"
"And will you, on the faith of such men as you know these soldiers to
be," said Edith, "take a part of such dreadful moment?"
"I will," said Lord Evandale,--"I must; my honour and loyalty are both
pledged for it."
"And all for the sake," continued Miss Bellenden, "of a prince whose
measures, while he was on the throne, no one could condemn more than Lord
Evandale?"
"Most true," replied Lord Evandale; "and as I resented, even during the
plenitude of his power, his innovations on Church and State, like a
freeborn subject, I am determined I will assert his real rights, when he
is in adversity, like a loyal one. Let courtiers and sycophants flatter
power and desert misfortune; I will neither do the one nor the other."
"And if you are determined to act what my feeble judgment must still term
rashly, why give yourself the pain of this untimely meeting?"
"Were it not enough to answer," said Lord Evandale, "that, ere rushing on
battle, I wished to bid adieu to my betrothed bride? Surely it is judging
coldly of my feelings, and showing too plainly the indifference of your
own, to question my motive for a request so natural."
"But why in this place, my lord," said Edith; and why with such peculiar
circumstances of mystery?"
"Because," he replied, putting a letter into her hand, "I have yet
another request, which I dare hardly proffer, even when prefaced by these
credentials.
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