The Collected Novels. William Harrison Ainsworth

Thackeray, Landseer, Clarkson Stanfield, Talfourd, Jerrold, and Cruikshank were among his guests. The list of his principal historical novels, with their dates of issue, may now be given: “Rookwood,” 1834; “Crichton,” 1837; “Jack Sheppard,” 1839; “Tower of London,” 1840; “Guy Fawkes,” 1841; “Old St. Paul’s, a Tale of the Plague and the Fire of London,” 1841; “Windsor Castle,” 1843; “St. James, or the Court of Queene Anne,” 1844; “Star Chamber,” 1854; “Constable of the Tower,” 1861; “The Lord Mayor of London,” 1862; “Cardinal Pole,” 1863; “John Law, the Projector,” 1864; “The Constable de Bourbon,” 1866; “Talbot Harland,” 1870; “Boscobel,” 1872; “The Manchester Rebels, or the Fatal ‘45,” 1873; and “The Goldsmith’s Wife,” 1874. These novels all met with a certain amount of success, but those of later years did not attain the striking popularity of his earlier efforts. Many have been translated into various modern languages, and the editions of his various works are so numerous that some twenty-three pages of the British Museum catalogue are devoted to his works. The scenery and history of his native country had a perennial interest for him, and a certain group of his novels — that is, the “Lancashire Witches,” “Guy Fawkes,” “The Manchester Rebels,” etc. — may almost be said to form a novelist’s history of Lancashire from the pilgrimage of grace until the early part of the present century.

      Probably no more vivid account has been written of the great fire and plague of London than that given in “Old St. Paul’s.” The charm of Ainsworth’s novels is not at all dependent upon the analysis of motives or subtle description of character. Of this he has little or nothing, but he realizes vividly a scene or an incident, and conveys the impression with great force and directness to the reader’s mind. Ainsworth came upon the reading world at a happy moment. People were weary of the inanities of the fashionable novel, and were ready to listen to one who had a power of vivacious narrative. In 1881, when he was in his seventy-seventh year, a pleasant tribute of respect and admiration was paid to him in his native town. The Mayor of Manchester entertained him at a banquet in the town hall September 15, 1881, “as an expression of the high esteem in which he is held by his fellow-townsmen and of his services to literature.” In proposing Mr. Ainsworth’s health, the mayor gave a curious instance of the popularity of his writings. “In our Manchester public free libraries there are two hundred and fifty volumes of Mr. Ainsworth’s different works. During the last twelve months these volumes have been read seven thousand six hundred and sixty times, mostly by the artisan class of readers. And this means that twenty volumes of his works are being perused in Manchester by readers of the free libraries every day all the year through.” It was well that this pleasant recognition was not longer delayed. The contrast was pathetically great between the tall, handsome, dandified figure presented in the portraits of him by Pickersgill and Maclise, and the bent and feeble old man who stood by and acknowledged the plaudits of those who had assembled to honor him. His last published work was “Stanley Brereton,” which he dedicated to his hospitable entertainer. He died at Reigate January 3, 1882, leaving a widow and also three daughters by his first marriage. He was buried at Kensal Green Cemetery. With the exception of George Gleig, he was the last survivor of the brilliant group who wrote for the early numbers of Fraser’s Magazine, and, though he died in harness, had outlived nearly all the associates of the days when he first achieved fame.

      TO MY MOTHER

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      When I inscribed this Romance to you, my dear Mother, on its first appearance, I was satisfied that, whatever reception it might meet with elsewhere, at your hands it would be sure of indulgence. Since then, the approbation your partiality would scarcely have withheld has been liberally accorded by the public; and I have the satisfaction of reflecting, that in following the dictates of affection, which prompted me to select the dearest friend I had in the world as the subject of a dedication, I have not overstepped the limits of prudence; nor, in connecting your honored name with this trifling production, involved you in a failure which, had it occurred, would have given you infinitely more concern than myself. After a lapse of three years, during which my little bark, fanned by pleasant and prosperous breezes, has sailed, more than once, securely into port, I again commit it to the waters, with more confidence than heretofore, and with a firmer reliance that, if it should be found “after many days,” it may prove a slight memorial of the warmest filial regard.

      Exposed to trials of no ordinary difficulty, and visited by domestic affliction of no common severity, you, my dear Mother, have borne up against the ills of life with a fortitude and resignation which those who know you best can best appreciate, but which none can so well understand, or so thoroughly appreciate, as myself. Suffering is the lot of all. Submission under the dispensation is permitted to few. And it is my fervent hope that my own children may emulate your virtues, if they are happily spared your sorrows.

      PREFACE

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      During a visit to Chesterfield, in the autumn of the year 1831, I first conceived the notion of writing this story. Wishing to describe, somewhat minutely, the trim gardens, the picturesque domains, the rook-haunted groves, the gloomy chambers, and gloomier galleries, of an ancient Hall with which I was acquainted, I resolved to attempt a story in the bygone style of Mrs. Radcliffe — which had always inexpressible charms for me — substituting an old English squire, an old English manorial residence, and an old English highwayman, for the Italian marchese, the castle, and the brigand of the great mistress of Romance.

      While revolving this subject, I happened, one evening, to enter the spacious cemetery attached to the church with the queer, twisted steeple, which, like the uplifted tail of the renowned Dragon of Wantley, to whom “houses and churches were as capons and turkeys,” seems to menace the good town of Chesterfield with destruction. Here an incident occurred, on the opening of a vault, which it is needless to relate, but which supplied me with a hint for the commencement of my romance, as well as for the ballad entitled “The Coffin.” Upon this hint I immediately acted; and the earlier chapters of the book, together with the description of the ancestral mansion of the Rookwoods, were completed before I quitted Chesterfield.

      Another and much larger portion of the work was written during a residence at Rottingdean, in Sussex, in the latter part of 1833, and owes its inspiration to many delightful walks over the South Downs. Romance-writing was pleasant occupation then.

      The Ride to York was completed in one day and one night. This feat — for a feat it was, being the composition of a hundred ordinary novel pages in less than twenty-four hours — was achieved at “The Elms,” a house I then occupied at Kilburn. Well do I remember the fever into which I was thrown during the time of composition. My pen literally scoured over the pages. So thoroughly did I identify myself with the flying highwayman, that, once started, I found it impossible to halt. Animated by kindred enthusiasm, I cleared every obstacle in my path with as much facility as Turpin disposed of the impediments that beset his flight. In his company, I mounted the hill-side, dashed through the bustling village, swept over the desolate heath, threaded the silent street, plunged into the eddying stream, and kept an onward course, without pause, without hindrance, without fatigue. With him I shouted, sang, laughed, exulted, wept. Nor did I retire to rest till, in imagination, I heard the bell of York Minster toll forth the knell of poor Black Bess.

      The supernatural occurrence, forming the groundwork of one of the ballads which I have made the harbinger of doom to the house of Rookwood, is ascribed, by popular superstition, to a family resident in Sussex; upon whose estate the fatal tree — a gigantic lime, with mighty arms and huge girth of trunk, as described in the song — is still carefully preserved. Cuckfield Place, to which this singular piece of timber is attached, is, I may state, for the benefit of the curious, the real Rookwood Hall; for I have not drawn upon imagination, but upon memory, in describing the seat and domains of that fated family. The general features of the venerable structure, several of its chambers, the old garden, and, in particular, the noble park, with