St Leon Author:Hobart Caunter Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: GERTRUDE. Thy jests are rude, I cannot bear them now. Another time, and I might haply think them Of better savour; merriment has lost For me its zest... more », and falls a dead weight o'er me. [Exit. Joanna (alone). I'm sure !—Pretty payment one gets for one's kind offices: more cuffs than good words methinks. Let her blubber till her eyes blister, an ungracious—she may pine herself into a jaundice for aught I care. Never will I try again to stop a tear of hers though I should be sure to save her eyes from rheum—they may glue together for me. [Exit angrily. SCENE VI. Changes to a Forest—the trunk of a blasted Oak appears in the Scene. Enter Bernardine. BERNARDINE. Praised be good luck ! Good luck, thou shall be henceforward my divinity! I owe thee much. Through thee have I got safe out of that horrible place of worldly torment. I much doubt if purgatory could yield worse quarters.Barring the disagreeable temperature of the latter, I think I should be almost disposed to give it the preference. I now begin to feel that I was'nt born to be one of the doom'd. Don Felix issues from the trunk of the tree disguised. Bernardine starts. Avaunt tliee, Satan! (Crosses himself.) DON FELIX. Dost thou not know me ? Bernardine (recognising him). Aye, for as brave a gentleman as ever denied quarter to a cut.throat. But what cloud didst thou drop from, Signor ? DON FELIX. None, Bernardine : the trunk of this scathed tree Has given me shelter from the midnight blast Since our last sudden parting: but in turn, Tell me how thou didst scale those frightful walls, Whose heavenward brows do beetle o'er their base, And mock the wildered vision ? BERNARDINE. Bless your ignorance, I had no manner of occasion to take any such flight. Those gentlemen in sab...« less