Emmeline, the Orphan of the Castle. Charlotte Smith

XI

       CHAPTER XII

       CHAPTER XIII

       CHAPTER XIV

       CHAPTER XV

       CHAPTER XVI

VOLUME I

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TO MY CHILDREN

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      O'erwhelm'd with sorrow—and sustaining long

       'The proud man's contumely, the oppressor's wrong,'

       Languid despondency, and vain regret,

       Must my exhausted spirit struggle yet?

       Yes! robb'd myself of all that Fortune gave,

       Of every hope—but shelter in the grave;

       Still shall the plaintive lyre essay it's powers,

       And dress the cave of Care, with Fancy's flowers;

       Maternal love, the fiend Despair withstand,

       Still animate the heart and guide the hand.

       May you, dear objects of my tender care!

       Escape the evils, I was born to bear:

       Round my devoted head, while tempests roll,

       Yet there—'where I have treasured up my soul,'

       May the soft rays of dawning hope impart

       Reviving patience to my fainting heart;

       And, when it's sharp anxieties shall cease,

       May I be conscious, in the realms of peace,

       That every tear which swells my children's eyes,

       From evils past, not present sorrows, rise.

       Then, with some friend who loves to share your pain,

       (For 'tis my boast, that still such friends remain,)

       By filial grief, and fond remembrance prest,

       You'll seek the spot where all my miseries rest,

       Recall my hapless days in sad review,

       The long calamities I bore for you,

       And, with an happier fate, resolve to prove

       How well ye merited your mother's love!

      [Pg xxviii]

      EMMELINE

       THE ORPHAN OF THE CASTLE

CHAPTER I

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      In a remote part of the county of Pembroke, is an old building, formerly of great strength, and inhabited for centuries by the ancient family of Mowbray; to the sole remaining branch of which it still belonged, tho' it was, at the time this history commences, inhabited only by servants; and the greater part of it was gone to decay. A few rooms only had been occasionally repaired to accommodate the proprietor, when he found it necessary to come thither to receive his rents, or to inspect the condition of the estate; which however happened so seldom, that during the twelve years he had been master of it, he had only once visited the castle for a few days. The business that related to the property round it (which was very considerable) was conducted by a steward grown grey in the service of the family, and by an attorney from London, who came to hold the courts. And an old housekeeper, a servant who waited on her, the steward, and a labourer who was kept to look after his horse and work in that part of the garden which yet bore the vestige of cultivation, were now all its inhabitants; except a little girl, of whom the housekeeper had the care, and who was believed to be the natural daughter of that elder brother, by whose death Lord Montreville, the present possessor, became entitled to the estate.

      This nobleman, while yet a younger son, was (by the partiality of his mother, who had been an heiress, and that of some other female relations) master of a property nearly equal to what he inherited by the death of his brother, Mr. Mowbray.

      He had been originally designed for the law; but in consequence of being entitled to the large estate which had been his mother's, and heir, by will, to all her opulent family, he had quitted that profession, and at the age of about four and twenty, had married Lady Eleonore Delamere, by whom he had a son and two daughters.

      The illustrious family from which Lady Eleonore descended, became extinct in the male line by the premature death of her two brothers; and her Ladyship becoming sole heiress, her husband took the name of Delamere; and obtaining one of the titles of the lady's father, was, at his death, created Viscount Montreville. Mr. Mowbray died before he was thirty, in Italy; and Lord Montreville, on taking possession of Mowbray Castle, found there his infant daughter.

      Her mother had died soon after her birth; and she had been sent from France, where she was born, and put under the care of Mrs. Carey, the housekeeper, who was tenderly attached to her, having been the attendant of Mr. Mowbray from his earliest infancy.

      Lord Montreville suffered her to remain in the situation in which he found her, and to go by the name of Mowbray: he allowed for the trifling charge of her board and necessary cloaths in the steward's account, the examination of which was for some years the only circumstance that reminded him of the existence of the unfortunate orphan.

      With no other notice from her father's family, Emmeline had attained her twelfth year; an age at which she would have been left in the most profound ignorance, if her uncommon understanding, and unwearied application, had not supplied the deficiency of her instructors, and conquered the disadvantages of her situation.

      Mrs. Carey could indeed read with tolerable fluency, and write an hand hardly legible: and Mr. Williamson, the old steward, had been formerly a good penman, and was still a proficient in accounts. Both were anxious to give their little charge all the instruction they could: but without the quickness and attention she shewed to whatever they attempted to teach, such preceptors could have done little.

      Emmeline had a kind of intuitive knowledge; and comprehended every thing with a facility that soon left her instructors behind her. The precarious and neglected situation in which she lived, troubled not the innocent Emmeline. Having never experienced any other, she felt no uneasiness at her present lot; and on the future she was not yet old enough to reflect.

      Mrs. Carey was to her in place of the mother she had never known; and the old steward, she was accustomed to call father. The death of this venerable servant was the first sorrow Emmeline ever felt: returning late one evening, in the winter, from a neighbouring town, he attempted to cross a ford, where the waters being extremely out, he was carried down by the rapidity of the current. His horse was drowned; and tho' he was himself rescued from the flood by some peasants who knew him, and carried to the castle, he was so much bruised, and had suffered so much from cold, that he was taken up speechless, and continued so for the few hours he survived the accident.

      Mrs. Carey, who had lived in the same house with him near forty years, felt the sincerest concern at his death; with which it was necessary for her immediately to acquaint Lord Montreville.

      His Lordship directed his attorney in London to replace him with another;