Sir John Constantine

John Constantine, by Prosper
Paleologus Constantine

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Title: Sir John Constantine Memoirs Of His Adventures At Home And
Abroad And Particularly In The Island Of Corsica: Beginning With
The Year 1756
Author: Prosper Paleologus Constantine
Editor: "Q" (A. T. Quiller-Couch)
Release Date: April 6, 2005 [EBook #15565]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SIR JOHN
CONSTANTINE ***

Produced by Lionel Sear

SIR JOHN CONSTANTINE.

MEMOIRS OF HIS ADVENTURES AT HOME AND ABROAD
AND PARTICULARLY IN THE ISLAND OF CORSICA:
BEGINNING WITH THE YEAR 1756.
WRITTEN BY HIS SON PROSPER PALEOLOGUS OTHERWISE
CONSTANTINE AND EDITED BY "Q" (A. T. QUILLER-COUCH).
"For knighthood is not in the feats of warre, As for to fight in quarrel
right or wrong, But in a cause which truth can not defarre He ought
himself for to make sure and strong Justice to keep mixt with mercy
among: And no quarrell a knight ought to take But for a truth, or for a
woman's sake."

TO THE READER
A hundred and fifty episodes, two sermons, and a number of moral
digressions, have been omitted from this story.
The late ingenious Mr. Fett (whose acquaintance you will make in the
following pages), having been commissioned by Mr. Dodsley, the
publisher, to write a conspectus of the Present State of the Arts in Italy
at two guineas the folio--a fair price for that class of work-- had
delivered close upon two hundred folios before Mr. Dodsley interposed,
professing unbounded admiration of the work, its style, and matter, but
desiring to know when he might expect the end: "For," said he, "I have
other enterprises which will soon be demanding attention, and, as a
business-man, I like to make my arrangements in good time." To this
Mr. Fett replied, that he, for his part, being well content with the rate of
remuneration, did not propose to end the work at all!--and, the
agreement, having unaccountably failed to stipulate for any such thing
as a conclusion, Mr. Dodsley had to compound for one at a crippling
price.
So this story had, in Browning's phrase, "grown old along with me,"
but for the forethought of Messrs. Smith, Elder and Co., in limiting its
serial flow to twelve numbers of The Cornhill Magazine As it is, I have

added a few chapters; but a hundred and fifty episodes remain
unwritten, with the courtships of Mr. Priske, and the funeral oration
spoken by the Rev. Mr. Grylls over the cenotaph Of Sir John
Constantine in Constantine Parish Church. These omissions, however,
may be remedied if you will ask the publishers for another edition.
Now, if it be objected against some of the adventures of Sir John
Constantine that they are extravagant, or against some of his notions
that they are fantastic, I answer that this book attempts to describe a
man and not one of these calculable little super men who, of late, have
been taking up so much more of your attention than they deserve.
Students who engage in psychical research, as it is called, often confess
themselves puzzled by the behaviour of ghosts, it appears to them
wayward and trivial. How much more likely are ghosts to be puzzled
by the actions of real men? And we are surely ghosts if we keep
nothing of the blood which sent our fathers like schoolboys to the
crusades.
Lastly, my friend, if you would know anything of the writer who has so
often addressed you under an initial, you may find as much of him here
as in any of his books. Here is interred part, at any rate, of the soul of
the Bachelor Q, in a book which, though it tell of adventures, I would
ask you not to disdain, though you be a boy no longer. An acquaintance
of mine near the Land's End had a remarkably fine tree of apples--to be
precise, of Cox's Orange Pippins--and one night was robbed of the
whole of them. But what, think you, had the thief left behind him, at the
foot of the tree? Why, a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles.
ARTHUR T. QUILLER-COUCH.
THE HAVEN, FOWEY, October 1st, 1906.

CONTENTS
Chapter.
I. OF THE LINEAGE AND CONDITION OF SIR JOHN

CONSTANTINE.
II. I RIDE ON A PILGRIMAGE.
III. I ACQUIRE A KINGDOM.
IV. LONG VACATION.
V. THE SILENT MEN.
VI. HOW MY FATHER OUT OF NOTHING BUILT AN ARMY,
AND IN FIVE MINUTES PLANNED AN INVASION.
VII. THE COMPANY OF THE