The Complete Northanger Horrid Novel Collection (9 Books of Gothic Romance and Horror)

by Eliza Parsons

  When they returned to the supper-room, the Countess and Lady Blanche met Valancourt with sincere congratulations; and Blanche, indeed, was so much rejoiced to see Emily returned to happiness, as to forget, for a while, that Mons. St. Foix was not yet arrived at the chateau, though he had been expected for some hours; but her generous sympathy was, soon after, rewarded by his appearance. He was now perfectly recovered from the wounds, received, during his perilous adventure among the Pyrenees, the mention of which served to heighten to the parties, who had been involved in it, the sense of their present happiness. New congratulations passed between them, and round the supper-table appeared a group of faces, smiling with felicity, but with a felicity, which had in each a different character. The smile of Blanche was frank and gay, that of Emily tender and pensive; Valancourt's was rapturous, tender and gay alternately; Mons. St. Foix's was joyous, and that of the Count, as he looked on the surrounding party, expressed the tempered complacency of benevolence; while the features of the Countess, Henri, and Mons. Bonnac, discovered fainter traces of animation. Poor Mons. Du Pont did not, by his presence, throw a shade of regret over the company; for, when he had discovered, that Valancourt was not unworthy of the esteem of Emily, he determined seriously to endeavour at the conquest of his own hopeless affection, and had immediately withdrawn from Chateau-le-Blanc—a conduct, which Emily now understood, and rewarded with her admiration and pity.

  The Count and his guests continued together till a late hour, yielding to the delights of social gaiety, and to the sweets of friendship. When Annette heard of the arrival of Valancourt, Ludovico had some difficulty to prevent her going into the supper-room, to express her joy, for she declared, that she had never been so rejoiced at any ACCIDENT as this, since she had found Ludovico himself.

  CHAPTER XIX

  Now my task is smoothly done,

  I can fly, or I can run

  Quickly to the green earth's end,

  Where the bow'd welkin low doth bend,

  And, from thence, can soar as soon

  To the corners of the moon.

  -MILTON

  The marriages of the Lady Blanche and Emily St. Aubert were celebrated, on the same day, and with the ancient baronial magnificence, at Chateau-le-Blanc. The feasts were held in the great hall of the castle, which, on this occasion, was hung with superb new tapestry, representing the exploits of Charlemagne and his twelve peers; here, were seen the Saracens, with their horrible visors, advancing to battle; and there, were displayed the wild solemnities of incantation, and the necromantic feats, exhibited by the magician JARL before the Emperor. The sumptuous banners of the family of Villeroi, which had long slept in dust, were once more unfurled, to wave over the gothic points of painted casements; and music echoed, in many a lingering close, through every winding gallery and colonnade of that vast edifice.

  As Annette looked down from the corridor upon the hall, whose arches and windows were illuminated with brilliant festoons of lamps, and gazed on the splendid dresses of the dancers, the costly liveries of the attendants, the canopies of purple velvet and gold, and listened to the gay strains that floated along the vaulted roof, she almost fancied herself in an enchanted palace, and declared, that she had not met with any place, which charmed her so much, since she read the fairy tales; nay, that the fairies themselves, at their nightly revels in this old hall, could display nothing finer; while old Dorothee, as she surveyed the scene, sighed, and said, the castle looked as it was wont to do in the time of her youth.

  After gracing the festivities of Chateau-le-Blanc, for some days, Valancourt and Emily took leave of their kind friends, and returned to La Vallee, where the faithful Theresa received them with unfeigned joy, and the pleasant shades welcomed them with a thousand tender and affecting remembrances; and, while they wandered together over the scenes, so long inhabited by the late Mons. and Madame St. Aubert, and Emily pointed out, with pensive affection, their favourite haunts, her present happiness was heightened, by considering, that it would have been worthy of their approbation, could they have witnessed it.

  Valancourt led her to the plane-tree on the terrace, where he had first ventured to declare his love, and where now the remembrance of the anxiety he had then suffered, and the retrospect of all the dangers and misfortunes they had each encountered, since last they sat together beneath its broad branches, exalted the sense of their present felicity, which, on this spot, sacred to the memory of St. Aubert, they solemnly vowed to deserve, as far as possible, by endeavouring to imitate his benevolence,—by remembering, that superior attainments of every sort bring with them duties of superior exertion,—and by affording to their fellow-beings, together with that portion of ordinary comforts, which prosperity always owes to misfortune, the example of lives passed in happy thankfulness to GOD, and, therefore, in careful tenderness to his creatures.

  Soon after their return to La Vallee, the brother of Valancourt came to congratulate him on his marriage, and to pay his respects to Emily, with whom he was so much pleased, as well as with the prospect of rational happiness, which these nuptials offered to Valancourt, that he immediately resigned to him a part of the rich domain, the whole of which, as he had no family, would of course descend to his brother, on his decease.

  The estates, at Tholouse, were disposed of, and Emily purchased of Mons. Quesnel the ancient domain of her late father, where, having given Annette a marriage portion, she settled her as the housekeeper, and Ludovico as the steward; but, since both Valancourt and herself preferred the pleasant and long-loved shades of La Vallee to the magnificence of Epourville, they continued to reside there, passing, however, a few months in the year at the birth-place of St. Aubert, in tender respect to his memory.

  The legacy, which had been bequeathed to Emily by Signora Laurentini, she begged Valancourt would allow her to resign to Mons. Bonnac; and Valancourt, when she made the request, felt all the value of the compliment it conveyed. The castle of Udolpho, also, descended to the wife of Mons. Bonnac, who was the nearest surviving relation of the house of that name, and thus affluence restored his long-oppressed spirits to peace, and his family to comfort.

  O! how joyful it is to tell of happiness, such as that of Valancourt and Emily; to relate, that, after suffering under the oppression of the vicious and the disdain of the weak, they were, at length, restored to each other—to the beloved landscapes of their native country,—to the securest felicity of this life, that of aspiring to moral and labouring for intellectual improvement—to the pleasures of enlightened society, and to the exercise of the benevolence, which had always animated their hearts; while the bowers of La Vallee became, once more, the retreat of goodness, wisdom and domestic blessedness!

  O! useful may it be to have shown, that, though the vicious can sometimes pour affliction upon the good, their power is transient and their punishment certain; and that innocence, though oppressed by injustice, shall, supported by patience, finally triumph over misfortune!

  And, if the weak hand, that has recorded this tale, has, by its scenes, beguiled the mourner of one hour of sorrow, or, by its moral, taught him to sustain it—the effort, however humble, has not been vain, nor is the writer unrewarded.

  THE END

  THE NECROMANCER

  BY LUDWIG FLAMMENBERG

  Editor's Note

  Rather than a novel, The Necromancer was originally a collection of the contemporary equivalent of urban legends from the Black Forest area in Germany, by Carl Friedrich Kahlert. It was originally published in German in 1794, under the pen-name Ludwig Flammenberg. The anthology eventually made its way into the hands of one Peter Teuthold, who set to "translating" it. Teuthold was well aware that a direct translation of the collection would be no more than a curiosity for those interested in German folklore, and so he took substantial liberties, "novelizing" the book, and borrowing freely from other German works, notably the writings of contemporary German author Friedrich Schiller (1759-1805). As many Gothic works were set in Germany, or preten
ded to be translations of legends or stories from that country, Italy or the Balkans, the real identity of the author was unknown for a long time, and it was thought that Peter Teuthold made the tale up entirely.

  Though popular at the time, The Necromancer had many critics who condemned the disjointed narrative. As the book had started life as a collection of tales, this is rather unsurprising.

  THE NECROMANCER:

  OR THE TALE OF THE BLACK FOREST

  INTRODUCTION

  As in England, so in Germany, the Romantic Movement, which among us may conveniently (if not quite exactly) be said to have commenced with the publication of The Castle of Otranto in 1765, had its first and perhaps most enthusiastic stirrings in the late decades of the eighteenth century, the middle years of which era were, in Germany, dominated by two great figures; Lessing, who was, in some sense, the flower and most brilliant exponent of the past, and Klopstock, who foreshadowed the years that were to come. It may truly be said that until 1750 England was not in touch with German thought and German literature. Translations there had been, but these were almost entirely of scientific and theological works, and, when one considers how jejune was the preceding period, the number of versions made from the German, the wide study of contemporary German literature, the influence of German dramatists and novelists upon the stage and in the library, from roughly 1790 to 1820, cannot but be regarded as a most extraordinary literary phenomenon. The ground had long lain fallow, and the harvest was bounteous to superfluity.

  It has been said, and the observation is indeed acute, that one of the predisposing causes of this sudden concentration upon German literature was the employment by England of German troops in the American War of Independence. This has been particularly pointed out by F. Jeffrey who, in his notice of Lichtenberg's Vermischte Schriften in the Edinburgh Review, January, 1804, definitely gives as his considered opinion that "During the American War, the intercourse with Britain was strengthened by many well-known causes. The German officers in our service communicated the knowledge of their books and language. Pamphlets, plays, novels, and other light pieces, were circulated in America, and found their way, after the peace, into England." There were, of course, other causes at work: Prussia was consolidating her power, and assuming no small international importance; friendlier and closer, until they reached the ties of stanchest (if interested) kinship and bonds of blood, grew the relations between the English court and Germany, and these cordialities were more zealously fostered and encouraged by none than by Queen Charlotte, who had brought the painful and drudging etiquette of the little court of Mecklenberg-Strelitz to St. James's, and whose wishes and whose patronage, both of which carried no small weight, were invariably and obstinately exercised in the direction of things German.

  A little later the declaration of war against France in 1793 would, however absurdly and illogically, divert popular favour from French thought and literature to other sources of intellectual activity, and these fertile Germany was eager and ready to supply.

  Nor must it be forgotten that there was in England a devoted and enthusiastic group of German scholars and students, for the most part exiles from their native land, and with the burning patriotism that distinguishes every Teuton, these ardent spirits proceeded to exhaust every energy in the tireless pursuit of literary propaganda on behalf of their Fatherland.

  This small but eager fraternity translated into English German works of every kind, both for the entertainment of leisure moments, and for the study of more serious hours; and sometimes, in reading these, we recognize the alien hand, since the phrasing is not infrequently far from impeccable, and the idiosyncrasies of the grammar betray their remoter origin. Conversely, many English books were translated into German, and here, it is to be hoped, a greater standard of correctness was obtained. Moreover, as is the bounden duty of every German professor, each of these sojourners on English soil composed a German grammar, and we cannot doubt that every one of these primers has a full, final, and comprehensive list of all the irregular verbs. Many of these enthusiasts were the Lutheran pastors of German congregations in London. Such, for example, was the Reverend Doctor G. F. Wendeborn, who came to England about 1767, and ministered in a small church at Ludgate Hill. In 1774 he published his Elements of German Grammar; a second edition of which appeared in 1790, and a third in 1797. There had already been three grammars, one by Martin Aedler, High Dutch Minerva à la Mode, 1680; one by Offelen in 1687; and one by John King in 1706. But when Wendeborn published his accidence, the only German grammar in use was that by James John Bachmaier, first issued in 1751, which in twenty years had reached its third edition. In 1799 two German grammars were published, the most correct that by the Reverend Doctor Wilhelm Render, who designated himself "teacher of the German language in the University of Cambridge"; the other by George Crabb; but this latter is unfortunately full of errors, so that our English philologist was obliged to submit it to a somewhat drastic revision, and reprint it in the following year as a second edition. In 1800 also yet another grammar appeared, by Georg Heinrich Noehden, who had settled in England in 1793, and is notable as being one of the earliest translators of Schiller.

  Many other names, and these not wholly undistinguished, nor entirely forgotten, might be cited to show how industrious and intent was this colony of German literary men, and it must be borne in mind also, that at social gatherings, lectures, and other meetings, they pressed the claims of their country's literature with an ardour and a zest that by no means fell on sterile ground. In proportion, the readers of novels were as many then as they are to-day. Especially favoured were the sentimental and sensational romances. It so happened that Germany could offer almost inexhaustible draughts of these vintages, and our fair readers were only too anxious to drain these cups of fancy to the dregs. Even the lees of literary wine were not rejected, nay, rather they were quaffed in bumpers and bellarmines, and later critics have not unjustly complained that much which in its own native land was regarded as of trifling account, here was welcomed, discussed, and bepraised.

  It is, indeed, extraordinary to remark that Johann Gottfried Herder and Schiller were not translated into English before 1790. Goethe's Werther at first appeared in a version which followed a French adaptation, and new editions of this were issued until 1795. The first translation from the original was published in 1786, and no fewer than eighteen editions of new translations--there were perhaps more--have been listed between 1790 and 1830. Lessing was hardly known, but Weiland was more popular; no fewer than seven of his works appeared in various versions between 1764 and 1790. Klopstock's Messias, when translated, cannot be said to have become widely popular, although there are imitations by minor writers, and Henry Mackenzie in 1788 spoke of this author as being "but little known in this country, though his genius is revered, even to idolatry, in his own." On the other hand, Conrad Gessner was immensely admired among us, and Mrs. Collyer's translation of Der Tod Abels had run into eighteen editions by 1782.

  It has been said that probably the first occasion upon which Schiller's name was publicly pronounced in the British Isles was when the celebrated author of The Man of Feeling, Henry Mackenzie, on April 21, 1788, read a paper dealing with the German drama before the Royal Society of Edinburgh. It is noticeable that Mackenzie's knowledge of the German theatre was derived from French sources, and French translations of the plays. The lecturer found little to commend in such dramas as Minna von Barnhelm, or Götz Berlichingen. But when he approached Die Räuber, his admiration, nay his enthusiasm, overwhelms him in a flood of perfervid eloquence. He at once declares: "the most remarkable and the most strongly impressive of all the pieces contained in these volumes is...Les Voleurs, a tragedy by Mr. Schiller, a young man who, at the time of writing it, was only twenty-three." Die Räuber is a "wonderful drama...most interesting and impressive," whilst its language is praised as being "in the highest degree eloquent, impassioned, and sublime." He is bound, of course, to warn his hearers that a serpent lurks beneath
the flowers, that the criminal actions of thieves are covered with a veil of tender sentiment expressed in poetic phrase, that the pure is impure, but, in spite of such subversive tendencies, the cool and cautious Mackenzie was constrained to acknowledge that Schiller's great drama appeared to him "one of the most uncommon productions of untutored genius that modern times can boast."

  This paper, Sir Walter Scott tells us, "made much noise and produced a powerful effect." Die Räuber was translated in 1792 by Lord Woodhouselee (Alexander Fraser Tytler), and soon ran into several editions, for such was its popularity, that the fourth issue was pirated at Paris in 1800. Other versions were made by Doctor Wilhelm Render, of whom we have already spoken; and by Mr. Thompson in the German Theatre, 1804. In this last considerable freedoms have been taken, but perhaps this is not a matter for criticism, since it is frankly stated to be arranged with a view to representation on the English stage. Dr. Render's version, which pretends to be faithful, is, in fact, very garbled and faulty; it has even been described as "a mere schoolboy performance," although this failure is no doubt due to the worthy pastor's ignorance of the English idiom.

  Schiller's Die Räuber was published in 1781, and this dramatic narrative, which traces out the innermost workings of the soul, immediately set the imagination of all the young men in Germany aglow and aflame. Even in our own country Coleridge, who at Cambridge found Die Räuber in a friend's rooms and sat down to read it one wild November midnight of 1794, when at last he threw aside the book, it was but to snatch his pen and, in a state of mind bordering upon panic, to write to Southey: "My God, Southey, who is this Schiller, this convulser of the heart?...upon my soul I write to you because I am frightened.... Why have we ever called Milton sublime?" Hazlitt too declares that when he first read Schiller's drama, it "stunned him, like a blow."