The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 321: what you’re looking at

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

$10 course she must be: it is natural you should have told her.” “T preserved that secret religiously until it trans- pired as one of the consequences of the duel. Yes —I preserved it for your aake, Florina ; because I deemed it to be a secret of so solemn a character that it ought not to be revealed, even to a sister, until you should vouchsafe the permission. I con- sidered it to be your secret even more than mine, because I knew how you were situated in respect to Edmund Saxondale, and I thought it best to retain everythin’ closely locked up in my own heart until you, in your own good time, should have told me that there was no longer need for such secrecy.” “You are all kindness and consideration, William, as you are all that is generous and noble,” said Florina, with affection beaming in her beauteous blue eyes; and as she gased upon he lover her countenance reflected the emotions that swelled in her soul deeper and happier than she had ever yet experienced in her whole life—unless an exception must be made for that day on which this love of her’s was first avowed and the reciprocal passion confessed. “When forced inté that duel,” resumed Deveril, “and seeing myself standing as it were face to face with death, I adopted those measures which pru- dence and my own demanded. I wrote several letters, to be delivered in case I fell. One was to you, Florina—assuring you of mine inno- cence as well as of my love, and beseeching that you would sometimes bestow a thought on him whoee heart had been so devotedly your’s,” “© William! what must you have suffered !”— and the beautiful creature threw her arms round his neck and kissed him of her own accord: but as she cheeks the tears that had started from her blue eyes. “Am I not now fully recompensed ?” exclaimed Deveril, with enthusiastio fondness. “ But let mo continue. Another letter was to my sister Angela, bidding her the tenderest farewells; and a third was to Mr. Gunthorpe. In this letter I gave him tie fullest explanation how I had been provoked to a duel by Lord Harold Staunton; and I revealed to him the secret of my devoted love for you—beseech- ing that in case I fell, he would personally become the bearer of the letter which I had written to you, my sweet Florina,—eo that he might tell you all he knew of my character and help to corroborate the assurances I had penned of my innocence towards Lady Saxondale. For two days after the duel I. remained insennble of what was passing around. | Mr. Gunthorpe, visiting my lodgings in Pall Mall, THE MYSTERIES OF THE OOURT. “To possess your sympathy and yon ene love, is sweet beyond description—it is paradise ineffable !” —and again did William Deveril prees the young maiden to his heart. “Think you, sweet Mirina,” he continued after a pause, “that your absence from the Castle will be noticed? think you that there is any danger of our being intruded upon P” “No: my aunt will not come out this morni Miss Farefield has gone to ride with a gentleman of the neighbourhood—and Lady Saxondale intimated after breakfast that she should be occupied for several hours in writing letters.” “If, then, we may safely enjoy another half-hour of each other’s society,” said Deveril, “ I will narrate to you a few incidents connected with myself and Angela. This is the time, my beloved Florina, for the fullest confidence.” “T shall listen,” the young lady, “ with a most heartfelt interest. Everything that regards you, William, is now of consequence to me. If you have sorrows to speak of, I can sympathise with them: and if you tell me of joys and remimiscences of past happiness, I can share the delights accom- panying your retrospection.” “ ‘You will not expect to hear, Florina, that I am of good family or of gentle birth,” resumed Deveril ; “and it was perhaps some little false pride on my part that prevented me from proffering certain ex- planations on that memorable and happy day when you first suffered me to know that I loved you not in vain. I had it on the tip of my tongue to tell you that Angela was my sister; but I knew you not then as I know you now, and I feared that it might shock those lofty notions in which you have been reared—and I at all events thought it better to reserve that and other explanations until another oocasion. Had I been more candid,—or rather had I then appreciated as I ought to have done the generosity of your nature, which enables you to rise superior to the artificial conventionalisms of aristocratic circles, — how much unhappi would have been spared us both! However, the past cannot be recalled, much as it may bg re- gretted; and I will now tell you my story.” “Proceed, dearest William,” said Florina: “I am all attention.” “ My earliest reminiscences,” commenced Deveril, “are connected with a troop of strolling players, to which company my father and mother belonged. Their name was Deveril. I am about a year older than my sister Angela; and I recollect that in her infancy she was one of the most beautiful little cherubs that ever constituted a parent’s joy. Al- though in euch humble c#cumstances—expoeed to all the sad vicissitudes of « strolling life—our father in pursuance of an intimation which he received | and mother were exceedingly kind to us, and treated from my second, Mr. Forester, found the letters and us with the tenderest affection. They were superior perused the one addressed to himself. Thus was it, people in their way. My mother had belonged to Florina, that he discovered the secret of our love.” a respectable family; but by marrying a poor clerk, “ But wherefore did he not bring to me the letter | as my father at first was, she was altogether dis- which you had written, and which was intended for "carded by her relatives and friends. My father was me P” asked Florina. one of those gay thoughtless men who cannot ap- “ Because the express injunction was penned by | preciate the value of money: and with but a very my hand upon the envelope to the effect that it was small salary and a wife to keep, he fell into difi- only to be delivered in case I should fall in the culties. Unable to pay his debts, and threatened duel.” with a prison, he abeconded from his native town, “Oh! if that horror had taken placo!”—and the his loving wife being the partner of his flight. fair young creature shuddered with a cold tremor From what I have often heard him say, I am but from head to foot at the bare ides. | too well aware that he and my mother must have COMIC LOO SS CO