United States or India ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He rode about, interrogating the frightened servants and grooms holding horses and dogs.
A troop of servants in rich liveries filled the hall; grooms lined the staircase; Spiridion, the Greek page, lounged on an ottoman in an ante-chamber, and, with the assistance of six young gentlemen in crimson-and-silver uniforms, announced the coming of the cherished guests. Cartloads of pine-apples were sent up from the Yorkshire Castle, and waggons of orange-trees from the Twickenham Villa.
But as it is the intercourse of private life that formeth the social character, so I do not apprehend that of the single soldier to be much polished by the conversation of the corporal or the sergeant, or that of Loyalty's Reward to have been much dulcified, or ameliorated, by the society of his Excellency's grooms, who bestow more oaths, and kicks, and thumps, than kindness or caresses, upon the animals intrusted to their charge; whereby many a generous quadruped, rendered as it were misanthropic, manifests during the rest of his life a greater desire to kick and bite his master, than to love and to honour him."
He sent out mounted grooms to search the different roads between the castle and the scene of the pic-nic; and then he left his guests without a word, and shut himself in his own apartments, to await the issue of the search.
The table near the bed was overturned on the floor, and the glass and the night-lamp both lie smashed to pieces on the carpet. 'Send for a doctor at once, cried Madame, letting go the bell-rope and crossing to the window; 'Selina has had a fit of some sort. Startled servant goes out to stables and wakes up the grooms, one of whom is soon on horseback riding for dear life to Dr Chinston.
On these occasions they sometimes borrow mortal steeds, and when such are found at morning, panting and fatigued in their stalls, with their manes and tails dishevelled and entangled, the grooms, I presume, often find this a convenient excuse for their situation, as the common belief of the elves quaffing the choicest liquors in the cellars of the rich might occasionally cloak the delinquencies of an unfaithful butler.
The household is composed of from twenty-five to thirty servants; namely two cooks, a scullion, two water-carriers, four servants to wait at table, four housemaids, a lamp-cleaner, and half-a-dozen seis or grooms.
One servant whispered to another that it was the bishop, and the word soon ran through all the hangers-on and strange grooms and coachmen about the place. There was quite a little cortege to see the bishop and his 'lady' walk across the courtyard, and the good man was pleased to see that the church was held in such respect in the parish of St Ewold's.
An hour later they stood within the walls of Westminster city, and Hilarius, amazed and weary, clung close to Martin's side. Around him he saw russet-clad archers, grooms, men on horseback, pedlars, pages, falconers, scullions with meats, gallant knights, gaily dressed ladies; it was like a tangled dream.
I should like to send those two grooms with their folded arms to the galleys I hate those fellows. For my part, I never was behind four horses except in a stage-coach. No peer of the realm ever took me on his drag. However, a day of reckoning will come; the people won't stand this much longer." Jawett was not there, for he disapproved of races.
Word Of The Day