you. Enough for you to know your guardian loves
you, cherishes you even as if you were his child.
Let us arise from table since our meal seems done; --
what is it that alarms you? Ah! And at that mo-
ment the report of a gun, the crashing of a window
pane, the sound of shot hurtling past, its striking the
opposite wall of the apartment, and dropping, along
with falling plaster, on to the floor, burst upon them;
followed, without, by the expostulating tones of a
man-servant, that were soon overpowered by a loud
guffaw, and, before the interlocutors had recovered
from their astonishment and terror, Narcisse, fol-
lowed by several men carrying fowling pieces, rushed,
swearing, into the vestibule. Amanda saw him,
and, rising to her feet, regarded him through the
doorway with a look of scorn and anger akin to that
cast by the Belviderean Apollo upon the wounded
Python. But his dull temperament was invulner-
able to the arrows that shot from her eyes, and, un-
daunted, he swept forward into the room, and with
coarse familiarity attempted to salute her. He was
unsuccessful, for Mona, advancing between them,
hindered the nearer approach of the intruding man-
nikin, who, baffled, and with the eyes of Amanda
still fixed upon him, and yet beaming ineffable con-
tempt and disdain, at length stood before her with
downcast look, like one detected in some act of guilt.
His companions one by one slunk back to the lawn,
whither in the dumb disgrace of his discomfiture, he
followed them. There, meeting with the domestic
already mentioned, and who had now been joined by
a fellow-servant; first an altercation, then a scuffle
ensued, in which latter the mastiff took an effective

[[18]]

p017 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p018w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p019

v?