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The Chaplain of the Fleet, by W. Besant and J. Rice
The Chaplain of the Fleet by W Besant and J Rice Author:Walter Besant General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1881 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER XIX. HOW WILL LEVETT WAS DISAPPOINTED. Thus was Harry Temple at last pacified and brought to reason. In the course of a short time he was so far recovered from his passion as to declare his love for another woman, whom he married. This shows how fickle and fleeting are the affections of most men compared with those of women; for I am truly of opinion that no woman can love more than one man in her life, while a man. appears capable of loving as many as he pleases all at once or in turn, as the fancy seizes him. Could Solomon have loved in very truth the whole seven hundred ? When I was no longer harassed by Harry, s gloomy face and jealous reproaches, I thought that the time was come when Iought to consider how I should impart to my lord a knowledge of the truth, and I said to myself, day after day : ' To-morrow morning I will do it;, and in the morning I said : 'Nay, but in the evening., And sometimes I thought to write it, and sometimes to tell it him by word of mouth. Yet the days passed and I did not tell him, being a coward, and rejoicing in the sunshine of his love and kindness, which I could not bear to lose or put in any danger. And now you shall hear how this delay was the cause of a most dreadful accident, which had well-nigh ruined and lost us altogether. I could not but remember, when Harry Temple reproached me with falsehood and faithlessness, that Will Levett had made use of nearly the same words, making allowance for Will, s rusticity. The suspicion did certainly cross my mind, more than once, that Will may have meant (though I understood him not) the same thing as Harry. An...« less