Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: September 13, 2025
She and Lesbia both knew that there were painful circumstances of some kind connected with this man's existence, his hidden life in the old house at Fellside; but they were both content to learn no more. Respect for their grandmother's memory, sorrowful affection for the dead, prevailed over natural curiosity.
'I went there as a man standing on his own merits, assuming no rank save that which God gave him among his fellow-men, claiming to be possessed of no fortune except intellect and industry. If I could not win a wife with such credentials, it were better for me never to marry at all, Lady Lesbia. But we have no time to speak of the past. I am here as your brother's friend, here to save you.
He made even Brentwood laugh; he danced all the evening with that giddy girl Lesbia Burke, who let slip that she remembered me at Naples in 1805, when she was there with that sad old set, and who consequently must be nearly as old as myself." "I hope you danced with her," said Mrs. Buckley. "Indeed I did, my dear. And she wore a wreath of yellow chrysanthemum, no other flowers being obtainable.
To-night her father, in his library, heard the sweet, true tones of her voice in "Lesbia" and "Believe Me," and remembered his mother singing those same old songs.
Lesbia obeyed, and went down to her cabin, where Kibble was waiting with a fresh white muslin frock and all its belongings, laid out ready for her mistress, sorely perplexed at the turn which affairs were taking.
It was such a new thing to have a stranger at the family board, a man whose information was well abreast with the march of progress, who could talk eloquently upon every subject which people care to talk about. In this new and animated society Lesbia seemed like an enchanted princess suddenly awakened from a spell-bound slumber. Molly looked at her sister with absolute astonishment.
There was plenty of talk and laughter at the dinner-table, while the Countess and Lady Lesbia conversed gravely and languidly in the dimly-lighted drawing-room. The dinner was excellent, and both travellers were ravenous. They had eaten nothing since breakfast, and had driven from Windermere on the top of the coach in the keen evening air.
Lesbia never mentioned such things herself. As far as I could judge, she was very shy with them all. I could not believe that the placid young baronet had any chance with her. She might possibly marry, but poor Charlie's successor would hardly be a thick-set, clumsy young man, with few original ideas of his own. Colonel Ferguson would have been far better; but he evidently preferred Sara.
'There are no nightingales after June. There is the Manola, as the band struck up, 'my very favourite waltz. Don Gomez was at her elbow at this moment 'May I have the honour of this waltz with you, Lady Lesbia? he asked; and then with a serio-comic glance at his stoutish friend, 'I don't think Smithson waltzes?
To Lesbia, who had been weary to loathing of her old life amidst the hills and waterfalls of Westmoreland, this new life was one perpetual round of pleasure. She flung herself with all her heart and mind into the amusement of the moment; she knew neither weariness nor satiety. To ride in the park in the morning, to go to a luncheon party, a garden party, to drive in the park for half an hour after the garden party, to rush home and dress for the fourth or fifth time, and then off to a dinner, and from dinner to drum, and from drum to big ball, at which rumour said the Prince and Princess were to be present: and so, from eleven o'clock in the morning till four or five o'clock next morning, the giddy whirl went on: and every hour was so occupied by pleasure engagements that it was difficult to squeeze in an occasional morning for shopping necessary to go to the shops sometimes, or one would not know how many things one really wants or for an indispensable interview with the dressmaker. Those mornings at the shops were hardly the least agreeable of Lesbia's hours. To a girl brought up in one perpetual tête-
Word Of The Day
Others Looking