Modern Broods; Or, Developments Unlooked ForYonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
General
Modern Broods; Or, Developments Unlooked For
Yonge, Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary)
Domestic fiction; England -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction; English fiction
F. R. HAVERGAL.
MISS MOHUN and Miss Merrifield encountered Miss Prescott and Agatha among
a perfect herd of cycles, making Bessie laugh over the recollections of
the horror caused at Stokesley by the arrival of Arthurine Arthuret on a
tricycle twelve years previously.
The place was the Town Hall, the High School having proved too small for
the number of the intended audience, and Lord Rotherwood having been
captured, in spite of the _Kittiwake_ being pronounced ready to sail, and
all the younger passengers being actually on board, entertaining a party
from Clipstone. There he sat enthroned on the platform, with portraits
of himself, his Elizabethan ancestor, and the Prince of Wales overhead,
and, in _propria persona_ on either side, the Mayor of Rockstone, Captain
Henderson, and a sprinkling of the committee, Jane, of course, being one;
while in the space beneath was a sea of hats, more or less beflowered and
befeathered.
Lord Rotherwood began by complaining of an act of piracy! After being
exposed to a tempest and forced to put in for supplies, here he was
captured, and called upon to distribute prizes! He perceived that it was
a new act of aggression on the part of the ladies, proving to what
lengths they were coming. Tyrants they had always been, but to find them
wreckers to boot was a novelty. However, prizes were the natural
sequence of a maritime exploit, and he was happy to distribute them to
the maidens about to start on the voyage of life, hoping that these
dainty logbooks would prove a stimulus and a compass to steer by even
into unexplored seas, such as he believed the better-informed ladies were
about to describe to them.
Rockstone was used to its Marquis’s speeches, and always enjoyed them;
and he handed the prize-books to the recipients with a shake of the hand,
and a word or two of congratulation appropriate to each, especially when
he knew their names; and then he declared that they were about to hear
what education was good for, much better than from himself, from such
noted examples as Miss Arthuret and Miss Merrifield, better known to them
as Mesa. Wherewith he waved forward Miss Arthuret, a slight,
youthful-looking lady, fashionably attired, and made his escape with
rapid foot and hasty nods, almost furtively, while the audience were
clapping her.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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