.. Had she dared to
look again, her delusion and her fears would have
vanished together, and she would have perceived that
the figure before her was not human, but formed of
wax... A member of the house of Udolpho, having
committed some offence against the prerogative of the
church, had been condemned to the penance of
contemplating, during certain hours of the day, a waxen
image made to resemble a human body in the state to
which it is reduced after death ... he had made it a
condition in his will that his descendants should
preserve the image."
Mrs. Radcliffe, realising that the secret she had so jealously
guarded is of rather an amazing character, asserts that it is
"not without example in the records of the fierce severity which
monkish superstition has sometimes inflicted on mankind." But the
explanation falls so ludicrously short of our expectations and is
so improbable a possibility, that Mrs. Radcliffe would have been
wise not to defraud Catherine Morland and other readers of the
pleasure of guessing aright. Few enjoy being baffled and thwarted
in so unexpected a fashion. The skeleton of Signora Laurentina
was the least that could be expected as a reward for suspense so
patiently endured.
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