Under the Red Dragon: A Novel

Already having met and been welcomed by my host and his daughters, my first glances round the room were in search of Lady Estelle and her mother. About eighteen persons were pre...

Caradoc and many other good fellows were gone eastward, and save Hugh Price and a newly-fledged ensign, I was the only officer with the depôt, and being senior had the command....

The moment I entered the drawing-room, where Winifred Lloyd had been doing her utmost to amuse her various guests till we came, and where undoubtedly the ladies' faces grew brig...

The 4th of October found me with my regiment (my detachment "handed over," and responsibility, so far as it was concerned, past) before Sebastopol, which our army had now enviro...

As yet I knew nothing of all that has been detailed in the foregoing chapter, consequently the entire measure of my vengeance against Guilfoyle was not quite full. I had, howeve...

Next day I heard the stranger's story, and it was a sad one. Georgette Franklin--for such was her unmarried name--was the last surviving child of George Franklin, a decayed gent...

It was Christmas-eve at Craigaderyn as well as before Sebastopol, and all over God's land of Christendom--the "Land of Cakes," perhaps, excepted, as Christmas and all such human...

In the growth of my passion for Valerie I forgot all about the probable opposition of her brother, the Count, to my wishes. Indeed, he entered very little into my schemes of the...

By the peculiarity of our position kept much apart, or seldom finding opportunities, even in a house like Craigaderyn Court, for being alone, as it was perpetually thronged by v...

I pursued the old road just described, urging my horse to a trot where I dare do so, but often being compelled--by the rough construction and nature of the way, and at times by...

How wild and inconceivable, abrupt, yet quite practicable, were the brilliant visions I drew, the projects I formed! Mentally I sprang over all barriers, cleared at a flying lea...

To be brief, when the effect of the chloroform passed away, I became sensible of a strange sensation of numbness about my left shoulder. Instinctively and shudderingly I turned...

The absence of the boat from its mooring-place was soon observed, and surmises were rife that we must infallibly have gone seaward. But why? It seemed unaccountable--and at such...

The night passed slowly with me in the khan. After the conclusion of the Hadji's story, the travellers who were halting there coiled themselves up to sleep, on the divan or on t...

In the rifle-pits many of our men lay dead or dying, and a few paces beyond them brought me among Russians in the same pitiable condition. One, who had been shot through the che...

I presume that I need scarcely inform my reader that, notwithstanding the predicament in which a preceding chapter left me, and the tenor of that paragraph which caused such con...

It was in the height of the gay London season that this interesting ceremony, which formed the last scene connected with the Crimean War--the last chapter in its glorious yet me...

I told Phil Caradoc of the strange meeting with Mr. Hawkesby Guilfoyle, and his emotions of astonishment and disgust almost exceeded mine, though mingled with something of amuse...

Winifred Lloyd was, as Caradoc had said, a very complete and perfect creature. The very way her gloves fitted, the handsome form of her feet, the softness of her dark eyes, the...

It was impossible for me not to feel lingering in my heart a deep and tender interest for Valerie. She had not deceived or ill-used me; we had simply been separated by the force...

We had all long since forgotten the discomfort of early rising. In my case I had never been to bed, so to buckle on my sword and revolver was the work of one moment; in another...

To expatiate upon the joy of all when we found ourselves safe in Craigaderyn Court again were a needless task. Lady Estelle was conveyed at once to her own room, and placed in c...

THE dreamy conviction or thought with which the last chapter closes, proved, perhaps, but a foreshadowing of that which was looming in the future. On the day after that terrible...

Apart from Welsh fable and tradition, the lands of Craigaderyn had been in possession of Sir Madoc's family for many ages, and for more generations of the line of Lloyd; but the...

The following day was Sunday; and ere it closed, there occurred a little contretemps which nearly lost me all chance of putting to the issue whether I was "to gain or lose it al...

A long time elapsed and we did not return, but amid the bustle that reigned in and around Craigaderyn Court, our absence was not observed so soon as it might otherwise have been...

Though convalescent, I was still too feeble to think of saddle-work; and the Hospoza Volhonski had no means of transmitting me otherwise than mounted, or of having me--even when...

Both girls were very handsome, and for their pure and brilliant complexion were doubtless indebted to the healthful breeze that swept the green sides of the Denbigh hills, toget...

While we were at luncheon, and the swollen champagne-corks were flying upward into the green foliage overhead, and while Owen Gwyllim was supplying us with iced claret-cup from...

Philip Caradoc, perceiving that I was somewhat dull and disposed to indulge in reverie, soon retired also, and we separated, intending to mature our plans after morning parade n...

I had now time amply to observe and to appreciate that which had impressed me powerfully at first--the wonderful beauty of the lady who protected me, and who spoke English with...

I have said that, ere the regular hutting of the army for the winter siege began, quarters were found for me by fate elsewhere; a circumstance which came about in the following...

I must have dropped asleep of sheer weariness and loss of blood, when tottering to the rear; for on waking I found the moon shining, and myself lying not far from the fifth para...

Close to, and yet quietly secluded from, the mighty tide of busy humanity that daily surges to and fro between the Bank and the Mansion House, all up Cheapside and Cornhill, in...

Even while Ivan Yourivitch was conferring with his startled mistress, I saw a tall figure in Russian uniform--the eternal long gray greatcoat--appear at the room door, and I was...

It is the morning of Saturday, the 8th September, 1855. For a year now the allied forces have been before Sebastopol; but the flag of St. Andrew is still flying in defiance upon...

Leave granted, our acceptance of Sir Madoc's invitation duly telegraphed--"wired," as the phrase is now--our uniforms doffed and mufti substituted, the morning of the second day...

"And _she_ is to be there--nay, is there already; so one more chance is given me to meet her. But for what?--to part again silently, and more helplessly bewitched than ever, per...

It was while the infantry and Naval Brigade were still before Sebastopol, toiling, trenching, and pounding with cannon and mortar at all its southern side, we had our ardour fir...

One enormous cannon-shot that struck the earth and stones threw up a cloud of dust which totally blinded the brave brigadier who led us; he was thus compelled to grope his way t...

My Lord Pottersleigh and the adventurer Hawkesby Guilfoyle--for an artful, presumptuous, and very singular adventurer he eventually proved to be--could not detect that there was...

After the living were mustered next morning, and burial parties detailed to inter the dead, Caradoc and one or two others dropped into my tent to share some tiffin and a cigar o...

In this world, events unthought of and unforeseen are always happening; so, as I have hinted, did it prove with me, on the epoch of Dora's birthday fête. It was not without cons...

In making a circuit of his farm on the morning after the storm, Farmer Rhuddlan, while traversing a field that was bounded by a strip of the sea shore, on which the ebbing surf...

When consciousness returned, I found the dull red evening sun shining down the long valley of Inkermann, and that, save moans and cries for aid and water, all seemed terribly st...

We came in sight of Malta at daybreak on the 28th of September, and about noon dropped our anchor in the Marsamuscetta, or quarantine harbour, where all ships under the rank of...

Brief though my nap of "forty winks," I had within it a little dream, induced, no doubt, by my return to Wales, and by my surroundings, as it was of Winifred Lloyd, of past tend...

Supposing her to have left Walcot Park, as her letter informed me, I rode in that direction no more; and though I knew the family address in London, I could neither write in exc...

Though the dower-house of Walcot Park dated from the days of Dutch William, when taste was declining fast in England, internally it had all the comforts of modern life, and its...

Had Estelle recognised me? If so, what might she--nay, what must she--think, and how misconstrue the whole situation? Should I ride after the carriage, or write at all risks, an...

"If I am to drag on my life for years perhaps as a Russian prisoner, better would it have been, O Lord, that a friendly shot had finished my career for ever. What have I now to...

And so it came to pass, as perhaps Sir Madoc had foreseen, by the doctrine of chances, and without any romance or sensationalism, that in the bright season of summer, Winifred a...

On the 28th of March, I found myself once more in my old tent, and seeking hard to keep myself warm at the impromptu stove, constructed by my faithful old servant, poor Jack Eva...

I re-entered the château feeling sad, irresolute, and crushed in spirit. I had lost that on which I had set my heart, and at the hands of Tolstoff, my rival, I might yet lose mo...

As Sir Madoc and I proceeded along the to me well-known Whitchurch road, I asked myself mentally, could it really be that I was again looking with farewell eyes on all this fair...

Lady Estelle received me with a welcome smile, for at that time all around her were strangers; and I hoped--nay, felt almost certain--that pleasure to see me inspired it, for on...

The comfort and splendour of the fashionable club-house, the tall mirrors, the gilded cornices, the soft carpets, the massive furniture, the powdered and liveried waiters glidin...

She seemed absorbed in thought as I drew near her, and did not perceive my approach. She was leaning on the carved balustrade of the terrace, and gazing at the sea and the scene...

"Weather bit your chain, and cast loose the topsails!" cried a hoarse voice, rousing me from a reverie into which I had fallen--one of those waking-dreams in which I am so apt t...

And now, while the stately troopship Urgent is passing under the guns of old Gib, and ploughing the waters of the Mediterranean, I may explain that which may have been a puzzle...

Quietly and before day dawned the trench-guards were relieved, and we marched wearily back towards the camp. I had dismissed my company, and was betaking me to my tent, threadin...