Explore "Flemington" by Violet Jacob on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
THE last months had been a time of great anxiety to Lord Balnillo. In spite of his fine steering, and though he had escaped from molestation, he was not comfortable as he saw the imprisonments and confiscations that were going on; and the precariousness of all that had been secure disturbed him and made him restless. He was unsettled, too, by his long stay in Edinburgh, and he hankered afresh after the town life in which he had spent so many of his years. His trees and parks interested him still, but he looked on them, wondering how long he would be allowed to keep them. He was lonely, and he missed James, whom he had not seen since long before Culloden, the star of whose destiny had led him out again into the world of chance.
He had the most upsetting scheme under consideration that a man of his age can entertain. At sixty-four it is few people who think seriously of changing their state, yet this was what David Balnillo had in mind; for he had found so many good reasons for offering his hand to Christian Flemington that he had decided at last to take that portentous step. The greatest of these was the effect that an alliance with the Whig lady would produce in the quarters from which he feared trouble. His estate would be pretty safe if Madam Flemington reigned over it.