Estates | Project Gothic

Maximilian and Selina

Maximilian and Selina: Or, the Mysterious Abbot. A Flemish Tale.

Author: Unknown
Publisher: Tegg & Castleman
Publication Year: 1804
Language: English
Book Dimensions: 10.4cm x 18.1cm
Pages: 72
University of Virginia Library Catalog Entry, Sadleir-Black Collection: PZ2.M356 1802

A tale of romance, resentment, and revenge, this 1804 chapbook tells the story of a noble family living in France as one brother’s evil corrupts the lives of those around him.

Material History

Maximilian and Selina, Or, The Mysterious Abbot. A Flemish Tale can be found in two collections in the Sadleir-Black Collection of Gothic Fiction at the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia. One copy is bound inside the collection Marvellous Magazine (volume III). Pencil notes (perhaps from Sadleir himself) on the inside cover of this copy indicate that this story can also be found in a volume called The Entertainer I, also in the Sadleir-Black Collection.

The title page for *Maximilian and Selina*, which is identical in both *The Entertainer* and *Marvellous Magazine* bound copies.

The printing of Maximilian and Selina bound in The Entertainer appears identical to the version bound in Marvellous Magazine; both share the same frontispiece and title page. The frontispiece shows a scene in which a man is being pushed out of a tower by someone else, while a woman watches in horror from behind. Each copy of Maximilian and Selina was published by Tegg and Castleman, but no author is indicated in either volume.

Marvellous Magazine appears very old and worn; the cover and first page are entirely detached from the rest of the book. The binding is plain and cracked. The cover is spotted leather with decorative swirling gold patterning on the spine and gold dots around the edge of the binding. The paper is medium- to lightweight and yellowed, displaying relatively small text. Before each story in the collection appears a black and white frontispiece illustrating a scene from the following pages. The entire book is 512 pages long and contains seven stories: six are exactly seventy-two pages long (including Maximilian and Selina), and one is eighty. The book is rather small, measuring only 4.3 x 10.4 x 18.1 cm.

Textual History

Maximilian and Selina is available in several different editions at the University of Virginia Special Collections Library. The copies in the larger volumes The Entertainer and Marvellous Magazine are identical and will be discussed first. The story was first printed in 1804 for Tegg & Castleman. Thomas Tegg was a well-known printer who lived from 1776 to 1846. According to an obituary, the bookseller struggled in his childhood and early career, but he eventually established his own successful business and began to amass his fortune printing, buying, and selling books. He was elected Sheriff of London in 1846 but did not serve in that position due to failing health. After his death, his sons continued in their father’s path. Interestingly, Tegg’s youngest son was so stricken with grief at his father’s death that he died as well shortly after, and their bodies were buried in the family plot together on the same day (The Gentleman’s Magazine 650). There is an intriguing (albeit unintended) parallel in Maximilian and Selina: the Duke of Anjou arrives at the convent just as the death knell tolls for his daughter, and he immediately dies of the shock. Their bodies are carried back to the chateau together, where the sight of his dead father and sister drive Godfrey to madness.

The frontispiece depicts the chapbook’s culmination where Edward pushes his brother off of the tower.

The 1804 version of Maximilian and Selina is available within multiple collections of stories. The two held by the University of Virginia are Marvellous Magazine and The Entertainer. Maximilian and Selina appears identical in both volumes, with the same title page and frontispiece. The other printing is for Dean & Munday in 1820. The edition printed by Dean & Munday that is housed at the University of Virginia Library is disbound and has significant brown spotting on the title page. It looks similar to the Tegg & Castleman version, but the publishing information is different and the frontispiece is in color. Also, it is only thirty-six pages instead of seventy-two. The shorter length is because this version is an abridged version of the 1804 edition. The overall plot is similar but most of the frame narrative has been cut out, several characters are entirely deleted, the sequence in which the reader learns about events is different, and in abridging the text many plot points are deleted in a confusing way, without any transitions being added. The Dean & Munday printing has a catalogue slip in it which gives some basic publishing information, a description of the physical object, and part of an assessment by scholar Frederick Frank: “A confusing patchwork of obscure and opaque plots … Complexity and lucidity are not necessarily incompatible elements of style in horror fiction, but in this chapbook, the style is so dense as to render even the basic facts of the story a matter of hazardous speculation” (The First Gothics 233). The explanation on the slip for the frontispiece does not relate to the story. The scene shown is Edward pushing Godfrey out of the tower while Elgiva screams in horror, but the slip describes “ruffians throwing a screaming boy from the top of a tower.”

Another incorrect description of the frontispiece is found in Frederick Frank’s article “Gothic Gold.” The year and publishing information match the Tegg & Castleman version, but the article says that the chapbook is thirty-six pages, like the Dean & Munday printing. The frontispiece is shown in black and white above a brief description of the book: “About to be hurled from the turret by his malicious brother, Adolphus de Monvel, Maximilian’s doom seems sealed as a pathetic mother figure murmurs an ineffectual prayer unheard in the fallen and godless universe. The scene is the chapbook’s initial spectacular incident in a series of unremitting crises” (“Gothic Gold” 309). This description mentions real characters from the story, but neither Adolphus nor Maximilian were a part of this scene, and the female figure is most likely Elgiva, Godfrey’s wife. This is also one of the last events in the chapbook, not the first.

Frank gives another critical synopsis of Maximilian and Selina in his book The First Gothics. It lists the publishing information of the unabridged 1804 version. However, this synopsis also contradicts the events of both versions of the chapbook (the Tegg & Castleman printing, and the abridged one for Dean & Munday). It is also different than the description given for the frontispiece in Frank’s “Gothic Gold.” In The First Gothics, the frontispiece is said to show ruffians throwing Godfrey off a tower, instead of Maximilian being thrown by de Monvel, his “brother.” This synopsis covers the rest of the chapbook, with references to real characters and similar plot points, but multiple inaccuracies which completely change the story.

Maximilian and Selina is mentioned more briefly in several other scholarly works (Potter History of Gothic Publishing 75, Mayo 551, Hoeveler). Mayo explains that Marvellous Magazine and similar anthologies generally featured stories of a specified length. For example, the volume of Marvellous Magazine containing Maximilian and Selina contains stories all seventy-two pages in length, save one exception. This length limit often resulted in the butchering of Gothic classics as they were edited and amended to reach a precise page count (Mayo 367). This is one possibility to account for the incoherency of the shorter Dean & Munday printing compared to the original, which was twice as long.

Narrative Point of View

The main story within Maximilian and Selina is narrated by Maximilian, the Abbott, as he recounts his life to Sancho Orlando. He uses first-person narration which focuses on his own thoughts and feelings as the plot progresses. Since Maximilian is older when he is telling this story, he occasionally inserts future knowledge. Part of the story is the packet that Maximilian wrote based on Nerina’s deathbed explanation. This part is told in the third person, with a somewhat omniscient narrator. The final section is the tale told by Guiscardo to Sancho, in first-person narration from Guiscardo’s point of view. The language is similar in all three: archaic and formal. The packet is perhaps a bit more flowery in its prose than the oral stories.

Sample Passage:

To discover who this was, became at length the predominant desire of my soul, since, could I but confront him, I knew my innocence must triumph; but where to seek for information, which Selina only could give, and had refused, almost to distraction. At length a light seemed to break on my bewildered senses, and I fancied the whole discovery lay clear before me. On revolving the whole affair, as stated by the Duke, I was forcibly struck with that part where Selina charged me with neglect during her father’s absence; at the same time praising the kindness of her eldest brother, by whose attention she was wholly sustained, whilst Edward and myself chose to amuse ourselves apart. I had once been told by Edward, that Godfrey was my foe, and I now believed it; he alone could have poisoned his sister’s mind against me, and made her notice, a long past and seemingly forgotten act of prudence, as a want of affection for her, —Wild as this idea was, it became conclusive, and I madly formed the resolution of following the Duke and his son, and of accusing the latter. (28)

This paragraph is from the section narrated in Maximilian’s point of view. By describing his past self’s inner thoughts about Selina’s change of heart, Maximilian emphasizes his own perspective. At the time, Maximilian did not have any doubts about his conviction that Godfrey was sabotaging his relationship with Selina, which is why he rashly rode out into the night to follow him. However, now knowing that it was Edward who really betrayed him, he uses words including “I fancied,” “wild,” and “madly.” The narrator’s hindsight creates the feeling of an omniscient point of view, even though it is simply Maximilian in the future, narrating retrospectively.

Summary

The story begins with a wise old abbot named Maximilian. A Spanish knight named Sancho Orlando comes to seek his advice after killing his friend in single combat. After the Abbot listens to his story, he assures the knight that his friend’s death was not his fault, and that he has no need for such guilt. The knight asks the Abbot how he came to be a monk, and the body of the tale is what the Abbot tells Sancho in reply.

Godfrey, Duke of Anjou, is a kind and generous nobleman visiting his chateau in the countryside with his children. Maximilian is the same age at that point as the Duke’s younger son, Edward, and because his uncle, the prior at a local convent, is close friends with the Duke, Maximilian spends a lot of time with his children. Godfrey, the Duke’s elder son, is friendly, noble, and admirable, while Edward is horrible, jealous, and cruel, but Maximilian does not notice Edward’s faults until too late because of their friendship. Selina, the Duke’s daughter, is beautiful and kind, and Maximilian falls in love with her, but Edward is the only one who knows of their relationship.

The bookplate for *Maximilian and Selina,* featuring a coat of arms, Latin text which translates to “Friendship and diligence restored,” and the name “Richardson Harrison.”

Three years later, the Duke leaves the chateau to visit a dear friend on his deathbed. While he is gone Godfrey is in charge, and Edward advises his friend not to let Godfrey see him with Selina, since he would disapprove. When the Duke returns, he is accompanied by Elgiva de Valmont, his friend’s daughter, who is now his ward. She is even more beautiful than Selina, with whom she becomes close friends. Maximilian’s heart already belongs to Selina, but the two brothers compete fiercely for Elgiva’s affections. Godfrey proposes to Maximilian and Edward that they should all stop pursuing her, since over time without the pressure of their attention she would form her own opinion of which brother she loved. Edward agrees readily.

A few weeks pass in relative peace. Edward asks Maximilian to find out from Selina whether Elgiva prefers him or his brother, but Maximilian refuses because that would be dishonorable when Edward had already agreed to Godfrey’s proposal. Soon after, Maximilian realizes that since no one is aware of his love for Selina, she could be courted by other suitors, and decides to ask his uncle to speak with the Duke. It is decided by his uncle and the Duke that Selina should be promised in marriage to him in several years, if they still love each other, since they are so young to make such a commitment. Maximilian is overjoyed with this outcome. Godfrey is also happy about his sister and Maximilian’s union, meaning that Edward had lied about his disapproval.

Maximilian speaks with Edward while walking home. Edward believes that Godfrey has broken their agreement and said something to Elgiva to turn her against him, but Maximilian does not think he would do that. Edward is distraught and wishes to do something to repair Elgiva’s opinion of him, but Maximilian advises him to keep his distance and not to act rashly. After this conversation, Maximilian is troubled by the situation and his friend’s conduct.

Soon after, the Duke invites Maximilian to come to his other chateau with his family, but just before they leave, Maximilian’s uncle falls ill so he stays behind. The plan is for Maximilian to spend a month with the Duke’s family at the chateau as soon as his uncle recovers, to visit his father’s estate to settle some affairs, then return to the chateau.

When she must leave without him, both Maximilian and Selina are distraught. He takes care of his uncle for over two months, then departs to join them at the chateau. However, Selina is not happy to see him. She says that she has changed her mind after so much time apart; that she has forgiven him, but they should be friends. Maximilian leaves, troubled, and speaks with Edward. He discovers that while he was away, a suitor named de Monvel visited Selina, so Maximilian asks her about him. She insists that she has loved only Maximilian, but that she cannot forgive his perjury. He is confused because he has only been faithful. Maximilian goes to his paternal home as he had planned, where he is soon visited by a stranger, Adolphus de Monvel. Adolphus had come to him to find out if he had broken his engagement to Selina, which he vehemently denies. Adolphus easily accepts this, and leaves.

Now, king Philip of France is preparing to marry, so the Duke and Godfrey go to court for the wedding. Maximilian receives a letter from the Duke saying that Selina is angry with him because she was under the impression that he was gone so long because he was in love with a peasant girl and had eloped with her. She refused to tell anyone where she heard this, but the Duke asks Maximilian to return to the chateau in a month so they can explain the truth. Maximilian convinces himself that it was Godfrey who turned Selina against him, so he goes to court to confront him. He challenges Godfrey to single combat, but Godfrey refuses the fight without due cause. The two men scuffle, and Godfrey stabs Maximilian in the chest.

Maximilian wakes up in bed in the Duke’s apartments at court, where he finds out that the Duke and Godfrey have hastened to the country on account of important news. He is worried because he has no idea what has happened. Godfrey visits while Maximilian is recovering and the two reunite as friends with all forgiven. He lies about the news that made them leave, and Maximilian later finds out that they had really received word from Edward that Selina had disappeared but they hid it from him so his anxiety would not impede his recovery. Shortly after Godfrey’s visit, they find out that Selina had run away to join a convent, in secret because she knew her father would disapprove. Now she is seriously ill and has asked the nuns at the convent to notify her father so that he could see and forgive her before she dies. The Duke, Edward, and Elgiva set out for the convent while Godfrey is still out searching for his sister, but they arrive just after she dies. The Duke immediately dies as well from grief. Godfrey is plunged into madness when he arrives back at the chateau at the precise moment when a procession is carrying the bodies of his sister and father through the gates. It is presumed that Edward and Elgiva will marry, and that Edward will become duke since the older son is indisposed.

Elgiva remarks once that Selina had died because of “hypocrisy,” so Maximilian is set upon exacting revenge upon whoever was responsible (33). He visits the chateau to question Elgiva privately, but Edward spends the whole day with Maximilian so he does not have the chance to speak with her alone. After speaking with his uncle, he decides to join the Christian army on their crusades, and he is renewed by his conviction. He fights successfully with many other knights, crusading from Constantinople from Jerusalem. They lay siege to Jerusalem and defeat the city. After the crusades are over, he joins an organization called the knights of Saint John and spends twelve years in Jerusalem.

One day, he sees a man dressed as a pilgrim being dragged to the church to perform devotions and realizes that it is Edward. Edward confesses that he has committed heinous crimes including murder and is now trying to atone for his sins. His wife is living, but she is now the mistress of king Philip. Elgiva married Godfrey, but she has died, and Edward refuses to explain further. He remains in Jerusalem for some time, and Maximilian manages to piece together some of the story. Godfrey had regained his sanity and married Elgiva, but they both died and left Edward as the guardian of their child. Edward had married a noblewoman and they had a son, but she left him to become the concubine of king Philip.

Edward leaves Jerusalem without saying goodbye. Several years later, Maximilian returns to France on business for the knights of Saint John. While there, he decides to visit the duke’s old chateau, where he finds only servants. They tell him that Edward had been dead for some time, and that his son (now the Duke) was in the country with his wife. Maximilian is confused, because he had heard from Edward that Godfrey had left an heir to the title. A few days later Edward’s son comes to visit Maximilian, saying that he had heard that someone had come to the chateau looking for his father. The new Duke explains that Godfrey had a daughter, but she had descended into madness and died, so he was now the lawful successor. Maximilian then accompanies him to his palace to meet the duchess and stays with them for a month.

Late one night, a woman knocks on his door, requesting that he come to give religious comfort to a dying servant until a confessor can arrive from a distant convent. The dying woman recognizes him as Selina’s lover because she is Nerina, Elgiva’s old servant. She tells him about Edward and Selina’s past, and Maximilian writes all of it down in a packet when he returns to his room. She dies the next morning before he can speak with her again. He learned from her that Godfrey’s daughter (named Elgiva, after her mother) was alive and well, and certainly not an imbecile as the Duke had told him. The Duke had illegally married her (his cousin) but because of their close relation it was not an official union, and he had no claim to the estate unless she died.

When the Duke enters the room, Maximilian horrifies him by immediately asking where he had hidden Elgiva. The Duke begs Maximilian not to expose him, saying that he had fallen in love with his cousin, and they had married in secret. He had been planning on suing for a dispensation and met his current wife while on his way to do so. He fell in love with her and proposed, instead of returning to Elgiva. When he broke off his engagement with her, she went insane and died of a broken heart. Maximilian pronounces him guilty of her murder, and they agree upon appropriate penance for him to perform in exchange for Maximilian’s silence. Maximilian leaves the Duke and Duchess to visit his uncle’s old convent, where he decides to join the brothers. When the prior dies two years later, Maximilian succeeds him.

Maximilian then decides to return to the chateau to find out from Nerina’s brother Conrad, the servant in charge of its care, what truly happened to Elgiva. Conrad relates that after her parents died, Edward had raised Elgiva in ignorance of her right to the estates so that she would believe that she was dependent upon him. Therefore, Nerina and Conrad did as much as they could to advance her marriage to Edward’s son, the current Duke, believing that this was the only way in which she could claim her birthright. Nerina passed away while recovering from a broken leg and when Elgiva heard the news, she went mad with grief and died. Maximilian is convinced, because Conrad has confirmed the Duke’s story.

After finishing his story, the Abbot tells Sancho that even all these years later justice can still prevail, so he plans to tell the king the whole story. He gives Sancho the packet he wrote after Nerina’s deathbed explanation containing everything that happened to him, asking Sancho to read it then come back to visit him. The Abbot believes that Elgiva is alive, and that she may now receive her rightful inheritance when the matter comes to light. Sancho takes the packet home and in it he reads the story of Maximilian and Selina once more, starting from the point where Selina, Edward, Elgiva, Godfrey, and the former Duke all left for a different chateau without Maximilian. Here, the point of view stays with Maximilian, but it’s based on his written packet, no longer on his conversation with the knight.

The family is all together at the chateau. Selina mourns Maximilian’s absence, but she cheers up in a few days. Adolphus de Monvel visits and is instantly attracted to Selina, who is completely unaware. When he confesses his feelings to her, she is flattered that he chose her over the more beautiful Elgiva, but gently denies him. However, Adolphus takes her mild denial as encouragement and continues to pursue her. The second time that he declares his affections, she tells him about her engagement. Edward overhears this and does his best to convince his sister that Maximilian is being unfaithful. He tells Selina that Maximilian has run off with a peasant girl, and she is incredibly upset. The Duke resolves to have the matter investigated, which Edward knows would expose his lies, but he does not have a chance to look into it before he and Godfrey leave for the king’s wedding. Edward hears Elgiva trying to convince Selina not to become a nun and he realizes that this would be very advantageous for him, so he persuades her over time to run away and join a convent without telling their father and helps her leave the chateau unnoticed.

Once she reaches the convent, Selina falls ill from distress since she knows that she has caused her family worry. When she explains her situation to the nuns and asks for their help, the abbess sends a messenger to the chateau to inform the Duke of his daughter’s whereabouts and her regret. He immediately sets out to see her with Elgiva and Edward. Selina writes a letter to Elgiva explaining everything and asking her to beg the Duke to forgive her. Selina and the Duke both die, and Godfrey goes mad with grief. However, after ten years he recovers and marries Elgiva. Edward is bitter and upset because he has lost his chance to have everything he wanted. Elgiva and Godfrey live happily together in the chateau with Edward and Elgiva gives birth to their daughter. One day in a rage while Elgiva and Godfrey are on a walk, Edward attempts to murder the couple. When Godfrey discovers him, Edward begs his brother to kill him, but Godfrey says that he forgives Edward and they all return to the chateau. However, Edward is even more upset by their kindness. He plans on joining the army and prepares to leave.

One night, the three of them are sitting by a window when the two brothers decide to climb a tower for a better view. When they reach the top, Edward pushes his brother off the battlements. Elgiva dies of shock when she sees his corpse. Edward is left as the guardian to the young Elgiva and marries the Duchess. After his wife leaves him for the king, he becomes penitent, and he suffers much in the name of atonement. Eventually, he passes away, still trying to pay for his sins.

After he reads the packet, Sancho is travelling when he sees his friend Guiscardo sitting by a forest, deeply upset. Guiscardo tells Sancho that he is upset because he is now a criminal and explains why. Guiscardo and his wife Maddalena visited one of Guiscardo’s castles for a reprieve but when they arrived the servants said that the new inhabitant of the neighboring property, an Italian named Prince Appiani, was infringing upon Guiscardo’s land and treating Guiscardo’s servants horribly. Soon, Appiani sent a letter apologizing for his conduct and promising to visit the next day. In person, the prince was apologetic, kind, and charming, but Maddalena seemed distressed by his visits, although she was unsure why. One day while Guiscardo was out riding with Appiani, a group of masked men come to the castle and kidnap Maddalena. Guiscardo believes that they were hired by Appiani, so he rushes into the prince’s castle and draws his sword. The prince denies any involvement and orders his servants to search for her. The two men leave together to look for her, but they are unsuccessful.

One morning a stranger comes to see Guiscardo, saying that a woman had given him a letter to deliver to Guiscardo. It is from Maddalena, telling her husband that she plans to kill herself with opium but wanted Guiscardo to know that she was imprisoned in Appiani’s castle and that the prince was the one who kidnapped her. Guiscardo immediately goes to Appiani’s castle and stabs him while he sleeps. However, Guiscardo is now consumed with guilt over having killed a helpless man. Sancho promises that after he returns from a pilgrimage, he will speak with the Pope to obtain absolution for his friend.

Bibliography

Barnes, James J., and Patience P. Barnes. “Tegg, Thomas (1776–1846), publisher.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. 23 September 2004. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/27102.

Frank, Frederick S. The First Gothics: A Critical Guide to the English Gothic Novel. Garland Publishing, 1987.

——. “Gothic Gold: The Sadleir-Black Gothic Collection.” Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture, vol. 26, 1997, pp. 287–312.

Hoeveler, Diane Long. The Gothic Ideology: Religious Hysteria and Anti-Catholicism in British Popular Fiction, 1780–1880. University of Wales Press, 2014.

Maximilian and Selina: Or, The Mysterious Abbot. A Flemish Tale. London, Tegg & Castleman, 1804.

Mayo, Robert Donald. The English Novel In the Magazines, 1740–1815: With a Catalogue of 1375 Magazine Novels And Novelettes. Northwestern University Press, 1962.

Potter, Franz J. The History of Gothic Publishing, 1800–1835: Exhuming the Trade. Macmillan UK, 2005.

——. Gothic Chapbooks, Bluebooks and Shilling Shockers, 1797–1830. University of Wales Press, 2021.

“Thomas Tegg.” Collections Online | British Museum, https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/BIOG48140.

“Thomas Tegg, Esq.” The Gentleman’s Magazine: and historical review. June 1846: 650.

Researcher: Grace S. Saunders

Fatal Secrets

Fatal Secrets; Or, Etherlinda de Salmoni. A Sicilian Story.

Author: Issac Crookenden
Publisher: J. Lee
Publication Year: 1806
Language: English
Book Dimensions: 18 cm x 11 cm
Pages: 36
University of Virginia Library Catalog Entry, Sadleir-Black Collection: PZ2.C76 F 1806

In Issac Crookenden’s 1806 chapbook, characters face betrayal, secret identities, romantic intrigues, incest, and other sinful subjects. The drama of these Sicilian nobles’ story prompts the narrator to interject with frequent lectures on morality.

Material History

Fatal Secrets is a small volume, only eighteen centimeters in length and eleven centimeters in width. As the sole chapbook included in the rebinding, it is quite slim. The cover is a solid tan paper, and the exterior is not decorated by anything but the title of the chapbook. The title is found on a rectangle of maroon leather with gold leaf stamping. “FATAL SECRETS / Issac Crookenden / 1806” is stamped into the leather. The material and quality of the cover indicate the chapbook was rebound following its first publishing. Comparison to other novels in the Sadleir-Black collection reveals that Sadleir likely rebound the chapbook in a similar style with several other books of his before selling his personal collection.

Handwritten cover preceding the title page

Upon opening the book, the reader sees the creamy, relatively unworn paper that appears to have been inserted during the rebinding. After turning these opening pages, the first page of the original chapbook is revealed. It is in much worse condition than the paper included in the rebinding. The first and last original page is suede-colored with gray stains. In ink, someone has written “Fatal Secrets; Or, Etherlinda de Salmoni” in a cursive script at the top of the page. The next page is distinctively lighter than that of the first, but is made of a similar thin, soft paper. The pulpy pages are worn, and in some cases have small tears along their edges. They have the same grey stains as the darker pages, which are absent on the pages inserted during the rebinding. Both types of pages have signature marks. The original signature marks are printed onto the page, while the newer pages have the signature marks penciled on. On a few of the 26 numbered pages, there are holes near the spine where they were threaded together. The thread was likely removed during the rebinding.

After turning to the printed pages, the reader sees the first of two illustrations in the chapbook. The frontispiece is in black and white and depicts a dramatic scene from the story. Included in the illustration is a plaque on which is written “Fatal Secrets.” The caption also reveals the publishing date as November 1, 1806. The title page lists the author as “Issac Crookenden, Author of The Mysterious Murder, &c. &c.” This page also lists the complete title of the chapbook: “Fatal Secrets; Or, Etherlinda de Salmoni. A Sicilian Story.”Turning past the title page begins the story. The print is small but clear with the pages numbered at the top. The last of the two illustrations is on the final page of the story and is more of a closing drawing than an illustration of a scene. At the end of the original pages, there are several fly leaves which are the same as those added from the rebinding.

Textual History

Fatal Secrets; Or, Etherlinda de Salmoni. A Sicilian Story has four publicly known copies according to WorldCat. At least three of these copies appear to be of the same edition, namely those in the University of Virginia, Duke University, and University of California, Los Angeles libraries. All available sources refer to the edition published in 1806, so there was likely only one edition. This edition was published by J. Lee, a publishing house on 24 Half Moon Street, Bishopgate. Isaac Crookenden’s only works published by J. Lee, Fatal Secrets and The Mysterious Murder; or, The Usurper of Naples, were both published in 1806 (Potter 91). J. Lee published authors other than Crookenden, including Sarah Wilkinson, another prolific chapbook author, and he also published sensationalist pamphlets and other literature outside of gothic chapbooks (Potter 91)

Fatal Secrets is just one of many of Crookenden’s works. He wrote at least ten gothic chapbooks, all under his name. Both his unabashed use of his own name and his frequent writings were very unusual in the world of gothic publishing (Potter 26). In fact, Crookenden was only second to Sarah Wilkinson in the number of gothic chapbooks published under his name (Potter 26). Over the course of twenty years, he regularly published his sensationalist chapbooks, all of them thirty-six pages each (Nevins 67). As the amount of money to be made from writing chapbooks was likely quite small and Crookenden was employed as a schoolteacher for part of his literary career, it is unlikely that he pursued this path with a mind for profit (Potter 26, 71–72). His work, however, was hardly original.

Scholarly analysis of Crookenden’s works largely focuses on one aspect of them: their plagiarism. He is accused of being “the most notorious counterfeiter of legitimate Gothic novels,” the “master counterfeiter of long Gothics,” and a plagiarist of “better-known English and German Gothics” (Tymn 59, Frank 19, Nevins 67). Crookenden was in no way unusual among his peers for abridging and even stealing more famous novels’ plots. What did make him notable, however, was the fact that he published this stolen work under his own name (Frank 143).

Fatal Secrets itself may be a plagiarized combination of Ann Radcliff’s A Sicilian Romance and The Italian (Frank 133). It certainly shares many popular Gothic tropes with the novels, including an imprisoned mother, evil father, hidden parentage, and possible fratricide (Nevins 303–5). Still, it is unclear whether Crookenden’s contemporaries recognized Fatal Secrets as plagiarism or cared whether it was so. There is little evidence for Fatal Secrets’s advertisement or subsequent reception. There do not appear to be any reprintings or adaptions. As of 2021, it is listed under both Amazon and AbeBooks, but neither website seems to sell any copies, digital or otherwise. Other than references to Crookenden’s plagiarism, Fatal Secrets is only mentioned in scholarship within lists of Gothic texts (Tracy 30). Fatal Secrets appears to have had neither significant scholarly nor cultural significance beyond its publishing. It blends into the fabric of the hundreds of gothic chapbooks published over several decades that briefly entertained their audience.

Narrative Point of View

Fatal Secrets is narrated in an omniscient third-person point of view, except for a letter written in the first person. The narration is highly dramatic and emotional, but clear. Sentences are lengthy and segmented. The narrator changes between the present and backstory multiple times. The narrator frequently interjects into the storytelling various direct addresses to the reader about the morality of the characters’ choices and human nature. The narrator clearly condemns some characters’ actions and portrays others as faultless heroes. The dedication at the beginning of the chapbook states that these addresses are meant to guide the reader’s personal morality.

Sample Passage of Third-Person Narration:

In the mean time, the degeneracy of his son, had a visible effect on the Marquis’s happiness; and at last precipitated him into those very vices for which the former had been excluded his paternal home. So inconsistent is human nature; and “so apt are we to condemn in others what we ourselves practise without scruple.”

The Marquis, as we have before observed, collecting his scattered property retired to a seat he had recently purchased in the vicinity of Beraldi Castle; but they lived such a secluded life, that altho’ Ricardo found them out by means of seeing Alicia accidentally, yet he little imagined it was his own parents who resided there. (35)

Sample Passage from the Letter:

I look round in vain to see my beloved Count? ah, how often do I fix my eye on the vacant spot where you used to sit, and strive to collect your every attitude, and those dear engaging features which shed such tender benevolence when I applied you to be my friend in my helpless state.—I told you that I had been the victim of a villain’s perfidy, you pitied my situation, and sheltered me in your castle.—Ah ! why did you so? for it was this kindness that begot gratitude in my soul, and gratitude soon ripened into love !—How often have you told me that you loved me, and not even Theodora herself should rival me in your heart*. (31)

Fatal Secrets’ narration fits the story it tells. The narrator’s knowledge of all the characters’ motivations and past actions both make the story clearer and serve its theatrical nature through the inclusion of dramatic irony. Full of twists that evoke horror and disgust in the characters, the black-and-white narrative descriptions simplify the quandaries it creates. The clear narrative division between the heroes and the sinners provides the story with a neat ending. The constant moralizing from the narrator is in clear conflict with the shocking and obscene story it tells but allows for the story to claim both sensationalist and righteous audiences.

Summary

Before the story begins, Crookenden dedicates the chapbook to a “Madam *******.” Here he accounts his anonymization of her to her assumed unwillingness to be associated with the story, but assures her that he will use the depravity of his story to teach the reader of morality.

Fatal Secrets starts with Theodora de Beraldi worried about her husband’s delay at one of his estates. She is comforted by Ricardo, the cousin of Count Beraldi, who is staying with her and his cousin after being disowned by his father for debauchery. While Ricardo comforts Theodora, she squeezes his hand and he begins to believe that she is in love with him. He lusts after her and is about to declare his intentions when her husband returns. Theodora, ignorant of Ricardo’s feelings, is overjoyed at her husband’s return, but Count Beraldi seems troubled.

Ricardo later finds a letter in the Count’s library that reveals Count Beraldi is having an affair. He leaves the letter for Theodora to find, and when she does, she falls ill. At this time, Count Beraldi is away. Ricardo leaves under the guise of finding the Count to make him return to his ill wife. In reality, he tasks a group of robbers to capture the Count and leave him in the dungeon of one of the Count’s estates. Having replaced all the servants of the estate with people loyal to him, Ricardo takes control of the Count’s land and rules while his wife is ill. Ricardo confesses his feelings for Theodora, who is horrified and refuses him. He imprisons her and separates her from her son, Ormando. She again falls ill, and, after being separated from her son for the final time, dies having never granted Ricardo’s wishes.

Ricardo takes in his lover’s daughter, Etherlinda, and raises her as the heir to Count Beraldi’s estate. He also raises Ormando, but as an orphan under his care rather than the true heir. Eventually, the two fall in love with each other. Ormando confesses his feelings and Etherlinda returns them. Ricardo sends Ormando off to serve him with the understanding that, if he returns and still loves Etherlinda, he will have Ricardo’s blessing.

The final page of *Fatal Secrets* and its accompanying illustration

Etherlinda is the daughter of Alicia whom Ricardo seduced and bore Etherlinda out of wedlock. Alicia is the daughter of the Marquis Salmoni, but she concealed this from Ricardo out of shame. The Marquis lost much of his wealth to debauchery and moved to his only remaining land with his wife and daughter. Ricardo eventually stole Etherlinda away from Alicia and stopped providing for the mother of his child. Alicia then went to Count Beraldi (before he was imprisoned) and implored his assistance. The two began an affair, the same one that was revealed in the letter. Ricardo discovered that Alicia was the mistress of Count Beraldi after he imprisoned the Count. He was enraged by this and imprisoned her in a separate dungeon.

On Ormando’s journey, he stops at a convent and is welcomed by a monk. This monk is Marquis Salmoni, although Ormando does not know it. The Marquis became a monk after his wife died of the grief caused by her missing daughter. When Ormando departs, he accidentally leaves behind the letter Alicia wrote Count Beraldi. This letter had been misplaced by Ricardo and was hidden for seventeen years before Ormando found it. Ormando did not get a chance to read it before he dropped it, so he is unaware of its contents. The Marquis died shortly after reading the letter and learning of his daughter’s sin.

Later in his journey, Ormando is kidnapped by Ricardo’s robbers and taken to a castle. Here Ricardo reveals himself to Ormando, having closely watched him the entire time. Ricardo leads Ormando into the dungeon and tells him that if he does what he says he will be entitled to Etherlinda and Ricardo’s estates. Ormando is horrified when Ricardo commands him to kill Alicia, who has been kept in the dungeon for all these years. She reveals that she is Etherlinda’s mother and that Ormando is Count Beraldi’s son. She and Ricardo argue, and she reveals her last name to be de Salmoni. Ricardo realizes that Alicia is his sister and dies of shock. Alicia believed her brother to have been dead and is horrified by the revelation.

Ormando releases both Alicia and Count Beraldi from captivity. He is announced as the true heir and marries Etherlinda. Etherlinda never finds out her true ancestry and bears Ormando many children. Alicia is reunited with her daughter but then spends the rest of her life at a convent, repenting.

Bibliography

“‘The Absolute Horror of Horrors’ Revised: A Bibliographical Checklist of Early-Nineteenth-Century Gothic Bluebooks.” Romantic Textualities, 29 Jan. 2013, http://www.romtext.org.uk/reports/cc09_n03/.

Crookenden, Isaac. Fatal Secrets: Or, Etherlinda De Salmoni. A Sicilian Story. J. Lee, 1806.

Frank, Frederick S. Gothic Writers: A Critical and Bibliographical Guide, edited by Douglass H. Thomson, and Jack G. Voller, Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc., 2001.

Nevins, Jess. The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana. Monkeybrain, 2005.

Potter, Franz J. Gothic Chapbooks, Bluebooks and Shilling Shockers, 1797–1830, University of Wales Press, 2021.

Tracy, Ann B. The Gothic Novel 1790–1830: Plot Summaries and Index to Motifs, University Press of Kentucky, 2014.

Tymn, Marshall B. Horror Literature: A Core Collection and Reference Guide. Rr Bowker Llc, 1981.

Researcher: Chloe Fridley

The Skeleton

The Skeleton; or, Mysterious Discovery. A Gothic Romance.

Author: Isaac Crookenden
Publisher: A. Neil
Publication Year: 1805
Language: English
Book Dimensions: 9.5cm x 17.75cm
Pages: 38
University of Virginia Library Catalog Entry, Sadleir-Black Collection: PZ2.C76 Sk 1805

Isaac Crookenden’s 1805 chapbook tells a tale of betrayal, terror, and romance. The shocking discovery of a skeleton in a castle dungeon is just one of its many twists.

Material History

This copy of The Skeleton; or, Mysterious Discovery, A Gothic Romance by Isaac Crookenden is a small collection of brittle and yellowed pages, delicately held together with a bit of thread and paste. The chapbook lacks binding, and the pages could potentially have been ripped from a larger volume containing an assortment of tales. Assembling these smaller stories into larger volumes was common practice at the time.

The title page of *The Skeleton,* including the various titles, author, description of author, publication information, and price.

In its present state, The Skeleton resembles a small pamphlet. The book and its pages have a width of 9.5 centimeters and a height of 17.75 centimeters. In its entirety, the book consists of 38 pages, including a blank cover page, a page containing an illustrated frontispiece, an official title page, another blank page, and two pages reserved for an author’s introduction.

This version of the text was published in London in 1805. It was printed and published by A. Neil at the Sommers Town Printing Office. The address of the office is listed as No. 30 Chalton Street. The title page notes that the story is sold by “all other booksellers” as well as Sommers Town. On the book’s title page, the price is listed to be six-pence—fairly cheap for its time.

Currently, this copy has a card indicating the University of Virginia’s possession and ownership of the text attached to the blank first page that was likely added in the 1930s or 40s. This card indicates that the book was presented by Robert K. Black. The notecard also has a handwritten inscription indicating that the text has been microfilmed.

Following the blank first page with this card is the second page containing a detailed frontispiece illustration of a man standing in an elegant stone hall holding an open flame. His face expresses shock as the flame illuminates a skeleton. Beneath the illustration is the text “Adolphus discovers the Skeleton of the Baron de Morfield” as well as publication information and attribution for the artwork. This is certainly the biggest artwork included in the text; however, on page 6, there is a small image of a rose to signify the end of the introduction.

The frontispiece of *The Skeleton*, showing Adolphus discovering the skeleton.

There is no shortage of unique defects to the text, making it one of a kind. Because of the lack of binding and seemingly careless way it was removed from its original bound copy, the text is held together loosely. The first ten pages are especially fragile and could easily be separated from the rest. There is a small rip midway down the first blank cover page. There are small stains throughout, but most noticeably on the bottom of page 35 there is a dark splotch on the page with unknown origins. The ink for the printed text has faded considerably in some parts of the book.

As well as defects, there are other intentional printed indicators of the book’s era. There are various letter/number combinations along the bottom of certain pages called signature marks, indicating the proper folding of the paper for the printer. They are as follows: A on page 3, B on page 15, B3 on page 19, C on page 27, and C3 on page 21. The book may be considered difficult to read to a modern reader on account of the printer’s use of the long S in which “s” look like “f”.

Textual History

The Skeleton is a gothic chapbook written by Isaac Crookenden. An edition of the chapbook is currently in the University of Virginia’s Special Collections Library as a part of the Sadleir-Black Collection of Gothic Fiction, where it was received as a gift. This chapbook was published by A. Neil in 1805 and it originally sold for six-pence at a variety of booksellers. This edition of the chapbook was published at the Sommers Town Printing Office at No. 30 Chalton Street in London, near the British Library.

Crookenden was born in 1777 in Itchenor, a village in West Sussex, England, as the youngest of nine children. His father was a shipbuilder who experienced bankruptcy. Crookenden overcame a presumably impoverished childhood to marry Elizabeth Pelham Fillery in 1798, and had a son, Adolphus, in 1800. His educational experience is alluded to in The Skeleton’s title page, on which he describes himself as the “Late assistant at Mr. Adams’ Academy in Chichester.” Crookenden’s status as a former schoolmaster indicates he was educated enough to educate others. Franz Potter hypothesizes that perhaps he advertised his former position as an educator in The Skeleton to heighten the shock and scandal of his work—that someone associated with children could conceive the horrors in the tale (71–2). Crookenden published the chapbook Berthinia, or, The Fair Spaniard in 1802, and nine other publications of the same variety are known. His main genre was gothic, though he experimented with a more purely romantic approach in 1808’s Venus on Earth (Baines). While some of his works were published as late as 1824, Crookenden died in Rotherhithe, Surrey in 1809 at just thirty-two (Potter 72).

Crookenden had an infamous reputation as one of the most prolific plagiarizing writers of the gothic genre. Frederick S. Frank describes Crookenden as “probably the most notorious counterfeiter of legitimate Gothic Novels” (“Gothic Romance” 59). His name is often mentioned alongside Sarah Wilkinson’s, and both authors have been said by Frank to pursue “lucrative careers of Gothic counterfeiting.” (“Gothic Chapbooks” 142). It should then come as no surprise that The Skeleton has no shortage of similarities to a gothic novel published in 1798 called The Animated Skeleton. While the author of the original work is unknown, Crookenden’s rendition of the story includes many borrowed plot points and thematic resemblances, mainly the discovery of a skeleton to incite terror. The key difference comes from the distinct castle settings and character names, as well as the fact that in The Animated Skeleton, the skeleton’s reanimation is found to be mechanized, whereas in Crookenden’s iteration, the skeleton is of a more supernatural variety (Potter 72). Frank notes that “Crookenden plundered the plot from The Animated Skeleton” (“Gothic Gold” 19). Frank, in a separate instance, also notes that The Skeleton “proves to be a refabrication of the anonymous Animated Skeleton of 1798 together with bits and pieces of the author’s extensive Gothic gleanings” (“Gothic Romance” 59)

WorldCat lists four copies of the chapbook around the world, each with the same publication date of 1805. Along with the University of Virginia’s copy in Charlottesville, Virginia, The Skeleton can be found in the Library of Congress in Washington, DC in the Rare Book/Special Collections Reading Room. The University of Oxford’s Bodleian Library’s Weston Stacks in Oxford, United Kingdom holds a copy of the chapbook as well. The Bodleian’s library catalog describes the binding as “sprinkled sheep” and indicates that it is bound with seven other items. The Monash University Library in Clayton, Australia holds the fourth and final of the catalogued copies of The Skeleton.

Narrative Point of View

The Skeleton is mostly narrated in the third person, with brief, occasional interjections of first-person narration providing commentary on the actions or events taking place in the chapbook. The introduction is a note to the reader in the latter style, condemning critics that call gothic romance unrealistic and directly warning the reader not to judge a book by its cover. Though the narrator often uses “we” when referring to their subjective thoughts, the introduction is signed “Your humble servant, The AUTHOR.” The story and action are presented in the third person, however, and the narrator makes abundant use of commas, dashes, and semicolons to present a unique voice. Letters are also included in the story, presented as written by the characters within the chapbook.

Sample Passage:

Almira now observed two horsemen issue from the wood, and as they directed their course towards her, she soon discovered them to be hunters. As they approached nearer, she retired towards the cottage; when the foremost of them sprung off his horse, and coming up to her, “I hope, Madam,” said he, bowing, “I have not disturbed your meditations at this serene and tranquil hour.” While he was speaking, Almira had leisure to observe his dignified deportment, his engaging and affable manners, and his polite address. His full, dark, expressive eye spoke a language which Almira’s hear instantly interpreted, and which on discovering, she cast her’s on the ground. — To keep the reader no longer in suspense, this young man was no other than Rotaldo; and his attendant was the individual– we wish we could add, the virtuous– Maurice. (17)

This style of narration evokes the feeling of being told a story by an unknown but still familiar voice. Because of certain story elements including the castles, romance, and suspense in the chapbook, this narration can resemble the style in which one tells a child a bedtime story. The prolonged and choppy sentence structure with the variety of punctuation could be read as mimicking an oral form of storytelling. The interjected claims and commentary with the plural “we” serve to liven up the story and engage the reader, providing breaks to clarify or emphasize characterizations or actions that may seem less clear due to the brevity of a chapbook. For example, because Maurice’s villainous nature is not able to be developed over many pages in The Skeleton, the narrator makes sure to clearly telegraph his lack of virtue in the above paragraph. This narration style makes the writing feel less stiff, and thus it has aged more gracefully than some of its blander contemporaries.

Summary

On a stormy night, Lord Ellmont resides in his castle with his two children. Lord Ellmont is a former warrior, now committed to domesticity after nobly defending his castle for many years. His twenty-two-year-old son, Rotaldo, embodies masculinity with a perfect heart, while his seventeen-year-old daughter Elenora is described at length as incredibly beautiful. The castle is located in Scotland and consists of a blend of many different styles and forms of architecture. Though Lady Ellmont died in childbirth, the castle always seems full on the birthdays of both children, and it is a mirthful affair when Rotaldo’s birthday arrives.

Page 21 of *The Skeleton*, including Rotaldo’s letter to Almira.

At the base of the mountain that the castle sits upon is the home of the peasant Viburn. He has a twenty-year-old son named Adolphus who has heart as well as temper. One day, Rotaldo asks Adolphus to be his sporting companion, but Adolphus mysteriously declines, hurting Rotaldo’s feelings. Rotaldo still wishes for a friend and thinks he finds one in the form of Maurice, an ugly and deceptive older peasant. Maurice is quickly taken by Elenora’s beauty, but he fears he will be rejected by her or her family because of his status. It is implied that his attraction to her is not entirely pure, and he develops an unhealthy lust for her.

In a valley further from the castle is the cottage of Volcome, an old peasant with only one surviving child. He was once rich and of nobility but his family fell upon difficult times, and he was exploited. He believes his brother was murdered under mysterious circumstances long ago, and his sister-in-law died while giving birth to a nephew he never got to meet. His wife also died, leaving him in charge of his seventeen-year-old daughter Almira, who is described as beautiful as she is innocent. One day, Rotaldo and Maurice come across their cottage and introduce themselves while riding horses. Rotaldo is deep in thought riding back from their cottage when a storm disturbs his horse and nearly flings him off a cliff. A stranger appears and stops the horse, harming himself in the process. The benevolent savior is revealed to be Adolphus, who Rotaldo invites back to the castle to be treated for his injuries. However, Maurice fears Adolphus as competition for Elenora. Adolphus says he declined Rotaldo’s earlier attempt at companionship because he must tend to his parents, which Rotaldo dismisses and graciously offers Adolphus and his family the castle and any assistance they may need.

Adolphus and Elenora instantly connect, while Rotaldo is overcome with passion for Almira and writes her a love letter. Elenora receives a proposal from the miserable Baron de Morfield, but her father knows she would be unhappy with him and declines on her behalf. Almira receives Rotaldo’s letter and soon receives a visit from Rotaldo himself as they confess their love. He visits her often, but one day he is returning to the castle from her cottage when an assassin shoots at him. Rotaldo swiftly draws his sword and fells the assassin who is revealed to be Maurice. Maurice expresses remorse for his treachery and gives a cryptic warning about his plans before expiring.

Returning home, Rotaldo finds his family in distress. Adolphus has been captured and taken by enemies in the night by the Baron de Morfield, and is imprisoned in a dungeon. As Adolphus ponders why he deserves this fate, the narrator reveals the villainous motives of Maurice and the Baron. It is revealed that Maurice planned to force himself upon Elenora and then propose an elopement to save her honor. However, Adolphus overheard this proposal and intervened. Maurice begged for forgiveness and Elenora found him deserving; Adolphus, however, was less understanding. Maurice later swore vengeance upon Adolphus, informing the Baron de Morfield that Elenora scorned him for Adolphus. Maurice then forged a letter in Adolphus’s hand stating that Adolphus has plans to kill Rotaldo and flee the castle.

Page 33 of *The Skeleton* with asterisks representing the illegible text of Adolphus’s father’s account.

Elenora and Rotaldo compare their experiences with each other, and Adolphus’s innocence is revealed. They fear that they may have been too late to save him from Maurice’s plans. In his dungeon cell, Adolphus discovers a secret passage, in which he finds a bloodied dagger and is shocked by a skeleton. Adolphus returns to his cell with a manuscript supposedly written by the dead man. It reveals that the real Baron de Morfield is the skeleton who had been forced to give up his estate though he had an infant son and heir just after he was killed. The supposed Baron presently interrogating and kidnapping Adolphus is a usurper.

At midnight, Adolphus is freed from his cell by a mysterious man. As they make their escape, the man turns and stabs the usurping Baron. The helper and Adolphus set out to return to the Ellmont castle. Back home, the Ellmonts despair, though Almira has now been taken into the castle after her father’s passing. Her relationship with Rotaldo as well as a friendship with Elenora provides them both great comfort as they fear Adolphus to be dead.

Adolphus is received with joyous welcomes upon his return. Adolphus’s supposed father reveals he found Adolphus in the woods nearly the same time the true Baron’s letter was datedmeaning Adolphus is the true son of the Baron de Morfield. Almira reveals she is also of Morfield descent, making her and Adolphus cousins. Almira’s father’s story about his brother’s murder and sister-in-law’s unknown child all come together before the group. The Ellmonts return to the Morfield castle and witness the usurping Baron on his deathbed as Adolphus is yielded his claim to the castle. Adolphus then marries Elenora as a baron and Rotaldo marries Almira. The story ends with festivity and moralizes that “although villany may triumph for a time, yet, in the end, Happiness must be finally united to Virtue.” (38)

Bibliography

Baines, Paul. “Crookenden, Isaac (b. 1777), Writer.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 23 Sept. 2004, https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/63518. Accessed 10 November 2021.

Crookenden, Isaac. The Skeleton: Or, Mysterious Discovery, a Gothic Romance. A Neil, 1805.

Frank, Frederick S. “Gothic Chapbooks, Bluebooks, and Short Stories in the Magazines (1790–1820).” Gothic Writers: A Critical and Bibliographical Guide, 2001, pp. 133–146.

——. “Gothic Gold: The Sadleir-Black Gothic Collection,” Studies in Eighteenth-Century Culture, vol. 26, 1997, pp. 287–312.

——. “The Gothic Romance.” Horror Literature: A Core Collection and Reference Guide, edited by Marshall B. Tymn. R.R. Bowker, New York, 1981, p. 59.

Potter, Franz J. Gothic Chapbooks, Bluebooks and Shilling Shockers: 1797–1830, University of Wales Press, 2021.

Researcher: Jacob Tisdale

The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors

The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors: A Gothic Story

Author: Sarah Scudgell Wilkinson
Publisher: Printed for T. and R. Hughes
Publication Year: 1807
Language: English
Book Dimensions: 12cm x 20cm
Pages: 38
University of Virginia Library Catalog Entry, Sadleir-Black Collection: PZ2.W55 Ca 1807

Set in Scotland, England, and Italy, Sarah Scudgell Wilkinson’s 1807 chapbook is a complicated tale of vengeance, violence, and long-lost love. And there’s a ghost!

Material History

At first glance, The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors: A Gothic Story is nothing more than a small, nondescript book. It is bound in a spotless cardboard cover, with no title or images on the front or back. The spine has a small red rectangle in which The Castle Spectre or Family Horrors is written in gold writing. The chapbook is about 12 centimeters wide, 20 centimeters long, and 1 centimeter thick.

The frontispiece of *The Castle Spectre*, which was glued onto a blank page for support

Upon opening the book, it is evident that it has been rebound. The pages inside are soft, yellowed, and worn. The edges are tattered and uneven and the pages are of different sizes. The frontispiece appears to have been glued to a blank page for structural support, as it was ripped and about two inches of the page is missing from the bottom. This page contains a colorful image of two knights in front of a red castle. They are holding blue shields with gold crosses and are wearing red skirts. Behind the knights is a woman in a pink dress; she is surrounded by what appears to be sunbeams and looks as if she is floating with her arm raised. Some of the colors go beyond the edge of the picture, indicating it may have been painted with watercolor. Beneath the image is a caption that says, “GERTRUDE rising from the Rubbish before the CASTLE”. Below the caption is a note about the print company.

The title page contains the title, written as follows: “The // Castle Spectre; // or, // Family Horrors: // A Gothic Story.” The words are all uppercase, except for “A Gothic Story,” which is written in a more elaborate gothic typeface. Beneath the title is a quote by Langhorne, and then a note on the publisher: “London: // Printed for T. and R. Hughes, // 35, Ludgate-Street.” “London” is written in the same gothic font, while the rest is again all capitalized. Beneath this is the publishing date: 1807. The title page has a small, rather illegible phrase written in pencil in the upper left corner, and a large stain on the right. The back of the title page is blank, except for a small stamp in the bottom left corner that says, “Printed by Bewick and Clarke, Aldergates-street.” It should be noted that the name of the author is never mentioned.

On the first page of the text, the title is again printed, but this time as The Castle Spectre. The chapbook contains thirty-eight pages, and the page sizes vary slightly. The upper and lower margins range from about 1.5 centimeters to 2.5 centimeters. “Castle Spectre” is written on the top margin of every page, and there are page numbers in the upper corners. The text is small and tight, and the inner margin is very narrow. On the left pages, the words run almost into the spine. On some pages, the text is fading and in certain instances, can be seen through from the back of the page. The pages are speckled with light stains, but none that obscure much text. The bottom margins of a few pages contain signature marks, such as B3, C, and C3. These marks indicate how the pages should be folded together, as the book was printed on one large sheet and then folded and trimmed. This binding technique also explains why the pages vary in size. There are nine blank pages at the end of the book. These pages seem newer and are larger; they were likely added to make the book slightly thicker, as it is difficult to bind such a thin book.

An index card is loosely placed in the front of the book, containing the title and publishing information. It appears to be written in Michael Sadleir’s handwriting and was likely used for cataloging purposes. The note indicates that the book was originally unbound, but then mounted on modern board and engraved. This explains the discrepancy between the wear of the cover and that of the pages. “Louisiana” is written on the upper left corner; Sadleir presumably got the book from someone who lived there. A line on the bottom of the card indicates his belief that the plot was plagiarized, as he notes the book is “a theft of title and idea.”

Michael Sadleir’s cataloguing card inserted within *The Castle Spectre*

Textual History

The Castle Spectre by Sarah Scudgell Wilkinson was printed by Bewick and Clarke for T. and R. Hughes in 1807. According to Michael Sadleir’s handwritten note, the copy in the University of Virginia Sadleir-Black Collection was originally unbound and then rebound as a stand-alone chapbook. It appears there is only one edition, the 1807 version, but some other copies are bound in volumes with other chapbooks. According to WorldCat, there are six copies of this edition located at Dartmouth Library, Columbia University Library, and the National Library of Wales, among others. As of 2021, there are no digital copies of the story, though GoogleBooks has information about the title, author, and publishing company.

The title page of *The Castle Spectre*, which features slight pencil markings and stains

Wilkinson’s The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors: A Gothic Story is often misinterpreted as being inspired by Matthew Gregory Lewis’s play The Castle Spectre. Though part of the title is the same, the actual plot, characters, and setting are entirely unrelated. The confusion has arisen because Wilkinson published two chapbooks with similar titles: The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors: A Gothic Story in 1807 and The Castle Spectre: An Ancient Baronial Romance; Founded on the Original Drama of M. G. Lewis in 1820. This second text, The Castle Spectre: An Ancient Baronial Romance, is in fact based upon Lewis’s play (as accurately suggested by the subtitle), with the same characters, setting, and plot. By contrast, the 1807 chapbook, The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors, remains separate and unrelated except for its similar main title.

Though the two Castle Spectre texts by Wilkinson are entirely separate, they are frequently confused for one another. For instance, Franz J. Potter notes in The History of Gothic Publishing that Wilkinson “also adapted two versions of Matthew Lewis’s melodrama ‘The Castle Spectre’ publishing The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors (2.58) in 1807 with Thomas Hughes, and The Castle Spectre; An Ancient Baronial Romance, Founded on the Original Drama M. G. L. (2.57) in 1820 with John Bailey” (119). In his section on the “Family Horrors” version of Wilkinson’s chapbook, Frederick S. Frank notes that she “transformed Lewis’s Gothic drama, The Castle Spectre [l-219], back into a Gothic novel” (171). Franz J. Potter similarly states that this “Family Horrors” version was “founded on Lewis’s The Castle Spectre. A Drama in Five Acts” (Gothic Chapbooks 39). Even an article in UVA Today makes this common error, stating “Lewis’ work was regularly plagiarized and used in this way, as it is in ‘The Castle Spectre, or, Family Horrors: a Gothic Story,’ by Sarah Scudgell Wilkinson” (McNally).

Many sources that make the claim of a link between The Castle Spectre and Matthew Lewis’s play cite Montague Summers’s Gothic Bibliography, which lists The Castle Spectre by Sarah Wilkinson without specifying the subtitle or a publication date. Summers’s entry reads: “Castle Spectre, The. By Sarah Wilkinson. Founded upon Matthew Gregory Lewis’ famous drama, The Castle Spectre, produced at Drury Lane on Thursday, December 14^th, 1797” (268). Of the libraries that own The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors, many list M. G. Lewis as an author, and these library catalogs frequently reference Summers’s Gothic Bibliography, echoing his statement that the story is “Founded upon Matthew Gregory Lewis’ famous drama ‘The castle spectre’.” Some libraries note the link to Lewis’s play based upon The National Union Catalog Pre-1956 Imprints, and this source also cites back to Summers’s Gothic Bibliography. It is possible Summers’s entry for The Castle Spectre was misunderstood to be about the “Family Horrors” version, when it was meant to reference the “Baronial Romance” version, which specifically claims to be founded upon Lewis’s play. Whatever the reason, this misunderstanding has spurred many sources, including library catalogs, to erroneously note a connection between the plot of Lewis’s The Castle Spectre play and Wilkinson’s The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors chapbook.

It should also be noted that some sources discuss a similarity between the two distinct chapbooks Wilkinson wrote under the titles The Castle Spectre. Diane L. Hoeveler, for instance, suggests that Wilkinson was plagiarizing herself in these two chapbooks, indicating she believes the plots to be “virtually identical and indicate how authors as well as publishers had no qualms about ‘borrowing’ literary texts from others as well as themselves” (14). Hoeveler writes, “Wilkinson’s The Castle Spectre: An Ancient Baronial Romance is actually her second attempt to capitalize on the popularity of Lewis’s 1797 drama The Castle Spectre”, naming as the “other version” The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors: a Gothic Story (14). Yet while it is true that Wilkinson used the same main title for two different books, they are not “virtually identical”: the plots, characters’ names, and setting of the story have no similarities. A potential reason for the similar titles was that Wilkinson used the phrase “Castle Spectre” precisely because of its popularity at the time to attract readers, despite the “Family Horrors” version being a unique story.

On a separate note, the title page of The Castle Spectre; or, Family Horrors includes a portion of a poem by John Langhorne. It appears to be an edited stanza from a longer poem entitled “Fable VII. The Wall-flower” from his collection of poems, The Fables of Flora (Johnson 447). It is unclear whether the poem was adapted by Wilkinson or the publishing company, but the poem alludes to the idea of remembrance and telling the stories of the dead. This theme reflects in the story of Gertrude’s death and Richard’s journey of avenging her.

Narrative Point of View

The Castle Spectre is, for the most part, narrated in the third person by an anonymous narrator who is not present in the plot. There are a few occasions throughout the story when the narrator speaks in first-person plural, referencing the history of the story and its translations. The narration follows the knight, Sir Richard, throughout the entire story, and much of the chapbook contains dialogue and interpolated tales spoken by a variety of the characters with whom Richard interacts, such as Douglas. The narrative focuses more on plot and less on characters’ thoughts, and the sentences are often long and descriptive. There is a bit of insight into Richard’s feelings, but the narrator does not discuss other characters’ emotions unless the characters reveal their feelings aloud in dialogue. There is also an instance where Sir Richard and Sir Kenelm exchange letters, which are printed within the text in quotation marks; both Sir Richard and Sir Kenelm refer to themselves in the third person in their letters. At times when Elenora (also known as Gertrude) appears as a ghost, she also refers to herself in the third person during her tales.

Sample of Third-Person Narration:

The moon, emerging from a black cloud just as he entered, enabled him to ascertain he was in a grand spacious hall, in the centre of which stood a large banquetting table He seized an extinguished taper, which he with difficulty lighted by the friction of some wood he found on the hearth. He had now an opportunity to observe the place more accurately. The table was laden with viands, some in a putrid state, some mouldering to powder; and to his eager view appeared vases filled with the juice of the generous grape. In a corner of the apartment he beheld the body of a man extended in death on the floor, the boards of which were stained with congealed blood. A murder had been committed here but a short time before. The sight of this did not alarm him; he knew not fear, but emotions of pity rose in his breast, for the unfortunate object before him, and a desire to develope the mysteries of the place he was in, prevailed over ever other consideration. (6)

Sample of First-Person Plural Narration:

But we must not anticipate in our story too much, and the Scottish manuscript from whence we translate, mentions some transactions that will better appear hereafter. In the mean time we must observe that after much consultation on these transactions, Lord Mackworth advised Sir Richard to appoint a meeting with Sir Kenelm at midnight. (16)

Sample of Sir Richard’s Third-Person Letter to Sir Kenelm Cromar:

Sir Richard, brother to Lady Gertrude, returning from the Holy Wars, finds his venerable father mouldering into dust, brought to the grave by grief for the untimely fate of a beloved daughter, whose fair fame was basely called into question, and her dear life sacrificed to lawless love. —Sir Kenelm must account for this, and inform Sir Richard what is become of a dear sister. For which purpose Sir Richard challenges Sir Kenelm to meet him, in single combat, near that castle-gate where he, Sir Kenelm, banquetting with his new bride, beheld the injured shade of Lady Gertrude, when, for a slight offence, he stabbed his cupbearer. Eight days hence, exactly at the hour of twelve, Sir Richard will be there, with two of his most trusty friends. (16)

Sample of Sir Henry Mackworth’s Interpolated Tale:

At his return to Palestine, finding I was in confinement, his generosity and friendship made him hazard his life to rescue me from my confinement. He succeeded beyond our most sanguine expectations. We continued together some time. We had but one heart, one purse, and were a pattern of friendship throughout camp and country. Clemena was often the subject of our conversation. I ventured to hint the inclination I felt for her, from his description and the picture I had seen. ‘Alas!’ said he, ‘I dare not flatter you with the least hope of success; my sister has been educated in a convent, and ever been intended by our parents for a nun, their fortune being too small to support us both in a manner suitable to our rank…’ I remonstrated with Vertolini on the cruelty of secluding a beloved sister, for life, within the dreary walls of a convent… (33).

The various types of narration in The Castle Spectre allow for a deeper exploration of different characters’ actions and emotions, as well as greater detail on the setting and history of the story. The Castle Spectre utilizes several techniques to augment suspense. On numerous occasions, the names of the characters Richard meets are not revealed until the end of that individual’s story, and the reveals often occur casually amidst the dialogue or narrative with little emphasis. The reveal of the characters’ names has a great impact on the entire plot, and the narration’s nonchalant delivery augments the suspense and adds an element of surprise. As a result, many key details and surprises are revealed suddenly and without foreshadowing. Though the narrator does not touch on characters’ feelings often, the dialogue provides greater insight into the different characters’ personalities and emotions. Because so many different plots are embedded into the chapbook, the story is both engaging and, at times, confusing: the chapbook is extremely fast-paced because so much action is packed into each sentence, and in some cases it is difficult to follow the story and to distinguish who is speaking or who characters are because the plot jumps back and forth in time or between the different story lines. The moments of first-person plural narration detail the story as if it were true by discussing the sources from which the story was translated. These moments where the narrator speaks as “we” directly to the reader, along with the detailed setting and long rambling sentences, all conspire to make the story oral in feel, as if being told to a friend.

Summary

The Castle Spectre follows the knight Sir Richard over a period of several years. The story begins on a stormy night in the Scottish Highlands. Sir Richard is traveling to his father’s castle in the Grampian Mountains after a four-year deployment to the Holy War in Palestine. He seeks shelter to ride out the storm, but no one will take him in. In a flash of lightning, he sees the turret of a castle; he sounds his bugle numerous times with no response, so he dismounts his horse and tries the door. By chance, the door is unlocked, and Richard enters the banquet hall of the castle. With only the moon and occasional flash of lightning to guide him, the knight explores. The hall is filled with food and drink that appears to have been placed there recently. In the corner of the hall lies the dead body of a man; the floor is soaked with congealed blood. Sir Richard vows to unravel the mystery of the catastrophe that occurred.

Sir Richard tours the rest of the castle, which is magnificently decorated in gothic splendor. No one is to be found and all is silent. He comes upon a great bed, and as he is exhausted from his journey, he jumps in and falls into a deep sleep. At one o’clock, a bell rings and Sir Richard wakes to the curtains of the bed being ripped open. Standing at the foot of the bed bathed in blue light is a veiled woman in a white dress. As he approaches her, the woman’s veil falls off and a stream of blood gushes from a wound in her side. Richard looks into the woman’s face, and it is none other than his sister! He calls to the apparition “by her name Elenora” (though later in the story she is referred to predominantly as Gertrude, with no explanation given for the shift in name) (7). Elenora the apparition stands, not speaking, while holding her hand over the seemingly fresh wound in her side. After repeated prodding, Elenora explains the story of her brutal murder in the castle, revealing that two years after Richard left, she married the owner of this castle, and in a fit of frenzy he stabbed her (while she was pregnant) and left her corpse in a rubbish pile. Left to rot without a proper Christian burial, she haunts her murderer and his new wife. The scene that Richard came upon in the banquet hall was the remnants of their wedding, which was ruined when Elenora appeared and terrorized the guests. Finally, with a clap of thunder and a flash of lightning, Elenora vanishes in a swirl of blue flame.

Shocked and overcome with emotion, Sir Richard decides to leave and avenge his beloved sister. He lets his horse take the reins on the way to his father’s estate and does not realize the horse has gone down the wrong road. They come upon a cottage where he is treated with great hospitality. The owner, Douglas, tells the story of his childhood and time as a soldier, where he saved the life of the “worthy nobleman, under whose banners I had enlisted” and was thus assured protection and this cottage (11). Douglas explains that the nobleman has died and his son is at war; he fears thar if he does not return, Sir Kenelm Cromar will take over his estates and leave Douglas and his family to live out their days in poverty. During this story, Douglas reveals the name of his former nobleman to be Duncan, and Sir Richard reveals that Duncan was his father! This means that Sir Richard is the son who has now returned home; the Douglas family rejoices. Douglas’s story also reveals that Sir Kenelm’s first wife was Elenora (now predominately referred to as Gertrude in the story). Upon Gertrude and Kenelm’s marriage, Ally (Douglas’s daughter) moved into the castle where Sir Kenelm “began to take great liberties with her” (12). Douglas says Lady Gertrude is now missing and so is Ally. Because of Gertrude’s ghost’s daily visits, Sir Kenelm and his new wife have moved to his hunting lodge so the castle remains uninhabited. Sir Richard thanks Douglas and promises him a life of friendship and protection.

When he finally arrives home, the servants rejoice at the return of their young lord. They tell the knight all that has happened and grieve for the good young lady Gertrude and their master Duncan. Enraged, Sir Richard vows to avenge her and lay her body to rest in a Christian burial. He seeks out his father’s friend, Lord Mackworth, and tells the man the story. Richard decides to challenge Sir Kenelm to single combat, with Mackworth’s assistance. As part of their agreement, Mackworth wants Sir Richard to marry his daughter and Sir Richard agrees. Sir Kenelm accepts Richard’s request, mentioning that though it is illegal to fight in this manner, he will do it anyways to honor the memory of the venerable Duncan. Meanwhile, Kenelm sends a letter to the king, requesting that he send men and imprison Richard before the fight occurs. Instead, the king decides the two men will have an impartial hearing at his court and he will support whichever cause is more just.

It is now the night of combat, and the marshal Lord Glencairn asks if any last-minute accommodations can be made. Richard declines, unless Sir Kenelm will admit to murdering Gertrude and surrender to public justice. Kenelm refuses, saying that Gertrude abandoned him for a lover, and Richard is about to stab him in rage when suddenly, they are both commanded prisoners and summoned to the king’s court. Before they leave with the soldiers, the clock strikes one and in a swirl of thunder and lightning, Gertrude appears. She shares her story and explains that three times now she has prevented Kenelm from murdering his new wife. She requests a proper burial, asks Mackworth to protect Richard, and vanishes in a thick blue flame amidst a crack of lightning and tremendous peal of thunder. Richard breaks the silence and tells the soldiers to bring them to the court, so that he can share the full story in front of the king. The hearing occurs, and Kenelm is found guilty and sent to prison; he later has a public trial and is condemned to death. Gertrude’s remains are recovered and she has a proper burial; all the churches in the surrounding area hold masses in her honor and her final wish is granted.

Finally, Richard goes home. He keeps his house open to serve his father’s tenants, and the neighboring nobility congratulate him on his return from the war and for bringing Kenelm to justice. Nevertheless, Sir Richard is unhappy; he mourns the loss of his father and sister and misses his lost love Lady Jane. The story now shifts back many years, before Richard went to the Holy Land. He fell in love with Mackworth’s daughter, Jane, and she waited for him to return from the war. In the four years of his absence, Jane denied many marriage offers from wealthy prospects, one of them being Lord Glendour. Finally, Richard returns and they are set to marry. We learn that two years before Richard left, Mackworth’s son went to war and never returned. They mourned his death, and Mackworth received Richard as a son and the heir to his estates and domains. As they prepare for the wedding at the Mackworth estate, Richard returns to his familial castle, and in his absence, an unfortunate event occurs. One evening, Jane is kidnapped while on a walk through the gardens. Mackworth sends news to Richard, who vows never to return until he finds his love. He searches for weeks with no sign of Jane, until he comes across a hut offering refreshments to travelers. The man inside mentions that a gagged woman and man had come through just before and were on their way to Italy. Richard chases them to the river’s edge and resolves to follow them. For years, he traverses all of Italy, hopelessly searching convents for his lover. He falls ill and almost dies from grief, but dreams of Jane and vows to recover and free her.

A sample of the body text of *The Castle Spectre*

The story jumps back in time to Jane’s kidnapping, and it is revealed that Lord Glendour, one of Kenelm’s friends, fell madly in love with her and kidnapped Jane to be with her. He requests her hand in marriage, but she refuses. She tricks him into allowing her to pass the time in a convent in Italy, where she is watched over by the Lady Abbess and not allowed to leave. Back in the present, Richard meets an English man in the middle of Venice. They become friends and visit the man’s villa. Richard recognizes someone in one of the family pictures and asks the man to share the story of why he left England. The man says the story is long, but he has written it down for his children and will one day give Richard a copy to read. After months of visits, Richard reads the man’s story and is surprised by the similarities between them. The man, Wentworth, was the eldest son of a noble house in England. He fell in love with a peasant girl Louisa, and though he was promised to marry a noble woman Anna, he runs away with his lover. He fakes illness and tells his father he will go to the Holy War; Louisa goes with him, and they marry and have a son and daughter. He returns from the war and vows to sort out his betrothal to Anna. Leaving his wife and children in the protection of her father, he goes back to his paternal castle. He sets a plan for his brother, William, to marry Anna instead, and it works. Elatedly, Wentworth returns to the cottage and is devastated to find Louisa and his infant son missing. They were tricked by a letter claiming to be from him, and Wentworth suspects his own father to have sent it. For five years, Wentworth and his daughter travel the world, though nothing can make him forget Louisa. Receiving word of his father’s ill health, he returns to England. On his death bed, Wentworth’s father reveals he sent Louisa to a convent in Italy, but she escaped. Wentworth and his daughter go back to Italy to search for her, but he never finds Louisa. He lives like a recluse in his villa, and this is where Richard reenters the story.

Richard again visits Wentworth. The man reveals he is Richard’s uncle but used a fake family name so that he may retire in peace, away from the nobility. Richard explains that during his search for Jane, he saw Louisa and her son in the Pyrenees. Together, Richard and Wentworth begin their journey to the mountains to find the long-lost wife and son. They come across a cottage that Richard had visited before and reunite with Louisa and the son. Wentworth, now revealed to be called Sir George, decides to return to his family home in England. Richard promises to join them, if they can spare a few weeks for him to search for Jane.

One night on his return to the Italian villa, Richard sees two criminals attacking a man. He intervenes, and they admit they were hired by Count Vertolini to kill him. Richard and the man go back to his house, so they may speak safely. The young man then explains his story: he came from England to fight in the Holy War and had a father and sister at home who he had not heard from in years. During the war, he became great friends with an Italian man, Vertolini, who had a sister named Clemena. The man falls in love with her, but is then taken prisoner in Palestine. Four years later, Vertolini bribed the soldiers and freed his friend, and they carry on their travels together. The Italian man reveals his sister is promised to a convent, so she cannot be with his friend despite his love for her. They meet the sister in Italy, where he becomes even more enamored. Clemena admits she does not want to join the convent, but it is necessary for her honor. Vertolini vows to save her before she takes the veil, and the siblings try in vain to convince their father to free her. The father, Count Vertolini, refuses the young man’s wedding proposal, and advises him to leave Italy immediately. It is now revealed that the young man is Sir Henry Mackworth, Lord Mackworth’s long lost son and Jane’s brother.

Back in the present, Richard and Henry plan to rescue Clemena. While at the convent, a girl hands the knight a note telling him to return at midnight to find something of great importance. He listens, and that night, finds Lady Jane at the convent! She explains her story and begs him to free her. Richard and Henry return to the convent to demand her release, but the Lady Abbess refuses. The next day, Henry interrupts the veiling ceremony and saves Clemena from the convent. Richard goes back to England with Henry and Clemena, where he hurries to find Mackworth. Together, they apply to the king and receive his royal mandate to imprison Lord Glendour. The king sends word to the Pope, and Mackworth and Sir Richard go back to Italy to retrieve a freed Jane. With Richard’s lover in tow, they return to England. Wentworth lives in his castle with his family, there are numerous weddings, Glendour dies in a convent, and Sir Richard is blessed with years of happiness with Jane, Henry, Wentworth, and the others. They all live happily ever after.

Bibliography

Frank, Frederick S. “A Gothic Romance.” Horror Literature: A Core Collection and Reference Guide, by Marshall B. Tymn, New York City, R.R. Bowker, 1981.

Hoeveler, Diane L., “Sarah Wilkinson: Female Gothic Entrepreneur” (2015). Gothic Archive: Related Scholarship. 7. https://epublications.marquette.edu/gothic_scholar/7.

Johnson, Samuel. The Works of the English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper: Including the Series Edited with Prefaces, Biographical and Critical. United Kingdom, J. Johnson, 1810.

McNally, Katie. “Fearsome Ink.” UVA Today, 29 Apr. 2016, http://news.virginia.edu/content/fearsome-ink-uva-library-boasts-worlds-finest-collection-english-gothic-literature. Accessed 4 Nov. 2021.

The National Union Catalog Pre-1956 Imprints. Vol. 664, London, Mansell, 1968. 754 vols.

Potter, Franz J. The History of Gothic Publishing, 1800–1835: Exhuming the Trade. Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.

Potter, Franz J. Gothic Chapbooks, Bluebooks and Shilling Shockers, 1797–1830. University of Wales Press, 2021.

Summers, Montague. A Gothic Bibliography. The Fortune press, 1941.

Wilkinson, Sarah Scudgell. The Castle Spectre; Or, Family Horrors: A Gothic Story. Printed for T. and R. Hughes, 1807.

Wilkinson, Sarah Scudgell, and Lewis, M. G. (Matthew Gregory). The Castle Spectre: An Ancient Baronial Romance; Founded On the Original Drama of M. G. Lewis. Published by J. Bailey, Printer, 1820.

Researcher: Abby Minkin

Feudal Days

***Feudal Days; or, the Noble Outlaw. An* *Historical Romance of the Fourteenth Century***

Author: Unknown
Publisher: J. Bailey
Publication Year: 1820s
Language: English
Book Dimensions: 10.5cm x 16.5cm
Pages: 28
University of Virginia Library Catalog Entry, Sadleir-Black Collection: PZ2.F462 n.d.

Published in the 1820s by an unknown author, this chapbook set in England features a disgraced outlaw obsessed with his rival’s daughter and a religious Prior determined to right the characters on the path of piety.

Material History

Feudal Days, a simple and small book, measures 16.5cm long by 10.5cm wide and contains twenty-eight pages. The book currently has no cover; the reader first encounters a blank yellowed page. All pages in the chapbook are brittle and thin; some are slightly ripped at the edges, and the pages’ top ends are all discolored brown. A small amount of black thread loosely links these pages together, although one can observe holes on the left size of pages where thread was likely once used to tightly bind the book.

Opening the book, the reader will observe a pull-out frontispiece illustration on the left side of the first page and the title page on the right side. The title page contains the full title of the chapbook: Feudal Days; or, the Noble Outlaw. An Historical Romance of the Fourteenth Century. The title appears in different variations throughout other places in the text. At the top of the first page of text, it appears as Feudal Days; or, the Noble Outlaw without the second line, and at the top of all pages of text, it reads The Noble Outlaw; (on the left page) and Or, Feudal Days (on the right side), thus reversing the order seen on the title page. An author’s name does not appear throughout the chapbook; however, the name J. Bailey appears on the title page, the last page of text, and on the final two pages. These mentions reveal that J. Bailey of 116 Chancery Lane “printed and sold” the book and also published numerous other chapbooks listed on the last two pages of this chapbook. The title page finally lists the price of the chapbook—6 pence.

Venturing past the front pages of the book, the reader will notice that the body text is closely-set and single-spaced and that many pages do not have paragraph breaks. On most pages, the margins are roughly 1cm all around; between pages 22 and 24, the bottom margin increases slightly to 2cm. Pagination on the top of pages begins on the second page of body text at page 4 and continues to the last page of body text (26). In addition to pagination, publishers have included a few extra printed markings on the bottom of pages: “A2” is printed on what would be denoted page 3; “A3” is on page 5; “A4” on page 7; “A5” on page 9; and “B” is printed on page 25. These markings, called signature marks, were printed in order to aid the accuracy in the binding of the chapbook.

Although almost all of the book contains text without any illustration, the frontispiece on the opposite page from the title page provides the singular illustration, depicting a woman stabbing a man inside a cave that is decorated with a chandelier. This frontispiece is unique in the chapbook, both because it is the only use of color and because is the only exception to the dimensions of the chapbook: it folds outward to comprise an overall width of 21cm and height of 16.5cm. This page bears the captions of “FRONTISPIECE” above and a reference to the body text below: “Nay then Ermina, cried Rudolph, ‘I will not brook delay’—when, by one bold effort she released her hand, and seizing my shining sword”. The content of this caption, while not a direct quotation, is a condensed version of dialogue recounted on page 14 of the text; additionally, this caption is printed slightly off-the-page; for this reason, exact punctuation is uncertain.

While most attributes described in this chapbook are particular to the entire batch that this book was printed in, it is finally worthwhile to point out a few characteristics that are likely unique to this particular copy in the Sadlier-Black collection. Overall, this book is devoid of most markings. The three particular marks include potential pen markings in a straight line at the top of the final page, a circular mark which may be glue or wax, and a bit of blue color that has spotted the front and back pieces of the book, which may be the remnants of a cover or binding.

Textual History

In addition to the copy of Feudal Days held by the University of Virginia, WorldCat indicates that multiple other copies exist in print form in fifteen other libraries. These copies are not concentrated in one geographic region: a copy of Feudal Days can be found at four Canadian libraries, one United Kingdom library, two Spanish libraries, and nine United States libraries (including the University of Virginia). In addition to the print forms of Feudal Days, there is also another digitized copy of the book held by New York Public Library (NYPL), which is accessible through HathiTrust and Google Books.

The frontispiece for *Feudal Days,* featuring misprinted margins

Multiple factors support an inference that there were multiple printings of Feudal Days when it was originally published: first, the digitized NYPL copy available on HathiTrust includes an additional cover page that the University of Virginia copy does not have. This page includes a notation that the book was “Printed and Published by S. Carvalho, 18, West Place, Nelson Street, City of London”. A few pages later, the cover page indicating that the book was printed by J. Bailey is still included, and the rest of the book looks exactly identical to the version held by the University of Virginia. S. Carvalho may have reprinted the entire book or simply added an additional cover onto the original printing by J. Bailey. Second, the date that Google Books lists for the publication of the NYPL version of Feudal Days is 1829, but the University of Virginia library catalog indicates a date range of 1820 to 1829. While this may not alone be enough to pin down potentially different printings, the WorldCat catalog record for Feudal Days notes that, according to I. Maxted’s London Book Trades, J. Bailey operated at the printed address (116 Chancery Lane) only between 1808 and 1827, not 1829 (Maxted, cited in WorldCat Catalog Record). Regardless, the wide circulation of Feudal Days in international libraries indicates that even if the book only went through one printing, it may have been printed in large volumes.

WorldCat lists three contributors to Feudal Days: J. Bailey, George Cruikshank, and Friedrich Schiller. The British Museum states that J. Bailey was a British “publisher active between 1799 and 1825,” and that he traded with William Bailey, who may have been a family member, during the latter period of his flourishing years, 1823–1824 (“J Bailey”). In addition to the list of chapbooks printed by J. Bailey in the back of Feudal Days, the British Museum also lists a few prints and pamphlets printed by him, including “The life and military career of Napoleon Bonaparte,” which was illustrated by George Cruikshank, evidence that J. Bailey collaborated with Cruikshank on multiple occasions (“Pamphlet”). George Cruikshank is thought to be the illustrator or the author of Feudal Days according to different sources. Cruikshank (1792–1878) was a fairly prominent British graphic artist; he started his career as a caricaturist and then moved to book illustration. Some of his most notable works include working with Charles Dickens on illustrations for Oliver Twist from 1837–1843 and the famous temperance comic The Bottle in 1847 (Patten). Most sources, including HathiTrust and University of Virginia library catalog, credit Cruikshank with illustrations; however, Diane Hoeveler credits Cruikshank himself with adapting Friedrich Schiller’s play Die Räuber into Feudal Days (Hoeveler 197). Finally, Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805) was a famous German playwright, poet, and philosopher (Witte). Schiller wrote his own unfinished gothic novel, The Ghost-Seer, but the most concrete link between Schiller and Feudal Days is the assertion that Feudal Days is based off an English translation of Schiller’s German drama Die Räuber (Andriopoloulos 1–2, Hoeveler 197).

The second-to-last page of *Feudal Days,* featuring advertisements for other books printed and sold by J. Bailey

Die Räuber is a drama about two brothers, one of whom is cast out by the father under the influence of the evil brother and who joins a band of outlaws. Although threads of outlawdom and banditti are common to Feudal Days, it seems that the plot of Feudal Days is not an exact adaptation of Die Räuber, primarily because it is missing the element of familial rivalry (“The Robbers”). However, an opera called The Noble Outlaw may also be a source of influence for Feudal Days. The Noble Outlaw, produced in 1815 in England, is “founded upon” Beaumont and Fletcher’s opera The Pilgrim (“Noble Outlaw” Theatrical 310). The Noble Outlaw is about an outlawed robber who returns to his beloved’s residence, disguised as a pilgrim, in order to leave with her (“Noble Outlaw” Monthly 302). As a resolution of the plot, the Outlaw of the opera saves his rival’s life, and “all ends happily” (“Noble Outlaw” Theatrical 311). Similar to Die Räuber, the common thread of outlawdom is present; in addition, plot points such as breaking into a woman’s home in a disguise and saving a rival’s life as a plot resolution are common to both the opera and Feudal Days. No source exists indicating that The Noble Outlaw specifically influenced Feudal Days, but given the time proximity and the name and plot similarities, this may be the case. As evidenced by a search on HathiTrust, there are many other chapbooks with “Feudal Days” or “The Noble Outlaw” constituting part of the title. Online copies of these other chapbooks are limited, so the degree to which these related works are similar is unknown. Therefore, Feudal Days could have other influences and could have influenced other works; at the same time, these numerous titles may indicate that “Feudal Days” and “Noble Outlaw” were simply popular book titles.

Notably inaccessible is information about Feudal Days’s marketing and reception during the time period, reprintings, prequels, and sequels, and any scholarly analysis of the book after its publication. One hypothesis for the absence of such information is that Feudal Days is one in a list of many gothic chapbooks published by J. Bailey during this time period, as evidenced by the final two pages of the chapbook listing other titles (Feudal Days 26–7). Therefore, Feudal Days might not have stood out amongst its counterparts enough to warrant independent reviews or scholarship. In sum, however, the information that can be gleaned about Feudal Days does lead to several inferences regarding its relative importance. First, given the numerous copies available of the book currently, it may have been fairly popular. Second, its plot may have been influenced by multiple, mixed-media sources, including well-known theatrical works like Die Räuber or The Pilgrim. Finally, one of Feudal Days’s potential contributors, George Cruikshank, would later achieve fairly notable status later in his career.

Narrative Point of View

The present-tense section of Feudal Days is narrated by a third-person anonymous narrator who never appears in the text. This narrator relies on recounting dialogue rather than independently describing or analyzing plot. While a minority of the story is recounted by this narrator in the present tense, the text also contains flashbacks and interpolated tales, narrated by the character who experienced the flashback. The majority of the text is spent on Rodolph’s interpolated tale, in which he recounts his descent into lawlessness. This tale is narrated in the first person by Rodolph, and every paragraph opens and closes with quotation marks, to indicate that Rodolph is telling his story during continuous conversation with Father Francis. Both the anonymous narrator and Rodolph often employ long sentences, containing multiple clauses joined by semicolons and oftentimes-unclear referential pronouns. Unlike the anonymous narrator, however, Rodolph utilizes elements of description and recounts his own feelings and state of mind, rather than simply narrating the dialogue of others.

Sample Passage from Rodolph’s Interpolated Tale:

“O, Ernulf! my friend, wealth, honour, fame, are now lost to me; malignant stars have crossed my fondest hopes; Rodolph no longer bears the name of brave, but skulks an outlaw, the meanest slave of passion, who, like the prowling monster of the forest, avoids pursuit, and sheds unguarded blood.” (7)

Sample Passage of Impersonal and Anonymous Third-Person Narrator:

“Hold! (cried the Prior) God commands that ye shall not proceed, re-sheath your swords, and release your captive.” Rodolph started, and gazed with amazement on the Prior. “What man art thou, (said he) that dare oppose my will; disclose to me thy name and purpose?” – “To preach repentance, (replied the prior) and to prevent evil.” Much more the Prior said, for he found that he had gained attention.

Rodolph raised his head, and gazing on the sky, an unwonted smile played o’er his features. “Thou holy man, (he kindly said) thy exhortations wind like infant tendrils round a sinner’s heart, and have taught my soul to know what constitutes true happiness on earth; thy words have chased error from my mind.” (18)

The anonymous narrator guides the reader along through the thoughts and lives of different characters without offering any independent commentary. The only character that the narrator independently comments on is the Prior, whom the narrator repeatedly describes as virtuous. This technique of guiding the narrative with a heavy focus on transcribing dialogue makes the characters of Feudal Days appear more developed than there may otherwise be space for in a twenty-eight-page chapbook. Additionally, the oftentimes-unclear sentences may require a second or third reading of a passage. These tactics combine to make the story appear longer and more action-heavy than what may be expected for a book of its size.

Rodolph’s narration, on the other hand, provides personal and descriptive insights, showcasing broader character development and highlighting Rodolph as the protagonist of the story. Rodolph is frequently over-dramatic, utilizing exaggerated similes such as, in the passage above, “like the prowling monster of the forest” to evoke his strong feelings and emphasize the weightiness of his tumult. The Prior’s eventual ability to calm even Rodolph’s tormented mind, as shown in the sample passage, lends extra weight to the anonymous narrator’s assertion that the Prior is inarguably virtuous. Although Rodolph’s style of narration may appear disjointed from the impersonal and brief narration of the rest of the chapbook, the fact that every paragraph of his tale is offset by quotation marks renders his interpolated tale as a long-form version of the dialogue relayed by the anonymous narrator. Therefore, Rodolph’s narrative style showcases an extended version of the character development tactic utilized by the anonymous narrator and is in fact consistent with the rest of the chapbook.

Summary

Feudal Days opens with a description of the Priory of Birkenhead, which sits close to the Mersey inlet, a place where ships frequently wreck. Beyond the inlet, there lies a “bleak and dreary” waste of vegetation; the pious father of the priory (the Prior) cautions travelers to avoid the “track on the right” when navigating through the waste and take the “track on the left” (3).

On a dark night, the Prior summons one of his men, Father Francis, to accompany him down to the water so that they can encounter any struggling travelers and give them aid. As they walk down to the water, the Prior recalls when Francis was rescued in a similar condition—on a night like this, the Prior slipped and fell walking back up to the priory, and locked eyes with Francis, also suffering on the ground and exhausted due to the weather. The Prior called the other brothers of the priory, and the two men were brought up to the priory and nursed back to health.

Back in the present, the men complete their journey down to the water; as the night gets even darker, they decide to head back to the priory. Before they can leave, they catch a glimpse of a man “in warlike form” wielding a sword, but the figure disappears (5). When they return to the priory and go to sleep, the Prior is haunted by dreams related to that figure.

The next morning, Father Francis steals away from morning prayers to sit in solitude in a sea cave on Mersey’s shore. Father Francis recalls his life before becoming a priest, when he was called Ernulf. Father Francis, in mental turmoil, recounts his parting with his lover, Angela. Father Francis killed Angela’s husband, Arden; Angela also died that night in shock, despite her love for Francis. Francis pleads with God to “forgive their murders,” when, suddenly, he sees the warlike figure from last night (6). The figure turns out to be Francis’s old friend, Rodolph. Rodolph first provides clarity to Francis’s backstory, then launches into his own story, declaring himself an “outlaw” and the “meanest slave of passion” (7).

Rodolph was fighting on behalf of the current king, King Henry, against Henry’s rival Edward and commanding other lords to join the fight. Lord Silbert had not yet joined the fight for Henry, so Rodolph resolved to convince him. Rodolph traveled to Silbert’s estate, where he was received by the Lady of Lord Silbert and their daughter, Ermina. At dinner, Rodolph was not able to convince Silbert to join the fight for Henry; in fact, Silbert believed Henry’s rival Edward had a legitimate claim to the throne. The two men began trading threats of violence against each other and Rodolph left the estate quickly.

However, once Rodolph left the estate, he started thinking about Silbert’s daughter Ermina and her charms, quickly forgetting “his king, friends, and country” (9). Unable to gain access to the estate in a conventional fashion, he sought advice from his friend Lord Redwald, and decided to enter the mansion in the disguise of a peasant. When he revealed himself to Ermina inside the mansion, she told him that he had to leave; Rodolph then kidnapped Ermina with the help of Redwald’s men and brought her to Redwald’s mansion. Silbert, about to greet Edward’s troops, realized that Ermina had been taken. He later received word that a peasant had taken Ermina and offered a reward for intelligence about her whereabouts. Rodolph’s identity and location were betrayed for the reward, and Silbert arrived with his men at Redwald’s estate to fight for Ermina’s freedom. Redwald received a fatal wound during the fight with Silbert’s army, but before he died, he conveyed knowledge of a secret passageway within his mansion that could be used as an escape, and Rodolph, his men, and Ermina left via that route.

Page 14 of the main text, depicting Rodolph and Ermina’s confrontation in the cave

Once they left the castle and found themselves in nature, Rodolph turned his attention back to Ermina, whose affections towards him had not warmed. She told Rodolph that she would not marry him until her father consented, but he resolved to marry her quickly and have her “share [his] couch tonight” despite her wishes (13). He had Ermina brought “shrieking” to his cavern, and told Ermina to swear to be his (13). Before Rodolph could rape Ermina, Ermina seized Rodolph’s own sword and plunged it into his bosom. She thanked God for preserving her honor, then fled from the area.

The next day, Rodolph came to and heard that Ermina had vanished without a trace. Walking around the area with one of his men, Edric, he saw a stranger, who asked him where to find the “lawless” Rodolph (15). Rodolph dueled with this man, killed him, and read his dispatches. According to these papers, a reward of 500 marks was placed on Rodolph’s head, his lands had been bestowed to Silbert, and his mansion had been used by the rival Edward’s troops. With that development, Rodolph ends his backstory, lamenting his new position as an outlaw. Francis states that the turn of events is beneficial, for Rodolph would have violated Ermina’s honor for a few seconds of pleasure, and invites Rodolph to join the priory for the day and give his penitence.

Meanwhile, another stranger—Lord Silbert—knocks on the door of the priory and asks to stay a night before he continues on his journey. The next morning, Silbert is guided along his journey by one of the priory’s domestics, Gaspar. The Prior watches them leave and realizes that Gaspar is leading Silbert along the wrong path to the right, contrary to the Prior’s constant warnings. On this wrong path, an armed band attacks Silbert, and he is about to die when Rodolph shows up and saves Silbert’s life. Rodolph now has Silbert at his mercy, and demands that Silbert give away Ermina to him. Silbert refuses, and then the Prior shows up to intercede. He urges Rodolph to not keep Silbert captive, and Rodolph quickly acquiesces to his exhortations. Rodolph asks Silbert for forgiveness and pledges to find Ermina for him, and Silbert quickly forgives Rodolph and thanks him for saving his life. As they are about to return to the convent, they come across the wounded Gaspar, who betrayed Silbert. The Prior tells Gaspar that he must repent, and Gaspar reveals that beneath this hill lies a secret cavern where a band of murderers, his companions, live.

Rodolph and Silbert resolve to raid this secret cavern. Once they enter the cavern, they find it fully decorated and quickly kill all of the banditti. They also free a woman who had been kneeling before the chief of the band pleading for mercy. This woman is revealed as Ermina, who was taken by this band when she fled from Rodolph. The chief of the banditti took a liking to her, and threatened to kill her unless she consented to marry him.

After the battle is over, the Prior enters the cavern with a messenger of Silbert, who tells Rodolph that if he swears allegiance to Edward and lays down his arms, he will not only be pardoned, but given a royal favor. Rodolph agrees because King Henry is dead and King Edward has the mandate of the people, and Silbert and Rodolph pledge allegiance to each other.

As the party walks back to the priory, they spot a priest, falling into the water. The priest dies soon after and is revealed as Father Francis. Despite this development, the characters of the book wrap up their story happily—Silbert gives Ermina as a gift to Rodolph and consents to their marriage, Silbert and Rodolph give Lord Redwald a proper burial, and King Edward declares that the men can destroy the robber’s cave and give the proceeds to be split amongst his followers. When the Prior dies a few years later, they all mourn “the good man’s death” together (26).

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***Feudal Days; or, the Noble Outlaw. An* *Historical Romance of the Fourteenth Century***