of ebony wood. An old crust of their mahogany bread, supposed at first
to be a specimen of quartz, was found in one of his coat pockets. He
kissed his girl Carinthia before going out on his last journey from home,
and spoke some wandering words. The mine had not been worked for a year.
She thought she would find him at the mouth of the shaft, where he would
sometimes be sitting and staring, already dead at heart with the death he
saw coming to the beloved woman. They had to let her down with ropes,
that she might satisfy herself he was not below. She and her great dog
and a faithful man-servant discovered the body in the forest. Chillon
arrived from England to see the common grave of both his parents.

And now good-bye to sorrow for a while. Keep your tears for the living.
And first I am going to describe to you the young Earl of Fleetwood, son
of the strange Welsh lady, the richest nobleman of his time, and how he
persued and shunned the lady who had fascinated him, Henrietta, the
daughter of Commodore Baldwin Fakenham; and how he met Carinthia Jane;
and concerning that lovely Henrietta and Chillon Kirby-Levellier; and of
the young poet of ordinary parentage, and the giant Captain Abrane, and
Livia the widowed Countess of Fleetwood, Henrietta's cousin, daughter of
Curtis Fakenham; and numbers of others; Lord Levellier, Lord Brailstone,
Lord Simon Pitscrew, Chumley Potts, young Ambrose Mallard; and the
English pugilist, such a man of honour though he drank; and the
adventures of Madge, Carinthia Jane's maid. Just a few touches. And
then the marriage dividing Great Britain into halves, taking sides.
After that, I trust you may go on, as I would carry you were we all
twenty years younger, had I but sooner been in possession of these
treasured papers. I promise you excitement enough, if justice is done to
them. But I must and will describe the wedding. This young Earl of
Fleetwood, you should know, was a very powder-magazine of ambition, and
never would he break his word: which is right, if we are properly