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So I decided to participate in a fellow blogger NerdExp's challenge, and write about a character in media who uses his brain over his brawn; a character that's not built to be one of the chess pieces, but instead is the player himself. After thinking about it, there's one pretty well known character that comes to mind.
*WARNING: SIGNIFICANT SPOILERS ARE AHEAD FOR CODE GEASS SEASON ONE*
Geass: a type of psychic power that manifests itself differently in each separate individual. Lelouch's power is the ability is make an individual do whatever he says. The catch is, it cannot be used on the same person twice. The day Lelouch received this power, he massacred a Britannian squad with it.
When you think about Lelouch's army The Order of the Black Knights and the battles he fought with them, each and every fight ends up like a game of chess. Lelouch uses his pieces and orders them at will, going into certain spots, ambushing foes and coming up with battle strategies. One on one fights with a KnightMare? He almost certainly ends up losing. Even in the battle with Cornelia near the end of the first season, his Gawain was not able to outmaneuver her. Instead, it was the appearance of Darlton, who under that influence of his Geass, that saved him.
In the Battle of Narita, Lelouch uses a bomb that releases radiation waves and causes a gigantic landslide taking out half the KnightMares being used by Cornelia. In the end, however, he is chased down by the Lancelot and almost captured, if it were not for C.C.'s help. When he wanted to save C.C. from Mao, he used tricks like recording and taking advantage of Mao's Geass. Even when Mao took his sister captive, he used Kuruguri as a chess piece, one that captures brawn, in order to save her, going as far as using Geass on himself. He is the perfect example of mind over matter, and brains over brawn. | <urn:uuid:a401dbf7-f972-4ea6-9941-fe98787c33ac> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.ign.com/blogs/bladesymphony/tag/brains-over-brawn/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280065.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00541-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.981654 | 437 | 1.546875 | 2 |
While obviously people in the strata of income discussed in this piece won't be coming to visit the website for investing tips or as potential mutual fund investors, anyone talking about the American economy should not be dismissing (or ignoring) what is happening in a great (and growing) part of the population.
- The U.S. poverty rate rose to the highest level in 11 years in 2008 and household incomes declined as the first full year of the recession took its toll, government data showed.
- The poverty rate climbed to 13.2 percent from 12.5 percent, and the number of people classified as poor jumped by 2.6 million to 39.8 million, according to a Census Bureau report released today.
- Real per capita income for the U.S. as a whole declined by 3.1 percent last year to $26,964, the report showed.
- The poverty threshold in 2008 was defined as $22,025 in income for a family of four.
- The rise in poverty is putting a strain on social services and charities. At the Atlanta Community Food Bank, demand in August was up by about 20 percent from a year earlier, said Bill Bolling, the founder and executive director.
- “There are a lot of people who have never needed help that need it now,” he said. “It is quite a different environment.”
[Jun 22, 2009: WSJ - Numbers on Welfare See Sharp Increase]
[Feb 20, 2009: NYT - Newly Poor Swell Lines @ Food Banks Nationwide]
[Nov 14, 2008: Wall Street Journal - A Run on (Food) Banks] | <urn:uuid:d46beab4-b845-4f01-9272-6a2e0849b0ee> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.fundmymutualfund.com/2009/09/us-poverty-rises-to-11-year-high-but.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281069.89/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00266-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967964 | 340 | 2.296875 | 2 |
PHIL. 134: COMPUTERS, ETHICS & SOCIETY
In a short writing of roughly 500 words, please respond to all of the following questions:
1. Now that you’ve been introduced to a variety of normative ethical theories, how do you now understand the relationship between ethics in general and computers in particular? Next, reconsider Moor’s paper, “What is Computer Ethics?”; what does Moor mean by claiming that computers are logically malleable devices? Furthermore, how does this claim about logical malleability lead to what Moor calls the invisibility factor (of which he offers three kinds)? Please be sure to define your terms and give examples.
Write a short essay that addresses the questions above. When you respond to these questions, you should be specific and cite specific details from the class readings and your own research. You may provide references from your own research, but only in addition to material provided by the course. Also, you MUST make sure to cite your sources in your response and include a reference list at the end of your essay. Citations must be from reputable sources. Sites like Wikipedia, about.com, etc. are NOT considered acceptable sources.
Higher credit will be given for responses that show evidence of a systematic and comprehensive understanding of the topics involved.
Standard font, preferably Arial in either 11pt or 12pt. Be sure to structure your paper in proper paragraph form. Do not write one, long run-on paragraph.
MLA, APA, or any other format is acceptable provided that it is consistent through the entire paper. Please, no cover sheets. | <urn:uuid:698fce15-adb3-4732-891b-21dfe0084fe8> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://www.essay-writing.com/blog/computer-ethics-reflection-2/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882571190.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20220810131127-20220810161127-00078.warc.gz | en | 0.923704 | 345 | 2.875 | 3 |
Drifter and conman Lino Espos y Mina came to the Chapmans’ Pennsylvania home in 1831, seeking a place to stay. And it was love at first site for the doctor’s wife Lucretia Chapman, an overworked, mother of five.
The night after Lino purchased arsenic from a drug store, Dr. William Chapman (pictured above) became ill. To help her sick husband through a suspected bout of food poisoning, Lucretia made him chicken soup—which only made him more ill.
When Dr. Chapman died on June 22, his autopsy revealed that he had been poisoned. Lino and Lucretia were immediately targeted, and given separate, highly publicized, trials. Lino was convicted, while Lucretia was found not guilty—but key witnesses gave damning evidence against the doctor’s wife.
A neighboring poultry farmer, Benjamin Boutcher, described how over 20 of his ducks dropped dead after consuming the leftover chicken soup that was thrown out on the Chapmans’ lawn. The same chicken soup had been given to Dr. Chapman by his wife before he died.
Linda Wolfe’s well-researched and highly detailed account The Murder of Dr. Chapman immerses readers in the case, providing all the evidence, and leaving it up to you to decide the real killer.
Keep reading to see how the crime played out. Then download The Murder of Dr. Chapman on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and iTunes.
Lino requested black trousers, a vest, and a costly black frock coat from Watkinson, and on Thursday, June 16, he went into town with Lucretia to pick up the clothes. After he got them, he put them on, then he and Lucretia separated. She went to attend to some personal chores, and he went into a pharmacy on Chestnut and Sixth, across the way from Watkinson’s.
It was the handsomest drugstore in the city, the creation of Elias Durand, an émigré from France. Durand had studied his profession in Paris and served Napoleon as a pharmacist in the Grand Armée, and he still bought all his medications and chemicals from France, which led the world in the manufacture of drugs. His taste for things French was also evident in his shop’s sophisticated decor, its array of polished mahogany cabinets, marble-topped counters, and etched-glass windows and doors.
Lino had a friend at the fancy shop, a clerk named Alfred Guillou. He’d met Guillou a few weeks earlier when he’d stopped in the pharmacy to ask for street directions. The young clerk, who knew some Spanish, had considerately supplied the directions in that language, and since that time Lino had paid him several other visits. He’d chatted with Guillou about his origins and told him he was the son of the governor of California, but he hadn’t given him either his true name or his adopted name of Espos y Mina. Instead he’d said he was called Estanislao de Cuesta, just like Mexico’s consul to Philadelphia.
Today he dawdled among the shiny cabinets and finally mentioned to Guillou that he was planning to stuff and mount some birds. Arsenic was a principal ingredient in taxidermy. Lino followed his statement by asking if the shop had any of the popular arsenical soap he wanted to use.
“We haven’t,” Guillou said. “But we might prepare it.”
That wouldn’t be necessary, Lino demurred. “If you have plain arsenic powder, that would answer.”
Guillou wasn’t sure whether he ought to sell Lino arsenic itself. He said he’d ask the boss, and called over Durand.
Durand was a clever man, the inventor of an apparatus for carbonating water who would soon open the first soda bottling company in America. More, he was scientifically astute, so knowledgeable about drugs that Philadelphia’s top physicians were in the habit of asking his advice before they prescribed medicine to their patients. But he was a poor judge of intent. After peering down his long Gallic nose at his clerk’s impeccably dressed friend, he averted his gaze, turned his heavy-lidded eyes toward his shelves, and took down one of his French porcelain jars. Then he scooped some powdery salt onto his brass scale and sold Lino two ounces of arsenic.
The following night William was seized with stomach cramps and nausea. He wasn’t worried about it. Assuming that something he’d eaten had been a little spoiled, he reviewed what he’d had. Roast veal, hot boiled pork, and green peas at the midday meal. Cold pork in the evening, topped with smearcase, the creamy cottage cheese that he relished. No one who’d dined with him had a stomachache, not Lucretia or Lino or any of the children or boarding students. But none of them had eaten any of the pork, his favorite, even though he’d urged it on them, told them how very tasty it was. It must be the pork that was making him feel so bad.
A little brandy would calm his stomach, he decided, and asked Lucretia to fetch him the bottle. But even though he drank a hearty swallow, his stomach continued to feel queasy, so he asked her to get him the peppermint. Alas, she couldn’t find it, which was unfortunate, because without the mint, he stayed up most of the night vomiting, and the next morning, Saturday, he still felt sick.
That was when Lucretia suggested they send for Dr. Phillips. William didn’t want Phillips. He didn’t want any doctor. “The doctor will only give me medicine,” he grumbled. “I have drops for stomachache in the house. I’ll take those.”
Lucretia gave him the drops, but he continued to throw up. He threw up all day, and all night, too, and on Sunday morning Lucretia insisted on getting Dr. Phillips. She didn’t consult William, just sent Lino over to Bristol, and next thing William knew, Phillips was there examining him. “You’ve had a mild attack of cholera morbus,” he said when he was done, and advised eating lightly for the next few days.
Doctors! “A beefsteak would do me more good than anything else,” he’d groused at Phillips.
After Phillips left, Lucretia went into the kitchen. She’d hired new help to replace Ellen, who’d finally quit. She’d hired Juliann, a local woman, as cook, and Ann Bantom, a black woman from Philadelphia, as part-time housecleaner and laundress. But it was Sunday, and neither Juliann nor Ann was in that day. She herself would have to cook William a meal, a light meal as Dr. Phillips had recommended. She decided on rice gruel, boiling the grains until they were soft and letting little Lucretia, who liked helping out in the kitchen, pound them in the mortar until they formed a smooth, gluey porridge.
The next morning Ann came to work but Lucretia still had no cook—Juliann had sent word she was sick. There was nothing for it but to do the cooking herself again. What to make for William? Going across the road to the poultry farm of her neighbors, the Boutchers, she bought a chicken, then hurried home and set about making the chicken soup Dr. Phillips had recommended.
She made a bland concoction, simmering the bird merely in salted water. But by the time the chicken was cooked through, its flavor had transformed the liquid into a rich broth. She added some seasoning, poured her soup into a pretty blue bowl, placed the fowl on a separate plate, carried both dishes to the parlor, and asked Mary to take the meal upstairs to her father.
Little Lucretia was keeping William company when Mary arrived with the food. The two girls got him up, sat him in the rocking chair, and made his bed. Then Mary took advantage of her position as elder sister and assigned Lucretia to help their father eat.
Lucretia didn’t mind. Her father was feeling a bit better, the little girl noticed. He wasn’t vomiting anymore.
Still, he ate slowly at first. He started with the gizzard—he was partial to gizzard. But he said this one was tough, so he gave the rest to her, and soaking a cracker in the soup the way her little brother John used to do when he was a baby, gummed the broth-drenched biscuit. The sucking made his appetite return and soon he was ignoring the soup and tackling the chicken again. He seemed very hungry—he ate all of the breast and part of the back.
When he was done with his meal little Lucretia hefted the heavy blue bowl and the plate of leftover chicken, carried her burden gingerly down the stairs, and set it on the kitchen table. Then she skipped back upstairs to her father.
He didn’t seem so well now, she thought when she scuttled into his room, not so well as he’d been before he’d eaten. | <urn:uuid:4290101b-60eb-4584-9d9d-225490eef592> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://explorethearchive.com/killer-con-poisoning-of-dr-chapman | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882571584.72/warc/CC-MAIN-20220812045352-20220812075352-00677.warc.gz | en | 0.986333 | 2,018 | 1.617188 | 2 |
A celebration naming College of Marin’s (COM) basketball court after trailblazing basketball player Don Barksdale will be held Friday, April 29, 2022, from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at COM’s Kentfield Campus.
Barksdale was one of the first African Americans to break the color barrier and play professionally in the NBA. He is considered one of the most significant alumni to have attended the College.
In June 2020, COM’s Board of Trustees made a unanimous decision to name the basketball court at the Kentfield Campus after the renowned alum. The pandemic delayed the ceremony for almost two years because of limitations and safety concerns for inside gatherings.
Born in Oakland in 1923, Barksdale loved playing basketball from a young age. He was frequently cut from school basketball teams that only allowed one Black player per team and took to playing at local parks. This is where his skills caught the eye of COM’s basketball coach who offered him a scholarship to play for the College, making COM his first school team. Barksdale led COM’s team to two state championships and was named most valuable player. He played at COM from 1941-43, a time when segregation, Jim Crow, and lynching were still legal throughout the United States.
His success at COM launched Barksdale’s basketball career and started a long line of firsts. Barksdale went on to be the first African American to play on the U.S. Olympic team, and at 28 years old, he was one of the first Black men to play in the NBA and one of the highest paid players in the entire league. His career spanned the return of African American troops from World War II, the racist implementation of redlining in housing, and the historic Brown v. Board of Education decision of 1954. He would later be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame.
After his basketball career ended in 1955 from an ankle injury, he became a very successful Bay Area radio host and pioneering entrepreneur well into the 1980s. In the 80s, he founded Save High School Sports, a successful nonprofit organization in Oakland that helped support local athletics threatened by a budget crunch.
Barksdale is the only COM athlete inducted into the Community College League of California COA Hall of Fame. Enshrined three years after his death in 1996, he joined the likes of Jackie Robinson, Warren Moon, and Valerie Brisco-Hooks. In 2007, he was inducted into the Bay Area Radio Hall of Fame.
COM is honored to name the College’s basketball court after such a legendary figure.
Register to attend and find out more about the Court Dedication, Jersey Retirement, and Celebration in Honor of Don Barksdale at: https://barksdale.eventbrite.com
This event is cosponsored by COM’s Umoja Equity Institute, COM Athletics, Play! Marin, and Associated Students of College of Marin (ASCOM). | <urn:uuid:ca65bdd0-6634-4303-a0b5-f147be79753e> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://www1.marin.edu/news/don-barksdale-court-dedication | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882572304.13/warc/CC-MAIN-20220816120802-20220816150802-00468.warc.gz | en | 0.975127 | 622 | 1.679688 | 2 |
Tube Rental Rainbow River Tubing
Images of Tubing down The Rainbow River
Let them stay at home and toil in the yard on a sun-burned summer day (or fight the lines at …. Our River Trips: Relaxing, refreshing, and sometimes invigorating, tubing allows you to put your feet up and breathe easy. We need a POC for this event. There will be no need to paddle or tread. Sep 26, 2018 · The Rainbow River. The Rainbow River, located in Marion County, FL, is a 5.7-mile-long river that is fed by natural springs. Tubing the Rainbow River is something so easy even a dead fish can do it. The Rainbow River in Dunellon is one of our favorite waterways in Florida. Tubing season runs April to October. The park offers tube rentals and a shuttle service to the tubing entry.
The camp site is along the tubing part of the river and there is a dock and steps into the river …. A large, aggressive alligator has caused officials to shut down swimming and tubing on the Rainbow River at KP Hole Park in Marion County. Tubing down the Rainbow River One night talking with some of Duane’s family they had said that they went tubing down the Rainbow River and it was a blast. The Rainbow River boasts crystal clear water that is a constant 72 degrees. Jun 03, 2013 · Reply Amity June 3, 2013 at 10:11 am. Tubing on the Rainbow River is very popular, especially in the summer. The history of Rainbow Springs dates back centuries to a time when native peoples regularly visited this lush spring. The KP Hole County Park in Dunnellon and Rainbow Springs is open daily for recreation. The river is immaculate and beautiful because of. We have kayaked, canoed, taken a paddle board, swam, snorkeled, and tubed down this river.
The State Park’s Tubing Entrance to the park is located at 10830 S.W. 180th Ave Rd, Dunnellon, FL 34432 on the east side of the river. Rent a regular tube for the 4 hour Rainbow River tubing trip down Rainbow River. Or get one of our cooler tubes. If you are coming to The Rainbow River to tube down the river a better alternative to the K. P. Hole is the new State Park facility on the east side of the river. The State Park’s Tubing Entrance to the park is located at 10830 S.W. 180th Ave Rd, Dunnellon, FL 34432 on the east side of river. Rainbow River tubing has never been so easy and stress-free. Ride and Tube will rent you a tube, and provide shuttle service to the KP hole the starting point and pick you up 4 hours later at the end point at Blue Run. Ride and Tune also provides parking while you enjoy floating down the Rainbow River. Apr 15, 2016 · Canoeing, Kayaking & Tubing on the Rainbow River. 400 – 600 million gallons of fresh water per day. The most significant natural feature is the first-magnitude headspring basin which produces between 400 – 600 million gallons of fresh water per day, forming the Rainbow River. Tubing the Rainbow River in Florida. Tubes can be put in at K.P. Hole County Park, off Highway 41. This is a great tubing experience in the crystal clear waters of Rainbow River in Rainbow Springs Florida. Nov 07, 2017 · Tubing is king on Rainbow River in summer. To minimize the impact of so many people, the Rainbow puts extensive limits on what you can bring on the river – no coolers, no alcohol, no food or beverages in disposable containers, no paper towels or bags. Well, the beauty of tubing down the Rainbow River is that you won’t have to anything at all. You’ll be gently pushed along by the same natural springs that pump 500 million gallons of water down river each day. You can take a moment to sit back & relax. This got me thinking that this would be something fun to do with the kids and so I started checking into it. Aug 12, 2005 · No plastic bags, ziplock or water bottles are allowed. You can and will need to bring water, but it must be in a rubbermaid like plastic bottle or cooler. We went tubing down the Rainbow River in Dunnellon, Florida in July 2005 with our 2 kids ( 6&11). Jul 15, 2019 · Welcome to Rainbow River Kayak Adventures. We are the premier kayak, paddleboard and tube rental outfitter in the historic boomtown of Dunnellon, located in Marion County, Florida. We have high-quality kayak, paddleboard and tube rentals that include kp hole shuttle transportation to and from the Rainbow River. From wading in the crystalline headwaters to canoeing, kayaking, and even lazily floating a tube down river, Rainbow Springs is a priceless jewel in the Florida park system. Crystal clear water of the Rainbow River. ENJOY THE CRYSTAL CLEAR WATERS OF THE RAINBOW RIVER Rich in natural beauty and cultural history. This page is for friends of the KP and Rainbow River, Present, Past and Future. About KP Hole Park: Since 1953, KP Hole® Park has been the year-round family destination for spending the day on the spring-fed Rainbow River. While on the 72 degree crystal-clear river, you may encounter a variety of wildlife including alligators, turtles, otters, birds and fish. Jun 01, 2019 · 10 Activities to Do at Rainbow Springs State Park. The tubing entrance is located on S.W. 180th Avenue Rd, Dunnellon, FL 34432. Park your car for $5, then Nature’s Quest will drive you up the river and drop you and your tube (tube rentals are $15) off to float back down the river to your car. We will tie up our floats and tubes together and float down the Rainbow River. + Add to Google Calendar + iCal export; Date 08/03/19. Location Rainbow River 11463 N Williams St, …. What To Do On My Rainbow River Tube Ride. Jul 18, 2016 · The Rainbow Springs, near Dunellon Florida, form the Rainbow River, which then flows into the Withlacoochee River. Tubing on the Rainbow River is the perfect way to cool down on a hot summer day. Tube Rental at Rainbow Springs State Park. There are several facilities where you can rent tubes, kayaks, or …. Away, then, with the petty morality of those petulant scolds whose scruples are offended by going with the flow. We went camping over spring break at Rainbow Springs. Tubing the Rainbow River is a refreshing experience; however tubing is not allowed in the Rainbow River headsprings areas of the park. Tubers can launch at the Rainbow River Tube Entrance on SW 180th Avenue Road or the KP Hole. It is crisp, clear, deep, and the river is wide. Each activity provides a different, fully enjoyable experience. Headwaters at Rainbow Springs State Park. The Rainbow River State Park in Dunnellon has a large roped off swimming hole right at the headsprings of the river, where millions of gallons daily of pure clean water naturally flows. We have a two and a half hour tubing trip from Parmalee Bridge to the Whirlpool Landing. The Rainbow Resort Canoe Livery uses only dual-chambered commercial rental tubes – with and without bottoms. The KP Hole on the Rainbow River is a great place to swim, tube or relax. Aquatic Wilderness Adventures We offer Kayak, and Stand Up Paddle Board rentals and a 4hr Tubing trip on the beautiful Rainbow River located in Dunnellon Florida. Choose our shuttle service or launch from site also our boats are not limited to the Rainbow River so load em’ up and. K,P, Hole County Park. K.P. Hole County Park (marioncountyfl.org) is 1.5 miles downriver from Rainbow River State Park. Located just over an hour away from The Quarters apartments, tubing down the river is a fantastic and relaxing way to enjoy a day. | <urn:uuid:e29beac1-3272-40b7-af2a-cd5ce1830501> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://forumg.org/2020/03/26/tubing-down-the-rainbow-river-ride-and-tube-rainbow-river-tubing-co-tube-rentals/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882571911.5/warc/CC-MAIN-20220813081639-20220813111639-00476.warc.gz | en | 0.929196 | 1,703 | 1.5 | 2 |
China Seeking Canadian Oil
22 December 2004
The New York Times reports that Chinese energy companies are maneuvering to strike ambitious deals in efforts to win access to Canadian oil.
Canada, the largest source of imported oil for the United States, has historically sent almost all its exports of oil south by pipeline to help quench America’s thirst for energy. But that arrangement may be about to change as China, which has surpassed Japan as the second-largest market for oil, flexes its muscle in attempts to secure oil, even in places like the cold boreal forests of northern Alberta, where the oil has to be sucked out of the sticky, sandy soil.
“The China outlet would change our dynamic,” said Murray Smith, a former Alberta energy minister who was appointed this month to be the province’s representative in Washington, a new position. Mr. Smith said he estimated that Canada could eventually export as many as one million barrels a day to China out of potential exports of more than three million barrels a day.
“Our main link would still be with the U.S. but this would give us multiple markets and competition for a prized resource,” Mr. Smith said. [...]
Chinese companies are also said to be considering direct investments in the oil sands, by buying into existing producers or acquiring companies with leases to produce oil in the region. In all, there are nearly half a dozen deals in consideration, initially valued at $2 billion and potentially much more, according to senior executives at energy companies here.
Canada’s oil production from the sands surpassed one million barrels a day this year and was expected to reach three million barrels within a decade. The bulk of output is exported to the Midwestern United States. That flow pushed Canada ahead of Saudi Arabia, Mexico and Venezuela this year as the largest supplier of foreign oil to the United States, with average exports of 1.6 million barrels a day.
Even so, there is the perception among many in Alberta’s oil patch that Canada’s rapidly growing energy industry remains an afterthought for most Americans. That might change, industry analysts say, if Canada were to start exporting oil elsewhere.
Competition for oil is starting to hit closer to home. (Earlier post.)
Here’s a breakdown of the top 6 exporters to the US in October 2004, according to data from the EIA. (Actual imports, not average daily rate.) Canada, which was number one in September, slipped behind Mexico to number 2.
Total actual imports from September 2004 to October 2004 increased 10%, from 290 million barrels to 320 million barrels.
|Top Petroleum Exporters to the US, Oct 2004|
|Country||Barrels (millions)||% total US Imports|
TrackBack URL for this entry:
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As America continues to grow, we are seeing a few patterns develop in terms of how and where people are choosing (or settling) to live. As the decades have passed, we've witnessed the transition from cities, to suburbs, back to urban centers, and into redeveloped
Whether republican, democrat, green, or independent, American’s from one end of the spectrum to the other are voicing their concern about one important (and growing) issue.
This issue is centered squarely on the trend towards ever larger gaps in income inequality and what that will continue
There are a number of rights that may or may not be separated from land ownership. Before you purchase a piece of land, you should look into whether or not you will have the following rights:
A landowner has a right to occupy the surface
Land ownership is something that has become safer for individuals and families, and also continues to be more difficult to accomplish in the United States. These two trends converge in a document, required of all "subdivisions of 100 or more parcels" by the Federal Government.
The Appalachian National Scenic Trail spans fourteen U.S. states during its journey that is 2,185 miles (3,516 km) long, including Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.
Let's take a look at America's
American's ability to finance real estate purchases is something that bends and sways withe the ever-changing climate of the global and national economy. There is one thing that remains constant, though, which is that when interest rates on Land are low, people tend to buy
If you have ever been to the Redwood forests of the American Northwest, then you know how incredible it is to be among such majestic and ancient trees. If you haven't yet visited, you must.
For those who have been, it may surprise you to know
100k or less
, 2-5 acres
, Location Based
If you live in the Houston, San Antonio, or Austin areas, you've got to find the time to check out Cape Shores on the Texas Coast. This property is home to sandy beaches, and deep, dockable waters.
Locals and vacationers alike know this part of the | <urn:uuid:6172b45e-06a4-4375-9780-96576babed9b> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | http://land-ownership.com/2016/07/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882571584.72/warc/CC-MAIN-20220812045352-20220812075352-00666.warc.gz | en | 0.943219 | 514 | 1.734375 | 2 |
S&P managed to capture the headlines yesterday when it announced that it had a negative outlook for the credit rating of the United States. After all, an actual credit downgrade for the United States government would be big news. While the immediate response was a boost to the deficit hawks’ efforts to cut programs like Social Security and Medicare, it is worth asking a few questions before we surrender these programs to the Wall Street numbers mavens.
The last time S&P was in the headlines it was for giving investment grade ratings to hundreds of billions of dollars of securities that were backed by subprime and ALT-A mortgages. These mortgages were used to buy over-priced homes at the peak of the housing bubble. Many of these mortgages not only carried high risks, but were fraudulent, with lenders having filled in false information to allow homebuyers to qualify for loans that their assets and income would not justify.
Serious people should ask what S&P has done to improve its ratings systems. Have they changed their procedures? Did the S&P analysts who gave AAA or other investment grade ratings to toxic junk get fired or at least get demoted? If not, should we assume that S&P used the same care in assigning a negative outlook to U.S. government debt as it did in assigning investment grade ratings to toxic assets?
Of course it was not just bad mortgage debt that stumped the S&P gang. It gave top quality investment grade ratings to Lehman until just before it imploded in the largest bankruptcy in history. The same was true of AIG, which would have faced a similar fate without a government rescue. Bear Stearns also had a top rating until the very end, as did Enron. In short, S&P has a quite a track record in missing the boat when it comes to assessing creditworthiness.
The markets seem to recognize S&P weak track record in assessing creditworthiness. It downgraded Japan’s government debt in 2002. The interest rate on 10-year government debt in Japan is currently under 1.5 percent, the lowest for any country in the world. Does S&P think that investors are mistaken in being willing to lend Japan money at such low rates?
It is worth noting that interest rates on U.S. bonds fell yesterday, suggesting that S&P’s negative outlook did not scare people who actually have money on the line. (Not to get too technical with our friends at S&P, but it is not even clear what a default on U.S. government debt would mean. After all, the debt is issued in dollars and as a practical matter we can print as many dollars as we want. But, we’ll leave that one for another day.)
Finally, we must remember that S&P is first and foremost a corporation that is run for profit. This is why they rated hundreds of billions of toxic trash as investment grade during the housing bubble. They were paid tens of millions of dollars to do it.
S&P and the other bond rating agencies had their lobbyists working overtime in the financial reform debate. The Senate had approved an amendment by Senator Franken, which would have taken away the power of the issuer to select the agency that rated its bonds. Under the Franken amendment this power would instead be given to the Securities and Exchange Commission.
This amendment removed an obvious source of corruption. If the company issuing debt gets to pick the agency that rates the debt, then the bond-rating agency has an obvious incentive to give the debt a positive rating. Otherwise they will lose business. This likely explains how hundreds of billions of subprime mortgage backed securities got investment grade ratings.
However, the Franken amendment never took effect. In the conference committee, Representative Barney Frank, who was then head of the House Financial Services Committee, got language that delayed the implementation for at least two years. In the mean time, the current system, in which the issuer picks the rating agency, remains in place.
This should raise the obvious question: does S&P hope to influence the final resolution of the Franken amendment with its negative outlook on U.S. debt? It’s a terrible thing that we have to ask if the umpire is taking payoffs, but we do have to ask.
After all, this is Washington and Wall Street, a truly toxic combination. And we all know that S&P’s first commitment is to its bottom line, not to provide accurate information to investors. So who is S&P serving in its negative outlook on U.S. government debt? | <urn:uuid:c6ccb177-f6cb-426b-bfbb-94c0f6b051d2> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://cepr.net/blogs/cepr-blog/questions-for-sap-on-its-potential-downgrade-of-us-debt | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280221.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00234-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.976016 | 939 | 1.53125 | 2 |
Legends & Sagas
48: Young Andrew
48.1 AS I was cast in my first sleepe,
A dreadffull draught in my mind I drew,
Ffor I was dreamed of a yong man,
Some men called him yonge Andrew.
48.2 The moone shone bright, and itt cast a fayre light,
Sayes shee, Welcome, my honey, my hart, and my sweete!
For I haue loued thee this seuen long yeere,
And our chance itt was wee cold neuer meete.
48.3 Then he tooke her in his armes two,
And kissed her both cheeke and chin,
And twise or thrise he pleased this may
Before they tow did part in twinn.
48.4 Saies, Now, good sir, you haue had your will,
You can demand no more of mee;
Good sir, remember what you said before,
And goe to the church and marry mee.
48.5 Ffaire maid, I cannott doe as I wold;
. . . . .
Goe home and fett thy fathers redd gold,
And Ile goe to the church and marry thee.
48.6 This ladye is gone to her fathers hall,
And well she knew where his red gold lay,
And counted forth five hundred pound,
Besides all other iuells and chaines:
48.7 was well counted vpon his knee;
And brought itt all to younge Andrew,
Then he tooke her by the lillye white hand,
And led her vp to an hill soe hye.
48.8 Shee had vpon a gowne of blacke veluett,
(A pittyffull sight after yee shall see:)
Put of thy clothes, bonny wenche, he sayes,
For noe foote further thoust gang with mee.
48.9 But then shee put of her gowne of veluett,
With many a salt teare from her eye,
And in a kirtle of fine breaden silke
Shee stood beffore young Andrews eye.
48.10 Sais, O put off thy kirtle of silke,
Ffor some and all shall goe with mee;
And to my owne lady I must itt beare,
Who I must needs loue better then thee.
48.11 Then shee put of her kirtle of silke,
With many a salt teare still from her eye;
In a peticoate of scarlett redd
Shee stood before young Andrewes eye.
48.12 Saies, O put of thy peticoate,
For some and all of itt shall goe with mee;
And to my owne lady I will itt beare,
Which dwells soe farr in a strange countrye
48.13 But then shee put of her peticoate,
With many a salt teare still from her eye,
And in a smocke of braue white silke
She stood before young Andrews eye.
48.14 Saies, O put of thy smocke of silke,
For some and all shall goe with mee;
Vnto my owne ladye I will itt beare,
That dwells soe farr in a strange countrye.
48.15 Sayes, O remember, young Andrew,
Once of a woman you were borne;
And for that birth that Marye bore,
I pray you let my smocke be vpon!
48.16 Yes, fayre ladye, I know itt well,
Once of a woman I was borne;
Yett for noe birth that Mary bore,
Thy smocke shall not be left here vpon.
48.17 But then shee put of her head-geere fine;
Shee hadd billaments worth a hundred pound;
The hayre that was vpon this bony wench head
Couered her bodye downe to the ground.
48.18 Then he pulled forth a Scottish brand,
And held itt there in his owne right hand;
Saies, Whether wilt thou dye vpon my swords point, ladye,
Or thow wilt goe naked home againe?
48.19 Liffe is sweet, then, Sir, said shee,
Therfore I pray you leaue mee with mine;
Before I wold dye on your swords point,
I had rather goe naked home againe.
48.20 My father, shee sayes, is a right good erle
As any remaines in his countrye;
If euer he doe your body take,
Your sure to flower a gallow tree.
48.21 And I haue seuen brethren, shee sayes,
And they are all hardy men and bold;
Giff euer th doe your body take,
You must neuer gang quicke ouer the mold.
48.22 If your father be a right good erle
As any remaines in his owne countrye,
Tush! he shall neuer by body take,
Ile gang soe fast ouer the sea.
48.23 If you have seuen brethren,"] he sayes,
If they be neuer soe hardy or bold,
Tush! they shall neuer my body take,
Ile gang soe fast into the Scottish mold.
48.24 Now this ladye is gone to her fathers hall,
When euery body their rest did take;
But the Erle which was her father
Lay waken for his deere daughters sake.
48.25 But who is that, her father can say,
That soe priuilye knowes the pinn?
Its Hellen, your owne deere daughter, father,
I pray you rise and lett me in.
48.26 . . . . .
Noe, by my hood! quoth her father then,
My [house] thoust neuer come within,
Without I had my red gold againe.
48.27 Nay, your gold is gone, father! said shee,
. . . . .
Then naked thou came into this world,
And naked thou shalt returne againe.
48.28 Nay! God forgaue his death, father, shee sayes,
And soe I hope you will doe mee;
Away, away, thou cursed woman,
I pray God an ill death thou may dye!
48.29 Shee stood soe long quacking on the ground
Till her hart itt burst in three;
And then shee fell dead downe in a swoond,
And this was the end of this bonny ladye.
48.30 Ithe morning, when her father gott vpp,
A pittyffull sight there he might see;
His owne deere daughter was dead, without clothes,
The teares they trickeled fast from his eye.
48.31 . . . . . .
Sais, Fye of gold, and fye of fee!
For I sett soe much by my red gold
That now itt hath lost both my daughter and mee!
48.32 . . . . . .
But after this time he neere dought good day,
But as flowers doth fade in the frost,
Soe he did wast and weare away.
48.33 But let vs leaue talking of this ladye,
And talke some more of young Andrew;
Ffor false he was to this bonny ladye,
More pitty that he had not beene true.
48.34 He was not gone a mile into the wild forrest,
Or halfe a mile into the hart of Wales,
But there they cought him by such a braue wyle
That hee must come to tell noe more tales.
* * * * *
48.35 . . . . .
Ffull soone a wolfe did of him smell,
And shee came roaring like a beare,
And gaping like a feend of hell.
48.36 Soe they fought together like two lyons,
And fire betweene them two glashet out;
Th raught eche other such a great rappe,
That there young Andrew was slaine, well I wott.
48.37 But now young Andrew he is dead,
But he was neuer buryed vnder mold,
For ther as the wolfe devoured him,
There lyes all this great erles gold.
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Title: The Mysterious Spaniard Author: Anonymous * A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook * eBook No.: 0606731h.html Language: English Date first posted: August 2006 Date most recently updated: August 2006 This eBook was produced by: Richard Scott Project Gutenberg of Australia eBooks are created from printed editions which are in the public domain in Australia, unless a copyright notice is included. We do NOT keep any eBooks in compliance with a particular paper edition. Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing this file. This eBook is made available at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg of Australia License which may be viewed online at http://gutenberg.net.au/licence.html To contact Project Gutenberg of Australia go to http://gutenberg.net.au
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THE Chevalier Franval, and his sister Amarylla, were the only children of a French General of great reputation, who died at the beginning of the last century, at an elegant villa to which he had retired in the evening of his days, at the distance of a few leagues from the city of Paris.
At the time of her father's death, Amarylla was receiving her education in the convent of St. Ann at Aurillac. The Chevalier watched the death-bed of his parent with the most anxious and tender affection; and the most solemn injunction which that parent bestowed on him, was, to supply his place, by every care and attention in his power, to his orphan sister; a command so congenial to the feelings of the Chevalier, that it was a satisfaction to himself to pronounce a vow to this effect on the ear of his expiring father.
Six months after the death of the General, was the time appointed for Amarylla to quit her convent; and the period being arrived, her brother set out for Aurillac, resolved himself to be her protector on her journey home. He travelled leisurely, and stopping one evening in a small town, where he was informed that the church was a handsome structure, he strolled towards it, intending to amuse an hour by viewing it. On his return to his inn, he perceived loitering before it, a gentleman whom he had seen examining the beauties of the church at the same time that he had been engaged in observing them himself; and concluding that he was a stranger in the place, and his fellow lodger at the inn, addressed himself to him. The young man (for he did not appear above twenty years of age) met Franval's advances towards an acquaintance with evident pleasure, and entered into conversation with him in a manner which displayed him to have added a liberal education to a good natural understanding. He proved (as Franval had supposed) to be a lodger at the same inn, and they agreed to sup together. The stranger informed Franval, that he was a Spaniard by birth; his name Don Manuel di Vadilla; and that he was travelling, attended by only one servant, solely for his amusement and improvement. After an evening pleasantly spent by both parties, they separated for the night; and on the following morning, took a friendly leave of each other previously to pursuing their respective journies.
The conciliating manners of Don Manuel had made a very favorable impression in his behalf on the mind of the Chevalier; and often, as he rode along, did he reflect on the agreeable hours which he had passed in the society of the young Spaniard. At length he reached the convent of Saint Ann, where a meeting of the most joyful and affectionate nature took place between him and his sister.
Amarylla had always been handsome whilst a girl; but during the four years that her brother had been separated from her, he beheld a great augmentation of her charms to have taken place. She was become tall and graceful; her eyes were of a sparkling blue, and expressive of the sweetness of her disposition; her cheeks, twin roses; her lips a bed of coral, within which reposed a double row of pearls.
After remaining three days at Aurillac, the Chevalier and his sister commenced their journey towards home. As they travelled, he remarked that Amarylla, notwithstanding the sweetness of her temper, which was never for a moment interrupted, appeared to have some object, either of regret or melancholy, for her private thoughts. She would frequently fall into short fits of absence, and heave sighs, which appeared to be accompanied with some tender emotion. The Chevalier entreated her, by the love which he bore her, as the only remnant of his revered parents, to confide to him the secrets of her heart. For some time Amarylla, with blushes, evaded a direct reply: at length she confessed that a young man, of whom she had a few weeks before caught an accidental view from the seat appointed in the chapel of her convent for the boarders, had made an impression on her heart, which she could not obliterate from it.
Her brother smiled at the warmth of the innocent Amarylla's first sensation of the imperious passion of love, and told her, that as her acquaintance with society increased, which it would do as soon as she was introduced, on her return home, to the world, she would herself laugh at the serious manner in which she now treated a recollection of this nature.
In apologizing for her confession, Amarylla urged that the youth had beheld her, not withstanding her retired situation; and that his eyes had beamed with an expression which had eloquently declared his wish of approaching her; and that he had left the church with a last gaze, which she had understood as entreating her to remember him. Still the Chevalier continued to smile, and Amarylla to sigh.
A journey free from all disasters brought them to the Chevalier's villa: it was the family mansion, a house of considerable elegance, and furnished in a style of magnificence which rivalled those of most of the nobles: in particular, one of its saloons, and a breakfast apartment on the second story, which were ornamented with paintings of so great value and excellence as frequently to attract strangers to inspect them; an indulgence which was always readily granted to persons of a respectable rank.
On entering the house, the Chevalier was met by his housekeeper, who informed him, that he had a gentleman, a stranger, lodging in one of the chambers. Franval requested an explanation of her words. She answered, that the gentleman of whom she spoke, had come to the villa about a week before, to view the pictures; that his foot having slipped as he was descending the stairs, he had had the misfortune of breaking one of his legs, and that she had been compelled by humanity, to offer him a bed in the house. The Chevalier, with the natural generosity and feeling of his heart, commended the conduct she had pursued; and, after a short time, went to visit the stranger, and make him personal offers of his services, when, to his great surprise, he beheld in the invalid, Don Manuel di Vadilla.
The nature of their remarks on this extraordinary meeting may be easily imagined: nor can it be doubted, that the Chevalier caused every attention to be paid to the recovery of a young man, his first acquaintance with whom had created for him a favorable prejudice in his heart.
Franval passed many hours in each day by the bedside of his guest; and as their acquaintance increased, he learnt from him the following particulars of his history: that he was an orphan; that the few relatives whom he possessed, were all distant ones; that Spain was a country of which the manners and the inhabitants were not congenial to his feelings, and that he had therefore quitted it, and resolved to settle in France; but he had not yet fixed on any spot as a residence: that his fortune, which was ample, he had placed in the hands of a banker in Paris; and had a servant, who was his only attendant, a man apparently about forty-five years of age, named Rodalvo, to whom he expressed himself particularly attached, as he had been in his service from the hour of his birth.
In their conversation, one day, it chanced that Franval mentioned to Don Manuel, his having brought home his sister from the convent of Saint Ann at Aurillac. At the name of the convent the Spaniard smiled; and when Franval enquired the cause of his doing so, he confessed to him, that, having one evening attended vespers in the Chapel of that convent, he had been particularly struck by the beauty of one of the boarders; that, at the time, he had not believed the impression made by her charms on his heart to have been so deep as he had since found it; but that with each succeeding day, he now desired more earnestly to see her again.
The Chevalier recollected the confession which his sister had made to him, of her having beheld with the eye of partiality, a stranger in the church of Saint Ann, who she believed had viewed her with the same emotions as she had seen him; and from the similarity of her account to that of the young Spaniard, he doubted not that they were reciprocally the hero and heroine of each others' adventures. He buried his suspicions in his breast but the progress of time proved them to have been correct.
When Don Manuel was sufficiently recovered from his hurt to quit his chamber, and descend into the apartments in the daily use of the family, the first moment of his encountering Amarylla, was attended with an emotion of joy and surprise on the part of each, which clearly explained to Franval the justice of his conjectures. The enamoured pair were in raptures at this unexpected introduction to each other; and when the perfect use of Don Manuel's limbs was again restored to him, he still lingered at the villa of the Chevalier Franval, unable to quit the adorable object who possessed his heart.
Thus passed on six months, at the expiration of which, Amarylla requested her brother's permission to bestow her hand on Don Manuel. The Chevalier saw that her affections were placed on him, and that he appeared devoted to her. He had now gained, he believed, a thorough knowledge of Don Manuel's heart and principles; he regarded them calculated to ensure happiness to his beloved sister; and their union was accordingly sanctioned by his approbation.
Never were two amiable hearts more happy than were those of Don Manuel and his Amarylla in the possession of each other; and the Chevalier Franval, unwilling to lose the pleasure of their society, invited them to make his villa their abode. Two years rolled on in happiness uninterrupted, during the course of which two lovely infants strengthened the bond of affection between their parents. Shortly after the birth of their second child, Don Manuel, one morning at breakfast, expressed an intention of riding that day to Paris, and returning again in the evening: this was by no means an unusual thing either with him or his brother-in-law Franval; and when the coffee was removed, he set out for the metropolis, attended by his servant Rodalvo.
The evening closed without the return of Don Manuel; the night advanced, and still he did not arrive. His wife consoled herself with the idea that some engagement, which he had been unable to decline, might have detained him to sleep at Paris, and that the morning would bring him home; but alas! her hope was fallacious; the morning came unaccompanied by Don Manuel; and once more the veil of night descended to the earth, without witnessing his return to his disconsolate Amarylla.
The Chevalier Franval was not less anxious for the fate of his brother-in-law, than distressed at beholding the misery which Don Manuel's mysterious absence caused his sister; and immediately repaired to Paris, to make enquiries concerning him. But in vain were all his attempts at discovering the truth; not a breath of intelligence could be obtained by him, either of Don Manuel, or his servant Rodalvo. The endeavors of the Chevalier to gain some light upon this dark occurrence, were unabating, and utterly unsuccessful. The days crept on; these grew into weeks, and still the adored husband of Amarylla did not return; and her grief and despondency were almost raised to madness.
At length a vague account reached the Chevalier and his sister, that her lost husband had been seen travelling in a carriage, which was moving at an extremely swift pace, upon one of the high roads at the southern extremity of the kingdom which led across the Pyrenees into Spain. From the first moment of his disappearance, Amarylla had constantly repeated her conviction, that not infidelity to her, but some misfortune, which he had not been able to counteract, had torn him from her; and she now declared her intention of endeavoring to trace his steps. With much entreaty and persuasion, her brother over-ruled her purpose, and prevailed upon her to remain the guardian of her children, whilst he undertook the office of following the track that had been described to them as the one pursued by Don Manuel.
Instant preparation was accordingly made for the Chevalier's journey, and, after a most melancholy scene of separation from his sister, he set out, accompanied by a friend named Montreville, whom he had requested to become the partner of his undertaking; and attended his Henri, a confidential servant of his own.
Their journey was pursued with the greatest alacrity till they reached the southern extremity of the kingdom: here they proceeded more slowly, being frequently delayed by their uncertainty of what road to take, and by the inquiries which they made after the object of their search. Not a gleam of success smiled on them, but still they pursued their way with unabating energy. About noon of a gloomy and uncomfortable day, they reached the foot of the rugged Pyrenees. Franval had already determined to proceed into Spain, and accordingly having refreshed themselves at an inn upon the borders of the kingdom they were about to quit, they began to ascend the rough path which led across the mountains.
They rode on till the shades of evening, which were beginning to fall on the earth, warned them to seek shelter for the night. The gloom of an overclouded sky, rendered the coming darkness more rapid than usual in its approach; and the light of day was almost entirely expelled from the Heavens, when the Chevalier Franval was so fortunate as to descry a light in a distant habitation.
"See there," he cried, on observing it, "a light at length appears! Thank Heaven, we shall now get housed for the night; for it is doubtless a post-house from whence it shines."
The light appeared in view till they were arrived within a short distance of the house, and it then vanished in a sudden manner, as if it had been blown out.
They rode up to the door: Henri applied the butt-end of his whip to it in lieu of a knocker; at the same time remarking, 'That if the inhabitants were in bed, every one could scarcely be asleep, except the lamp they had seen had gone out of itself.'
For a time they were led to conjecture that this had been the case, for no reply was returned to their repeated knockings: but at length, after another salute on the part of Henri with his leaden-headed whip upon the hollow door, which was loud enough to have raised the dead, if they were ever to be raised by mortal means, a window in the upper part of the house was opened, and a head thrust out. "What is it you want?" asked the voice of a female.
"Meat, drink, and repose," replied Montreville; "have you them to sell?"
"I am no conjurer, to sell sleep," replied the woman, in a tone between pleasantry and sulkiness. "If you mean that you want to lodge here, I have not a pallet in my house that is unoccupied;" and with these uncourteous words she drew in her head again, and shut the window.
"I wish we had not travelled so late," said Franval.
"Phoo, nonsense," cried Montreville, who was a young man, and whose good spirits, and gaiety of heart, never forsook him, "they must at all events allow us to sit up in the house, if they can't put us to bed in it. I'll be satisfied with a chair to repose in, if they will but open the larder to me."
"And the cellar, Monsieur," said Henri.
"And the cellar, as you say," replied Montreville. "So, at them again, Henri; beat another rattatatoo upon the door, and let us learn if we can't come to terms, now we agree to put beds out of the question."
Henri had again recourse to his leaden-headed whip and in about ten minutes the same casement was again opened, and the rough voice of a man called out, "Whoever ye are, if ye do not go quietly about your business, and cease to disturb the peace of my house, I'll find means to make you answer for your behaviour."
"Our business, friend, is here," replied Montreville. "We are three half-starved travellers, who request to be allowed to shelter ourselves in your house during the night."
"Half-starved travellers, indeed," grumbled out the host: "it is worth while raising a man out of his sleep, to attend to half-starved travellers, truly."
"But my friend only means," said Franval, "that we are very hungry travellers, not very poor ones; and I add in his name, and my own, that we will reward you very liberally for any accommodation you may grant us."
"Upon the word of a Christian," said Henri, "there is gold in the saddle bags of both these gentlemen."
"All the better for them," returned the host, "but as I am no robber, nor can admit them into my house, none of it is likely to fall to my share."
"Why can you not admit us?" enquired Franval. "We are not robbers any more than yourself."
"It cannot be," returned the host.
"So you have told us before," replied the Chevalier; "and still do not inform us by what motive you are actuated, in refusing us shelter beneath your roof."
The host was silent.
"Yours is a post-house, is it not?" continued Franval.
"Yes," was the reply.
"Then let me tell you, friend," rejoined Montreville, "that as you live by keeping open house, the travellers upon whom you shut your door, have a just right to receive a very good reason, for your conduct, or to open the door for themselves."
"Are ye Catholics, gentlemen?" demanded the landlord.
"Yes, we are," both answered.
"Do you respect an oath as sacred?" enquired the host.
"Yes, yes; we do, we do," replied all three; imagining that some terms for their entrance into the house were about to be proposed to them.
"Then know," replied the host, "that I have already once to-night sworn by Saint Francis not to open my door; and I now swear by him a second time, to keep my first oath sacred."
Montreville was beginning to fly into a passion. The host stopped him, by raising his voice and continuing to speak; "But if I can render you any other service; if a flask of wine, a loaf of bread, or a lanthorn to light you on your way, are of any use to you, you shall have them."
"Let us taste the wine," said Montreville, whilst Franval sat meditating on the strangeness of the host's conduct.
A flask of good wine for the production of a post-house was handed out to them, and with it some cakes of newly-baked bread. Hunger is a keen sensation, that requires much less parade in its gratification than custom usually assigns to it; and, seated upon their saddles, they found the bread and wine very refreshing and comfortable.
"You have dealt so far honorably by us," said Franval, "and shall experience the same honor from us. Here," added be, throwing a demi-louis d'or at the window as he spoke, "this for your bread and wine, and twenty more shall follow it, if you will let us in."
"It is a good price, Messieurs; but I am better paid to keep you out," said the host.
"Us!" cried Montreville, "to keep us out?"
"Not you in particular," returned the man; "for I know you not; every one, I mean."
A woman now advanced to the window with a lanthorn, which had a lamp burning in it; the man received it at her hands, and lowering it out of the casement, asked if they chose to have it?
Henri received it; and the host then drew in his head, and was upon the point of shutting the casement.
"Stay, hear us an instant, I beg," said Franval. "Cannot you direct us to any cottage, any dwellings, where we might pass the night?"
"There are stray cottages scattered about," answered the host; "but you would find it impossible to gain admittance into any one of them: their inhabitants would take you for robbers, and nothing you could say would convince them to the contrary, at this time of the night: they live in so great fear of banditti, that they might even, perhaps, fire upon you without enquiring your business."
"To cut the matter short at once," exclaimed Montreville, "tell us how much you have received to keep out visitors, and if our purse is rich enough, we will outbid your guests."
"Gentlemen," said, the host, gravely, "you said you were Catholics, and respected an oath. Remember mine--You shall not come in."
"But if the inhabitants of cottages are afraid of three men, probably those of castles will not have the same apprehensions, as they are provided both with numbers and arms; so cannot you direct us to one of them?" enquired Franval.
"Why this is a part of the country where there are but few buildings of that description," answered the host; "there is but one within ten leagues of us, and that is at the distance of nearly four from this spot; and were you near it, I would not by any means advise you to attempt to enter it."
"Why so? who inhabits it?" asked Montreville.
"He is known by the name of Don Bazilio," replied the host, "and is by some reputed to be a nobleman of great wealth; others believe him to be Belzebub himself."
Montreville laughed at the manner of the host's expressing himself; and Franval's eye was at that moment attracted by a faint light which proceeded from an upper casement of the house, at which he perceived standing, a tall, lank form, of a swarthy and terrific countenance, which almost corresponded with his idea of the being which the host had just named, and caused him an undescribable sensation for the moment he beheld it; and it was but a moment that his eye had fixed on it, ere the shutter was pulled up, and closed it from his sight.
Franval made no observation on what he had seen to his companions; and Henri, addressing the host, said, "I suppose you mean to let us understand that it is haunted."
"Dreadfully, dreadfully haunted, is the Castle of Virandola," replied the landlord; "at least so it is reported. I never went to see, nor ever intend it."
"What shall we do in this cursed dilemma?" exclaimed Montreville.
"I have done all it is in my power to do for you," said the host; "and so I wish you safe travelling; and a good night, Messieurs;" and with these words he shut the casement.
Montreville was again on the point of calling him back, when Franval stopped him, by saying, "Come, let us ride on."
"Ride on! but whither?" cried Montreville.
"We can have no choice; the road lies before us," replied Franval; then, in an under tone, he added, "I'll explain myself to you presently;" and as he spoke, he clapped spurs to his horse, and set forward; and his companions followed his example.
"Why did you so suddenly leave the house which you were a quarter of an hour ago as eager as myself to enter?" enquired Montreville of his friend, before they had ridden an hundred yards away from the post-house.
Franval did not slacken his horse's pace till Montreville a second time urged his enquiry; and Franval then replied, "I have no doubt but that the reason of our being refused admittance into that house, is, that a gang of banditti, or at least some members of a lawless community of that nature, are concealed within it; perhaps in the very act of flying from justice;" and he then described the terrific visage which he had seen peeping through the window, and which, he said, if it had been a human countenance, he could only suppose to be that of a savage and bloodthirsty plunderer.
"Thank Heaven, I did not see him," cried Henri.
"We all owe our thanks to Heaven, that we were not admitted into the house, if such are its guests, as I conjecture them to be," said Franval.
"But in my opinion," returned Montreville, "we are far from safe now: don't it appear likely to you, that we were turned from the house, in order that these fellows, of whom you saw one, might pursue and plunder, perhaps murder, us? The rascal of a host would not lose the credit of his house, by suffering us to be assailed in it, lest any of us should have the good fortune to escape from their clutches, and relate the story; so he artfully takes a deeper share in the plot, by sending us forward."
"I have no fears of that kind," rejoined Franval; "our horses are fleet-footed, and will outstrip many animals."
"Of what use is their fleetness in this gloom?" said Montreville: "don't you perceive that the night is become so dark, that when we are half a dozen paces before or behind Henri and his lanthorn, we cannot discover the road? Thus, in such an emergency, the fleetness of their feet would, in all probability, only serve to carry us headlong down a precipice. The farther we get away from the post-house, however, the better, I think; so let us lose no time in debating."
This was agreed to by Franval; and they again spurred their horses into a trot, which they continued for about half a league, when a rocky break in the ground obliged them to move with caution, and at foot's pace. Whilst they were crossing this uneven track of ground, "Hark! Messieurs, hark!" cried Henri.
"What! what do you hear?" asked Montreville impatiently.
"The trampling of horses, Messieurs: don't you?" was the reply.
"I do, I do," cried Montreville: "they are coming upon us! Franval, don't you hear them?"
A pause of silence ensued: Franval broke it: "I did hear them," he said, "but they are no longer audible."
"They have stopped," said Montreville, "perhaps till some more of their comrades have joined them."
"Or, perhaps," said Henri, "they have turned out of the road upon the grass, that we may not hear their approach: they must judge that their horses hoofs cannot escape our hearing on the beaten pathway, as our lanthorn informs them exactly at what distance we are from them."
"Oh, curse the lanthorn; blow it out," cried Montreville.
"No, no," interrupted Franval: "in the course of our necessities this night, its light may prove as beneficial to us, as we now consider it injurious to our safety; therefore give it to me, Henri, and I'll hide it under my cloak."
"The sounds do not return," said Henri.
"It is as dark as pitch," cried Montreville.
"I can distinguish a knot of trees to our right," said Franval: "my plan is, that we ride in amongst them, and keep ourselves concealed there for a short time, during which period it is not improbable that they may pass us, supposing us to be gone on.--What think you of my scheme?"
"I do not disapprove it," said Montreville; "but we will load our pistols."
"Undoubtedly," replied Franval; "but the expedient I have proposed may save us from the necessity of spilling human blood, or suffering our own to be spilt."
They rode swiftly up to the trees, which were not above two score in number, planted in a shallow declivity at the mouth of the valley. Partial clumps of underwood formed a tolerable screen between them and the road they had just quitted, and they sat scarcely allowing themselves to respire, lest the suspiration of their breath should prevent their hearing any other sound which it might be important to them not to lose.
Nearly a quarter of an hour was thus spent, without the least noise of any kind meeting their ears, when they heard a sound resembling the leaves of a bush, when pressed upon by a person who is endeavoring to force himself a passage through them.
"There, there!" whispered Montreville.
Franval cocked his pistol, but did not speak.
Several minutes again passed away in silence. "It was only the wind," again whispered Montreville; but scarcely had he spoken, ere the noise was repeated; and in the following instant a voice exclaimed, "Proceed to the Castle of Virandola."
Montreville immediately discharged his pistol towards the spot from whence the voice had proceeded, and Henri fired off his in the same direction.
When the report of the pistols had died away, universal silence again prevailed; no groan announced the bullets to have inflicted a wound: no flying step discovered the discharge of their tubes to have inspired any object with fear. "What can this mean?" exclaimed Franval.
"It is, doubtless, a lure to draw us into the power of some enemy. Ten to one but the Castle of Virandola is the residence of a banditti, who hope by this stratagem to inveigle us into their power," replied Montreville. "A likely story, indeed, that we should proceed to a place we have the account of, which the landlord gave us of this castle, upon such an obscure invitation. You would not certainly be so rash as to think of it?"
"The voice appeared more than human," said Franval.
"Nonsense," exclaimed Montreville; "I say it is some trick; and whatever your opinion may be, I swear that if I go to the castle"--
"Swear not, but go," interrupted the voice which had before been heard; and it now spoke from the opposite direction to that whence it had before proceeded.
"There again," cried Franval.
"'Tis solemn, I confess," said Montreville; "but still, I think it is mortal."
"Let us search whether we can discover some one hidden amongst the bushes," rejoined Franval, drawing the lanthorn from under his cloak; and as he spoke, he vaulted from his horse. Montreville followed his example; and Henri taking the bridles of their horses, they proceeded towards the spot where the speaker had appeared to be concealed the second time they had been addressed by him.
Nothing was to be seen; nothing was to be heard. They moved on towards the place from whence the voice had proceeded the first time of their hearing it. Equally unsuccessful was their pursuit.
After a considerable time thus spent in fruitless researches after the mysterious speaker by whom they had been addressed, they returned to their horses. "Nobody is to be found," said Montreville, addressing Henri.
"I feared as much, Monsieur," returned the valet.
"Feared!" echoed Montreville.
"Yes, Monsieur: I cannot help thinking that the voice resembled one that was heard the night before an old lady I once lived with in Alsace died," was the reply.
Franval had already said that the voice had appeared to him to be more than human. Henri's opinion strengthened his; and the light of the lanthorn was just sufficient to shew each that his companions' minds were occupied with unpleasant and undefined sensations.
The temper of Franval was steady, firm, and cool; and although transactions of an unexplained nature had lately occurred in his family, such as might also prepare him for a voice of warning or instruction, he did not choose to let it appear to his friend and servant, that he was moved by the occurrence just past; and therefore, with as much composure as he was able to command, he mounted his saddle, and said "As we appear to have no immediate cause to apprehend the approach of banditti, let us ride on; let us return to the road, and pursue our way."
Montreville was a young man not deficient in courage, but his disposition was tinctured with a dislike to forming acquaintance with any of the members of the world of spirits. Henri resembled him in this particular; and therefore they joyfully followed Franval's proposition of quitting the spot, where they firmly believed one of the members of the aerial community to have been flitting around them.
They continued to ride on for a considerable time without interruption; their conversation consisting merely of occasional remarks on the extraordinary adventure which they had encountered that night. When they had proceeded about a league and a half, Montreville said, "My horse knocks up; he can't go much farther without rest, I am certain; indeed, I expect that our beasts and ourselves will all be material sufferers by our want of repose, and shelter from the night air. If we could discover any habitations I should be tempted to knock at the door, in spite of what the master of the post-house said."
This observation had not been long made on the part of Montreville, ere a vivid flash of lightning passed before their eyes.
"I have foreseen a tempest some time," said Henri, "and a heavy one I think it will be; only look at the awful blackness of the clouds over our heads, Messieurs."
Franval and his friend raised their faces to the sky and felt upon them a few partial drops of rain, which announced a shower at hand. Again the lightning flashed its resplendent brilliancy upon the earth, and the thunder rolled in solemn grandeur through the sky; with each flash the tempest appeared to gather strength; with each succeeding moment the rain fell in greater quantities: and the situation of our travellers became of the most pitiable kind.
"Can we espy no cavity in the earth, no rocky dell, no place of any kind which may afford us a temporary shelter?" said Montreville; "not only the clothes we have on, but those in our saddle-bags likewise must be drenched with this heavy rain."
The mingled hail and rain, driven along by the current of a powerful north-east wind, met them full in the face; and the horses of our travellers kept continually turning to the right and to the left, in order to avoid it. At the moment Franval's horse was making a movement of this nature, a sudden flash of lightning enabled his master to descry what he could merely distinguish to be part of a wall. He communicated the observation he had made to his friend, and they immediately turned their horses towards it, in the hope of its forming part of a building which might afford them the enviable blessing of shelter from the inclemency of the weather.
As they moved on, they observed many fragments of stone scatted upon the ground, which appeared to be the ruins of a building that had either fallen into natural decay, or been crumbled by the hand of violence; and when they gained the wall which had been descried by Franval, their conjectures were confirmed, for they found that it formed a part of the ruin of an ancient monastic building.
A considerable part of the front of the edifice was still standing; but, on looking through the archway in which the gate of the entrance had once been swung, the observations which they were enable to make by the momentary illumination of the passing lightning presented them only with a long perspective of gloomy ruins.
It appeared, however, probable that these ruins might afford some nook to protect them from the weather; and in this hope they dismounted; and leading their horses through the gateway, they tied them by their bridles to the remains of a massive pillar, by the side of which the wall was sufficiently high to protect them, in some measure, from the driving blast; and by the help of the lanthorn, they then proceeded to seek out for some spot which was supplied with a covering for their own heads.
A high and narrow door-way attracted them towards it: they passed through it, and found themselves within a passage partially sheltered by a roof. On one side appeared three steps of a dark marble; these they ascended, and entered an apartment which had in all probability, been the chamber of the superior at the time that the mansion had been in a state of habitation; its walls were now bare; the floor of a black oak, and in many parts broken through; and the hearth filled with fragments of stone, which had fallen upon it from the chimney.
From this apartment a single step led into a small closet, formed in the shape of an alcove, of which the floor corresponded with the former; but the walls were intersected by niches and slender pillars of stone, surmounted with compartments in fret-work, which now exhibited a striking picture of former elegance sinking under the ravaging hand of decay.
The thunder still rolled in hoarse and awful peals; and the refulgence of the forked lightning blazed at intervals through a narrow arch in the wall, which had once been the frame of a gothic and spiral window, and of which no remnants, but the iron bars, which had intersected the glass, were now remaining.
At length, after full an hour had passed in tedious expectation, the lightning became scarcely visible, and the thunder receded in gentle murmurs to the distant mountains. "Shall we return to our horses, and proceed?" said Franval.
"It still rains violently," replied Montreville; "and the darkness appears almost impenetrable."
"It is quite so, Monsieurs," said Henri. "If I might take the liberty of advising, I think it would be infinitely better, now we have a roof over our heads, to keep under it till day begins to dawn."
"But this is a sad, uncomfortable place," resumed Franval; "and if we could reconcile ourselves to enduring it in preference to being exposed to the pelting of the merciless elements, our horses must remain suffering in the wet and cold."
"They will not be the worse for that, Monsieur," returned Henri; "they are used to all weathers when they are out at pasture; and I left them bridle-room enough to enable them to pick up the grass as they stand."
"Upon my life," cried Montreville, "I am very much of Henri's opinion about remaining here till dawn of day. We are now become tolerably dry again; and should we issue out from this retreat, we shall be certain of getting wet through once more; and perhaps, after all, may not be lucky enough to find a house to refresh ourselves at. I think it would be very possible to get a comfortable nap here, wrapped up in our cloaks."
After a good deal of debate upon the subject, it was agreed that any shelter was preferable to encountering the heavy rain which continued to fall; and Montreville having wound his horseman's cloak tightly around him, lay down in one corner of the apartment with the intention beguiling an hour or two in sleep, and advised his companions to do the same.
"Had you not better, Monsieur, endeavor to compose yourself to sleep?" said Henri to his master; "this place seems to be perfectly quiet, and free from danger; and a little repose will render you the better able to bear the fatigue of travelling tomorrow."
"No," replied Franval; "I don't feel inclined to sleep; but lie you down, and take a nap, if you please." Henri availed himself of his master's permission, and stretched himself out by the side of Montreville, placing the lanthorn at his head.
Franval continued for some time to wander about the apartment where his friend and servant lay locked in the arms of sleep, till the wind, beginning to blow from another quarter to what it had before done, pierced through the stone arch of the window with chilly gusts, that induced him to seek a more sheltered situation in the adjoining closet.
In spite of those anxieties of mind which rendered him less impressive to the attacks of sleep than his companions, Franval began to feel rather weary; and seating himself upon the floor, he rested his head in niche between two of the pillars of the stone-work.
The minute he desisted from bodily exercise, the influence of sleep began to steal over his senses, and ideas to fade away under its advances. Suddenly a momentary crash made him start, and this was followed by a rumbling noise, which he had no hesitation in supposing to be caused by some mouldering fragments of the building, which had been precipitated upon the ruins below by the violence of the wind; and he again leant back his head, and closed his eyes.
Again his thoughts were wandering from the world into that confusion of ideas which accompanied the approach of sleep to a mind ill at ease within itself, when he was startled by the sound of a lengthened sigh. He sprang upon his feet; but instantly recollecting how near to him were Montreville, and his servant, he made no doubt that the sound he had heard, had been an exclamation uttered by one of them in his sleep.
He approached the door of the room where they lay, and, by the light of the lanthorn, he perceived them both still extended on the floor; and as he stood observing them, he heard Henri exclaim, "Oh, Marie! Marie!" which he knew to be the name of a little peasant girl in Brittany, who had won his heart and not doubting that the sigh he had hears, had been one which Henri had addressed to her image, which had appeared to him in his dreams, he returned to his resting place, and a third time composed himself to sleep.
He sunk to repose; but how long he had slept he was uncertain, when he was awakened by a noise resembling a gust of wind rushing through a narrow aperture; he hastily opened his eyes, and beheld object, at the sight of which the blood ran cold and trembling through his veins--He beheld the very countenance of savage expression, which he had seen through the window of the post-house; its eyes were fixed upon him, and assisted in their observation by a lighted firebrand, which the terrific form held in one of its hands. The figure of the unknown was tall and lank: the long black cloak in which it was enveloped was insufficient to hide the sharp angles of its bony stature; a hat of dark brown fur pulled down below its ears, gave a very finish of horror to its savage aspect; thus the horrible being appeared, bending forward as it stood, to gain a better view of Franval's person.
Franval started, but had not power to rise, or to speak. Instantly upon this motion on his part, with one rapid stride, the figure vanished from his sight. Its disappearance was followed by a loud clap, resembling the echo which runs through a hollow passage, after a door at its extremity has been hastily closed.
Franval attempted to call to his friend and Henri, but his tongue clove to his mouth, and refused its office. He staggered to the door of the apartment where he had left them asleep; the light which had been burning by their side, was now extinguished, or the lanthorn gone. A few minutes recovered to him the power of speech, and he called upon them both by name. Henri immediately replied to his call; and very soon after, Montreville enquired "what was the matter?"
Through an arched window, Franval had a view of the Heavens; and he perceived that the light of day was already beginning to streak the sky. "Be not alarmed," he replied, in answer to their enquiries; "follow me into the air; I stand in need of its refreshment; and I will then explain to you what agitates me."
He darted out of the apartments and they followed him as quickly as the darkness of the place would permit; for their lamp had died in the socket, and the light of day was still so feeble, as to render objects scarcely discernible.
They found him leaning against a broken pillar, which stood in an open space apart from the mass of ruins. They approached him, renewed their enquiries; and he satisfied them with an account of what he had witnessed.
Montreville heard him with patience, but persisted in endeavoring to persuade him that the whole had been a dream, caused by the impression which had been made on his mind by the strangeness of the voice that had addressed them when amongst the trees, and the ghastly countenance which he had seen peeping through a window of the post-house. But Franval replied, "that he was certain that the figure which he had seen standing over him with a firebrand in its hand, and which he knew to be the same that he had beheld with a sensation approaching to horror when looking through the window of the post-house, had been a reality.
"Well," returned Montreville, "it is possible that this ruin may be the haunt of a banditti, of which he is one."
"I do not believe him to be a robber," replied Franval.
"Why not? What has changed your opinion of him?" asked his friend.
"I cannot say why," answered Franval; "and yet I feel my sentiments utterly changed with regard to him."
"Your ideas are bewildered by the events of the night," said Montreville.
"And then that strange voice commanding us to go to the Castle of Virandola," said Henri; "it rings in my ears yet."
"Strange indeed!" breathed forth Franval in solemn accents; and he added, "Can it be connected with him whom we seek?"
"Whithersoever we go," rejoined Montreville, "I think we had better be jogging from hence; this is not a place favorable to the combating of gloomy reflections, whether they proceed from imagination, or fact."
"No," resumed Franval; "I can't, I will not quit this spot, till I have made some investigation of the closet where I slept: I must examine whether there is a door in that particular part of the wall, at which the strange figure, whose countenance rests so forcibly on my memory, could have departed from the place: if I find any outlet, my ideas of its mortality will be confirmed."
"And if you do not?" said Montreville
"I shall still be very much tempted to believe that there is some mode of egress from the place which is not discernible to me, though known to that person, whoever he may be," answered the Chevalier.
Franval could not be argued out of his resolution of examining the closet in which he had passed the night, as soon as the light of the day should be sufficiently powerful to assist him in his investigation. Indeed, Montreville had promised to accompany Franval on his present journey from motives of pure friendship, and therefore was easily won to desist from any opposition to such plans as his friend conceived to be for his happiness.
A drizzling rain was still falling to the earth; and although the wind had much abated in strength, it still blew cold and cheerless through the long avenues of ruins; and as Franval was unwilling to return to the shelter of the apartment they had just quitted, they wandered about in order to preserve themselves from the ill effects of the cold.
After some time, Henri was, in the course of their movements, separated from his master and Montreville; and scarcely had they noticed his absence, ere they heard a pistol fired at a short distance from them. Supposing Henri to be attacked, they flew to the spot where they had parted from him, and observed him standing with his arm extended into the air, and his pistol still in it.
"Was it you who fired?" asked Franval.
"Yes," replied Henri; "and I have either brought him down, or he is run away."
"Who? who?" Impatiently demanded Franval and his friend.
"A tall fellow, wrapped in a black cloak," answered Henri, "exactly corresponding with the description my master gives of the rascal who stood gazing upon him with the firebrand in his hand. The moment that you had turned the angle of the range of pillars behind us, I observed him mounted upon the high wall; and the instant I observed him, I saw him stretch his arm towards me, and was ignorant to what end, till I saw some sparks, which convinced me that he had directed at me a pistol that had missed fire. I immediately drew mine from my girdle, and fired it at him in my own defence; and he directly disappeared; but I cannot tell whether he fell by my bullet or fled from a repetition of my fire."
"We will go to the spot, and ascertain," said Franval boldly; and immediately began to climb a pile of the ruins which led to the wall whereon Henri had seen the form. Nothing that had motion, was visible to any one of the party, when they had reached the height, which had once been a terrace projecting from the second range of windows on the side of the monastery. Many delusive shapes were to be seen, which, on close investigation, proved to be only broken arches, and decapitated pillars, which, beheld at a short distance in the twilight of the morning, appeared in certain directions to assume the form of men.
They did not relax in their search, because many disappointments attended it; but it proved wholly unsuccessful; no human being was to be discerned in any part of the ruins; nor did it appear probable that Henri's pistol had wounded the one he had beheld; for as the light of day rose, they found that no spots of blood stained any part of the stone-work upon which he had appeared.
They again descended to the lower range of dilapidated grandeur, which presented itself in the romantic fragments of the mouldering abbey; and judging it now to be sufficiently light for the examination of the closet upon which Franval had resolved, they returned to that part of the building where they had passed the hours of sleep.
Montreville was the first who entered the chamber leading to the closet, and directly on stepping into it, he exclaimed, "Why, what have we here?--See--behold--characters traced upon the floor!"
Franval darted hastily forward, and beheld upon the black oak floor, these words, "Quit this place." Wrapt in astonishment and thought, he stood with his eyes fixed on the letters.
"Surely, Monsieur," cried Henri, half trembling, "it can only be a devil who plays these pranks with us."
"It is a friendly devil, however," returned Montreville, "for he warns us to get our of the way of danger; if there is any in staying here."
"I will not quit this place," cried Franval sternly, after a pause of reflective silence. "This command is to my senses, a sufficient conviction that there is some mystery to be developed by staying; and I feel impelled by a stronger sentiment than curiosity, to exert myself in order to make that discovery."
Franval rubbed one of the letters on the floor with his finger, and found that they were only written in chalk, and could easily be effaced.
"Come, pray, let us depart," said Montreville, after another pause.
"Not, at all events, till I have examined the walls of the closet," said Franval, and moved forward to the investigation. His companions followed him, and assisted in the scrutiny; but it produced only disappointment; there were an infinite number of cracks in the stone-work of the walls, but none of sufficient regularity, or length, to flatter them with the idea that it could form any part of a door, or an opening of any kind.
"I would wager my life," said Franval, "that these words were written by that horrible figure which I twice beheld in the course of last night. Surely this ruin cannot be the Castle of Virandola, of which the host spoke."
"I should imagine not," replied Montreville: "this place does not bear the appearance of ever having been a castle; every thing about it denotes it to have been a religious building."
A silence ensued; Montreville broke it: "Franval," he said, "I am certain you cannot doubt my friendship; prove to me that you have not lost that respect for the admonitions of your friend, with which you have so frequently received them at my lips: let us for the present quit this abode of mystery; let us seek some house where our bodily necessities may be attended to; and let us also employ some time in making enquiry into the report which this ruinous fabric bears in the world; and should you then still have any cause, or merely feel any wish, to make a future investigation of its secrets, I pledge my honour, that I will return with you to it, and even risk my life in assisting you through your adventure."
For a considerable time the entreaties of Montreville, seconded by those of Henri, produced no effect upon the mind of Franval: at length, after he had received a renewal of his friend's promise to return with him at some future period, if it should be his desire to make a second visit to the place they were now in, he agreed to accompany them in quest of refreshment; and information, if any were to be gained, which could assist in throwing light upon the strange adventures which had marked the last twelve hours.
Having mounted their horses, they turned into the road, and pursued the path along which they had on the former evening been journeying: at the distance of rather more than half a league from the ruin, they descried a cottage apart from the high road, and immediately rode up to it.
Before they reached the humble dwelling, the door was opened by a peasant girl of about twelve years old, who, it appeared, had seen them through a window, and been attracted by curiosity to behold travellers of so different an order of beings to those amongst whom she was accustomed to live.
Montreville called to her, and enquired whether there was any body in the cottage besides herself, and whether they would sell them any milk and bread.
The girl replied that her mother and grandmother were both within; and directly called the former, who quickly made her appearance. Having heard our travellers wants, she readily agreed to supply them in the best manner she was able; and invited them to alight, and walk in: this Montreville and Franval did: and Henri, conducted by the girl, led the horses to a stable behind the cottage, where he found a welcome of sweet, although coarse provender, for his beasts.
Franval and his friend took seats. The woman, with the garrulity natural to her sex, and her rank in life, began to inform them of her own family affairs: her husband and her sons, she said, were gone to labour on a distant part of the mountains, and she was anticipating their return with much pleasure, because they had promised to beg some grapes of the master of the vineyard for her mother, who was particularly fond of them, and who being now far advanced in years, and totally blind, had no enjoyment left her but that of the palate, which she had the least opportunity of gratifying.
This decripit old female sat in one corner of the cottage, with her feet rested on a large stone, in order to shorten the distance at which they would else have hung from the ground, and with her chin nearly bent upon her knees.
The peasant's wife having finished the little history of her family, began to speak of the tempestuous night which was just past; and to enquire whether our travellers had rested in any part to which the tempest had extended?
"We had, indeed, a most uncomfortable lodging," replied Montreville, and informed the good woman where they had passed the night.
"It must have been uncomfortable lodging in the ruins of Saint Luke's Abbey," said the woman.
"Extremely so, I assure you," returned Montreville; "but on what account do you particularly mean?"
"The want of accommodation for sleep," she answered; "I should imagine there is scarcely a nook about it furnished with a roof."
"Yes, there is," replied Montreville, and gave a short account of the apartment they had found, with this necessary appendage for comfort against the peltings of a storm.
"But is there no other account on which you consider that it might be an unpleasant resting place?" enquired Franval.
"I dare say it is full of night birds, that shriek and scream, and make it dismal enough," replied the woman.
"Is it never disturbed with those spirits which, like the birds you speak of, do no leave their retirement, except in the shades of night?"
"What, haunted, do you mean, Messieurs?" cried the woman. "O no, blessed be the Virgin, I never heard that of the Abbey of Saint Luke. I am sure, I hardly durst live here, if such were the case;" and she crossed herself as she spoke. "No, no; one house possessed by the Devil is enough for any district."
"And have you a house of that description in your district?" asked Franval.
"You must be a stranger in these parts to ask that question, I am certain," she returned. "The Castle of Virandola, about half a league from this house, is, as I may say, a very receptacle for Satan's legions."
Franval drew his chair nearer to the woman's, and enquired of her who was its possessor.
She replied, that his name was Don Bazilio; that he and his castle were the terror of the neighbourhood; that not an individual durst approach within a considerable distance of it after dark; and that Don Bazilio was by some supposed to be a Frenchman, by some a Spaniard, and by others a Moor. Farther information on the subject she was unable to give him.
A comfortable meal was now set before them. Franval scarcely tasted it; and the perturbation of his mind appeared to increase with every minute; at length, drawing aside his friend Montreville, he told him, that he could not divest himself of the idea of the voice which had warned them to proceed to the castle of Virandola, having some connexion with the fate of Don Manuel; and that he could not satisfy himself without approaching the edifice, over which hung the impenetrable veil of mystery with which they had on the preceding evening become acquainted.
Montreville had promised to second every endeavor of his friend towards the development of Don Manuel's fate, and accordingly agreed to accompany him. As the castle was but a short distance from the cottage, they resolved to walk towards it. Franval had not yet determined to ask admittance; his present design was confined to inspecting the outside of the building, and proving whether he should receive any intimation of his being expected at it by the person whose voice had admonished him to approach it. The friends informed Henri of their design, and bade him prepare to accompany them; and Franval pretending to the cottagers, that curiosity impelled him and his companions to take a view of the outside of the castle of the mysterious Don Bazilio, they asked Ricardo's grand-daughter to conduct them into the road to it. She readily complied with their request; and as they proceeded, they learnt from her replies to the questions which they had advanced to her, that there was no idea existing of Don Bazilio being himself a robber, or his castle the haunt of banditti; but that he had the repute for dealing in the black art, and that midnight was the preferred hour of his orgies, at which period strange lights had been seen flitting about the castle, and dreadful noises heard within it, by those few who at that solemn hour had ventured to approach it; but that no one, of whom she had heard, had ever attempted to gain admittance.
When the towers of the castle, rising above a rocky eminence of the rugged mountains, rendered a guide no longer necessary to the travellers, the girl ran back to her cottage; and Franval and his companions pursued their way. As they advanced towards the castle, they perceived that it had once been strongly fortified, but that its bulwarks were now fallen to decay: it presented to their view a huge pile of ancient stonework, black with age, and partially mouldering under the destructive hand of Time: gloom and awfulness were its characteristic features, and not any sign of its containing inhabitants was to be discovered about it: the drawbridge appeared no longer capable of being raised; and the moat was nearly choked up.
Our friends walked several times round its gloomy walls, and were on the point of quitting the spot, when a key, thrown from some considerable eminence, fell at the feet of the Chevalier Franval. He picked it hastily up, for he perceived that there was fastened to it a paper, on which he could distinguish the marks of hand-writing: with the most tremulous agitation he read the following words; "This key opens the door in the western turret; enter it at the return of night." If these words excited the astonishment of the Chevalier Franval, what was the emotion with which he beheld the paper signed by the name of Rodalvo, the faithful and respected servant of Don Manuel!
The paper fastened to the key, by directing them to return at night, appeared to warn them to retire for the present from the site of the castle, which they accordingly did.
The emotion of Franval's soul was so great at the belief that he had discovered the retreat of his beloved sister's husband, that he was incapable of expressing his feelings. Equally tongue-tied by astonishment were his friend Montreville, and his servant Henri. They returned to the cottage, and seated themselves on a bench by the door, where some degree of composure gradually returning to their minds, they at length began to give expression to their ideas: but to form conjectures was all they were still able to do; it was impossible for them to decide by what power Don Manuel was detained an inmate of the Mysterious Castle of Virandola, as his servant's being an inhabitant of it seemed to bespeak that he was; or to ascertain what connexion there could be between him and the universally dreaded Don Bazilio.
They now doubted not that the voice which had on the preceding evening admonished them to proceed to the Castle of Virandola, had been that of Rodalvo; but they were at a loss whether or not to suppose that the terrific being who had twice been seen by Franval, and once by his servant Henri, was the owner of the castle.
The agitation of mind in which the day was passed by them all, especially by the Chevalier Franval, may be easily conjectured. They were entertained with hospitality and kindness at the cottage, but the attentions of their hostess and her family were often unheeded by them; and the natural impatience of their minds, rendered the day, in appearance, the longest they had ever known.
When the shades of night had fallen to the earth, Franval and his companions set out on their mysterious expedition. The night was cloudy, scarcely a star gemmed the face of Heaven; the crescent of an infant moon rising above the distant mountains, threw a faint and silvery light upon partial spots of the landscape. Having reached the castle, they sought out the western turret, of which the situation could not be mistaken; and Franval applied the key to the lock: with little difficulty the door was opened by him, and they all three entered. Total darkness prevailed within, and they stood debating, how to proceed. Suddenly a distant light gleamed upon the scene, and they perceived that it was reflected through a spiral window of stained glass, at the extremity of a spacious hall in which they were standing. The light was no sooner beheld, than it again vanished: it had, however, been sufficient to shew our adventurers that they might proceed for a considerable space without the danger of falling, as the momentary illumination had been sufficient for them to perceive that there were no intervening steps between the door which they had entered and the opposite wall. Franval drew his sword; and extending before him the arm which bore it, as a protection to his person, he moved cautiously on. He continued his progress for some time, till a flaming firebrand, carried in the hand of some being whose pace was so swift as not to give him time to behold its person, darted across his path; and he observed, by the temporary influence of the light, that he had wandered into a lofty and narrow passage.
He stopped a moment, and listened; no sound met his ear; and he concluded, from the silence, that he had strayed from his companions. He, however, resolved not to suffer his courage to forsake him, or to relax in his attempt at developing the mystery of the place, to which act he had been summoned by one connected with a man whom he did not esteem less on his own account, than as the nearest relative of his beloved sister: using, therefore, every precaution which his perilous situation permitted him to do for guarding against accident, he still proceeded.
Suddenly a deep groan struck his ear; it was followed by a stifled shriek; and these sounds were succeeded by several voices, uttering such tones as might have been expected from demons uttering expressions of delight. Again all was still; and the next moment the Chevalier, moving a step or two from the spot where he had been standing, found himself upon so rapid a declivity, as obliged him to move on, whether it met his inclination or not.
This declivity continued, as nearly as Franval could conjecture, for at least the space of an hundred feet; and whilst descending it, he heard a repetition of the dreadful sounds to which he had before listened.
At length he felt himself again upon even ground; there was now no longer any pavement under his feet, but a loose and crumbling earth. Here he paused an instant: he wished for the society of his friend and Henri, but the wish was in vain: it was now evident that the darkness of the place had separated them from each other. An infinite satisfaction would it have been to his feelings, had Rodalvo now appeared to him, and either directed his progress, or given him some explanation of the existing mystery. Whilst he stood debating thus with his own mind, he heard the voice of some one either in solemn prayer, or reading emphatically aloud; which of the two he could not distinguish; and turning his eyes around on every side, a faint light, playing on a distant wall, met his sight; he moved towards it, and pursuing the direction in which it shone, ascended a few steps, cut, as it seemed, out of the rugged earth, which led him to an eminence, from whence he looked down upon a scene which almost froze his blood in its current to his heart.
Some few feet below the surface of the spot on which he stood, was what appeared to him a spacious cavern; it was illuminated by several firebrands, which were stuck into the earth at certain distances from each other, and of which the pitchy tops sent forth darting flames, which climbed like fiery serpents towards the dusky roof. At the extremity of the place, in letters which appeared the colour of transparent blood, was decyphered the word "VENGEANCE;" and immediately under this inscription, in a chair, on the back of which were fixed three human skulls, and on either side of which stood a ghastly skeleton, sat the very being whom Franval had on the preceding evening beheld, first through the window of the post-house, and next bending over him with a lighted firebrand in his hand, amidst the ruins of Saint Luke's Abbey; the being whom, from the account which he had heard of the possessor of the castle, he could not doubt to be Don Bazilio himself nor were his suspicions incorrect.
On either side of him, seated around a table of a semi-circular form, were several other persons, habited like himself, in loose garments, with hats of dark fur, of which the brims were drawn down around their faces, and added to the terrific appearance of their countenances, already sufficiently dreadful to the view.
Before the table, and immediately opposite to Don Bazilio, knelt a human figure, nearly naked, and whose limbs were shaking with a violent trembling, produced either by cold or apprehension; and judging, from his own feelings, at the scene before him, Franval could not doubt it to be the latter. Around him were placed six familiars, in the habits of demons, each directing at him an instrument of death, which they were prepared to thrust to his heart, if a signal were given them to that effect.
A few moments observation clearly proved to Franval, that the kneeling man was a recipient, about to be admitted a member of some secret community, the lawless transactions of which he was to be terrified from divulging. The solemn voice which he had heard on his approach to the spot of terror which he was now contemplating, he found to have been that of Don Bazilio, who was still reading from a volume, extended before him on the table, the obligations to which the novice, at that moment initiating into the mysteries of the community, was called upon to swear observance.
The first of these obligations to which Franval heard Don Bazilio call upon the recipient to subscribe, contained these words: "Swear to divulge no secret with which you are made acquainted by the community, to any being unconnected with it; and to report every one with which you may be entrusted by other persons to it."
"I swear," replied the recipient: and the expression of satisfaction with which the assembly received his acquiescence, explained to Franval what had been the shouts of joy that had before heard when at a distance from the cavern.
Again Don Bazilio read; "If thou refuse to comply with any command issued to thee by the authority before whom thou kneelest, recollect that the sword of their revenge will fall on thee quicker than the lightning; remember this; and swear that, in assisting the vengeance they are leagued to perpetrate, neither the life of thy father, mother, wife, nor child, of thy dearest friend, or nearest connection, shall be regarded by thee."
The recipient did not immediately reply. "Swear instantly," cried Don Bazilio, "or I pronounce the signal that shall seal thy death." He raised himself upon his seat as he spoke. Franval believed the last moment of the kneeling man to be at hand, and the exclamation of "Oh, merciful God!" burst from his lips.
His voice was heard by the members of the assembly; and turning their eyes to the spot from whence it had proceeded, they no sooner beheld him, than several of them sprang from their seats, and flying up to an ascent which led to the eminence where Franval stood, they seized his person, and dragged him down into the centre of the cavern.
"Who art thou?" exclaimed Don Bazilio, "who hast dared intrude upon our privacy? and by what means hast thou gained access to this spot?" Whilst speaking, he advanced towards Franval; and when he had approached sufficiently near to him to distinguish his features, he added, "Ha! I have beheld thee before in a situation to which I cannot doubt thou camest as a spy upon my actions. The ruined Abbey of St. Luke is the spot to which I refer. Under the impression which thy conduct has raised in my mind, thou can'st not live." Then turning to the familiars around him, he cried, "Bring the cord, and do your duty."
No sooner had Don Bazilio issued this command, than the recipient, moving forward, threw himself on his knees before him, and, in a voice of the humblest supplication, he exclaimed, "Oh spare him! I entreat, I implore you, for my sake spare him; he is the brother of my beloved wife!"
The tones in which the kneeling man spoke, were familiar to the ear of Franval; he turned his eyes upon him, and, to his utter astonishment, beheld in him Don Manuel di Vadilla!
After a few instants of private conversation with another member of the occult community, Don Bazilio commanded Franval to be led to the grated cell. The familiars immediately seized his arms, and, preceded by one of their fellows, who lighted them with a torch which he had torn up from its station in the floor of the cavern, they forced him along several winding passages, which ultimately brought them to the grated dungeon, into which they thrust him, and then departed, taking away with them the light.
The torturing and perplexing sensations which at this period filled the breast of the Chevalier Franval, may be easily imagined. What could he suppose would be the event of his present situation? what could be the mystery which bound together the community before whose authority he had beheld the unfortunate Don Manuel, kneeling an apparent victim? Where now, he wondered, were his friends Montreville and Henri: had they, like himself, fallen into the power of the mystic band by whom the castle was habited, had they escaped their toils?
About the midnight hour, through the grating of his prison, he beheld a light approaching: in a few minutes it drew sufficiently near to him for him to distinguish that it was borne in the hand of Don Bazilio; he placed himself opposite to the grated window of Franval's cell, and thus addressed him: "Stranger, having beheld as much as you have done of the mysteries of this place, there is but one point left for you to decide upon; you must either forfeit your life to our safety, or bind yourself by the vows which connect our community."
"Your terms," replied Franval, "appear as extraordinary as your mysteries; you must inform me what the latter are, and to what purpose they are maintained, ere I can consent, or refuse, to subscribe to them."
"I intend to do so," returned Don Bazilio. "I fear not to entrust to you the secret, because within the next twenty hours, you must, as I have already declared to you, become one of us, or cease to exist. Had it not been for the intercession of the young man who is known to you by the name of Don Manuel, you had not at this moment been alive to receive my offer. Now then attend: I am not a Spaniard, as my name implies me to be; I am by birth a Frenchman. My elder brother was the Marquis de la Croix; myself the Chevalier of the same name. It is now about eighteen years since by brother, and another gentleman, were alike suppliants to the crown for the permission of acceding to a Duchy which at that moment lay dormant; and, in the line of succession to which, they both stood with apparently equal rights; it rested consequently on the breast of the monarch on whom the honor should be conferred; and, after having deceived my brother with false hopes, the King bestowed the contested title on his competitor. Was not this a disappointment sufficiently strong to drive almost to madness a man of proud spirit? for such was my brother; and whose pride was supported by a consciousness of having devoted not only his active services, but his purse, to his King and his country. He immediately quitted the course, vowing never to return to it again.
"My brother was, at the period of which I am speaking, a widower; from his wife, who had been a Spanish lady of considerable distinction, he had inherited this castle of Virandola; and hither he retired, accompanied by myself, and three other friends, peculiarly attached to his interests.
"We had not been here many days ere he thus addressed us. 'My friends, I am sufficiently well acquainted with your attachment to me, to be conscious that I may disclose to you the inmost sentiments of my hear in full assurance of your secrecy. Listen, then to my words: as we have not in our power any present means of revenging the failure of my just and high-raised expectation, let us have the glory of founding a sect, which shall grow by our rearing, privately and unsuspectedly, from the small number here collected, into a magnitude which shall eventually crush the exercise of such unlimited power as I have been a sufferer from."
"We applauded his idea, and entered with fervor into his plan: we immediately bound ourselves by the most solemn oath which could pass the lips of man, to act by every exertion of our ability towards the subversion of every earthly power, by the possession of which one man is raised to a superiority over his fellows: we swore that not even the peace or safety of our dearest connections should obstruct us in the progress of our design; and moreover, that we would use every means of adding members to our secret community."
"From that instant we became a sect of Illuminati; we frequented lodges of masonry, and all public societies; we probed the hearts of their members, and when we found individuals suited to our purpose, we conducted them hither; and in the cavern which you have this night beheld, we initiated them into our mysteries.
"At the expiration of twelve years, my brother died; he fell the victim of a disorder which was slow in its progress; and as he was conscious of the approach of death, he appointed me the guardian of his only child, who was a son named Lewis, at that time in his fifteenth year; and concerning the future conduct of whose life he gave me the most particular and impressive directions.
"For many reasons, my brother and myself had for some time assumed the name of Vadilla, and professed ourselves to be Spaniards; and that of Lewis had, for the sake of accordance with our own, been changed to Manuel. Thus you perceive that the husband of your sister is my nephew."
Franval did not reply, and Don Bazilio continued thus:
"My deceased brother had enjoined me to initiate his son into the mysteries of our society when he had attained the age of twenty-one years, and to inform him that it had been the dying request of his father, that he would never form any connections in life, above all, that of marriage; but devote himself entirely to the forwarding of those views which had been planned by his parent; and which that parent conceived he might be less strenuous in pursuing, if he were bound by any other ties, which might claim at least an equal share of his feelings.
"At the age of eighteen, I informed him of his father's wish that he should lead a life of celibacy; and informed him that, at the age of twenty-one, a secret of the utmost importance would be entrusted to him, and business of the most interesting and peculiar nature placed in his hands; for devoting himself entirely to the services of which, I wished him, in the intermediate time, to prepare his mind, as it had been the dying request of his father that he should do so. He was become accustomed, by habit, to behold an air of mystery pervading the countenances of such inhabitants of the castle as were in my confidence, and had been in that of his deceased father; and my words did not appear so much to surprise him, as I had expected they would. He had hitherto not been the distance of more than four or five leagues from the Castle of Virandola, and he petitioned me to suffer him to travel for two or three years: to this request I consented, on condition of his promising to return to me against the period of his completing his twenty-first year, and of his forming no connection, or engagement, in the world, upon which he was about to enter. He gave me his promise to this effect. I furnished him with a most liberal supply of money, which I was with the greatest ease enabled to do, from the wealth of my deceased brother; and placing him under the care of a man named Rodalvo, the only domestic in my brother's service who had been admitted into our secret community, I permitted him to depart.
"By mutual agreement, I was not to receive any letter from my nephew during his absence. At length arrived his twenty-first birthday, and he was not returned. Several months passed on, and still he came not. I felt dissatisfied at the apparently ungrateful use which he had made of my indulgence; and I employed spies to discover for me where he loitered. Judge my disappointment and anger, when I learnt, in the course of time, from these persons, that he had broken through every injunction which I had given him, and was become a husband and a father. Against Rodalvo, also, was my rage excited, for not having withheld him from forming ties so opposite to the will of his late father.
"Having gained the knowledge of his retreat, I commissioned some of the inferior members of our occult society to lie in ambush for him and Rodalvo, to seize their persons, and to reconduct them to this castle. On their way to your villa, my emissaries were so fortunate as to meet them in Paris; where, having hurried them into a closed carriage, they set off with them, without delay, for the frontiers of the kingdom.
"Several accidents, which they met with on the road, so materially delayed their progress, that they did not till the afternoon of yesterday, reach the post-house before which you and your companions stopped last night.
"Impatience to behold my nephew, and reason with him on his disobedience to my injunctions, had brought me to the post-house to meet him; and as I found that he could not be prevailed upon, although in my power, by gentle means, to proceed to the Castle of Virandola, I resolved not to conduct him to it till the dead hour of midnight, when we should not be liable to encounter any observers of his conduct; and having resolved to remain till that hour at the post-house, I bound the host by a handsome bribe, and an oath, not to admit any one into it whilst we continued his inmates: how faithfully he performed his trust, you are already acquainted.
"Whilst we remained in the post-house, I questioned my nephew on the reason which had induced him to act in opposition to the conduct I had marked out for him to follow; and he confessed to me, that he had, by his supplications and entreaties, won Rodalvo into confessing to him, the cause for which he had been so earnestly enjoined to return, at the age of twenty-one, to the Castle of Virandola; and that abhorring, as he expressed himself, the nature and object of our community, immediately on having gained this knowledge, he determined never to accede to the plan which had been proposed for his future life, but to strike out one which he himself deemed more capable of producing his happiness. Having done this, he procured Rodalvo's promise never to quit his service; and in the course of time, he became the husband of your sister. Sufficient honor, however, was still left to him to resolve never to betray the secret of our community, out of respect to the safety of me, his uncle.
"In the Ruins of Saint Luke's Abbey, where you last night found shelter from the storm, is the entrance to a subterranean passage which leads into vaults beneath the Castle of Virandola; and this passage is in constant use by the members of our secret community, in order to protect them from being seen, and recognised, in entering or quitting the castle, as might chance to occur were they always to pass through its gates. By this passage I had last night resolved to reconduct my nephew; and having seen him safely guarded through it's entrance, I was about to follow him, when, hearing the sound of a voice amidst the ruins, I judged it not impossible that it might proceed from some brother of our society, who might have lost his way in the darkness amongst them. Lighted by the firebrand which I carried in my hand, I proceeded towards the spot from whence the sound had proceeded, and discovered you and your companions stretched on the ground asleep. The moment I beheld you, I believed you to be one of the travellers whom I had before seen refused admittance into the post-house: and as I bent over you, to ascertain if my conjecture were just, you awoke, and turned upon me your eyes. To avoid, as much as possible, your observation, I darted precipitately through a concealed door in the wall, which led to a branch in the subterranean passage of which I have already spoken to you.
"When I had quitted your sight, I began to doubt whether you and your companions were really weary travellers, or spies upon me, or the place ye were in, and counterfeiting sleep, the better to cover you purpose: I accordingly determined to watch your actions. From the spot of my concealment, I heard your footsteps quitting the dilapidated chamber, and I followed you amidst the ruin. Your servant beheld me turn an angle of the walls: I levelled my pistol at him, and it missed fire: my aim had not been to wound him, but to alarm you all, and send you away from the spot. I was foiled in this attempt: but still I pursued your steps unseen by you, and hearing you express a desire of returning to the apartment where you had slept, I resolved to repair thither before you and to mark the floor with the words of warning which you found upon it. 'Quit this place,' was the sentence I wrote; and seeing you shortly after mount your horses and depart, I congratulated myself on having procured the end I desired, by means which, probably, appeared to you of the greatest mystery; and having done so, I immediately proceeded to the castle.
"I thought of you no more throughout the day: it was passed by me in preparations for the admission of Don Manuel into our secret community; to be present at which ceremony, I had invited all the principal members of our society. The initiation was proceeding successfully, though I confess with evident reluctance on the part of the recipient, when the exclamation you uttered assailed our ears. I instantly recognised your person; and another minute would have sealed your fate in death, had not Don Manuel, to my utter astonishment, pleaded for mercy to be shewn to you, as the brother of his wife.
"A request made to the community by one of its members, is never refused to him without due deliberation being first given to it; and as we deemed Don Manuel to have proceeded so far in his initiation, as to be entitled to rank as one of us, his petition was heard, and you conveyed to prison.
"My immediate concern was then to examine by what means you had gained admittance into this castle; and to cause a diligent search to be made for your companions, who I supposed might also have entered it: they could not be discovered; but a paper, tied to a key found in the door of the western turret, directing you to return at night, and signed Rodalvo, explained at once how you had gained entrance, and who was the traitor that merited the vengeance of the community.
"I caused him instantly to be dragged by my familiars to my feet: the fact of his own handwriting he could not deny; his every nerve appeared to be unstrung with terror; and instead of attempting to exculpate himself, he increased my knowledge of his guilt, by confessing, that, having recognized your voice last night on the outside of the post-house, his desire of informing you where to find Don Manuel, of whom he could not doubt that you were in search, led him to steal out of the post-house, and to pursue you on a mule, which he took from one of the stables; and that, having overtaken you, he enjoined you to proceed to the Castle of Virandola; but durst not stay to converse with you, lest his absence from the post-house should have been discovered by me, and punished with death."
"Whatever my fate may be," exclaimed Franval, "let me entreat your mercy to that kind old man."
"It is too late," returned Don Bazilio; "he had twice been faithless to his trust: my poniard has drunk his blood."
"Unhappy man!" replied the Chevalier: "he will be rewarded in Heaven; for his errors were on the side of Virtue."
Don Bazilio uttered an exclamation of contempt, and, after a momentary pause, spoke thus:
"Now, to my most important business with you, Chevalier: by the interference of my nephew, your life has hitherto been miraculously preserved to you; it now rests entirely with yourself, how long you wish to retain that blessing of yours. To-morrow night you must either become a member of this community, or share the fate of Rodalvo: the intervening twenty-four hours will be give you for forming your determination."
"I require not an instant," returned Franval: "the vows which bind your infamous society can never pass my lips: truth and loyalty to my sovereign, and his adherents, glow with true fervor in my breast. Beneath the authority which sways this land, my father prospered; he conducted the battles which upheld it: and his son will sooner expire on the rack, than nourish a thought towards its destruction."
"The hour of proof will come," replied Don Bazilio. "To-morrow night at twelve--Remember!" and he departed.
No one again appeared to disturb the silence of Franval's prison throughout the night; and the rugged earth, barely covered with a lock of straw, was his resting-place. In the morning Don Bazilio again appeared; he was followed by an attendant, who, through the gratings of Franval's prison, placed upon a shelf immediately below the opening a small loaf of coarse bread, and a cup of muddy water.
"Under the resolution by which I left you swayed last night," said Don Bazilio, "this wretched fare must be yours; if you are become a proselyte to my opinion, you may command whatever your please."
"I am not become so, nor shall I ever," returned Franval.
"Remember what is to be the issue of the approaching night," said Don Bazilio emphatically, and again retired.
In the utmost wretchedness passed the hours of the Chevalier Franval: he had no other fate to expect from the merciless beings into whose hands he had fallen, than a death of savage torture; and no consolation under his affliction, except that which he derived from the conviction that it was better to die, than to lay a load of guilt upon his conscience.
At last arrived the hour of Franval's trial; it was announced to him by the beams of torches playing on the walls of his prison, and numerous footsteps approaching towards it. Several men, dressed in similar habits to those whom he had beheld on the preceding night, led him forth, and conducted him into the cavern of horrors, where he found the blood-thirsty community over whom Don Bazilio presided, assembled: He looked anxiously around, in the hope of espying amongst the number Don Manuel, but he saw him not.
Savageness, horror, and malignancy, were portrayed on every countenance; and each appeared to grin with exultation, and a mixture of contempt, on Franval. The place was lighted by firebrands, as on the preceding night, and every regulation appeared the same. After a short pause, Don Bazilio spoke; he repeated to Franval, that his life could only be preserved to him by his accepting the vows of the society; and concluded by informing him, that three questions were about to be proposed to him, and that if his replies to them all were unsatisfactory to the community, his death would immediately ensue.
Franval still answered with the same firmness and resolution which his conscience had before dictated to him.
Warning him once more to consider well his intention ere he drew upon himself the sword of vengeance, Don Bazilio proposed to him the first question; pointing, as he spoke, to the inscription above the chair upon which he sat.
"Wilt thou," said he, "bend thy body in obedience to the attribute of our society, Vengeance?"
"I will not," Franval replied.
"Wilt thou kneel, and pray for the approach of that day which shall give equality to men?" was the second question.
"I will not," again replied Franval.
"Hadst thou rather submit to death thyself, than cause the death of one placed in a situation of power over thee?" was the substance of the third question.
"I had," replied Franval firmly.
"Take then the reward of thy stubbornness," cried Don Bazilio. "Familiars, do your duty."
Instantly Franval felt himself seized by many hands: a cloth was thrown over his head; and he expected immediately to feel the steel piercing his heart; when, at the very instant, a crash like thunder rent the castle: it was repeated a second, a third, and a fourth time, with increased violence.
"We are betrayed!" cried Don Bazilio. "Comrades, defend yourselves."
"The hands which held Franval, were now withdrawn; and, snatching the cloth from his head, he beheld the cavern entered by a band of soldiery, who, rushing upon the Illuminati, made them in a few minutes their prisoners; and the next instant Montreville and Henri were by the side of Franval."
The tide of joy which rushed into the heart of the Chevalier Franval, every breast of feeling must be capable of estimating; but it is necessary that we should give a detail of the happy cause which led to this unexpected event.
When Montreville and Henri had, on the preceding night, been separated by the darkness in the castle hall from Franval, they wandered about for a considerable time, without being able to make any progress into the building. Franval did not return to them. Strange noises met their ears: their sight was started by one of the familiars of the secret community in his demon's dress, passing before them with a lighted firebrand in his hand; and their apprehensions being raised, not only for their companion, but for themselves, they resolved to seek assistance for enquiring into the fate of him from whom they had been separated.
Thus determined, they precipitately quitted the castle, and returning to the cottage where they had been entertained throughout the day, they took their horses from the stable, and having mounted them, rode with all speed towards the nearest garrison town on the frontiers of France: they reached it early in the morning, and having laid an account of their adventure before the police in terms which excited them to an immediate investigation of the truth, they selected fifty of the soldiery, under the command of a trusty officer, to accompany Montreville without delay to the Castle of Virandola. They marched with as much expedition as a body of men bearing arms were able to do, and reached the castle about the hour of midnight: they immediately forced themselves an entrance into the building; and dispersing different ways, a considerable number of them met in the cavern of horrors, as has already been related, at the critical moment of Franval's fate.
As soon as the members of the infamous community of vengeance were secured, and Franval convinced of his safety from the mouths of his friend and servant, a search was made in the castle, in order to ascertain whether it contained any unhappy beings suffering beneath the inhumanity of the terrific horde by which it had been infested: the first object of horror which was discovered by the scrutineers, was the body of the unfortunate Rodalvo, who had fallen the victim of his affection for his master: the next was Don Manuel himself, who was chained to the walls of a flinty dungeon, where he had been fated by his relentless uncle to remain till the Chevalier Franval had either pronounced the vows which were to constitute him a member of the society, or paid the forfeit of his refusal in death.
The grief which Don Manuel had experienced at being torn from the arms of his beloved wife, and dragged to the execution of a purpose at which his soul revolted, could only be equalled by the ecstacy with which he beheld himself and Franval again at liberty, and dwelt on his return to his adored Amarylla, and his infant children.
The rage of Don Bazilio's disappointed soul expressed itself solely in sullen silence. By the command of the police in the town from whence Montreville had procured military assistance, the band of Illuminati were conveyed in chains to Paris, to take their public trial; and on their arrival there, the Chevalier Franval, Montreville, and Don Manuel, whom we must now know by his real name of the Marquis de la Croix, were detained to give evidence against them.
Before the day of trial arrived, Don Bazilio gave a most unquestionable proof of his consciousness of his past guilt, and of the present wretched state of his mind, by putting an end to his own existence in prison. By the voice of the law, his associates in iniquity were adjudged to die beneath the hand of the executioner; which sentence was put into effect on the third day after their condemnation.
On the Chevalier Franval, and the Marquis de la Croix, the King, in addition to other high marks of his favor, bestowed an immense pecuniary reward from the coffers of the state. And the united voice of a rejoicing people bestowed on them the tribute of public applause, for having been the instruments through which retribution and punishment had been inflicted on a set of beings, sufficiently depraved and worthless, to have been brooding the subversion of a prosperous state, and the fall of a virtuous monarch.
Happy in the consciousness of having acted as it became virtuous and loyal subjects to have done, and grateful to Providence for its invisible interposition in the fate of the excellent young Marquis, they returned to the Chevalier's villa crowned with triumph and delight, where the caresses they received from an affectionate sister, and adored wife, rendered them the most enviable men whom the kingdom of France could boast. The society of vengeance being scattered to the winds, the Chevalier and his brother instituted a community of Benevolence to celebrate its destruction. Great was the honor of being admitted a member, and unsullied the virtuous principles of those who became so.
The children of de la Croix, as they grew to manhood, considered it their glory to be descended from those who had sown the seeds of so praiseworthy a society; and their lovely mother, stretching over them in affection and joy, appeared the earthly representative of that goddess of Benevolence, to whom a temple was raised in all their hearts.
This site is full of FREE ebooks - Project Gutenberg Australia | <urn:uuid:1201921b-9aed-440c-ab99-4e8ca36d58b0> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks06/0606731h.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279368.44/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00328-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.989476 | 21,463 | 1.648438 | 2 |
“I wish also to express my deep concern that for the fourth time the Human Rights Council is compelled to convene a Special Session to discuss the situation in Syria. I would like to echo the calls of the Secretary-General and of the Joint Special Envoy, Mr. Kofi Annan, for an immediate end to all forms of violence and human rights violations by all parties,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay told the Human Rights Council.
She emphasised the need to end impunity, to ensure accountability for perpetrators, and to provide adequate and effective remedies for the victims.
“I take this opportunity to call again on the Government of Syria to assume its responsibility to protect the civilian population in the country. I reiterate that those who order, assist, or fail to stop attacks on civilians are individually criminally liable for their actions. Other States have a duty to do all they can to prevent and prosecute perpetrators of international crimes. Once again, I urge the Security Council to consider referring the case of Syria to the International Criminal Court,” Pillay said.
Pillay reiterated her call to the Syrian government to grant the Independent Commission of Inquiry on Syria full and unimpeded access to the country so as to carry out investigations into all human rights violations, including the El-Houleh killings, during which at least 108 people including 49 children were killed.
She said: “In this context, I regret that, despite the Human Rights Council’s repeated calls on the Government of Syria to cooperate fully with the Commission of Inquiry, the Commission still has not been granted access to Syria. I have taken note of the Security Council’s call on the UN Supervision Mission in Syria to continue its investigations into the El-Houleh killings, and I urge the Government of Syria to cooperate fully with UNSMIS.”
Meanwhile, UN Independent Experts to the Human Rights Council in a joint statement said: “We deplore the fact that since the last special session and after more than one year of widespread violence, the situation has alarmingly deteriorated. The killings which have occurred over the past few days have again alerted us to the imperative for immediate action from the highest level, in particular President Assad.”
The statement read on behalf of the UN Independent Experts by Christof Heynsthe Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions said: “the use of indiscriminate and disproportionate use of artillery and tank shelling against residential areas is unacceptable.”
The Human Rights Council heard that livelihoods and access to medical care, food, and water have been affected across the country.
UN Independent Experts urged the Syrian authorities to ensure” unhindered access to humanitarian assistance, including to internally displaced persons,” adding that this must be a priority for all parties and be provided irrespective of other efforts to resolve the crisis.”
They also expressed concern over the impact of the violence and the growing number of internally displaced persons; they noted that more than 61,000 people are seeking shelter in Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.
The Council voted a resolution condemning the recent killings in the village of El-Houleh, near Homs, describing it as “an outrageous use of force against the civilian population, which constitutes a violation of applicable international law and of the commitment of the Government of the Syrian Arab Republic…”
Forty-one members of the council voted for the resolution, three states voted against and there were two abstentions.
The Human Rights Council has previously convened three special sessions on Syria to address the human rights violations unfolding on the ground since violence erupted in the country in March 2011.
1 June 2012 | <urn:uuid:13a9273c-aa87-47ce-9c1b-637cb122f956> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/UNHRCholdsafourthSStodiscusstheSyriancrisis.aspx | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560284405.58/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095124-00041-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948294 | 762 | 1.773438 | 2 |
All businesses must address the three main workplace security concerns – staff safety and asset security as well as the protection of confidential information and data. These security concerns require a strong workplace security system in order to minimize any risks to the business. This could include theft, robbery, system hacking, and physical damage. The most important aspect of workplace safety is physical security.
This article will examine the importance of security guard and physical safety in the workplace. It will also discuss some of the most important elements.
Physical access control can be described as determining who has access to buildings, grounds, equipment, or sensitive areas.
This is an important aspect of preventative security measures at workplaces all over the world. For both crime prevention and emergency response, it is important to know who is on and inside your buildings.
Unauthorized access to the workplace’s assets and workplace must be strictly controlled using ID-based physical restrictions.
No employee should have access to restricted areas if a company has sensitive data, equipment, and chemicals. They could not only damage equipment or cause harm to themselves but could also share information that they shouldn’t have.
There are many physical security access control options that can be used to provide strong security at work, such as computer-based automated controls or manual controls.
Every business has a duty to ensure that their employees have a safe working environment. This includes keeping a close eye on what is coming in and going out using security systems such as CCTV.
For maintaining high levels of security, physical surveillance at work is an effective tool. It can be used to track incidents and is a great preventative security measure.
Workplace security and safety can be improved by having reliable, real-time video surveillance systems. An up-to-date CCTV surveillance camera system should monitor all exit and entry points as well as other areas such IT rooms and critical data centers.
A well-thought-out security plan is essential to your business’s success. It reduces insurance claims, liabilities, closures, and any other expenses that can impact your bottom line.
Your security policy should include information about identity authentication, employee access and alarm systems.
Alarm systems are crucial to prevent malicious activity and security breaches. High-quality security lighting is also important for workplace safety.
Exterior lighting that is not adequate or insufficient can lead to dangerous night-time conditions. Poorly lit spaces can lead to accidents and encourage crime.
Only then can proper surveillance and monitoring be effective. These are where badges or tokens come in. They are especially useful for larger areas of workplace security.
Larger workplaces today require employees to have an identification card. This will usually include their name, title and photo as well as your logo.
These ID cards are used to verify identity. Access control badges for employees ensure that everyone is safe. It also makes it easier to protect restricted areas within a company.
Why are these Physical Aspects so Important in Security?
A business must protect its employees and valuable information against theft, damage, and loss.
Small Biz Trends recently conducted a survey that found that a 5% retention rate could help increase a company’s profit margins by between 25% and 95%.
These figures are significant because they show that a secure and productive workplace environment can improve productivity and efficiency, which directly impacts customer satisfaction and leads to customer retention.
A business’s workplace security system must be reliable and effective. This reduces the costs of insurance, compensation, and other expenses it has to pay its stakeholders. It ultimately leads to higher business revenues and lower operational costs.
How To Implement a Strong Physical Workplace Security System
These steps will create a safe and reliable working environment for all employees in your company.
- Assess and evaluate the security needs of your workplace.
- Next, create a policy that covers all of the safety aspects.
- Request recommendations from regulatory agencies by consulting contractors or regulatory consultants.
- Third-party contractors can be hired to install your physical security system. The scope of work will be determined.
- Verify that your security system meets all regulatory requirements.
- You should commission your system for real-world operations.
- Follow your workplace security policy to maintain your security system.
Hear from our clients...
The Security Guard’s Role
Security guards are responsible for protecting people, property, and information. They have different obligations to different groups.
As a security guard, your employer has a responsibility for ensuring the security and protection their property. This includes:
-Making every effort to protect property and premises from natural and criminal threats in a proper and effective manner. This covers vandalism, theft, and any other damage to the property. A single burst pipe or fire can cause more damage than a burglar to a business.
-Detection, prevention and response to any criminal or other damaging acts on or against client property.
Security guards are required to conduct their duties professionally and with thought. This allows clients to feel confident that they won’t lose business or face a civil suit.
The public is also responsible. A security guard is frequently assigned the responsibility of protecting the public against injury or loss while on client premises. This includes:
Keeping the public safe by directing them to avoid dangerous work areas and areas where they could hurt themselves.
-A duty to cooperate with law enforcement officials when necessary and appropriate. For example, detaining someone who is convicted of a crime. A security guard might be able to complement the efforts of the police by either performing preliminary investigations, preventing a crime from being committed, or securing the crime scene until police arrive. The police can also use security personnel to provide valuable information about building layouts, entry and exit points, and dangerous conditions.
Security guards can sometimes be viewed as leaders and guides in emergency situations.
Security guards are able to assist other emergency personnel because of their authority and knowledge. This knowledge can help firefighters and emergency medical teams arrive faster and safer on the scene.
-A security guard who has provided information to police to enable them to make a criminal arrest will be required to give professional testimony to the court.
A security guard must also accept responsibility for their actions. Security guards need to realize that they are professionals and have a lot of responsibility. Protection and Security agents often have to protect thousands or even millions of items and property. Guards must be professional and responsible at all times.
Observe, prevent and record. Report, assist, and report. While the daily routine of a security guard may change, there is one constant. The primary responsibility of a security guard is to protect the personnel, property, and information of clients.
What’s the purpose of a security officer?
Five Top Responsibilities for Security Personnel:
Be a visible deterrent to crime
A security guard will make it less likely that criminals commit theft, vandalism, or assaults. Shoplifters, muggers, and burglars will be stopped by the presence of security personnel.
Identifying suspicious behavior
Your employees may be busy working, but criminals could also be there. A dedicated team that monitors suspicious and irregular behavior is a great asset for businesses. It is unrealistic to expect employees to be able to spot suspicious behavior. Security guards are trained and skilled to recognize abnormal smells, sounds or sights and get immediate attention.
Contacting the authorities and communicating with them
Security guards can be a point of contact and a resource for authorities in an emergency situation. Security guards are trained in observing and gathering the necessary information for law enforcement or fire departments to complete their work. Security guards are partners with the business owners, fire and police services.
Access control to properties
Unauthorized access to property is one of the greatest threats to businesses. Hospitals, construction sites and schools, as well as other prominent organizations, understand the importance of monitoring their exits and entrances. Security guards are able to check credentials and keep logs of visitors and vendors.
In emergency situations, take action
Security guards are equipped with the necessary skills and training to handle any emergency that may arise. Security personnel act as a watchdog and are often the first ones to notice a security emergency and to respond. They can assist with evacuations and other serious security incidents.
Get In touch
Leave us a message | <urn:uuid:5248e22e-d846-4130-8994-4fdfd321ec28> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://sassecurity.co.za/security-guard-security-is-more-important/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882571147.84/warc/CC-MAIN-20220810040253-20220810070253-00473.warc.gz | en | 0.949381 | 1,703 | 2.515625 | 3 |
RE:QUESTA space for resources to help RE teachers and their students explore the Christian faith
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People: Lord Shaftesbury
What was so special about Lord Shaftesbury?
Anthony Ashley Cooper was born on 28 April 1801, in London, in the house of his uncle, the fifth Earl of Shaftesbury. His uncle died in 1811, so Cooper's father became the sixth earl. Cooper became the seventh Earl of Shaftesbury in 1851, after the death of his father.
Over his lifetime he became famous for the social reforms he brought about for children and the poorer members of British society. Although born into a rich and privileged family, Cooper did not have a happy childhood; his parents did not show him much love, and his father was quite unkind. However, he had a nurse, Maria, who he afterward described as his best friend. She loved him, told him stories, read the Bible to him, and taught him her simple Christian faith. Although she died when he was only ten and away at school, he always kept the faith she passed on to him, and it became the driving force of his life's work.
After gaining a degree at Oxford University, Cooper became involved in politics and was elected as a Tory Member of Parliament in 1826. Early in his political career, he was asked to join a committee that heard evidence about the treatment of ‘lunatics’ ( a common term in those days). What he heard was so appalling that he resolved to see for himself if the report was true. The depths of cruelty, filth, and degradation he saw so affected him that he continued to work on behalf of these people all his life.
He was chairman of the Metropolitan Commissioners on Lunacy for fifty-seven years. He also promoted two bills 'for the Better Treatment of Lunatics.' Cooper became aware of the terrible plight of working children in the textile mills, coal mines, brickworks and chimney sweeps. This was the time of the industrial revolution, and the workforce consisted partly of children. He was asked to support a bill to limit the hours worked by children to ten. Children were working impossible hours; up to 18 per day.
Cooper's first attempt at introducing legislation to prevent this abuse of children was thrown out by Parliament in 1833. The very men he had to convince were often the landowners or mill owners that exploited the children. He kept trying and little by little he managed to get laws passed to lessen their suffering. However, it was not until 1875 that the Shaftesbury Act to abolish the practice of climbing boys sweeping chimneys was finally made law. Cooper devoted his life to helping the poor, underprivileged and helpless, especially children. During his life, he became the leading evangelical layman of the time and campaigned successfully for church reform as well as social reform. Cooper puzzled about how to improve the literacy of ordinary, working people.
Then he discovered the "ragged schools", which were springing up in various places, usually begun by London City Missionaries and other volunteers. Convinced that these schools were the best way of helping children to "climb out of the gutter", Cooper supported them enthusiastically, soon becoming president of the 'Ragged School Union', an organisation that still exists, though now known as the Shaftesbury Society. The Committee for Refuges (an offshoot of the Ragged School Union) also bought or leased houses for training boys and girls. These became known as 'Shaftesbury Homes'.
Cooper, seventh Earl of Shaftesbury, died at his home, Wimborne St Giles on 1 October 1885.
Representatives of 196 missions attended the funeral, in Westminster Abbey, every one of which had been his personal concern. The crowds (at least 7000), which lined the streets as the procession passed, were mainly poor people. It seemed that the slums of London converged on the Abbey in spontaneous mourning such as England had never seen before.
Cooper's son, Cecil, wrote:
'When I saw the crowd which lined the streets as my father's body was borne to the Abbey - the halt, the blind, the maimed, the poor and the naked standing bareheaded in their rags amidst a pelting rain, patiently enduring to show their love and reverence for their departed friend, I thought it the most heart-stirring sight my eyes had ever looked upon...’ | <urn:uuid:86faf96e-d471-4b7a-b926-b3a0b55f9062> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://request.org.uk/resource/people/significant-people/anthony-ashley-cooper/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882570765.6/warc/CC-MAIN-20220808031623-20220808061623-00269.warc.gz | en | 0.992447 | 947 | 3.40625 | 3 |
Medical marijuana has been legal in Minnesota for a little more than a day and already lawmakers and advocates are looking to the future of the program.
In the first month of the program, 98 patients have been approved to get the drug at one of two patient clinics that opened Wednesday – the day the drug became legal in the state – according to figures released by the state Department of Health Thursday morning.
More than 30 families picked up medical marijuana prescriptions in the first day, the Pioneer Press reports, as the clinics saw a "steady trickle" of patients who showed up by appointment to get their medication.
“Qualified patients now can receive cannabis medications in a controlled, healthcare-like environment, and Minnesota is poised to be a research leader as we expand our understanding of how various medical cannabis formulations may help patients with qualifying conditions," Minnesota Health Commissioner Dr. Ed Ehlinger said in a news release Wednesday.
Expanding the program
On the first day of the program there was already talk about expanding it to add more conditions that would help qualify more patients for the program.
Gov. Mark Dayton said at a news conference Wednesday that he may consider supporting the addition of chronic pain to the list of qualifying conditions if people can medically benefit from the drug, the Pioneer Press notes.
House Speaker Kurt Daudt also spoke about the program, saying the 2016 Legislature will likely see bills seeking to expand it, but he noted that the state has to give the new law a chance to work before changing it, the newspaper adds.
Patrick McClellan – a patient-advocate for Minnesotans for Compassionate Care who was one of the first people to pick up a legal dose of medical marijuana – joined other advocates in describing Wednesday as "a huge day for Minnesota," but also noted they need to continue their fight in order to get more people qualified for the medication, according to Forum News Service.
McClellan is among those who are hoping Minnesota's medical marijuana program – one of the strictest in the nation – will become a model for health insurance companies so they'll eventually cover the cost of the medication.
Currently, eligible patients have to pay hundreds of dollars a month in out-of-pocket costs for the prescriptions because Minnesota health insurance companies do not cover medical cannabis, MDH notes.
MinnMed and LeafLine Labs – the state's two licensed medical marijuana manufacturers – each opened their first patient clinics Wednesday in Minneapolis and Eagan, and in the coming months they will open three more apiece. Eventually the state will have eight patient cannabis centers located around the state. | <urn:uuid:e479428d-a595-4511-b104-e2028965a0a8> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://bringmethenews.com/minnesota-news/as-patients-get-first-medical-marijuana-doses-officials-look-to-the-future | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882570977.50/warc/CC-MAIN-20220809124724-20220809154724-00465.warc.gz | en | 0.96679 | 525 | 1.507813 | 2 |
By: Suzanne Canada, Ph.D.
Tanager Medical Writing
An ongoing barrage of information and mis-information has been dispersed through various media about the dangers of toxins in our environment. Although everyone agrees that you certainly should avoid ingesting, inhaling, or absorbing toxins into your body; your body has natural ways of removing toxins. Some new fads claiming that you need to “detox” to assist in the process may actually harm you more than help.
There are certainly many pollutants in the world today that should be minimized or avoided1. Naturally occurring sources of toxins in the environment include:
- Other people: who can carry human pathogens
- Food poisoning: due to contamination with E. coli, Salmonella, or even Botulism
- Wild animals: that may carry typhus, viruses, cholera (e.g., rats in Manhattan were recently surveyed by researchers at Columbia University and were found to carry many bacteria and viruses)
- Bacillus and Clostridial bacteria, the spores of which exist naturally in soil
- Plant toxins (lectins, tannins, alkaloids) that limit herbivore ingestion and damage
- Air pollution: dust, pollen, fungal spores such as mold and mildew
However, hype about the prevalence of toxins in our homes for the purpose of selling extreme detoxification products and procedures could hurt people both physically and financially. Misinformation has been widely promoted, claiming that these toxins are the source of many health problems such as ADD, autism, chronic fatigue, and even cancer. In fact, detoxification is sometimes appropriate when prescribed by doctors in the healthcare setting:
“In the setting of real medicine, detoxification means treatments for dangerous levels of drugs, alcohol, or poisons like heavy metals. Detoxification treatments are medical procedures that are not casually selected from a menu of alternative health treatments, or pulled off the shelf in the pharmacy. Real detoxification is provided in hospitals when there are life-threatening circumstances.” 3
Increases in the use and promotion of “Detox” diets, products, and procedures has brought them under scrutiny of some health researchers. In one case, researchers from Georgetown University Medical School looked at 20 studies published in the last decade and found no evidence of benefit to colon cleansing.4 An investigative article by Consumer Reports reported that their medical consultants questioned the need for detoxification at all! 5 Another evaluation published at WebMD concluded that you could quickly lose a weight using a detox diet, but you will have to endure hunger, weakness, and could experience side effects of low energy, low blood sugar, muscle aches, dizziness, and nausea. Other health authorities point out that the human body has natural processes to handle the elimination of toxins, no matter what you eat.6
How Does Your Body Get Rid of Toxins?
Far from being helpless, the human body has developed many ways to defend itself against toxins in the environment. 8 The body defends itself through three major organ systems:
1. The skin and gut, which act as a physical barrier.
2. The kidneys and liver: The primary function of the liver, kidneys, and urinary system is to expel toxins that result from the body’s metabolism of food and drink 7.
3. The immune system: Organs including lymph nodes, bone marrow, thymus, and white blood cells resist or eliminate potentially harmful foreign materials or abnormal cells. Their major targets are bacteria and viruses. White blood cells (Lymphocytes: B-cells, T-cells, macrophages, etc) are highly specialized cells which recognize and destroy specific targets.
The innate immunity and the complement system consist of 11 plasma proteins produced by the liver, usually activated by pathogens and antibody complexes, which help to eliminate pathogens. This mechanism includes inflammation, which is the human body’s first defense that destroys invaders, and prepares affected areas for healing and repair.
- US EPA website: www.epa.gov
- Paul T., (2014) New York’s Rat Population Hosts Dangerous Pathogens. Columbia University Medical Center.
- Gavura S., (2014). The Detox Scam: How to spot it, and how to avoid it. Science-Based Medicine.
- Raymond J., (2011). Detox danger: Trendy colon cleansing a risky ritual. NBC News.
- Do you really need to detox? Consumer Reports, Jan 2009.
- Zelman K., (2016). The Truth About Detox Diets. WebMD.
- Liver, Kidney and Urinary System. NetDoctor, 2016.
- Ritchison G., Blood and Body Defenses II. BIO 301 Human Physiology. | <urn:uuid:5a4f8c12-55d1-433b-b219-15034cda2b1f> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://listlabs.com/tag/toxins/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882573876.92/warc/CC-MAIN-20220820012448-20220820042448-00065.warc.gz | en | 0.934103 | 976 | 3.0625 | 3 |
“My son, age 11, has had bedwetting his whole life. Our pediatrician gave him a prescription for desmopressin pills. We were hoping these would solve his bedwetting, but even 3 pills have not enabled him to have a dry night. We’re at our wits end. What should we do now?”
Bedwetting pills, namely desmospressin, do not work for everyone. Their method of action is to decrease the amount of urine produced in the 10-12 hours after the pills are taken. The urine is more concentrated and has less volume. Less volume means that the bladder has less to hold and in many children, enables them to have a dry night that night. This is a temporary solution because the nights that the medication is not taken, the body returns to making more dilute urine. Special occasion sleepovers are possible in the children who stay dry with these pills.
There is another solution to your son’s bedwetting, however. Using a bedwetting alarm provides a permanent cure. Once your son learns how to wake up to the feeling of a full bladder, he will no longer wet. Older boys are happy to use the Rodger wireless alarm, which senses wetness and then alerts them using a loud sound. The receiver that sounds is plugged into a wall outlet and requires that your son get out of bed to turn it off. The moisture sensing underwear is like regular cotton underwear, and is comfortable and easy to use. Over time, as your son gets used to getting up when he is wetting, his body will begin to wake him before he wets.
Many older children have become dry when using an alarm. There is no reason to wait any longer for him to “outgrow” his problem when you have a permanent solution. Don’t be discouraged just because the pills did not work for him. | <urn:uuid:11c46aec-5624-45fb-b178-85ba777f8f32> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://bedwettingstore.com/blog/bedwetting-pills-did-not-work-what-next/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281649.59/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00446-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.973879 | 392 | 2.0625 | 2 |
Schools can be a place of community, growth, and learning. Extracurriculars, like school clubs and sporting groups, can foster these things in ways classrooms oftentimes can’t. But what happens if you have multiple identities, where neither intentionally cross paths in programming?
That’s exactly what Youth Alliance for Intersectional Justice is trying to correct. In an education system where specific support can be found for students who are racialized or disabled, but not racialized and disabled, co-founder Carolyn Tinglin is trying to connect the two.
“School is just quite an isolating place for a lot of youth. It's tough on most youth, but particularly for racialized youth who have disabilities,” she said.
Tinglin, a Black mother of an autistic son who is also currently undertaking a PhD in education, was at various points over the last few years looking to connect her son, Jantz, to a school group or club where he could be entirely himself.
“I was looking specifically at programs or organizations that offered entrepreneurship opportunities to youth with varying abilities, and or with neuro-variety, who were also from the Black community and from Indigenous nations and could not find a community-based organization that did that,” she said.
Having conversations with Jantz about what such a program could look like, they both knew that the solution needed to be “actionary.”
“We wanted it to be a safe space. I wanted to specifically focus on Black youth as well as Indigenous youth who have been pushed to the margins more so than other youth have,” Tinglin said. “And who, when it comes to research, whether it's autism research, whether it's FASD [fetal alcohol spectrum disorder] research, or Down Syndrome research, you don't hear from racialized youth in those communities.”
Currently operating at West Vancouver’s Rockridge Secondary School, Kimberly Jung, YAIJ advisory council member and English teacher at the school, was able to implement the program that runs every Monday during lunchtime.
“She literally took it and ran with it,” Tinglin said of Jung, adding, “That is the purpose of YAIJ, to take ideas that are relevant and meaningful, and inspired by or directly coming from youth, and bringing them to life.”
According to the West Vancouver School District, 121 students identify as Indigenous; however the district does not collect other data regarding race. The district told the North Shore News approximately 10 per cent of its student body has an Individualized Education Program but could not provide numbers regarding how many of those students are also racialized.
Tinglin notes that often, racialized and disabled youth are not envisioned as people with hopes or aspirations, and more frequently, not thought of at all.
“That's really what we're about, amplifying their voices, facilitating, supporting ideas and projects, and research that they're interested in doing and learning about,” she said.
Incorporating intersectional justice theory, including the principles of history of racism and supremacies, into teaching and education is something Tinglin is passionate about.
“When we talk about intersectional justice, from an educational standpoint, we're really talking about understanding who students are, what their lives are, who they are as people, what their lives are like, and what's relevant to them and teaching with that with those understandings in mind,” she said. “So really pushing for equitable opportunities for youth based on intersectional justice.”
Tinglin said teachers and schools are in a unique position to question the socially constructed categories of race and disability and can “exercise the tools of social justice.”
Practically, Tinglin said the program centres issues that are relevant and important to Black and Indigenous students with disabilities, including entrepreneurship, economics, and harnessing skills for long term financial independence.
“There are young people who don't have parents or adult support, they're literally on their own. And so, they're on their own, but what happens if they're underemployed and they're not able to find consistent work that's meaningful to them?” she asked.
“There is nothing wrong with being a Walmart greeter, if that's what you choose to do. But there are many who don't especially choose to do that, and those are the only options they are offered. So, we see that as being a bit problematic,” she said. “If you choose to do that, that's very different from being pushed into that position simply because of the labels that are attached to you, or that you've been designated.”
Tinglin is hoping to expand YAIJ across the country, not only in schools, but into policy development and economics.
“When a youth finishes high school, typically youth who have either a special education label or they have an IEP are kind of streamed for certain types of jobs. Very low paying, service oriented jobs. So, we're wondering, what are the supportive avenues for youth who don't want service oriented jobs and want to be part of the post-secondary community?” she said.
“If I am a young person and I have FASD, or I have an intellectual disability and I'd like to see what it's like to be in a college botanical course, who makes that happen?” | <urn:uuid:f5fcb230-afd2-486e-bb88-282d4e03465e> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://www.nsnews.com/local-news/west-van-school-racialized-disabled-students-4837325 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882570692.22/warc/CC-MAIN-20220807181008-20220807211008-00667.warc.gz | en | 0.980865 | 1,147 | 2.765625 | 3 |
What Cathie Black’s resignation means for school reform is the title of Valerie Strauss’ latest piece in the Washington Post. Black, of course, is the publisher who had zero experience with public schools when she was appointed by New York City Mayor Bloomberg as head of the New York schools a few months ago. She resigned today.
The Drucker Institute also had a short post about the departure of Cathie Black from the New York Schools. They suggested that Mayor Bloomberg might have made a better decision if he had seen a short animation the Institute created on the importance of “domain knowledge” prior to her appointment. It’s a similar position many of us have made about the importance of having experienced educators as Superintendents. The film makes some good points, though, after the recent revelation that GE didn’t pay any taxes last year, I wish it didn’t point to Jeffrey R. Immelt from GE as such a model person.
As most of this blog’s readers know, Joel Klein has become the third big-city school superintendent to resign in the past month) Michelle Rhee and the Superintendent of Chicago Schools were the two others). Klein is leaving his position as head of the New York School District.
Amazingly, Mayor Bloomberg has proposed replacing him with Cathleen Black, a publishing executive with no prior experience in education and who sends her children to private schools.
There have been an enormous number of articles and blog posts written about this — in my opinion — absurd move by the mayor. I read a lot, but even I have been intimidated by their quantity. I’ve created this “The Best…” list, though, because I believe the issue of placing people with no experience in the classroom in charge of our schools (beginning with Education Secretary Arne Duncan) is a critical one.
In this list, I’ve tried to include blog posts and articles that speak more broadly to that concern, and that are less focused on New York only (though I have included some of them for background.
Since I know I’ve missed good posts and articles, please leave them in the comments section.
Here are my picks — so far — for The Best Blog Posts & Articles About Joel Klein’s Departure & The Question Of Who Should Be Leading Our Schools:
Choosing School Chancellors the Wrong Way is a piece in Education Week by Walt Gardner.
Coincidentally, the week before Klein’s departure, I wrote a post about this very same issue — This Is A Great Explanation Of One Of My Biggest Concerns About “School Reformers.” It primarily discusses an excellent article that had appeared in Forbes and how it related to my concern about non-educators being in put in charge of schools. And, no, I’m not clairvoyant…
Dana Goldstein has written a good commentary about the situation.
Who’s Qualified to Run New York City Schools? is a forum on this question published by the New York Times.
A narcissistic approach to education reform comes from The Answer Sheet at The Washington Post.
New York Schools Chancellor Ends 8-Year Run provides some basic background on what’s going on in New York and also appeared in The Times.
Big School Problems Await New Chancellor is another Times article.
Mayor Takes Idea of Education Outsider to New Level also comes from The Times.
And The Times ran a tongue-in-cheek column titled If You Were Asked About Chancellor’s Job, Tell Us.
Interviewing the New NYC Schools Chancellor is a fun animation created by Dan Brown showing a made-up interview with Ms. Black.
The corporate takeover of American schools is an article appearing in the British Guardian newspaper, and it’s one of the best pieces on school policy that I’ve read all year. Its subtitle is “The trend for appointing CEOs to the top jobs is symptomatic of a declining commitment to public education and social justice.”
Feedback is welcome. | <urn:uuid:40fe8138-bbe9-4c8a-a306-7eddc37e4516> | CC-MAIN-2016-44 | http://larryferlazzo.edublogs.org/2010/11/13/the-best-blog-posts-articles-about-joel-klein%E2%80%99s-departure-the-question-of-who-should-be-leading-our-schools/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-44/segments/1476988719027.25/warc/CC-MAIN-20161020183839-00303-ip-10-171-6-4.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.962803 | 843 | 1.539063 | 2 |
HNMS Van Kinsbergen (U 93)
Sloop of the Van Kinsbergen class
|Navy||The Royal Dutch Navy|
|Built by||Rotterdamsche Droogdok Maatschappij, (Rotterdam , Holland)|
|Ordered||10 Dec 1936|
|Laid down||11 Sep 1937|
|Launched||5 Jan 1939|
|Commissioned||24 Aug 1939|
|End service||29 May 1959|
Decommissioned on 29 May 1959.
For this ship's service record see this website (offsite link).
Commands listed for HNMS Van Kinsbergen (U 93)
Please note that we're still working on this section.
|1||kapitein-luitenant ter zee (Cdr.) John Louis Karel Hoeke, RNN||29 Aug 1939||18 Aug 1941|
|2||kapitein-luitenant ter zee (Cdr.) Cornelis Hellingman, DSO, RNN||18 Aug 1941||26 Apr 1943|
|3||kapitein-luitenant ter zee (Cdr.) Johannes Jacobus Lukas Willinge, RNN||26 Apr 1943||19 Aug 1943|
|4||kapitein ter zee (Capt.) Jan August Gauw, RNN||19 Aug 1943||20 Sep 1945|
You can help improve our commands section
Click here to Submit events/comments/updates for this vessel.
Please use this if you spot mistakes or want to improve this ships page.
Notable events involving Van Kinsbergen include:
14 Oct 1939
HrMs O 20 (Lt.Cdr. A.J. Bussemaker, RNN) and HrMs O 15 (Lt. H.M.L.F.E. van Oostrom Soede, RNN) and their escort HrMs Van Kinsbergen (Cdr. J.L.K. Hoeke, RNN) arrived at Ponta Delgada, Azores.
20 Aug 1940
On 20 August 1940 observers from the US Navy attended a demonstration of the Bofors 40 mm AA gun in the triaxial twin-mount Hazemeyer configuration aboard the Van Kinsbergen. The performance convinced them to adopt the gun as US Navy standard. (1)
27 Sep 1940
In the evening, HMS Caradoc (Capt. J.S. Bethell, RN), fuelled from the chartered tanker San Adolfo (7365 GRT, 1935) off Castries, St. Lucia.
HMS Caradoc then departed to patrol 100 miles to the east of Martinique with the Dutch sloop HrMs Van Kinsbergen (Cdr. J.L.K. Hoeke, RNN) to intercept the Vichy-French transport Mont Agel (4572 GRT, built 1920).
The Vichy-French ship was however not sighted as it first had proceeded to Guadaloupe and then to the east into the Atlantic. (2)
11 Dec 1940
HrMs Van Kinsbergen (Cdr. J.L.K. Hoeke, RNN) intercepts the German merchant vessel Rhein (6031 GRT, built 1926) west of the Florida Strait in position 24°55'N, 83°15'W. Unfortunately before the German ship can be captured it is set on fire by her own crew. The wreck is sunk later that day by the HMS Caradoc (Capt. J.S. Bethell, RN).
HMS Caradoc took over the patrol duties in the afternoon of the following day. (3)
- Personal communication
- ADM 53/111710 + ADM 53/367
- ADM 53/113817 + ADM 199/402
ADM numbers indicate documents at the British National Archives at Kew, London. | <urn:uuid:a9075dc7-2bc5-424f-af33-2789eb47a2a0> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://li178-61.members.linode.com/allies/warships/ship/2871.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882572833.78/warc/CC-MAIN-20220817001643-20220817031643-00266.warc.gz | en | 0.766612 | 892 | 1.78125 | 2 |
[Python-ideas] Cofunctions PEP - Revision 4
greg.ewing at canterbury.ac.nz
Thu Aug 12 01:17:28 CEST 2010
Paul Du Bois wrote:
> Perhaps it's the "cocall" keyword that could be removed, rather than
> "codef"? A revised semantics for "codef" could cause the body to use
> the most recent PEP revisions's "__cocall__ or __call__" mechanism for
> all function calls, perhaps at the expense of some runtime efficiency.
Thinking about it overnight, I came to exactly the same
conclusion! This is actually the idea I had in mind right
back at the beginning.
I think there are some good arguments in favour of it.
If cocall sites have to be marked in some way, then when
you change your mind about whether a function is a
generator or not, you have to track down all the places
where the function is called and change them as well. If
that causes the enclosing functions to also become
generators, then you have to track down all the calls to
them as well, etc. etc. I can envisage this being a
major hassle in a large program.
Whereas if we mark the functions instead of the calls,
although some changes will still be necessary, there
ought to be far fewer of them. Generally one tends to
call functions more often than one defines them.
Also, it seems to me that changing 'def' into 'codef' is
a far less intrusive change than sprinkling some kind of
call marker throughout the body. It means we don't
have to invent a weird new calling syntax. It also means
you can read the function and think about it as normal
code instead of having to be aware at every point of
what kind of thing you're calling. It's more duck-typish.
So now I'm thinking that my original instinct was right:
cofunctions should be functions that call things in a
More information about the Python-ideas | <urn:uuid:dbf4f1bd-3bea-4b6b-b152-d46cc64f5706> | CC-MAIN-2016-44 | https://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-ideas/2010-August/007954.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2016-44/segments/1476988720468.71/warc/CC-MAIN-20161020183840-00489-ip-10-171-6-4.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936953 | 444 | 1.546875 | 2 |
The Nepal Supreme Court on Tuesday reinstated the dissolved House of Representatives and ordered the government to summon the House session within the next 13 days, dealing a setback to Prime Minister K P Oli on his 70th birthday.
Nepal plunged into a political crisis after President Bidhya Devi Bhandari had on December 20 dissolved the 275-member lower House and announced fresh elections on April 30 and May 10 at the recommendation of Oli, amidst a tussle for power within the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) between factions led by the Prime Minister and by Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’ and Madhav Kumar Nepal.
On Tuesday, a five-member constitutional bench, headed by Chief Justice Cholendra Shumsher Rana, in a unanimous judgement said that the provisions of the Constitution cited by Oli and Bhandari were not relevant as Nepal’s Constitution has made a special provision against the dissolution of Parliament mid-term without exhausting all options to forming an alternative government.
The bench, also consisting of Justices Tej Bahadur Karki, Bishwambar Shrestha, Anil Sinha and Sapana Pradhan Malla, also instructed Oli and Bhardari to convene the House within 13 days.
What next for Oli?
With a loss of face, Oli is left with limited options like proving majority in the House, or to stall efforts the NCP’s rival faction from taking leadership of the government. There are speculations that Oli may even support Sher Bahadur Deuba, leader of the main opposition Nepali Congress party and prop up a government on a power-sharing basis. However, this is an approach that could also be explored by the Prachanda-Nepal faction of the NCP.
Before the verdict was announced, there was heavy police deployment around the Supreme Court. Oli summoned the chiefs of security forces, including the Nepal Army chief, to assess the likely political response and resultant law-and-order situation in the face of his defeat.
Soon after the verdict, Prachanda called on the PM to resign. “If Oli has any bit of shame left, he must resign now,” he said.
Earlier in December, Oli, facing infighting from within the NCP, made the unilateral recommendation to dissolve the House to Bhandari, blaming his opponents within the Party of not cooperating with him or letting the government function smoothly.
He argued that going to the people for a fresh mandate is the biggest democratic exercise and said that he took the decision to dissolve the House as he enjoyed the inherent power as the leader of a majoritarian government.
The dissolution of the House sparked protests from a large faction of the ruling NCP led by Prachanda and Nepal. The move was immediately challenged in Supreme Court by 13 different petitioners, including the chief whip of the NCP.
In the last general elections, the NCP had won a nearly two-third majority. However, after Oli’s move to dissolve the House, the two factions – one led by Oli, and the other led by Prachanda and Nepal – have both been claiming to be the “real” NCP – an issue that the Election Commission is yet to settle.
While Oli continues to be the chairman of the NCP that unilaterally controls the government, the Prachanda-Nepal faction of the NCP has more MPs and enjoys a majority within the party’s central secretariat, steering committee and the central committee. | <urn:uuid:42063b8b-9d34-421f-a528-f33e18a2f9b5> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://businessnation.co.in/blow-to-oli-as-nepal-top-court-reinstates-dissolved-house/ | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882573699.52/warc/CC-MAIN-20220819131019-20220819161019-00277.warc.gz | en | 0.972731 | 743 | 1.570313 | 2 |
Story by Jerry Osborn and photos by Kristen Cart
The summer of 1954, before my senior year, I started working at the Hormel plant again, but after a few weeks my dad asked me to work on the elevator his company, Mayer-Osborn Company, was building at Blencoe, Iowa. This would be a different experience. Since I had no transportation of my own he took me to Blencoe and set me up in a motel near the site. He also took me to a shoe store to buy work shoes so I would be set to go to work. The wages weren’t great. They were $1 an hour just like all the other grunts on the job. No nepotism on this job. My job was to select the correct steel and see that it was laid properly as the slip forms were filled and jacked. Fortunately, I had enough engineering drawing work that I could read the blueprints. The slip operation had just begun when I arrived, so it was learn-on-the-run for me.
Things seemed to be progressing nicely until we were about twenty feet in the air. At that point it was noticed that some of the exposed concrete was crumbling and falling to the ground. This can’t be good. The operation was shut down immediately to determine what the problem was. It became obvious that the mix ratio of cement to sand and gravel was too low. The work to that point had to be torn down. The demolition was done over the weekend, and we were setting up to slip again on Monday. The concrete was mixed on the job and the appropriate mix weights were to be locked into the scales. Somehow the proper amount of cement was not designated. My brother, who had been on a lot of these jobs, was a supervisor on this job and should have checked the setting for the proper mix.
When operating properly, the concrete was mixed next to the elevator; each mix was dumped into a bucket hoist, which was lifted to the deck level. The mud was fed into two-wheel mud buggies. The buggies were then wheeled to and dumped at the place needing concrete. As this process took place another mix was in process, so when the hoist bucket was returned, it was once again filled and the whole process was repeated over and over until a height of more than 100 feet was reached. As the forms were filled, steel was laid and other features such as portholes were laid in place as the forms were jacked upward, exposing freshly set concrete at the bottom of the forms and providing more space at the top for more mud. A scaffold was built below but connected to the forms so men with trowels could smooth the fresh concrete as it was exposed below.
I had hoped to work until the slip was finished, but the restart didn’t leave enough time prior to football practice.
- A contemporary view of Mayer-Osborn’s Blencoe elevator (ourgrandfathersgrainelevators.com) | <urn:uuid:bcb0202f-10c0-4679-9399-ced921beb8bf> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://ourgrandfathersgrainelevators.com/2012/06/09/jerry-osborn-recalls-blencoe/?replytocom=4312 | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882572021.17/warc/CC-MAIN-20220814083156-20220814113156-00069.warc.gz | en | 0.994226 | 623 | 1.820313 | 2 |
Date Of Execution: 4 Aug 1873
Execution Place: Derby
Benjamin Hudson murdered his wife Eliza Hudson at Handley, Eckington in a field with a hedge stake.
They were married with 2 children but were also cousins. Benjamin Hudson was a collier.
On 20 April Eliza Hudson summoned her husband for using threats against her but he never appeared before the magistrate because he agreed to a seperation and to pay his wife 5s a week towards her maintenance. A while before he had been in prison for 3 months for assaulting her and had been bound over to keep the peace for 6 months.
Shortly after he killed her in a field. | <urn:uuid:07d3efac-7c8d-4c12-948c-10290ef0dff8> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://www.britishexecutions.co.uk/execution-content.php?key=1120&termRef=Benjamin%20Hudson | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882572833.78/warc/CC-MAIN-20220817001643-20220817031643-00269.warc.gz | en | 0.98997 | 160 | 1.609375 | 2 |
BRASOV, Romania, Oct. 8, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Mondly, one of the world’s leading online language platforms, and Oxford University Press (OUP), the world’s largest university press, today announce a new suite of custom English progress tests via the Mondly app.
The collaboration between Mondly and OUP enables English language learning, assessment, and testing in 33 languages, including less common languages like Danish, Persian, or Hebrew. The new module offers easily accessible learning support with access to 3,500+ different questions and 108 different English language progress tests for each of the languages included in the partnership.
As part of this module, Mondly will now have lessons based on Oxford Practice Grammar tests and the Oxford 3000, and that are aligned to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) for reporting at levels B2, B1, and A2. These tests are based on CEFR guidelines and integrated into Mondly’s pre-existing topics.
“We’re very excited to partner with OUP to offer content and testing from their world-renowned English-learning resources,” said Mondly CEO, Alexandru Iliescu. “There are over 1.5 billion people around the world currently learning English, including over 25-percent of our users. Mondly and OUP are the ideal team to comprehensively support and enable their learning journey.”
“We’re delighted to collaborate with Mondly, who have been pursuing innovative solutions for language learning for several years,” said Harry Cunningham, Partnerships and Innovation Manager at Oxford University Press. “Improving education around the world, and working alongside partners by providing our leading expert content to help more learners access the resources they need, is fundamental to achieving our mission.”
For more information, visit https://www.mondly.com.
Mondly Press Kit
Mondly is a leading online language learning platform that enables over 60 million people from 190 countries to learn 41 languages. Launched in 2014, it quickly became a leading app in the mobile space, reaching #1 in Education in most European countries, Latin America and Asia.
Internationally acclaimed by outlets like Business Insider, CNN and Forbes, it’s the first app to launch VR and AR experiences for learning languages, featuring innovative speech recognition and chatbot technologies. Mondly was also awarded “App of the Year” by Facebook, “Best New App” by Apple, and “Editors’ Choice” by Google Play.
About Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press (OUP) is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. OUP is the world’s largest university press with the widest global presence.
It has become familiar to millions through a diverse publishing program that includes scholarly works in all academic disciplines, bibles, music, school and college textbooks, children’s books, materials for teaching English as a foreign language, business books, dictionaries and reference books, and academic journals.
Photo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1252691/Mondly_Oxford_University_Press.jpg
Logo – https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1252692/Mondly_Logo.jpg
+40 733 969 116
View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/mondly-partners-with-oxford-university-press-to-introduce-an-enhanced-english-language-learning-module-supporting-33-languages-301148509.html | <urn:uuid:e3937ce1-5951-493e-a903-86cc47e474a3> | CC-MAIN-2022-33 | https://ghosts-uk.net/mondly-partners-with-oxford-university-press-to-introduce-an-enhanced-english-language-learning-module-supporting-33-languages.html | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2022-33/segments/1659882571150.88/warc/CC-MAIN-20220810070501-20220810100501-00672.warc.gz | en | 0.915673 | 819 | 1.78125 | 2 |
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