As he wanders amid the ruins he recalls not only "the
buried Caesars," but also the monk in _The Italian_, of whom he
had read in childhood--a striking proof of Mrs. Shelley's faith
in the permanence of Mrs. Radcliffe's fame.
Though the style of _The Last Man_ is often tediously prolix and
is disfigured by patches of florid rhetoric and by inappropriate
similes scattered broadcast, occasional passages of wonderful
beauty recall Shelley's imagery; and, in conveying the pathos of
loneliness, personal feeling lends nobility and eloquence to her
style. With so ambitious a subject, it was natural that she
should only partially succeed in carrying her readers with her.
Though there are oases, the story is a somewhat tedious and
dreary stretch of narrative that can only be traversed with
considerable effort.
Mrs. Shelley's later works--_Perkin Warbeck_ (1830), a historical
novel; _Lodore_ (1835), which describes the early life of Shelley
and Harriet; _Falkner_ (1837), which was influenced by _Caleb
Williams_--do not belong to the history of the novel of terror;
but some of her short tales, contributed to periodicals and
collected in 1891, have gruesome and supernatural themes. _A Tale
of the Passions, or the Death of Despina_[123] a story based on
the struggles of the Guelphs and the Ghibellines, contains a
perfect specimen of the traditional villain of the novel of
terror:
"Every feature of his countenance spoke of the struggle
of passions and the terrible egotism of one who would
sacrifice himself to the establishment of his will: his
black eyebrows were scattered, his grey eyes deep-set
and scowling, his look at once stern and haggard.
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