DARK AND LIGHT STORIES. London: Chapman and Hall, 193, Piccadilly, 1879. Octavo, pp. [i-vii] viii [1] 2-322 [323: ad] [324: blank], original decorated brown cloth, front and spine panels stamped in black and gold, rear panel stamped in blind, top edge untrimmed, fore-edge rough trimmed, yellow coated endpapers. First edition. A collection of 17 crime and sensation stories, some light-hearted and humorous, some serious and tragic. "An Amateur Lunatic" and "An Amateur Lunatic's 'Revanche'" feature Bobbie De Cameron, a journalist for the LONDON MERCURY who attempts to get himself committed to a private lunatic asylum in order to write a series of articles about the conditions found in madhouses. In "The Ghostly Oarsman," a mysterious specter rowing near Eton is revealed to be a suitor who, after being barred from calling on his girlfriend by her parents, resorts to communicating with her via fireworks he sets off at night from the river. "The Disappearance of Mrs. Bennion" is the tale of an unfaithful wife who mysteriously disappears and allows everyone to believe she is dead rather than let her husband discover that she has had an affair with a forger and been arrested as his accomplice. A diplomat and journalist who wrote for a variety of publications, such as the PALL MALL GAZETTE, CORNHILL MAGAZINE and QUEER STORIES, Eustace Clare Grenville Murray (1824-1881) was publicly horsewhipped by Lord Carrington at the Conservative Club for slandering Carrington's father, an incident that led to Murray exiling himself to Paris for the remainder of his life. The book was reissued by Ward, Lock & Co. as AN AMATEUR LUNATIC. Hubin (1994), p. 412. Sutherland, Victorian Fiction, p. 452. A clean, bright, very good copy. (#170092).
Price: $350.00
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