The daily sentinel., 1899-06-07
KILLING VILLAINS
HOW FAMOUS NovELISTS DO
MURDER.
Some of Them Are brutal, Others Re-
fined, While the Great Majority En-
deavor to Do Something Original
Collins Alone Ghastly.

tertalning gallery OF rogues. Quiip
the distorted dwarf, Rogue Riderhood
Qhe rufiian), and Bill Skies (the brutal
cracksman) alike terminate their ex
istence in watery grave: no small ao-
| ditional pathos being added in the last
case by the fate OF the ragged. beaten
cur, which. faithful even in death, fol-
lows his masters sullen corpse into the
reeking mud OF Folly Ditch. Ralph
Nickleby. Gashford and Jonas Chuzzle-
wit take their own lives: whilst Uriah
| Heep. SQueers, and Littimer leave their
country for their country's good in
| garbs gratuitously provided by govern
ment and freely embossed with broad
| arrows"
Perhaps the most grewsome OF Dick
| ems death scenes Is that provided by
the fate of the ever-smiling Carker into
| which the irresistible locomotive is i'm
| pressed, probably for the first time in
the history of fiction.
Scott's villains most frequently meet
with violent deaths at the hands of
others. But the sensation-lover has.
nevertheless, been catered for in
the death OF Anthony Foster. the ac-
No-APAN>o VI Iho pAAoohCl AeiSAdiu
ney. This miserable wretch is depicted
as hiding from his pursuers in a Sc
cret cell. The entrance to this is fas-
tened by means OF spring lock. OF
which, however. he omits to retain the
key, with the consequence that he even
tually perishes miserably of mingled
fear and famine.
Lytton's Might and Morning" gives
us the coiner Gawtrey, who meets his
fate at the hands Of the Paris police,
from whom he is attempting to es-
cape when pistol-shot drops him over
the side of house to perish miserably.
This idea of falling from height Is
by no means confined to Lytton. 1t is
utilized by Anthony Hope, in "Phroso."
and by Stanley Weyman in Under the
Red Robe" where the villain and his
victim fall from a lofty bridge into a
seething torrent below. In this way,
too, Conan Doyle killed the immortal
Sherlock Holmes, who. fast locked in
struggle with "the greatest villain
OF them ALL" falls over an Alpine preci-
pice.
Wilkie Collins brings his principal
villain, the double-faced. calculating
| Count Fosco, to an ignoble end, he dis
| appearing for time. only to reappear
upon the ghastly shelves of the Paris
morgue. A still more ghastly fate ia
that of the she-fiend. Gagood. immor-
talized by Rider Haggard In king Sol
| omon's Mines" Having conducted
Quatermain, Curtis and party into
that celebrated monarch's rock-hewn
treasury. which is guarded by a pom
| derous rising door of living rock, she
touches secret spring, by means of
| which the door begins once moro to
descend with slow but Irresistible
motion.
Whilst the Englishmen are sizing up
the jewelry she makes off through the
rapidly lessening aperture. Her
progress is temporarily arrested by the
unfortunate girl Foulata, whom she
stabs in order to free herself Hurled
ly scrambling over the threshold she IL
caught by the inexorable force which
she has herself put in motion. and .
realistically dramatic "scrunch" puts
an end forever to the Vaccinations Of
| this truly horrible old woman.
Svengali. like Scott's Templar in
"Ivanhoe," dies from an excessive men
tai strain acting upon the heart:
whilst, to harit back to the days of the
bluff Doctor OF Fleet Street, the gentle.
aenial-hearted Goldsmith is contented
to reform the rakish Squire Thornhill
in order that he may at last become the
exemplary spouse Of the gentle Olivia,
around whom we wove that entranc-
ingly simple narrative, "The Vicar of
Wakefield"
Finally. the palm for writing lurid"
may fairly be accorded Harrison
Ainsworth for his thrilling disposal Of
the two ghoulish wretches who haunt
the pages Of his celebrated novel. "Old
Saint Pauls" The creatures who fat
tened upon the spoils Of the dead and
dying during the Great Plague we're
wont to stow their ill-gotten gains in
one of the Cathedral vaults. The Ca
thedral taking fire. they hasten thither
in order to rescue their precious hoard.
The greed of gain, however, misleads
them into sojourning Just q moment
too long.
AS they turn to leave the now sitting
vault. they see that . thin silvery
stream Is making its way down tho
stairs, by which alone they can gain
an exit. Even as they look It thick
ems perceptibly and before they can
escape the whole stairway Is blocked.