Belle Rose: A Romance of the Cloak and Sword — page 21: what you’re looking at

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

THE FALCONER’S SON. 11 while he was promenading in a meadow at a short dis- tance from St. Qmer, an unknown man who was indiffer- ently dressed. You would have taken him for some de- serter, by his accouterment, which pertained as much to the civil as to the military state, if the stranger had not been deformed. One could not be asoldier with a hump on the shoulders, and Jacques thought he might be a peddler. The siranger followed a path traced by the marsh-gar- deners between the vegetables, and mounted attimes upon a hillock to look over the hedges at the country beyond. When he was close to Jacques he stopped and began to consider him fora moment. Jacques was leaning against an apple tree, his hands in his pockets and whistling be- tween his teeth. After some minutes of refiection, the un- known walked toward him. “Do you belong to this country, my boy?’’ he said to *“Yes, monsieur,’’ replied Jacques. If some one had asked Jacques why he had saluted him whom he took for a peddler with the name of monsieur, he would have found great difficulty in explaining it. The stranger had an air which awed Jacques, though the son of Guillaume Grinedal did not allow himself to be easily intimidated. He spoke, looked, and acted with an extreme simplicity, but in this simplicity there was more of nobil- ity and pride than in all the importance of Monsieur de “Tf that is the case,”’ said the unknown, ‘“‘you can un- _ doubtedly give me the name of some one able to makea I ey on horseback?’’ _ “*You have that same one before you, monsieur.”’ oe “You?” “Bat, my little friend, you appear to me very young. you know that it is a question of galloping seven or ‘without drawing bridle?”’