The Land of Bondage: A RomanceBloundelle-Burton, John
History
The Land of Bondage: A Romance
Bloundelle-Burton, John
Inheritance and succession -- Fiction; Virginia -- History -- Colonial period, ca. 1600-1775 -- Fiction
And now you shall hear a strange thing, for, as the bier with its mean
burden came close, so that the features of those who accompanied it
might be plainly perceived through the fog, the butcher, turning to
the lad dressed as a scarecrow, said, "_My lord_, stand forth and show
thyself. Here come those who have put it about that you have been dead
these two years, and who, if they had their will, would soon have you
dead now. Show thyself therefore, I say, Lord St. Amande, and prove
that thou art alive."
"Ay, ay, do," one of the collegians added. "If the news from London be
true, thy uncle, Robert, has already proclaimed himself the new lord,
and it is as well that the contrary should be proved."
Thus solemnly adjured, the boy did stand forth and, figure of fun
though he looked, gazed fiercely on those who rode behind his father's
coffin.
There were but three mourners--if such these ghouls could be called
who followed the body to its last resting place, not with any desire
to pay a tribute to the dead, but rather with the desire of satisfying
themselves, and one other, their master, that it was indeed gone from
the world for ever--two men mounted and a woman in a one-horse hackney
coach.
All were evil-looking, yet she was the worst, and, as she peered forth
from the window, the beggars all about groaned at her while the
students regarded her with looks of contempt. She was the German woman
who had come to Dublin when the late King had come to London, and was
called Madame Baüer, and was now no longer young. That she may once
have been comely is to be supposed, since the late Herr Baüer was said
to have been a wealthy German gentleman who ruined himself for
her--if, indeed, he had ever existed, which many doubted--and also
since the dead man now going to his grave had formed a passion for
her, while his usurping brother was actually said to be privately
married to her. Yet of a certainty, she had no beauty now, her face
being of a fiery red, due, it was whispered, to her love of strong
waters; her great staring and protuberant eyes were of a watery
blue-green hue, and her teeth were too prominent and more like those
of an animal. And when the small crowd groaned at her and called her
"painted Jezebel"--though she needed no paint, in truth--she gnashed
those teeth at them as though she would have liked to tear and rend
them ere she sank back into the carriage.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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