The Maid of SkerBlackmore, R. D. (Richard Doddridge)
General
The Maid of Sker
Blackmore, R. D. (Richard Doddridge)
Foundlings -- Fiction; Romance fiction; Wales -- Fiction
The Coroner, having found no need to charge (except his rummer), left
his men for a little while to deliberate their verdict.
"Visitation of God, of course it must be," Stradling Williams began to
say; "visitation of Almighty God."
Some of the jury took the pipes out of their mouths and nodded at him,
while they blew a ring of smoke; and others nodded without that trouble;
and all seemed going pleasantly. When suddenly a little fellow, whose
name was Simon Edwards, a brother of the primitive Christians, or at
least of their minister, being made pugnacious by ardent spirits, rose,
and holding the arm of his chair, thus delivered his sentiments;
speaking, of course, in his native tongue.
"Head-man, and brothers of the jury, I-I-I do altogether refuse and deny
the goodness of that judgment. The only judgment I will certify is in
the lining of my hat,--'Judgment of Almighty God, for rabbiting on the
Sabbath-day.' Hezekiah Perkins, I call upon thee, as a brother
Christian, and a consistent member, to stand on the side of the Lord
with me."
His power of standing on any side was by this time, however, exhausted;
and falling into his chair he turned pale, and shrunk to the very back
of it. For over against him stood Evan Thomas, whom none of us had seen
till then. It was a sight that sobered us, and made the blood fly from
our cheeks, and forced us to set down the glass.
The face of black Evan was ashy grey, and his heavy square shoulders
slouching forward, and his hands hung by his side. Only his deep eyes
shone without moving; and Simon backed further and further away, without
any power to gaze elsewhere. Then Evan Thomas turned from him, without
any word, or so much as a sigh, and looked at us all; and no man had
power to meet the cold quietness of his regard. And not having thought
much about his troubles, we had nothing at all to say to him.
After waiting for us to begin, and finding no one ready, he spake a few
words to us all in Welsh, and the tone of his voice seemed different.
"Noble gentlemen, I am proud that my poor hospitality pleases you. Make
the most of the time God gives; for six of you have seen the white
horse." With these words he bowed his head, and left us shuddering in
the midst of all the heat of cordials. For it is known that men, when
prostrate by a crushing act of God, have the power to foresee the death
of other men that feel no pity for them. And to see the white horse on
the night of new moon, even through closed eyelids, and without sense of
vision, is the surest sign of all sure signs of death within the
twelvemonth. Therefore all the jury sate glowering at one another, each
man ready to make oath that Evan's eyes were not on him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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