KENILWORTH - Penn State University

Kenilworthhis physiognomy the sharp, keen expression of inventive geniusand prompt intellect, which, joined to quick and brillianteyes, a well-formed mouth, and an intelligent smile, oftengives grace and interest to features which are both homelyand irregular. Janet looked at him with the sly simplicity ofher sect, and replied, “Notwithstanding thy boasted honesty,friend, and although I am not accustomed to read and passjudgment on such volumes as thou hast submitted to myperusal, I think I see in thy countenance something of thepedlar-something of the picaroon.”“On a small scale, perhaps,” said Wayland Smith, laughing.“But this evening, or to-morrow, will an old man come hitherwith thy father, who has the stealthy step of the cat, the shrewdand vindictive eye of the rat, the fawning wile of the spaniel,the determined snatch of the mastiff—of him beware, foryour own sake and that of your distress. See you, fair Janet,he brings the venom of the aspic under the assumed innocenceof the dove. What precise mischief he meditates towardsyou I cannot guess, but death and disease have everdogged his footsteps. Say nought of this to thy mistress; myart suggests to me that in her state the fear of evil may be asdangerous as its operation. But see that she take my specific,for” (he lowered his voice, and spoke low but impressively inher ear) “it is an antidote against poison.—Hark, they enterthe garden!”In effect, a sound of noisy mirth and loud talking approachedthe garden door, alarmed by which Wayland Smith sprunginto the midst of a thicket of overgrown shrubs, while Janetwithdrew to the garden-house that she might not incur observation,and that she might at the same time conceal, atleast for the present, the purchases made from the supposedpedlar, which lay scattered on the floor of the summer-house.Janet, however, had no occasion for anxiety. Her father, hisold attendant, Lord Leicester’s domestic, and the astrologer,entered the garden in tumult and in extreme perplexity, endeavouringto quiet Lambourne, whose brain had now becomecompletely fired with liquor, and who was one of thoseunfortunate persons who, being once stirred with the vinousstimulus, do not fall asleep like other drunkards, but remainpartially influenced by it for many hours, until at length, bysuccessive draughts, they are elevated into a state of uncontrollablefrenzy. Like many men in this state also, Lambourne248