With its twists and turns, this transatlantic tale recounts heartbreak, love, desire, and greed. Where one end is tied, another frays, keeping readers in suspense. There is no shortage of the gothic in this text.
Material History
The cover of The Commodore’s Daughter is 21.75 cm tall and 13.5 cm wide with a spine thickness of 1.5 cm. While the cover does not have a special design, the two corners and part of the spine have a softer and lighter leather than the rest of the book’s cover, which is a rougher and darker leather. There are three stories bound within this volume and the spine is decorated with gold lettering with the titles: Lucelle. — Julia St. Pierre. — Commodore’s Daughter.
This opening page for The Commodore’s Daughter contains a small note at the top that reads “complete”
The Commodore’s Daughter, by Benjamin Barker, begins approximately two-thirds of the way into this volume. The pages are clearly in excellent shape. The title page is plain and includes the title, author, and publication information: “PUBLISHED BY E. LLOYD, 12, SALISBURY-SQUARE, FLEET-STREET, AND SOLD BY ALL BOOKSELLERS.”The next page, which starts the text of the story, also includes a detailed picture and caption, as well as the word, “complete” handwritten lightly in pencil at the top of the page. The Commodore’s Daughter was originally published as a “penny dreadful” serial, which is when small cheap portions of the story were published at regular intervals and later bound together. “No. 1,” “No. 2,” etc. appear at the bottom corners of their respective pages (outside of the border created around the text) to indicate the start of a new section of the story. Though the sections were all printed, sold, and originally purchased separately, this version is “complete” because these sections have now been bound together.
The Commodore’s Daughter is sixty-eight pages long. The text is small, always surrounded by a decorative border, and relatively easy to read with decent-sized margins. This copy of The Commodore’s Daughter also shows an error made during printing. Though the final chapter appears to be Chapter XIX, this book does not have nineteen chapters, but rather, eighteen, with one entire chapter having been skipped due to misnumbering. The book leaps from Chapter XVII to Chapter XIX, which should have been correctly numbered as Chapter XVIII. This erroneous Chapter XIX is printed on the back of the page with Chapter XVII. Interestingly, the side of the page with Chapter XVII is much more pristine and in better shape than the other side, which must have been exposed at one point to different environmental conditions.
Textual History
The Commodore’s Daughter was written by Benjamin Barker—an author who was no stranger to publishing, as he released nineteen other works under his name. Two publishers produced The Commodore’s Daughter—Frederick Gleason in Boston, Massachusetts in 1846, and Edward Lloyd in London in 1847—and versions of each are housed in the Sadleir-Black Collection of Gothic Fiction.
The preface page for The Commodore’s Daughter
The Lloyd and Gleason printings of The Commodore’s Daughter contain a few key differences. For instance, the 1846 Gleason printing (which is also available on Google Books) includes the alternate title, The Dwarf of the Channel, or, The Commodore’s Daughter. While both versions contain the same story content, the Gleason’s version prints the story in columns, and this copy also lacks the illustrations present in the Lloyd version. Lloyd’s 1847 printing also initially appeared serialized as a penny dreadful.
The Lloyd printing of The Commodore’s Daughter contains a preface dated December 1847. In this preface, “the Publisher” provides context for the story’s historical significance, characters, and plot, including the backstory and setting. The final sentence of the preface reads: “The moral of the tale is unexceptionable, and as the incidents do not violate probability, and the characters are so truly drawn, the Publisher anticipates a favourable reception for the work.”
Like much of gothic literature that has faded from view, The Commodore’s Daughter has not remained widely available and the publisher’s projected “favourable reception” was short-lived, if at all. However, there are a few notable online versions. In addition to digital copies of the Gleason printing available via Google Books, Historical Texts has a digitized version of the Lloyd edition. In 2010, the British Library Historical Print Editions released a reprinting of TheCommodore’s Daughter.
Benjamin Barker has a notable publishing history. Not only did he publish nearly twenty works under his name, but he also published under the pseudonym Egbert Augustus Cowslip. One of his most well-known works under this pseudonym was Zoraida; or The witch of Naumkeag! A Tale of the Olden Time. Another of Barker’s works published under his own name, Blackbeard, or, The Pirate of Roanoke, is listed on Amazon and, as of 2021, has several reviews including one with a complaint about its historical inaccuracies, which reiterates the preface of The Commodore’s Daughter regarding the accuracy of accounts of the American Revolution.
Narrative Point of View
The Commodore’s Daughter is narrated in the third person (and occasionally with first-person plural moments) by an unnamed omniscient narrator who does not appear in the text. The narration feels relatively modern, but still contains antiquated vernacular. The paragraphs and sentences are generally lengthy. Yet, there still are inconsistencies in the style, with some paragraphs being much longer or using more eloquent vocabulary than others. The narration describes the characters and their feelings matter-of-factly (and frequently through characters’ actions), and there is very little text dedicated to introspection. The narration also contains much more description than dialogue.
Sample Passage:
Premising that the following romance is founded upon facts, with the details of which many of our readers may possibly be acquainted, and that for particular reason, we shall claim the privilege and take the liberty of introducing our principal characters under fictitious names, we now proceed to open our story as follows… (1)
By performing that this fictional story is based on facts—a common gothic trope—the narrator effectively tells the story with increased credibility (and possibly more shock value, as well). The narrator seeks to communicate a story by establishing familiarity with the characters in the book without revealing their names, thus providing an even foundation to readers and inviting everyone to enjoy the story with shared knowledge provided by the narrator from the beginning. The use of the first-person plural “we” also gives a more rounded and less singular feeling to the narration, enabling the fictional story to mimic an actual recounting of events.
Summary
In the early days of the American Revolution, before the colonies had banded together to declare their own independence, an old and cunning man by the name of Henry Hartville desired a fortune that was supposed to be inherited by a girl named Nora. Through his meticulous planning, Henry was able to trick Nora into believing that she was his daughter, all the while finding the perfect suitor for her so that Henry could obtain this wealth. The story then asks what Henry Hartville’s plan is to arrive at his goal.
The title page for The Commodore’s Daughter
An older, “deformed” man named John Ellery, frequently described in the text as a “dwarf,” has taken under his wing a “maniac” girl, Helen Morton, whose parents died years prior. John Ellery is one day met by a man carrying a letter and a black crucifix, who leaves soon after handing him these mysterious items. Despite not knowing who this man is or who the person who wrote the letter could be, Mr. Ellery accepts the commands listed out to him on the letter without any hesitation. One of those commands being to seek Nora Hartville out to keep under his wing, which the story reveals later.
Luckily, Mr. Ellery met with a ship on its way to a New England port, carrying several passengers in its cabins. Since he is able to pilot the ship, Mr. Ellery is gratefully accepted by the captain to guide it to its destination. Mr. Ellery, however, begins to take notice of a peculiar passenger whom the captain dreaded and wanted jettisoned as soon as possible. Through a careful line of questioning, Mr. Ellery finally realizes what he had hoped to find——the girl on the ship is Nora Hartville, the one the letter instructed him to keep under his wing for the next few years.
Mr. Ellery, Helen Morton, and Nora Hartville all arrive at Mr. Ellery’s home and remain there for several months in peace, as Helen and Nora become closer in what Helen describes as a sisterhood. Unfortunately, the fateful night arrives soon enough, and Miles Warton, the man who brought the letter and the crucifix to Mr. Ellery so long ago, finally comes to collect Nora Hartville for the suitor that Henry Hartville had set up for her. Miles Warton was a criminal, so Mr. Ellery knew his arrival at the cottage meant something was wrong. Prior to their meeting, Mr. Ellery heard Nora’s objections to the forced marriage, for the girl had her heart set on another man, George Wellington. Both parties soon realize that this night will not go as planned. In a shocking turn of events, Warton is killed by none other than Helen Morton, as she defends her adoptive father from being harmed by the criminal.
Through many events to follow, George Wellington, who was originally deprived of his desire to see his love, Nora Hartville, meets up with a man named Edward Hale, Helen Morton’s former lover. It is revealed that once George and Edward work together in their search for their lovers, the cruel and conniving plans of Henry Hartville can be overturned.
This page shows the final chapter, which was misnumbered as chapter nineteen though it should have been numbered chapter eighteen.
Yet before their arrival, another surprising figure appears: the former wife of Mr. Ellery, whose name is Julia. Long ago, Julia (the original owner of the black crucifix) held a gun to her husband’s chest in a fit of hatred and demanded that he follow the orders of whoever bears the crucifix. Now, Julia seeks forgiveness for the trouble she has caused, and the old man gracefully accepts. Seeing that Mr. Ellery accepted her apology, Julia knows she can now rest, and she breathes her last breath at her former husband’s humble cottage.
Finally having come to peace with his life, Mr. Ellery travels with his daughters and their suitors (who have found his cottage after a long search) to the ship of a well-known commodore, where it is revealed that the villainous Henry Hartville is aboard the vessel. Cornered and seeing that all his plans have been foiled, Henry Hartville takes a pistol to his head and pulls the trigger, allowing for Edward Hale and Helen Morton to fulfill their love and Nora and George Wellington to do the same. Through much pain and sorrow, Mr. Ellery finally gets to live a happy life away from shame.
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 sharethe 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.
Sample of text from page 17.
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.
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).
The first page of The Skeleton.
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.
Set in England and published in 1827, The Twin Sisters warns of the sexual improprieties of men, cautioning that men lead to the destruction of women, unless women are resilient in their actions.
Material History
The book containing The Twin Sisters; or, Two Girls of Nineteen: Being the Interesting Adventures of Sophia and Charlotte Melford. An Affecting Narrative by “Charlotte, one of the sisters” is a small 9.1cm by 14.15cm worn book. The book contains seventy-two pages total: pages three through forty-two detail the story of the twin sisters and the remaining thirty pages recount Orphan of the Castle: a Gothic Tale, or the Surprising History and Vicissitudes of Allan Fitz-Roberts, the Orphan Heir of the Castle of Lindisfarne by an unknown author.
The title page for The Twin Sisters. Note the white tape holding the page to the book, the tearing along the bottom edge, and the rectangular staining in the middle of the page.
This desaturated teal-colored hardcover book is discolored by light warm-brown staining. The discoloration is most exaggerated on the bottom edge of the book. The front cover has a thin crack halfway up the page, starting from the right side, tapering off until it reaches a cool dark-brown freckle near the middle of the book. This dark splotch is the most distinctive out of many, most likely unintentional, freckles splattering the cover, giving the book an aged appearance. There is also a 0.5cm in diameter distinctive stain in the upper left-hand corner, rimmed thinly with a warm dark-brown and filled with a cool-blue grey. The stain resembles a hippopotamus’s head with a small protrusion where the neck should be, giving the appearance of a small gourd.
The binding is exceedingly damaged. The book, bound similarly to modern hardcovers, has a cardboard-like substance acting as the base, wrapped in a colored paper to attach the front hardcover with the back. The desaturated orange-brown colored cardboard-like substance peaks from the corners of the book where the teal paper covering has worn through. The paper cover folds over the edges of the hardback and a rectangle of white paper, now discolored with age, pastes over it to secure it. Only severely degraded paper covers the spine. The spine is intact from the bottom until 8.2cm up from the bottom, where it is torn off completely until 11.5cm up from the bottom. A few centimeters of the paper remain attached, but only attached to the left edge of the spine. In the binding of the pages, some type of adhesive glue adhered each edge of the paper together with a thin bit of string threaded through all of the pages in three places near the center of the inner margin or gutter of the book. Each puncture falls one centimeter apart.
A sample page of The Twin Sisters.
The paper, brittle and browned from age, has the most browning along its edges. On the first page, an 8 by 3cm rectangle-shaped discoloration appears in the middle of the page. A few of the pages are ripped, but only along the bottom edge, including the first page, resulting in a brown staining its negative on the third page. A few of the odd-numbered pages are marked below the text with signature marks used by a printer; the marks appear as a combination of letters and the number 2, ranging from A2 to D2 in The Twin Sisters. The Orphan of the Castle has more damage to the paper detailing its story than The Twin Sisters. The damage evokes the interaction between watercolor paint and salt, giving the pages a speckled appearance.
When looking at a standard spread of The Twin Sisters, the thirty-four lines of text are fully justified causing the spacing between words to be on average narrower than standard. The margins are consistent at 1cm on the bottom and outside edge with the top margin 1.5cm to leave adequate room for “The Two Girls” above the text on the left page, and “Of Nineteen” above the text on the right page. All of the pages are numbered, except for the first page of The Orphan of the Castle and the first three pages of the book: the title page, the blank back of the title page, and the first page of The Twin Sisters.
Beyond a mostly illegible scrawl of what appears to be the name “Mr. Wyllis” in the top left corner of the inside of the cover, and the University of Virginia Library bookplate, there are no illustrations, marginalia, or personal marks in the book. Neither is the title of either story listed anywhere apart from the title page and the first page of each respective story. On the opening page of each story, each of the titles is shortened from their full form inscribed in the title page to just the primary title, without its subtitle.
Textual History
The title page attributes Charlotte Melford, the narrator of the story, as the author of The Twin Sisters; or, Two Girls of Nineteen: Being the Interesting Adventures of Sophia and Charlotte Melford. An Affecting Narrative; however, this is spurious, as the far-fetched story is a work of fiction. There are no other authors listed in any available copies of the book, except one WorldCat entry erroneously listing the publisher, Freeman Scott, as the author.
The copy held at the University of Virginia Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library was published in 1827 by Freeman Scott, with premises on the N.W. Corner of Tenth and Race Streets, Philadelphia. There was another publication of this story produced in London and “printed and sold by Dean & Munday, 35, Threadneedle Street” (as noted on its title page); this copy has been digitized and made available on Google Books, which lists the date at 1830, though this date is not shown anywhere on the scan of the book. The two copies are very similar in most regards but differ substantially in some ways. The Freeman Scott version is one of two stories in the chapbook, with the other being Orphan of the Castle, and The Twin Sisters accounts for pages 3 through 42; by contrast, the Dean and Munday edition was published alone and accounts for pages 8 through 36 of its book. The difference in page count is primarily due to what appears to be differences in margin size as well as page size; the body of the text is largely the same. There are, however, some discrepancies in the text, especially with punctuation. The two editions have very little consistency between their punctuations with over six changes between the two editions on the corresponding text of the first page of the Scott edition alone. Occasionally, there are also some changes in word choice: for instance, page six of the Scott edition uses “written” while the corresponding section of the Dean and Munday edition uses “wrote” on page nine. Or, later, in the same sentence, the Scott edition uses “house” while the Dean and Munday edition uses “home.” There are also some cases where there is an entire half of a sentence or full sentence present in the Dean and Munday edition that is missing in the Scott edition, such as the inclusion of “to go with her; my father she said, was visited by dissolute men in whose company it would be imprudent for us to mix” at the end of a sentence on page ten in the Dean and Munday edition but not the Scott edition. Perhaps most notably, the Dean and Munday edition includes an illustration of the scene where Charlotte is taken from her lodgings by the police as the frontispiece before the title page; this illustration is absent in the Scott edition.
The final page of The Twin Sisters. Note the warm brown staining, shaped like a rattle in the top right corner.
WorldCat also lists several other editions with various publication years, all attributed to Charlotte Melford. For instance, WorldCat lists an 1821 edition that is twelve pages long and was published for wholesale and retail in New York at 386, Broadway, W. Grattan Printer by S. King, and sold at his bookstore. There is only one library with this 1821 edition: the University of Iowa Library.
WorldCat lists an 1823 edition that was published for wholesale and retail in New York by W. Borradaile. This copy is one of the earliest editions and does not have the attached Orphan of the Castle story. This version is thirty-six pages long and includes an illustration.
WorldCat also identifies an edition with an unspecified publication date in the 1800s, and Jstor lists the date for this version as somewhere between 1814 and 1837. This edition was printed in London “for the booksellers, and for J. Kendrew, Colliergate, York.” In the WorldCat entry, James Kendrew is listed as one of the named persons in the book twice alongside Sophia and Charlotte, even though he never appears in the book. This copy appears to be similar to the Dean and Munday edition as the story spans pages 8 through 36 and has a front plate illustration like the Dean and Munday edition; however, this version is listed as being one centimeter smaller (19cm compared to 20cm). The University of York Library, in the United Kingdom, is the only library with a copy of this edition. There is a scan of this book on Jstor, in the form of a photograph of each page spread, showing that it is very similar to the Dean and Munday version of the book as the punctuation and general length and spacing of the book appear to be consistent. There is however a difference in the fonts on the title page and the image on the page before. The image in this University of York version is not colored and depicts the sisters together before they depart on their trip to London. The covers of both books also appear to be a warm brown color, however, the image of the University of York version is more degraded than the image of the Dean and Munday edition available on Google Books. The Kendrew edition of the book most likely contains another story after it within the same physical book, since in the Jstor scan the last page of text is on the left, leaving the right page blank, allowing for the ink from the image on the back of the page to show through. Furthermore, visually, there appear to be numerous pages left in the book.
Fourteen libraries in the world, including the University of Virginia Library, have a copy of the 1827 Scott edition of this book according to WorldCat, with thirteen of the fourteen being in the United States and the last copy being in Canada. The copy of the Scott edition that is owned by the New York Public Library was digitized on January 19th, 2007 onto Google Books where it can be read for free. This copy is the exact same, textually, as the Scott edition owned by the University of Virginia; however, the cover and physical quality are distinct, since the New York Public Library version appears to be in better physical condition and has a harder warm-brown cover as opposed to the worn discolored teal of the University of Virginia version. There is an odd speckling on the first few pages of the New York digitized version that is absent in the physical University of Virginia version.
There is also another book about the sisters called The Sisters, or, Virtue Triumphant : Being the Eventful History of Sophia & Charlotte Melford, which is depicted as authored by Charlotte and Sophia Melford and available on Google Books; other library catalogues, including McGill Library’s Chapbook Collection, New York Public Library Catalogue, and WorldCat just list Charlotte Melford as the author. According to WorldCat, The Sisters, or, Virtue Triumphant was printed by Hodgson & Co. in London at No. 10, Newgate-Street, sometime between 1822 and 1824, indicating that this story predates most but not all editions of The Twin Sisters. From the frontispiece of The Sisters depicted on a scan from the McGill Library, the story appears similar to that of The Twin Sisters in that they share the same general plot points: the smugglers in the sisters’ room dressed as women, Charlotte being taken by the constables, Charlotte and the Colonel, and Sophia being turned to the street (The Sisters 1). The McGill Library catalog entry notes the book is written by Robert Cruikshank, but he is most likely the illustrator of the images.
There are newer publications of The Twin Sisters—with Kessinger Publishing, LLC republishing The Twin Sisters in 2010 and Forgotten Books republishing it in 2018—that can be purchased on several online websites such as Amazon, eBay, and Better World Books.
Narrative Point of View
Charlotte, one of the sisters, narrates The Twin Sisters in the first-person point of view. The narration of the plot is fast paced, with many brief summaries of long periods of time, oftentimes spanning several years, but, at the same time, Charlotte imbues the story with haughty, verbose language in some instances, giving it a formal feel. The chapbook is told in the past tense, making it seem like a story Charlotte is reflecting on and sharing with the readers rather than being more present in the action. This gives the narration a detached sense, which is compounded by the formal titles that she calls every character. She refers to everyone in the book, except her aunt Emma, Sophia, and Susan by their formal names, her close friends, her husband (she calls him Colonel Woodly or colonel), and even people whom she despises. Charlotte focuses primarily on her actions and interactions with people rather than going in-depth about her thought processes or feelings. There is minimal dialogue throughout the novel, with paraphrasing of dialogue more common.
Sample Passage:
The coach went on with rapidity, and I found in a short time that we had left town, and were proceeding along a road that appeared very dreary. I became seriously alarmed, though, to speak with justice of his lordship, he did not offer to take the least unbecoming liberty. He felt my hand tremble, and bade we dismiss my fears, that we were only going a little way beyond Bayswater, and were near our journey’s end. We stopped at a neat white house, the coachman was ordered to knock, but the summons was several times repeated with violence before the door was opened; nor was that done till a female demanded in a harsh discordant voice, who was there at such an hour? And discovered Lord Morden to be the intruder. (21)
It seems as though Charlotte is trying to prop herself up with the narration, since, by using her extensive vocabulary to create a more complex twist on a simple narrative, she is showing off her intelligence and education. She was born into a lower-class family but was given a genteel education by her aunt, so she is trying to use this education to distinguish herself from these lower classes and establish her place in the upper class of her husband. Relatedly, she refers to people in higher social classes than herself in more formal ways, regardless of her personal feelings about them, and calls people at or below her social class by their informal first names, indicating that they are beneath her. Charlotte distances herself from this story throughout her narration; the writing is closed off and impersonal in most instances, not demonstrating the emotions of terror, disgust, loneliness, and joy. She seems to breeze past her emotions, mentioning a slight hand tremble and feeling “seriously alarmed” but then immediately changing the subject or focusing on the actions of the scene rather than her perceptions of it, as though they are nothing. This generates the distance between the events of the story and the narration, and also functions as a form of protective emotional detachment.
Summary
Charlotte, one of the sisters, begins The Twin Sisters with the purpose of the story: a warning to the “fairer sex” about the “delusive arts” of men (2). The Twin Sisters then briefly describes the background of the sisters’ family, detailing the tragedy of their lives and history of issues with financial support. Their mother dies in a horseback riding accident, pushing their father into a grief-fueled sickness from which he eventually dies. His death leaves the girls penniless under the guardianship of their aunt until she too dies a few years later.
The first page of The Twin Sisters. Note the warm brown staining on the bottom edge of the page from the tearing in the title page the page before.
The girls receive a letter from Mrs. Mowbray, a friendly neighbor one summer, offering one of them a job as a nanny in London to a rich family, the Aspleys. Having no real opportunities, they accept and venture on their journey to London.
They stop for the night at a crowded inn and are forced to share a room with two other female travelers, who they later discover to be male smugglers in disguise. These men come into the rooms after their late dinner while Sophia is sleeping and while Charlotte is pretending to sleep. Charlotte overhears them consider raping her and her sister before they drunkenly fall asleep. Much to Charlotte’s relief, the smugglers’ coach arrives before they have the chance to hurt either of the sisters.
The rest of their trip to London is uneventful. Upon their arrival, they are summoned by Mrs. Mowbray to meet the wealthy Lady Aspley. On the advice of Mrs. Mowbray, she chooses Sophia for the nannying position, but Charlotte remains living with Mrs. Mowbray.
Charlotte becomes apprehensive as the company Mrs. Mowbray keeps acts more rudely and obscenely than how she expected people of their supposed standings to behave. When she questions Mrs. Mowbray about it, she just calls her a “pretty innocent rustic,” stating that this behavior is normal for townsfolk (16). In an attempt to confirm her apprehensions, Charlotte tries to visit Sophia to compare their experiences. Mrs. Mowbray informs her that is impossible as Lady Aspley’s household, along with Sophia, had moved to Margate so their sick child could sea-bathe. When Charlotte tries to leave anyway, she is stopped by Mrs. Mowbray and some of her servants. They lock Charlotte in her bedroom, causing her to realize she and Sophia were betrayed by Mrs. Mowbray.
From a servant, Susan, who brings her food, Charlotte finds out that Mrs. Mowbray is a sex trafficker, or rather a “procuress who was employed by (to use [the servants] own words) very great gentlemen to ensnare young girls” (17). The servant also informs Charlotte that a man named Lord Morden paid Mrs. Mowbray to set this trap specifically for her as he had taken a fancy towards her. After this revelation, Charlotte bribes Susan to help her escape; Charlotte sneaks out of the room, but faints from fear and wakes up in the arms of Lord Morden. He asks her to give him her affection and to live with him. Charlotte declines his offer, stating she is imprisoned because of him, so why would she want to be with him. When he offers to free her from Mrs. Mowbray, she agrees to go with him as, in her mind, it was better to be content with him than to live enslaved to the “vile” Mrs. Mowbray (21).
Lord Morden then takes her to the house of his former mistress, Matilda, whose life he ruined after taking her innocence, and asks her to watch over Charlotte for a few days. Charlotte is furious as she feels imprisoned again, so she asks to leave. Matilda, partly because of her jealousy towards Charlotte and Lord Morden’s relationship and partly because of her anger towards Lord Morden, agrees to let her go.
Charlotte flees Matilda’s house and finds shelter at a boarding house where she is subsequently falsely arrested for forgery the next day. The victim of the forgery, Mr. Newton, comes to identify her, but brusquely proclaims Charlotte’s innocence. He then offers to take Charlotte back to her room at the boarding house to collect her things. In the carriage ride, he solicits her for sex as he believes her to be a prostitute. Charlotte is horrified by the offer and demands to be let out of the coach. On his refusal, she starts screaming, causing the coach to stop to make sure everything is alright. Charlotte uses this chance to escape.
Charlotte stops at a toy store to rest from her vigorous dash away from the carriage. The owner, a nice old woman named Mrs. Brent, agrees to provide her room and board. Charlotte then gets a job as an English teacher with connections from her bank. Things seem to be looking her way, until one day Charlotte runs into Sophia on a walk. Sophia tells her that she should have yielded to Lord Morden as she would be safe from the danger of the world. Sophia then goes on to share her experiences in the time they were apart and how happy she is with her place in life. Mrs. Mowbray introduced Sophia to a wealthy man named Mr. Greville. He raped her, took her on as his mistress, and is now supporting her lavish lifestyle financially.
Some time passes before her next interaction with Sophia in the form of a letter asking for a meeting. Sophia looks like a wreck; Mr. Greville found a new mistress and abandoned her, forcing her into prostitution, but she still refused to accept Charlotte’s help. She says she is content and happy with her life, that she has time to repent after she retires.
Time passes and Charlotte falls in love with Mrs. Brent’s nephew, Colonel Woodly. Despite the fact that he likes her as well, she feels the marriage is one of unequals. She will sully his reputation with marriage and his mother would never agree to it. His mother, however, overhears this conversation and agrees immediately to the union. They marry and have a successful marriage with two children.
Three years after the marriage, Mrs. Brent arrives, announcing that she found Sophia passed out in the streets and took her in. Sophia had experienced all of the degradations that came with prostitution: she was abandoned by her pimp; sick, penniless, with nothing more than the clothes on her back. Charlotte then helps care for her physically and spiritually. She now lives a very pious, peaceful life in South Wales.
The Twin Sisters, or, Two Girls of Nineteen : Being the Interesting Adventures of Sophia & Charlotte Melford. An Affecting Narrative. London : Printed for the booksellers and for J Kendrew Colliergate York, pp. 1–17, https://jstor.org/stable/10.2307/community.29959877.
Tales of the Passions; The Married Man; An English Tale: In Which is Attempted an Illustration of the Passion of Jealousy in Its Effects on the Human Mind
In this 1811 book by English author George Moore, an envious husband wreaks havoc until finally learning to trust his family and control his passions.
Material
History
The gothic novel, Tales of the Passions; The Married Man; An
English Tale: In Which is Attempted an Illustration of the Passion of Jealousy
in Its Effects on the Human Mind, was written by English author George
Moore. Its full title stands as such, but either Moore or his publisher
shortened the full title to Tales of the
Passions in certain places within the novel. For example, the first title
page, located after a single blank page at the beginning of the book, simply
uses Tales of the Passions as its
title. The title page also includes the author’s name, written as George Moore,
and publishing information, including the name of the publishers, G. Wilkie and
J. Robinson, and where it was printed in London, which was Paternoster Row. It
also lists the publication date of 1811. This title page is followed by an
uncut page, meaning that for this particular novel the top of the page remains
folded and unbroken. Because large pages were folded to create a bound book, it
was common practice for manufacturers to sell books uncut. This means that the
pages remained folded over at either the top or side of the novel, which made
printing cheaper and thus made novels more affordable to the common consumer.
When readers bought the books, they could either have had the books taken to a
binder who would cleanly cut the novel, or they could cut it themselves, which
is apparently what the reader of this particular copy of the novel did, since this
person never ended up slicing open the page in question.
The title page for Tales of the Passions: Jealousy
This uncut page reads “Tale II:
Jealousy” with the word “Jealousy” printed far beneath Tale II and further
separated by a small, floral symbol. This page is also printed in a slightly
more intricate font than the title page. Such a font seems to be suggestive of
handwritten cursive due to the ways the letters curve and flow. Following this
page is the second title page with the novel’s full title. Interestingly, the
font size of different sections of the title change; for example, the “Married
Man” portion of the title is quite large relative to the size of the other
text, but the “In which it is attempted” is quite small. Furthermore, Tales of the Passions is also engraved
in cursive on the spine of the novel below the surname Moore. Two lines also
bracket this combination, separating it from a numerical 2, indicating the
volume number, written several inches further down the spine.
Aside from the pages the reader cut
to consume the novel, it otherwise largely remains unchanged; thus, it is
paper-bound with a plain hard cover and unevenly cut pages such that they stick
out irregularly on the novel’s side. Aside from the ragged nature of the pages,
it appears strikingly similar to the way hardback books look today with their
book jackets removed. The cover is a plain navy blue color with a tan binding,
and both the binding and the cover of the novel are made out of paper. It
should be noted that at the time, books were originally sold simply like this;
not only were the pages sealed at the top or side like aforementioned, but they
were also unevenly cut, as they were thus cheaper to print, causing them to
also be more inexpensive. However, if an individual had enough wealth, he or
she might go to a binder and have the novel rebound in leather and the pages
cut evenly. Neither happened with this copy.
This page remains uncut
The state of the book is in
relatively good condition. It is largely unmarked save for a couple of light
stains on some of the pages, most of which are inexplicable save for one page
that appears to be stained with what looks like ink splotches. There is also
what appears to be perhaps indirect ink stains or charcoal visible on the
bottom edges of the pages of the novel when the book is closed. Other notable
physical alterations of the book include the presence of a small insect on page
243. It is unknown what species of insect it is without the aid of an
entomologist, but more tantalizing is the consideration of how long it has been
inside the book: whether it was preserved accidentally by the original owners
or trapped in its afterlife in the archive.
The pages themselves are lightly
tanned by age, but do not seem to be exceptionally delicate due to the fact
that the paper the manufacturer used is sturdy and thick. There are no
illustrations throughout the text, and no written comments either; indeed, the
only visible signs of it being read before are the aforementioned stains. The
set of the page includes large amounts of white space and copious margins with
large text set far apart. Thus, while the novel itself is long at around 400
pages, the structure of the print accounts for much of the relative length of
the novel.
Textual
History
Tales
of the Passions was written by
George Moore, published by G. Wilkie and
J. Robinson, and printed by S. Hamilton. The publishers, G. Wilkie and J
Robinson, were involved with a variety of novels, including renditions of
Shakespeare’s plays (Murphy 347–48). There is little information available
about the author, George Moore, which contrasts with the informal, welcoming
tone of his preface, where he directly discusses his reasoning for why he wrote
the novel as well as explaining the different plot choices he decided to keep
in the final version. Moore also included a dedication where he discloses that
he is independent from patrons as well as noting how important independence is
to him on a personal level. Furthermore, he also dedicates the novel to his
mother. It should be noted that in regards to Moore’s own obscurity, there is a
significant confounding variable: a far more famous Irish writer from later in
the nineteenth century shares his name exactly. Thus while many results do
appear when searching for the name George Moore, they all appear to be about
this other writer.
This second full title page includes a different title
There is some evidence that Tales of the Passions, while never truly
popular at any point of history, received some recognition when it was
initially published. For example, the novel is listed in a British periodical
where new British novel releases were listed for the year, although it is only
listed by name and without summary in a list with hundreds of name-only
releases (“List of New Works” 514). More notably, there are also records of two
articles written in the early nineteenth century that focus on Moore’s work. A
literary journal called Monthly Review reviewed
Tales of the Passion: Jealousy in
1812.The review provides insight
into how Moore’s writing style and plot may have been similarly received by the
general public. The article’s author sums up the way Moore writes perfectly:
“without climbing to the eminences of his profession, he walks much above the
plain of ordinary novelists” (Tay 388). Furthermore, the article goes on to
mention that the story was made too complex by “unintelligible relationships
between subordinate personages,” and that the West Indies plotline was
“improbable, difficult to remember, and not essential to the catastrophe” (Tay 388).
His next section of the review focuses on the lack of realism in Moore’s
flowery prose of the novel, giving the specific example of Osmond’s speech when
he is ill and near death. The reviewer notes how the fact that Osmond’s speech
patterns do not change even then weakens the effect of Osmond’s illness because
sick minds are more “concise” and “abrupt” (Tay 390). The article then argues
that the focus of Felix’s jealousy should have been concentrated on one person,
and that the reader should have been led to believe the wife was cheating as
well to give Felix’s character more moral standing and depth.
There is also another review in Monthly Review about Moore’s Tales of the Passions, but this one
focuses on the first volume of the series, originally published in 1808 and focusing on the passion of revenge. This
reviewer structures his article in a similar way to the review of the second
volume, as both begin by recommending various changes they feel would make the
novel more powerful. Both of the reviews make note of the fact that Joanna
Baillie’s Plays on the Passions
inspired Mooreto write his novel,
but this second review goes into far more depth about the subject. It even goes
so far as to include an entire statement that Moore released regarding the
topic, where he discusses how the idea of focusing a work on various passions
was an engaging one, and how he enjoyed Baillie’s work so much he decided to
write his own “moral tale” about domestic life focused on a single passion (Meri
262). The reviewer then goes on to discuss the plotline of the first volume,
and concludes by noting that while Moore “evidently possesses powers which are
calculated to raise him to distinction in this walk of literature,” his work is
“not polished nor accurate” and he has “palpable violations of grammar and of
propriety” (Meri 266).
Another possible influence for Moore’s writing of the novel comes from a quote he includes in the title page of Tales of the Passions: Jealousy, where he added a section from what he titles as Collins’s “Ode on the Passions,” but in actuality is part of William Collins’s “The Passions: An Ode for Music.”
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting, Possest beyond the Muse’s painting, By turns they felt the glowing mind, Disturb’d, delighted, raised, refined: ‘Till once, ’tis said, when all were fired, Fill’d with fury, rapt, inspired […] Each, for Madness ruled the hour, Would prove his own expressive power.
Unlike Baillie’s plays, it is
impossible to know precisely how this poem might have inspired the text or
whether Moore decided to include some verses that fit well with his novel’s
thematic purpose and plotline.
Other than the two
nineteenth-century reviews and one mention in a periodical, Moore and his work
are not well-documented on either the Internet or in print form. There are
digital editions of both volumes of Tales
of the Passions available, on Google books. Yet they appear to
have had only one run of publishing in the nineteenth century. The novel also
lacks adaptations to various other forms of media. Combined with the two
reviews that concentrated on the mediocrity of his novels, such a lukewarm
response to Moore’s works have likely contributed to the fact there has been a
near-complete absence of scholarly attention on Tales of the Passions.
Narrative
Point of View
Tales
of the Passions: Jealousy is
narrated in the third person. This third-person narration focuses on the
thoughts and feelings of the main character, Felix Earlvin, hinting at a
third-person limited point of view, although this framework is complicated by
the fact the narrator occasionally also discusses thoughts and events Earvin is
not aware of. Because Earlvin’s mindset is the one that directs the novel the
vast majority of the time, the narration thus hovers between limited and
omniscient third-person narration. Due to the fact that the novel explicitly
explores the idea of jealousy as an emotion, there are many and repetitive
examples of Earlvin thinking about the way he feels and how he is acting, and
the plot and action are often interrupted by these episodes of reverie and
meditation on his actions. The writing style itself often uses simple and
uncomplicated language, but the sentences can be long and complicated by many
phrases, creating runon sentences that can be difficult to follow.
Sample Passage:
But Onslow heard him not, while Earlvin kneeling, by the side of his wife, pressed his lips to her cold and pallid cheek in silent agony. In a short time two or three persons arrived at the spot, and the driver informed them of the circumstances which had happened. From the appearance of Mrs. Earlvin, they supposed surgical assistance could be of little service, and therefore prepared to secure him who had wounded her, as the first and principal duty incumbent upon them. The instant, however, they attempted to move him, he was roused from a torpid state of suffering to the most violent emotions of anguish and despair. He repelled their efforts with a power and resolution they had much difficulty to overcome. He called on the names of his children and declared himself the murderer of their mother. He entreated, he implored, that he might not be removed from her side and struggled to release himself with convulsive energy. At length he sunk on the ground incapable of farther resistance, and was conveyed to a small house near the road-side, insensible to the vulgar and cruel upbraidings of those by whom he was surrounded. (394)
The narrative style of Tales of the Passions: Jealousy is
interesting in that the writing articulates some complex thematic ideas.
However, the power of Moore’s writing is often undermined through the presence
of seemingly unintentional runon or awkward sentences. Furthermore, the
narrator often repeats his key ideas in the text in the same language every
time, making his central theme seem triter each time he repeats it. As for
Moore’s choice to focus his writing on telling the story from Felix’s
perspective while also occasionally including the thoughts of other characters,
such a framework is convenient because the shifts occur when the narrator needs
to explain a plot point that would otherwise be difficult to explain from
simply Felix’s point of view. Such a method of storytelling is also important
when considering the fact that Tales of
the Passions: Jealousy functions in large part as a mystery, so the shifts
in point of view not only allow the narrator to reveal new information but also
add a flair of dramatic irony.
Summary
Tales
of the Passions: Jealousy
focuses on an Englishman named Felix Earlvin. Earlvin is a moderately wealthy
nobleman whose kind heart permits him to marry a woman far below his rank.
Nevertheless, his wife, Julia, is extremely well tempered and kind, and for
several years they have lived happily in the countryside with their children.
Felix and Julia’s marriage is generally peaceful, but Felix has one fatal flaw:
he becomes jealous very easily, which, combined with his fear of discussing his
thoughts and secrets with other people, can lead to conflict and chaos. Julia
is aware of this personality trait, but has, up to the point when the novel
starts, been easily able to dispel his jealous fears.
Nonetheless,
at the beginning of the novel an event occurs that becomes a catalyst for
problems in their marriage. Felix is on his daily evening walk when he hears
his wife’s name. He follows the sound and finds a dilapidated hovel with an old
woman and a well-dressed young man inside. He sees the old woman clearly but
the young man is hidden in shadow. Felix is instantly suspicious, but vows to
return to the hut the next day to talk to the woman alone because he is unarmed
and could not take the man on if it turned into a fight. That night, he shares
dinner with his wife and his neighbor, Mr. Osmond, and Felix is able to largely
act normal until he happens to read an article in the newspaper after dinner
about a couple that was going to get divorced because the wife was unfaithful,
a problem compounded by the fact that the couple has children. Julia, when she
hears of the case, initially says she thinks the wife still deserves pity, but
because of the scene Felix had witnessed in the forest, he has an outburst at
her, which causes his wife to nearly cry and remain quiet and dejected for the
rest of the night. Felix is stressed and starts to feel ill; they are forced to
call Dr. Sulfit. This doctor is greedy and selfish, and throughout the novel he
overcharges characters for his medicine or makes up illnesses in order to
receive more benefits. However, he also often moves the plot along, as he does
in this scene, where he discusses how he saw a finely dressed stranger
wandering around their property on a nice horse, and that this stranger passed
the house several times and then disappeared without speaking to anyone. Felix
then asks the doctor whether he has also seen any old women, a fact that Julia
seems very alarmed by, but the doctor says he has not seen anyone.
Nevertheless, Felix continues to be agitated by what he has seen, and he ends
up traveling back to the hovel after he has fully recovered only to learn from
a neighboring farmer that the hovel had not been lived in for years and it has
thus been demolished a couple days ago.
At this point, the novel transitions
to the backstory of Felix’s grandfather, Abel. Abel had been a poor orphan who
a farmer adopted in order to use him for menial labor, though he was also very
intelligent. Abel grew to admire and desire wealth because the farmer would
regularly favor his children over Abel by giving them all the material goods
they desired while leaving Abel with nothing. When he left the farmer’s abusive
household for London, Abel worked hard to accumulate wealth, and eventually
became an accountant with a sizable income, which, due to the fact Abel loved
money and would never spend it on anything other than necessities, he was able
to amass a sizeable fortune. He also married his employer’s daughter out of
desire to further increase his status. His wife dies within two years, but she
gives him a son that Abel adores because he dreams of passing on his wealth to
his progeny and becoming more officially part of the elite circle. His
father-in-law dies and leaves him substantial sums of money, and he also
becomes increasingly richer from things like trade, speculations, and contracts
with companies. Thus, he raises his son like an aristocrat, sending him to Eton
and Oxford and giving him the best private tutors and education possible.
However, this education does little because his son is naturally unintelligent.
He is also noted to be a nice person, but one easily taken advantage of. This
becomes a problem when Abel’s son goes abroad because he quickly becomes
corrupted and increasingly greedy and prideful. One of Abel’s friends suggests
marriage, a solution also convenient for the friend because he has only
moderate wealth and a daughter of marriageable age. This daughter proves to be
a greedy and controlling person, and she quickly becomes the unofficial leader
of the household, controlling the finances and allowing her husband to be the
laughingstock of their friends. When they give birth to Felix, he becomes his
grandfather’s last hope for passing on his vision of preserving his household’s
name. He teaches Felix to resent his father’s weakness and his mother’s
transgressions, and leads him to fear being in a marriage like his parents’.
Thus, Felix values morality more than wealth, and although Julia’s father, Mr.
Roseville, is an unprincipled, immoral gambler, Julia herself is intelligent
and honorable. They end up courting for two years because Felix wavers over
whether he wants to marry her due to her father’s sinful nature, but when her
father dies, he decides to marry her and they retire to his largest estate,
which is located in the countryside in a little English town called
Monmouthshire.
Back in the present, Felix continues
to be disturbed about the scene he saw in the woods, but he also realizes he is
being cruel to his family. He ends up seeking advice from his neighbor, Osmond,
again. Osmond is raising a teenage girl named Caroline Almond, even though they
are ostensibly not related. She is intelligent and accomplished but he does not
allow her to go very far from him. During their conversation, Osmond hints at
the possibility of Julia duping Felix, and he also discusses how he became celibate
to avoid what he calls “female manners” (60). Several days later, Felix returns
from his walk to find Julia at her desk reading a letter that appears to reduce
her to tears, which reinforces his fears.
A sample page of text from within Tales of the Passions: Jealousy
The next time the doctor visits, he
tells a story about how Caroline accidentally ended up falling into a lake on
Osmond’s property and was saved by the son of another noble, Sir William. The
son, Herbert William, took her back to the house, but Caroline remained
distressed. Julia asked the doctor if she could see Julia since Osmond is away.
When Julia arrives at the Osmond residence, Osmond has already returned, but he
acts cold to Herbert as well as Caroline, whom he chides for being careless.
Indeed, rather than appearing to be worried, he is irate about the obligation
he now has to pay back to the William family. When Julia queries Caroline about
his behavior, she confesses she wants them to be closer, but she had previously
attempted to close the gap between them and he continued to be apathetic to her.
Herbert is clearly fond of Caroline, but Osmond’s antipathy forces him to leave
quickly. Julia also likes Caroline, and she invites her to the Earlvin
household, but Caroline tells her it is likely impossible for her to visit
because of Osmond’s restrictions upon her.
The next large incident in Felix and
Julia’s life occurs when Herbert visits the household when Felix is there.
After he leaves, Julia innocently praises his virtues to Felix, which causes
Felix to feel lonely and jealous. During a visit with Osmond, Felix learns that
Caroline will be unable to visit because the two are going to London
indefinitely. Osmond also insinuates that Herbert is dangerous and that his
popularity in the village is limited to only women, and that Julia’s virtue
could fall to him. The doctor, who is present to see Caroline, mentions how he
had just seen Herbert going to the Earlvin residence for what Herbert called
“urgent business” (111). Felix becomes furious because it seems to him as
though Julia attempted to get him out of the house to see the young man, who he
views as superior in youth and novelty to him. After Felix leaves, Osmond’s
purpose is also revealed: he lusts after Felix’s wife, but he always believed
it was hopeless because their marriage appeared very resilient. However, one
day he happened upon Felix’s penchant for petty jealousy and now uses it to
attempt to drive them apart so he can have Julia.
Meanwhile, Felix attempts to think
of ways to avoid Herbert and Julia coming in contact with each other. He
finally comes to the conclusion that if he, like Osmond, went to London with
Julia and his children, he could get Julia away from Herbert in the
countryside. Julia is initially wary of this proposal but ultimately agrees to
go. However, when Felix returns from his evening walk, he finds his wife
conversing once again with Herbert. Of course, he is thrown back into complete
disarray. Luckily, Julia realizes Felix’s problem stems from jealousy and she
explains to him that Herbert is loves Caroline and wanted advice from Julia.
This statement nearly causes Felix to confess his jealous fears to her, but he
ends up deciding it would cause her added injury and does not do so.
They begin their travels to London
and end up stopping in a small inn along the way. The inn is small enough it is
difficult to fit Felix’s entire party of servants, and the innkeeper ends up
attempting to kick out a paying customer from the inn. Felix stops him and ends
up talking to the older man, a failed poet named Selville who has endured great
hardship but has become a more moral person because of it. When they arrive in
London, they find Osmond is having a party that evening. The party is difficult
for Felix; he overhears men talking about his wife and becomes increasingly
infuriated. He goes to sit with Julia and implies he wants to leave, but she
appears to be greatly enjoying interacting with everyone. One person in
particular, Mr. Onslow, a wealthy man from West India who Osmond ostensibly
wants Caroline to marry, disturbs Felix with his conduct towards Julia, as the
two act far too friendly for his comfort. Felix becomes ruder and ruder, and
ends up spoiling the atmosphere.
Julia and Felix argue once again
when they return to their London lodgings, but end up forgiving each other until
Julia gets a letter about a masquerade ball from Onslow. Felix tells her she
should not go, and she agrees but stipulates he should go instead, telling him
he should have some fun. Felix is initially compliant but begins to worry why
she might want him gone. During the party, Caroline asks him to set up a
meeting between her and Julia, and he agrees to do so. He is then dragged away
by a person he describes as an “obi woman,” who acts like a seer or magical
being (244). She asks him if he wants his future worries told, and believing
she is in jest, he agrees, and she mysteriously answers with “look to your
wife” (246). Afterwards, he overhears Onslow and this woman arguing. The woman
removes her mask, and Felix recognizes her as the woman he saw in the woods.
When Felix returns to their
accommodations, he is surprised and incensed that Herbert came from the
countryside to meet with Julia. Julia explains he came to see Caroline away
from Osmond. The next day, someone Felix met at Osmond’s party, Mr. Parrot,
also comes to meet with Felix. He had promised to find information about Onslow
for Felix, and he reveals the person Felix saw was Onslow’s mother. She was
briefly romantically involved with Mr. Wellsford, and although he decides not
to marry her he later adopts her son. He moves to Jamaica after inheriting a
plantation. He gets married twice, once to a frivolous woman who leaves him and
takes his first-born daughter away from him, and again to a woman who gives him
another daughter but quickly dies from disease. His second daughter goes to
England to avoid greater illness, but before Wellsford can settle his
plantations and go to England to be with his daughter, he hears word she has
died. His loneliness over his lost children prompts him to adopt Onslow as his
own son. Mr. Parrot also reveals Onslow and Julia had previously met each
other, but yet they had acted like strangers at the party. Indeed, the man the
doctor saw in front of the house and Felix saw inside the hovel was in fact
Onslow, and the two had apparently met while Felix was out. Felix is terrified
and extremely jealous, and while Parrot attempts to reassure him, he is too far
gone.
Julia goes to Osmond’s house to see
Caroline, leaving Felix jealous. When Julia arrives, she first meets with Osmond.
During their conversation, Osmond confesses he is wants to enter a relationship
with her. She becomes terrified, and attempts to leave but Osmond stops her.
Osmond accosts her verbally, telling her it is her fault Felix is becoming
abusive because of the fact she had a visitor she did not tell her husband
about even though she knew he would be jealous, implying he knew Onslow visited
her several months prior. Onslow coincidentally arrives and saves Julia. In his
carriage, Julia initially wants to return to Caroline, but Onslow insists they
continue on their way. She also asks to go straight home, but he insists on
riding through a park to aid her recovery of her spirits. Felix, on his way to
Osmond’s place, sees Onslow and Julia in the coach together, which causes his
jealousy to reach new heights. When he talks to Osmond, Osmond convinces him to
go to a tavern instead of returning home, where he would hear the truth about
his intentions from Julia, and also further convinces Felix to hold on to his suspicions
by saying Julia wants to stop the marriage between Caroline and Osmond but not
explaining her reasoning behind it.
This page of texts shows ink splotches from a previous reader
The next chapter delves into more
backstory, explaining that Osmond is Wellsford’s second wife’s brother and
thus, in order to execute the will, Onslow had to meet with Osmond, which is
why he went to Monmouthshire in the first place. Onslow also explains that
Wellsford’s first wife eloped with Roseville, who was a ship captain, in order
to leave for England, and that Julia is in actuality Wellsford’s first
daughter. When Onslow explains these circumstances to Osmond upon his visit,
Osmond pretends it is his first time hearing it, even though in actuality he
heard Roseville confess the story on his sickbed. He advises Onslow to meet with
Julia secretly to tell her the truth about her life. He explains this to Onslow
by saying that even though Felix is a good person, he is easily jealous so it
would be better to not let him know about the visit, and that perhaps hearing
about Roseville, who Felix detested, would also inflame his anger. He also asks
that Onslow not let anyone know he is involved because it might cause more
problems. Onslow agrees on both accounts, and lets Julia know by letter he is
coming to visit. Julia sets up the time for when Felix is gone for similar
reasons to the ones Osmond gave. Onslow’s mother was there because she wanted
to receive better clothes from him in order to travel to Bristol, and they
moved into the hovel because the weather turned for the worse, and thus
everything had a logical reason behind it.
On his way to the tavern, Felix
happens upon Selville, the poet he met in the inn on the way to London, and he
is in such great despair he rambles loosely about jealousy and then asks
Selville to accompany him to the tavern. Selville is so worried about Felix he
agrees, but his presence does little to prevent Osmond from convincing a
drunken Felix to vow to leave his wife and challenge Onslow to a duel to the
death. Osmond then returns to the main area of the inn to ask Selville to
deliver Felix’s dueling letter to Onslow, which Selville debates doing. He
ultimately decides to carry it out but to discuss it with Felix in the morning
when he is not intoxicated.
Osmond returns to his London home
questioning whether it was morally correct of him to carry out his plan. When
he arrives at his home, he finds Dr. Sulfit there, who tells him Herbert is in
London in order to see Caroline. Osmond asks his servants to bring Caroline to
him, but he learns she has left for the Earlvin’s household, causing him to
worry that the two will find each other and elope. He thus sends the doctor in
order to find Caroline and bring her back.
Felix continues to obsess over his
impending duel with Onslow, and fetches a pistol and horse to attempt to find
him. He sees a carriage and wonders whether it holds Onslow and Julia, and when
finds that it does, he is furious. Julia is so terrified that there is a man
with a gun she falls against Onslow, which makes Felix even more enraged to the
point he prepares to shoot himself in the temple and commit suicide. However,
Julia looks back upon him, recognizes him, and then appears to recoil,
something that makes him so angry he aims the pistol towards the carriage. His
wife starts to run to him in order to embrace him, but he ends up shooting her
instead and appears to kill her. He instantly is in the agony of remorse and
refuses to leave her body. However, she is not dead and she quickly gets
medical attention. The surgeons call for all people who have medical
experience, and they come across Dr. Sulfit, who explains he is looking for
someone in order to help his friend. During the doctor’s explanation, Onslow
realizes Osmond must have been tricking all of them and he goes with the doctor
in order to find him and challenge him to a duel himself to compensate for the
betrayal. Osmond accepts the duel, but Onslow easily shoots him, although he is
not killed and only badly wounded.
Julia and Osmond slowly recover from
their wounds, while Selville attempts to comfort Felix in his misery over his
violent actions. Osmond, in an attempt to repent his sins, calls Caroline and
Selville to his bedside the next morning to explain his life. He too had a
frivolous, extravagant mother who caused their father to lose his riches and
fortune, and because he was the favorite of his mother, he became a greedy,
weak man. Osmond lived for a time in the Indies close to his wife and her
husband, Wellsford. However, he moved back to England in order to attempt to
gain a larger fortune, which he did by investing Wellsford’s properties. Thus,
when the woman taking care of Wellsford’s second child said a fever had taken
ahold of the girl and would likely kill her, he told Wellsford the girl was
dead both because he did not want his shady dealings discovered, as Wellsford
was unlikely to return to England if his daughter died, and because he thought
she would anyway. However, she did not, and he instead took her in as a weak
form of retribution. Thus, Julia and Caroline are revealed to be in fact
sisters.
Julia recovers in about a month, and
she forgives Felix for nearly killing her and instead embraces him together
with their children. Felix now feels unworthy of their love, but he slowly
attempts to right his wrongs by treating them correctly for the rest of his
life. Osmond moves to Lisbon to attempt to recover, but he grows continually
weaker, and without anyone who loves him, he dies in only a few months. Herbert
and Caroline get married, which cools Herbert’s passions slightly and makes him
more mature. Felix and Julia stay together and grow old watching their children
grow up. From his transgressions, Felix realizes the importance of his duties
he has to his family, as well as how important it is to control passion in
order to maintain happiness.
Bibliography
Collins, William. “The Passions: An Ode for Music.” English Poetry II: From Collins to Fitzgerald. Bartleby. www.bartleby.com/41/296.html.
“List of New Works.” The British Review, and London Critical
Journal, No. 1 (Jan. 1811): 514.
Meri. “ART. VII. Tales of the Passions; in which is Attempted an Illustration of their Effects on the Human Mind.” Monthly Review, Vol. 57 (Nov. 1808): 262–66.
Moore, George. Tales of the Passions; The Married Man; An English Tale: In Which is
Attempted an Illustration of the Passion of Jealousy in Its Effects on the
Human Mind. London,\ G.
Wilkie and J. Robinson, 1811.
Murphy, Andrew. Shakespeare in Print: A History and Chronology of Shakespeare
Publishing. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2003.
Tay, Jr. “ART. VI. Tales of the
Passion; in which is attempted an Illustration of their Effects on the Human
Mind: each Tale comprized in one Volume, and forming the Subject of a single
Passion.” Monthly Review, Vol.67 (Apr. 1812): 388–90.
In this chapbook set in France, a love story is hindered by a villain’s lust and Machiavellian quest for power, full of abduction and murder.
Material History
Clairville Castle; or, the History of Albert and Emma with the Death of the Usurper Morenzi is embedded with a varied and interesting material history. The aforementioned title of the book appears on the first page, and later, throughout the pages on the upper margins. However, the subtitle is omitted from these subsequent pages. Interestingly, the author’s name does not appear whatsoever, even on the title page.
The title page for Clairville Castle
The chapbook is in surprisingly good condition for being over two hundred years old. The paper itself is good quality, albeit a little brown. However, the pages will not last indefinitely because the novel has been disbound, so if one were to turn the leaves the novel would loosen. Therefore, the Sadler-Black collection might rebind it in the future to prevent this from occurring. The physical dimensions of the book measure out to be 17.3 cm by 10.6 cm. The page count is thirty-eight, including a second short story titled Ogus & Cara-Khan; or the Force of Love appended at the end but not mentioned on the title page. The addition of this second story is not explained, unless perhaps both novels were a part of a larger collection of stories. Unfortunately, while the edition of the novel that is a part of the Sadler-Black library collection was previously bound, no details of the original binding are available.
The overall appearance of the book is cheap (most likely meant to be discarded like other copies), unblemished (there is a relative lack of markings for such a copy), aged (comparatively to modern publications), and of middling quality. Offset is another descriptor here–the text was conveyed (aka “offset”) from a plate to a rubber blanket to a printing surface, which is a common practice in printing. The body pages themselves contain minimal white space, despite the font being in a relatively small size. An interesting aspect of the font of the text is the use of the long s, an archaic form of the lowercase s, which resembles an f more than an s. It generally replaces the single s and also one of the letters s when there is a double s. This used to be a somewhat common practice but has long fallen out of fashion.
The frontispiece for Clairville Castle
The novel begins with a frontispiece illustration, facing the title page on the right-hand, or recto page. It shows an illustrated image of a man and a woman in antiquated outfits, with the woman sitting on a chair, seemingly in grief—the man is comforting, or trying to comfort, her. They are in a room with a single window, allowing light to enter the space. This scene is not explicated in the chapbook, but could be interpreted as illustrating many parts of the text. The illustration itself is an copper-plate engraving.
Something notable is that the title page has offsetting. The technical reason for this is that there were two printing presses used as they specialized in different types of printing, one for the text and one for the illustration; these would later be combined. Due to this, different inks are used, resulting in offsetting from the oxidation, which forms a brownish rectangle.
Finally, there is one mark of ownership within the book, on the first page, for one Robert Allen. Also, on page thirty-six, there is a printer’s imprint featuring the name of the printer who printed the text—A. Kemmish. The title page contains the name of the publisher—J. Kerr.
Textual History
The title page for the attached story, Ogus & Cara-Khan
Clairville Castle; or, the History of Albert and Emma with the Death of the Usurper Morenzi was originally published by A. Kemmish for J. Ker. Several copies were seemingly published for this book collector, about whom there is much biographical information. John Ker was the third duke of Roxburghe and lived from 1740 to 1804. There is no date of publication on Clairville Castle and no clear indication in source material of its publication date, though one WorldCat entry estimates 1805 as a potential year of publication.
Jon Ker owned an expansive personal library, which continued to grow throughout his life. He even arranged the marriage of Anna Ker into his family, who was a gothic writer herself, and may have influenced some of the additions to his large collection of books. “Roxburghe books are today the prized possessions of many of the world’s great libraries, and their collector is immortalized by the distinction of having named after him one of the most exclusive and famous of bibliographical societies, the Roxburghe Club” (Hillyard). This aligns with the inclusion of this chapbook in the Sadler-Black collection and many others throughout the U.S. and abroad.
There were no subsequent editions of Clairville Castle published; it was originally written in English, and was never translated into any other languages. There is no preface or introduction to the chapbook, and this appears consistent with the other editions of the novel, all of which were published at the same time. The text also does not appear to have any prequels or sequels in publication, although there are several chapbooks from this time period featuring similar characters and plots.
The final page of Ogus & Cara-Khan
There are no contemporary reviews for the text, and so it is unknown whether it was received poorly or positively at the time of publication. The text also does not appear to have been advertised, and does not appear to have been reprinted following its original publication—the copies that exist are as follows: one in the University of Virginia library, one at the Stanford Library, one at Harvard University in the Houghton Library, one at Oxford University, one in the British Library Reference Collections, and one in Leakey’s Bookshop (which is a secondhand bookshop in Scotland). Some of these copies have been digitized recently, such as the copy the British Library houses, which was digitized on Sep 28, 2016, according to WorldCat. Also, there is a digital copy available on Google Books; this copy appears nearly identical to the one available in the University of Virginia Sadleir-Black library collection, although it does not contain a frontispiece illustration and has differing marks of ownership, such as an indiscernible signature on the title page.
This text has not been adapted, seemingly, in any fashion. There is a clear similarity in this text to other gothic novels and chapbooks of the time period; however, it does not appear to have specifically influenced any pieces of literature following its publication. Furthermore, this work seems to have been completely unattended to by academic scholarship, and this is most likely a result of the lack of popularity concerning the chapbook. It simply appears to be one of many similar gothic texts published during this time period, which were overshadowed by each other and by even more popular works in the genre.
Narrative Point of View
Clairville Castle; or, the History of Albert and Emma with the Death of the Usurper Morenzi is told by an anonymous narrator in the third person. This narration contains sentences that vary in length, but the style certainly feels antiquated and long-winded. The narrator strikes a balance between describing the actual plot of the story and the characters’ emotions towards these events throughout the chapbook. The narrator also uses dialogue sparingly, since there is much background information and action within the plot that is described without its use.
Sample Passage:
Emma had for some time enjoyed the retirement, from which she was aroused by a confused sound of voices that proceeded from below—she started up and recollecting her perilous situation, which the height of the sun beaming through the curtains painted in strong colors; she felt her apprehensions of pursuit renewed—she adjusted her dress, and tied on her straw bonnet, in order to seek her father, when he suddenly entered–he found her so apprehensive from the interval of time that they had lost at the inn, that he ventured to inform her of Albert’s arrival, and his impatience to behold her. The glow of pleasure animated her fair cheek, but was instantly succeeded by a deadly paleness. (30)
This narration succeeds in moving the plot along quickly, by utilizing long compound sentences (such as the passage above) in order to describe the events and the characters’ feelings towards them. By balancing these descriptions of the plot and the internal sentiments of the characters, the narrator is able to allow for lulls in the action of the story so that the plot does not progress too quickly. The minimal use of dialogue also highlights the importance of what the characters say, and works as a plot device in and of itself. All of these features of the narration combine to create a story that is fast paced but still leaves room for the reader to breathe when necessary.
Summary
Clairville Castle; or, the History of Albert and Emma with the Death of the Usurper Morenzi, told by a narrator in the third person, begins with a character description of a peasant named Bernard and his daughter, Emma. Although they are not wealthy, the father is a well-respected member of the community of Clairville due to his generous and benevolent nature. His daughter shares these qualities as she joins village festivities and is doted on by her father. Despite the death of Emma’s mother in years past, the two live a happy life as a family unit.
This page shows an example of the text in Clairville Castle
Bernard works as a bailiff under the Marquis de Clairville—until his untimely death, that is, which ushers in a general sadness as exemplified by his funeral which is attended by many, with all attendees displaying great amounts of grief. During the procession, a young Swiss man named Albert arrives at the castle, and decides to join the ceremony after learning who had died from one of the townsfolk. At the church where the funeral is being held, a group of women begin to lay flowers on the coffin of the late Marquis; one is a beautiful girl, whom Albert immediately notices and is enchanted by. He follows her down the middle aisle of the church, and sees her embracing her father, both mourning the man in the casket. Not daring to interrupt, he asks another peasant for the girl’s name, which he learns is Emma. The peasant offers Albert a bed in his cottage, and he agrees immediately, since it is near Bernard and Emma’s abode, and he plans to ask for her hand in marriage already.
The story of the late Marquis’s life is then embellished upon—his wife and infant child were ambushed by some bandits several years prior, resulting in his wife’s death and his son’s kidnapping. This drove him to great melancholy, but he remained generous at heart and treated the townspeople as his own children. Following his death, his lands and estates became those of the Baron of Morenzi, who is a much crueler man. He discards his subjects’ complaints and pays them no heed. He also carries a heavy debt, which he does not pay, instead pursuing a life of vice and leisure.
Meanwhile, Albert has gained the affections of Emma and the approval of Bernard. She reads to him often, having amassed a great collection of books, all of which impress Albert immensely. He begins to fall in love with her and she reciprocates. However, her father declines to support their proposal of marriage because he believes that they are of two distinct social classes. Promising to receive his father’s support for the match, Albert returns to his native country. Bernard then proceeds to tell Emma to relinquish all notions of this potential marriage occurring, and she submits to her father’s request.
The Baron meets Emma a little while later while roaming his lands, and immediately falls for her, planning to seduce her despite Bernard rebuking his advances. One day, a messenger from the castle arrives at Emma’s doorstep and informs her that her father has suddenly been struck ill. She hurries to the castle, only to find the Baron, who threatens her into staying with him, displaying his power over her father. She rejects him, and flees the castle, finding her father at the gates (the Baron’s steward, Du Val, had instructed him to remain there under false pretenses); both return to their cottage. Fearing the Baron’s wrath, they decide to flee to the castle of Brinon, some twenty miles away and where his late wife had labored. On the way, they stop at an inn where the landlord offers them refreshments and water for their horses.
The final page of Clairville Castle
Albert had returned to his home, to the estate of his father, the Count de Bournonville. He tells his father of Emma and begs his permission to marry her. In response, the Count tells him that he is in charge of his own destiny, and reveals that he merely adopted Albert, whose real name is Henry de Clairville. The Count’s infant son had recently died of an illness while they were travelling from France to Switzerland. When the Count and his inconsolable wife came upon the result of a bandit attack and found a dying servant coddling an infant boy, they decided that they must raise Albert as their own. They named him, then, after their late son. The assassin who killed his mother was none other than the Baron de Morenzi. Learning all of this, Albert resolves to avenge his mother and returns to France with a retinue.
During this time, Du Val attempts to capture Emma for the Baron. Finding her cottage empty, he returns to the castle and informs the Baron, who flies into a rage—both set out in pursuit of the fugitives. Albert reaches the inn in which Bernard and Emma are staying, and explains to the father all that he had recently learned. The Baron, too, arrives, and Albert confronts him with extreme anger. However, he is unarmed, unlike the Baron and his retinue, so his men restrain him and drag him to another room where they lock themselves inside. The Baron, feeling immense regret for his past actions, draws a pistol and shoots himself in the head before Du Val can stop him. Albert returns to the room and finds the lifeless body, proclaiming it to be a just death for a murderer, to the onlookers.
Bernard informs Emma, in her chamber, of what has just occurred, and offers her hand in marriage to Albert, or Henry, in his eyes. Albert’s adopted father also approves of the match wholeheartedly. With the usurper now dead, Albert becomes the new Marquis of Clairville—he also marries Emma. The people of the village rejoice at this turn of events and all ends merrily.
Bibliography
Hillyard, Brian. “Ker, John, Third Duke of Roxburghe.” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 23 September 2004. https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/15452
Steele, John Gladstone. “Anne and John Ker: New Soundings.” Cardiff Corvey: Reading the Romantic Text 12, summer 2004, www.romtext.org.uk/reports/cc12_n03/.
Clairville Castle; or, The History of Albert & Emma. With the Death of the Usurper, Morenzi. London, A. Kemmish.
In this circa 1810 chapbook, backdropped against the outskirts of Italy, a complicated web of family, loyalty, and betrayal spirals a noble family into conspiracy and murder.
Material History
Fatal Vows is presented in a disbound pamphlet. The pamphlet was once bound, but there is no longer a hardcover. Paste on the spine of the pamphlet and gilding on the top edge of the pages reflect its previous state. Presumably, Fatal Vows was at some point bound with other pamphlets for ease of storage and style—a common practice at the time. The pages themselves are a linen blend (with perhaps a bit of cotton) in fairly decent shape. The paper is browned by age, but not brittle. There are no significant stains and few splotches—none that obscure the text or decrease legibility.
The title page for Fatal Vows, or, The False Monk, along with the printer’s information
Fatal Vows is 18.4 x 11.3 cm in dimension, and sixteen pages long. Along the top of the pamphlet the pages are uniformly trimmed, but all other edges are slightly irregular. This variation is presumably due to the nature in which the collection of pamphlets was bound. Commonly, pamphlets of varying sizes were trimmed to the dimensions of the largest pamphlet. Works smaller than the largest pamphlet were often missed by the blade on a few sides, leading to irregularities in page edges like Fatal Vows’.
The front page of the pamphlet, once the University of Virginia note is moved aside, reads “William Coventry // Piccadilly.” This inscription indicates that the text was likely part of a personal collection. The next two pages feature the only two illustrations in the pamphlet, one in the frontispiece and one on the title page. The frontispiece illustration is brightly colored and depicts two men standing outside of a building. The man on the right, with a red cape and green suit, is holding out a sword. The man on the left, with yellow trousers and a blue tunic, appears to be making a vow on the sword. This illustration is helpfully captioned “Rinaldo binding Montavoli by an Oath.” Below the caption is the mark of the publisher, “Pub. By T. Tegg June 1810.”
The second illustration follows immediately after the title. At the top quarter of the page is the title, which varies between flowing cursive and block lettering (indicated by italicized and non-italicized text, respectively) reading: “Fatal Vows, // or // The False Monk, // a // Romance.” Below the title is the second illustration, depicting a man in purple leading a man in green down a staircase and into a stone room. The caption curves around the bottom of the illustration and reads “The Spirit of Montavoli’s Brother ledding him to a place of Safety.” Below the caption, once again, are three lines of the publisher’s information. The first line, “London”, indicates the city Fatal Vows was printed in. The next line repeats “Printed for Thomas Tegg, III, Cheapside June 1-1810” and the final line indicates the price: “Price Sixpence.”
Once the story itself begins, the page layout is relatively consistent. Aside from the first page, which repeats the title (interestingly adding a “the” before the title, the only point in the chapbook where this occurs) before beginning the story about halfway down the page, the margins on the page vary slightly from page to page but average out to a 2 cm outer margin, 1 cm inner margin, 2.5 cm bottom margin, and 0.5 to 0.75 cm top margin. At the top of each page, centered just above the text, is the title in all caps: FATAL VOWS. The page numbers are on the same line as the title, to the far left (for even number pages) or right (for odd number pages) edge of the text. The text itself is single-spaced. The only notable features in the story pages are the occasional letters at the bottom center of the page. Page six has a B, page nine has B3, page seventeen has a C, page nineteen has a C2, and page twenty-one has a C3. These letters serve to assist the printer in ordering the pages—pamphlets like these were generally printed on one large sheet, folded together, and then trimmed to allow for page-turning.
Textual History
Unfortunately, there is very little either known or recorded on Fatal Vows, or, The False Monk, a Romance. Both the author and illustrator are unknown. Francis Lathom has been named as the author, notably by Google Books, due to the similarities in titles between Fatal Vows and his work The Fatal Vow; Or, St. Michael’s Monastery, but this is a misattribution. Only two copies of Fatal Vows are available online: one on Google Books courtesy of the British Library (although the author is misattributed, as Francis Lathom), and one through the University of Virginia’s Sadleir-Black Collection. Fatal Vows is mentioned in a handful of catalogs listing known gothic novels, but with no opinion or further insight attached to it, with one exception.
The frontispiece for Fatal Vows, or, The False Monk
Fatal Vows has not been featured in much academic work. However, that does not mean Fatal Vows was entirely unnoted beyond the commercial sphere. Its one notable reference is an allegation that Fatal Vows is a plagiarism of, or at least very heavily influenced by, Matthew Gregory Lewis’s The Monk. In Peter Otto’s introduction to the Rare Printed Works from the Sadleir-Black Collection of Gothic Fiction at the Alderman Library, University of Virginia, he notes: “Like Radcliffe’s works, Lewis’s novel inspired a host of plagiarizers, imitators and competitors. The mystery of the black convent (London: A. Neil, [n.d.]) and Fatal vows, or The false monk, a romance (London: Thomas Tegg, 1810) are two of the many chapbooks that draw heavily on The Monk.” This is the only academic work to articulate opinions on Fatal Vows, although it is cited in other works and catalogs.
There appear to be no prequels, sequels, reprints, translations, or adaptations connected to Fatal Vows. Even when published, there is no surviving (if any) mention of Fatal Vows in the ads or articles of the time. There was no announcement in the newspapers of the time and no evidence that Fatal Vows stirred any public notice or controversy.
The only name that can be reliably connected to Fatal Vows is the publisher of the novel. T. Tegg (or Thomas Tegg III) is listed on both available scans as the publisher and bookseller and is comparatively much more well documented. Tegg set himself apart from his contemporaries by both the low prices and the lower quality of the books he produced. His self-description as “the broom that swept the booksellers’ warehouses” fairly articulates his practice of reprinting successful novels, works past copyright protections, and remainders (Curwen 391). Considering the nature of the works published by Tegg, it is perhaps not unsurprising that Fatal Vows was published with little fanfare.
Narrative Point of View
Fatal Vows combines the main story told in the third person by an omniscient, detached narrator, and interpolated stories told by characters explaining things that either occurred off-page or before the story began. There is no meta-narrative of the story’s origin or any relation to the narrator, but characters often narrate their own backstories through letters and oral stories, which are narrated in the first-person voice of the relevant character. The style is fairly formal, with no contractions and winding prose. The epistolary narratives vary slightly depending on the character narrating them, ranging from powerful emoting to detached cynicism, but the overall tone is still formal and vaguely antiquated.
Example of Third-Person Narration:
Rinaldo now informed Count Montavole that Miranda was his own daughter by Serina. The Count grew very faint; to encrease his misery Rinaldo added: “Know likewise that it is a BROTHER who is the death of thee.” He had no sooner finished this speech than he was seized for the murder of the Count, and as he quitted the dungeon he put a paper into Alberto’s hands. Montavole only lived to ejaculate, “a brother ! Miranda too my daughter ! oh—” (25)
Example of Interpolated Oral Tale of Susanna’s Confession:
Unconscious of what I did, I took the dreadful oath, and went gently into Lady Leonora’s room, and changed children with her, by which means Montavole has reared up his brother’s son instead of his own. (20)
Example of Interpolated Tale of Rinaldo’s Letter:
Hereupon I was seized by two footmen in livery, who dragged me to a noble palace: I was conducted to an elegant saloon, when a nobleman, for so I learnt he was, desired me to relate the whole adventure; accordingly, I did. He then observed that I had been used ill, and in return desired his nephew to give me a diamond ring. (26)
Overall, this chapbook’s narration focuses much more internally than externally—there is little imagery or scene building, but a heavy emphasis on the actions of the characters, which drive the majority of the plot. This contrasts with the low-key delivery the narrator uses to convey plot twists or surprises, as exemplified in the first passage. Miranda being the daughter of Count Montavole is a devastating plot twist even by itself, but Rinaldo being the brother of Count Montavole is even more so. However, the verbs used to describe Rinaldo’s proclamation are low-energy (“informed” and “added” are not exactly declarations) and Montavole’s death (who, in fairness, was already on the way out) is received without much fanfare. Within the scene, the room is full of characters that would be rattled by these announcements, but their perspectives are not noted. Even the announcement of Miranda’s parentage reads like an afterthought.
When characters themselves are narrating, more of their personality is able to shine through and influence the story. Susanna’s passage, when she explains the kidnapping she committed almost two decades ago, is full of qualitative adjectives and descriptors; Susanna is one of the kinder, moral characters in the story. This is juxtaposed against Rinaldo describing an altercation in his boyhood, where he describes his own actions with more understated neutrality.
Summary
Fatal Vows takes place on the outskirts of Italy, in a castle owned by a Count named Savini. Count Savini has two sons: Montavole and Alberto. Alberto is the youngest and is a charming and obedient son, while Montavole is morose and selfish. Montavole leaves home at an early age to pursue his own interests, breaking Count Savini’s heart. While on his travels, Montavole is attacked by bandits. His life is saved by a stranger, who identifies himself as Rinaldo and commands Montavole to repay his debt by swearing a vow of friendship and loyalty. Montavole is troubled but agrees, and Rinaldo vanishes into the night with an ominous “be careful of Saint Peter’s day” (7).
This page shows the first page of the actual story, along with one of the folding guide markings
Eventually, Montavole hears word that his father is critically ill and returns home to see him before he passes. Unfortunately, he is too late, but in their grief Montavole and Alberto reconcile and Montavole decides to settle down. Montavole marries a rich woman named Leonora, and Alberto marries his fianceé, Matilda. Montavole and Leonora are miserable, as their marriage was one for money rather than love and Leonora is afraid of Rinaldo, who Montavole now keeps company with, but Alberto and Marilda are happy and in love. However, tragedy strikes one night when Alberto is murdered. The murderer escapes into the night, and the heavily-pregnant Matilda dies of grief in labor shortly after.
Over the next twenty years, two things of note occur. Firstly, Rinaldo is arrested after killing a man in a dispute, but escapes from jail just before his execution. Secondly, a baby girl is left on Montavole and Leonora’s doorstep with a letter in her crib. Leonora reads the letter, swoons, and decides to raise the child (now named Miranda) as her own, locking the letter away without explanation.
At the end of these twenty years, Leonora is now on her deathbed. Montavole and their son, Alphonso, (who is in love with Miranda despite the two being kept apart by his father) have been out of the kingdom for weeks, leaving only Miranda around to tend to Leonora. Knowing her time is coming to an end, Leonora decides it is time for Miranda to know the truth about her birth. She gives Miranda a key to a cabinet that holds the mysterious letter from her crib. Leonora directs her to read the letter, burn it, and then leave the castle to join the nearby convent. Her only warning is to avoid the castle’s resident monk, Roderigo, who she finds suspicious. After Leonora dies, Miranda goes to the cabinet, but the letter is not there. She despairs, but is interrupted by a mysterious voice that tells her “You have a father living… your father is a murderer!” (13—14). Overcome with shock, Miranda faints.
Alphonso and Montavole return, too late to say goodbye to Leonora. Alphonso rushes to Miranda but Montavole stops him. He has betrothed Alphonso to the daughter of a man to whom he owes a significant amount of money. In exchange for Alphonso’s hand (and prestigious family name) the man will not only forgive Montavole’s debts but offer a substantial dowry. Alphonso is heartbroken but consents.
Miranda, in the meantime, goes for a walk in the surrounding countryside to bolster her spirits. She comes across a cottage with an old woman named Susanna and her nephew, Alonzo, who is insane. Susanna tells Miranda that eighteen years ago, a woman who looked very much like her came to the cottage and died, leaving behind a baby who was taken away by a “mean-looking man” (15). Miranda concludes that she must have been the baby, but returns homes before uncovering anything else. However, as soon as she returns home Roderigo (the suspicious monk Leonora was so afraid of) seizes her and locks her in an abandoned tower. Montavole ordered her to be locked away so she could not get in the way of Alphonso’s wedding, and Roderigo tells her she will stay there for the rest of her life.
Meanwhile, with Miranda effectively out of the picture, Alphonso and Cassandra’s wedding goes off without a hitch. In the ceremony, however, Cassandra drinks a goblet of wine (provided to her by Roderigo) and dies of poisoning. There was another goblet of wine meant for Alphonso, but he disappears shortly after the ceremony and is spared from the chaos. The castle descends into an uproar.
After a few days in the tower, Miranda discovers a key to the door and flees to Susanna’s cottage. She begs Susanna to let her stay the night before she leaves the kingdom, and Susanna readily agrees. That night, however, Montavole and Roderigo break into the cottage. Miranda tries to intervene but she is powerless to stop Montavole and Roderigo, and they murder Alonzo. Susanna comes down just in time to see his death and exclaims “Count Montavole you have killed your son, the real offspring of Leonora… you cruel man!” (19—20). Shocked, Montavole flees. Roderigo takes away the body, and Susanna confesses Alonzo’s backstory to Miranda.
Susanna used to be a servant at the castle. When Matilda died, her child had actually survived, but lord Montavole commanded her to take the child away to the cottage and raise it as her nephew. However, Susanna switched Alberto’s child (Alphonso) with Montavole’s (for no discernable motive) and took him instead. Shortly after confessing, Susanna dies of grief. Miranda returns to the castle, hoping to beg Alphonso for protection, but comes across Roderigo instead. He gives her the letter Leonora had meant to leave her and leaves the room. Miranda finally learns her origins.
Montavole was Miranda’s real father all along. Her mother, Serina, was a noblewoman with a sickly father and little money. Montavole secretly murdered her father, who had attempted to keep him away from Serina, took Serina in, and got her pregnant. He strung her along for a while, promising that once his father died they would get married, but one day Rinaldo revealed to Serina that Montavole’s father had died long ago. Moreover, he had been married to a rich woman for the past twelve months. Serina fled, selling her clothes and jewelry, but was robbed by a coachman. She made her way to Susanna’s cottage and died of grief, and baby Miranda was taken away to the castle.
Meanwhile, Count Montavole is hiding out in one of his dungeons, having been led there by his brother’s ghost—but it is not his ghost. Alberto has been alive the entire time. Roderigo (who is revealed as Rinaldo) bursts in, in the middle of an unspecified fight with Alphonso, but switches tactics to kill Montavole. In Montavole’s final breath he realizes Miranda is also his daughter.
Miranda and Alphonso marry, and Rinaldo is put to death. A letter he wrote before his arrest reveals his own motivation. Rinaldo was actually Alberto and Montavole’s half-brother. His mother, Angelina, was seduced by Alberto and Montavole’s father (Count Savini), but he grew tired of her and abandoned her. Angelina gave birth to Rinaldo and managed to get by for a few years, but caught small-pox and lost her beauty. All her admirers abandoned her, and they were forced to sell all their furniture and move into a small apartment. They eventually ran out of money, and when Rinaldo was nineteen they were evicted. Angelina died in the streets, penniless and heartbroken, but before she passed she told Rinaldo about his father and begged him to avenge her death.
Now it is Alberto’s turn to reveal how he survived. Count Montavole had hired an assassin to kill him, but the wound was not fatal. One of Rinaldo’s servants saved him but locked him in a dungeon in the castle, where he lived until the servant slipped up and left behind a key. The servant himself had conveniently died a few days ago. With all the mysteries explained, everyone lives happily ever after.
Bibliography
Curwen, Henry. “Thomas Tegg: Book-Auctioneering and the “Remainder Trade.” A History of Booksellers, the Old and the New 1st ed., Chatto and Windus, 1873.
Fatal Vows: or the False Monk, a Romance. Thomas Tegg, 1810.
In this abridged version of Sarah Wilkinson’s 1807 novel “The Fugitive Captive,” Magdalena retells the story of the peculiar circumstances in which she has been forced to escape her mysterious husband, the Count de Ottagro.
Material
History
The Convent
of Saint Usurla, or Incidents at Ottagro. An Italian Romance was published in London on August 22, 1809 with no named author.
The full title appears only on the title page; in the header of every other
page, it appears only as The Convent of Saint Usurla. It is important to
note the spelling of Usurla, not Ursula, in the title. The reason for this
misspelling seems to be intentional, as it appears in that form throughout the
book; however, the reasoning is unknown. In addition, printing and publishing
credit appears on the bottom of the frontispiece and title page, as well as the
final page of the book and indicates both printer and publisher to be John
Arliss at Bartholomew-Close.
The title page for The Convent of Saint Usurla
The book is
fairly small in size (18 x 11 cm) and without a cover, aside from the title
page. This is consistent with the fact that it is likely from an inexpensive
chapbook with several other stories. Additionally, the book is disbound. It is
precariously held together by thread, evidenced by three small puncture holes
on the interior of the pages which it is wound through. On one page, a small
fragment of the thread pokes out. Furthermore, the pages are yellowed in an
uneven quality throughout the book and scalloped around the edges. Some pages
are shorter in width than others. This low quality in binding and appearance
can be attributed to its nature as an economical source of entertainment for
the public.
Upon opening
the book, one is met with two illustrations. There is a large (13 x 8 cm)
illustration on the frontispiece and a smaller (3.5 x 5.5 cm) one on the title
page. Both are black and white depictions of scenes from the book. There is a
slight reverse image transfer from the large frontispiece illustration onto the
adjacent title page. This is due to the differing properties in ink from the
two pages.
The remaining
forty pages relay the story of The Convent of Saint Usurla. The text is
closely set and fairly small with margins ranging from 1.5 to 2 cm. There are
few paragraph indentations, leading to long blocks of uninterrupted text which
give the page a crowded appearance. Some pages present words that are precise
and clearly distinguishable, while others have ink globs and letters that
appear fuzzy. This particular copy of the book has no post-production markings
other than one small dark yellow rectangular stain on pages 20 and 21, most
likely from a previous owner leaving a scrap of paper in the book for a long
period of time.
At the bottom
of various pages, there are signature marks. In the production process,
multiple pages were printed on the same large roll of paper which then needed
to be folded in the correct order. These signature marks assisted the printers
in the folding and binding of the text. Such signature marks appear on pages 3,
5, 15, 19, 25, 27, and 37 and are labeled B, B2, C, C3, D, D3, and E, respectively.
Interestingly, each section under a particular signature mark, has a different
paper and ink quality than those surrounding it. For example, the paper in
signature mark section D is of a visibly lower quality than section C3. Despite
the presence of these signature marks, a mistake in the folding of this copy
was discovered which led to duplicate copies of pages 25 and 26.
Textual
History
In addition
to the copy in the Sadlier-Black Collection at the University of Virginia, The
Convent of Saint Usurla, or, Incidents at Ottagro. An Italian Romance
(1809) can be found in various forms. For instance, in 2017, a copy of the
chapbook was digitized to Google Books by the British National Library. It
appears to be the same chapbook edition published by John Arliss, even
exhibiting the same mistakes in page numbering. Additionally, the story was
republished in Literary Mushrooms: Tales of Horror and Fiction from the
Gothic Chapbooks, 1800–1830 by Franz J. Potter in 2009 with the author
listed as Sarah Wilkinson. Likewise, a 2004 reprint by the Zittaw Press
publishing company lists Sarah Wilkinson as the author as well.
The reason
for this ambiguity regarding the author comes from the fact that the brief
chapbook story is an abridged version of the full-length novel, The Fugitive
Countess or, Convent of Saint Ursula (1807) by Sarah Wilkinson. Sections of
the chapbook story are pulled directly from the novel, with a few small
changes. One alteration is the name change of “Ursula” in the novel, which has
been printed as “Usurla” in the chapbook. Similarly, the name “Ottagio” in the
novel is slightly altered to “Ottagro” in the chapbook. It is unknown if Sarah
Wilkinson herself abridged her novel into the chapbook released in 1809, or if
it was plagiarized by a counterfeiter, which was a common practice in the day
(Frank 142).
As
aforementioned, The Fugitive Countess (1807), written by Sarah Wilkinson
and published by J.P. Hughes, is a four-volume novel that expands upon the
short chapbook story The Convent of Saint Usurla (1809). There do not
appear to be any critical reviews of the novel or chapbook at the time of
original publication; however, The Fugitive Countess is found to be
advertised in newspapers. For example, the novel is mentioned under the section
“New Novels, just published” in the London based newspaper Morning Post
on June 12, 1807. Also, in the Morning Post, it is listed as number six
in the “Popular novels/Romances” section on January 1, 1808 which indicates
that it was at least marginally popular.
Despite the
few mentions of the novel at the time of its release, The Fugitive Countess
has received some scholarly critical analysis in recent years. In his work, The
History of Gothic Publishing, 1800–1835: Exhuming the Trade, Franz Potter
notes a striking similarity between Clementina’s interpolated tale from The
Fugitive Countess and one of Wilkinson’s previous chapbooks, The Wife of
Two Husbands, which was itself an adaptation of a theater musical. He
asserts that in the novel, Wilkinson, “drew from other popular themes found in
Gothic novels, most notably from Eliza Parsons’s The Mysterious Warning”
(128). Despite these similarities, The Fugitive Countess appears to be a
legitimate, original novel that was only heavily influenced by popular Gothic
works of the time, not plagiarized (History of Gothic Publishing
120).
A signature mark is shown at the bottom of this page
Nowadays, The
Fugitive Countess can be found digitized in the Corvey Collection, a
massive collection of European literature from 1790–1840 (Behrendt). It can
also be found in, English Language Women’s Literature of the18th & 19th
Centuries published by Belser Wissenschaftlicher Dienst in 2004. This
republishing of The Fugitive Countess, along with other recent
republishings of its chapbook version, may be attributed to the revival of
interest in Gothic chapbooks, and author Sarah Wilkinson herself in recent
years, as “a case study of middling to lower-class female authorship during the
early nineteenth century” (Hoeveler 184).
A well-known
chapbook author of her day, Sarah Carr Wilkinson (1779–1831) was the author of
over one-hundred chapbooks, gothic novels, and abridged versions of plays,
operas, and popular gothic novels—making her one of the most prolific writers
of her genre (“Writing for the Spectre of Poverty” 23). Early on, Wilkinson’s
writing career began with children’s books, but she soon transitioned primarily
to writing short Gothic chapbooks, also called bluebooks, and full-length
novels (Hughes 253). Wilkinson produced many more chapbooks, which were cheaply
constructed and sold, than novels. Ultimately, chapbooks were a more profitable
venture for her, and writing was her primary source of income (“Writing for the
Spectre of Poverty” 23). Her most active and successful years were between 1803
and 1812, in which she received modest popularity in her genre (History of
Gothic Publishing 116). Unfortunately, despite her relative popularity in
the chapbook scene, Wilkinson “never had the comfort of literary or economic
success” and faced a life-long struggle against poverty (“Writing for the
Spectre of Poverty” 18). Her financial concerns intensified around 1820, which
is exemplified in the many petitions (and denials) for financial assistance
from the Royal Literary Fund (History of Gothic Publishing 113). In
1824, after being diagnosed with breast cancer, her plea for assistance was
finally granted. The petition was endorsed by several of her publishers and
cites, “a depression in the Book trade” as a reason for her need of assistance.
This interesting inclusion indicates the waning popularity of the genre that
had once sustained her. Unfortunately, Wilkinson’s health and financial
situations both continued to deteriorate, culminating in 1831 when she passed
away in a London workhouse (History of Gothic Publishing 113–15).
Currently,
there are varying opinions on the merit of Wilkinson as a serious author. Some
of her harshest critics have gone as far as to assert that she engaged in
“Gothic counterfeiting” (Frank 142). Others have called her a “‘hack’ writer”
who pumped out contrived, formulaic stories for the sole purpose of making
money (Hoeveler 184). On the other hand, more generous critics admit that
Wilkinson wrote to sustain herself and often employed “recycled scenes and
motifs” from the genre, even as some argue that her works also show an “ability
to construct clear and simple story lines free from dense subplotting that
often encumbered Gothic novels” and are important in that they “uniquely show
the amalgamation of the bluebook and the novel” (History of Gothic
Publishing 116, 130).
Narrative
Point of View
The
Convent of Saint Usurla is
told in two alternating perspectives. Primarily, the novel is written from a
third-person point of view. The narrator is unspecified, but omniscient to all
of the characters’ thoughts, feelings, and actions. The chapbook is written in
a fairly formal style, frequently employs long sentences, and often delves into
the interiority of the protagonists. In contrast to this style of writing, the
novel also has several interpolated tales inserted throughout which are written
in a first-person perspective. These tales extend for many pages at a time and
function to recount relevant past events. Since they are told from an
individual’s perspective, they are limited to only this character’s point of
view. Despite this, however, they are imbued with a great level of detail and
highly specific dialogue.
Sample Passage of Third-Person
Narration:
On this occasion the count visited Tivoli; and having remained there a few days, escorted his daughter to the convent, to the regret of her governess, who did not give her assent to this visit. The journey was delightful to Magdalena: everything was novel, consequently pleasing to her youthful mind; and she chatted with the utmost gaiety. The count could not withhold his love and admiration; but her presence forcibly reminded him of the injury he had done to her, and the necessity of preserving his own reputation unblemished. (7–8)
This
passage from near the beginning of the novel demonstrates the omniscient qualities
of the third-person point of view. In this case, this narrative perspective
functions to give the reader a sense of the motivations of the characters which
justify their subsequent actions in the story.
Sample Passage of First-Person Narration in an Interpolated
Tale:
A few days after this I was ordered to receive Ottagro as my husband. Such was my desperation, that being left alone with the count, I, on my knees, confessed my prior marriage, and its consequences, beseeching him not to betray me, but to form some pretext for preventing our approaching union. He raised me in his arms. “You have acted,” said he, “with honorable candour, never shall your confidence be betrayed. Lenardo’s widow must be my bride. If I act in conformity to your wishes your father will seek another alliance; the next suitor may not act with the same generosity as myself. Let me, in the character of husband, be your defender from ill.” (26)
This
passage is from Clementina de Lusini’s interpolated tale in which she recounts
her backstory to Magdalena. A first-person perspective is important here
because the readers are not given all aspects of the story, only the parts
known to Clementina, herself. Due to this, the reader does not receive all
relevant information until the end when all of the stories connect together. In
addition, the interpolated tale format creates a non-chronological sequence of
events. These elements propel the story forward and create mystery that can
only be resolved by fully completing the novel.
Summary
The
chapbook, The Convent of Saint Usurla, begins in the middle of an
action-packed scene in which the protagonist, Magdalena, the Countess de
Ottagro, closely escapes imminent death at the hand of her husband, the Count
de Ottagro. Upon fleeing, Magdalena and her maid, Laura, take refuge in the
Convent of Saint Usurla where her loving aunt Viola is the Abbess. With this,
the novel goes back in time in order to tell the story of how Magdalena came to
be in this situation.
As
a young girl, Magdalena lost her mother and thus received a sheltered
upbringing by her father, the Count de Verona. The Count de Verona was from an
esteemed family in Tivoli; however, he was a gambler and managed to gamble away
all of his money, as well as Magdalena’s inheritance. Due to this, Magdalena
has no dowry, and thus little prospect for a favorable marriage. To avoid this
problem, the Count de Verona wants Magdalena to become a nun and sends her to
the Convent of Saint Usurla for a visit. Here, Magdalena becomes close to her
Aunt Viola and makes friends, coming to appreciate the convent as she considers
taking the oath.
While,
at the convent, Magdalena meets the Count de Ottagro, who is a wealthy nobleman
and friend of her father’s. The Count takes a liking to her, though she feels
impartial, and two continue to meet. Suspecting his marital intentions and
questioning his character, Aunt Viola expresses her disapproval of these
meetings to Magdalena’s father. In response, the Count de Verona removes
Magdalena from the convent and transfers her to the Castle de Ottagro.
At
the Castle de Ottagro, Magdalena spends several weeks with her father, the
Count de Ottagro, and his cold sister, Lady Jacintha. In this time, Magdalena
also grows close to the Lusini family—the amiable daughter Angelina and
handsome son Ernestus—who live nearby; however, this is disapproved of as a bad
blood exists between the Count de Ottagro and the Lusini’s for some unknown
reason. In addition, Magdalena passes her time secretly reading in the castle
library, in which she is forbidden. One late night in the library, Magdalena
briefly sees a mysterious woman in white, and she flees in terror. The next
day, Magdalena returns to the library and finds a mysterious note, addressed to
her, which warns her of some unspecified danger.
Soon
after this strange occurrence, the Count de Verona orders Magdalena to marry
the Count de Ottagro. He says that by doing this, Ottagro will erase the
gambling debts that he has incurred and will even give him a future loan. At
first, Magdalena rejects the idea since she is suspicious of Ottagro. However,
the Count de Verona threatens suicide, so she ultimately agrees. The next
morning, Magdalena unhappily accepts the Count de Ottagro’s marriage proposal,
and the wedding ceremony is set for two weeks’ time.
The frontispiece for The Convent of Saint Usurla
In
the interim, one-night Magdalena spots the Count de Ottagro and his sister,
Lady Jacintha, carrying a covered basket to the library. There, the two open a
hidden trapdoor and descend. Now, Magdalena is highly wary of her groom-to-be
and suspects that there is a secret prisoner in the library. Nevertheless, she
proceeds with the marriage.
A
few weeks later, on a night in which the Count de Ottagro is out of town and
Lady Jacintha is sick, Magdalena returns to the library and opens the trap
door. She descends down a staircase and a long passage where she then reaches a
locked door. Disappointed, Magdalena starts to return to the surface; however,
Lady Jacintha’s maid Thomasine finds her. Magdalena fears that Thomasine will
turn her in, but instead she unlocks the door to reveal the secret. Inside,
there is a small child and a dying woman who is identified as Clementina de
Lusini—the first wife of the Count de Ottagro.
At
this point, the dying Clementina de Lusini retells the story of how she came to
be imprisoned in the library dungeon in the Castle de Ottagro. As a teen,
Clementina fell in love with Lenardo di Orizzi, the son of her father’s arch
nemesis. She was forbidden to marry him, but the two secretly eloped. Soon,
their elopement was discovered by Lenardo’s family and because of this, he was
sent far away to war where he was killed in action. After this devastating
tragedy, Clementina discovered that she was pregnant. Fortunately, her family
was scheduled to go on a long trip without her, during which she gave birth to
a baby boy. She called him Lenardo and gives him to her doctor and his wife to
raise. The doctor and his family, including young Lenardo, then moved to
England.
Ignorant
to all of the events that had taken place, Clementina’s family returned from
their trip with a friend, the Count de Ottagro. Thinking her lover to be dead,
Clementina married the Count de Ottagro, but before long, her guilty conscience
prompted her to tell the Count of everything that had occurred. Surprisingly,
the Count de Ottagro accepted her admission, but over time grew resentful and
unkind. After some time, Clementina became pregnant and gave birth to a baby
girl, Adeline, but the Count de Ottagro remained unhappy, as he wanted a male
heir.
After
several years, Clementina visited her family’s mansion, where she found Lenardo,
her lover, to be alive and well. Apparently, he was not sent away to war, but
imprisoned by his father for his indiscretion and declared dead to the world.
Upon the recent death of his father, he was freed. However happy, Clementina
was also greatly troubled at this news, as she had already remarried.
Almost
immediately, the Count de Ottagro discovered that Lenardo was alive, and he and
Clementina have met. With this knowledge, he accused Clementina of plotting to
murder him and took her to the dungeon under his library. There she found
Lenardo and her maid, Drusilla, who was imprisoned as an accomplice to
Clementina’s perceived betrayal. In a rage, Ottagro murdered Lenardo and
Drusilla, and Clementina was devastated. The Count de Ottagro realized that he
cannot free Clementina as she could expose him; however, he also does not want
to kill her. As a result, he faked her and their daughter’s deaths and
imprisons them in the library dungeon where they have been for the last five
years. Soon after relaying this story, Clementina dies.
Soon
after this wild discovery, the Count de Ottagro grows suspicious that Magdalena
has uncovered his secret. Under pressure, she admits. The Count threatens
Magdalena, but ultimately swears her to secrecy. Two years pass by with this
arrangement, when one-night Magdalena sees the Count de Ottagro smuggle a teen
boy into the library dungeon. She secretly enters the dungeon and discovers
that it is Clementina’s son, Lenardo. Lenardo tells her that he was raised in
England by his adopted family, but upon growing older was told of his true
past. On hearing this, he vowed to take revenge on Ottagro and started heading
for Italy. However, all of this time, the Count de Ottagro kept tabs on the
boy, so he was intercepted on his journey and imprisoned. With the help of
Magdalena, Lenardo manages to escape and arrives safely at the Lusini home. The
Count de Ottagro discovers this and, furious, he nearly kills Magdelena.
However, Magdalena escapes and flees to the Convent to take refuge. This is
where the various timelines of the novel converge.
Fearing
exposure, the Count de Ottagro rapidly flees the castle when his carriage
crashes and he dies. Magdelena is now free from the evil Count de Ottagro and
she and the handsome Lusini son, Ernestus, get married.
The
Convent of Saint Usurla, or, Incidents at Ottagro. An Italian Romance. London, John Arliss, 1809.
Frank,
Frederick S.. Gothic Writers: A Critical and Bibliographical Guide,
edited by Douglass H. Thomson, and Jack G. Voller, Greenwood Publishing Group,
Incorporated, 2001. ProQuest Ebook Central.
Hoeveler,
Diane Long. “More Gothic Gold: the Sadleir-Black chapbook collection at the
University of Virginia library.” Papers on Language & Literature,
vol. 46, no. 2, 2010, pp. 164–193.
“Multiple Classified Ads.” Morning Post [London], Issue 11322, June 12, 1807, p. 2. Gale Primary Sources: British Library Newspapers.
“Multiple Classified Ads.” Morning Post [London], Issue 11503, Jan. 1, 1808, p. 4. Gale Primary Sources: British Library Newspapers.
Potter, Franz. The History of Gothic Publishing, 1800–1835: Exhuming the Trade. Palgrave Macmillan, 2005.
Potter,
Franz. ‘Writing for the Spectre of Poverty: Exhuming Sarah Wilkinson’s
Bluebooks and Novels.” Cardiff Corvey: Reading the Romantic Text, issue
11, 2003, pp. 17–34.
Wilkinson,
Sarah. The Fugitive Countess or, Convent of Saint Ursula. London, J.P.
Hughes, 1807.
Angelina is one of Thomas Peckett Prest’s serialized works from 1841 that centers around murder, mystery, and forbidden love.
Material History
The novel, having come out in serialized parts, was likely assembled by a G. Sharpe, whose name is handwritten on this page prior to the title page. The book was probably popular at the time and its ownership most likely transferred, leading this writing to be crossed out.
Angelina: Or, the Mystery of St. Mark’s Abbey. A Tale of Other Days by Thomas Peckett Prest was published in 1841 in serialized parts. Releasing the novel in parts lowered the cost of producing the book as a whole. Each section would have been sold using an image on the first page of the part as an incentive to purchase it. For this reason, each page with an image has a corresponding label at the bottom of the page to signify its order among the parts. The parts were presumably compiled by a G. Sharpe, whose signature appears on the blank pages prior to the assembled novel’s frontispiece and title page. Along with his signature is the date handwritten as follows: July 16, 1841. However, the name and date are crossed out, implying that this edition had multiple owners.
The book is bound in a cloth detailed with an artificially ingrained texture. Sharpe chose to use leather on the edges of the cover and the binding of the spine which has kept the exterior of the book in great condition for its age. The pages are speckled with red thinned out paint which was a common aesthetic for nineteenth-century books. The book is in very good condition due to the binding that Sharpe chose for the book. However, the pages have become slightly yellow and brittle with age. There are some pages that were saturated by a substance as well as a few torn pages that have been mended by the Special Collections archivists. The book was easily elegant in its day, as can be seen through the careful measures taken by Sharpe in binding it. The worn quality of Angelina demonstrates its popularity when Prest was at the prime of his career.
The detail in the images of Angelina are impressive compared to other texts of its days, displaying aesthetic visions specific to the author. Images during the Gothic period of literature were produced through making woodblock prints. Such prints were created by physically carving into wood to create the desired image. They would have been lined up with the text and inked during the printing process. At the beginning of the book, opposite the title page, is a frontispiece, which is the largest image in the book and the only image that possesses a quote. It reads, “They soon entered a spacious and lofty cavern, round which were piled on immense number of casks, chests, bales of goods, while arms and ammunition were there in abundance.” This sentence describes the setting most important to the narration in Angelina.
The frontispiece was created by a woodblock print, meaning that the artist carved wood with precision to create such images. This is the only image in the novel that has a quote beneath it which describes the setting central to the novel. Across from the frontispiece is the title page that includes the full title and a list of Prest’s other works below his name.
As to the type itself, the font size is much smaller than is usually seen today. The margins are typical in size, yet there is no inner margin which is a current stylistic feature for books. The images are placed every four pages on the front of the right page since it was released as parts rather than an entire novel. The images are a page and a half in size, featuring artistry of woodblock printed images that are hard to come by anymore.
Textual History
Angelina: Or, the Mystery at St. Mark’s Abbey was published in 1841 by Edward Lloyd of London. Lloyd regulated many newspapers, the most successful of them being Lloyd’s Weekly Newspaper and The Penny Sunday TimesandPeople’s Police Gazette; Angelina was published in the latter. He gained the nickname “father of the cheap press” as he sought to bring exciting literary works to the lower classes. Lloyd played a part in history through assisting the rise of the serial novel in which a new part would appear in successive weekly editions of a newspaper. Angelina, in particular, is one of many of Prest’s successful serial novels that appeared courtesy of Lloyd and his work as a newspaper proprietor. Journalist Anne Humphrey’s states that “perhaps half of Lloyd’s penny bloods” were written by Prest, who was “one of his most prolific and most successful authors”. The significance of the serial novel and the success of Angelina are both referenced in the preface of the novel Angelina.
This page of Angelina is missing letters in many places.
Interestingly, the edition of the novel housed in the Sadleir-Black Collection does not include a preface at all, though a preface does appear in other editions. The preface can be found online through a scanned edition published courtesy of the New York Public Library on Google Books.
The preface functions as both a historical reference as well as an advertisement. The first paragraph of the preface discusses the popularity of Angelina upon its release in the “penny” press, which led its pieces to later be compiled into a novel format. The author of the preface informs the readers that Angelina’s pieces were originally published in The Penny Sunday TimesandPeople’s Police Gazette.
Prest appears most frequently in scholarly works related to his involvement with the serial novels of the penny press. Prest’s work in particular falls under the category of penny dreadfuls, or the terror genre of the penny press. This nineteenth-century phenomena began through its reproduction of eighteenth century gothic fiction via cheap means. Currently, only one of Prest’s works, The String of Pearls is more widely recognized as a significant and impactful part of this literature.
Though there is a lack of information on Prest himself, the author obviously sought to promote himself through an advertisement which is the second half of the preface. The phrase “New and Entirely Original Tale of Romance and Pathos” along with Prest’s upcoming works Emily Fitzomord; Or, The Deserted One and The Death Grasp; Or, A Father’s Curse emphasize the importance in self-promotion for both Lloyd and Prest.
Despite their combined efforts, Prest experienced a success limited to his day and age as only one of his characters is truly known today. However, Angelina, being one of Prest’s earlier works, most likely influenced the author’s writing style and, therefore, his subsequent works. In particular, the elements of terror in Angelina were just the beginning of Prest’s concepts that would appear in The String of Pearls. The latter work was adapted for the theatre which debuted in March of 1847 and is the basis for the modern-day movie adaptation Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (“Sweeney Todd”). While Angelina can be found in modern day print published by HardPress and accessible via Kindle. Its current lack of reviews allude to the lack of popularity Prest receives today. The String of Pearls, on the other hand, can be readily found in print and in theatrical adaptation.
Narrative Point of View
Angelina: Or, The Mystery of St. Mark’s Abbey is told through third-person omniscient narration. The narrator does not play an active role in the storyline; however, they hardly makes himself known until the end of the novel, when the backstories of characters are finally revealed. At this point, they speak directly to the reader before divulging events of the past that have remained hidden. Overall, the narration is very detailed and elaborative, yet the narrator remains detached in their descriptions of events and emotions. The narrator follows the protagonist, Angelina, until she becomes separated from her loved ones, which happens frequently in the novel. When Angelina gets kidnapped, the narrator proves their omniscient perspective in cycling through each scenario for Angelina, her Uncle Woodfield, and her lover Hugh Clifford.
Sample Passage of Third-Person Narration:
Saint Mark’s Abbey had evidently been a splendid edifice, but it had been left to decay for many years, and few persons in the place would venture to approach it after night-fall, for, like most old buildings, it was reported to be haunted, and many appalling legends were related by the old gossips, as they sat trembling before their blazing fire on a winter evening, concerning the dreadful crimes which had been perpetrated within its mouldering walls. The more reasonable, and less superstitious portion of the community, however, accounted for the noises that had been heard to issue at various periods from the gothic pile, in a far more probable way; and it was strongly suspected that the abbey was, in fact, the retreat of a gang of robbers or smugglers—more particularly the latter, and although the proper authorities had hitherto failed in making any satisfactory discovery, it was still hoped that they would succeed ere long in doing so, and in setting all doubts upon the subject at rest. (2)
In this passage, the narrator is describing the setting most central to the novel, St. Mark’s Abbey, or what is left of it. The description of the abbey is done through focusing on the conditions surrounding the ruins, which sets the tone for the setting itself. The narrator uses their omniscience to impart the emotions of the surrounding peoples who keep their distance from the ruins, regardless of what they believe. The narrator first relays the more superstitious group of people who have heard rumors of terrible crimes being committed within its now decaying walls. After this, the narrator describes the more realistic option, which foreshadows the end of the novel when it is revealed that Angelina’s mother, Matilda, and her mother’s cousin, Emmeline, are still alive. The narrator’s knowledge of both scenarios reflects their omniscience.
Sample Passage of Direct Address:
We will now proceed to detail the particulars of the “strange eventful history” connected with the principle characters in our narrative, and with which the reader is, no doubt, anxious to be made acquainted. (215)
This passage occurs at the end of the novel, just before the backstories are revealed. The narrator uses the pronoun “we” to describe who is telling the story, an intimacy that is reinforced by the inclusion of the word “our” later in the sentence. Interestingly, the narrator, who usually sets the mood though their lengthy descriptions, here decides to directly address the readers. By saying that the reader is “no doubt, anxious to be made acquainted,” the narrator breaks the fourth wall, reminding the reader of the fictive nature of the content in making a clear cut between the present and the past.
Summary
The novel begins with the protagonist, Angelina, who is accompanied by her cousin, Lauren Woodfield. While in the deserted ruins of St. Mark’s Abbey, the young ladies see the apparition of a woman that warns Angelina not to return there for her own safety. However, Angelina’s brave spirit only causes her to become increasingly curious as she sees another apparition while exploring a nearby cavern during a storm. This apparition is a handsome man that plays the flute and appears later in Angelina’s dreams. Upon waking from this dream, Angelina returns to the cave, this time finding a door leading to a gallery. Coincidentally, this gallery belongs to St. Mark’s Abbey. To her surprise, Angelina finds she is not alone when she sees the villainous Baron de Morton and his servant Rufus. The pair are quietly discussing a terrible secret. Angelina accidently reveals herself to the Baron, who becomes frightened upon believing her to be a ghost related to his dark deeds. The narrator here divulges the Baron’s history, most importantly stating the interesting nature of his brother’s disappearance followed by his marriage to a widowed baroness. Angelina then overhears a conversation between Rufus and the Baron, in which they speak about Angelina and proclaim that she must die. Angelina returns home shaken.
The cover of the book is cloth detailed with an artificially ingrained texture.
The first apparition of the woman returns, this time visiting Angelina’s uncle, Arthur Woodfield, with whom she lives. The apparition speaks to him privately, causing Arthur to be stern during an unexpected meeting with the Baron when he shows up at the Woodfield’s. Afterwards, the Baron leaves obviously upset and Arthur refuses to talk to his family about either the Baron or the woman. The only insight he gives them is through the promise he forces Angelina to make: she can never return to the Abbey.
Despite her promise, Angelina returns many weeks later, this time discovering a sliding picture frame that conceals a room similar to Angelina’s dreams. She witnesses a woman running about the ruins but she refuses to speak and runs away instead. Upon searching the premises, she is startled upon finding a chest containing bones. Angelina resolves to leave but runs into the Baron, who is frightened of her, initially believing her to be a ghost. Suddenly, the Baron grabs her arm and attempts to end her life, just as she had experienced in her dreams. The flute-playing apparition appears and saves her from the Baron, revealing himself to actually be a young man. Without introducing himself, he makes it obvious that he wants to protect Angelina. The next night, Angelina hears a sweet melody coming from beyond her window; she looks out to see the stranger once again.
The next day, Angelina is wandering outside, contemplating her feelings toward the mysterious stranger, when he appears and admits his feelings towards her, presenting her with a miniature of himself. That evening, while exploring the cavern, she sees the handsome stranger with some smugglers. Angelina is captured and taken aboard a ship by a different group of bandits. They eventually reach land, where she discovers she has been captured under the designs of the Baron, who questions her of her origins and her parents; Angelina knows none of her descent beyond the Woodfields. Bridget, who resents being married to one of the bandits, takes care of Angelina. It is only after Angelina attempts to make her solo escape that Bridget opens up to her. The castle where Angelina is being held captive has a dark history including the possible murder of the Baron’s brother who mysteriously disappeared; this information is striking to Angelina as she has felt a cold arm on her every night as she sleeps. Bridget then hints towards the portrait on the wall, behind which is a doorway that leads to a room where Angelina can overhearing the Baron’s conversation with Rufus. The Baron states that his suspicions have been confirmed and Angelina must be executed; Rufus tells him to wait. Shaken by these comments, Angelina puts her faith in Bridget, who sacrifices herself to save Angelina.
Returning to the Woodfields, the narrator reveals that the female apparition is actually a woman known as Kate of the Ruins who is friends with the mysterious stranger and smuggler, Hugh Clifford, or Angelina’s mysterious stranger. After Kate seeks out Arthur, Hugh reveals his plans to rescue her; Bridget aids them. Kate speaks to Angelina, warning her against reciprocating the flirtatious nature of her relationship with Hugh. Later that night, Angelina wakes to see yet another apparition giving her a kiss on the cheek, which Kate attributes to her imagination. However, Bridget had mentioned that Kate of the Ruins was in touch with the supernatural and had bewitched the grounds of St. Mark’s Abbey.
The next day Angelina and her uncle return home, only to hear a knock on the door and find Hugh, wounded. The Woodfields take care of him and Laura senses the romantic tension between Angelina and Hugh. Despite Kate’s warning, the affections between the pair only intensify until Arthur catches them during a rendezvous. Arthur reprimands them both and is backed up by the sudden appearance of Kate, who reminds them of the conversations she had with each of them. Their forced separation leads to despair for all parties involved. Angelina’s aunt and cousin question Arthur’s decision; he responds ambiguously, expressing empathy yet stating that the pair cannot be. Kate makes Angelina promise not to become involved with Hugh, revealing that she is speaking on behalf of Angelina’s deceased mother. The sight of her mother baffles her as it is the same apparition who kissed her on the cheek earlier. Angelina’s depressive state convinces Arthur to send Angelina to stay with Mrs. Montmorency, a distant relative whose daughter, Charlotte, is around the same age as Angelina.
This image shows Angelina’s surprise in observing the apparition of her mother. This is the beginning of the seventeenth part of this serially published novel. Small woodblock images are placed at the beginning of each part as incentive to buy and read it.
A few months later, Angelina looks out the window to see that Hugh has found her. The pair argue about their fate due to his persistence in finding her, but they are interrupted by ruffians who kidnap them. Ruthven takes Angelina to an underground dungeon in which she hears the moans of someone suffering; the Baron shows her that it is Bridget and she passes out. When Angelina comes to in a nice room, the Baron enters, proceeding to profess his love for her but is steadily refused; he attempts to bribe her with Hugh’s freedom and refrains from kissing her when he looks upon the painting behind her in fear. Angelina is reunited with Bridget, who has healed and is to be contained with her. Bridget goes on to tell her story, which is very similar to Angelina’s; however, in this case, it was Bridget’s parents who forbid their relationship, believing the façade that Rufus showed them. She married Rufus against her will, after which they eventually ended up at the old Grey Tower. It was then that Rufus left, returning with Angelina in tow. When it was discovered that Bridget helped Angelina escape, she is tortured and nearly dies of starvation. Bridget then discloses information about Ophelia de Morton, the woman in the portrait, whom she says that Angelina resembles. She speaks of the mysterious death of Ophelia’s husband, Baron Edward de Morton. Shortly after, the baroness married Edward’s brother since she was carrying his child. The baroness, referred to as the “Lady of White,” was brought to the old Grey Tower, where she bore a stillborn child, although there is said to be some doubt about its fate. It is said that this Lady’s musical talents, once heard in the tower, can still be heard from the ruins of St. Mark’s Abbey. After this bonding experience, Bridget and Angelina are forced onto a boat.
Meanwhile, Ms. Montmorency and Charlotte look for Angelina and write to Mr. Woodfield about her disappearance after they find blood near her miniature of Hugh. Mr. Woodfield persists on seeing the baroness Orillia, Baron de Morton’s wife, to demand the Baron’s location, explaining the situation to her. She is flustered as he catches her in the middle of an affair and is uncompromising as she thinks that Angelina is replacing her in the eyes of her husband. Mr. Woodfield responds by hinting at having more noble blood than she does. The baroness feels vengeful towards Angelina and sends for the Marquis Florendos, whom she has grown fond of, so he can assassinate them.
Mr. Woodfield leaves knowing he must get justice for both himself and the baroness to protect his niece. He becomes suspicious of the help from Kate of the Ruins, but she changes his mind in revealing her knowledge of his true identity, Sir Eustace Arlingham, and produces a treasure which he had left in the ruins of the Abbey years ago. The pair proceed to talk about his long-deceased sister Emmeline, who she reveals herself to be. She admits to him that Angelina is not her child and that Angelina’s mother, baroness Matilda de Morton, is alive. Furthermore, she states that Hugh is her child but he has yet to find out. Emmeline explains that her and Matilda have been watching over Angelina and assures him of her own innocence. He believes her and follows her to the vaults in which Matilda has been living.
Returning to Hugh’s circumstances, he is being held captive and losing hope for his lover, Angelina. He is saved by Winston, a former crew member of his, who is sent to attend to him. The pair leave together, explaining the reasoning behind Bridget and Angelina’s sudden leave from the old Grey Tower.
The ship carrying Bridget and Angelina wrecks, and the pair miraculously end up at the fisherman’s hut where Hugh and Winston are taking shelter. They all return home the day after Emmeline’s confession, but before their lineage can be exposed, the baroness Matilda enters, giving in to Angelina’s cries for her mother.
The narrator goes on to tell the story of the family Arlingham, which was of wealthy and noble descent. Lady Emmelina and Sir Eustace are the children of Sir Edward Arlighman and the baroness Arlingham. The four of them lived in a castle with their cousin, the orphan child of the baroness’ sister. After the sudden death of the baroness, Sir Edward passed away, leaving Eustace in charge of himself, his sister, and their cousin. Eustace and Matilda both found lovers who got along with one another as well as Emmeline. One day, the five of them witness a shipwreck which leads to their meeting of Sir Vincent Rosenford and his two companions. Upon seeing Vincent, Eustace’s wife shudders at him and begins to go mad. Sir Vincent and one of his companions, Lord Dalton, make frequent visits, and Lord Dalton eventually asks for Emmeline’s hand. Eustace urges her to marry him and she eventually gives in. However, after a short period, she elopes with Sir Vincent. As a result, Eustace’s wife gets deathly sick but has one last period of reason in which she admits that Sir Vincent was her first love and that they had an affair after his repeated visits and persistence with her. With this confession, she passes away. Eustace’s bad luck continues as Emmeline’s story is viewed as scandalous, causing him to lose his title in the court. Before he can receive a prison sentence, he escapes on a ship headed to Flanders, where he recreates his identity and eventually remarries. One day, he finds a baby at his door with a note from Emmeline to take care of her child, which she wanted to name Angelina.
Returning to present day, Emmeline apologizes to Eustace and points out that he should not have forced her into marriage. She then explains that her marriage with Lord Dalton became a good one, and that she actually bore his child, contrary to rumors. However, Lord Vincent Rosenford followed her and confessed his love, becoming cynical upon her denial of him. He told her that she should not deny him and proceeded to kidnap her while she is on a walk one evening. Emmeline expresses the anguish she felt as she was forced upon a ship that was then destroyed by a storm. It was not until after this event that she met Captain Clifford, who saved her and her infant son from drowning. Captain Clifford then became a smuggler, but he continued to look after Emmeline’s child. Emmeline recalls that he made a vow to be another parent to the child regardless of circumstance. Emmeline had then attempted to return home only to hear of Eustace’s scandals, which she emphasizes are now irrelevant. Shortly after, Emmeline returned to Captain Clifford and was introduced to his wife, who also takes pity on her. Emmeline also sought out her cousin’s current husband, the Baron de Morton, brother of her prior husband. To her shock, he informed her that the baroness has passed away. Unfortunately, it was upon her return to the Cliffords in which she was kidnapped, this time by Rufus and some ruffians; she was taken to the old Grey Tower. Upon her escape, she returned to the Cliffords to find that his wife has passed away, causing him to return to sea with her child, Hugh. Luckily, having possession of some money allowed Emmeline to return to a place that Captain Clifford had shown her, which was connected to the ruins of an old abbey, which the readers know as St. Mark’s Abbey. To her astonishment, Emmeline finds the baroness Matilda there. Emmeline then stops her narrative there, requesting that the baroness herself iterate the rest of the story. After the baroness refuses, Emmeline continues, telling of the cruel manner in which Matilda’s second husband treated her.
After forcing a secret marriage in the middle of the night, the baron stole her away to the old Grey Tower, in which she bore him a baby girl. Matilda was told that her baby was a stillborn; however, she felt that the baron was somehow responsible not only for the fate of their child, but for the mysterious disappearance of her first husband. After Matilda healed, she sought out her old nurse, explaining the situation to her. She instead found the daughter of her nurse, who was told by her husband of the deliverance of a baby to their neighbors. Matilda ran next door, looked upon the baby, and instantly recognized her as her own. The baroness also recognized a mark of companionship on her daughter’s arm, signifying that it was Bridget’s parents who saved baby Angelina. Matilda resolved then to live in the abbey, following the same line of thought as Emmeline in seeking shelter in the supposedly haunted place. In this way, Matilda and Emmeline were reunited. Captain Clifford returned, informing Matilda that her child was being attended to by a nearby nurse. The women related to him their plan of being covert in order to deliver retribution. Emmeline then relates that it was her who delivered the baby to Eustace so that he would care for the child. Emmeline recalls having been worried about the locket which she had left with Angelina; Eustace recalls his curiosity about it initially.
The storyline ends here as Emmeline concludes by coming back to her warnings to Eustace, Hugh, and Angelina, which can be understood as prevented due to its ill-timing as this was before the true nature of their births were revealed. The book finishes with a conclusion that doles out poetic justice. Sir Eustace Arlingham seeks justice via the court for himself, his sister, and their cousin. The king pities them and returns to them their respective riches and titles, having heard some news of the baron’s death along with his confessions of treason. Emmeline is reunited with her husband, and Hugh with his true parents. Orillia shamefully runs off with the Marquis Florendos after hearing word of her husband’s death. Angelina and Hugh get married and are surprised when they are approached by Bridget, who was miraculously cured. These three live together in their castle near the Woodfields and the Daltons. Angelina’s cousin, Laura, finds a gentleman whom she marries. Lady de Morton revives the abbey and the narrator explains the use of Emmeline’s scare tactics, such as the chest of bones, to ward of any early discovery of the pair’s plot. The author ends with “Thus, then, do we end ‘This round unvarnished tale’”—referring to the cyclic tropes of the novel and of life in general (236).
Bibliography
Humpherys, Anne. “Edward Lloyd.” British Literary Publishing Houses, 1820-1880, edited by Patricia Anderson and Jonathan Rose, Dictionary of Literary Biography, vol. 106. Detroit, Michigan, Gale, 1991. Literature Resource Center.
The Castle of Montabino by Sarah Wilkinson is a riveting narration of mystery and adventure in early 1800’s Italy, centralizing around two sisters’ daring escape from the clutches of their cruel uncle.
Material
History
The Castle of Montabino; or the Orphan Sisters: An Original Romance is a lengthily-titled, 38-page work of gothic fiction authored by Sarah Wilkinson. Originally, the contents of the book were stored in a fragile pamphlet of pages consisting of a blue cover and backing. However, the book was later rebound, and is currently held in a cardstock-weight tan binding. The novel does not appear particularly aesthetically pleasing as the exterior is bland, lacking an intriguing cover and decorative effects. The contents of the book, however, tell a more interesting story. Within the yellowed, aged pages of Wilkinson’s story are small splotches, stains, tears, and other mysterious man-made marks. These pages, containing the actual text, are quite delicate, uneven in length, and frayed at the ends as if torn.
This page shows the bluebook cover, and a catalogue of books printed and sold by the publisher
The first page of the text, or the introductory catalogue, is a detailed table of books printed on faded turquoise-blue parchment paper. This catalogue contains a list of the various works, including The Castle of Montabino, mentioning that they were all printed and sold by the same publisher. The full title of the book appears on the title page after this catalogue, and interestingly, the author’s name is quite inconspicuous, wedged between the full title, the publisher’s name, and a small drawing. Wilkinson is only mentioned as the author once throughout the whole course of the text.
A frontispiece precedes the title page. This is a larger, well-depicted illustration of three women who appear to be kneeling in fear within a castle. The expressions on their faces are contorted and overdramatized, indicating astonishment and fright. Under this image is a caption with the words, “The Castle of Montabino.” The second, smaller drawing is on the title page, and resembles a lightly sketched depiction of a miniature castle surrounded by a few trees. Both images are black and white, appearing relatively simple without ornate detailing or vibrant colors.
The remainder of the book is solely text, containing no other visual aids or sources which depict scenarios relevant to the plot. While the pages are saturated with words and there is not a lavish amount of white space, there is a generous amount of contrast between the paragraphs and spaces so that the reader is not overwhelmed by a mass of text. The font is large enough to easily read, comparable with 12-point font. The dimensions of the book in terms of the external length and width are 19.5 cm by 12 cm. The lengths of the pages within the book are varied as some of the pages are more worn or torn slightly more than others. Additionally, the turquoise blue introductory page and cover are significantly smaller than the yellowed pages with the contents of the text. The material on which the text is printed is a thinner version of printer paper, more aged and discolored than expected. With a tawny yellowish-tan color, the pages appear not only frail, but slightly brittle as well. A few interesting post-production marks found on some pages within the text include an inked signature on the catalogue which appears to spell the word “Montabino” in fluid cursive, along with smaller, more arbitrary pencil markings within the text containing dates and numbers.
Textual
History
Sarah Scudgell Wilkinson, the author of The Castle of Montabino; or the Orphan Sisters: An Original Romance, was a novelist known as one of the most prolific female gothic fiction writers of her time (Potter 109–10). She wrote and published over a hundred works of fiction, almost half of which were chapbooks. Many of her works were adaptations of previously existing novels, romances in particular (Baines). Many of Wilkinson’s pieces such as The Thatched Cottage and A Visit to London were abridgements. The Castle of Montabino, however, was her original work. Interestingly enough, Wilkinson is one of the few female authors whose names were printed and made visible within her published texts. Not only was her presence in the gothic fiction realm immense in the early nineteenth century, but some of her writings were also so popular that they were reprinted and recirculated multiple times (Baines). Some of Wilkinson’s more popular works included The History of Crazy Jane, Monkcliffe Abbey, and The Maid of Lochlin. By contrast, The Castle of Montabino, however, was not considered to be one of Wilkinson’s most notable or highly received works, and appears to have been less-known.
Title page for The Castle of Montabino
Unfortunately,
Wilkinson faced many difficulties in her early writing career. She was born
into a lower middle-class family, living on the border of poverty in the heart
of London. This continued on into her adult life as she was widowed, struggling
to support herself and her family with multiple odd occupations. She held a
variety of small jobs including being a schoolteacher, running a circulating
library, and taking in boarders (Potter, 110–11). Simultaneously, she was
diagnosed with breast cancer, leading her to petition the Royal Literary Fund
for aid. She cited not only these medical issues, but the difficulty of earning
a decent income as a female (Baines). Ultimately, she was fortunate enough to
receive this aid and was able to continue writing and publishing until her
death.
Wilkinson’s
interesting background and experiences are reflected in her bold,
unconventional writing. While she did fit into the framework of gothic style,
she combined typical gothic elements with more realistic aspects of daily life,
making subtle statements about societal constructs and the social position of
women (Baines). She was known to have mocked or satirized mainstream gothic
writers such as Ann Radcliffe, depicting diametrically opposing themes such as
female social liberation and freedom in her works, The Castle of Montabino
being one. Rather than catering to the higher classes, Wilkinson’s works were
aimed at the literate, lower-class population, specifically women. Not only did
she combine typical gothic tropes with the supernatural, she also focused on
the themes of female subjectivity, gender, and identity. This innovative aspect
of her writing marked her as a breakthrough female gothic fiction author
(Hoeveler, 3–4).
The particular
edition of TheCastle of Montabino held in the University of
Virginia Special Collections Library was published around 1810 by Dean and
Munday Publishers. In total, there are two editions and several physical copies
of these two editions held in libraries across the world. In addition to the
copies at the University of Virginia Special Collections Library, databases
indicate that the book is also at Duke University Libraries, UCLA,
Northwestern, and The British Library in London. Additionally, there is an
online edition of the text available with free access for the public through
Chawton House Libraries (WorldCat). Different library databases and collections
cite either 1809 or 1810 as the approximate time the work was printed. There is
a second edition that was published around the same time, but by S. Bailey
instead of the initial publishers, Dean and Munday. While the University of Virginia
library catalog indicates that it is published by Dean and Munday, the interior
catalogue of the text features a table of books, including TheCastle
of Montabino, as being printed and sold by S.Bailey.
This page shows the shortened title of the book, and an image of three women who appear to be hunched over, fearfully looking towards a dark, cloaked figure standing in an archway
The intriguing
details regarding the history of the publishing of The Castle of Montabino originate
with the relationship between Dean and Munday and S. Bailey, also known as
Susan Bailey. The two publishing entities were thought to have had familial
ties, providing a possible explanation for the reprinting and production of two
copies around the same time frame (“Movable Stationary”). Among many of
Wilkinson’s works, it is a common theme that most of the pieces are published
by either S. Bailey or Dean and Munday, sometimes even both. Dean and Munday as
a publication company was said to have been effective in their advertising,
cultivating a name as the largest supplier of movable children’s books and
chapbooks, fitting Wilkinson’s niche. The company primarily published fiction
chapbooks in the form of bluebooks: small, thin paper pamphlets with
turquoise-blue covers and backings, illustrated clearly through the visual
appearance of The Castle of Montabino (“Movable Stationary”).
Not only was
Wilkinson considered an influential author of her time, but she is also studied
by contemporary scholars. She is mentioned as a female gothic pioneer with her
works being cited in Franz Potter’s The History of Gothic Publishing.
She is often referred to as one of the most productive and gifted writers in
the field, introducing bold and daring concepts for her time period (Hoeveler
3–4). Wilkinson’s impact on the development of gothic fiction is also a major
focal point of discussion in Ellen Malenas Ledoux’s Social Reform in Gothic
Writing. Ledoux particularly analyzes what she calls the “working-class
gothic in The Castle of Montabino (77).
Narrative
Point of View
The Castle of
Montabino is narrated in the
third-person omniscient by an anonymous narrator who is never discussed or
mentioned within the text. The narration is often convoluted and consists of
lengthy paragraphs that occasionally form tangents away from the central plot.
The narration focuses on the internal feelings and emotions of the characters
briefly during the beginning of the book through dialogue and description.
Later on, this focus shifts to a centralization around action and details of
the core events in the plot. The language utilized throughout the text is
intricate and verbose, and transitions from one event to another often blend
together. In addition, the narration is extremely hurried and events are often
grouped together, depicted as occurring back to back with no pause in between.
Sample Passage:
“Thanks be to heaven,” said the Signor, her apprehensions and suspense will now be converted to joy. “Then, turning to the servants, he said—“I think I scarce need repeat any injunctions of secresy.”— “We are faithful, and would die to prove it,” was the general reply. He asked a few questions, and being informed that the Countess had ordered breakfast not to be on table till two, he proposed retiring till that hour, and Laurinda conducted the ladies and Beatrice to their respective chambers. The sisters were so much fatigued with travelling, that they were not able to converse with their usual facility; and after a few remarks, they fell into a profound slumber, from which they did not awake till the entrance of Beatrice, who came to assist them in dressing; Laurinda having supplied her with the necessary articles for that purpose. At two they descended to the breakfast saloon; Signor Rupino and the Countess were ready to receive them, the former paid them the usual compliments, in a most elegant and flattering speech, the lady spoke not- yet she cordially pressed their hands,—heavy sighs distended her bosom, and she sobbed most piteously. The Signor apologized for the Countess’s not speaking to them; he said that their presence had awakened some bitter recollections that had overcome her. She wore a thick muslin veil, and she took great care, while eating her breakfast, that no part of her face should be seen. Before their repeat was concluded, they were joined by the two gentlemen who had always accompanied Signor Rupino and the Countess in the boat; the latter whispered something to the Countess, they retired together to one of the open balconies (15).
This particular
narrative style creates a fast-paced story due to the fleeting portrayal of
events. In some cases, it is difficult to distinguish the start of one event
and the end of another due to the fact that both the sentences and paragraphs
are long and strung out. The events are portrayed as occurring one after the
other, and the narration significantly contributes to the sudden nature of
transitions within the plot. This aspect of the narration along with some
obscured language makes it hard to identify certain contexts or intervals. In
illustrating the sister’s journey in the passage above, the narrator mentions,
“The sisters were so much fatigued with travelling, that they were not able to
converse with their usual facility; and after a few remarks, they fell into a
profound slumber, from which they did not awake till the entrance of Beatrice,
who came to assist them in dressing; Laurinda having supplied her with the
necessary articles for that purpose” (15). This sentence highlights the
quantity of condensed details within particular points of the narration,
offering an example of the culmination of ideas that are often presented in a
short period of time.
Summary
The Castle of
Montabino is a short gothic story set in Italy in the early nineteenth
century. The plot places specific focus on Emillia and Theresa, two recently
orphaned sisters faced with peril after the passing of their aunt, the
Countess. The novel begins by describing the somber mood within the castle, and
the despair experienced by the two sisters. Emillia and Theresa convey that
they do not wish to reside in the Castle at Montabino under the care of their
cold and cruel uncle, the Count. In their private apartment, they discuss their
plan to escape from the castle with the help of mysterious, unidentified
companions. These companions—three noble, well dressed men and one woman, soon arrive
at the castle by boat. They dock their boat under the window of the sisters’
apartment, confirming their role in aiding the girls with their escape. The
mysterious figures state that the two sisters are nearing imminent danger, and
that they must take action in immediately ensuring their safety.
Theresa and Emillia
agree that escaping from the castle the next day is the most suitable option,
and they begin to make the proper arrangements to do so. Subsequently, Emillia
and Theresa proceed with their normal lifestyles within the castle, engaging
with their domestic employees Susette, Cosmo, and Judith. During this time,
Judith, Emillia, and Theresa make the startling discovery that a ghost occupies
the castle, causing slight turmoil and fright. While the sisters express their
dismay at leaving their beloved employees, Susette and Judith, in the castle
with the presence of a ghost, they ultimately make their daring escape that
night. Following the instructions given to them by their mysterious friends, the
sisters travel through arched recesses and narrow tunnels, exiting the castle
and entering a desolate area filled with ruins.
Unfortunately, they
cross paths with two cloaked figures. Startled, they hide behind fragments of
stone, concealing themselves to avoid discovery. During this time, they learn
the identity of the cloaked figures: a man named Gusmond and his servant Hugo.
Their sole purpose for entering the desolate area at such an odd hour was to
bury a child. The men banter about preserving secrecy and concealing the events
that were to transpire, mentioning that if anyone were to find out, the Count
would punish them harshly.
A page of sample text for The Castle of Montabino
After the men leave,
Theresa and Emillia hastily arrive at their set meeting point, waiting in
anticipation for their transportation to arrive. They discuss the strange,
dreadful mystery that plagues the Castle, their relief at escaping the clutches
of the Count and their hopes to never be found by him or ever return. Shortly
after, the sisters are met by their companions and introduced to their
attendants, Signor Rupino and Beatrice. They embark upon a carriage, and ride
until dawn, taking shelter at a deserted castle for a while, restarting their
journey at dusk, and later arriving at a cottage where they again take rest.
Their travel progresses until they arrive at a villa quite distant from the
castle. It is here that the sisters learn a treacherous secret: the Count had
ordered Cosmo to poison his wife. Cosmo, unable to go through with this order,
deceived the Count and instead aided the Countess in escaping under a
guise.
Upon hearing this
news, the sisters are overjoyed, invigorated yet shocked by the thought of
seeing their aunt. Shortly after, the sisters are reunited with the Countess,
who begins to reveal the details of her story. She narrates her childhood,
mentioning the hard work and sacrifices her father made to accumulate wealth
and provide for the family. Leading up to the moment she was introduced to the
Count, she recalls the party during which she was acquainted with him. Soon
after, the Count became a frequent visitor, and made numerous proposals for the
now-Countess’ hand in marriage. They were quickly married, and she soon came to
realize his true intention, which was to gain wealth from her family through
their union. Moreover, after the untimely death of her father, the Count
refused the Countess’ request to visit her family or have any of them visit
her. He became intolerable, refusing her the luxuries of a maidservant, and
becoming increasingly cruel.
She briefly narrates
her happiness in caring for the sisters once their parents passed away, and
proceeds to reveal the night on which Cosmo assisted her in her escape. She was
drugged, proclaimed dead, and later hidden in a coffin to be transported to a
cottage in the woods a few miles from the Castle. It was after this fateful
night that she realized the Count’s evil intentions to take her fortune, and
the fortune of her nieces by first murdering her, as she was their guardian.
After her departure from the Castle and knowledge of this information, the
Countess contacted her friends for a place to stay, financial means, and safe
passage far away from the Castle. It was later on that she contacted her
mysterious allies, Beatrice and Signor Rupino, requesting them to approach her
nieces in order to affect their escape, as the Count had planned to poison them
as well.
While this unfolds,
the Count seethes with anger upon discovering the disappearance of Emillia and
Theresa. As a result, he murders Cosmo in a fit of anger while trying to
extract the truth from him. Even though Cosmo is unaware of the means of their
escape, he divulges that the Countess is still alive, sending the Count into a
rage. The Count scours the tunnels and hidden passages of Montabino, attempting
to discover what could have allowed his nieces to escape, or some clue as to
where his wife has fled. However, this search ends in his accidental stabbing
and eventual death.
Once the Count’s
death is confirmed, friends of the Countess and noblemen from the villa begin
searching all corners of the castle to uncover the treacherous secrets that the
Count may have hidden. It was then that they come across a young woman,
Harmina, who was locked away in a small, unkempt room with her daughter.
Harmina later reveals her story, discussing her working-class upbringing, her
struggles to receive her romantic and material interests, and how she came to
be acquainted with the Count. She originally attracted the attentions of
Fernando, a servant of the Count, who later introduced the two. The Count was
enraptured by her beauty, while hiding his marriage, began to have an affair
with her. He ensured that she lived in a charming villa away from the castle,
visiting her occasionally and giving her the luxuries she desired. Their affair
lasted for three to four years, and she bore him three children. However,
Harmina later became aware that he was a married man and, dismayed, revealed to
him her plan to return to her father and the rest of her family immediately.
During her escape,
she was intercepted by the Count and forced into imprisonment, where her
children were taken from her, pronounced dead under mysterious and vague
conditions, and later buried. Gusmond, the man who Emillia and Theresa
witnessed at the desolate site, confesses to murdering Harmina’s children, and
is sentenced to life imprisonment. In the end, Harmina retires to a convent,
and leaves her child in the care of the Countess who is joyfully remarried.
Theresa and Emillia, who also get married, live happily. The story ends with
the moral that those who are virtuous will be rewarded and those who are wicked
will meet with punishment.
Bibliography
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“Wilkinson, Sarah Scudgell (d. c. 1830), Writer: Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography.” (d. c. 1830), Writer | Oxford Dictionary of National
Biography, Oxford University Press, 5 Oct. 2019.
“The Castle of
Montabino; or The Orphan Sisters: an Original Romance.” WorldCat, 12 Dec.
2018.
Hoeveler, Daine L.
“Sarah Wilkinson: Female Gothic Entrepreneur.” Gothic Archive: Related
Scholarship, Marquette University, 1 Jan. 2015.
“Movable Stationary,”
The Movable Book Society Newsletter,
May 2013 (“Vintage Pop-Up Books” with further information, accessed 30 October
2019).
Potter, Franz. “The
Romance of Real Life: Sarah Wilkinson.” The History of Gothic Publishing: 1800–1835, Palgrave UK, 2005, pp.
109–30.
Wilkinson, Sarah Scudgell. The Castle of Montabino; or The Orphan Sisters: an Original Romance.
London, Dean and Munday, 1810.
