The Works of George W. M. Reynolds — page 343: what you’re looking at

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

326 REYNOLDS’ WORKS sceptres in their hands. As I stood in that room surveying those and all other familiar objects, what a gush of memories swept through my brain! What a tide of emotions surged up in my breast! Methought that I still beheld that lady, with her beautiful countenance all bedewed in tears, seated on the sofa where I had once seen her, and where too I had sat upon her knees and been strained to her bosom, and for a few minutes I was blinded with my weeping. Oh, if she were my mother? Why, why was I unacknowledged, and my sister also? Was it that we were the children of shame? Alas, alas, poor mother! ” Asain did Francis Paton pause, well-nigh overcome by his emotions, and Juliana, deeply touched by his tale, lavished upon him the tenderest caresses. She spoke soothingly to him; she said all she could think of to break down the artificial barrier which separated them and make him feel himself upon an equal and familiar footing. The youth saw and appreciated these evidences of love on her part, and was profoundly moved thereby; so that it was with a tone and manner of greater confidence that he thus resumed his narrative: “Tf any doubt had previously existed in my mind in respect to St. James’s Palace being the place where I had seen that lady whom I always think of as my mother, it was now cleared up. But who was she? Who could she have been? Some one of no mean rank, for on two oceasions had I seen elegantly dressed ladies with her, apparently in attend- ance upon her, and treating her with deference and respect. Moreover, that nobleman with a star upon his breast, was he not in some way closely connected with that lady or with her secret? For that there was a secret, and that this mystery regarded my sister and myself, it was impossible to doubt. However, I will not dwell upon all the ideas which suggested themselves, all the conjectures that I formed, because they led to nothing. Let me continue my narrative. Weeks and months passed away, and never amidst the crowd of titled dames who visited at the palace did I catch a glimpse of that one countenance which above all others I would have siven worlds to behold.” ‘And should you recollect it now, if vou beheld that countenance, Frank?” inquired Juliana, more and more interested in the youth’s strange and romantic story. CONNIE OO KS (E(0)