United States or Mayotte ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
I had the pleasure of hearing you read at Williamsburgh last Sunday afternoon, though this is your parish, I believe? What was that last name that the youngster cried? I failed to catch it." "Audrey, sir," answered the minister of James City parish; "Gideon Darden's Audrey. You can't but have heard of Darden?
Marmaduke Haward had dined with the minister the day before. Audrey, her task done, went after her, to be met with graciousness most unusual. "I'll see to the dinner, child. Mr. Haward will expect one of us to sit without, and you had as well go as I. If he's talking to Darden, you might get some larkspur and gilliflowers for the table.
Darden, another of the trustees, "we all remember, at least I'm sure General Thornton does, old Sally, who used to belong to the McRae family, and was a member of the Presbyterian Church, and who, because of her age and infirmities she was hard of hearing and too old to climb the stairs to the gallery was given a seat in front of the pulpit, on the main floor."
"All our folks are just recovering from the scarlet fever," is the reply to my first application; "Muvver's down to ve darden on ve island, and we ain't dot no bread baked," says a barefooted youth at house No. 2; "Me ould ooman's across ter the naybur's, 'n' there ain't a boite av grub cooked in the shanty," answers the proprietor of No. 3, seated on the threshold, puffing vigorously at the traditional short clay; "We all to Nord Blatte been to veesit, und shust back ter home got mit notings gooked," winds up the gloomy programme at No. 4.
W. H. Darden, formerly of Isle of Wight county, Va., with Miss Novella Darden as principal, with the assistance of Miss Lizzie J. King, gives to the school a reputation that must add greatly to its success. Young ladies at this school are instructed in all the higher branches, music, painting and drawing. It is eligibly located on College Avenue.
They had parted with the minister before his favorite ordinary, and were on their way to the house where they themselves were to lodge during the three days of town life which Darden had vouchsafed to offer them. For a month or more Virginia had been wearing black ribbons for the King, who died in June, but in the last day or so there had been a reversion to bright colors.
Darden, coming out of the vestry room, found the churchyard almost cleared, and the road in a cloud of dust. The greater number of those who came a-horseback were gone, and there had also departed both berlins, the calash, and two chaises. Mr. Haward was handing the three Graces into the coach with the chained coachman, Juba standing by, holding his master's horse.
"She's more than eighteen, Charles, and anyhow, if I understand it rightly, she was never really bound to Darden. The law has no hold on her, for neither vestry nor Orphan Court had anything to do with placing her with Darden and Deborah. She's free to stay." "Free to stay?" queried Charles, and took a prodigious pinch of snuff. "To stay with us?"
"You sent for me, Audrey," he said, and laid his hand lightly upon her hair. She shrank from his touch. "The minister made me write the letter," she said, in a low voice. "I did not wish to trouble you, sir." Upon her wrist were dark marks. "Did Darden do that?" demanded Haward, as he took his seat beside her.
The mayor could not resist this mark of intimacy on the part of one of the old aristocracy, and walked somewhat proudly through the street arm in arm with Mr. Darden. They paid their respects to the colonel, who was bearing up, with the composure to be expected of a man of strong will and forceful character, under a grief of which he was exquisitely sensible.
Word Of The Day