Excerpt from Jesus Christ in Flanders, Vol. 2: Melmoth Converted; The Elixir of Long Life; Seraphita At that moment, a young man appeared a few steps away from the pier; the pilot, who had neither seen him nor heard his footsteps, was much sur prised at his sudden appearance. He seemed to have risen suddenly from the earth, as if he were a peasant who had lain down in a field awaiting the hour of departure, and had been awakened by the horn. Was he a thief? Was he an officer of the customs or police? When he reached the pier at which the boat was moored, seven persons who were standing at the stern hastily took seats on the benches, so that they might be by themselves and not allow the stranger to join them. They acted in obedience to a swift, instinctive thought, one of those aristocratic thoughts that come to the minds of the rich. Four of these persons belonged to the oldest nobility of Flanders. First of all, a young cavalier, accompanied by two beautiful greyhounds and wearing upon his long hair a round cap adorned with precious stones, clashed his gilded spurs and twisted his moustache impatiently from time to time, casting contemptuous glances at the rest of the ship's company. A haughty young woman held a falcon on her wrist and spoke with no one but her mother and an ecclesiastic of high rank, evidently their kins man. These four made a great noise and talked together as if they were alone on the boat. Ever theless, close beside them was a man of great im portance in the country, a stout burgher of Bruges, wrapped in a great cloak. His servant, armed to the teeth, had placed two bags of gold by his side. Next to them, again, was a man of learning, a doctor at the University of Louvain, attended by his clerk. These people, who severally looked down on one another, were separated from the bow of the boat by the bench of rowers. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.