Beadle's Dime Novels No. 127: Bald Eagle — page 25: what you’re looking at

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

MONTAGNIE’S STRUGGLE. 27 True, that very day she had spoken scornfully, even harshly, if a voice so sweet and lips so fuir could be thus disposed. She had stigmatized the cause so dear to the heart of Montagnie as “ rebellious, treasonable and insane ”——-more than this, they, the Supporters thereof—they, the halfclad and half-staryed army, Who had left the peace and comforts of home to march and Counter-march before a nobly equipped foe—ay, die and be forgotten, leaving only the result of the conflict to brighten the hereafter—men like these Katrina had stigmatized as a ‘ridiculous rabble,” “a host of ragamuffins,” who must soon grace the gibbet in return for their folly. Montagnie thought of these things bitterly; and his love waned when he recalled the scornful curve of her pretty lip, and the flashing of her bright eye coupled with words like these. He remembered that she had intimated that more than one British officer (who had found the way to the house of her tory father) had spoken of himself with ap- proval, and that wealth and promotion might both be his by au change of service. He felt no temptation here, rather a bitter scorn for himself that any thing should lurk about him by which another should dare couple him with so base a thought. No, insignificant as he might be, he was all free- dom’s ; doubly so when peril and shame were heaped upon her cause—doubly so when his own hopes were baffled. Then appeared the image of Katrina, as she had some- times appeared, gentle, winning, and most womanly, and his mood softened. “She is worth the winning,’ he said to himself; “but I must not through her learn to despise my- self.” Suddenly the thought of his mission flashed like a pang through his nerves. He was yet unaware of its precise im- port; he had only learned that some one superior to the or- dinary soldier was necessary to sacrifice somewhat for the public good. Then came the images of Nathan Hale, of Hayne, of Andre, and others whose deaths had been such that the mothers that bore them might well shriek aghast, as if the shame of the mode might leave its blighting shame upon the soul, and forever blend it with their memories, True, these were ennobled by the act which cast a temporary degradation about them—the fatal tree was to them the cross a comicbooks.com