iven to
the world, including a verse romance in eight cantos, "St. Alban's
Abbey," and the verses scattered through her novels. By this time Scott
and Coleridge were dead; Byron, Shelley, and Keats had been dead for
years, and Mrs. Radcliffe's poesies fell upon the unheeding ears of a new
generation. A sneer in "Waverley" (1814) at the "Mysteries of Udolpho"
had hurt her feelings;[28] but Scott made amends in the handsome things
which he said of her in his "Lives of the Novelists." It is interesting
to note that when the "Mysteries" was issued, the venerable Joseph Warton
was so much entranced that he sat up the greater part of the night to
finish it.

The warfare between realism and romance, which went on in the days of
Cervantes, as it does in the days of Zola and Howells, had its skirmished
also in Mrs. Radcliffe's time. Jane Austen's "Northanger Abbey," written
in 1803 but published only in 1817, is gently satirical of Gothic
fiction. The heroine is devoted to the "Mysteries of Udolpho," which she
discusses with her bosom friend. "While I have 'Udolpho' to read, I feel
as if nobody could make me miserable. O the dreadful black veil! My
dear Isabella, I am sure there must be Laurentina's skeleton behind it."

"When you have finished 'Udolpho,'" replies Isabella, "we will read 'The
Italian' together; and I have made out a list of ten or twelve more of
the same kind for you. . . I will read you their names directly. Here
they are in my pocket-book. 'Castle of Wolfenbach,' 'Clermont,'
'Mysterious Warnings,' 'Necromancer of the Black Forest,' 'Midnight
Bell,' 'Orphan of the Rhine,' and 'Horrid Mysteries.'"

When introduced to her friend's brother, Miss Morland asks him at once,
"Have you ever read 'Udolpho,' Mr. Thorpe?" But Mr. Thorpe, who is not a
literary man, but much given to dogs and horses, assures her that he
never reads novels; they are "full of nonsense and stuff; there has not
been a tolerably decent one come out since 'Tom Jones,' except the
'Monk.'" The scenery about Bath reminds Miss Morland of the south of
France and "the country that Emily and her father traveled through in the
'Mysteries of Udolpho.'" She is enchanted at the prospect of a drive to
Blaize Castle, where she hopes to have "the happiness of being stopped in
their way along narrow, winding vaults by a low, grated door; or even of
having their lamp--their only lamp--extinguished by a sudden gust of wind
and of being left in tot