[Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy]@TWC D-Link bookFar from the Madding Crowd CHAPTER XXVI 13/17
Yes--you shall.
A gift, Miss Everdene--a gift." And before she knew what the young man was intending, a heavy gold watch was in her hand. "It is an unusually good one for a man like me to possess," he quietly said.
"That watch has a history.
Press the spring and open the back." She did so. "What do you see ?" "A crest and a motto." "A coronet with five points, and beneath, _Cedit amor rebus_--'Love yields to circumstance.' It's the motto of the Earls of Severn. That watch belonged to the last lord, and was given to my mother's husband, a medical man, for his use till I came of age, when it was to be given to me.
It was all the fortune that ever I inherited. That watch has regulated imperial interests in its time--the stately ceremonial, the courtly assignation, pompous travels, and lordly sleeps.
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