The Wars of Wapsburgh. by the Author of 'The Heir of Redclyffe'. (Paperback)

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 MAIDENS OF WAPSBURGH. O the nurseries were built, and surrounded with a circular wall of the same grey marble fabric, and, in due time, each little chamber contained an infant, the offspring for whom the Princess had toiled so hard, and in whom she already beheld the renewal of the city she had mourned. With their birth, however, her careswere far from ceasing. Each lay helpless in its narrow room, or more properly speaking, stood on its head, for such were Vespa's peculiar nursery arrangements; yet, like other babies, all required constant nourish ment, and countless were the excursions of their untiring mother to procure food for them, and many the perils she endured on their behalf. They were swaddled in a shining white garb, and slept, asbefitted their noble lineage, within curtains of snowy silk. Indeed, as the labours of the distaff and the loom have ever been the becoming occupation of classic princesses, the first task fulfilled by each of these scions of a high-spirited race was to spin her own hangings for her sleeping chamber, after which she sank into a long and sound rest, and, upon awakening from it, was invested, like the goddess Pallas Athene, in whose steps she already trod, with a full suit of armour, in the hereditary colours of her race, black and sulphur, with a helmet with a double plume, and a veil of transparent gauze. This armour was never laid aside. Like the knights of Branksome, the entire clan were wont to " drink the red wine through the helmet barred," and to be ready for defence, sally, or foray upon the shortest notice. The eldest daughter of the family was known by the homely west-country name of Appledrone. She was invaluable to her mother, and, from the moment of having her armour, relieved Vespa of all the most arduous labour...