The Wanderer; or, Female Difficulties (Volume 4 of 5)Burney, Fanny
History
The Wanderer; or, Female Difficulties (Volume 4 of 5)
Burney, Fanny
France -- History -- Revolution, 1789-1799 -- Refugees -- Fiction; Historical fiction; Refugees -- Fiction; War stories
Under pretence of change of air for his health, Lord Granville, to hide
his grief from his father and friends, spent the first year of his
widowhood at Montpellier; then the residence of the Bishop of ----, the
maternal uncle of Gabriella; with whom he formed a friendship that
neither time nor absence, not even death itself, had had power to
dissolve; and to whom he confided the history and punishment of his
clandestine juvenile engagement. Called home, the following year, by the
Earl, his father, he had been prevailed upon to marry a lady of quality
and large fortune. But, previous to these new nuptials, to secure
justice to his eldest born, though he had not the courage to own her; as
well as to tranquillize Mrs Powel; he deposited in the hands of that
worthy old lady, the certificate of his first marriage; to which he
added a deed, that he called the codicil to whatever will he might have
made, or might hereafter make; and in which he declared Juliet
Granville, born near ----, in Yorkshire, to be his lawful daughter, by
his first marriage, with Juliet Powel, in Flanders; and, as such, he
bequeathed to her the same portion, at his death, that should be settled
upon any other daughter, or daughters, that he might have, hereafter, by
any subsequent marriage.
The impossibility of obtaining, in the Yorkshire retirement, such means
of improvement, as were suitable to the future expectations and lot in
life of his little girl, determined Lord Granville to have her conveyed
to France for her education. Mrs Powel, who had no other remaining tie
upon earth, but a son who was settled in the East Indies, preferred
accompanying her little darling to a separation; the fear of which, with
the possession of the marriage certificate, and the codicil to the will,
had always counteracted her impatience for the discovery ultimately
promised. The uncle of Gabriella, the Bishop, consented to take the
child under his immediate care; and to place her in the convent in which
his sister, the Marchioness of ----, had placed his niece. And here the
children had been brought up together, with the same opportunities of
improvement; except that the little Juliet had the advantage of speaking
English with her grandmother; who knew no other language; and who
entered the convent as a pensioner. By this means, and by books, Juliet
had perfectly retained her native tongue, though she had acquired
something of a foreign accent. She was known only as a young English
lady of fortune, for whom no expence was to be spared; and the
remittances for her board and education were constant, and even
splendid. She had been called simply by the name of Mademoiselle
Juliette, which had generally been supposed to be the name of her
family. Here, from the facility with which she caught instruction, and
the ability with which she appropriated its result, she became the most
accomplished pupil of the convent and was not more generally, from her
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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