soft-hearted to blow her up. Tell her to meet me in half an hour by the

broken dial, and to bring the brat, and all her affairs in a bundle such

as she can carry, or kick down the hill before her. In half an hour, do

you understand? And if you care for your stiff old bones, get out of the

way by that time."

In that half-hour Carne gathered in small compass, and strapped up in a

little "mail"--as such light baggage then was called--all his important

documents, despatches, letters, and papers of every kind, and the cash

he was entrusted with, which he used to think safer at Springhaven. Then

he took from a desk which was fixed to the wall a locket bright with

diamonds, and kissed it, and fastened it beneath his neck-cloth. The

wisp of hair inside it came not from any young or lovely head, but from

the resolute brow of his mother, the woman who hated England. He should

have put something better to his mouth; for instance, a good beef

sandwich. But one great token of his perversion was that he never did

feed well--a sure proof of the unrighteous man, as suggested by the

holy Psalmist, and more distinctly put by Livy in the character he gives

Hannibal.

Regarding as a light thing his poor unfurnished stomach, Carne mounted

the broken staircase, in a style which might else have been difficult.

He had made up his mind to have one last look at the broad lands of his

ancestors, from the last that ever should be seen of the walls they had

reared and ruined. He stood upon the highest vantage-point that he could

attain with safety, where a shaggy gnarl of the all-pervading ivy served

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