GOD'S PRISONER
RISING FORTUNES
A PRINCESS OF VASCOVY
BONDMAN FREE
OUR LADY OF DELIVERANCE
JOHN OF GERISAU
UNDER THE IRON FLAIL
BARBE OF GRAND BAYOU
HEARTS IN EXILE
JOSEPH SCORER
A WEAVER OF WEBS
WHITE FIRE
THE GATE OF THE DESERT
GIANT CIRCUMSTANCE
PROFIT AND LOSS
THE LONG ROAD
TO
WILLIAM FREDERICK COLLINGS, ESQ.
Seigneur of Sark
AND
JOHN LINWOOD PITTS, ESQ., F.S.A. (Normandy)
Managing Director
of the Guille-Allès Library, Guernsey
AND ALL THOSE GOOD FRIENDS IN THE ISLANDS
WHO HAVE SHOWN SO GREAT AN INTEREST IN THIS BOOK
I INSCRIBE THE SAME
IN HEARTY RECOGNITION OF MANY KINDNESSES
FOREWORD
Sercq is a small exclusive land where the forty farm holdings to-day are almost identical with those fixed by Helier de Carteret in the time of Queen Elizabeth; where feudal observances which date back to the time of Rollo, Duke of Normandy, are still the law of the land; and where family names and records in some cases run back unbroken for very many generations.
To obviate any personal feeling, I desire to state that, to the best of my belief, no present inhabitant of Sercq is in any way connected with any of the principal characters named in this book.