Sir Jasper Carew: His Life and Experience
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Lever Charles James. Sir Jasper Carew: His Life and Experience
CHAPTER I. SOME “NOTICES OF MY FATHER AND MOTHER”
CHAPTER II. THE ILLUSTRATION OF AN ADAGE
CHAPTER III. A FATHER AND DAUGHTER
CHAPTER IV. A BREAKFAST AND ITS CONSEQUENCES
CHAPTER V. JOE RAPER
CHAPTER VI. TWO FRIENDS AND THEIR CONFIDENCES
CHAPTER VII. SHOWING HOW CHANCE IS BETTER THAN DESIGN
CHAPTER VIII. A STATE TRUMPETER
CHAPTER IX. A GENTLEMAN USHER
CHAPTER X. THE COMPANY AT CASTLE CAREW
CHAPTER XI. POLITICS AND NEWSPAPERS
CHAPTER XII. SHOWING THAT “WHAT IS CRADLED IN SHAME IS HEARSED IN
CHAPTER XIII. A MIDNIGHT RENCONTRE
CHAPTER XIV. A CONFERENCE
CHAPTER XV. CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE
CHAPTER XVI. AN UNLOOKED-FOR DISCLOSURE
CHAPTER XVII. A FRIEND’S TRIALS
CHAPTER XVIII. DISAPPOINTMENTS
CHAPTER XIX. “FUM’S ALLEY, NEAR THE PODDLE”
CHAPTER XX. PROSPERITY AND ADVERSITY
CHAPTER XXI. AT REST
CHAPTER XXII. THE VILLAGE OF REICHENAU
CHAPTER XXIII. A MOUNTAIN ADVENTURE
CHAPTER XXIV. “THE HERR ROBERT”
CHAPTER XXV. THE COUNT DE GABRIAC
CHAPTER XXVI. PARIS IN ‘95
CHAPTER XXVII. THE BATTLE OF THE SECTIONS
CHAPTER XXVII. AN EPISODE OF MY LIFE
CHAPTER XXIX. THE INN AT VALENCE
CHAPTER XXX. LINANGE
CHAPTER XXXI. HAVRE
CHAPTER XXXII. MY REWARD
CHAPTER XXXIII. A GLIMPSE OF A NEW PATH
CHAPTER XXXIV. SECRET SERVICE
CHAPTER XXXV. “DISCOVERIES”
CHAPTER XXXVI. THE ORDEAL
CHAPTER XXXVII. THE GLOOMIEST PASSAGE OF ALL
CHAPTER XXXVIII. THE STREETS
CHAPTER XXXIX. A STRANGE INCIDENT TO BE A TRUE ONE
CHAPTER XL. AT SEA
CHAPTER XLI. LYS
CHAPTER XLII. THE COMING SHADOW
CHAPTER XLIII. A PASSAGE IN THE DRAMA
CHAPTER XLIV. THE PRICE OF FAME
CHAPTER XLV. DARK PASSAGES OF LIFE
CHAPTER XLVI. YSAFFICH
CHAPTER XLVII. TOWARDS HOME
CHAPTER XLVIII. THE PERILS OF EVIL
CHAPTER XLIX. THE FIRST DAY
CHAPTER L. A TRIAL – CONCLUSION
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It has sometimes occurred to me that the great suits of armor we see in museums, the huge helmets that come down like extinguishers on the penny candles of modern humanity, the enormous cuirasses and gigantic iron gloves, were neither more nor less than downright and deliberate cheats practised by the “Gents” of those days for the especial humbugging of us, their remote posterity. It might, indeed, seem a strange and absurd thing that any people should take so much pains, and incur so much expense, just for the sake of mystifying generations then unborn. Still, I was led to this conclusion by observing and reflecting on a somewhat similar phenomenon in our own day; and indeed it was the only explanation I was ever able to come to, respecting those great mansions that we Irish gentlemen are so fond of rearing on our estates, “totally regardless of expense,” and just as indifferent to all the circumstances of our fortune, and all the requirements of our station, – the only real difference being, that our forefathers were satisfied with quizzing their descendants, whereas we, with a livelier appreciation of fun, prefer enjoying the joke in our own day.
Perhaps I am a little too sensitive on this point; but my reader will forgive any excess of irritability when I tell him that to this national ardor for brick and mortar – this passion for cutstone and stucco – it is I owe, not only some of the mischances of my life, but also a share of what destiny has in store for those that are to come after me. We came over to Ireland with Cromwell; my ancestor, I believe, and I don’t desire to hide the fact, was a favorite trumpeter of Old Noll. He was a powerful, big-boned, slashing trooper, with a heavy hand on a sabre, and a fine deep, bass voice in the conventicle; and if his Christian name was a little inconvenient for those in a hurry, – he was called Bind-your-kings-in-chains-and-your-nobles-in-links-of-iron Carew, – it was of the less consequence, as he was always where he ought to be, without calling. It was said that in the eyes of his chief his moderation was highly esteemed, and that this virtue was never more conspicuous than in his choice of a recompense for his services; since, instead of selecting some fine, rich tract of Meath or Queen’s County, some fruitful spot on the Shannon or the Blackwater, with a most laudable and exemplary humility he pitched upon a dreary and desolate region in the County Wicklow, – picturesque enough in point of scenery, but utterly barren and uncultivated. Here, at a short distance from the opening of the Vale of Arklow, he built a small house, contiguous to which, after a few years, was to be seen an outlandish kind of scaffolding, – a composite architecture between a draw-well and a gallows; and which, after various conjectures about its use, – some even suggesting that it was a new apparatus “to raise the Devil,” – turned out to be the machinery for working a valuable lead mine which, by “pure accident,” my fortunate ancestor had just discovered there.
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“She told you that she was not afraid? – she said so to yourself?” cried he, eagerly.
“Ay, a dozen times,” replied Dan, freely. “It was impossible to have behaved better.”
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