The Boyne Water Author:John Banim 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: THE BOYJVE WATER. CHAPTER I. It was in the summer of 1685, that a party of travellers, suggesting, in the group, some remarkable contrast, held their way ... more »from Belfast to the more northern and ancient fortress of Carrickfergus. First came, on a jennet and steed, of the best kind the country afforded, a maiden and a youthful cavalier, well clad, well favoured, and exhibiting in their air that certain, though indefinable something which proclaims the habits and feelings,if not the birth and lineage of gentle maidens and gallant cavaliers. The damsel, in her tight, grass-green long- waisted jerkin, laced and fringed with silver ; in her ample cloth riding-skirt, of a graver colour, showing, through certain openings, glimpses of a rich silk under-dress ; in her low-erf'-ned, broad-leafed, riding hat, flapped down, to be secured under the chin ; and, above all, in the very delicate, if not very beautiful face beneath it, shaded by loose tresses of a pale gold-colour ; she, in particular, asserted, at a glance, her pretensions to gentle rank ; and, if her mar- bly cheek and melancholy brow did not well become a sylph- like girl of sixteen, perhaps they touched the bosom of a beholder with more interest than could the burst of a sunny face, and a laughter-loving glance. He who rode at her side, and, with an air of brotherly and affectionate protection, occasionally touched her rein, was not so prepossessing in visage or figure, though he was almost as young as his sweet chargr. His features were, perhaps, too rigidly marked, though by no means of a common cast; and seriousness, without pensiveness, seemed, at all events now that he remained unexcited, their predominant character. Bu his figure, though even in boyhood, more square and manly than round or gracefuf, had an expre...« less