The Fall of the Dubarrys

But, soft! behold, lo, where it comes again!
I'll cross it, though it blast me.--Stay, illusion!
If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,
Speak to me!--SHAKESPEARE.

"The Dubarrys," he began, "were a French Roman Catholic family of
distinction. A cadet of that family came over to Virginia among the
earliest English settlers of the colony.

"As in the case of the more important among his anglican comrades, he
obtained a very large tract of land by Royal patent. He built his hut
and fixed his abode here, not a hundred yards from the spot where this
church now stands.

"He took an Indian girl for a wife, and continued to live a wild
huntsman sort of life in the wilderness; only breaking it sometimes by
going down to Jamestown, twice a year, to buy such necessaries of
civilized life as the wilderness could not furnish, and to hear news
from any ship that might have come in from the old country; and above
all, to take a holiday among civilized pleasure-seekers--for such
existed even in the primitive settlement of Jamestown.

"In due course of time, a family of half-breed sons and daughters grew
up around him, and the little primitive hut gave place to a substantial
stone lodge.

"And the country around was becoming settled. The Berners had got a
grant of the Black Valley, and had built the first part of Black Hall,
which has since been added to in every generation, until it has grown to
its present dimensions.