CHAPTER I.

He left me when the down upon his lip

Lay like the shadow of a hovering kiss.

"Beautiful mother, do not grieve," he said;

"I will be great, and build our fortunes high.

And you shall wear the longest train at court,

And look so queenly, all the lords shall say,

'She is a royal changeling: there is some crown

Lacks the right head, since hers wears naught but braids.'"

O, he is coming now—but I am gray:

And he——

On the first of September, in the memorable year 1832, some one was expected at Transome Court. As early as two o'clock in the afternoon the aged lodge-keeper had opened the heavy gate, green as the tree trunks were green with nature's powdery paint, deposited year after year. Already in the village of Little Treby, which lay on the side of a steep hill not far off the lodge-gates, the elder matrons sat in their best gowns at the few cottage doors bordering the road, that they might be ready to get up and make their courtesy when a travelling carriage should come in sight; and beyond the village several small boys were stationed on the look-out, intending to run a race to the barn-like old church, where the sexton waited in the belfry ready to set the one bell in joyful agitation just at the right moment.

The old lodge-keeper had opened the gate and left it in the charge of his lame wife, because he was wanted at the Court to sweep away the leaves, and perhaps to help in the stables. For though Transome Court was a large mansion, built in the fashion of Queen Anne's time, with a park and grounds as fine as any to be seen in Loamshire, there were very few servants about it. Especially, it 

 Prev. P 9/418 next