A TALE OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. BY THE AUTHOR OF "WAVERLEY." Master, go on; and I will follow thee, To the last gasp, with truth and loyalty. As You Like it. COMPLETE IN ONE VOLUME. BOSTON: SAMUEL H. PARKER, NO. 12, CORNHILL. 1824 REDGAUNTLET. LETTER I. DARSIE LATIMER TO ALAN FAIRFORD. Dumfries. CUR me exanimas querelis tuis—in plain English, Why do you deafen me with your croaking. The disconsolate tone in which you bade me farewell at Noble House, and mounted your miserable hack to return to your law-drudgery, still sounds in my ears. It seemed to say, "Happy dog, you can ramble at pleasure over hill and dale, pursue every object of curiosity that presents itself, and relinquish the chase when it loses interest; while I, your senior and your better, must, in this brilliant season, return to my narrow chamber and my musty books." Such was the import of the reflections with which you saddened our parting bottle of claret, and thus I must needs interpret the terms of your melancholy adieu. And why should this be so, Alan? Why the deuce should you not be sitting precisely opposite to me at this moment, in the same comfortable George-Inn; thy heels on the fender, and thy juridical brow expanding its plications as a pun rose in your fancy? Above all, why, when I fill this very glass of wine, cannot I push the bottle to you, and say, "Fairford, you are chased!" Why, I say, should not all this be, excepting because Alan Fairford has not the same true sense of friendship with Darsie Latimer, and will not regard our purses as common, as well as our sentiments. I am alone in the world; my only guardian writes to me of a large fortune, which will be mine when I reach the age of twenty-five complete-my present income is, thou knowest, more than sufficient for all my wants, and yet thou-traitor as thou art to the cause of friendship-doest deprive me of |