Volume I Part 39 (2/2)

Kenny I. Dodd.

Address me, ”Golden Ox,”--I mean at the sign of,--Rastadt, for you 're sure of finding me here for the next four weeks at least.

LETTER x.x.xV. MARY ANNE DODD TO MISS DOOLAN, OF BALLYDOOLAN

”The Golden Ox,” Rastadt.

My dearest kitty,--I have only time for a few and very hurried lines, written with trembling fingers and a heart audible in its palpitations!

Yes, dearest, an eventful moment has arrived,--the dread instant has come, on which my whole future destiny must depend. It was last night, just as I was making papa's tea, that a servant arrived on horseback at the inn with a letter addressed to the Right Honorable and Reverend the Lord Dodd de Dodsborough. This, of course, could only mean papa, and so he opened and read it, for it was in English, dearest, or at least in imitation of that language.

I refrain from quoting the precise expressions, lest in circ.u.mstances so serious a smile of pa.s.sing levity should cross those dear features, now all tension with anxiety for your own Mary Anne. The letter was from Adolf von Wolfenschafer, making me an offer of his hand, t.i.tle, and fortune! I swooned away when I heard it, and only recovered to hear papa still spelling out the strange phraseology of the letter.

I wish he had not written in English, Kitty. It is provoking that an event so naturally serious in itself should be alloyed with the dross of grammatical absurdities; besides that, really, our tongue does not lend itself to those delicate and half-vanis.h.i.+ng allusions to future bliss so germane to such a proposal. Papa, and James, too, I must say, evinced a want of regard to my feelings, and an absence of that fine sympathy which I should have looked for at a moment like this. They actually screamed with laughter, Kitty, at little lapses of orthography, when the subject might reasonably have imposed far different emotions.

”Why, it's a proposal of marriage!” exclaimed papa, ”and I thought it a summons from the police.”

”Egad, so it is!” cried James. ”It's an offer to you, Mary Anne. 'The Baron Adolf von Wolfenschfer, Frei-herr von Schweinbraten and Ritter of the Order of the c.o.c.k of Tubingen, maketh hereby, and not the less, that with future-coming-time-to-be-proved-and-experienced affection, the profound humility of an offer of himself, with all his to-be-named-and-enumerated belongings, both in effects and majorats, to the lovely and very beautiful Miss, the first daughter of the Venerable and very Honorable the Lord Dodd de Dodsborough.'”

[Ill.u.s.tration: 470]

”Pray stop, James,” said I; ”this is scarcely a fitting matter for coa.r.s.e jesting, nor is my heart to be made the theme for indelicate banter.”

”The letter is a gem,” said he, and went on: ”'The so-named A. von W., overflowing with a mild but in-heaven-soaring and never-to-earth-descending love, expecteth, in all the pendulating anxieties of a never-at-any-moment-to-be-distrusted devotion--'”

”Papa, I really beg and request that I may not be trifled with in this unfeeling manner. The Baron's intentions are sufficiently clear and explicit, nor are we now engaged in the work of correcting his English epistolary style.”

This I said haughtily, Kitty; and Mister James at last thought proper to recover some respect for my feelings.

”Why, I never suspected you could take the thing seriously, dear Mary Anne,” said he. ”If I only thought--”

”And pray, why not, James? I'm sure the Baron's ancient birth--his rank, his fortune--his position, in fact--”

”Of all of which we know nothing,” broke in papa.

”But of which you may know everything,” said I; ”for here, at the postscript, is an invitation to us all to pa.s.s some weeks at the Schloss, in the Black Forest, his ancestral seat.”

”Or, as he styles it,” broke in James, impertinently, ”'the very old castle, where for numerous centuries his high-blooded and on-lofty-eminence-standing ancestors did sit,' and where now 'his with-years-bestricken but not-the-less-on-that-account-sharp with-intelligence-begifted parent father doth reside.'”

”Read that again, James,” said papa.

”Pray allow me, sir,” said I, taking the letter. ”The invitation is a most hospitable request that we should go and pa.s.s some time at his chateau, and name the earliest day our convenience will permit for the visit.”

”He spoke of capital shooting there!” cried James. ”He told me that the Auer-Hahu, a kind of black-c.o.c.k, abounds in that country.”

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