Pelham — Volume 02Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron
History
Pelham — Volume 02
Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron
Adventure stories; English fiction -- 19th century; Great Britain -- History -- 19th century -- Fiction
We then raised the unfortunate landlady, placed her on the sofa, and
Dartmore administered a plentiful potation of the Curacoa punch. By slow
degrees she revived, gave three most doleful suspirations, and then,
starting up, gazed wildly around her. Half of us were still laughing--my
unfortunate self among the number; this the enraged landlady no sooner
perceived than she imagined herself the victim of some preconcerted
villainy. Her lips trembled with passion--she uttered the most dreadful
imprecations; and had I not retired into a corner, and armed myself with
the dead body of Jocko, which I wielded with exceeding valour, she might,
with the simple weapons with which nature had provided her hands, have
for ever demolished the loves and graces that abide in the face of Henry
Pelham.
When at last she saw that nothing hostile was at present to be effected,
she drew herself up, and giving Bedos a tremendous box on the ear, as he
stood grinning beside her, marched out of the room.
We then again rallied around the table, more than ever disposed to be
brilliant, and kept up till day break a continued fire of jests upon the
heroine of the passage. "Cum qua (as Vincent observed) clauditur adversis
innoxia simia fatis!"
CHAPTER XXIII.
Show me not thy painted beauties,
These impostures I defy.
--George Withers.
The cave of Falri smelt not more delicately--on every side appeared
the marks of drunkenness and gluttony. At the upper end of the cave
the sorcerer lay extended, etc.
--Mirglip the Persian, in the "Tales of the Genii."
I woke the next morning with an aching head and feverish frame. Ah, those
midnight carousals, how glorious they would be if there was no next
morning! I took my sauterne and sodawater in my dressing-room; and, as
indisposition always makes me meditative, I thought over all I had done
since my arrival at Paris. I had become (that, God knows, I soon manage
to do) rather a talked of and noted character. It is true that I was
every where abused--one found fault with my neckcloth--another with my
mind--the lank Mr. Aberton declared that I put my hair in papers, and the
stuffed Sir Henry Millington said I was a thread-paper myself. One blamed
my riding--a second my dancing--a third wondered how any woman could like
me, and a fourth said that no woman ever could.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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