The Light of Scarthey: A Romance

E-text prepared by Audrey Longhurst, Karen Dalrymple, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)
Take whichsoever way thou wilt—the ways are all alike; But do thou only come—I bade my threshold wait thy coming. From out my window one can see the graves, and on my life The graves keep watch. Luteplayer's Song.
New York Frederick A. Stokes Company MCM
Copyright, 1899, By Frederick A. Stokes Company. All rights reserved.
FOURTH EDITION.
I Dedicate THIS BOOK TO THE MEMORY OF FREDERICK ANDREWS LARKING OF THE ROCKS, EAST MALLING, KENT THAT, SO LONG AS ANYTHING OF MINE SHALL ENDURE, THERE MAY ENDURE ALSO A RECORD OF OUR FRIENDSHIP AND OF MY SORROW

Among the works of every writer of Fiction there are generally one or two that owe their being to some haunting thought, long communed with—a thought which has at last found a living shape in some story of deed and passion.
I say one or two advisedly: for the span of man's active life is short and such haunting fancies are, of their essence, solitary. As a matter of fact, indeed, the majority of a novelist's creations belong to another class, must of necessity (if he be a prolific creator) find their conception in more sudden impulses. The great family of the children of his brain must be born of inspirations ever new, and in alluring freshness go forth into the world surrounded by the atmosphere of their author's present mood, decked in the colours of his latest imaginings, strengthened by his latest passional impressions and philosophical conclusions.
In the latter category the lack of long intimate acquaintance between the author and the friends or foes he depicts, is amply compensated for by the enthusiasm appertaining to new discoveries, as each character reveals itself, often in quite unforeseen manner, and the consequences of each event shape themselves inevitably and sometimes indeed almost against his will.
Although dissimilar in their genesis, both kinds of stories can, in the telling, be equally life-like and equally alluring to the reader. But what of the writer? Among his literary family is there not one nearer his heart than all the rest—his dream-child? It may be the stoutest of the breed or it may be the weakling; it may be the first-born, it often is the Benjamin. Fathers in the flesh know this secret tenderness. Many a child and many a book is brooded over with a special love even before its birth.—Loved thus, for no grace or merit of its own, this book is my dream-child.