FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   243   244   245   246   247   248   249   250   251   252   253   254   255   256   257   258   259   260   261   262   263   264   265   266   267  
268   269   270   271   272   273   274   275   276   277   278   279   280   281   282   283   284   285   286   287   288   289   290   291   292   >>   >|  
following discovery: The Rev. and Hon. Mr. Harland was the younger son of an Irish earl, who had early embraced his sacred profession in that church, in which he held a valuable living in the gift of his father's family. His father was yet alive, and then at Lisbon with his mother and sister, in attendance on his elder brother, who had been sent there in a deep decline a couple of months before. It had been the wish of his parents to have taken all their children with them; but a sense of duty had kept the young clergyman in the exercise of his holy office, until a request of his dying brother, and the directions of his father, caused him to hasten abroad to witness the decease of the one, and to afford all the solace within his power to the others. It may be easily imagined that the discovery of the rank of their accidental acquaintance, with the almost certainty that existed of his being the heir of his father's honors, in no degree impaired his consequence in the eyes of the dowager; and it is certain, his visible anxiety and depressed spirits, his unaffected piety, and disinterested hopes for his brother's recovery, no less elevated him in the opinions of her companions. There was, at the moment, a kind of sympathy between Harland and Jane, notwithstanding the melancholy which gave rise to it proceeding from such very different causes and as the lady, although with diminished bloom, retained all her personal charms, rather heightened than otherwise by the softness of low spirits, the young clergyman sometimes relieved his apprehensions of his brother's death by admitting the image of Jane among his more melancholy reflections. The voyage was tedious, and some time before it was ended the dowager had given Grace an intimation of the probability there was of Jane's becoming, at some future day, a countess. Grace sincerely hoped that whatever she became she would be as happy as she thought all allied to John deserved to be. They entered the bay of Lisbon early in the morning; and as the ship had been expected for some days, a boat came alongside with a note for Mr. Harland, before they had anchored. It apprised him of the death of his brother. The young man threw himself precipitately into it, and was soon employed in one of the loveliest offices of his vocation, that of healing the wounds of the afflicted. Lady Herriefield received her mother in a sort of sullen satisfaction, and her companions with an a
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   243   244   245   246   247   248   249   250   251   252   253   254   255   256   257   258   259   260   261   262   263   264   265   266   267  
268   269   270   271   272   273   274   275   276   277   278   279   280   281   282   283   284   285   286   287   288   289   290   291   292   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

brother

 

father

 
Harland
 

clergyman

 
mother
 

dowager

 

spirits

 
companions
 

melancholy

 

Lisbon


discovery

 

relieved

 

reflections

 
apprehensions
 

admitting

 

voyage

 
tedious
 

proceeding

 

diminished

 

softness


heightened
 

charms

 
retained
 
personal
 

precipitately

 
employed
 

anchored

 

apprised

 

loveliest

 

offices


received

 

sullen

 

satisfaction

 
Herriefield
 

vocation

 

healing

 

wounds

 

afflicted

 

alongside

 

notwithstanding


sincerely

 

countess

 
probability
 

future

 

thought

 

allied

 

expected

 

morning

 

deserved

 
entered