Colonel Evellin first broke silence. "You are Eustace Evellin, my only
son, for whom I cherished the remnant of my unfortunate life.--Boy, I
was plundered of wealth, title, and reputation, by a perfidious friend.
I submitted to obscurity and poverty, for I was blessed with a faithful
wife in your angel-mother. Thanks be to Heaven, she lives not to see
this day!--I have fought and bled for my King. I have endured hardships
which would paralyze your pampered niceness to hear described. For
eleven months I fed on carrion, reposed on filth, deafened with the
sound of battering cannon, the shouts of besieging rebels, and the
groans of dying comrades. I have swam across rivers, warding the broken
ice from my wounded body. I have, like a hunted wolf, dressed those
wounds in mountain-fastnesses, shunning the abode of man, and eluding
pursuers whose mercy I disdained to ask. I have seen my King a prisoner,
without power to redress his wrongs; my country a prey to tyrants; all
her hallowed institutions overturned; but never till now, Eustace, was I
completely wretched; for never did anguish, in its most desperate
forebodings, whisper that I could be the parent of a traitor.
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