The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 53: what you’re looking at

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

34 REYNOLDS’ WORKS himself up in his own chamber; my father was the only person whom he would see. His health suffered, and his physicians earnestly recommended that he should travel, in order that change of scene might have a salutary effect upon his spirits. My father offered to accompany him, and for this purpose to postpone the alliance which he was about to con- tract with the object of his own love. Such a circumstance may afford you, my dear Zoe, an idea of the strength of that friendship which my father experienced toward the viscount, —a friendship which would even have led him to sacrifice, for the time being, the consummation of his own fondest hopes. But the viscount would not hear of it, and in order to escape from my father’s well-meant importunities that he should accompany him, Delorme took his departure sud- denly and stealthily, without leaving a clue to the direc- tion in which his contemplated journey lay. He however left behind him a letter for my father, promising that he would write so soon as his mind should have somewhat re- covered from the effects of the terrible bereavement he had sustained. His infant son the viscount had consigned to the care of a distant female relative, a marchioness of consider- able wealth, and who resided in the neighbourhood of Fon- tainebleau, where, I should observe, the Viscount Delorme’s country mansion was situated, as you already know that my father’s likewise was. Shortly after the viscount’s departure my father espoused the object of his love, my mother.”’ Here Clarine became deeply affected, as if that allusion to her long-departed mother had reopened the fountains of her grief. But at length conquering her emotions, she continued her narrative in the ensuing manner: ‘“‘ The marriage of my father and mother took place about — six and twenty years ago. At the expiration of a year a daughter was born, who, if she had lived, would have been my elder sister, but she died a few months after her birth from one of those maladies which are peculiar to infancy. Highteen months had elapsed without the slightest intelli- gence being received from the Viscount Delorme, either by my father or the marchioness who had the care of his child, and it was feared that he had died in some foreign land. But at length letters arrived to announce that he was still a denizen of this world, that he had travelled through many climes, and that he had resolved not to sadden the minds of CORMICLIOOKS (E(0)