The Sun.
London, England, 1852-08-02 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY EVENING,

Pastime though it was in reality, it practically
enough tencehi Without question to devekipe .he
dreamer into •he novelist—tutoring his mind to the_
more 1 otelsss •
twen .Y .
unravelling of the intricacies of .
ere
pecti..
a plot, and to the
40'4n:fitly nothing could be ,i a , .
ripening of those synthetic powers which
i„
veers ago than en attempt to revive the popularity Ot
itar-ua„,, "tong Englishmen. Romance, we mein, li•rty requisite in the creation,.
_an. and ihod. piaerrtaicca;
it-thl•enerl by the glamour of a larly in the delineatiki of a fictitioas i lost ~_
Having exhausted his ardour sa those ionocent ad-
peapetuel and porteetous imprebatility—roman ' Oh
possessing an interest lan„ _
ce ,
~
incidents of which were phenomone, the muchinery of ventures, Herrison Ainsworth .saccessively ceased
hie labours both es an amateur pyrotechnist, and as
.
which was the neerementiceand the principal elarecters a iity then
With in toile, or rathsr -inthe
manager of rearioeettes. His aseidu -
the
galleries" which were the. supernatural. . the " storied became absorbed
... h.
..I_., .
tit
galleries" of Abbotsford the age had become de- delights of literary composition. He trauumeatisc
that Walter Scott
lightedly familiarised ; insomuch
despotism through thehe now wrote desultory
ready written,h . as
.we have seen, . d
exercised a kind ,of literary scenes arid dialogues .
skelehes and ventured even upon incliting certain
influence of his incomparable masterpieces. The charms
of his voluble rhetoric had lapsed into the chief among already f " ate
witnessed in the trametiguradon o
tragedies. Several of these fugitive pieces he had
the luxuries of imaginative literature. People were glory of print" before his departure from school,
so far infatuated with his " school " that their havingbeen a frequent contributor to a weekly
sense of pleasure passed into an ahtorbieg and
in a rather select literary circle at Man-
pfie)roirofd2kciaulg" ntitled " The Iris," at that period-
dominant predilection. They restricted their apprevai
chaster. is
teeste:e ee these papers, moreover, he pennsd
almost exclusively to stories couetructed according
a variety of others in - the o Earepean alagteine,
to the MO(1,1 rendered fashionable by the Author or
E; added to which lie contrived to issue on his own ac-
lirry,rley—oxulting in his exquisite
„ sensibility,his
co a unt small theatrical publication, aitd to edit the
genial ror-rrirn,nt, and*. Pictur,'squ'' 4.'l' '1:1""arl', 4D3' six firetniunbers of a locel journal called the :Bteotion.
as in former times the lettered comenutnty had re.
Among the tregedies.bernie, alluded to, the history: of
juiced in the witty.obscenity of Henry Fielding and
one at Least is not unworthy of remembrance. The
thehumorous piquancy of Tales Smoliett, or as a still
earlier genera. ioit had vaunted the punctilious decorum sahleer °I this
identical with that of Lerd Byron's `cF
Two oscari,"
and seteimeetal morality of Samuel Richardsoo. Toe "tragedy was, tutiously enough,
a kind of synoptical criticism of it Bp-
enthusi,,ln for the horrible seemed to have died out
peering about a mouth before the publication of the
-aids Robert Maturio, but little likelihood remaining
lattera in the page a .of `sConstable's Edinburgh
visible of any companion memorial to that of '`Mel-
Alagazine"--to which serial the young tragedian
moth the Wanderer." Simplicity was generally
thereupon became an established contributor. To-
recognised as, of all, the most desirable quality in
gether with his effusions in
_this quarter must be
the novelist—simplicity conducing almost inevi_
numbere,d a tale entitled the Falls of Ohiopyle—
tablv to naturalness. There was en nppret
inserted in Taylor and Hessey's " Lotecien Magazine,"
cable disrelish for the artificial phantasies .of
and two poem: (printed by Arliss)callsd respectively,
Horace Walpele, and a proportionate preference for
A Summer Evening's Tale and toe Maid's Revenge.
the sweet and homely delineations of Diver Gold-
A selection from these miscellaneous writings, col-
smith. Scarc•-ly anyone cared to penetrate the nays- lected together in a diminutive volume designated
tries of the " Castle of 0--ranto," but everyone che-
December Tales, was subsequently published by
risaeri en affectionate interest in the fortunes of the
Whittaker ; and must be inscribed on the catalogue
``Vicar of Wekefield." . Across the Channel, the
of those works which are interesting as productions—
fantastic and grimly genius of Honore de Balzac
jejune it may be, but still original in their very crudity
was preparing the public mind for the more cordial
and extravagance—completed before the age of nine-
appreciation of Paul Lecroix, if it was not actually
teen. If devoid of .loftier merit, they evidence at
euggesting that hornsge for the marvellous which
least a very considerable fertility of fancy with a pre-
eventually produced the strangest characters in the
" Notre Dame" of Victor Hugo, the ghastliest fea-
tures in the " Juif Errant" of Eugene Sue, and those position.
very extraordinary complications of plot which Scarcely had Ainsworth reached that momentous
render the " Monte Christo" of Alexandre Dumas in epoch when, with the generality, life begins in all
some respects altogether incomparable. Beyond the its earnestness—when the death of his father induced
Rhine, moreover, the wizard-like capacities of Ludwig him to repair to the metropolis for the purpose of
Teak were preparing for his wilder effusions a con-
completing (under the guidance of Mr. Jacob
sideration in Germany equivalent only to that which
Phillips of the Inner Temple) his long-evaded studies
s a conveancer. Oetensibl least suchas the
has been secured by the " Devil's Elixir" of Ernest
object
with which his journey tot London wa sunder'Hoffmaon. lii England the revival, we repeat, of the
taken, though we conjecture that his arrival in the
popularity of Romance appeared. at that epoch by. no
capital was attributable to emotions similar to those
which. subsequently conducted the hero of his master-
almostmeans matter of probability—scarcely, one might.tof
have ventured to assertovithin theLewismi limits
piece through so many novel and fascinating enter-
possibiliiy. The notoriety of Matthew L ihad
tainments. Whatever the motive, 'the result was
already floated away into dim perspective, as
indisputably such as might, under the Circumstances,
his own corpse - is, said to havedone
hammock—when they
buried him in the deep sea in his have been anticipated. The " jealous mistress"
of the Law Was abandoned for a. flirtation with
the shot slipping, the shroud blowing open into
Literature. . Previously, however, the young
a sail, sud the dead man gliding awayt withh.kghost-
like rapidity—an incident we can,rio but,,t think peal- law-student had penetrated , those mysteries
of the metropolis of which, at a subsequent period, he 1
litirly befitting the author of the ' ?honk,. of all ro-
mances the Most daring as it is unquestionably of all the began the Revelation. That he should ever have
most detesieble. Besides which the lovers of ro. er'rmitted himself to be diverted from the -completion
Pof this enteri e ust always be matter of regret,
mantic fiction had reason to lament, about the period
h
Pr
rise
is of his very peculiar and ad-
referred to, namely in 1823, the departure its the aw.t ir
he las t el . p lic
fi dons. With somewhat of the nail
year of her age, of Ann Radcliffe. There rnira e qua i ai
Henry
Mayhew. and with something
seemed no likelihood whatever of the world of
nutenessofth' of James Grant,' he pos-
letters producing very speedily' any one worthy more than
much of
exactitudeofEugene Sue's. mastery over the
d• being her successor. Itlaterialistri appeared
muith none of his socialist views or of- his sickly
,o have altogether, if not permanently, usurped territftee,
forw the licentious. Aided by this unusual
the place hitherto occupied by Spiritualism. More
appetite
of abilities, he might yet recount the
than ever a mercantile community, the people of
°I
marvels of Loudon in. some fiction wherein the prin
these islands were beginning precisely at that period
°*ales of social economy would be illustrated through
to augment their activity very considerably for the
ethiPe medium of its own picturesque analysis, while the
purpose of extending, as well as of facilitating, their • glittered (like motes in the sunbeam) in
commercial avocations. Physical science and me- driest statistics
.. .
chanical ingenuity were entering upon that the golden glow sine erle • •
of imagination. A xp need as his
in
favourite Itandulph, as susceptible
.temperament,
united action which, within the last guar-
g v and as handeome, Harrison Ainsworth passed
ter of a century, has so miraculously mul- asrase zest through the roupd of the London
tiplied the industrial achievements of the United w"" equal t, Happily, also, he very speedily; disco-
Kingdom. England was being threaded, even then, amusemen, • .
by railroads, which, by subsequent ramifications and
vered a Hilda in an , • .a 1 ny the youngest daughter of
intersections, have beeome transformed into an iron Mr. Ebert, the eels-known librarian, at that period
network. Under all circumstances, an endeavour at lessee of the Italian .
Opera, or, as it is designated by
that time to wield anew the wand of a literary Merlin way of peculiar distinction, Her Majesty's Theatre.
which consequently took place in 1826
would have seemed to the generality a scheme of the The marriage,_ocve
1 fi of those three daughters-do Fanny,
most idle and preposterous extravagance.lt was scarcely Ewas.pola.
ar
y and Blanche"—to whom Ainsworth
less futile than an attempt to encounter a ghost at hasm very Emily gracefully inscribed the most delightful of
twelve o'clock at noon-day in Piccadilly.
It was his animated compositions. Scarcely twelve years
like evoking a dryad out of a lamp-post. It was his
her nuptials, however, the young mother, in
pitting Ariel or Puck in a race against
;the electric
1838, expired—and the continued literary success of
telegraph. It was surrimoaing Egeria from among
the bow .pots, and the London-pride, and the lupins,widower became thereupon, we may conjecture,
the
enhaned from a pleasure into a consolation. That
and the geraniums of a front-garden, twelve feet by
success may with a certain degree of accuracy be
seven, in Pimlico. There might have appeared
dated back to the year which witnessed his union
at the time hardly more absurdity in examining a
with his betrothed-1826 having, in a manner, also
drop of the divine ichor—the blood of the gods—(if
witnessed its commencement. For it was than that
one could only have obtained it) by the aid of the
his maiden romance, Sir John Chiverton, first made
oxyht-drogen microscope. To a matter of ract ob its t isooeratice—a story recounting in seven chapters
wevor the prvjt-ct of realizing a tnernugi3ly popular-
the crimes and sorrows of an English baronet at an
reputation as an ultra-romancist would have seemed
old country house, peopled with victims under-
about as rational, possibly, as an effort to trans-
ground, and above-ground with a motley and sinister
form a steam-engine into a hippogriff. Yet
group of -myrmidons. Brief though tile narrative
that project was actually realiz,d, The
steam- was, it yielded augury of worthier achievements,- and
engine was not transformed into the hippogriff, but the
was mentioned in " Scott's 'Diary," under date
romancist appeared, and in an age of railroads secured
ear of-
October 17, in the ypublicatiou, as a " clever"
to himself this apparently unattainable reputation!
volume, which had been perused " with interest" aver
And what was, perhaps, yet more remarkable, his affec-
tion for the unearthly dreams'of mysticism had been by the fastidious eye of the Master-Novelist. Un-
questionably the most enthralling passage in the
nurtured in the land of the loom—their voice becom-
wole story is that in ' which the heroine,
ing audible, so to speek, above the din of the roaring
Ellice Chiverton, proceeding at ,midnight tbrough
workshops and the populous factories of Lancashire. the subterranean dungeons, releases her lover Reginald
William Plarrison Ainsworth, born on the 4:h of -
ea tw che from captivity—otrather the subsequent
February, 1805, in King-street, Manchester, was the resY
where she is surprised by her brother while
eldest son of Thomas Ainsworth (a solicitor, etjoyiug portion,.rsieg.
the vaults under Chiverton Hall, andln fly-
in that locality considerable practice), by Ann, ri:av'from him, through dread of assassination, is acct.
daughter of the Rev. Ralph Harrison, a distinguished
'eget Ity drowned. - Occhsionally, even-in the diction
Presbyterian. Among his progenitors there had al- d. aaadia John Chiverton," , there are perceptible the
ready been several in both branches of this (it, _
t ces of a beginner, the evidences of a quaint and
family who bad achieved for themselves some degree evi
enttc affectation—as where in the course of this
of' distinction. His maternal ancestors Cuthbert incidentHar-
fan;vaal reference is made to the-" external ex-
;--rison, was celebrated both by learning and by ludo- ver" o from the cavern, Several of the subordinate
oendence as a nonconformist. His paternal ancestor, trance
personages introduced are little else than the dim
Robert Aineworth, has, by his industry as a leiica-
()
f dowings of character, afterwards more eare-
grapher, associated his name with the English-aad.
fulll aand artistically elaborated—such, for . ex.
Lvin, as inseparably as Boyer has associated his with yl
~
,as the tawny. visage of Mahmood
the Eta fish-and-French Dictionary : while another
ample,"
e,
the Moor and the malignant features
member of the same house, Henry Ainsworth, oh-
of Bali
Scymel the Physician. Another creation,
twined a high repute two centuries‘ ago as a Brownist
o e
nally sketchy of- its kind, lends to the
having evidenced, moreover, the ripeness of his erus though
moreg egreeable fascination in the goodly
and
dition as a Hebrew scholar, both by his translation
book
abe person of the steward, Master Misseltue:
of the Pentateuch and by his annotations on the
venerable person
with, or shortly before, the
Old Testament. Our author's younger brother,
111 Th
tta- Sir John Chiverton, Harrison Ainsworth is.
appear-
Thomas Gilbert Ainsworth, appears to .have once of oil.=
the
press A. Pamphlet (Bvo, pp. 24), en-
given early promise of attaining some position sued
" Considerations on the Best Means of
Afford-
kindred in its intellectual eminence, but after taking titled .
•P Relief to the Operative Classes in the
a scholarship at Cambridge, ing Immediate
and Otherwise enhancing
. the expectation of those interested in watching his Manufacturing Districts"--a paper inscribed by the
advancement, his constitution author to the Right H. Robert Peel, then Secrea
appears to have sud-
denly broken (lawn' under the effects of over-stud y-- tary of State for the .
Home Department. A feeling
compelling him to abandon' tbe idea of . 31. of hugnenity appears to have been the motive
obtainin . - •motive
to appeal thus to the mhis degree, and precluding a entering actuating the writer -,ath "
_him frown _0 e population--lat '
, the Church, to which 'he could scarcel • cence, and magnanimity „ . -, a n i
y have
"proved otherwise anroused by the norrora :of a
than ornament. Very dif-sympathies
beingd titution. It would Scarcely
ferent were the destinies of the- elder son of the very fatal and prevalent es
solicitor. Elucated in the first instance by his uncle have been necessary, however, to allude otherwise
the Rev. William Harrison, he was eventually placed than in the most cursory manner to an effusion like.
in and ephemetalina.
in one of the classes presided over by the Rev. RO-., this, invested with a simply, .
El tlel at the ' free grattdmat-
tinson se. e, school .in terest—had we not remarked in one portion of tit-
Manchester. establishnient • illustrated In this . . .
ti, t it- h cons'd e-
argument (p. 20) an expression wlc —. i. ering
by many' scholars of clistinhuo dating back the subject mentioned,. the time in wh'i'ch it' was
in the sixteenth-to
mentioned, and the statesiben to whom it. was • meta;
the period of its foundation
reported to have tioned—must, if only from its singularity, coMmand-
century, Harrison Ainsworth is
precocious abilities, our surprise and our admiration. The expression
displayed somewhat unusual and among occurs-where the pamphleteer, having hinted at the
obtaining the commendation of his superiors,
.
other things, by his ingenious translations of Greek advisability of settling the question of the corn-laws
the in reference to the alleviation of the distress in the
and Latin poetry—his declamation on one of
manufacturing districts (a distress analogous to that
public-dis I d
idavtaays of the "Quit vere Rex" of Seneca,.
of 1846), addresses this curious inquiry, in 1826, to
followed by the recithl of an original version, beiug the very statesman who, twenty years afterwards,
• still remembered in the scene of his academic successes.
inaugurated the free-trade principles—" Important as
Shortly after attaining the dignity 'of the " first
it is [meaning the question of the Corn-lawe].w i
form' the st • Vremoved froth the school, and its determination
rip ing was its ou d
either way immediately [sic in 0 • '
introduced es a clerk into the office of Mr. Alexander tikr.]
yield relief to the sufferers ?" Surely a suggestion
Kay, an attorney of high respectability—thesfather of
ot.most t prophetic appositeness—submitted tweat:
the future novelist intendin to dedicate his energies •
six year.s ga 0 to the judgment of the Destr ' .
oyer of
to the legal profession. Angirreprestible passion for
literature decided otherwise. Chatterain himself had Protection.
literature
to
the experiment by his father-in.law,
scarcely more manifest disrelish for the drudgeries of Incited
Ainsworth, in 1828 commenced business ."
Harrison-.
the law or a more apparent- appetite for the fruits of
originated in as
a publisher. The enterprise an enthu.
imagination. And as the "wondrous boy"
enabled to solace himself by frequent was siasm for letters, rather than in a solicitude to sue.
meditation near
d in it merely as a commercial speculation. It
Csnynge's tomb in the beautifulchurch Marv, coed
and large
than the eir.
Redcliffe, Ainsworth wandered mono. the - was
more con- are rapid' returns and large e
genial solitudes of the garden at B !fdeavour to sec are molument.
rec Hill, a country !About the time of its commencement Ainsworth
residence to which the family had
removed almost have assumed the post originally intended
immediately upon the occasion of his nativity', a plea- • might •
sant mansion agreeably situated att by formally becoming the head
a distance of ' for his
legalaccep ancfiet,m
established
by his progenitor,
nearly two miles on the road to Chatham. DiVidieg ' 111. the a which were then being directed •by two
his time between the dusty lawyer's office the affairs ow i
aucl the in Manchester. Inatead of return-
green shrubberies of home, his hate of letters appears partners residentlhowerat,
be still clung with tenacity
[lava very
to , "pip, gained the preponderaece, hay- ing to the aw,. .
a lava that had devel d
iog been prect, lei by au entlathiasm for the . u to the love of his childhood, opt
beautiful
d suh 1e ti for m"---- ' into ambition—the innocent love and anihi_
fixture of firewolks, an
It
.stgfil n y the con- ,
lion ofliterature. He preferr' d the iesdu of a pub,
duet of private theatricals.is r - eted. of him, hi aa., '
i
of a solicitor: and in the former cepa_
the taste mentioned eccentricity, n-her to those
terence to that his jrender his establishment, if pat
the histrionic art induced him city he resolved to
schoolboy devotion to . .
havens of scholarship:a-were
d retiched the acme cf its inten. ; sibie, one of the securer
at let g;h, when it ht
+d
ht be nurtured from embryoes to
city, to. erect a miniature the ore in a cellar (aossibty reputation mg
Us of amenity.
selecting that subterranean . Toe project was
n machinist, his own n
liberality, and discrimiatitio •
to interruption), being la, o_w
~and it
drstaettat. Added to all eminently benevolent in its character, : was
scene • painter, and his own .
of
ices than it experleaced.
whicb, you might hate
• said him as Charles wertiay of happier conseque
in
Lamb said to delightfully t
,f Munden, The " flying island" never settled down earnest, or
uch a come- tuck root in " the Row." After eighteen months had
that he was "not so - m
himself the elapsed the endeavour -was teluctantly brought to a
dish as a company"—acting
doubt- co „
I'4'l'3on—the youthful adventurer finding' himself
wholeof 'lf t characters ! Rae, jn,,,,
his CI eren ---taoalsetent
less, correct when he to emu Sie
. poor Langan Blanchard was Although the attempt
(eater sea in his of the career of Richardson.
author, -
Originally published ' 1.842 in the "Mirror," that proved in no respect lucrative, it
no • 'bubble was brolun---
"itis t this in ,
that our „att.Pecuniary Involvement. A - •
o ea circumstance aerha t n
D t at our hat"' but it was only the bubble of a daydream. Mean-
are ar • " . • ' i •
e Indebted for many admirable romances. ► !bile the pleasures of composition had not been alto-

EARIZISON AINSWORTIL

gether forgotten in the anxieties of publication. Se-
veral riiiseeeeTaTieeeie pieces --were penned, -011116-115-, y
a
Batten' of ..reaeforegoines experiment wee
_eegere
before 1830 arrived,. Ainsworth bad written, besides_
one or two melodramas, still in manuscript, the open-
ing acts of a tragedy never since completed—the theme
being identical with that selected by Henry Taylor
as the eubiect of his masterpiece, the nobly and.
locking forward to the realizatian of his hopes; and,
eminently drametic history of Philip Van Artevelde.
Later on, - Ainsworth' stateed for the continent,
visiting eehe romantic scenery of Switzerland, and
traversiegn the picturesque cities- of the Roman
peninsula.
During 1831 be determined, at length, to produce
a work of larger pretension than any upon the com-
position of which he had hitherto adventured. He
resolved that it shauld ensure some degree er popular
attention by the novelty of its materials and by the
very manner of its construction. His enterprise he
had elreadv faintly indicated in the framework of the
story of " Sir John Chiv,,rton " but a ne w . tale was
now to be written, in which' •he would venture to
emulate the geeius of I'aZi3. Radcliffe—the scenery
Laing nations! instead of cutlandieh, the style moths-
nizedineteed of .fintiqrtanol. These intentiens were
first fereacd toward e tee close of 1831, upon the, oc-
casiou of eepleasaiit yieit at Chesterfield. rret it sees
already the spring of 1834 when their fulfilment
was rendered visible by the publication of
Rook/rood. The reception accorded to thee-work was
tritee &aunt. It fixed public notice upon the
novelis,e, if it left him still the task of building up his
reputation. Cuelefield Place in SUPSeX, be hes since
informed .us, was the original of the ancient residence
described by him as Rookwood Hall in Yorkshire.
ALAI vividly has he herein depicted the old manorial
dwelling• place of "which he had long meditated the
celebration, with the trim gardens "—one of those
exquisite gardens he has himself exquisitely celled
ee Rook." te 1., ch. iii.) " home out of doors "—to-
geber Kith the " rook-haunted groves, the gloomy
chambere and the gloomier galleries," he loves to
paint with the sombre tints of Rosa rather than with
the sunlight touch of Lorraine. Unlike " Waverley,"
the story dated hack, not sixty, but a hundred years
before the time of its original appearance. It ap-
pealed none the less readily, however, to the sympathies
of the reader—so ingeniously blending the horrible
with the familiar and weaving together, as it were,
in a single woof, the real and the mysterious, as to
elicit soon afterwards the panegyric of one of the
Edinburgh Reviewers. Originating, as the plot
does, in the crimes of the ancient family of the Rook-
woods, it commences and terminates in the midst of
the appropriate terrors of a vault where the murdered
and the murderers are rotting side by side in their
coffins—one of the most villanous and revengeful of
the house appearing at the outset as the sexton, Peter
Bradley, but ultimately in his true identity as Alan
Rockwood. His grandson, Luke Bradley, eldest
born of Sir Piers, contrasts strangely enough with the
gentle and heroic nature of his younger half brother,
Rtnulph, his own desperate and sinister temperament
—the main interest of the narrative being centered in
his resolute endeavour to secure for himself the
title and fortunes of Sir Luke Rookwood.
Associated with these, there appears darkly
but conspicuously upon the canvass, the widow
of Sir Piers and mother of Ranulph-Maud, the Lady
Rookwood ! It is not, however, to these characters
that the romance, by any means, owes its principal
fascination. Neither is it to little Codicil Coates the
attorney, nor to big Titus Tyrconnel the physician,
nor even, with all his astounding " sesquipedality of
stomach," to Dr. Polpyhetnus Polycarp Small, the
Vicar of Rookwood. It is discoverable even elsewhere
than in the constancy of the heroine Eleanor, or in
the soldier-like self possession of her brother, Colonel
Mowbray. Briefly; the principal charm of " Rook-
wood" lies not among the reputable personages intro-
duced but among the vagabonds ! The interest of
perusal only becomes enthralling when we have
reached the ruins of Daveneam Priory,' and find
ourselves jostled in the raotley horde of the
gipsies owning Barbara Loyd as their Queen, and
Balthazar as their Patrico. Toere we are introduced
to the Upright Man, otherwise called Magus Zoroas-
ter, and to that Brummell of the "boozing kens,"
Jerry Juniper—the very pink of tatterdemalions. A
pleasant anachronism makes us acquainted, moreover,
with the redoubtable Knight of Malta, Sir William
Courtenay, who swaggers over the green award as
gaudily bedizened as when he flouriebed his sword
Excalibur in the archiepiscopal streets of Canterbury.
A multitude of other impostors throng the sequestered
preoincts of the priory, .
o Where slumbetel abbots purple as their wines,"
in the Golden Age uniting the Happy and the Pic-
turesque. There, however, during the last century,
under a baser influence, collected the minions'of the
moon, the nimble whip-jacks and the squalid palliards,
the rufflers, the sorts, the dells, and the dories, the
priggers, the gills, and the jarkmen—those
rogues who were the spawn of Crime and Destitution,
whose desceolants have been nearly extir-
pated by the Vagrant Acs, and who are yet to
the romance of those generations what the lszzsroni
are_ now-a-days to on Italian landscape. Associated
with these rogues of Daveuham, but still, altogether
apart from them, ate two characters the " bright,,
particular stars" of this lesser hemisphere—Sybil the
dark-eyed Gitanilla, beloved by Sir Luke Rookwood,
and another who has already appeared at intervals
upon the scene, the real, hero of the story—Dick
Turpin the . Prince of Highwaymen. Immediately
upon his entrance, even under the sobriquet of Jacks
Palmer, there is a promise of adventurous
whichexcitement
e
attains th
e
crowning the fullness of its realization in
crowning incident of "Rookwood"—one of the most
animated and inspiriting descriptions within the
who
range of romantic literature. Everyone
has once read it bears it in remembrance
like an ode of Pinder or a symphony
la . : Beethoven. Written
Within twenty-four hours
from the time of its commencement, it bears evidence
of the inspiration of a. continuous and sustained en-
thusiasm. Essentially lyrical in style, the narrative_
here partakes in a great measure of the melody of.
rhythm, the hoofs of Black Bess yielding throughout
the music of the accompaniment. The Ride to York,
it must be remembered, Was no mere myth, but a
matter upon actual record, a miracle of harsernan..
a
ship as indisputable as the celebrated feat achieve
by Mr. Osbaldeston. It occurred as here recountee?n,
during an autumnal night of 1737—and; marvelous
_
though the journey was in itself it has been altogether
grace
exceeded by the brilliant facility and abounding
ciby
of its celebration. The rider has been surpasbe
ng his historian. Eclipse has beer eclipsed. starti
of
from Kilburn Wells—in the immediate vicinity
aes
which spot, at a house called " the Elms," the
two
_,
terly narrative of Ainsworth was peened—we Sedownn‘
upon that long and breathless race at about
slinet our
on a beautiful evening in October. From the outlsong
to
sympathies are with the high ova man and we over
witness, or rather to Participate, in hie triumph the
his pursuers—Coates, Tyrconnel, and Pattersonmani-
chief constable of Westraineter. EscaPe es-bsieera-
featly, from the first, a matter of secondarie" -
t Black
tion. Besides Which, with the fleetness ed. The
Beds, it is so easy as to be absolutely desPia,e,. di M.
'purpose from that moment is to tantalise 1"
16
-Arn e.--
lowers" with the probabilities of a eliptat 13e doubt,
11() doubt,
ally doomed to disappointment. Sometimes,
tete hair-
Dick allows his temerity to carry l'inlee be abso-
breadth ventures, where success appears t,
siert for ex-
lutely hopeless—but Dick cherishes a pathoce there
citement, and the reader loves it too, " socessive
is an inexpressible zest in the agony of ece,r7sweeeerful--
predicament. Throughoutthe whole of
e,, with the
ride we are with Turpin, observingje% too always
vividness' of reality and observing, "I"Niieurn be-
with a rapturous admiration. Letterng strike into
hind us, we gallop up Windmill-hi" ee Hemp-
Shoot-up-hill lane, Air.; the lower Partbe pathway
steadeneath, surmount the acclivity
nenbtroadt and so
leading to North-end, cross the Reeet-ewares the en-
hasten on by Crackskull-cosmos 0 a eyevvay to
trance into Highgate. Turning dow
I.oe. Pick Turpin is
escape the main street of the eil-n-e• fits proving no
all but taken, from the circumstancte,„ he threads the
thoroughfare—but, clearing s gaee'. scudding past
fields in the direction of o°ll2;tetil confronted by
Crouch-end and up Duval-lane .
e chivaux-cle-frize.
the lofty bar-gate surmounted 5'
i vvatchiag how Bess
There is a feeling of exultation -u ease than its pre-
bounds over it with scarcely Leas teenpikesman to
decessor—almost causing 1". e., his amazement:be trampled to death . "
1 et Ducket's-green,
Striking into a bye lane,
as be proceeds
we are with Turpin
seetilleitfterwards when he
through Tottenham, and wining its driver, to
leaps over the donkey-cart cent Edmonton, and so
the delight of the good folks' eb_s
i pipe of tobacco in
passes on until he coolly lights kimeoing swiftly over
sight of
,his pursuers, while swe are once mere with
the Enfield highway. A-war-lova -time, perhaps of
Bees and her rider—,1 of hisee._ o incomparably the
any time," bays his biograTe;
hear him sending his
crack rider of Englend."o„aggoner before clattering
taunting message by the ' streets of Ware, where
through the darkened enlP'llYs they are subsequently
fresh horses are obtained, s afterwards, by Paterson
We ebtainei at different- -atair witness Dick's encounte
and his companions. I: stage—we observe his ins
with the York and renew
re, the bucket of brandy-
end-water and the raw ne
.
genious refresher for the Ti.stesk round the bit, at
the little hostelrie Dear
Surleigh House, after having
completed eighty odd wiles and traversed the county
Again,
in the saddle, we are with
of Northampton. ward, through Lincolnshire.
him—on—through Stamford,
across the interinediat" ground of Rutland, by Mel•
~.
h ton ranthaln, over Gonerby-hill,
-Mowbray, by ur_, pad Newark, past Trent,
down the vale of Belvoir, ,
the broad shire of Notting-
on, through the gledea
ham, into the heart Io of
r the waste that was once a
I,e kindred Robin and his merry
forest, haunted by te
t
archers
.at Sherwood. A.way into Yorkshire--past
oast Selby, by the waters of
Ravvtrey, past Thorlbee past Selby,
fuse, over the Aire,
, the
the Do,
past $Ol4O, oyes