"Come," said Richard, "we will to the pavilion, and lead our conqueror thither in triumph."
The victor entered and knelt gracefully down before the queen, though more than half the homage was silently rendered to Edith.
"Unarm him, my mistresses," said the king. "Let Beauty honour Chivalry. Undo his spurs, Berengaria. Unlace his helmet, Edith--by this hand, thou shalt. Here terminate his various disguises. The adventurous Knight Kenneth, arises David, Earl of Huntington, Prince Royal of Scotland."
The next day saw Richard return to his own camp, and in a short space afterwards the young Earl of Huntington was espoused by Edith Plantagenet.
The Soldan sent, as a nuptial present on this occasion, the celebrated talisman; but, though many cures were wrought with it in Europe, none equalled in success and celebrity those which the Soldan achieved.
MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT SHELLEY
Frankenstein
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, the daughter of William Godwin (see Vol. IV) and Mary Wollstonecraft, was born in London, August 30, 1797, and married to the poet Shelley in 1816, on the death of his first wife Harriet. Two years previous to this she had eloped with Shelley (see Vol. XVIII) to Switzerland, and they lived together in Italy till his death in 1823, when Mrs. Shelley returned to England, and continued her literary work. "Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus," the first of Mary Shelley's books, was published in 1818, and owed its origin to the summer spent by the Shelleys on the shores of Geneva when Byron was their neighbour. It was "a wet, ungenial summer," according to the account Mary Shelley has left. "Some volumes of ghost stories, translated from the German into French, fell into our hands." Then one evening Byron said, "we will each write a ghost story," and the proposition was agreed to, and Mary Shelley's contribution was developed till at length "Frankenstein" was written. The story is at once a remarkable and impressive performance. The influence of Mrs. Shelley's father is apparent throughout, but probably the authoress was most influenced by the old German tales of the supernatural. The theme of a mortal creating, by the aid of natural science, a being in the shape of man, was at the time a bold and daring innovation in English literature. Mrs. Shelley died February 21, 1851.