by Bram Stoker
3. cairngorm brooches… sporran: A precious stone of a yellow or wine-colour, cairngorm stone was commonly used for brooches, seals and for ornamenting the handles of dirks (a kind of dagger). A sporran is a large purse made of animal skin, usually with the hair left on, that is worn in front of the kilt (or philibeg) by Scottish Highlanders.
4. Royal Stuart dress tartan… Balmoral: The Royal Stewart is the tartan of the British Royal House of Stewart and the personal tartan of Her Majesty the Queen. The Balmoral Estate, situated in Royal Deeside, Aberdeenshire, was purchased by Queen Victoria in 1848 and has been the Scottish home of the British Royal Family ever since.
5. claymore: The two-edged broadsword of the ancient Scottish Highlanders.
6. Girdle Ness lighthouse: Situated at the south entrance to Aberdeen harbour, Girdle Ness lighthouse was designed by Robert Stevenson and built in 1833.
7. Glengarry cap: Invented by Alasdair Ranaldson MacDonell of Glengarry, a Glengarry cap (or bonnet) is a boat-shaped cap without a peak made of thick-milled woollen material with a toorie, or bobble, on top and ribbons hanging down behind.
8. mulls: Snuffboxes.
9. ‘Vanity of vanities… one of these’: Cf. Ecclesiastes (Qoheleth)1:2: ‘Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity’ and Matthew 6:28–9: ‘Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.’
10. döppleganger: Traditionally, seeing one’s double was an omen of ill-luck, ill-health or death. The theme of the doppelgänger was popular in nineteenth-century literature, especially Gothic fiction, examples including James Hogg’s The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner (1824), Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886) and Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890).
THE LAIR OF THE WHITE WORM
DEDICATION
1. Bertha Nicoll: A friend of Bram Stoker’s who first made him aware of the ‘Bisley Boy’ legend attached to Overcourt manor house in Bisley, Gloucestershire. The legend held that the young Queen Elizabeth had died in infancy there, and had been replaced by a male child. The episode formed a section in Stoker’s penultimate book, Famous Impostors (1910).
CHAPTER I
ADAM SALTON ARRIVES
1. the Great Eastern Hotel: Large hotel adjacent to Liverpool Street railway station. Opened in May 1884, the Great Eastern was for many years pre-eminent among London’s elegant railway hotels. It also features in Dracula as Abraham Van Helsing’s hotel of choice when staying in London: ‘Have then rooms for me at the Great Eastern Hotel’ (p. 123).
2. West Australia: James Cook (1728–79) ‘discovered’ Australia in 1770, claiming possession in the name of George III (1738– 1820). On 26 January 1788 the British government assumed control over the eastern half of the country, exploiting its potential as a trading, whaling and penal colony. In the nineteenth century, with a rapidly expanding and diversifying immigrant population, Australia underwent a transition from penal colony to free and self-governing dominion, and finally became a nation in its own right on 1 January 1901.
3. Mercia: After the end of Roman rule in 409, the British Isles became a patchwork of territories founded by both indigenous and immigrant communities and led by chieftains and kings. Mercia emerged as one of the most powerful of these kingdoms, between the sixth and eighth centuries fiercely maintaining its independence and often waging war with other major kingdoms to preserve, or expand, its area of control. At the height of its power Mercia stretched from the River Thames to the borders of Yorkshire and Lancashire, and from the coast of Lincolnshire and the borders of East Anglia to the Welsh border. After a series of strong warrior kings, most notably Offa, who ruled from 757 to his death in 796, Mercian hegemony declined in the ninth century, the kingdom losing much of its territory to its neighbours. It was finally and irrevocably annexed by King Edward the Elder of Wessex (c. 874/7–924) in 919.
4. Stafford: In 913 Stafford was fortified by Queen Æthelflaed (r. 911–18) and became the new capital of Mercia. It was also home to a royal mint for 250 years from 924 to 1189.
5. William IV: William IV of England (1765–1837).
6. ribbons: Reins.
CHAPTER II
THE CASWALLS OF CASTRA REGIS
1. the ‘donkey’ engine: A small steam-engine, usually for subsidiary operations on board ship, for instance feeding the boilers of the propelling engines.
2. Salisbury… Stafford: All of these towns and cities are ancient settlements dating back to Anglo-Saxon, Roman or pre-Roman times. Stoker’s reference to these locations reinforces the sense of Adam Salton’s journey into the heart of ancient Britain.
3. the British Romans: Following Julius Caesar’s reconnaissance expeditions to Britain in 55 and 54 BC, Emperor Claudius (10 BC – AD 54) ordered its forcible invasion in 43 BC. Despite meeting with fierce resistance from British tribes, by AD 47 the Claudian armies occupied Britain as far as the Severn and the Trent and by AD 84 Roman control had extended to the far north of Scotland with garrisons to the edge of the Highlands.
4. all the various nationalities… became Britain: Britain only became so-called after the 1707 Act of Union which created the United Kingdom of Great Britain. The early history of the country is dominated both by foreign invasion (Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Viking and Norman) and the division of the country itself into tribal territories.
5. Salisbury Cathedral: Relocated from its original position in Old Sarum, Salisbury Cathedral was started in 1220 and finally consecrated in 1258. The spire, the tallest in England (123m), was added in the middle of the fourteenth century. Although it escaped relatively unscathed from the religious architectural purging of the Commonwealth, in 1790 permission was granted for the architect James Wyatt (1746–1813) to ‘restore’ the interior of the cathedral. Porches, chapels, screens and stained glass were destroyed and the interior was white-washed. The campanile, which rose almost 61 metres over the north side of the churchyard and housed the original bells which rang at Old Sarum, were also destroyed at this time.
6. The aquiline features… close and curly: Dracula’s face, too, is described as: ‘very strong – aquiline… His eyebrows were massive, almost meeting over the nose, and with bushy hair that seemed to curl in its own profusion’ (Stoker, Dracula, p. 24). Many of Stoker’s stories pay homage to the late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century pseudo-science of physiognomy, pioneered by Johann Caspar Lavater (1741–1801), which held that the true character of an individual could be deduced by the structure of the head and body, and from facial expressions and physical gestures.
7. partly hypnotic, partly mesmeric: Mesmerism was first popularized by Franz Anton Mesmer (1734–1815), who claimed that all animal life was underpinned by a ‘magnetic’ fluid which, in illness, became unbalanced. Mesmer maintained that he could realign a patient’s magnetic field through the influence of his own ‘animal magnetism’. Although mesmerism was discredited by a scientific commission established by Louis XVI of France in 1784, Mesmer’s techniques had great popular appeal and were variously developed by other practitioners in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, ultimately forming the basis of the modern practice of hypnosis, itself first developed by Dr James Braid (1795–1860).
8. in propria persona: ‘In proper person’ (Latin).
CHAPTER III
DIANA’S GROVE
1. the coup d’œil: A comprehensive glance (French).
2. Welsh Marches… Humber to the Wash: The term ‘march’ is derived from the Anglo-Saxon mearc meaning ‘boundary’, the Welsh Marches thus roughly encompassing the area between the Welsh mountains and English river beds that divide the two nations.
3. seriatim: OED: ‘One after the other; one by one in succession’ (Latin).
4. Druidical: Belonging to the Celtic tribes of Gaul and Britain, the Druids, according to Julius Caesar’s
Gallic Wars, were priests and teachers. Their name is synonymous in native Irish and Welsh legend with magician and sorcerer, however. Druidism was suppressed after the Roman conquests of Britain and Gaul, but retained its influence in Ireland until the coming of Christianity.
5. Vilula Misericordiæ: Literally ‘House of Mercy’ (Latin).
6. Queen Bertha… King Penda… St Augustine: Augustine arrived from Rome in Kent in May 597, under the direction of Pope Gregory the Great (c. 540–604), and he and his mission were received hospitably by Kent’s pagan king, Ethelbert, whose Frankish queen, Bertha, was already a Christian. The account of Augustine’s mission suggests that English Christianity began in the year 597, but the English had been exposed to Christianity from more than one direction throughout the sixth century. Kent was the first kingdom to convert in the late 590s/early 600s, East Anglia followed in the early seventh century and Wessex set up a bishopric at Dorchester-on-Thames in 634. The Mercians held out against outright conversion for most of Penda’s reign (633– 53) and it was only under King Wulfhere (r. 658–75) that official sanction was given to Christianity.
7. savage Wales: Welsh military might ensured that the country resisted capitulation to Roman, Anglo-Saxon and Norman invasion. It was only finally conquered in 1282 when Edward I (1272–1307) defeated Llywelyn the Last (c. 1228–82).
8. each fresh wave… the Normans: The traditional dates applied to these various invasions of Britain are: Anglo-Saxons, c. 450; Danes, 865 (with smaller raids on Lindisfarne in 793, Jarrow in 794 and Iona in 795); Normans, 1066. This history of invasion roots the novel in a culture of national conflict, making it a tale of physical and spiritual boundary disruption.
9. Henry I: Henry I of England (1068–1135).
CHAPTER IV
THE LADY ARABELLA MARCH
1. Stone: Located in Staffordshire, about seven miles north of Stafford and seven miles south of Stoke-on-Trent, Stone was the early capital of Mercia before Stafford and then Tamworth.
2. Wulfere… Christianity: Contrary to Stoker’s interpretation, King Wulfhere in reality embraced Christianity and married a Christian Kentish princess, Eormenhild, in about 660. The Mercian king gave every assistance to Christianity, providing much land for the founding of monasteries and seeing to it that they were richly endowed. Wulfhere was also father of a saintly daughter, St Waerburh.
3. My father is Lord Lieutenant of the County: The Lord-lieutenant of a county acted as the chief executive authority and head of the magistracy. First introduced in the sixteenth century, his role was the active defence of the realm, and up until 1871 he had extensive powers with regard to the militia. Although the position is now mainly ceremonial, the position of Lord-lieutenant retains some of its former powers, including the recommendation of persons for appointment as justices of the peace.
4. several black snakes: There are no wholly black snakes indigenous to Britain. Stoker could, however, have been alluding to the black racer or black rat snakes of America, both constrictor snakes, or perhaps the poisonous Australian hooded black snake, Pseudechis, of the cobra family.
5. She was clad… her sinuous figure: In an article entitled ‘Character Note: The New Woman’, published in Cornhill Magazine 23 (1894), the New Woman is depicted thus: ‘She dresses simply in close-fitting garments, technically known as tailor-made. She wears her elbows well away from her side. It has been hinted that this habit serves to diminish the apparent size of her waist… It certainly adds to a somewhat aggressive air of independence which finds its birth in the length of her stride… Her attitudes are strong and independent, indicative of a self-reliant spirit.’
CHAPTER V
HOME-COMING
1. so brutal as to be hardly human: The mid-nineteenth-century theory of polygenism posited the theory that the human races are separate biological species. Non-white races were held to be essentially another – lesser – form of life, closer to the animals, thus ‘justifying’ their inferior status.
2. he treated her… a deity: If Oolanga is a practitioner of Voodoo, then his adoration of Lady Arabella and her snakiness correlates to the voodoo worship of Dan, the great snake. Often depicted as a snake biting its own tail (and also represented in the form of a rainbow circling the earth) who creates a bridge between heaven and earth, Dan is symbolic of unity in the world, and is also responsible for the control of all the activities of the numerous nature gods. The snake is a very important figure and symbol in Voodoo rites and worship, whilst (like Lady Arabella) the Voodoo hounon (priest) traditionally wears white.
3. the local Jamrach: Johann Christian Jamrach (1815–91) was an importer of wild animals for zoos and circuses, and a well-known East End personality. Having moved to England in 1843, Jamrach eventually established his business on the Ratcliffe Highway. Jamrach’s business is also mentioned in Dracula as the place where Bersicker, the grey wolf which escapes from the London Zoological Gardens, was purchased.
4. the coigns of vantage: A position affording facility for observation or action. Cf. William Shakespeare, Macbeth (I, vi, 7–9): ‘No jutty frieze, /Buttress, nor coign of vantage, but this bird/Hath made her pendent bed and procreant cradle.’
5. dacoits in Burmah: Derived from the Hindi word dakait (‘a robber’), dacoits were a class of robbers in India and Burmah who plundered in armed bands. Previously an independent kingdom, Burma (Myanmar) was invaded by the British in 1824–6, 1851– 2 and 1885–6 and became a part of India. It regained independence from Indian administration in 1937, becoming a sovereign state on 4 January 1948.
6. Lilla all fair… her mother’s race: Such physiological contrasts between two characters are a common feature in Stoker’s work. See also Mina Harker and Lucy Westenra in Dracula, and Abel Behenna and Eric Sanson in ‘The Coming of Abel Behenna’.
CHAPTER VI
THE WHITE WORM
1. ‘Advance, Australia!’: ‘Advance Australia Fair’ was composed by Glasgow-born Peter Dodds McCormick (c. 1834–1916), under the pseudonym ‘Amicus’. The first public performance is thought to have been given in Sydney on 30 November 1878. On 19 April 1984 it was proclaimed Australia’s national anthem, to be played at all official and ceremonial occasions. ‘God Save the Queen’ subsequently became the ‘royal anthem’, to be played when the Queen or members of the Royal Family are present.
2. ‘They stumble that run fast’: Cf. William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet (II, iii, 94): ‘Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.’
3. legend of the ‘Worm Well’… near Bamborough: See Appendix II.
4. shikaree: A hunter or sportsman.
5. The condition of things… possibility of survival: Evolution theory’s emotive principle of a ‘struggle for survival’ inspired many writers from Thomas Hardy to H. G. Wells. The premise of large primeval creatures, existing in vast subterranean caves, who challenged the hegemony of Homo sapiens was an enduring concept in fiction, appearing in such works as Charles John Cutcliffe Hyne’s ‘The Lizard’ (1898) and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s ‘The Terror of the Blue John Gap’ (1910) and The Lost World (1912).
CHAPTER VII
HAWK AND PIGEON
1. the Christy Minstrel: Minstrelsy was a form of music that began in the United States in the 1820s. It was often staged by white performers who used cork to make themselves up in blackface, although there were many black groups also. While not, as he claimed, the leader of the first blackface minstrel troupe, Edwin P. Christy (1815–62) indisputably led one of the most renowned. Formed in New York in 1842, Christy’s Minstrels crystallized the pattern of the minstrel show. For over ten years Christy and his troupe had great success all over the United States (including Broadway), most notably performing the works of Stephen Collins Foster (1826–64). E. P. Christy himself eventually retired in 1854 and committed suicide in 1862. Minstrelsy continued as a part of the American music scene until the 1950s.
2. à l’outrance: Literally ‘at outrageousness’ (French); to the bitter end.
&n
bsp; CHAPTER VIII
OOLANGA
1. an Obi-man… a user of Voodoo: Voodoo is a set of religious practices deeply rooted in African culture whose adherents believe that nature and natural forces are animated by divinities and spirits, and that in ecstatic states, such as trance, it is possible to establish direct contact with them. In Jamaica, the faith brought from Africa continues to flourish as Obeah, hence an Obeah man is one that practises the rituals of Voodoo.
CHAPTER IX
SURVIVALS
1. the scheme of a First Cause: Cf. Revelations 22:13: ‘Christ is the First and Last Cause.’
2. ‘the effectual fervent prayer… availeth much’: James 5:16.
3. the dove became… the nunnery: In Christian iconography the dove is a traditional symbol of love and peace. A dove was supposed to have been released by Noah after the flood in order to find land, returning with an olive branch. A dove also symbolizes the Holy Spirit in reference to Matthew 3:16 and Luke 3:22 where the Holy Spirit appears as a dove at the Baptism of Jesus.
4. Penda: Penda, pagan king of Mercia (r. 626–55), consolidated and enlarged the Kingdom of Mercia. His military achievements ensured the emergence of Mercia as one of the most important kingdoms of the Anglo-Saxon era.
5. King Offa… restored Christianity: Although supporting Christianity, Offa actually sought to control it in England by maintaining effective political control over the Kingdom of Kent, and so over the Archbishop of Canterbury.
CHAPTER XI
THE FIRST ENCOUNTER
1. a comparative anatomist: Comparative anatomy is the study of similarities and differences in organisms.
2. a new Berserker fury: see Dracula’s Guest and Other Weird Stories, ‘The Coming of Abel Behenna’, note 8.
CHAPTER XII
THE KITE
