Penny Dreadfuls, 1916 · page 392 of 400
Tom Anderson, Dare-Devil: A Young Virginian in the Revolution — page 392: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This is a page of running prose from a Victorian penny dreadful serial titled *Tom Anderson, Dare-Devil* (page 372). The text describes an action scene in which a female character named Dare defends a bridal portrait from destruction by a rowdy crowd, firing pistols to protect it. When a man named Arthur Leslie calls out from a sickroom asking whether she retrieved a dispatch for Colonel Tarleton, Dare finds a folded military document in Leslie's coat signed by "Arthur Leslie, Major-General Commanding British Troops in Virginia"—marked "Immediate" and addressed to Colonel Banastre Tarleton. The passage suggests espionage or military intrigue during the American Revolutionary War period.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
372 Tom ANDERSON, DarE-DEVIL ming eyes and exquisite features—features with the rectitude of Greek ideals and the tenderness of a French court beauty. The bridal veil was cloud-white over heart- melting shoulders: the hand upholding a rope of pearls was of a more delicate symmetry than the hands of mar- ble women. The iconoclasts were closing around her! Dare drew Leslie’s pistol on her nearest adversary. “If you touch this picture —”’ Words were drowned in Lum’s drunken trollings. Dare!” thundered John Pratt. She moved not an eyelid. Her tormentor lurched nearer; and a bullet whizzed through his shako. This was a huge joke. hey pounded the floor, the tables, the spinet, in applause. She had the other pistol j in hand, now. Dr. Pratt was shouldering his way through the pack. “Hold on, boys. I’m the doctor, you know. somebody ‘Il need me if she takes another pop at you.’ At this instant Dare saw help at hand. A huge, bushy head was thrust through a window. A giant signaled her. Him she beckoned. Big Busher made his way through the staggering crowd. He had acquired some English; and his fidelity to his master’s family was a part of him. Dare stood on guard till the portraits were under the giant’s arm. [here was but one place where they might be secure — in the room sentineled by a British dragoon. The uproar had aroused Leslie. When Dare tiptoed into the sick-room, pistol, in hand, Busher following with his burden, Arthur suddenly called out, — “Dare! Dare!—did you get the dispatch—to — Tarleton?” He fell back on his pillow. “Mimi! What does he mean?” She caught up Les- lie’s coat — while Mimi was asking him questions — and shook out of one pocket a folded document. It was ad- dressed to “Col. Banastre Tarleton”’ and inscribed “ Im- mediate.” She broke through the blotches of green seal- ing-wax as she had burst through the rabble. [he paper was signed “Arthur Leslie, Major-General Commanding ritish Troops in Virginia.” It was an order to Colonel ECONMMICOOOKSa(e© m