The Belton Estate - Taschenbuch

CCLI THE BELTON ESTATE BY ANTHONY TROLLOPE THE BELTON ESTATE BY ANTHONY TROLLOPE HUMPHREY MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS London Edinburgh Glasgow Copenhagen New York Toronto Alelbourrle Cape Town Bombay Calcutta Madras Shanghai ANTHONYT ROLLOPE Born Bloornsbury, London . 24 April 1815 Died London . . . 6 December 1882 The Belton Estate Prst appeared serially in The Fort nightly Review in 1865, was reprinted in book form twice in 1866. In The Worlds Classics it wasprst printed in 1923. PRINTED IN ENGLAND AT THE OXBORD UNIVBRSITY PRESS BY BREDERICK HALL CONTENTS CHAP. I. 11. 111. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII. IX. X. XI. X I . XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. XVIII. XIX. PAGE THER EMNANT O S F THE AMEDRO F Z A MILY . 1 THE HEIR PROPOSES TO VISIT HIS COUSINS 17 WILL BELTON . . . . . 27 SAFE AGAINST LOVE-MAKING . . 42 SAFE AGAINST LOVE-MAKIN ON G C E AGAIN 65 MISS AMEDRO G Z O ES TO PERIVALE . 77 CAPTAIN A YLMER M EETS HIS CONSTITUENTS 90 CONTENTS CRAP. XX. XXI. XXII. XXIII. XXIV. XXV. XXVII. XXVIII. XXIX. XXX. XXXI. XXXII. PAGE W LIAM BE LTON D OES NOT GO OUT HUNTING . . . . . 251 THE BELTON ESTATE CHAPTER I THE REMXANTS OB THE AMEDROZ FAMILY MRS. AMEDROZth, e wife of Bernard Amedroz, Esq., of Belton Castle, and mother of Charles and Clara Amedroz, died when those children were only eight and six years old, thereby subjecting them to the greatest misfortune which children born in that sphere of life can be made to suffer. And, in the case of this boy and girl, the misfortune was aggravated greatly by the peculiarities of the fathers character. Mr. Amedroz was not a bad man, -as men are held to be bad in the worlds esteem. He was not vicious, -was not a gambler or a drunkard, -was not self-indulgent to adegree that brought upon him any reproach nor was he regardless of his children. But he was an idle, thriftless man, who, at the age of sixty-seven, when the reader will first make his acquaintance, had as yet done no good in the world whatever. Indeed he had done terrible evil for his son Charles was now dead, -had perished by his own hand, -and the state of things which had brought about this woeful event had been chiefly due to the fathers neglect. Belton Castle is a pretty country seat, standing in a small but beautifully wooded park, close under the Quantock hills in Somersetshire and the little town of Belton clusters round the park gates. Few Englishmen know the scenery of England well, and the prettinesses of Somersetshire are among those which are the least known. But the Quantock hills are very lovely, with their rich valleys lying close among them, and their outlying moorlands running off towards Dulverton and the borders of Devonshire, -moorlands which are not flat, like Salisbury Plain, but are broken 251 B 2 THE BELTON ESTATE into ravines and deep watercourses and rugged dells hither and thither where old oaks are standing, in which life seems to have dwindled down to the last spark but the last spark is still there, and the old oaks give forth their scanty leaves from year to year. In among the hills, somewhat off the high road from Minehead to Taunton, and about five miles from the sea, stands the little town, or village, of Belton, and the modern house of Mr. Amedroz, which is called Belton Castle. The village-for it is in truth no more, though it still maintains a charter for a market, and there still exists on Tuesdays some pretence of an open sale of grain and butchersmeat in the square before the church-gate-contains about two thousand persons. That and the whole parish of Belton did once-and that not long ago-belong to the Amedroz family. They had inherited it from the Beltons of old, an Amedroz having married the heiress of the family...