The Mysteries of the Court of London by Pauline Clarendon — page 390: what you’re looking at

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

THE HONOURABLE ARTHUR EATON © 887 of her movements, and the mild, though dignified expression which animated her features, all combined to render her a being of whom an adoring husband might well be proud. Searcely had the Countess of Desborough resumed her seat on the sofa, when a domestic, attired in a sumptuous livery, — that disgusting trumpery which degrades the man into the menial, and which, thank God! the noble-minded Americans have cast off from amongst them, — threw open the door of the apartment, and announced the Honourable Mr. Eaton. The only son of Lord Marchmont was, as we have already stated, about three and twenty years of age. He was tall, and naturally slender, but now so thin that there was some- thing spectral in his appearance. His hair was dark and curly; his eyes, of a corresponding hue, were large and searching, fascinating the beholder with their extraordinary brilliancy. But it was the light of fever that shone thus superhumanly in them; and when observed in contrast with the emaciated and colourless cheeks, the thin lips, the natural richness of whose red had been subdued into a faint rose-tint, and the general appearance of sickness, attenua- tion, and decay which marked the unfortunate young man, the effect produced was shocking in the extreme. Retaining the air of youthfulness, he seemed to have entered suddenly on the term of caducity without having passed his prime, and likewise without falling into decrepi- tude. He still walked upright; there was not a wrinkle upon his brow, not a streak of snow on his dark and silky hair; nor was there a speck to mar the brilliancy of his even and perfect teeth. And yet he was wasting away, gliding on- ward to the tomb with a rapidity that might almost be seen. The Earl and Countess of Desborough rose and received the visitor with a reserve the coldness of which was less intense than they meant it to be; for grievous as was the wrong which he had inflicted upon Fernanda Aylmer, they could not help being touched by the change, the awful change, which had taken place in Arthur Eaton since last they saw him. A few months ago, and he was a fine, handsome young man, vigorous in the enjoyment of that spring-time of his existence when the sanguine imagination, elate with hope, decks out the world in all its brightest hues, and fancies that CONnniclooolKs (EO)