The Project Gutenberg EBook of Heartsease, by Charlotte M. Yonge

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Title: Heartsease
or Brother's Wife

Author: Charlotte M. Yonge

Posting Date: December 22, 2008 [EBook #2601]
Release Date: April, 2001

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HEARTSEASE ***

Produced by Sandra Laythorpe

HEARTSEASE,

or BROTHER'S WIFE

By Charlotte M. Yonge

PART I

And Maidens call them Love in Idleness.

--Midsummer Night's Dream

CHAPTER 1

There are none of England's daughters that bear a prouder presence.
*****
And a kingly blood sends glances up, her princely eye to trouble,
And the shadow of a monarch's crown is softened in her hair.

--ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING

The sun shone slanting over a spacious park, the undulating ground here
turning a broad lawn towards the beams that silvered every blade of
grass; there, curving away in banks of velvet green; shadowed by the
trees; gnarled old thorns in the holiday suit whence they take their
name, giant's nosegays of horse-chestnuts, mighty elms and stalwart
oaks, singly or in groups, the aristocracy of the place; while in the
background rose wooded coverts, where every tint of early green blended
in rich masses of varied foliage.

An avenue, nearly half a mile in length, consisted of a quadruple range
of splendid lime trees of uniform growth, the side arcades vaulted over
by the meeting branches, and the central road, where the same lights and
shadows were again and again repeated, conducting the eye in diminishing
perspective to a mansion on a broad base of stone steps. Herds of
cattle, horses, and deer, gave animation to the scene, and near
the avenue were a party of village children running about gathering
cowslips, or seated on the grass, devouring substantial plum buns.

Under a lordly elm sat a maiden of about nineteen years; at her feet
a Skye terrier, like a walking door-mat, with a fierce and droll
countenance, and by her side a girl and boy, the one sickly and poorly
clad, the other with bright inquiring eyes, striving to compensate for
the want of other faculties. She was teaching th