We
insist upon this satisfaction; and upon their promise, that they never
more will come within two leagues of Abbeville; and we will leave them to
your protection. I fancy, Harriet, that these women-frightening heroes
needed not to have been urged to make this promise.
Sir Charles, turning towards them, said, If you have done wrong,
gentlemen, you ought not to scruple asking pardon. If you know
yourselves to be innocent, though I should be loath to risk the lives of
my friend and servants, yet shall not my countrymen make so undue a
submission.
The wretches kneeled; and the seven men, civilly saluting Sir Charles and
Mr. Lowther, rode off; to the joy of the two delinquents, who kneeled
again to their deliverer, and poured forth blessings upon the man whose
life, so lately, one of them sought; and whose preservation he had now so
much reason to rejoice in, for the sake of his own safety.
My brother himself could not but be well pleased that he was not obliged
to come to extremities, which might have ended fatally on both sides.
By this time Sir Hargrave's post-chaise was come up. He and his
colleague were with difficulty lifted into it. My brother and Mr.
Lowther went into theirs; and being but a small distance from Paris, they
proceeded thither in company; the poor wretches blessing them all the
way; and at Paris found their other servants waiting for them.
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