Coinkings

Coinkings "Yes," said Salome; "shall you tell her to-morrow?" The Wopp parlor was seldom entered, except on very special occasions or when Mrs. Wopp with formality and no undue haste dusted the furniture. The room had an air of solemnity and gloom, absent in the cheerful dining-room where the family usually sat. A homemade rag carpet covered the floor. Six slippery, horsehair chairs, one of them a rocker, and a horsehair couch, which did not invite confidence, were ranged stiffly around the sides of the room. In one corner was an ancient organ, wheezy and querulous with neglect, and in another stood a lofty what-not, on whose numerous shelves were deposited the family treasures. Here, was a woolly lamb at one time beloved of Moses; there his tin savings bank. Stiffly upright stood Betty’s wax doll Hannah, seldom played with and then only for a few minutes at a time. Mrs. Wopp was represented by a few shell boxes and a match box of china flanked by a sleek china cat.,'You are now to learn that, about a century ago, this castle was in the possession of Vincent, third marquis of Mazzini, my grandfather. At that time there existed an inveterate hatred between our family and that of della Campo. I shall not now revert to the origin of the animosity, or relate the particulars of the consequent feuds—suffice it to observe, that by the power of our family, the della Campos were unable to preserve their former consequence in Sicily, and they have therefore quitted it for a foreign land to live in unmolested security. To return to my subject.—My grandfather, believing his life endangered by his enemy, planted spies upon him. He employed some of the numerous banditti who sought protection in his service, and after some weeks past in waiting for an opportunity, they seized Henry della Campo, and brought him secretly to this castle. He was for some time confined in a close chamber of the southern buildings, where he expired; by what means I shall forbear to mention. The plan had been so well conducted, and the secrecy so strictly preserved, that every endeavour of his family to trace the means of his disappearance proved ineffectual. Their conjectures, if they fell upon our family, were supported by no proof; and the della Campos are to this day ignorant of the mode of his death. A rumour had prevailed long before the death of my father, that the southern buildings of the castle were haunted. I disbelieved the fact, and treated it accordingly. One night, when every human being of the castle, except myself, was retired to rest, I had such strong and dreadful proofs of the general assertion, that even at this moment I cannot recollect them without horror. Let me, if possible, forget them. From that moment I forsook those buildings; they have ever since been shut up, and the circumstance I have mentioned, is the true reason why I have resided so little at the castle.',“It seems to me you do nothing but eat,” came through the window.,“Jeremias the wood-cutter is ill in bed, too,” he said suddenly.,Early in the morning Kŭt-o-yĭs´ pushed the old man and said, "Come, get up now, and we will go down and kill, when the buffalo come out." It was still very early in the morning.，“Last November,” piped Evelyn.，Finally the dogs are called off, and reluctantly accompany the jubilant Mickey down the hill.，The spare hours of the rest of that week were devoted to the prize designs, and both progressed so happily that their authors were filled with a greater measure of content as the days sped.Why it has become suddenly necessary that Violet should be made cosey and comfortable she omits to explain.

Anson's mouth fell open in terror. "You don't mean—" he commenced, then gulped, unable to proceed.,"Why, you never even saw him," says Mona, opening her eyes.,The dance was held in a new barn of which the floor was especially good. Indeed the young people of the family had seen to that. Unfortunately the stable end of the building was already in use and this proved to be somewhat inconvenient. During the festivities of the evening one delicate lady fainted from excitement and overpowering stable odors. She speedily revived, however, on being carried into the fresh air and soused with a bucket of cold water. The building was illuminated with lanterns and an occasional oil lamp. Benches were ranged along the walls. The crowd was large and as usual at these affairs men predominated in numbers. The dances were mostly square ones and when a husky caller-off became hoarse and exhausted with shouting, another took his place. He usually stood at one end of the building beside the fiddler.,They had arranged to drive as far as the bridge, where they would quit the carriage and walk along the wharves to view the Aurora and give the sulphur to Mr Eagle. But there were several places to be visited first of all: Mrs Bigg was to be enquired after; a little basket of comforts in the shape of tea, sugar, and the like was to be left at Mrs Lavender's, whose husband had fallen into a disused pit, and after lying in it all night, during which it rained heavily and continuously, he was discovered by a boy, and later on hauled up with both his legs broken. Several such errands of kindness and compassion must render the drive to the bridge circuitous.,"Wait till you see her," says Geoffrey, after a little pause, with full faith in his own recipe.,"But," said Captain Acton, who was perhaps helped to a display of comparative composure of mind by the Admiral's reception of the news, "though if possible we shall sail to-morrow evening or the following day in pursuit, my opinion is, sir, that even if Mr Lawrence were left to his own shifts he would never be able to compass his undertaking. First of all, he has a highly respectable man, who has proved a good servant to me, to deal with in his mate. Will Mr Eagle permit him to carry the Minorca to Rio? Will the crew have nothing to say? What will be thought by all hands when it gets about that my daughter is on board, a prisoner in confinement in the cabin? And is my daughter so enamoured of Mr Lawrence that because he has placed her in a highly equivocal[Pg 222] situation she will be willing to marry him, or to have anything to say to him on their arrival at Rio?","I shall remember," says Mona, not knowing what the paper contains. "And who am I, that I should dwell upon the sins of another? Are you tired, Paul? How fearfully pale you are looking!",Every year in summer, about the time the berries ripen, the Blackfeet used to hold the great festival and sacrifice which we call the ceremony of the Medicine Lodge. This was a time of happy meetings, of feasting, of giving presents; but besides this rejoicing, those men who wished to have good-luck in whatever they might undertake tried to prove their prayers sincere by sacrificing their bodies, torturing themselves in ways that caused great suffering. In ancient times, as we are told in books of history, things like that used to happen among many peoples all over the world.,The two young men burst out simultaneously with the speech in tones of sheer astonishment, and stared at Etwald as at some strangle animal. That this elderly man--Etwald was midway between thirty and forty, but that looked elderly to these boys of twenty-five--should dare to love Isabella Dallas, was a thing unheard of. She so young, so beautiful, so full of divine youth and diviner womanhood; he so sombre, pale and worn with intellectual vigils; with a mysterious past, a doubtful present and a problematic future.,The man who manages the farm generally—and is a plague and a blessing at the same time to his master—appears round a corner, and declares, respectfully, that he will be ready in a "jiffy" to accompany Miss Mona, if she will just give him time to "clane himself up a bit.","Why, sir, yes, as sure as we can be of anything at sea," said Captain Acton, who thought it judicious and proper to join in. "Yesterday we spoke the brig Louisa Ann of Whitby, who reported that three days before, she had asked for some provisions from a ship named the Minorca whose rig was that of my barque. There is no doubt that my ship[Pg 424] is just ahead of us, and that our superior sailing will enable us to overhaul her within a week. The effect of the frigate's presence will be to rescue the capture from the trouble of bloodshed. When your guns are seen, sir, and the character of your ship distinguished, the mutineers will back their topsail yard and leave us to quietly take possession.",They found the usual array of aproned students in the corridors and work rooms, and although the boys tried to be enthusiastic it was plain that the famous Academy did not appeal to them very strongly..