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Battle of the Strong — Volume 1 by Gilbert Parker
page 6 of 77 (07%)
There is no man living to-day who could tell you how the morning broke
and the sun rose on the first day of January 1800; who walked in the
Mall, who sauntered in the Park with the Prince: none lives who heard and
remembers the gossip of the moment, or can give you the exact flavour of
the speech and accent of the time. Down the long aisle of years echoes
the air but not the tone; the trick of form comes to us but never the
inflection. The lilt of the sensations, the idiosyncrasy of voice,
emotion, and mind of the first hour of our century must now pass from the
printed page to us, imperfectly realised; we may not know them through
actual retrospection. The more distant the scene, the more uncertain the
reflection; and so it must needs be with this tale, which will take you
back to even twenty years before the century began.

Then, as now, England was a great power outside these small islands.
She had her foot firmly planted in Australia, in Asia, and in America--
though, in bitterness, the American colonies had broken free, and only
Canada was left to her in that northern hemisphere. She has had, in her
day, to strike hard blows even for Scotland, Ireland, and Wales. But
among her possessions is one which, from the hour its charter was granted
it by King John, has been loyal, unwavering, and unpurchasable. Until
the beginning of the century the language of this province was not our
language, nor is English its official language to-day; and with a pretty
pride oblivious of contrasts, and a simplicity unconscious of mirth, its
people say: "We are the conquering race; we conquered England, England
did not conquer us."

A little island lying in the wash of St. Michael's Basin off the coast of
France, Norman in its foundations and in its racial growth, it has been
as the keeper of the gate to England; though so near to France is it,
that from its shores on a fine day may be seen the spires of Coutances,
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