Project Gutenberg's Bungay Castle: A Novel. v. 1/2, by Elizabeth Bonhote

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Title: Bungay Castle: A Novel. v. 1/2

Author: Elizabeth Bonhote

Release Date: September 25, 2011 [EBook #37533]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BUNGAY CASTLE: A NOVEL. V. 1/2 ***

Produced by ppcunningham from the library of San Francisco State University

Transcriber's Note:

This is a faithful transcription of the original 1796 printing of this novel. All archaic words, alternative spellings, and inconsistencies of grammatical form and fashion, have been preserved.

* * * * *

BUNGAY CASTLE:

A NOVEL.

BY MRS. BONHOTE.

Author of the Parental Monitor, &c.

In Two Volumes

  Astonished at the voice he stood amaz'd,
  And all around with inward horror gaz'd.

ADDISON.

VOL. I.

LONDON:
PRINTED FOR WILLIAM LANE,
AT THE
Minerva Press
LEADENHALL-STREET.
M.DCC.XCVI.

FRONTISPIECE

[Illustration: Drawing of Bungay Castle]

BUNGAY CASTLE

TO THE MOST NOBLE CHARLES DUKE OF NORFOLK, WHOSE URBANITY AND PHILANTHROPY MUST EVER REFLECT ADDITIONAL HONOURS ON THE NAME OF HOWARD; BY WHOSE NOBLE FAMILY BUNGAY CASTLE WAS POSSESSED FOR MANY CENTURIES; THE FOLLOWING PAGES ARE RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED, BY HIS GRACE'S MOST OBEDIENT, AND VERY HUMBLE SERVANT, ELIZ. BONHOTE.

Bungay, 1797.

INTRODUCTION.

Castle-Building appears to have been the passion of all ages; while some have been raising their fabrics on the most solid and lasting foundations, others have been forming them in the air, where the structure has been erected with infinitely less trouble, as their own invention led them to wish, and very pleasant, no doubt, was the delusion of the moment.

It is now the prevailing taste to read wonderful tales of wonderful castles; to recall them from the [* Missing words here ] ages, and represent them as the novelist finds most suitable to the circumstances of his tale. In times like these, every book that serves to amuse the mind, and withdraw the attention from scenes of real distress, without inflaming the passions, or corrupting the heart, must surely be as acceptable to the reader as it may have been found pleasant to the writer, and should exempt the latter from the severity of criticism. Under the influence of this opinion, the Author of the following sheets has been tempted to send them into the world. She might, indeed, to evade the danger of having her work condemned, pretend to have found it in some recess of her favourite ruins, or to have discovered it artfully concealed in the bottom of an old chest, in so defaced and mutilated a condition, as to have rendered it a very difficult and laborious task to collect the fragments and modernize the language: but the writer of these pages has not been so fortunate; and, had she attempted to assert so marvellous a circumstance, she could not have expected any miss of fifteen would have been credulous enough to believe her.

The thought of publishing a novel, under the title given to these volumes, has long been her intention,—a thought which originated from her living within the distance of twenty yards from those venerable ruins, which still attract the attention of the stranger and the curious. Often in early youth had she climbed their loftiest summits, and listened with pleased and captivated attention to the unaccountable tales related by the old and superstitious, and considered as real by herself and her inexperienced companions.—In one place, it was said the ghost of an ancient warrior, clad in armour, took his nightly round to reconnoitre scenes endeared by many a tender claim. In another, a lovely female form had been seen to glide along, and was supposed to disappear on the very spot where it was imagined her lover had fallen a victim to the contentions of the times.

    "Her face was like an April sky
     Dimm'd by a scatt'ring cloud;
     Her clay-cold lily hand, knee-high,
     Held up her sable shroud."

All these circumstances added strength to a romantic turn of mind, which acquired additional force from a love of reading the old romances, and this propensity for the marvellous was for some time indulged in the midst of scenes which afforded ample scope for the creative excursions of fancy. After having left her paternal dwelling many years, she is again replaced in it by some of those changes which so frequently occur in the progress of human life; and has purchased the little spot of ground on which stands the principal part of all that now remains of Bungay Castle, and which, though a mere heap of unconnected ruins, are still so venerable as to excite, in the feeling and thoughtful mind, a sympathetic regret at the instability of human grandeur and the weakness of human strength.

Among these ruins, once the property, and, in all probability, the temporary residence, of the noble house of Norfolk, cottages are now built, and inhabited by many poor families, and those very walls, which perhaps sheltered royalty, are now the supporters of miserable hovels. Such are the awful effects of time, and the unaccountable revolutions it produces!

But, were it in the Author's power as much as it is her inclination, she would adorn their venerable remains with all the flowers of spring, and the tempting treasures of autumn should surround them. The jessamine and honey-suckle should clasp them in their embraces, and the tendrils of the vine and the fig-tree should encircle and decorate them with their luscious sweets. She would, on the loftiest corner of their remains, build herself a little hut, in which she could sit and contemplate the variegated scenes around. She would reverse the order of things, and render them as lovely and beautiful in age, as they were grand and magnificent before time had robbed them of those envied and valuable properties which it cannot restore.

Being again in the habit of spending many leisure hours in this favourite spot, endeared to her for bringing to remembrance the enlivening scenes of youth, and, having opportunities to pursue her sedentary amusements, she determined to accomplish her design, seeing no reason why Bungay Castle should not be as good a foundation for the structure of a novel as any other edifice within or without the kingdom. But, as so many ages are elapsed since this Castle was reared, and since time and death have swept away with ruthless hand almost every vestige of what it once was, she has to lament, and so perhaps may her readers, that she was furnished for this employment with no other materials than the scanty portion her own imagination afforded. She has borrowed some real names, and she hopes the characters she has introduced will be found neither disgusting nor unnatural. But, as Solomon so many centuries ago declared,