But, soft! behold, lo, where it comes again!
I'll cross it, though it blast me.--Stay, illusion!
If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,
Speak to me!--SHAKESPEARE.
"The Dubarrys," he began, "were a French Roman Catholic family of
distinction. A cadet of that family came over to Virginia among the
earliest English settlers of the colony.
"As in the case of the more important among his anglican comrades, he
obtained a very large tract of land by Royal patent. He built his hut
and fixed his abode here, not a hundred yards from the spot where this
church now stands.
"He took an Indian girl for a wife, and continued to live a wild
huntsman sort of life in the wilderness; only breaking it sometimes by
going down to Jamestown, twice a year, to buy such necessaries of
civilized life as the wilderness could not furnish, and to hear news
from any ship that might have come in from the old country; and above
all, to take a holiday among civilized pleasure-seekers--for such
existed even in the primitive settlement of Jamestown.
"In due course of time, a family of half-breed sons and daughters grew
up around him, and the little primitive hut gave place to a substantial
stone lodge.
"And the country around was becoming settled. The Berners had got a
grant of the Black Valley, and had built the first part of Black Hall,
which has since been added to in every generation, until it has grown to
its present dimensions.
"About this time also, Charles Dubarry was inspired with a certain
ambition for his eldest son, a densely ignorant, half-Indian youth of
nineteen; and hearing that the two young sons of Richard Berners of
Black Hall were to be sent to England to be educated, he proposed that
his own 'black boy,' as he called his handsome dark-eyed heir, should go
with them. And as the three lads had been forest companions for some
years, the proposal of old Dubarry was gladly accepted, and the three
young men sailed in company for England.
"They spent ten years in the old world, and returned, as as they had set
out, together. It was after their return that the close friendship of a
young lifetime was turned to the deadliest enmity. It happened in this
manner: "The country, during their absence, had grown a great deal in
population. Every rich valley among these mountains had its white
proprietor. In the Valley of the Roses--so named, because at the time it
was taken possession of by its first proprietor, it was fairly carpeted
and festooned all around and about with the wild-rose vine--dwelt one
Gabriel Mayo, a gentleman of fortune, taste, and culture. He had a
family of fair daughters, of whom old Charles Dubarry, with his national
gallantry and proneness to exaggeration, had said, that 'they were all
the most beautiful girls in the world, and each one more beautiful than
all the others.' "Be that as it may, it is certain that there were five lovely maidens,
ranging from fifteen years to twenty-one, to choose from. Yet who can
account for human caprice, especially in such matters? The three young
men--Louis Dubarry, and John and William Berners--all fixed their
affections upon Florette Mayo, the youngest beauty.