Category: Novels

Brownlows: A Novel

Every body in the neighborhood was perfectly aware what was the origin of John Brownlow’s fortune. There was no possibility of any mistake about it. When people are very well known and respectable, and inspire their neighbors with a hearty interest, some little penalty must be...

Chapters

35. CHAPTER XXXIV.

Next morning Powys was up early, with his wise resolution very strong in his mind. He seemed to see the folly of it all more clearly in the morning light. Such a thing might be...

37. CHAPTER XXXVI.

It would be difficult to describe the looks of the assembled party in the library at Brownlows at this moment. Jack, to whom every thing was doubly complicated by the fact that...

28. CHAPTER XXVII.

Sara’s affairs were perhaps not so interesting, as indeed they were far from being so advanced, as those of Jack; but still all this time they were making progress. It was not w...

19. CHAPTER XVIII.

It may be imagined after this with what sort of feelings the unhappy Jack turned up the avenue in cold blood, and walked home to dinner. He thought he knew what awaited him, and...

25. CHAPTER XXIV.

“I don’t say as you’re to take my advice,” said Mrs. Swayne. “I’m not one as puts myself forward to give advice where it ain’t wanted. Ask any one as knows. You as is church fol...

17. CHAPTER XVI.

Late in the afternoon Mr. Brownlow did really look as if he were taking a holiday. He came forth into the avenue as Sara was going out, and joined her, and she seized her opport...

24. CHAPTER XXIII.

It was almost dark when Jack reached Swayne’s Cottages, and there was no light in Mrs. Preston’s window to indicate her presence. The only bit of illumination there was in the d...

11. CHAPTER XI.

After all, no doubt it is the young people who are the kings and queens of this world. They don’t have it in their own hands, nor their own way in it, which would not be good fo...

30. CHAPTER XXIX.

It was the beginning of September, as we have said, and the course of individual history slid aside as it were for the moment, and lost itself in the general web. Brownlows beca...

27. CHAPTER XXVI.

Jack entered the avenue that evening in a frame of mind very different from his feelings on his last recorded visit to Swayne’s cottage. He had been sitting with Pamela all the...

21. CHAPTER XX.

Mr. Brownlow, perhaps, did not know very well what he meant when he called young Powys into his room. He was in one of those strange states of mental excitement in which a man i...

15. CHAPTER XIV.

Next morning Mr. Brownlow was not well enough to go to business. He was not ill. He repeated the assurance a score of times to himself and to his children. He had not slept well...

14. CHAPTER XIII.

All this time affairs had been going on very quietly in the office. Mr. Brownlow came and went every day, and Jack when it suited him, and business went on as usual. As for youn...

2. CHAPTER II.

Mr. Brownlow had one son and one daughter--the boy, a very good natured, easy-minded, honest sort of young fellow, approaching twenty-one, and not made much account of either at...

44. CHAPTER XLIII.

Next morning Mr. Brownlow resumed his regular habits, and went down to the office, reassuring the household a little by this step, which seemed a return to ordinary life. He loo...

29. CHAPTER XXVIII.

It was nearly two hours after this when Jack Brownlow met Powys at the gate. It was a moonlight night, and the white illumination which fell upon the departing visitor perhaps i...

43. CHAPTER XLII.

It was Jack who hurried his sister down the avenue in obedience to that peremptory summons. The effects of the fresh air and rapid movement roused her, as we have said, and nobo...

38. CHAPTER XXXVII.

Of all painful things in this world there are few more painful than the feeling of rising up in the morning to a difficulty unsolved, a mystery unexplained. So long as the darkn...

22. CHAPTER XXI.

It was not for some days that the clerks in Mr. Brownlow’s office found out the enormity of which their employer had been guilty--which was almost unfortunate, for he gave them...

20. CHAPTER XIX.

It was only two days after this when Mr. Brownlow received that message from old Mrs. Fennell which disturbed him so much. The message was brought by Nancy, who was in the offic...

41. CHAPTER XL.

The dinner passed over without, so far as the guests were aware, any special feature in it. Jack might look out of sorts, perhaps, but then Jack had been out of sorts for some t...

10. CHAPTER X.

It was not to be expected that Sara could be long unconscious of her humble neighbors. She, too, as well as Jack, had seen them in the carrier’s cart; and though Jack had kept h...

36. CHAPTER XXXV.

Powys was proud, and his pride was up in arms. He slept little that night, and while he sat and brooded over it all, the hopelessness and folly of his hope struck him with tenfo...

34. CHAPTER XXXIII.

There was a pleasant bustle about the house that evening when the dog-cart drove up. The sportsmen had been late of getting in, and nobody as yet had gone to dress; the door was...

7. CHAPTER VII.

While Sara and Jack were thus enjoying themselves, Mr. Brownlow went quietly in to his business--very quietly, in the dogcart, with his man driving, who was very steady, and loo...

39. CHAPTER XXXVIII.

Jack followed his father down stairs, and did not say a word. It had been an exciting morning; and now that he knew all, though the excitement had not as yet begun to flag, care...

23. CHAPTER XXII.

Jack Brownlow was having a very hard time of it just at that moment. There had been a lapse of more than a week, and he had not once seen the fair little creature of whom every...

18. CHAPTER XVII.

After that day of curious abandonment and imprudence, Mr. Brownlow returned to his natural use and wont. He could not account to himself next day even for his want of control, f...

46. CHAPTER XLV.

Within six months all these changes had actually taken place, occasioning a greater amount of gossip and animadversion in the county than any other modern event has been known t...

16. CHAPTER XV.

It was like a dream to the young Canadian when he followed the master of the house into the dining-room;--not that _that_, or any other social privilege, would have struck the y...

40. CHAPTER XXXIX.

Mr. Brownlow and his son were a long time together. They talked until the autumn day darkened, and they had no more light for their calculations. Mr. Brownlow had been very wear...

26. CHAPTER XXV.

A few days after these events, caprice or curiosity led Sara to Swayne’s cottage. She had very much given up going there--why, she could scarcely have explained. In reality she...

31. CHAPTER XXX.

Pamela could make nothing of her companion. Nancy was very willing to talk, and indeed ran on in an unceasing strain; but what she said only confused the more the girl’s bewilde...

9. CHAPTER IX.

Perhaps one of the reasons why Jack was out of temper at this particular moment was that Mrs. Swayne had been impertinent to him. Not that he cared in the least for Mrs. Swayne;...

42. CHAPTER XLI.

The guests at Brownlows next morning got up with minds a little relieved. Notwithstanding the evident excitement of the family, things had passed over quietly enough, and nothin...

32. CHAPTER XXXI.

Neither the next day, however, nor the next again, was Mrs. Preston able to move. The doctor had to be brought at last, and he enjoined perfect quiet and freedom from care. If s...

45. CHAPTER XLIV.

The Brownlow family scarcely met again until after Mrs. Preston’s funeral. Sara did not even attempt to leave her forlorn charge, or to bring her away from Mrs. Swayne’s on the...

6. CHAPTER VI.

Dewsbury Mere was bearing, which was a wonder, considering how lately the frost had set in; and a pretty scene it was, though as yet some of the other magnates of the parish, as...

5. CHAPTER V.

The next morning the frost had set in harder than before, contrary to all prognostications, to the great discomfiture of Jack Brownlow and of the Dartfordshire hounds. The world...

8. CHAPTER VIII.

Mr. Brownlow took his new clerk into his employment next morning. It is true that this was done to fill up a legitimate vacancy, but yet it took every body in the office a littl...

33. CHAPTER XXXII.

While these things were going on at the gate of Brownlows, a totally different scene was being enacted in Masterton. Mr. Brownlow was at his office, occupied with his business a...

4. CHAPTER IV.

There was a very pleasant party that evening at Brownlows--the sort of thing of which people say, that it is not a party at all, you know, only ourselves and the Hardcastles, or...

1. CHAPTER I.

Every body in the neighborhood was perfectly aware what was the origin of John Brownlow’s fortune. There was no possibility of any mistake about it. When people are very well kn...

3. CHAPTER III.

His mind had been going leisurely over his affairs in general, as he went down to his office; for naturally, now that he was so rich, he had many affairs of his own beside that...

13. civil. No doubt principally it was because they knew so little of her,

and her appearance had the semi-dignity of preoccupation--a thing very difficult to be comprehended in that region of society which is wont to express all its sentiments freely....

12. CHAPTER XII.

“But you must not set your heart upon it, my darling,” said Mrs. Preston. “It may be or it mayn’t be--nobody can say. And you must not get to blame the young lady if she thinks...