Anthony Trollope's 'An Autobiography' 1883

 

The Trollope Society edition - 1999

I am back with a Trollope - this time the Great Man on himself. Although written in 1878, he told his son Henry that it was not to be published until after his death - which occurred on 6th December 1882. Henry made no alterations to his father's text, but suppressed a few passages but not more than would amount to two printed pages has been omitted. He also added a list of the books his father had published subsequent to the Autobiography being written This included one of my favourites, Doctor Wortle's School. The list totalled a further thirteen works.

William Blackwood first edition - 1883

Trollope has been criticised for the almost mercenary feel that he gives to his career as a Man of Letters. Certainly, the pages abound with references to how much he made from his books and his financial dealings with publishers, but he is very honest about it. In his Conclusion, Trollope lists not only the title and publication date of each work, but the total sum accrued. I found it interesting that the novel he received most money for was Can You  Forgive Her? (1864), for which he gained £3,525; it is not a book I have read. The only other books to net him £3,000 or more were Phineas Finn (1869) and He Knew He Was Right (1869) - both at £3,200; Orly Farm (1862) at £3,135; and, for £3,000, Small House at Allington (1864), The Last Chronicle of Barset (1867) and The Way We Live Now (1875). Trollope totalled up his earnings by 1879 to £68,939 17s 5d. (which included £7,800 for Sundries!).

What also came across was the author's decided opinions on the merits, or demerits, of his books. He argues that Barchester Towers would hardly be so well known as it is had there been no Framley Parsonage and no Last Chronicle of Barset...The Three Clerks was a good novel... Doctor Thorne has, I believe been the most popular book that I have written - if I may take the sale as proof of comparative popularity...I have been surprised by the success of Doctor Thorne... I do not think that I have ever done better work on Orly Farm and Can You Forgive Her?...Outside Lily Dale and the chief interest in the novel, The Small House at Allington is, I think, good...Taking it as a whole I regard [The Last Chronicle of Barset] as the best novel I have written...The Way We Live Now was, as a satire, powerful and good... 

On the other hand, the story of The Bartrams is more than ordinarily bad, and as the book was redeemed by no special character it failed...Most of my friends say that [Orly Farm] is the best I have written. In this opinion I do not coincide...The Belton Estate is similar in its attributes to Rachel Ray and to Miss Mackenzie. It is readable and contains scenes which are true to life, but it has no peculiar merits and will add nothing to my reputation as a novelist... He Knew He Was Right - I do not know that in any literary effort I ever fell more completely short of my own intention than in this story...I look upon the story as being nearly altogether bad...Ralph the Heir have always thought it to be one of the worse novels I have written.  

It was good to read again about the embryo of The Warden: I visited Salisbury and whilst wandering there on a midsummer evening round the purlieus of the cathedral I conceived the story of The Warden - from whence came that series of novels of which Barchester with its bishops, deans, and archdeacon was the central site. What a wonderful and productive wander!

As for his place in the Pantheon of English Literature, he wrote: I do not think it probable that my name will remain among those who in the next century will be known as the writers of English prose fiction; but if it does, that permanence of success will probably rest on the characters of Plantagenet Palliser, Lady Glencora and the Revd Mr Crawley. Well, not having read about the first two, I couldn't possibly comment; but, surely, one has to add Septimus Harding, the Warden; Archdeacon Grantley; Mrs Proudie; and even Mr Slope to that list.

I did empathise with his comment about his own Library and its cataloguing: As all who use libraries know, a catalogue is nothing unless it shows the spot on which every book is to be found - information which every volume also ought to give of itself. Only those who have done it know how great is the labour of moving and arranging a few thousand volumes. At the present moment I own about 5,000 volumes, and they are dearer to me even than the horses which are going, or than the wine in the cellar which is very apt to go and upon which I also pride myself. Well, I own no horse nor do I possess a cellar, but my books (I have over 3,000 more than Trollope) are very dear to me.  Nearly all the hardbacks are catalogued - what would I do without Libib? - many of them listed and illustrated in my privately produced author bibliographies; and I can go straight to any book on a shelf that an enquirer wishes to peruse. It is a harmless, relatively inexpensive passion, but book-collecting is a disease, pleasant though it might feel.

James Morris's 'Farewell the Trumpets' 1978

 

Faber and Faber first edition - 1978  

James Morris (who had gender reassignment surgery in 1972) died as Jan Morris in North Wales in November 2020, aged 94. Some years back, I read his/her book on The Venetian Empire (Penguin, 1990) and liked the easy style very much. Then, a couple of years ago, I bought and read Heaven's Command (Faber, 1973) the first - but not the first to be written - on the British Empire, which I have commented on in a previous Blog. This volume, taking the story from 1897 to Sir Winston Churchill's death in 1965, completes the trilogy. Inevitably for a proud Englishman, this is the most poignant volume to read.

One could argue that Kaiser Bill and Herr Hitler destroyed the British Empire, with a supporting heavy push by Comrade Stalin and a more cynical shove by Roosevelt and the USA. However, the increasingly strong stirrings from 'within', steadfastly propelled  by Gandhi, Nehru and Jinnah; by Kenyatta and Nkrumah and Nyerere; and a host of less remarkable African, West Indian, and Far East leaders (demagogues?) were, by the end of the Second World War, pushing at an 'open door'. Harold Macmillan's tour of southern Africa, with his famous 'Wind of Change' speech, merely underlined what had been happening for well over two decades.

For someone who grew up on two British West Indian Islands in the late 1940s and early 1950s, and whose Geography lessons were all about trade between a 'Mother Country' and its brood, the Empire appeared to be an orderly, well-run, 'natural' state of affairs - by 'Heaven's Command' almost. What Morris' final volume shows, is just how shaky - almost 'unnatural' - everything was. Mountbatten's precipitate Imperial withdrawal from the Indian subcontinent had major flaws, but the alternative would have surely been worse. The Palestinian mandate was a poisoned chalice which should have been steered clear of - the eternal enmity between Jew and Arab is still going strong after nearly seventy years. Few African states (British or otherwise) are well governed; anarchy or brutal dictatorship rules in most. It becomes increasingly difficult to keep blaming the European powers for the continuing mess. 

Morris skilfully weaves the general with the specific, explaining the developments in the various states - from the Far East (Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Burma); the Middle East (Palestine, Iraq, Persia, Aden and Syria); West and East Africa (the Gambia, Gold Coast/Ghana, Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya Tanganyika), Southern Africa (the Rhodesias, Nyasaland, South Africa); the West Indies (Jamaica, Trinidad, British Honduras, Bermuda...); and the far flung Falkland Islands, Mauritius, the South Sea islands. His travels in the early and mid seventies gave him the geographical mindset and the personal anecdotes to sustain the interest of the reader. Occasionally, I felt his gift of hindsight made him perhaps more cynical than he might have been.  But his Envoi, at the end of the book, redeemed him for me. 

The arrogance of the Empire, its greed and its brutality was energy gone to waste: but the good in the adventure, the courage, the idealism, the diligence had contributed their quota of truth towards the universal fulfilment...The wind dies, and is forgotten, but some of the seeds it blows about will be fertile in the end.    

Eamon Duffy's 'Fires of Faith: Catholic England under Mary Tudor' 2009

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Yale University Press first edition - 2009

I have two other books by Eamon Duffy - the splendid and provocative The Stripping of the Altars: Traditional Religion in England 1400-1580 (Yale U. P., 1992; and Marking the Hours: English People and their Prayers 1240-1570 (Yale U.P., 2006). He is an historian of the first order, burrowing into original sources and using and explaining them with skill. He can be ranked with other catholic apologists - Christopher Haigh, Diarmaid MacCulloch - as responsible for transforming one's approach to the Roman Catholic story under the Tudors. My sixth form and university days were formed by such as A.G. Dickens, Geoffrey Elton and Joel Hurstfield, and even during much of my teaching career which focussed on the Tudor period, this veritable revision of the traditional Protestant/Whig approach mainly passed me by. It was not surprising that he would turn to an appraisal of Mary I's reign;  'Bloody Mary' was summed up in Elton's England Under the Tudors (1955) - my main Sixth Form textbook - Positive achievements there were none; Pollard declared that sterility was its conclusive note, and this is a verdict with which the dispassionate observer must agree...[Mary's] life was one of almost unrelieved tragedy, but the pity which this naturally excites must not obscure the obstinate wrong-headedness of her rule.   

Duffy is anything but a dispassionate observer. He states that this book was long in the making, with one origin being the short account of the restoration of catholicism in the reign of Mary he published in The Stripping of the Altars in 1992.  He has now expanded and added material to five lectures he delivered in Cambridge in the Michaelmas Term of 2007.  He is a clever, most persuasive writer. There are plenty of sweeping statements - Protestantism was a minority faith everywhere in England, except possibly in one or two of the villages of the Stour valley - but such is Duffy's well-honed craft that the reader doesn't really notice he/she is being swept along.  A time-consuming project would be to detail the use of adjectives to describe Catholic compared with Protestant figures, beliefs or events. Again, one has to admire Duffy's grammatical technique. This is not to say that reading his book was not enjoyable or compelling. Certainly it was provocative.

What I did agree with was the author's elevation of Cardinal Reginald Pole to the forefront of the decision-making and cohesion of the reign. Whether it was the broadsheets, the sermons or the burnings, it was usually Pole's vision which was triumphant. Mary was not far behind, either. It was somehow apt that both queen and cardinal archbishop died on the same day. Secondly, I could understand Duffy's argument that the Marian church was not a backward-looking and sterile failure, but that it was one of the cogs in the Counter Reformation wheel. It heavily influenced the recusants of Elizabeth I's reign.                 

Fires of Faith has, of course, a double meaning. Faith was/is not the preserve of Roman Catholics. Many, if not most, of the Protestants they burned had just as a sincere and deep faith as themselves. Duffy is right to say that 21st century sensibilities means a horrified recoil from the burnings (and yet our world dishes up similar, if not worse, behaviour). Where this lapsed Methodist parts company with the author - and would always side with the Protestant cause - is in the role of the Papacy. Cisalpine catholicism? just bearable. Transalpine/ultramontane Roman Catholicism? ugh! Moreover, I didn't subscribe to Duffy's rather strange argument about Sir Thomas More - being God's special grace to England and to London. It was the privilege of martyrdom, granted to no other country afflicted by religious division. These two (Bishop Fisher too) men, the paragons of their age, were special legates from God to England... More's vicious persecution of so-called heretics was downplayed both by the Marian Catholic propagandists and Duffy himself. No similar appraisal of any of the Protestant 'martyrs' such as Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer. 

Duffy is persuasive in that his reassessment portrays Mary's regime as neither inept nor backward-looking. But in 1558 death took not only Mary and Pole, but also their cause. Equally skilful propaganda over the next few centuries meant Roman Catholicism and the Papacy were equated with foreign domination and treachery. Not until the early nineteenth century were Catholics officially allowed any semblance of religious freedom again.

Frank Curzon Britten's 'Sir Roland Preederoy' 1909

 

The Religious Tract Society first edition - 1909

I couldn't find out anything about the author this time, but no matter. The sub-title, The Last of the Plantagenets, made me think the novel would be focused on Richard III, but he only appears as a relatively minor character. It is perhaps revealing that, when a second impression came out in the 1920s, it featured in the RTS's Schoolboy's Library edition and the copy on the Internet had a Boy's Own Paper prize competition on the inside board. I can't trace any other books by this author.

The tale is told in the first person singular, by a man looking back over his life under the Yorkists. He is using his chaplain, a worthy man of the Franciscan order... to write of Bosworth Field by my two sons. It is now 1515, six years into Henry VIII's reign. Roland Preederoy was born in 1461 in Southampton; his father, Sir Antony was knighted by Henry VI and was at the Battle of Wakefield in the Queen's army at the time. His father is the Lancastrian apple of Roland's eye, who has a likeness of the mighty Edward of Cressy. Roland attends school at Winchester in 1470 and, whilst there, hears of Robin of Redesdale's revolt and Warwick and Clarence's overturning of Edward IV's rule (Preederoy refers to him as the Earl of March). Sir Antony had joined them and, once Edward had regained his throne, fully expected to be imprisoned or even executed. His knightly word given not to rebel, he was, however, able to enjoy years at his home at Twyford. Roland, by this time (1476) has been accepted at New College, Oxford. Engaged in a boisterous melee, Roland is 'sent down' to a disappointed father. He becomes squire to a Yorkist 'new' man, Baron Thorndyke of Otterbourne, who is given a charge from King Edward to his most Christian Majesty Lewis.

Due to a storm, their ship fails to reach Harfleur, but lands at Treguier in Brittany. They travel to the Chateau of Rennes, where the now 19 year-old meets the fairest face I had seen - Adela, daughter of Sir Roderic Marshall, of Odiham Castle, and erstwhile friend of Roland's father. The choleric Sir Roderick is in exile as he would have no terms with Edward of York. The story now jumps a few years, to April 1482. Baron Otterbourne is given a scroll to take to King Lewis of France; they travel from Paris through Tours, Orleans and Blois to Plessis. There is a good description of the fortifications designed to keep the paranoid King safe. Roland fortuitously saves the life of the King's physician, who grants him the boon of releasing Adela and her father from their 'chateau arrest'. Roland meets Lewis - a man in dire sickness...the face as of one dead...with withered, claw-like fingers.

The Baron and Roland determine to return to England. At Calais, they get news that Edward IV has died. Roland aims for London, but not before Adela meets him again and asks him to plead for her father's return to Odiham from the Duke of Gloucester. Roland recalls for his sons: the young king...was slain in the Tower in August, and in a strange manner, for none have ever done more than guess at the author of his death. He meets Richard - a man whom I shall ever recall as the ablest ruler and warrior of his time. Shorter that the common height, and withal spare of figure...save that his right shoulder appeared to be raised, I could see nought of that deformity whereof writers of our own day tell so much. Saving Richard from a ruffian, Roland asks for and is given the leave for the Marshalls to return. Roland hies himself to Calais and brings Adela and her father back to Hampshire.

Tales of the two princes' deaths in the Tower circulate. Sir Roderick Marshall and Roland's father meet up and urge Roland to support Henry Tydder's efforts to seize the throne. They all get involved in the October Buckingham Rebellion. Caught up in its failure. Roland disguises himself in the company of travelling clowns. They move between the Marches, Nottingham, Banbury and Hereford. Now 1485, and hearing of Henry Tydder's landing, Roland collects retainers to join him.  The King, so we quickly learned, was at hand with his power, together with the Earl of Oxford, Sir John Savage, Bishop Morton, and certain Welsh chieftains whose strange-sounding names have escaped me. Our hero journeys with Tudor's army to Bosworth and witnesses Richard III's brave end. An Envoy wraps up Roland's tale. His father is released from the Tower; Odiham Manor is returned to Adele's mother (her father had been killed). In May 1487, Roland marries Adela in Twyford Church. A simple story of Lancastrian dedication and prowess.

Escott Lynn's 'Under the Red Rose' 1905

 

Cassell and Company first edition - 1905

Escott Lynn is an author who is very hard to track down. Apparently it was the pseudonym of Christopher George Holman Lawrence, In the Three Jolly Cadets: a Tale of the Royal Military Academy (W & R Chambers, 1931), he inscribed it "for my nephew Richard Lawrence 'bill' from his uncle escott lynn". He used several other names for his works, including Jackspur, Lawrence Abbott and Captain W.C. Metcalfe. Books before the Great War included: For Bonnie Prince Charlie (1910), Blair of Balaclava. A hero of the Light Brigade (1911) and A Cavalier of Fortune (1912). He spent many years as a volunteer in the armed forces and several of his books are war related, such as: Oliver Hastings VC (1916), Tommy of the Tanks (1919) and Last of the Lothians; with the Royal Scots at Gallipoli (1920). He was born in 1866 and died in 1950.

As the title - Under the Red Rose - suggests, this story is very much a Lancastrian one. The hero is a youth of 17, Guy Talbot, who is in the household of Lord Rivers at Ludlow. It is April 1483, and Edward IV's reign is drawing to an end. Guy is served by a faithful retainer, Martin. Their home is in the south-eastern corner of Herefordshire. The two are out riding, when a haughty, bombastic man appears, followed by a swart cross-eyed, heavily built man wearing a steel cap and a brigandine over a leathern jerkin. They are Sir Fulke Bourchier and his henchman Roger, travelling on the king's business to Ludlow Castle, which they must reach at the earliest instant. They clash and Martin cries: "Go; we care nothing for your Yorkist king here..." Thus commences an enmity which last throughout the novel. Guy and Martin carry on to an old priory where they know the prior well. He has a distinguished visitor - none other than the Bishop of Ely. The latter counsels Guy to be ready to defend Edward, the young Prince of Wales, and gives him a ring as a passport to the Bishop's confidence in future. 

Guy and Martin continue to Combe Hall, the Talbots' mansion. Guy's father has been abroad for the past two years (and it soon becomes apparent that he is in the service of Henry Tudor.) Not only is his father at home with his wife Dame Talbot and their daughter Hilda, but so is Sir Fulke. Moreover, also there is Isabel Bray, in Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond's household. A goblet is brought to the dining table - it has a chasing a lion passant crowned, the device of Lord Lisle, said to have been slain at Barnet fighting against King Edward.  Cunning Sir Fulke puts two and two together, much more quickly than most of the readers. From then on the Talbots are under suspicion. Guy and Martin travel to Ludlow and the former then reconnects with  Rivers and Prince Edward, a slim, handsome boy of thirteen, with golden curls reaching to his shoulders. By now, we know that his father is dead and Guy reaffirms his oath to protect the new monarch.

We first hear of the Duke of Gloucester, when his promise arrives to guard his nephew with his life. "I love not my uncle Gloucester; his smile freezes my blood. I will not trust myself with him", says the perspicacious youth. The story then follows the well-known chronology. Rivers and King Edward V journey to London, get near to Northampton, but hear that Richard awaits them there. They press on to Stony Stratford. Guy witnesses everything, by now with his friend Will Dysart. Throughout the novel Guy comes across as rather naive and headstrong, Will much more cautious, but acute and sensible.  The two young men now meet Gloucester, who was short, remarkably so...he was slightly though gracefully formed, with a hardly perceptible inequality in the height of his shoulders - hence, among his enemies, the nickname of "Crookback"...his eyes were small and almost closed, his lips were thin, and his manner was nervous and impatient. The Duke of Buckingham is with him - a tall, stout, insipid-looking man, whose looks bespoke him what he was - a pompous, shallow-minded coxcomb...

Sir Fulke keeps trying to incarcerate Guy and Will, but it is here that a Carmelite friar first appears, and keeps appearing, to help them in their need. We later find out that he is Sir Christopher Urswick, a loyal Tudor supporter. employed by the Bishop of Ely. Rivers, Sir Richard Grey and others are imprisoned and Gloucester takes charge of the young king. Guy speeds ahead to London to warn Queen Elizabeth of the turn in events. The author describes her well: she had in her day possessed much beauty of a certain insipid kind, and even then was quite passable-looking, but the tremulous lips betrayed a weak, vacillating nature; and her arrogant air, as well as the many acts of her life, proved that she possessed a greed and avarice that there seemed no satisfying. Guy is attacked yet again in London but recovers to witness Gloucester's moves against Hastings, Ely and the others at the Tower. He makes a friend of Hastings only to see his execution on Tower Green. The tale follows the More/Shakespeare version of events, strawberries, withered arm and all. 

Taken prisoner, on the orders of Sir Fulke, and placed in one of the Tower's dungeons, Guy is spirited away to Brecknock Castle, where the Bishop of Ely is slowly working his wiles on the Duke of Buckingham. Guy once again allows his rather stupid headstrong behaviour to spoil the bishop's plans for his release. Luckily, better judgement prevails and he escapes with the bishop himself, thanks to Will Dysart's involvement. More twists in Guy's story continue, including him seeing the two dead princes in the Tower before they are buried. No wonder the Chapter is called Richard's Foulest Deed.  Guy and Will get involved, with Sir John Cheney, in the disastrous Buckingham Rebellion, Will flees abroad to Brittany, whilst Guy and Sir John try to raise support in the North. Guy is captured for the umpteenth time, and is brought before King Richard. Headstrong as ever, he challenges the king: "I count it no treason to act against one who is but a usurper...I will tell you of the punishment of Heaven. You, who slew your brother's children, who murdered Rivers and Hastings...", and is able to tell Richard that his own son is dead!  Amazingly, Guy escapes from Nottingham Castle, meets up with the faithful Martin, gets to King's Lynn, finds the Bishop of Ely, and they take ship for Vannes. Here Christopher Urswick joins them, and they link up with Sir John Cheney and Guy's father.  And, finally, Henry of Richmond. It is Guy, of course, who holds a bridge so that Henry can escape to France. The boy is simply everywhere!   He is at Bosworth, but not before he has met up with Isobel Bray and realises he loves her. Will kills King Richard's henchman, Ratcliffe; Guy is involved in the end of Sir Fulke and is responsible for sending Richard's helmet flying.

Escott Lynn has quite cleverly wrapped the story of a fictitious youth around the exciting events of April 1483 to August 1485. Perhaps Guy is too ubiquitous, seemingly at hand at just the right time to witness all. The Epilogue, a year later, sees Elizabeth of York sharing the throne with Henry; Bishop Morton is Archbishop of Canterbury, the Stanleys and Sir John Cheney are of the Council; Lord and Lady Lisle (yes - they are Guy's parents) are at their rightful home of Sudeley Castle; and Sir Guy Talbot walks hand in hand with Isabel Bray, and Sir William Dysart with Hilda Talbot. 

In the Notes, at the end of the book, Escott Lynn discusses Richard III's character, using the works of Sir Thomas More, Edmund Hall, and James Gairdner. 

L.F. Winter's 'Castle Harcourt; or, The Days of King Richard the Third' 1825

 

 

Modern reproduction of A.E. Newman's first edition - 1825

This is the only novel on Richard III that I have been unable to track down in a first edition, and the first time I have purchased a modern reproduction. Kessinger Publishing is one of several firms (often based in India or the Far East) which have made it their mission to republish rare historical book reprints. They are right to say that the result may possibly have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages. Luckily, none of Castle Harcourt's pages were missing but quite a few were difficult to read, due to the blurred text. The subheading on the front cover reads: A Tale of 1483. The story actually commences in August 1485 and the three volumes detail events leading up to the Battle of Bosworth in the penultimate week of that month. Admittedly, the blurring on the original title pages makes it well nigh impossible to distinguish between a '3'  and a '5', but even a cursory reading of the text would have highlighted the error. No matter.

The story is tight knit, concentrating on the goings-on of a nominally Yorkist family dwelling at Harcourt Castle in north Leicestershire. This is fictitious, although all the other places mentioned - Charnwood and Charley Forests, Barrow, Loughborough, Mountsorrel, Belgrave and Leicester are real enough.  Sir Walter Harcourt lives in an antique residence, with his venerable dame, their daughter Adela, and Eldred their son and heir, who had been devoted by his parents to a military life. Sir Walter's last active employment had been in Scotland under the duke of Gloucester, now King Richard III - a name which the immortal bard of Avon hath thrown forth...as the image of the arch fiend among his subject legions. Sir Walter disliked talking about Richard as strange tales had been whispered respecting the death of his nephews...

The family are joined in August by a nearly 21 year-old Oxford scholar, Alfred Lutterell, orphan heir to a large estate and erstwhile playfellow to Adele Harcourt. Love was now in the air between them, but so also was mystery.  Whilst Alfred favoured the Yorkist king, it becomes increasingly clear that both Adele and Eldred are probably supporters of Henry Tudor and secretly corresponding with Lord Stanley. Adele burst out to her lover - on the battlements of the castle, no less - "Oh! it would be a happy day for England were that monster Richard hurled from the throne!...Murder - murder - ay, even of poor innocent children - marks his footsteps. His odious image haunts me! And it was for such a wretch that my father and my brother have fought and bled!  Later she castigates the bloody boar that now cruelly rioteth in the fulness of his usurped power. She starts talking about the supernatural, a topic seemingly engrained in so many of the early 19th century historical novels. Far too often, apparent supernatural events and evil spirits appear to frighten the participants of the tale, and bore the reader. Winter is also often guilty of purple passages (usually describing the weather or the scenery) - another failing of 19th century historical novelists.

The story continues with many twists and turns, including secret and intricate passages and winding stairs, murders, a scheming porter and a monk at Leicester Abbey, and plenty of goings-on in woods, byways and disreputable inns. The Gothic is never far away. That the author has read up on his sources is apparent from his footnotes, where he quotes Rymer's Foedera, Rapin, Camden, Hall, Holinshed, Speed and Stowe. He also has a long quotation from George Buck's History of Richard the Third, which one must assume is the 1646 version, and refers to both John Nichols's Leicestershire and William Hutton's Bosworth.

There are some well written minor characters, such as Adam Belton, Alfred's serving-man at Oxford; Hugh Ratcliffe, a highly-skilled local forester and archer; John Belisdon, Harcourt Castle's reeve or steward; Robert, the surly gatekeeper at Leicester Abbey and Father Rodolph, the cunning friar; all play important parts in the development of the story. There is the usual over-emphasis of what every character is wearing and what they eat - as if to prove the author is knowledgeable about the time he writes about, but these sections can be speedily passed over. 

The story is universally hostile to Richard III, whose brief and bloody reign included dark occurrences. The reader meets Richard but twice: once on his entry into Leicester, where his lowering brow proclaimed a heart ill at ease; and on the field at Bosworth. At least Winter admits that Shakespeare's version of Richard was created possibly to gratify a descendant of the earl of Richmond. The end of the three volumes felt rather like those stage plays, where Act V Scene V brings all the loose ends together, rather too quickly, but at least the reader can shut the volume knowing that Alfred and Adele are happily wedded and the former, now of age, inherits his estate. He builds his own terrace walk, like that at Harcourt Castle, and there he loved to walk with Adele, listening awhile to the harmony of her voice, and ever and anon stopping to enjoy the calm luxury of silent and unutterable bliss. 

John Reed Scott's 'Beatrix of Clare' 1907

Grosset & Dunlap first edition - May 1907

John Reed Scott  (born Gettysbury, Pennsylvania 8 September 1869; died Westminster, Maryland, 21 January 1942) was a lawyer and author of several books, possibly the best known being The Colonel of the Red Huzzars. This tale, set in 1483, is essentially a love story wrapped around the momentous events between Edward IV's demise and the Duke of Buckingham's rebellion. After the last few pro-Lancastrian stories, it was a refreshing change to encounter a positive character study of Richard, Duke of Gloucester then King.

Richard's overall portrayal is that of a kind but formidable Plantagenet - clearly in love with Anne, his wife, and whose love is returned in full. His approach to Beatrix of Clare and Sir Aymer de Lacy is almost avuncular but to a rebel such as Buckingham or the fictitious Lord Darby cold and unforgiving. We first meet him in Pontefract Castle: the pale, clean-shaven face, with its beautiful mouth and straight Norman nose, and the short, slender figure in its mantle and doublet of black velvet furred with ermine...and dark brown hair hanging bushy to the shoulders, would have been effeminate but for the massively majestic forehead and the fierce black eyes - brilliant, compelling, stern, proud - that flashed forth the mighty soul within...Richard had been famed for his wisdom and statecraft...while his royal brother was dallying in a life of indulgence amid the dissipations of his Court, the brave and resolute Richard was leading his armies, administering his governments, and preserving order on the Marches of the Border. No mention of any deformity or involvement in previous murders. Later in the book, the author again sings Richard's praises: he wore no armour, but in his rich doublet and super-tunic of dark blue velvet with the baudikin stripes on the sleeve, he made as handsome and gallant a figure as one was wont to see, even in those days of chivalry. And no reign, since his protonymic predecessor's, gave promise of a brighter future...England had known Richard of Gloucester, even since his boyhood, as a strong man among strong men - a puissant knight, an unbeaten general, a wise counsellor, a brilliant administrator; in all things able, resourceful, proficient; combining, as it were, in the last of the Angevines, all the keen statesmanship, stern will, and fiery dash of the great House that had ruled England for three hundred turbulent years. And, rather amazingly, he is as shocked as anyone to be told that the Princes in the Tower were dead. On it being suggested that Edward killed Richard and himself. He had lately been oppressed with heavy melancholy, King Richard replies, "yes, that is doubtless the solution, yet scant credence will be given it. To the Kingdom it will be murder foul...Richard, you were a good seer.

The hero, Sir Aymer de Lacy, has returned to England after a spell abroad. He is making his way north from Windsor to beg service in Gloucester's  when he is attacked and robbed by outlaws. Wounded, he is found by a slender figure in green velvet - the sweet, bow-shaped mouth, the high-bred, sensitive nose, the rounded chin, the tiny ear, the soft, deep grey eyes, and crowning all, the great rolls of the auburn hair that sunbeams spin to gold. He can't help but be smitten and falls headlong in immediate love! She departs, without him finding out her name. A little later, on Edward IV's death, de Lacy is sent by the Duke of Buckingham (whom he had met some years previously in Paris) with a message to Richard at Pontefract. From then onwards, he is intimately bound up with the fast-moving events of that summer and autumn of 1483. At Pontefract he not only meets Anne Neville, but Beatrix de Beaumont, in her own right Countess of Clare. He finds he has a rival also enamoured with her: Lord Darby (not to be confused with the real Lord Derby) is determined to wed her, by fair means or foul. It is to be very foul as, in league with the duplicitous Cistercian Aldam, Abbot of Kirkstall - an intriguing, political priest of Lancastrian inclination -  he has her kidnapped and inured in his castle at Roxford. Lord Darby and the Abbot are both enmeshed in Buckingham's Rebellion. Thanks to the support of the older Sir John de Bury of Craigston Castle, Beatrix's uncle, de Lacy rescues Beatrix from the castle. She finally agrees to marry him, he will become Earl of Clare, and they will live happily ever after. Or do they, as Scott's story ends in 1483? 

There maybe occasionally touches of a Mills & Boon, or Robert Hale, romance about the tale, but the author draws the reader in well and one begins to care about the result. De Lacy follows the Duke of Gloucester to London; is present when Rivers and Grey are seized and Edward V is escorted south; witnesses the famous Council at the Tower of London, when Hastings is taken out to be executed. Thomas, Lord Stanley is duly assessed:  His countenance was peculiar, for in it there was both cunning and frankness; cunning in the eyes, frankness in the mouth and chin; a face, withal, that would bear constant watching, and that contained scarce a trace of virility - only a keen selfishness and a crafty faithlessness...with that cool indifference to aught but expediency which characterized his whole life...whilst the Duke of Buckingham, according to King Richard, has no statecraft in him and can learn none

Scott writes persuasively - there are compelling accounts of the [in]famous Council Meeting in the Tower; of the Kirkstall abbot's Chapter House meeting; of Buckingham's final moments at Salisbury; and Lord Darby's unmasking in front of King Richard at the end of the tale. Having recently read some rather juvenile books - to be fair, deliberately so - I enjoyed John Reed Scott's account of the intrigues of those Yorkist days. His characters were well-fleshed out; the pace of the narrative was admirable and sustained; and the atmosphere of the late fifteenth-century was realistically conveyed.