Agnes, or, Beauty and Pleasure — page 168: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

160 ES Ee eee ee eee ee eee “Then, in this case,” said the Judge, “you tive development to her richly-modelled contours. must be locked up again. I have no objection to | The symmetry was of such statue-like porfection wait an hour: but if at nine o’clock you are not | that it would only have been impaired by such un- agreed, you will be locked up for the night.” ‘natural artifice; and as she walked in freedom, The jurors again retired; and the Judge sat | every movement was characterized by an elegant upon the bench, alternately reading the evening | elasticity. Although at so early an hour in the paper and conversing with the Lord Mayor. | morning, the heat was already oppressive ; and thus Winifred was kept in the dock: the number of | the lightness of Emily’s vesture was a comfort as AGNES; OR, BEAUTY AND PLEASURE, the audience remained undiminished. * He has brought four round to his own view !” Winifred kept repeating to herself. “Ob, how he must have striven for me!” The hour passed—and the jury were again sum- moned. In reply to the usual question put by the clerk of the court, the foreman said, “There are now seven on the side where at first there was only one: there are consequently five in favour of the verdict originally proposed. But there is not the slightest chance of an agreement.” “I don’t know,” said the Judge. “If only the ome had continued to hold out, I should deem it my duty to discharge you: but inasmuch as he has brought six others to his own opinion, I am bound to leave thé matter to the continued influ- ences of discussion.” “ Would it be too much to ask your lordship to wait another hour?” inquired the foreman, hesi- tatingly. “J will wait another hour,” responded the Judge. That hour elapsed: then another ten minutes was begged: and finally, at a quarter past ten o’clock—when Judge, barristers, audience, aud prisoner were well-nigh exhausted—the jury re- turned for the last time into their box. ““ Gentlemen, are you agreed ?” inquired the clerk of the court. “We are, sir,” was the foreman’s response. “How say you, gentlemen ?” demanded the clerk. ‘“ Guilty or Not Guilty ?” “Not Guilty,” rejoined the foreman. A faint cry escaped from Winifred’s lips ; and she was borne senseless from the dock. CHAPTER XXIX THE BANK OF THE STREAMLET. | well as a becoming mode of setting off her dusky loveliness. Nothing could be finer than the polish | of her skin, looking like tinted alabaster, so smooth and even, and conveying an idea of the firmness _of the flesh itself, yet also associated with the im- pression of velvet softness. It was as if the most | perfect statue which ever emanated from the ‘chisel of an ancient sculptor, had become animated ; with the Promethean fire of life—and as if having hurriedly cast light draperies around itself, was wandering with all the unstudied graces of natural movement and gesture. A large straw hat protected the quadroon girl’s countenance from the burning rays of the sun; and a basket was slung to her arm. But her mood was pensive: her eyes were bent down as she walked slowly through the garden attached to the villa of Mount Pleasant. With that thought- ful air the long ebon fringes of the eyelids half- curtained the luminous orbs themselves: the rich red lips were slightly apart, affording a glimpse of the snowy teeth, like closely set kernels in a cleft | of moist red fruitage. She was reflecting pro- foundly—painfully and sorrowfully; and ever and anon as she proceeded, a deep sigh made the half- revealed bosom heave, swell, and then sink again. Through the garden she bent her steps, until she | reached the bank of a little crystal streamlet; and | here she paused. On this spot bloomed the love- ‘liest flowers and flourished the choicest fruits of |the garden. It was Emily’s custom to cull the sweetest of these flowers and pluck the most | luscious of those fruits for the decoration of the _breakfast-table ; and she had been wont to take a pleasure in the proceeding—especially since Gus- : tavus was an inmate of the villa. But for the last | day or two, and particularly on this morning of | which we are writing, the beauteous quadroon ceased to experience that pleasure: for she now scarcely took pleasure in anything, for reasons i that will presently be explained. Nevertheless, | she still adhered to her custom: but it was in a THE scene of our story again shifts to that West | mechanical sort of manner, without pausing for Indian isle where the destinies of Gustavus Bar- | the purpose of selection, that she culled flowers rington had cast him. It was three or four days! and gathered fruits on the bank of the streamlet. after the loss of the box containing the ore and | Her basket was soon fuil; and then she sat down gold dust,—that loss which had suddenly reduced | close by the purling brook, abstractedly gazing on him from wealth and independence to compara- | its gently flowing tide and giving way to her re- tive poverty or dependence once more,—when the | flections once more. following scene took place. Presently, in the same mechanical way in which At a very early hour in the morning—much | she had plucked the fruits and flowers, Emily drew earlier than she was accustomed to issue from the | off her slippers and her hose; and she bathed her villa—Emily Pinnock walked forth. She was at- feet in the streamlet. The clear waters gurgled tired in the simplest negligée—a mere wrapper around her exquisitely shaped limbs which were “ thrown around her form,—the pliant and almost | thus consigned to their refreshing coolness; and owes? 12ers ll gauzy folds of the muslin displaying the exquisite symmetry of her shape, and following as it were the very movements of her beauty with a grace which only the sentiment of an anchorite could disasso- ciate from voluptuousness. those waters almost seemed to play with them with the consciousness of a sentiment. For seve- ral minutes did the beauteous quadroon continue ‘seated thus; until she was suddenly startled by She wore no corset—| hearing some one advancing amongst the trees; there was no artificial means of compressure to give | and looking round, she beheld Gustavus. additional slenderness to the waist or a more effee- Eee lIs tov had come forth to walk at that early —_—__——— — , Gomichbooks, com,