The vehicle mentioned in the first chapter of this history, in the account of the adventure with the robbers, was drawn up before the steps of the hall-door, and announced to be ready for their reception. Around it was collected a group of Sir Edgar’s tenants, most of whom, besides being bound to him by many obligations, professed the same religion as he did, and, with the jealousy which persecution never fails to excite, considered that he was now suffering for that religion, and, therefore, regarded him with peculiar sympathy. Many of them, too, especially of the poorer sort, had experienced the good offices of Evaline; and the remembrance of distresses that her bounty had mitigated, or of hours of sickness that, either by her personal interposition, or by means less direct, but equally effective, her active sympathy had relieved, gave an additional and deeper interest to the scene that they had come to witness.
Every head was uncovered, and many a blessing, “not loud, but deep,” ejaculated in their behalf, as Sir Edgar and his daughter appeared at the hall-door. Neither of them spoke a word in acknowledgment--their hearts were too full to speak;--but they both looked round kindly on the crowd, and this, in their estimation, was acknowledgment sufficient. They passed hastily to the carriage, followed by Martha Follett; and, stepping in, at once took their seats in that vehicle, and closed the door. Don Felix di Corva, pursuant to a previous arrangement, mounted a saddle-horse, as did the two constables also; and, all being settled, the mournful cavalcade set forward for Exeter.
This was a trying moment to the afflicted inmates of the carriage. It was the moment of separation--the parting from their native home--the crossing of the bourne, as it were, that divided them from the strife and troubles of the wide world. All the comforts and peace of that dear abode, which habit, no less than affection, associated with the blithest impulses of their nature, were now to be exchanged for a prison, and the tranquillity of their past lives for anxiety and sorrow. They were passing from retirement into the world--from security to peril; and their home had never seemed so dear to them, under any former trial or visitation, as at that moment.