Split (1)

train · 10.3k rows

chapter_number stringlengths 1 2	title stringlengths 3 691	text stringlengths 38 376k	metadata dict
5	None	You could not but suppose, my Curtius, when you came to the end of my last letter, that I should soon write again, and not leave you ignorant of the manner in which I passed the evening at the palace of Zenobia. Accordingly, knowing that you would desire this, I had no sooner tied and sealed my epistle, than I sat down...	{ "id": "8938" }
6	None	Many days have passed, my Curtius, since I last wrote, each bringing its own pleasures, and leaving its ineffaceable impressions upon the soul. But though all have been in many things delightful, none has equalled that day and evening at the palace of the Queen. I have now mingled largely with the best society of Palmy...	{ "id": "8938" }
7	None	You will be glad to learn, my Curtius, that the time has now come, when I may with reason look for news from Isaac, or for his return. It was his agreement to write of his progress, so soon as he should arrive at Ecbatana. But since he would consume but a very few days in the accomplishment of his task, if, the gods he...	{ "id": "8938" }
8	None	The words of that Christian recluse, my Curtins, still ring in my ear. I know not how it is, but there is a strange power in all that I have heard from any of that sect. You remember how I was struck by the manner, the countenance, and above all by the sentiments of Probus, the Christian whom I encountered on his way t...	{ "id": "8938" }
9	None	Several days have elapsed since I last wrote, yet Calpurnius is not arrived. I am filled with apprehensions. I fear lest he may have thought too lightly of the difficulties of an escape, and of the strictness with which he is watched; for while he seems to have held it an easy matter to elude the vigilance of his keepe...	{ "id": "8938" }
10	None	As I returned from the worship of the Christians to the house of Gracchus, my thoughts wandered from the subjects which had just occupied my mind to the condition of the country, and the prospect now growing more and more portentous of an immediate rupture with Rome. On my way I passed through streets of more than Roma...	{ "id": "8938" }
11	None	From my late letters to Portia, and which without doubt you have before this read, you have learned with certainty, what I am sure the eye of Lucilia must before have clearly discerned, my love of the Princess Julia. I have there related all that it can import my friends to know. The greatest event of my life--the issu...	{ "id": "8938" }
12	None	I lament to hear of the disturbance among your slaves, and of the severity with which you have thought it necessary to proceed against them. You will bear me witness that I have often warned you that the cruelty with which Tiro exercised his authority would lead to difficulties, if not to violence and murder. I am not ...	{ "id": "8938" }
13	None	These few days having passed in the manner I have described, our impatience has been relieved by news from the West. We learn that Aurelian, having appointed Illyricum as the central point for assembling his forces, has, marching thence through Thrace, and giving battle on the way to the Goths, at length reached Byzant...	{ "id": "8938" }
14	None	The last days of this so lately favored empire draw near--at least such is my judgment. After a brief day of glory, its light will set in a long night of utter darkness and ruin. Close upon the rear guard of the Queen's forces followed the light troops of Aurelian, and early this morning it was proclaimed that the ar...	{ "id": "8938" }
15	None	It were a vain endeavor, my Curtius, to attempt to describe the fever of indignation, and rage, and grief, that burned in the bosoms of this unhappy people, as soon as it was known that their Queen was a captive in the hands of the Romans. Those imprisoned upon suspicion of having been concerned in her betrayal would h...	{ "id": "8938" }
16	None	I write to you, Curtius, as from my last you were doubtless led to expect, from Emesa, a Syrian town of some consequence, filled now to overflowing with the Roman army. Here Aurelian reposes for a while, after the fatigues of the march across the desert, and here justice is to be inflicted upon the leaders of the late ...	{ "id": "8938" }
17	None	I write again from Palmyra. We arrived here after a day's hard travel. The sensation occasioned by the unexpected return of Gracchus seemed to cause a temporary forgetfulness of their calamities on the part of the citizens. As we entered the city at the close of the day, and they recognised their venerated friend, th...	{ "id": "8938" }
18	None	From Piso to Fausta I trust that you have safely received the letter which, as we entered the Tiber, I was fortunate enough to place on board a vessel bound directly to Berytus. In that I have told you of my journey and voyage, and have said many other things of more consequence still, both to you, Gracchus, and mys...	{ "id": "8938" }
1	TWO GENERATIONS	Why all delights are vain, but that most vain Which with pain purchased doth inherit pain. “My dear--Madam--what you call heart does not come into the question at all.” Sir John Meredith was sitting slightly behind Lady Cantourne, leaning towards her with a somewhat stiffened replica of his former grace. But h...	{ "id": "8939" }
2	OVER THE OLD GROUND	A man who never makes mistakes never makes anything else either. Miss Millicent Chyne was vaguely conscious of success--and such a consciousness is apt to make the best of us a trifle elated. It was certainly one of the best balls of the season, and Miss Chyne's dress was, without doubt, one of the most successful ar...	{ "id": "8939" }
3	A FAREWELL	Since called The Paradise of Fools, to few unknown. Having been taught to take all the chances and changes of life with a well-bred calmness of demeanour, Jack Meredith turned the teaching against the instructor. He pursued the course of his social duties without appearing to devote so much as a thought to the q...	{ "id": "8939" }
4	A TRAGEDY	Who knows? the man is proven by the hour. In his stately bedroom on the second floor of the quietest house in Russell Square Mr. Thomas Oscard--the eccentric Oscard--lay, perhaps, a-dying. Thomas Oscard had written the finest history of an extinct people that had ever been penned; and it has been decreed that he wh...	{ "id": "8939" }
5	WITH EDGED TOOLS	Do not give dalliance Too much the rein; the strongest oaths are straw To the fire i' the blood. “And what do you intend to do with yourself?” asked Lady Cantourne when she had poured out tea. “You surely do not intend to mope in that dismal house in Russell Square?” “No, I shall let it if I can.” “Oh, ...	{ "id": "8939" }
6	UNDER THE LINE	Enough of simpering and grimace, Enough of vacuity, trimmed with lace. “Curse this country! Curse it--curse it!” The man spoke aloud, but there was no one near to hear. He shook his skinny yellow fist out over the broad river that crept greasily down to the equatorial sea. All around him the vegetable kingdom ...	{ "id": "8939" }
7	THE SECRET OF THE SIMIACINE	Surtout, Messieurs, pas de zele. Such was the meeting of Victor Durnovo and Jack Meredith. Two men with absolutely nothing in common--no taste, no past, no kinship--nothing but the future. Such men as Fate loves to bring together for her own strange purposes. What these purposes are none of us can tell. Some hold tha...	{ "id": "8939" }
8	A RECRUIT	Said the Engine from the East, “They who work best talk the least.” It is not, of course, for a poor limited masculine mind to utter heresies regarding the great question of woman's rights. But as things stand at present, as, in fact, the forenamed rights are to-day situated, women have not found comprehension o...	{ "id": "8939" }
9	TO PASS THE TIME	Quand on n'a pas ce que l'on aime, il faut aimer ce que l'on a. “Your energy, my dear lady, is not the least of many attributes.” Lady Cantourne looked up from her writing-desk with her brightest smile. Sir John Meredith was standing by the open window, leaning against the jamb thereof with a grace that had lost its...	{ "id": "8939" }
10	LOANGO	Faithful and hopeful, wise in charity, Strong in grave peace, in pity circumspect. Those who for their sins have been to Loango will scarcely care to have its beauties recalled to memory. And to such as have not yet visited the spot one can only earnestly recommend a careful avoidance. Suffice it to say, there...	{ "id": "8939" }
11	A COMPACT	Drifting, slow drifting down a wizard stream. “No one knows,” Victor Durnovo was in the habit of saying, “what is going on in the middle of Africa.” And on this principle he acted. “Ten miles above the camping-ground where we first met,” he had told Meredith, “you will find a village where I have my headquarters....	{ "id": "8939" }
12	A MEETING	No one can be more wise than destiny. The short equatorial twilight was drawing to an end, and all Nature stood in silence, while Night crept up to claim the land where her reign is more autocratic than elsewhere on earth. There is a black night above the trees, and a blacker beneath. In an hour it would be dark, and...	{ "id": "8939" }
13	IN BLACK AND WHITE	A little lurking secret of the blood, A little serpent secret rankling keen. The three men walked up towards the house together. It was a fair-sized house, with a heavy thatched roof that overhung the walls like the crown of a mushroom. The walls were only mud, and the thatching was nothing else than banana leav...	{ "id": "8939" }
14	PANIC-STRICKEN	Is this reason? Is this humanity? Alas! it is man. The next morning Jack Meredith was awakened by his servant Joseph before it was fully light. It would appear as if Joseph had taken no means of awakening him, for Meredith awoke quite quietly to find Joseph standing by his bed. “Holloa!” exclaimed the master, fully...	{ "id": "8939" }
15	A CONFIDENCE	The spirits Of coming things stride on before their issues. There is nothing that brings men so close to each other as a common grievance or a common danger. Men who find pleasure in the same game or the same pursuit are drawn together by a common taste; but in the indulgence of it there is sure to arise, sooner...	{ "id": "8939" }
16	WAR	Who, when they slash and cut to pieces, Do so with civilest addresses. There is no power so subtle and so strong as that of association. We have learnt to associate mustard with beef, and therefore mustard shall be eaten with beef until the day when the lion shall lie down with the lamb. Miss Millicent Chyne b...	{ "id": "8939" }
17	UNDERHAND	The offender never pardons. Victor Durnovo lingered on at Loango. He elaborated and detailed to all interested, and to some whom it did not concern, many excuses for his delay in returning to his expedition, lying supine and attendant at Msala. It was by now an open secret on the coast that a great trading expedition...	{ "id": "8939" }
18	A REQUEST	It surely was my profit had I known It would have been my pleasure had I seen. “Why did he come back?” Jocelyn had risen as if to intimate that, if he cared to do so, they would sit in the verandah. “Why did Mr. Durnovo come back?” she repeated; for Jack did not seem to have heard the question. He was drawin...	{ "id": "8939" }
19	IVORY	'Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus, Another thing to fall. One of the peculiarities of Africa yet to be explained is the almost supernatural rapidity with which rumour travels. Across the whole breadth of this darkest continent a mere bit of gossip has made its way in a month. A man may divulge a secret, say,...	{ "id": "8939" }
20	BROUGHT TO THE SCRATCH	Take heed of still waters; they quick pass away. Guy Oscard was sitting on the natural terrace in front of Durnovo's house at Msala, and Marie attended to his simple wants with that patient dignity which suggested the recollection of better times, and appealed strongly to the manhood of her fellow-servant Joseph. O...	{ "id": "8939" }
21	THE FIRST CONSIGNMENT	Since all that I can ever do for thee Is to do nothing, may'st thou never see, Never divine, the all that nothing costeth me. One morning, three months later, Guy Oscard drew up in line his flying column. He was going back to England with the first consignment of Simiacine. During the twelve weeks that lay ...	{ "id": "8939" }
22	THE SECOND CONSIGNMENT	Who has lost all hope has also lost all fear. Among others, it was a strange thing that Jocelyn felt no surprise at meeting the name of Millicent Chyne on the lips of another man. Women understand these things better than we do. They understand each other, and they seem to have a practical way of accepting human natu...	{ "id": "8939" }
23	MERCURY	So cowards never use their might But against such that will not fight. On nearing the bungalow, Jocelyn turned aside into the forest where a little colony of huts nestled in a hollow of the sand-dunes. “Nala,” she cried, “the paddle-maker. Ask him to come to me.” She spoke in the dialect of the coast to some...	{ "id": "8939" }
24	NEMESIS	Take heed of still waters. Despite his assertion to Lady Cantourne, Guy Oscard stayed on in the gloomy house in Russell Square. He had naturally gone thither on his return from Africa, and during the months that followed he did not find time to think much of his own affairs. Millicent Chyne occupied all his thoughts-...	{ "id": "8939" }
25	TO THE RESCUE	I must mix myself with action lest I wither by despair. Jocelyn had not conveyed to her brother by word or hint the accusation brought against him by Victor Durnovo. But when he returned home it almost seemed as if he were conscious of the knowledge that was hers. She thought she detected a subtle difference in his m...	{ "id": "8939" }
26	IN PERIL	He made no sign; the fires of Hell were round him, The Pit of Hell below. “About as bad as they can be, sir. That's how things is.” Joseph set down his master's breakfast on the rough table that stood in front of his tent and looked at Jack Meredith. Meredith had a way of performing most of his toilet outside ...	{ "id": "8939" }
27	OFF DUTY	Chacun de vous peut-etre en son coeur solitaire Sous des ris passagers etouffe un long regret. “Good-bye to that damned old Platter--may it be for ever!” With this valedictory remark Joseph shook his fist once more at the unmoved mountain and resumed his march. “William,” he continued gravely to a native porte...	{ "id": "8939" }
28	A SLOW RECOVERY	We dare not let our tears flow, lest, in truth, They fall upon our work which must be done. “They was just in time,” said Joseph pleasantly to Marie that same evening, when Jack Meredith had been made comfortable for the night, and there was time to spare for supper. “Ah!” replied the woman, who was busy with ...	{ "id": "8939" }
29	A CHANCE ACQUAINTANCE	The pride that prompts the bitter jest. A space had with some difficulty been cleared at the upper end of an aristocratic London drawing-room, and with considerable enthusiasm Miss Fitzmannering pranced into the middle of it. Miss Fitzmannering had kindly allowed herself to be persuaded to do “only a few steps” of he...	{ "id": "8939" }
30	OLD BIRDS	Angels call it heavenly joy; Infernal tortures the devils say; And men? They call it--Love. “By the way, dear,” said Lady Cantourne to her niece the next afternoon, “I have asked a Miss Gordon to come to tea this afternoon. I met her last night at the Fitzmannerings. She lives in Loango and knows Jack. I th...	{ "id": "8939" }
31	SEED-TIME	What Fate does, let Fate answer for. One afternoon Joseph had his wish. Moreover he had it given to him even as he desired, which does not usually happen. We are given a part, or the whole, so distorted that we fail to recognise it. Joseph looked up from his work and saw Jocelyn coming into the bungalow garden. H...	{ "id": "8939" }
32	AN ENVOY	What we love perfectly For its own sake we love,... ... That which is best for it is best for us. “Feel like gettin' up to breakfast, do you, sir?” said Joseph to his master a few days later. “Well, I am glad. Glad ain't quite the word, though!” And he proceeded to perform the duties attendant on his master'...	{ "id": "8939" }
33	DARK DEALING	Only an honest man doing his duty. When Jack Meredith said that there was not another man in Africa who could make his way from Loango to the Simiacine Plateau he spoke no more than the truth. There were only four men in all the world who knew the way, and two of them were isolated on the summit of a lost mountain in...	{ "id": "8939" }
34	AMONG THORNS	We shut our hearts up nowadays, Like some old music-box that plays Unfashionable airs. Sir John Meredith was sitting stiffly in a straight-backed chair by his library fire. In his young days men did not loll in deep chairs, with their knees higher than their heads. There were no such chairs in this library,...	{ "id": "8939" }
35	ENGAGED	Well, there's the game. I throw the stakes. Lady Cantourne was sitting alone in her drawing-room, and the expression of her usually bright and smiling face betokened considerable perturbation. Truth to tell, there were not many things in life that had power to frighten her ladyship very much. Hers had been a prospe...	{ "id": "8939" }
36	NO COMPROMISE	Where he fixed his heart he set his hand To do the thing he willed. “MY DEAR SIR JOHN,--It is useless my pretending to ignore your views respecting Jack's marriage to Millicent; and I therefore take up my pen with regret to inform you that the two young people have now decided to make public their engagement. Mo...	{ "id": "8939" }
37	FOUL PLAY	Oh, fairest of creation, last and best Of all God's works! For one or two days after the public announcement of her engagement, Millicent was not quite free from care. She rather dreaded the posts. It was not that she feared one letter in particular, but the postman's disquietingly urgent rap caused her a vague ...	{ "id": "8939" }
38	THE ACCURSED CAMP	Here--judge if hell, with all its power to damn, Can add one curse to the foul thing I am-- There are some places in the world where a curse seems to brood in the atmosphere. Msala was one of these. Perhaps these places are accursed by the deeds that have been done there. Who can tell? Could the trees--the two ...	{ "id": "8939" }
39	THE EXTENUATING CIRCUMSTANCE	Yet I think at God's Tribunal Some large answer you shall hear. In a dimly-lighted room in the bungalow at Loango two women had been astir all night. Now, as dawn approached, one of them, worn out with watching, wearied with that blessed fatigue of anxiety which dulls the senses, had laid her down on the curtain...	{ "id": "8939" }
40	SIR JOHN'S LAST CARD	'Tis better playing with a lion's whelp Than with an old one dying. As through an opera runs the rhythm of one dominant air, so through men's lives there rings a dominant note, soft in youth, strong in manhood, and soft again in old age. But it is always there, and whether soft in the gentler periods, or strong ...	{ "id": "8939" }
41	A TROIS	Men serve women kneeling; when they get on their feet they go away. Guy Oscard stood for a moment on the threshold. He heard the door close behind him, and he took two steps farther forward. Jack Meredith and Millicent were at the fireplace. There was a heap of disordered paper and string upon the table, and a few ...	{ "id": "8939" }
42	A STRONG FRIENDSHIP	Still must the man move sadlier for the dreams That mocked the boy. “Where are you going?” asked Meredith, when they were in the street. “Home.” They walked on a few paces together. “May I come with you?” asked Meredith again. “Certainly; I have a good deal to tell you.” They called a cab, and singular...	{ "id": "8939" }
43	A LONG DEBT	The life unlived, the deed undone, the tear Unshed. “I rather expect--Lady Cantourne,” said Sir John to his servants when he returned home, “any time between now and ten o'clock.” The butler, having a vivid recollection of an occasion when Lady Cantourne was shown into a drawing-room where there were no flower...	{ "id": "8939" }
44	MADE UP	My faith is large in Time, And that which shapes it to some perfect end. “MY DEAR JACK,--At the risk of being considered an interfering old woman, I write to ask you whether you are not soon coming to England again. As you are aware, your father and I knew each other as children. We have known each other ever si...	{ "id": "8939" }
45	THE TELEGRAM	How could it end in any other way? You called me, and I came home to your heart. “They tell me, sir, that Missis Marie--that is, Missis Durnovo--has gone back to her people at Sierra Leone.” Thus spoke Joseph to his master one afternoon in March, not so many years ago. They were on board the steamer Bogamayo, which...	{ "id": "8939" }
1	LE ROI EST MORT	"There; that's it. That's where they buried Frenchman," said Andrew--known as River Andrew. For there was another Andrew who earned his living on the sea. River Andrew had conducted the two gentlemen from "The Black Sailor" to the churchyard by their own request. A message had been sent to him in the morning that thi...	{ "id": "8942" }
2	VIVE LE ROI	"The Last Hope" had been expected for some days. It was known in Farlingford that she was foul, and that Captain Clubbe had decided to put her on the slip-way at the end of the next voyage. Captain Clubbe was a Farlingford man. "The Last Hope" was a Farlingford built ship, and Seth Clubbe was not the captain to go past...	{ "id": "8942" }
3	THE RETURN OF "THE LAST HOPE"	Not only France, but all Europe, had at this time to reckon with one who, if, as his enemies said, was no Bonaparte, was a very plausible imitation of one. In 1849 France, indeed, was kind enough to give the world a breathing space. She had herself just come through one of those seething years from which she alone se...	{ "id": "8942" }
4	THE MARQUIS'S CREED	Dormer Colville smiled doubtfully. He was too polite, it seemed, to be sceptical, and by his attitude expressed a readiness to be convinced as much from indifference as by reasoning. "It is intolerable," said the Marquis de Gemosac, "that a man of your understanding should be misled by a few romantic writers in the p...	{ "id": "8942" }
5	ON THE DYKE	Neither had spoken again when their thoughts were turned aside from that story which Colville, instead of telling, had been called upon to hear. For the man whose story it presumably was passed across the green ere the sound of the ship's bell had died away. He had changed his clothes, or else it would have appeared ...	{ "id": "8942" }
6	THE STORY OF THE CASTAWAYS	When River Andrew stated that there were few at Farlingford who knew more of Frenchman than himself, it is to be presumed that he spoke by the letter, and under the reserve that Captain Clubbe was not at the moment on shore. For Captain Clubbe had known Frenchman since boyhood. "I understand," said Dormer Colville ...	{ "id": "8942" }
7	ON THE SCENT	Dormer Colville attached so much importance to the Captain's grave jest that he interpreted it at once to Monsieur de Gemosac. "Captain Clubbe," he said, "tells us that he does not need to be informed that this Loo Barebone is the man we seek. He has long known it." Which was a near enough rendering, perhaps, to pa...	{ "id": "8942" }
8	THE LITTLE BOY WHO WAS A KING	The Reverend Septimus Marvin had lost his wife five years earlier. It was commonly said that he had never been the same man since. Which was untrue. Much that is commonly said will, on investigation, be found to be far from the truth. Septimus Marvin had, so to speak, been the same man since infancy. He had always look...	{ "id": "8942" }
9	A MISTAKE	The tide was ebbing still when Barebone loosed his boat, one night, from the grimy steps leading from the garden of Maiden's Grave farm down to the creek. It was at the farm-house that Captain Clubbe now lived when on shore. He had lived there since the death of his brother, two years earlier--that grim Clubbe of Maide...	{ "id": "8942" }
10	IN THE ITALIAN HOUSE	The Abbé Touvent was not a courageous man, and the perspiration, induced by the climb from the high-road up that which had once been the ramp to the Château of Gemosac, ran cold when he had turned the key in the rusty lock of the great gate. It was not a dark night, for the moon sailed serenely behind fleecy clouds, bu...	{ "id": "8942" }
11	A BEGINNING	There may be some who refuse to take seriously a person like Albert de Chantonnay because, forsooth, he happened to possess a sense of the picturesque. There are, as a matter of fact, thousands of sensible persons in the British Isles who fail completely to understand the average Frenchman. To the English comprehension...	{ "id": "8942" }
12	THE SECRET OF GEMOSAC	There is no sentiment so artificial as international hatred. In olden days it owed its existence to churchmen, and now an irresponsible press foments that dormant antagonism. Wherever French and English individuals are thrown together by a common endeavour, both are surprised at the mutual esteem which soon develops in...	{ "id": "8942" }
13	WITHIN THE GATES	The great bell hanging inside the gates of Gemosac was silent for two days after the return of Juliette de Gemosac from her fever-stricken convent school, at Saintes. But on the third day, soon after nightfall, it rang once more, breaking suddenly in on the silence of the shadowy courts and gardens, bidding the frogs...	{ "id": "8942" }
14	THE LIFTED VEIL	"Where is the boatman?" asked Marie, as she followed Juliette and Barebone along the deserted jetty. A light burnt dimly at the end of it and one or two boats must have been moored near at hand; for the water could be heard lapping under their bows, a secretive, whispering sound full of mystery. "I am the boatman," r...	{ "id": "8942" }
15	THE TURN OF THE TIDE	"Tide's a-turning, sir," said a voice at the open doorway of the cabin, and Captain Clubbe turned his impassive face toward Dormer Colville, who looked oddly white beneath the light of the lamp. Barebone had unceremoniously dragged his hand away from the hold of Juliette's fingers. He made a step back and then turned...	{ "id": "8942" }
16	THE GAMBLERS	In a sense, politics must always represent the game that is most attractive to the careful gambler. For one may play at it without having anything to lose. It is one of the few games within the reach of the adventurous, where no stake need be cast upon the table. The gambler who takes up a political career plays to win...	{ "id": "8942" }
17	ON THE PONT ROYAL	It would appear that John Turner had business south of the Seine, though his clients were few in the Faubourg St. Germain. For this placid British banker was known to be a good hater. His father before him, it was said, had had dealings with the Bourbons, while many a great family of the Emigration would have lost more...	{ "id": "8942" }
18	THE CITY THAT SOON FORGETS	There are in humble life some families which settle their domestic differences on the doorstep, while the neighbours, gathered hastily by the commotion, tiptoe behind each other to watch the fun. In the European congerie France represents this loud-voiced household, and Paris--Paris, the city that soon forgets--is the ...	{ "id": "8942" }
19	IN THE BREACH	The Marquis de Gemosac was sitting at the open window of the little drawing-room in the only habitable part of the château. From his position he looked across the courtyard toward the garden where stiff cypress-trees stood sentry among the mignonette and the roses, now in the full glory of their autumn bloom. Beyond ...	{ "id": "8942" }
20	"NINETEEN"	As Juliette returned to the Gate House she encountered her father, walking arm-in-arm with Dormer Colville. The presence of the Englishman within the enceinte of the chateau was probably no surprise to her, for she must have heard the clang of the bell just within the gate, which could not be opened from outside; by wh...	{ "id": "8942" }
21	NO. 8 RUELLE ST. JACOB	Between the Rue de Lille and the Boulevard St. Germain, in the narrow streets which to this day have survived the sweeping influence of Baron Haussmann, once Prefect of the Seine, there are many houses which scarcely seem to have opened door or window since the great Revolution. One of these, to be precise, is situat...	{ "id": "8942" }
22	DROPPING THE PILOT	"The portrait of a lady," repeated Loo, slowly. "Young and beautiful. That much I remember." The old nobleman had never removed his covering hand from the locket. He had never glanced at it himself. He looked slowly round the peering faces, two and three deep round the table. He was the oldest man present--one of the...	{ "id": "8942" }
23	A SIMPLE BANKER	Mr. John Turner had none of the outward signs of the discreet adviser in his person or surroundings. He had, it was currently whispered, inherited from his father an enormous clientèle of noble names. And to such as have studied the history of Paris during the whole of the nineteenth century, it will appear readily com...	{ "id": "8942" }
24	THE LANE OF MANY TURNINGS	If John Turner expected Colville to bring Loo Barebone with him to the Rue Lafayette he was, in part, disappointed. Colville arrived in a hired carriage, of which the blinds were partially lowered. The driver had been instructed to drive into the roomy court-yard of the house of which Turner's office occupied the fir...	{ "id": "8942" }
25	SANS RANCUNE	A large French fishing-lugger was drifting northward on the ebb tide with its sails flapping idly against the spars. It had been a fine morning, and the Captain, a man from Fécamp, where every boy that is born is born a sailor, had been fortunate in working his way in clear weather across the banks that lie northward o...	{ "id": "8942" }
26	RETURNED EMPTY	The breeze freshened, and, as was to be expected, blew the fog-bank away before sunset. Sep Marvin had been an unwilling student all day. Like many of his cloth and generation, Parson Marvin pinned all his faith on education. "Give a boy a good education," he said, a hundred times. "Make a gentleman of him, and you h...	{ "id": "8942" }
27	OUT OF THE MOUTHS OF BABES	Miriam's manner toward him was the same as it had always been so long as he could remember. He had once thought--indeed, he had made to her the accusation--that she was always conscious of the social gulf existing between them; that she always remembered that she was by birth and breeding a lady, whereas he was the son...	{ "id": "8942" }
28	BAREBONE'S PRICE	At Farlingford, forgotten of the world, events move slowly and men's minds assimilate change without shock. Old people look for death long before it arrives, so that when at last the great change comes it is effected quite calmly. There is no indecent haste, no scrambling to put a semblance of finish to the incomplete,...	{ "id": "8942" }
29	IN THE DARK	Had John Turner been able to see round the curve of his own vast cheeks he might have perceived the answer to his proposition lurking in a little contemptuous smile at the corner of Miriam's closed lips. Loo saw it there, and turned again to the contemplation of the clock on the mantelpiece which had already given a pr...	{ "id": "8942" }
30	IN THE FURROW AGAIN	Turner, stumbling along the road to "The Black Sailor," probably wondered why he had failed. It is to be presumed that he knew that the ally he had looked to for powerful aid had played him false at the crucial moment. His misfortune is common to all men who presume to take anything for granted from a woman. Barebo...	{ "id": "8942" }
31	THE THURSDAY OF MADAME DE CHANTONNAY	"It is," Madame de Chantonnay had maintained throughout the months of January and February--"it is an affair of the heart." She continued to hold this opinion with, however, a shade less conviction, well into a cold March. "It is an affair of the heart, Abbé," she said. " _Allez_! I know what I talk of. It is an af...	{ "id": "8942" }
32	PRIMROSES	"If I go on, I go alone," Barebone had once said to Dormer Colville. The words, spoken in the heat of a quarrel, stuck in the memory of both, as such are wont to do. Perhaps, in moments of anger or disillusionment--when we find that neither self nor friend is what we thought--the heart tears itself away from the grip o...	{ "id": "8942" }
33	DORMER COLVILLE IS BLIND	It was late when Dormer Colville reached the quiet sea-coast village of Royan on the evening of his return to the west. He did not seek Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence until the luncheon hour next morning, when he was informed that she was away from home. "Madame has gone to Paris," the man said, who, with his wife, was lef...	{ "id": "8942" }
34	A SORDID MATTER	"_Bon Dieu! _ my old friend, what do you expect?" replied Madame de Chantonnay to a rather incoherent statement made to her one May afternoon by the Marquis de Gemosac. "It is the month of May," she further explained, indicating with a gesture of her dimpled hand the roses abloom all around them. For the Marquis had fo...	{ "id": "8942" }
35	A SQUARE MAN	All through the summer of 1851--a year to be marked for all time in the minds of historians, not in red, but in black letters--the war of politics tossed France hither and thither. There were, at this time, five parties contending for mastery. Should one of these appear for the moment to be about to make itself secur...	{ "id": "8942" }
36	MRS. ST. PIERRE LAWRENCE DOES NOT UNDERSTAND	It was early in November that the report took wing in Paris that John Turner's bank was, after all, going to weather the storm. Dormer Colville was among the first to hear this news, and strangely enough he did not at once impart it to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. All through the year, John Turner had kept his client su...	{ "id": "8942" }
37	AN UNDERSTANDING	Loo Barebone went back to the Château de Gemosac after those travels in Provence which terminated so oddly on board "The Last Hope," at anchor in the Garonne River. The Marquis received him with enthusiasm and a spirit of optimism which age could not dim. "Everything is going _à merveille! _" he cried. "In three mo...	{ "id": "8942" }
38	A COUP-D'ÉTAT	As the Marquis de Gemosac's step was already on the stairs, Barebone was spared the necessity of agreeing in words to the inevitable. A moment later the old man hurried into the room. He had not even waited to remove his coat and gloves. A few snow-flakes powdered his shoulders. "Ah!" he cried, on perceiving Barebo...	{ "id": "8942" }
39	"JOHN DARBY"	Although it was snowing hard, it was not a dark night. There was a half moon hidden behind those thin, fleecy clouds, which carry the snow across the North Sea and cast it noiselessly upon the low-lying coast, from Thanet to the Wash, which knows less rain and more snow than any in England. A gale of wind was blowing...	{ "id": "8942" }
40	FARLINGFORD ONCE MORE	After a hurried consultation, Septimus Marvin was deputed to follow the injured man and take him home, seeing that he had as yet but half recovered his senses. This good Samaritan had scarcely disappeared when a shout from the beach drew the attention of all in another direction. One of the outposts was running towar...	{ "id": "8942" }
1	LANDLORD'S DAUGHTER AND TENANT'S SON.	In a kitchen of moderate size, flagged with slate, humble in its appointments, yet looking scarcely that of a farmhouse--for there were utensils about it indicating necessities more artificial than usually grow upon a farm--with the corner of a white deal table between them, sat two young people evidently different in ...	{ "id": "8944" }

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