Stories by English Authors: England | Page 4

acquaintance that evening. That night for the first time Dolignan was in
love. I will spare the reader all a lover's arts by which he succeeded in
dining where she dined, in dancing where she danced, in overtaking her
by accident when she rode. His devotion followed her to church, where
the dragoon was rewarded by learning there is a world where they
neither polk nor smoke, the two capital abominations of this one.
He made an acquaintance with her uncle, who liked him, and he saw at
last with joy that her eye loved to dwell upon him when she thought he
did not observe her. It was three months after the Box Tunnel that
Captain Dolignan called one day upon Captain Haythorn, R.N., whom
he had met twice in his life, and slightly propitiated by violently
listening to a cutting-out expedition; he called, and in the usual way
asked permission to pay his addresses to his daughter. The worthy
captain straightway began doing quarter-deck, when suddenly he was
summoned from the apartment by a mysterious message. On his return
he announced, with a total change of voice, that it was all right, and his
visitor might run alongside as soon as he chose. My reader has divined
the truth; this nautical commander, terrible to the foe, was in complete
and happy subjugation to his daughter, our heroine.
As he was taking leave, Dolignan saw his divinity glide into the
drawing-room. He followed her, observed a sweet consciousness
deepen into confusion; she tried to laugh, and cried instead, and then
she smiled again; when he kissed her hand at the door it was "George"
and "Marian" instead of "Captain" this and "Miss" the other.
A reasonable time after this (for my tale is merciful and skips
formalities and torturing delays) these two were very happy; they were
once more upon the railroad, going to enjoy their honeymoon all by
themselves. Marian Dolignan was dressed just as before--duck-like and
delicious, all bright except her clothes; but George sat beside her this

time instead of opposite, and she drank him in gently from her long
eyelashes.
"Marian," said George, "married people should tell each other all. Will
you ever forgive me if I own to you; no--"
"Yes, yes!"
"Well then, you remember the Box Tunnel?" (This was the first
allusion he had ventured to it.) "I am ashamed to say I had three pounds
to ten pounds with White I would kiss one of you two ladies," and
George, pathetic externally, chuckled within.
"I know that, George; I overheard you," was the demure reply.
"Oh! you overheard me! Impossible."
"And did you not hear me whisper to my companion? I made a bet with
her."
"You made a bet? how singular! What was it?"
"Only a pair of gloves, George."
"Yes, I know; but what about it?"
"That if you did you should be my husband, dearest."
"Oh! but stay; then you could not have been so very angry with me,
love. Why, dearest, then you brought that action against me."
Mrs. Dolignan looked down.
"I was afraid you were forgetting me! George, you will never forgive
me?"
"Sweet angel! why, here is the Box Tunnel!"
Now, reader--fie! no! no such thing! you can't expect to be indulged in

this way every time we come to a dark place. Besides, it is not the thing.
Consider--two sensible married people. No such phenomenon, I assure
you, took place. No scream in hopeless rivalry of the engine--this time!

MINIONS OF THE MOON
BY F. W. ROBINSON

Our story is of the time when George III was king, and our scene of
action lies only at an old farm-house six miles or so from Finchley --a
quaint, ramshackle, commodious, old-fashioned, thatched farm-house
that we see only in pictures now, and which has long since been
improved off the face of the earth.
It was a farm estate that was flourishing bravely in those dear
disreputable days when the people paid fivepence a pound for bread,
and only dared curse Protection in their hearts; when few throve and
many starved, and younger sons of gentry, without interest at court or
Parliament, either cut the country which served them so badly, or took
to business on the king's highway and served the country badly in
return.
The Maythorpe Farm belonged to the Pemberthys, and had descended
from father to son from days lying too far back to reckon up just now;
and a rare, exclusive, conservative, bad-tempered, long-headed race the
Pemberthys had always borne the reputation of being, feathering their
own nests well, and dying in them fat and prosperous.
There were a good many Pemberthys scattered about the home and
midland counties, but it was generally understood in the family that the
head of