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marry a reigning sovereign, were I not sure that her heart was free. But,
O, Lionel! a kingdom is a word of might, and gently sounding are the terms
that compose the style of royalty. Were not the mightiest men of the olden
times kings? Alexander was a king; Solomon, the wisest of men, was a king;
Napoleon was a king; Caesar died in his attempt to become one, and
Cromwell, the puritan and king-killer, aspired to regality. The father of
Adrian yielded up the already broken sceptre of England; but I will rear
the fallen plant, join its dismembered frame, and exalt it above all the
flowers of the field.
"You need not wonder that I freely discover Adrian's abode. Do not
suppose that I am wicked or foolish enough to found my purposed
sovereignty on a fraud, and one so easily discovered as the truth
or falsehood of the Earl's insanity. I am just come from him. Before I
decided on my marriage with Idris, I resolved to see him myself again, and
to judge of the probability of his recovery.--He is irrecoverably mad."
I gasped for breath--
"I will not detail to you," continued Raymond, "the melancholy particulars.
You shall see him, and judge for yourself; although I fear this visit,
useless to him, will be insufferably painful to you. It has weighed on my
spirits ever since. Excellent and gentle as he is even in the downfall of
his reason, I do not worship him as you do, but I would give all my hopes
of a crown and my right hand to boot, to see him restored to himself."
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