The Rings Author:Christoph von Schmid Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: seeds which she ardently prayed might bring forth fruit unto eternal life. CHAPTER IV. THE GUARDIAN. Don Alonzo, the husband of Lady Blanche, did not re... more »semble, in any respect, his noble brother, the Count D'Alvarez. He was proud, ambitious, selfish, and dissipated. The fine estate which had descended to him, in the division of the property, as the youngest son, was inadequate to meet his expenses: he looked upon it as mean and insignificant. He entered the army, in the hopes of making up by his valour for what the law of primogeniture deprived him. His old castle appeared too small and too humble for him. He passed the greater part of his time, when not in the army, at court. He spent but little time at home, and then it was always with a numerous train of attendants, and for some festive occasion. As soon as he arrived, the nobility of the neighbourhood assembledaround him, and then revelry and magnificent entertainments began at the castle. He occupied himself with his children no further than' to take them away from the pleasant occupations in which they were engaged, to prepare them for appearing with advantage among his guests. The children, on their part, were not sorry when he left the castle, for they could then again be with their mother in the garden. Fernando, of whom he was the guardian, was never an object of affection with . his uncle; indeed, he heartily disliked the child, whose birth had blasted all his ambitious expectations. He regarded him on this account with determined aversion, and it was natural that the child, who was quick to see it, felt uneasy in his presence. But the Lady Blanche was always the same kind friend to him, and never suffered herself to be swayed by the unjust reproaches of the Count. "I love him," said she, "as I love my own ch...« less