Zanoni invokes the aid of the
mysterious Intelligences, and his courage at length brings
Adon-Ai again to his side. He wins a day's reprieve for Viola,
and is executed in her stead. The death of Robespierre releases
the prisoners, but Viola dies the next day.
The compact between Zanoni and the Dweller of the Threshold is a
renovation of the time-worn legend of the bargain with an evil
spirit, but Lytton transforms it almost beyond recognition.
Zanoni is no criminal. He has attained his secrets through
will-power, self-conquest, and the subordination of the flesh to
the spirit, and he surrenders his gifts willingly for the sake of
another. Both Mejnour and Zanoni disclaim miraculous powers, yet
Zanoni is ready to stake his mistress on a cast of the dice, and
can cause the death of three sanguinary marauders without
stirring from the apartment in which he ordinarily pursues his
chemical studies. From such incidents as these it would seem as
if Lytton, for the actual craftsmanship of _Zanoni_, may have
gleaned stray hints from the novel of terror; but the spirit and
intention of the book are entirely different. Though Lytton
expressly declares that his _Zanoni_ is not an allegory, he
confesses that it has symbolical meanings. Zanoni is apt to
assume the superior pose of a lecturer elucidating an abstruse
subject to an unenlightened audience.
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