Margery of Quether & Other Weird Tales ~ S. Baring-Gould

Sabine Baring-Gould's novella 'Margery of Quether' first appeared in two parts in the Cornhill Magazine in 1884, accompanied by drawings by Harry Furniss (1854-1925). It first appeared in book form in 1891 (more than a decade before the collection A Book of Ghosts), when Margery of Quether and Other Stories was published by Methuen & Co.

In 1999, Sarob Press republished 'Margery of Quether' along with five other tales and one religious poem (see the cover image on the right). 'Master Sacristan Eberhart' (December 1858), 'The Fireman' (March 1860), 'Easter Eve' (April 1860) and 'The Dead Trumpeter of Hurst Castle' (May-June 1860) were originally published in the Hurst Johnian, the journal of St John's College, Hurstpierpoint. 'The Devil's Mill' (1908) and 'Crowdy Marsh' (1910) first appeared in The Storyteller.

In 'Margery of Quether', George Rosedhu is a yeoman of Brinsabatch,* in the parish of Lamerton, Devon. On Sundays, he worships at the little church of S. Michael de Rupe, atop an extinct volcanic cone called Brentor. It is a custom that on Christmas Eve the sexton and two others climb Brentor and ring the bells of the church at midnight, but the sexton has fallen ill, so George offers to do the ringing. He climbs Brentor alone with nothing but a dim lantern to light his way, enters the church, and rings the first bell. He is just about to ring the tenor bell when he sees 'something dark, like a ball of dirty cobwebs, hanging to the cord'. The creature, which has a human form but is only the size of a baby, descends to the floor below.

'In colour the object was brown, as if it had been steeped in peat water for a century, and in texture leathery. It scrambled, much as I have seen a bat scramble, out of the puddle on the pavement to the heap of broken timber, and worked its way with its little brown hands and long claws up a rafter, and seated itself thereon, holding fast by a hand on each side of what I suppose was the body.'

The creature explains that she is Margery of Quether, once a living woman, now a dried up old crone who cannot die. George is so moved by her story that he takes her in his arms and carries her home. She drives her one remaining tooth into his flesh and clasps him so tightly with her claws that he is unable to remove her... until she drops off of her own accord. At which point she appears less dried up, a little rosier, and a little heavier.

Margery is a vampire, though not one of the sparkling variety (she doesn't go to highschool either). She increases her own vitality by draining that of her victim, increasing in youth as her victim increases in age. And she appears to inspire willingness in poor old George to be complicit in his own sapping. Baring-Gould's tale is satirical (with a great deal of social commentary), and yet his church-going vampiric creation is no less dangerous than Stoker's Dracula. The Spectator wrote (3rd of May, 1884):

'We hardly know in what the power of the little tale consists, unless it is in the realistic simplicity with which the horrible "facts" are related; but there is something about it positively uncanny. There is nothing to revolt at, but one would much rather not have read it.'

'Master Sacristan Eberhart' lives in the tower of the ancient church of S. Sebaldus, above the big bells. He rarely descends to the world below, save to attend Mass in the morning, and rarely speaks to another living soul, aside from the birds. On the top of the church tower there are four life-size carved figures, one of which is a monk squatting on his haunches, and Master Eberhart is very fond of him. Having noticed that there is a crack at the back of the figure, and having been told by the mason that the church won't pay for repairs, Eberhart vows that he will pay for them himself, no matter the cost. The monk repays his kindness in a gruesome and dramatic manner.

In 'The Fireman', Peter Lundy, an iron puddler, is not a nice man; he is not averse to a bit of robbery, or a bit of attempted murder for that matter. An elderly man arrives at Lundy's hut and asks for lodging for the night. Then the elderly stranger explains that he is after some curious crystals that can only be obtained by wading into molten iron. He will pay twenty pounds for each specimen procured, he explains, and he gives Lundy a special ointment to protect his lower body from the immense heat of the molten metal. But each time Lundy enters the fiery molten iron, there is a price to pay...

The setting for 'The Dead Trumpeter of Hurst Castle' is the same Hurst Castle in which Charles I was imprisoned in 1648, before being taken to London for his trial and execution. It concerns the King's time at the castle, the appearance of the ghost of a trumpeter that protects Charles during his stay there, and an apparition within the King's room at the moment of his execution.

In 'The Devil's Mill', the narrator, who has an interest in both botany and archaeology, is engaged in research on the coast, when the night draws in suddenly and he loses his way. He comes across a windmill and inside it meets a miller who makes psychosopic lenses. The miller explains, 'he who wears these glasses can see into a man's soul and read all that passes therein.' The narrator takes a bagful of the lenses away with him to sell, but there are consequences to spying on the innermost thoughts of others.

The narrator of 'Crowdy Marsh' is out shooting with his friend Richards on the moor around Brown Willy.** With the light beginning to fail, they set out for a hotel in Camelford, but lose their way and become separated. The narrator comes across a stone house, in which three haggard old women are sorting through unused, neglected and misused 'faculties', left for them by the Wild Hunt.

Unlike A Book of Ghosts, this collection is more serious in tone, aside from 'Margery of Quether', which is satirical in nature. These tales are more creepy. If I had to pick a favourite, it would be 'Master Sacristan Eberhart'. The only tale I don't much care for is 'The Dead Trumpeter of Hurst Castle', which is too sentimentally monarchist for my liking (though I have nothing particular against Charles I, and would have preferred it if Oliver Cromwell had been decapitated instead).

Sarob Press issued Margery of Quether and Other Weird Tales in a limited edition of 250 copies. A fine copy in a fine dust jacket costs between sixty and eighty pounds at the moment (that's about $100-130). Leonaur published The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Sabine Baring-Gould in 2012, and that is available as a hardback or paperback, the former costing just over twenty pounds.
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* In the Cornhill Magazine, George Rosedhu is a yeoman of Brinsabatch. In Methuen's Margery of Quether and Other Stories the location of George's home was changed to Foggaton. The Sarob Press volume utilises the text of the Cornhill Magazine.
** From the Cornish 'Bronn Wennili', meaning 'Hill of Swallows', it is the highest peak on Bodmin Moor, Cornwall.

A Letter from the Literary Squarson

I have always collected old postcards, letters, photos and the such like. I love finding old bus and train tickets, or newspaper clippings, inside antiquarian books too. I'm always rummaging about, looking for another interesting tidbit for my collection of paper lovelies. Anyway, not long ago I came across this letter, written by the author of A Book of Ghosts, Sabine Baring-Gould.

It was written in purple ink, at Baring-Gould's family home, Lew Trenchard Manor, on the 20th of July 1882, in response to a request for a photograph of the well-known literary squarson. It reads:

'I think you can get a photograph from Mr. Walker, Margaret St., Cavendish Sqr. London; he took me some years ago, & I have not been done since, nor have I any of his photos by me, or you should have one & welcome. I do not know even whether he still has the old plate.'

The letter was posted on the 21st of July 1882, and sent to J. T. Baron Esq, of 48 Griffin St., Wilton, Blackburn. The envelope has a purple penny postage stamp (stuck on upside-down, so the queen is standing on her head) and a Lewdon postmark.

S. Baring-Gould Alleges That He Is Not Dead

This morning papers announced the death of the well-known and picturesque clerical novelist, the Rev S. Baring-Gould. Although the rev gentleman is to-day one day nearer the dissolution which lies before the best of us than he was this time yesterday, we can assure our readers that this morning's statement is slightly wide of the real facts of the case. This morning's papers announced: -

Death of the Rev S. Baring-Gould

The Rev Sabine Baring-Gould, the well-known novelist and the author of the hymn "Onward, Christian Soldiers," died on Saturday evening at Port Elizabeth on board the steamer Norman. He was born at Exeter on the 28th of January, 1834, his father being a country squire, the owner of an estate of 3,000 acres. (Full obituary followed...)

A DENIAL

The Rev S. Baring-Gould telegraphs as follows from his home in Devonshire:-

"The news of my death is false. I have not been in Africa."

The gentleman who is dead is Mr E. S. Baring-Gould, of Boxgrove House, Merrow, near Guildford. Mr E. S. Baring-Gould was a cousin of the novelist, and has a brother living at Guildford.

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The Rev. S. Baring-Gould

READS NOTICES OF HIS OWN DEATH

The Western Gazette, Friday 8th of June 1906

Nearly all the morning papers praised the novelist's versatility and productiveness. One pays tribute to his "lively imagination and humour," adding that "these characteristics sometimes ran away with him;" another, giving a list of his numerous works, is of the opinion that he will probably be known to posterity as the author of "Onward, Christian Soldiers;" a third remarks that "he became rather a shadow to the present generation."

"If he never at any point touched or even attempted high literary distinction he did many things," another journal admits, "with brilliance and success."

Regret is expressed by several newspapers that he did not restrict himself to one subject or one branch of literature. Had he done so it is thought he might have left an enduring name.

Mr. Baring-Gould is, however, by no means the first celebrity who has lived to read his own nekrology, and to enjoy the sensation of seeing how people will write of him after his death. It was burning curiosity in this respect which caused Lord Brougham to circulate a report of his own death, and he was by no means flattered by the result.

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READING HIS OWN OBITUARY

Rev. S. Baring-Gould Describes the Sensation

The Western Times, Friday 15th of June 1906

The Rev. S. Baring-Gould, in the "Graphic," complies, although with reluctance, to the request of the Editor, to whom he is "under many obligations," to describe the sensation on reading the obituary announcement in the papers of Tuesday of last week. Mr. Baring-Gould says:- "On Friday and Saturday I had been with a friend at Sidmouth, and I had written a postcard to him on my return to inquire whether I had left my shaving tidy and brush in his house. I got a wire from him: 'Condole with you on your death. No shaving tackle here.' Then came a shower of condolences from sympathising friends to my wife. One message was sufficiently curt: 'When and where is the funeral to be?' The following morning came congratulations by wire, and letters 'To the representatives of the late Rev. S. Baring-Gould,' containing cuttings from the papers relative to myself. One made the liberal offer of having a complete set mounted and handsomely bound - I suppose with a death's head and crossbones on the cover - for three guineas. I intended to make a bonfire of the whole lot unread, but instead have packed them in an envelope, sealed, and stowed away with my will. The milliners also sent in their cards and offers to supply widow's weeds. I doubt not that the undertakers would have done the same in their line had not the mistake been rectified in the afternoon papers.

A Book of Ghosts ~ Sabine Baring-Gould

Sabine Baring-Gould (1834 ~ 1924) was a man of numerous talents. He was an Anglican priest, a respected archaeologist, a folklorist, and one of the most prolific writers of both fiction and non-fiction of the Victorian era. There are in excess of twelve hundred publications listed in his bibliography, and his works enjoyed a substantial readership during the second half of the nineteenth century; he was considered one of the top ten novelists of his day. A contemporary provincial newspaper said of him, 'There can hardly have been a moment of Baring-Gould's life which was not in one way or another turning itself into 'copy' of some kind, and occasionally into copy that is destined to a long popularity' (quoted in the Western Gazette, 8th of June 1906, in a premature obituary ~ but that's another story, and one which I'll come back to in a future post). Sadly, the newspaper was wrong. Nowadays most people have never heard of Baring-Gould or his books and articles, and if he is remembered at all it is usually for the hymns that he wrote, especially 'Onward, Christian Soldiers'.

A Book of Ghosts was published by Methuen in October 1904, one month before M. R. James' Ghost Stories of an Antiquary. It sold out almost straight away, and a second edition was put out in the December of the same year, just in time for the usual Christmas rush. The illustrations for the book were produced by the Scottish artist David Murray Smith (three of which I have included below). Extremely popular when it first appeared, A Book of Ghosts has been somewhat neglected ever since; before the appearance of the Ash-Tree Press limited edition in 1996, it had been republished in its entirety only once (in a limited run by Books for Libraries Press, in 1969).

The Spectator reviewed A Book of Ghosts in its issue of the 3rd of December 1904, but it was less than complimentary. It accused Baring-Gould of creating ghosts that were 'easy, familiar, and therefore disgusting'. According to the reviewer, 'Mr. Baring-Gould apparently takes an exceedingly low view of the human soul, and he shows it as concerned after death with the most trivial affairs, and as a slave to its place of burial.' The reviewer did not find the ghosts alarming, and reassured readers that A Book of Ghosts 'may be read even late at night without any unpleasant consequences'. It is true that the ghosts themselves aren't likely to frighten the life out of any modern reader, but some of the tales are quite creepy, and I find it hard to believe that the reverend intended to frighten anyone when writing several of his stories. His spooks are often very human, full of character, and very entertaining. His apparitions are not the malevolent spectres of M. R. James.

For example, in 'McAlister', the narrator, whilst taking a drop of whisky in a French churchyard, is confronted by the ghost of Captain Alister McAlister of Auchimachie, the upper half of whom is perched atop a wall (his legs having been interred in Scotland). The narrator tells us:

'Having somewhat recovered from my astonishment, I was able to take a further look at him, and could not restrain a laugh. He so much resembled Humpty Dumpty, who, as I had learned in childhood, did sit on a wall.'

Being confronted by an apparition in a graveyard doesn't appear to disturb the narrator in the slightest. As is generally the case in Baring-Gould's stories, spooks are quickly accepted as being spooks, they are conversed with as though such a thing is absolutely commonplace, and they rarely seem to incite fear in the narrator of the tale, so it's not surprising that they don't inspire any in the reader. As McAlister explains how his lower half came to be interred in Scotland, the narrator asks if his body was embalmed. McAlister responds:

'Embalmed! no. There was no one in Bayonne who knew how to do it. There was a bird-stuffer in the Rue Pannceau, but he had done nothing larger than a seagull.'

In 'H. P.', an archaeologist finds himself trapped in a cave with the ghost of a man killed eight thousand years earlier. 'H. P.', as the ghost is named by the narrator, 'stands for Homo Praehistoricus, not for House-Parlourmaid or Hardy Perennial'. H. P. objects to having his bones transferred to a museum on the grounds that spirits cannot travel far from their mortal remains and he is no great fan of museums. Being stuck inside one would be an insufferable torture. He prefers the conversation of commercial travellers to scientists, so he wants to remain buried beneath a tavern. The ghost, being determined to point out the unfair advantages afforded a man living in the modern age, proceeds to share details of prehistoric life. His description of the invention of butter is hilarious. On the subject or getting milk from a reindeer, H. P. tells the narrator, 'whenever we desired a fresh draught there was nothing for it but to lie flat on the ground under a doe reindeer and suck for all we were worth.' This is not dialogue intended to chill the reader's blood.

"Who are you?" from 'Colonel Halifax's Ghost Story'.

'Glámr' is a different matter. There'd be nothing to laugh about if you found yourself alone with him after dark. Glámr is actually a character from the Icelandic Grettis saga; a godless Swedish stranger who is killed, becomes undead, then wreaks havoc upon the household who once employed him. Baring-Gould refers to him as a vampire in the story, but he was actually a draugr, an animated corpse capable of swelling to an immense size.

I found 'A Dead Finger' to be very creepy for the most part. A man visiting the National Gallery takes home more than he expects and finds himself the victim of a dead, but very animated, finger. The tale lost its chill when the spectre began to speak, which it did right at the very end, but the descriptions of the finger itself, and what it did to its intended victim, were very chilling.

'The finger was attached to a hand that was curdling into matter and in process of acquiring solidity; attached to the hand was an arm in a very filmy condition, and this arm belonged to a human body in a still more vaporous, immaterial condition. This was being dragged along the floor by the finger, just as a silkworm might pull after it the tangle of its web.'

There are twenty-two tales in total, one of which, 'A Professional Secret', has nothing approaching a ghost in it, and some of the stories are more successful than others. The least successful of the lot is 'The Mother of Pansies', in which a young woman keen to avoid motherhood enlists the services of a witch and destroys her unborn children before they are even conceived. Whilst keeping watch over her husband's dead body, the woman, Anna Arler, is visited throughout the night by the ghosts of children who could have been, not unlike Scrooge's Christmas visitations but without the chance for redemption. There is too much moralising in the tale to make it enjoyable.

Left: "Mammy," said he. "Mammy, my violin cost three shillings and sixpence, and I can't make it play noways," from 'Little Joe Gander'. Right: "I believe that they are talking goody, goody," from 'A Happy Release'.

To my mind, the humorous tales are more successful than those intended to be serious. 'The Merewigs' is very funny. It includes a ghost who rips open his victim's nightclothes in order to hunt for moles, and the dialogue between the narrator and his boating companion is very entertaining. And the first story of the collection, 'Jean Bouchon', is also funny. In it, a long dead waiter makes a nuisance of himself at a Paris café by pilfering all the tips. If I had to choose a favourite, it would be a toss up between 'Jean Bouchon' and 'H. P.', and the caveman's description of prehistoric butter making might just swing it the latter's way.

Fine copies of the first edition of A Book of Ghosts appear to be going for anything between five and seven hundred pounds at the moment (that's about $850-1200). The Ash-Tree Press edition, which is long out of print, sells for £120-150 ($200-255) in fine condition; this includes two stories that were not in the original edition: 'A Dead Man's Teeth', which was published in Monsieur Pichelmere in 1905, and 'The Old Woman of Wesel', which was published in Cornhill magazine in June 1905. There are a few Kindle ebooks that cost up to a couple of pounds, but I haven't road tested them so I don't know if they're any good. There's also Leonaur's The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Sabine Baring-Gould. It doesn't include 'Jean Bouchon', 'The Red-Haired Girl' and 'A Dead Finger', but it adds seven other stories (including Baring-Gould's vampire tale, 'Margery of Quether', which was first published in 1891).