Chatsworth Volume 3; Or, The Romance Of A Week

Synopsis

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1844 Excerpt: ...of giving me freedom: oh'. set me but free; and bid me cope a bear or tiger; wrestle with the far-famed Minotaur, or that sea-beast whose scales are brass; set me upon a fierce chimera, a horrid shape compounded of all strangeness; bid me do anything, so it may buy my freedom; for there is no rest for my troubled thoughts, while bondage hinders me from pursuing that quest which is the only end of my sad life This said, he was silent; and the Queen replied to him. None of these things I will propose to you. The task I enjoin you shall be easy, and free from danger. You see that unarmed youth;take this sword and kill him. This is all I ask of you; which done, you and your fellows shall have instant freedom. He took the sword, and having proved, upon his hand, its point and edge, he looked upon the Queen for a moment, and then turned towards the priest of Apollo, whom he had not till then seen, and who was standing by, awaiting his death, with such a calm and sweet aspect, that all who looked upon him were moved to pity. The old man's feelings became doubly distracted at the sight of such antipathy growing between those two bright creatures; the one so sweet to look on, yet so cruel; the other so young and valiant; and what seemed to strike him most with wonder was the strong resemblance between them. But these feelings soon gave way before those which grew out of his own condition; for he now perceived how basely he was disesteeined, and how impossible it would be to recover his freedom without acting this bloody sin which Avas proposed to him. And how could he, who had all his life feared nothing so much as to do evil, turn his innocent hands to kill? Thus all his sad disasters seemed to stand in array before him, and he saw no hope to re...