Curtsey

“ I asked, "that was found on Lansdown yesterday morning?"
"What body?" replied my two cousins together.
"The body of an old lady."
"We have heard nothing of it," replied St. Nivel, "and we ought to have done so. But you have not told us what happened to you."
Going down the old stone staircase, I gave them a brief account of my arrest in London and journey down there, with my imprisonment during the night in the tower.
"Well," remarked St. Nivel, while his sister murmured a few words of sympathy, "I haven't quite got the hang of the thing yet, but you must tell us more at lunch." ”

“ Straight as a pillar she stood before the astonished boy, and the wounded bird had now spread out both its wings across her bosom, like some great mystical ornament of frosted silver.
"Oh, now I can never forget you!" cried Curdie. "I see now what you really are!"
"The wounded bird now spread out both its wings across her bosom."
"Did I not tell you the truth when I sat at my wheel?" said the old lady.
[31]
"Yes, ma'am," answered Curdie.
"I can do no more than tell you the truth now," she rejoined. "It is a bad thing indeed to forget one who has told us the truth. Now go." ”

“ Twenty men could not have done that And your fingers are white and smooth as any lady's in the land. I don't know what to make of it."
"I could give you twenty names more to call me, Curdie, and not one of them would be a false one. What does it matter how many names if the person is one?"
"Ah! but it is not names only, ma'am. Look at what you were like last night, and what I see you now!"
"Shapes are only dresses, Curdie, and dresses are only names. That which is inside is the same all the time." ”

“ Increasing friction with the burgesses soon led to an insurrection, and the Clito was wounded at the siege of Alost, late in July 1128, and died soon after. [59] That night, Robert Curthose, we are told, lying in his distant English prison, dreamed that he had himself been wounded in the right arm; and waking, “Alas!” he said, with telepathic vision, “my son is dead.” [60] It was, indeed, the end of all hope for the captive duke; and thereafter Henry I ruled in peace in Normandy as well as England. ”

“ Sir George Curzon for me; you are more used to that sort of thing than I."
All my eloquence being thrown away upon him, and on that instant thinking of my little lady in the grove, I walked towards the group with my hat in my hand, without further hesitation.
"If you please, Sir George Curzon, there is a young lady in the shrubberies who wants you."
"I think, young sir," replied Sir George, "you must make a mistake."
"No, sir. She has lost you, she says; it is Miss Curzon." ”

“ At the farther end of the terrace was an old lady sitting in an invalid's chair, also enjoying the beautiful prospect. By her side sat a nun on a garden chair, holding a large white sunshade over her; the sun was very hot. Not wishing to disturb her privacy, we turned back and met the Reverend Mother approaching with our conductress.
She was amiability itself. Certainly she would show monsieur and madame the goats. She was unaware that they had become so celebrated. Perhaps monsieur and madame kept goats in England?
"No; you have come only by the recommendation of the boatman, Fritz Killner?" ”

“ Henry could well afford to be obdurate, and he returned a flat refusal to the duke’s demands. Robert withdrew in anger, and returned to his duchy; [128] and [170] Henry wrote immediately to Anselm, who was still in Normandy, announcing his own crossing for 3 May following. It is not quite easy to see why he should have stated in his letter that Robert had parted with him amicably, [129] but the ways of diplomacy are often obscure.
Robert Curthose now knew beyond all question what he had to expect, and, as formerly in the crisis of his struggle with William Rufus, he sought aid from without. ”

“ Presently he turned to me.
"Look here, Bill," he remarked, "Ethel and I had a talk this evening before dinner about matters generally and she has started what I call a very good idea."
"What's that?" I asked.
"Of course, she knows all about your promise to the old lady; you told her, you know."
"Certainly," I answered, "I told you both. I know you never keep secrets from one another."
"Well, she knows," he proceeded, "therefore, that you have made up your mind to go to Valoro with that packet the old lady gave you." ”

“ What do you go breaking the rock for—the very rock upon which the city stands?"
"Look at your friend's forehead," said Curdie. "See what a lump he has got on it with falling over that same stone."
"What's that to my window?" cried the barber. "His forehead can mend itself; my poor window can't."
"But he's the king's baker," said Curdie, more and more surprised at the man's anger.
"What's that to me? This is a free city. Every man here takes care of himself, and the king takes care of us all. ”

“ James’s Palace had not been viewed without remonstrance; the Duke of Newcastle had begged the Princess Emily “for God’s sake”; that she would use her influence with her mother to prevent the last message going to the Prince.
But this request being conveyed to the Queen, by the Princess, did the Duke more harm with her than “all the stories his enemies could put together.”
[Pg 249]
So the message went, and the Prince and his family had to turn out on the 14th of September.
But even in this turning out, the little King, with his million a year [54] income, could not behave like a gentleman. ”

“ One day he remarked, without lifting his head, ‘In the interior you will no doubt meet Mr Kurtz.’ On my asking who Mr Kurtz was, he said he was a first-class agent; and seeing my disappointment at this information, he added slowly, laying down his pen, ‘He is a very remarkable person.’ Further questions elicited from him that Mr Kurtz was at present in charge of a trading post, a very important one, in the true ivory-country, at ‘the very bottom of there. Sends in as much ivory as all the others put together...’ He began to write again. The sick man was too ill to groan. ”

“ I MEET SIR HENRY CURTIS
It is a curious thing that at my age—fifty-five last birthday—I should find myself taking up a pen to try to write a history. I wonder what sort of a history it will be when I have finished it, if ever I come to the end of the trip! I have done a good many things in my life, which seems a long one to me, owing to my having begun work so young, perhaps. At an age when other boys are at school I was earning my living as a trader in the old Colony. I have been trading, hunting, fighting, or mining ever since. ”

“ Getting no satisfaction from the duke, the envoy hastened to England to ask aid of the king. But Henry was engrossed in the affairs of his realm—which Robert’s return had rendered critical—and he prudently decided not to embark upon a hazardous foreign enterprise at that time. He thanked the Norman commanders at Le Mans for their loyalty and consideration, but sent their messenger away empty. And when they had thus “laudably proved their fidelity,” they surrendered the citadel to Helias of La Flèche, late in October, and marched out with the honors of war. ”

“ He reappeared in about a couple of minutes, wearing an overcoat and a tall hat.
"Now," he said, "just lead the way."
We went together straight back to Number 190, and I think he had some misgivings about entering the house with me alone, but I reassured him by reminding him that an old lady was dying within; as it was he made me go first.
"I had no idea any one lived here at all," he remarked, as I lighted him along the passage to the stairs by means of wax vestas, of which I fortunately had a supply, for there was no candle in the hall. "I always thought this house was shut up. ”

“ Curthose did as he was advised. Excited and discontented, he went to William, and demanded to be put in possession of either part of the kingdom of England or the duchy of Normandy. William, instead of complying, exhorted Curthose, in a paternal tone, to amend his life, and to behave in a manner more worthy of the position he was destined to occupy.
"Return to your duty as a son," said the Conqueror, "and then make choice of better counsellors than you now have. Make choice of wise and grave persons of mature age to guide you—such a man, for instance, as Archbishop Lanfranc."
"Sir King!" ”

“ And I know I have been grumbling at my work, and doing a hundred other things that are wrong.'
'You have got it, Curdie,' said the old lady, in a voice that sounded almost as if she had been crying. 'When people don't care to be better they must be doing everything wrong. I am so glad you shot my bird!'
'Ma'am!' exclaimed Curdie. ”

“ Kurtz—Kurtz—that means short in German—don’t it? Well, the name was as true as everything else in his life—and death. He looked at least seven feet long. His covering had fallen off, and his body emerged from it pitiful and appalling as from a winding-sheet. I could see the cage of his ribs all astir, the bones of his arm waving. It was as though an animated image of death carved out of old ivory had been shaking its hand with menaces at a motionless crowd of men made of dark and glittering bronze. ”

“ Moreover, when we compare the curtsy of a lady with the awkward one a peasant girl makes, which, if continued, would bring her down on both knees, we may see in this last a remnant of that greater reverence required of serfs. And when, from considering that simple kneeling of the West, still represented by the curtsy, we pass Eastward, and note the attitude of the Mahomedan worshipper, who not only kneels but bows his head to the ground, we may infer that the curtsy also, is an evanescent form of the aboriginal prostration. ”

“ This gave a much-needed change to my ideas, but before I packed up to leave Bath I went down and had another look at 190 Monmouth Street.
I rang the bell and a woman opened the door with a baby in her arms.
"I'm the sergeant's wife, please sir," she said in reply to my inquiry.
"We was put in here by Inspector Bull."
"Then nothing has been heard of the old lady?" I asked.
"No, sir," she replied, "nothing. The neighbours hardly knew she was here, she showed herself so seldom; but the woman that used to come in and do odd jobs for her says she's been living here ten year." ”

“ Curtis called to his party just before sunrise to get up and see Old Faithful, the greatest geyser of them all, throw its stream of water into the air as high as a fourteen-story skyscraper while the morning sunrise on the enormous clouds of steam made reds and greens and all the colors of the rainbow, and the rainbow itself.
"How did you know when to call us, Dr. Curtis?"
"Old Faithful works on schedule time, every sixty-three minutes, night and day, summer and winter. It's very handy for travellers." ”

“ Curdie was not in a very good way then at that time. His father and mother had, it is true, no fault to find with him—and yet—and yet—neither of them was ready to sing when the thought of him came up. There must be something wrong when a mother catches herself sighing over the time when her boy was in petticoats, or the father looks sad when he thinks how he used to carry him on his shoulder. ”

“ Probably Pascal referred to the notorious scandals of Lisieux and of Saint-Pierre-sur-Dives. Something also of the duke’s reply may be gathered from the papal letter. Taking his stand upon the rights and customs of his ancestors, he had boldly claimed for himself [155] the right of investiture. This was sound ducal policy, but it would not be accepted in Rome from such a prince as Robert Curthose. It could only serve to complete the breach between the ex-crusader and the Holy See and leave the duke without support in his hour of need. ”

“ Henry accepted the offer, William of Évreux agreed, and a formal transfer of the homage was effected, the duke placing the count’s hands between the hands of the king. And with this reward for his pains, Henry returned to England “before winter,” doubtless more than ever convinced of [159] the weakness of Robert Curthose and of the feasibility of his overthrow and of the conquest of the duchy. ”

“ Had you been rich, my Peter, you would not have been so good as some rich men I know. And now I am going to tell you what no one knows but myself: you, Peter, and your wife both have the blood of the royal family in your veins. I have been trying to cultivate your family tree, every branch of which is known to me, and I expect Curdie to turn out a blossom on it. Therefore I have been training him for a work that must soon be done. I was near losing him, and had to send my pigeon. ”

“ Herbert formally became Duke William’s vassal for the county of Maine, and agreed that, if he should die childless, the duke should succeed him in all his rights and possessions. And further, a double marriage alliance was arranged, according to which William promised the count one of his infant daughters, and Robert Curthose was affianced to Herbert’s sister, Margaret of Maine. ”

“ Then, his father having again married happily, the boys were brought home to Providence, where they stayed till, in 1839, their father removed to New York. Three years later, Curtis, being allowed to determine for himself his course of life, and being in sympathy with the spirit of the so-called Transcendental movement, became a boarder at the community of Brook Farm. He was accompanied by his brother, James Burrill Curtis, whose influence upon him was strong and helpful. He remained there for two years, brought into stimulating and serviceable relations with many interesting men and women. ”