The Battle of the Strong: A Romance of Two Kingdoms — Volume 1 — John Shaqi
The Battle of the Strong: A Romance of Two Kingdoms — Volume 1Parker, Gilbert
General
The Battle of the Strong: A Romance of Two Kingdoms — Volume 1
Parker, Gilbert
Anglo-French War, 1793-1802 -- Fiction; Channel Islands -- Fiction
At last the youth encased his telescope, and turned to descend the hill
to the town. As he did so, a bell began to ring. From where he was he
could look down into the Vier Marchi, or market-place, where stood the
Cohue Royale and house of legislature. In the belfry of this court-
house, the bell was ringing to call the Jurats together for a meeting of
the States. A monstrous tin pan would have yielded as much assonance.
Walking down towards the Vier Marchi the lad gleefully recalled the
humour of a wag who, some days before, had imitated the sound of the bell
with the words:
"Chicane--chicane! Chicane--chicane!"
The native had, as he thought, suffered somewhat at the hands of the
twelve Jurats of the Royal Court, whom his vote had helped to elect, and
this was his revenge--so successful that, for generations, when the bell
called the States or the Royal Court together, it said in the ears of the
Jersey people--thus insistent is apt metaphor:
"Chicane--chicane! Chicane--chicane!"
As the lad came down to the town, trades-people whom he met touched their
hats to him, and sailors and soldiers saluted respectfully. In this
regard the Bailly himself could not have fared better. It was not due to
the fact that the youth came of an old Jersey family, nor by reason that
he was genial and handsome, but because he was a midshipman of the King's
navy home on leave; and these were the days when England's sailors were
more popular than her soldiers.
He came out of the Vier Marchi into La Grande Rue, along the stream
called the Fauxbie flowing through it, till he passed under the archway
of the Vier Prison, making towards the place where the child had snatched
the hat from the head of the Bailly.
Presently the door of a cottage opened, and the child came out, followed
by her mother.
The young gentleman touched his cap politely, for though the woman was
not fashionably dressed, she was distinguished in appearance, with an air
of remoteness which gave her a kind of agreeable mystery.
"Madame Landresse--" said the young gentleman with deference.
"Monsieur d'Avranche--" responded the lady softly, pausing.
"Did the Bailly make a stir? I saw the affair from the hill, through my
telescope," said young d'Avranche, smiling.
"My little daughter must have better manners," responded the lady,
looking down at her child reprovingly yet lovingly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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