It was a little corner of green, sheltered by gray rocks. Mary-Ann seemed more depressed but such is the mobility of youth, that she cried out with joy when she saw the place where our meal was spread. Simons descended to the place, all the while protesting that although she would eat her breakfast, yet she would never pay the bill. He closed the interview, and pointed out to us the dining hall. The King listened neither to my objections, nor to Mrs.
Such are the blunders we all make at twenty-five. The count and countess went to Lady DudleyĮternal Spirits Or have ye chosen this placeĪlbert Savaron de Savarus, she repeated to herself. The good mother, on learning that Dempster was not at home, had at once thought that she could gratify Janets wish to go to Paddiford Church.īut three days later she was once more thinking of the serpent, recalled to him by that singular emotion, painful and yet sweet, which the first sight of Raoul had given her. Kitty, perceiving there was a mystery she was not to inquire into, returned to Orchard Street, really glad to know that her mistress was safe, but disappointed nevertheless at being told that she was not to be frightened. So, too, barbarism and savagery, already tired of the novelty, went about their nightly business, and save for a howling dog here and there, the beast world left the star unheeded, Common sense at last, a little heated by argument, signified its unalterable convictions by going to bed. Grim warnings were treated by many as so much mere elaborate self-advertisement. He did not open his eyes until the first glimmer of dawn, and he waited till his usual hour for riding, so as to excite no suspicion. He slept, however, that nighthe slept with a heavy, brutish sleep like the sleep of certain persons condemned to death. We relieve our conscience by the confession, at all events leaving it to exercise its authority as it may see fit. The name has appeared to find favor, and all things considered, it may possibly be quite as well to let it stand, instead of going back to the House of Hanover for the appellation of our finest sheet of water. As every word uttered by Natty Bumppo was not to be received as rigid truth, we took the liberty of putting the Horican into his mouth, as the substitute for Lake George. Looking over an ancient map, it was ascertained that a tribe of Indians, called Les Horicans by the French, existed in the neighborhood of this beautiful sheet of water. While writing this book, fully a quarter of a century since, it occurred to us that the French name of this lake was too complicated, the American too commonplace, and the Indian too unpronounceable, for either to be used familiarly in a work of fiction. As we believe this to be an appropriation of the name that has its origin with ourselves, the time has arrived, perhaps, when the fact should be frankly admitted. Hawkeye calls the Lac du Saint Sacrement, the Horican. There is one point on which we would wish to say a word before closing this preface.