Penny Blood Serial Fiction — page 144: what you’re looking at

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

LADY BESS’S HISTORY 127 at my presence amongst them. I answered him frankly, that I was anxious to make my way back to England, in order to earn my livelihood by my own industry, instead of being a burden on the kindness of strangers. He assured me, with impassioned vehemence, that so far from being a burden, I was the most welcome of guests; and he added that circumstances would compel the band to remain in that same spot for another fortnight, during which he besought me to tarry amongst them. Perceiving that I was em- barrassed how to answer, he addressed me gravely in the following manner: “ “Tt would be ridiculous, Sefiora Chandos, to suppose that you do not suspect what we are. I must, however, for my own sake, give you some explanations. In me you behold a Spanish nobleman, bearing the rank of count, and descended from one of the oldest families of Catalonia. But when I inherited my father’s title, the family estate was so impoverished that I found myself a man of broken fortunes. I sold all that was left, and joined the cause of Don Carlos, with the rank of captain in his army. Whether I have conducted myself as a gallant cavalier is not for me to say; suffice it for my lips to proclaim that where the fight has ever been thickest, there was I to be found. The recent treachery of Maroto, in signing a capitulation with the queen’s general Hspartero, annihilated my royal master’s cause. ‘Two alternatives then became present to my con- templation, — either to throw down my arms and acknowl- edge Queen Isabella, or to fly into France. No, there was another course to be pursued, and that was to associate myself with a few men, gallant and desperate as I am, and adopt a wild, predatory lite such as you behold us leading. The world will doubtless call us banditti, and we are so; but on entering upon this career, solemn oaths were regis- tered amongst us, to the effect that we should never plunder the poor, but only the rich, and that on no occasion should we use unnecessary violence, much less spill human blood. Those were our oaths, and they have become our laws. “* You now know, Senora, who and what we are, if, indeed, you were not previously aware of it. Perhaps you tremble lest we live in a constant state of danger, but this is not so. The queen’s troops are still too much occupied in making head against Cabrera to overrun the wilds of Catalonia for CONNIE DOOKS (FO)