding round the King in the village down below. Let the battle be first over. You will do good service, I am sure. You can fight in armour not your own, and then--"
"Armour, Harry!" ”

“ I caught but a glimpse of her, indeed; but that bright face is not easily forgotten when once it has been seen."
"And yet I never thought of her!" murmured Richard of Woodville to himself: "poor girl, her deep gratitude would have merited better remembrance. Why smile you, boy? Every honourable man is bound to recollect all who trust him, and all who serve him."
"Nay, sir," replied the page, resuming a grave look, "I did but smile to think how often ladies remember knights and gentlemen, when they are themselves forgot."
"A sad comment on the baseness of man's nature," answered Woodville ”

“ WOODVILLE or WYDVILLE, ANTHONY, Baron Scales and second Earl Rivers (1442?–1483) , eldest son of Richard Woodville, first earl Rivers [q. v.] , and his wife Jacquetta, duchess of Bedford, was born in or about 1442 (Baker, ii. 162) . Lionel Woodville [q. v.] was a younger brother. In January 1460 his father took him to Sandwich, where both were surprised and captured by a band of Yorkists and carried off to Calais to be severely ‘rated’ by the Yorkist leaders for upstart insolence in taking part in their recent attainder at Coventry (Will. Worc. p. 771; Paston Letters, i. 506) . ”

“ Young Woodford too, though he had failed of marrying the rich young Jewess, either because of his indifference towards her, or of the preference she gave at the time he was first acquainted with her to Orlando, had since married the daughter of a great underwriter, and was in high affluence. The whole of the Woodford family, being thus circumstanced, looked down with contempt on the remains of that of Somerive; and, under the semblance of pity, enjoyed their depression, particularly that of Orlando, of whom, in talking of him to his mother, Mr Woodford affected to speak with great concern. ”

“ Richard of Woodville raised not his eyes to look at those who hung between death and life; he turned not to gaze at his companions on the shore: he knew that every energy, every thought was wanted to accomplish the great object; and, if he suffered his mind to stray, for even a single instant to other things, it was but to think, "I will show those who have belied me that I can risk life, even for beings I do not know!" ”

“ Soon afterwards the Lord Woodville himself appeared, attended by his household and guests, and followed by the main body of his mounted archers and men-at-arms.
As Ralph looked down into the valley below he was struck by the gay prospect. The bright tabards and glancing weapons of the men-at-arms gave colour and life to the picture, mingling as they did with the soberer dresses of the townsfolk, with their wives and daughters. ”

“ Richard of Woodville, and Hal of Hadnock, had soon seen enough of the Glutton mass; and, at a hint from his companion, the former took an opportunity of whispering to the priest,--
"We must go, I fear; lest my uncle be angry at our absence."
"Well, well," said the worthy clerk, "if it must be so, we cannot help it; but 'tis a sad pity, Master Richard, that so good a man as the Knight of Dunbury, should be such a discourager of pious ordinances."
"It is, indeed," answered Woodville, in a solemn tone; "but all men have their prejudices; and you know, father, he loves the Church." ”

“ He is a man who suspects everybody because he knows everybody has a right to suspect him. He may even have been suspecting me, his old, and, I fear, too generous employer. He has a mania about a spy hidden somewhere in Vicksburg.”
Young Victor Woodville laughed gayly.
“What folly,” he said, “for your old overseer, a man of Northern origin to boot, to suspect you, of all men, of helping a Yankee in any way. Why, Uncle Charles, everybody knows that you'd annihilate 'em if you could, and that you were making good progress with the task until you got that wound.” ”

“ The entrance to the Acorn was a tall dark arch, and as soon as Richard of Woodville rode in, followed by his two attendants--for Ned Dyram he had not seen since the day before--the host presented himself, saying, with a low reverence and a smile, "There has been a fair maid seeking you, noble sir. There have been tears in her eyes, too, full lately. I hope you are not a faithless squire, to make the pretty maiden weep."
"Poor thing, she has good cause," answered Woodville, gravely. "She is the poor old man's daughter, I suppose, who was killed by the horses last night. ”

“ You know your own heart--you know your own actions; and if they do not make you shrink from discussing what may be between you and me--"
"Shrink!" cried Richard of Woodville, vehemently; "Why should I shrink? shrink from discussing aught that I have done. No, by my knighthood! not before all the world, varlets or horseboys, princes or peers: I care not who hears my every action blazoned to the day."
"But I do, sir," replied Sir John Grey; "for the sake of those dear to us both--for your good uncle's sake, and for my child's."
"You are compassionate, Sir John!" said Woodville, bitterly ”

“ Wherever my son goes, he can claim kindred with Ap-Kerrig. He may not have money, but he always has what is much better—family, my dear.”
I had my doubts of their caring so very much for Morgan ap-Kerrig in India and China, but of course I never expressed them. I used to say it was a great thing to be so highly connected.
“It is, my dear, a great thing,” Mrs. Woodcourt would reply. “It has its disadvantages; my son’s choice of a wife, for instance, is limited by it, but the matrimonial choice of the royal family is limited in much the same manner.” ”

“ Tell me, however, one thing,--does not Sir Simeon of Roydon inherit the estates of this poor Lady Catherine?"
"He does, Sire, and is already in possession," replied Woodville.
"He is here at the court," rejoined the King, "and I shall show him favour for her sake."
Richard of Woodville gazed at the monarch in surprise, but a slight smile curled Henry's lip; and, although he gave no explanation of the words which he had spoken in a grave tone, his young companion was satisfied.
"I always love to get at the heart of a mystery," continued the King, seeing that Richard remained silent ”

“ The character of Woodville was entirely changed; and from that time it has continued to be one of the most moral, quiet, thriving, and prosperous of all the minor towns upon the Mississippi.
Turning our eye Paris-ward, our first emotion is one of sorrow—for their sakes and our own—at the present sad fate of our French brethren of the quill. The bayonet has pitted itself against the pen, and has come off victor—for the time being. The most immediate sufferers are doubtless political writers, who must stretch their lucubrations upon the Procrustean bed furnished by the Prince-President. ”

“ To that one little room, high up in the château, was Woodville restricted; no exercise was permitted to him, but the pacing up and down of its narrow limits: no relaxation but to sing snatches of the old ballads of which he was so fond, or to gaze from under the pointed arch of the window over the changing scene below. No one was permitted to see him but his own page, who had been captured with him, and one of the soldiers of the castle; no book existed within the walls ”