Joseph Wilmot, or, The Memoirs of a Man-Servant — page 279: what you’re looking at

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

a so a VAS SOs ere rose 266 JOSEPH WILMOT; OR, THE MEMOIRS OF A MAN-SERVANT. — stantine besought me to reconsider my decision in| ing to conciliate them, he fled from his native respect to the treasure: but I remained firm ; and | island and fixed his abode in France. This was having reiterated my former arguments, earnestly | some little while after the murder of his brother begged that the subject might be dropped. But | and the destraction of the monastery. In subse- urazzo persisted in reasoning with me on the] quent years the Leone family migrated from poin he urged everything that his generous| France to England, where in process of time they nature could suggest—he was profoundly vexed | formed matrimonial connexions; and their Corsi- and grieved at the resoluteness with which I ad-}can blood thus became blended with that of the hered to my first decision. He even fancied that} Exglish. The young gentleman whom I now I should regard it as a slur upon himself that he | found at the farm-house, was the last living scion took what I refused to make use of, and that it} of that family of Leone, and was therefore the was nothing but the most punctilious propriety of | only existing representative of the race to which feeling on my part which prevented me from | the murdered Abbot had belonged. Upwards of availing myself of such a golden opportunity. Ij} a century and a half had elapsed since the date of said all I could to induce him to assent to the| that terrific tragedy; and thus did I find myself arrangement I had suggested—or I should rather | in the presence of one who reckoned the venerable say that I advanced everything to enforce my de- | victim of the crime amongst his ancestry. cision and put an end to the topic: but he re-| I need hardly remind the reader that the rule turned again and again thereto, until our arrival | of the Genoese had long ceased in Corsica, and at the farm-house necessarily put an end to it. that it now belonged to France. The troubles It was dusk when we reached the hospitable | which the island had at yarious times experienced, homestead ; and on entering the cheerful parlour, | the distracted state into which it had been fre- we found a stranger there. This was a young man | quently thrown, the arbitrary decrees of one set of who appeared to be about my own age, and who| rulers altering and upsetting the territorial grants was dressed in the most elegant fashion. He was} and Janded apportionments of a previous set, had by no means good-looking : but there was some- | necessarily led to an almost interminable confusion thing interesting in his countenance and pleasing | as well as to constant litigation on the part of the in his manners. His hair was light—his com- | holders, claimants, and pretenders with respect to plexion fair ; and at the first glance I took him to| different estates. Sanguinary feuds and family be a fellow-countryman of my own, or at all events | hatreds, terrific animosities and appalling reprisals, a native of a more northern clime than that in| as well as those hereditary vendettas, or reyenges, which we thus met. Nevertheless, as I presently | which have proved so dark a stigma upon the Cor- learnt, Corsican blood flowed in his veins; and he} sican character,—-all these were amongst the bore the name of Leone. 1t appeared that he had | natural consequences of those disputes which I arrived in the neighbourhood on horseback, at-| have been describing in respect to the land. At tended by a valet; and that for reasons which will} length the French Chamber of Deputies took the be presently explained, he had sought the hospi-| subject into consideration; and a measure passed tality of the farm-house. the two bodies of the Legislature at Paris for the I may as well detail in a narrative form that | regulation of what was termed the Corsican Land- which came to my knowledge through the medium | question. The result was the institution of a of conversation: but in order to render this ex-| Special Commission at Ajaccio, to examine into planation clear, I must go back to those circum- | the grounds on which disputed estates were held stances which relate to the monastery of St. Bar- | by present occupants, as well as into the founda- tholomew, and which have been laid before the; tion on which the pretensions of claimants were reader. It was the custom, on the election of an | based. The appointment of such a commission abbot, for the whole ecclesiastical patrimony to be | naturally produced the utmost excitement in Cor- duly invested in him: he was a temporal Baron as | sica; for many holders of estates were stricken well as a spiritual prelate; and thus whosoever | with alarm, while many hitherto hopeless claimants wore the mitre of St. Bartholomew was for the! were inspired with joy. There was a sufficient time being as much the owner of the monastery | military force to suppress any disturbance that and domain as any other nobleman or gentleman! might arise; and thus the Commissioners were was the possessor of his own family estate. The| enabled to proceed uninterruptedly with the im- last Abbot of St. Bartholomew was cut off by a! portant business that came under their jurisdiction. violent death in the manner already described ; | Being thoroughly able and upright men, they con- and as the monastery was reduced to a ruin and | ducted this business not merely with despatch but the monks were dispersed, no other Abbot was | also with the most rigid adherence to the justice elected. The last of that series of mitred Prelates | of each special case; and I must farther observe thus died in virtual possession of the whole domain | that the Commission had already been in existence of St. Bartholomew. He left behind him a|a twelvemonth at the time when shipwreck threw brother—a weak, imbecile, and time-serving man,;me and my Greek companions upon the Corsican who had not the courage nor the magnanimity to | shore. take any steps to avenge the Abbot’s death or to} It may be easily conceived that the result of the punish his murderer the Count of Monte d’Oro. | Commissioners’ labour was to effect considerable The brother thus alluded to, and who lived at| changes in the distribution of Corsican lands. Ajaccio, bore the name of Leone; and he had for | Families which had long held estates on no better the greater portion of his life been engaged in| ground than the maxim “that possession is nine mercantile and financial pursuits. He was mar- | points of the law,’ found themselves dispossessed ried and had a family: but becoming an object of | and were forced to make way for the legitimate persecution on the part of the Genoese authorities, | owners: the weaithy became poor—the poor be- despite the servile zeal he displayed in endeavour- | came wealthy; and thus a complete revolutiva of -_— COomicaoolks (CO)