The Ingoldsby legends
In order utterly to squash and demolish every gainsayer, I had thought, at one time, of asking my old and esteemed friend, Richard Lane, to crush .them at once with his magic pencil, and to transmit my features to posterity, where all his works are sure to be ' delivered according to the direction '; but somehow the noble-looking profiles which he has recently executed of the Kemble family put me a little out of conceit of my own, while the undisguised amusement which my ( Mephistopheles Eyebrow/ as he termed it, afforded him, in the 'full face,' induced me to lay aside the design.
Besides, my dear Sir, since, as has well been observed, ' there never was a married man yet who had not somebody remarkably like him walking about town,' it is a thousand to one but my lineaments might, after all, out of sheer perverseness, be ascribed to anybody rather than to the real owner. I have therefore sent you, instead thereof, a fair sketch of Sappington, taken from the Folkestone road (I tore it last night out of Julia Simpkinsoii's album); get Gilks to make a woodcut of it.
And now, if any miscreant (I use the word only in its primary and ' Pickwickian ' sense of ( Unbeliever ') ventures to throw any further doubt upon the matter, why, as Jack Cade's friend says in the play, ' There are the chimneys in my father's house, and the bricks are alive at this day to testify it! ' ' Why, very well then — we hope here be truths! '
Heaven be with you, my dear Sir ! — I was getting a little excited: but you, who are mild as the milk that dews the soft whisker of the new-weaned kitten, will forgive me when, wiping away the nascent moisture from my brow, 1 ' pull in,' and subscribe myself, Yours quite as much as his own,
Some contents:
Legend of Hamilton Tighe, . . . . . . 32
The Witches' Frolic, 35
The Jackdaw of Rheims, 51
A Lay of St. Dunstan, 55
A Lay of St. Gengulphus, 67
The Lay of St. Odille. 78
A Lay of St. Nicholas, . . . . . ... 86
The Tragedy, 95
Mr Barney Maguire's Account of the Coronation,. 100
The 'Monstre' Balloon, 103
Hon. Mr Sucklethumbkin's Story— The Execution, . 1D7
Some Account of a New Play, Ill
Mr Peters's Story— The Bagman's Dog, . . .121
Appendix," 138
The Black MQUsquetaire, 138
Sir Rupert the Fearless, 161
The Merchant of Venice, 172
The Auto-da-fe, 186
The Ingoldsby Penance, . ... 207
Netley Abbey, 221
Fragment, 226
Nell Cook, 228
Nursery Reminiscences, 239
Aunt Fanny, 241
Misadventures at Margate, 250
The Smuggler's Leap, 256
Blondie Jacke of Shrewsberrie,. .263
The Babes in the Wood,,276
The Dead Drummer, 282
A Row in an Omnibus (Box), 295
The Lay of St. Cuthbert, 300
The Lay of St. Aloys, 314
The Lay of the Old Woman Clothed in Grey, . . 325
Raising the Devil, 344
The Lay of St. Medard, 345
The Lord of Toulouse, 353
The Wedding-Day; or, The Buccaneer's Curse, . . 367
The Blasphemer's Warning, 383
The Brothers of Birchington, 406
The Knight and the Lady, 419
The House- Warming 429
The Forlorn One, 444
Unsophisticated Wishes, 445
Hermann; or, The Broken Spear 447
Hints for a Historical Play, 450
Marie Mignot, 452
The Truants, 454
The Poplar, . 458
My Letters, 459
New-Made Honour, 462
The Confession, 462
Song,. 463
Epigram, 464
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Mythology and Folklore