The Child of Waterloo, or, The Horrors of the Battle-Field — page 287: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

284 THE CHILD OF WATERLOO. and that they could not count more days in their lives than he could count lives he had taken. The men were all astonished at the occurrence, and the govern- or ordered hiin to be taken and placed in a strong room, with extra irons, and two men with him. His ravings were terrific, and men did not believe in the hor- rible tale he told of his own criminality, but looked upon it as a species of frenzy gr madness, during the continuance of which, visions of all that was dreadful visited him, and he believed himself a monster of crime even greater than they took him to CHAPTER L. CapTaIN Morton thought it prudent, as, indeed, it was, to take Mabel away as quickly as he could from London, and spare her all the unpleasantness that was likely to arise from the knowledge that any man, however well deserving he might have been of his fate, should suffer the extreme penalty, in whose ap- prehension and punishment she had even been forced into be- coming the cause. This, Captain Morton rightly judged. would give her great pain, and a shock to her system that might take time to recover from. He, however, resolved to travel slowly, and taking his own time in doing so, so that the fatigue should not be felt, either by himself or Mabel, whose troubles and adventures had already given her a severe shock, as well as to render her mind suscep- tible of any sudden emotion of alarm, and moreover it would ive time to send Rafferty Brolickbones onward and prepare the Fall for their reception, and to acquaint Mrs. Morton with their coming. What a change had taken place since last they were all assem- bled in the Hall; how much had been done, endured, and discov- ered since that time! What an epoch had it been! There were events enough to fill volumes, crowded into so short a space that the mind has scarcely time to take cognizance of them. But now they were likely to end, and the even tenor of their former life was likely to return, and the happiness was like to be continued, which had been so suddenly and rudely broken in upon. The future was a smiling prospect, the past a darkened picture, in which were many dangers which were aJmost hidden, and from which escape was <lifficult. Now, however, beside the captain. and in her altered position, she felt all the confidence and happiness she was capable of en- oying. } Rafferty Brolickbones was well pleased to travel afterward at his own pace, which, had it at all met his own desires, he should have flown home, he said, on the wings of a carrier-pigeon; but Rafferty was pot angelic enough to be treated with a pair of aerial flappers, and he couldn’t fly; and, moreover, it was so in- congruous, that it was difficult to imagine how he could, ina future state, even think of becoming a cherub or seraph. However, Rafferty pushed forward with all the haste he could, comicbooks. com