United States or Dominica ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
So, with no thought in her heart but for her own worldly advancement, Beatrice Fairfax stood before God's altar and vowed to love, honour, and obey a man for whom she had no scrap of affection, and whom she would have laughed to scorn if he had been poor and friendless. She married him, but the life which followed was not by any means all that she had expected.
I was rich, I had a home and a child; I am now poor, houseless, childless, friendless, and an outcast. If in my solitary wretchedness I have loved to look upon that old bark, it is because its fortune seemed like my own. It had outlived all that needed or cared for it.
Why should I record the sickening experience of six months' daily suffering. That I was beaten every day was to be expected in an Age when blows and stripes were the only means thought of for instilling knowledge into the minds of youth. But I was alone, I was friendless, I was poor.
"He loves me!" said she to herself; "loves me; and is married to another, whom he loves not! and dares to tell me this! O, never, never, never! And yet he is so friendless and alone in this unsympathizing world, and an exile, and homeless! I can but pity him; yet I hate him, and will see him no more!"
As Miss Mills spoke in her motherly tone, and cast a proud and happy look toward the warm and quiet nest in which she had sheltered this friendless little sparrow, feeling sure that God meant her to keep it from falling to the ground, Polly put both arms about her neck, and kissed her withered cheek with as much loving reverence as if she had been a splendid saint, for in the likeness of this plain old maid she saw the lovely charity that blesses and saves the world.
She turned to the left and pressed on, fighting valiantly against the persistent spirit of loneliness which seemed to dog her footsteps. Men and girls hurried by to keep appointments with friends or lovers. Buses jogged past her, loaded with people who all had somewhere to go, and probably someone who looked for their coming. She was friendless and alone.
My love to her for it was such, ardent and passionate was more the devotion of some worshipper at a shrine than an affection that sought return. The friendless soldier of fortune, poor, unknown, uncared for, how could he raise his thoughts to one for whose hand the noblest and the bravest were suitors in vain? Yet, with all this, how my heart throbbed to think that we should meet again!
Thy brother's career, bright and lofty, may be but as a falling star; should darkness swallow it, should his power cease, should his throne be broken, and Rome know no more her Tribune; shouldst thou no longer have a brother in the judge and destroyer of my house; shouldst thou be stricken from pomp and state; shouldst thou be friendless, kindredless, alone then, without a stain on mine honour, without the shame and odium of receiving power and happiness from hands yet red with the blood of my race, I may claim thee as my own.
He offered up his prayers to God; humbly besought his grace and protection; nor did he forget to implore a blessing upon those who I had thus soothed his early sorrows, and afforded him, though a stranger and friendless, I shelter, comfort, and sympathy. "I hope," thought he, "that I will meet many such, till I overcome my difficulties, an' find myself able to assist my poor father an' mother!"
His spirits sank lower and lower as he moved between the glittering files of bowing courtiers; for he recognised that he was indeed a captive now, and might remain for ever shut up in this gilded cage, a forlorn and friendless prince, except God in his mercy take pity on him and set him free.
Word Of The Day