Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1873-06-12
From Temple Bari
Ten Minutes Late: A Tale with
out a Moral.


| have always been late all my life
| began it by being ten minutes late for
title and fortune. In this wise it
happened: my mother, after ten years
of marriage, during which time she had
not made the slightest attempt at pre-
senting my father with an heir, sudden
announced. that she had great hopes of,
in time, supplying him with the much
desired blessing. Great hopes they
proved themselves to be; for one lovely
June morning she not only conferred on
my father one son, but being determined
to do nothing by halves, ten minutes
afterward a second made his appearance.
The eldest son was at once proclaimed
as such, and invested with a piece of
blue ribbon-which / should think form
ed pleasing contrast to the crimson
wrist it adorned-that no mistake to his
Identity should occur, while |, not be-
ing expected, came off second best in
honor and attention, and went shares in
all the goods the gods had provided for
my brother, .. e., his food, his clothes.
and his cradle OF course we were the
image of each other, and being strongly
impressed with the fact we naturally
grew up to admire each other intensely.
| never, however, quite forgave him
for giving ME the go-by in my entrance
/ into life until he squared matters by out
running me in another race which
proved more to my advantage than the
first. 1t is this adventure ! am about to
relate.
First it IS necessary to tell you, that
through a whim of my mothers we were
christened by the respective names of
Charles and Charlewood, my fathers
name was Manners my mother having
been an heiress of the name of Compton.
had conferred@it, with herself, on my
grateful father, whose. acres before his
marriage were not equal to his ancestry,
and whose barOnetcy was bestowed upon
him by an impoverished monarch, who
received in exchange an equivalent, and
rather more, in the coin of his realm.
Such being the case, the double pat
ronymie of Compton-Manners descended
to the twin offspring of the illustrious
couple afore- mentioned, and remained
| their undisputed possession, as my
mother, after that supreme and highly
| successful effort of maternity, rested on
her. laurels, SO to speak, and no other
| child arrived to share my fortune as a
| younger son. [ have mentioned that il
| was a Whim of my mothers to call us
| both by Christian names beginning with
| the same letters, and the same whim
| caused her to increase if possible the
| likeness between us by dressing us ex
| actly alike Of course this Occasioned
| endless confusion, but luckily when we
| had attained the age of twelve years,
| my hair grew rapidly darker. while my
! brothers retained its rich auburn color
| This at once, greatly to my mothers
/ disgust, proclaimed difference between
us, though we possessed the same blue
| eyes, dark eyelashes, and regular fea-
| lures.
pass over the school days at Harrow,
year at Christ Church, and, finally, as
we would have it so, our first separations,
my brother Charley getting his commis-
sion in the Guards while contented
myself with one in the Rifle Brigade ;
1 aud had not been in that most edifying
/ and. steadiest of dear old regiments for
a month before became fully.cohviilc-
4 ed. that the Guards were nowhere com
1 pared with it, and not for goM untold
| would have exchanged my dark green
i there is really as mnch green about ii
| as there is in a London square-for the
| gaudier trappings of the Household
troops. -
When Twas about two and twenty. it
chanced that my brothers battalion of
the Guards and my battalion of the Rifle
| Brigade were ordered to Montreal, we
preceding the Guards by few weeks.
I 1t happened to be about the time that a
/ certain political outbreak was feared,
and soon after our arrival at Montreal /
was sent on detachment to a country
~wn to frighten the disaffected inhabit-
L. ITO good behavior. This proceed
ants |. q 10 say, gave great delight to
ing, strans though fear it was only
some of them, It the town of Agnes
the female portion {. - hailed our adj
vile, Canada West, VII. -. but as a
vent, not only as protectlc, @rWlse
break in the monotony of an otn,
decidedly dull country town.
| think it only fair to. mention that
consider bis Excellency was, for once in
his life, wrong in. the impression be re-
cetyed of the rebelliOus state of feeling
at Agnesville. From my. humble ex-
perience, which | believe would be en-
dorsed by the bulk of my brother officers
and signed by the colonel himself, |
should say we found far more affection
than disaffection in that hospitable town;
the only danger we ran was from the
fire of the brightest eyes ever remem-
ber. This fire we returned, as in duty
bound, so as to keep up the name for
gallantry we have always borne ). not,
however, that we all escaped scot free;
there were one or two of US, and per-.
haps more, who, am ashamed to say,
were taken prisoners after very faint
resistance. and who being allowed their
I Ia
certain continental neighbors lately did
under similar circumstances.
You must know that in those days of
youth and folly, dear reader, prided
myself on an. unexceptionable taste in
beauty, and to keep up my. supposed
credit for. this | went Systematically to
work to ascertain who was the belle par
excellence before / fixed on any one
Young lady as my muffin during our
stav at Agnesville.. For the first week |
fiirted generally the second week | be
gan to reduce the circle of my acquaint-
ance; the third found me in state of
waver between two beauties and by
the end of the first month ! was, fgura-
lively speaking, on my knees before
Miss Marguerite Duval, who, | had now
quite made up my mind, was one OF the
most beautiful, as well as one of the
most innocent and simple.minded, of her
sex. Who could doubt the fact for an
| instant who had been permitted the
| felicity of gazing at her? When with
her felt inspired, like Montrose,
| ssTo make her glorious by my pen, and
famous by my sword"
| When | was away from her / Ifelt-don't
be shocked my sentimental reader-as if
| had had nothing to eat for fortnight,
| followed by an extraordinary tendency
toward Villa Duval. This, suppose,
was sympathetfcal electricity.
/ Let me describe her; let me, in fact,
make her glorious by my pen, as the
substitute of rifle, | fear preeiudes the
j possibility of winning her fame by any
other means. She was tall and slight
very slight. Now this slightness is, to
my mind, almost fault in Canadian
beauty, and it is IN the one respect OF OF
figure that the maidens OF England excel
! their Canadian sisters. Imploring your
/ nardon for this DEPRESSION, let my pro-