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Historical Mysteries By: Andrew Lang (1844-1912) |
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BY ANDREW LANG
WITH A FRONTISPIECE SECOND EDITION LONDON
SMITH, ELDER, & CO., 15 WATERLOO PLACE
1905 [All rights reserved]
[Illustration: William Smith 1754 Pinx. Mac Ardell. Mezzo. Elizabeth Canning. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 15 Waterloo Place, S.W.]
PREFACE
These Essays, which appeared, with two exceptions, in The Cornhill
Magazine , 1904, have been revised, and some alterations, corrections,
and additions have been made in them. 'Queen Oglethorpe,' in which
Miss Alice Shield collaborated, doing most of the research, is
reprinted by the courteous permission of the editor, from Blackwood's
Magazine . A note on 'The End of Jeanne de la Motte,' has been added
as a sequel to 'The Cardinal's Necklace:' it appeared in The Morning
Post , the Editor kindly granting leave to republish. The author wishes to acknowledge the able assistance of Miss E.M.
Thompson, who made researches for him in the British Museum and at the
Record Office.
CONTENTS
PAGE I. THE CASE OF ELIZABETH CANNING 1 II. THE MURDER OF ESCOVEDO 32 III. THE CAMPDEN MYSTERY 55 IV. THE CASE OF ALLAN BRECK 75 V. THE CARDINAL'S NECKLACE 99 VI. THE MYSTERY OF KASPAR HAUSER: THE CHILD OF EUROPE 118 VII. THE GOWRIE CONSPIRACY 143 VIII. THE STRANGE CASE OF DANIEL DUNGLAS HOME 170 IX. THE CASE OF CAPTAIN GREEN 193 X. QUEEN OGLETHORPE ( in collaboration with Miss
Alice Shield ) 214 XI. THE CHEVALIER D'ÉON 238 XII. SAINT GERMAIN THE DEATHLESS 256 XIII. THE MYSTERY OF THE KIRKS 277 XIV. THE END OF JEANNE DE LA MOTTE 297 PORTRAIT OF ELIZABETH CANNING. Frontispiece.
HISTORICAL MYSTERIES
I THE CASE OF ELIZABETH CANNING Don't let your poor little
Lizzie be blamed! THACKERAY.
'Everyone has heard of the case of Elizabeth Canning,' writes Mr. John
Paget; and till recently I agreed with him. But five or six years ago
the case of Elizabeth Canning repeated itself in a marvellous way, and
then but few persons of my acquaintance had ever heard of that
mysterious girl. The recent case, so strange a parallel to that of 1753, was this: In
Cheshire lived a young woman whose business in life was that of a
daily governess. One Sunday her family went to church in the morning,
but she set off to skate, by herself, on a lonely pond. She was never
seen of or heard of again till, in the dusk of the following Thursday,
her hat was found outside of the door of her father's farmyard. Her
friend discovered her further off in a most miserable condition,
weak, emaciated, and with her skull fractured. Her explanation was
that a man had seized her on the ice, or as she left it, had dragged
her across the fields, and had shut her up in a house, from which she
escaped, crawled to her father's home, and, when she found herself
unable to go further, tossed her hat towards the farm door. Neither
such a man as she described, nor the house in which she had been
imprisoned, was ever found. The girl's character was excellent,
nothing pointed to her condition being the result d'une orgie
échevelée ; but the neighbours, of course, made insinuations, and a
lady of my acquaintance, who visited the girl's mother, found herself
almost alone in placing a charitable construction on the adventure. My theory was that the girl had fractured her skull by a fall on the
ice, had crawled to and lain in an unvisited outhouse of the farm, and
on that Thursday night was wandering out, in a distraught state, not
wandering in. Her story would be the result of her cerebral
condition concussion of the brain... Continue reading book >>
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