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A derisive laugh broke from Herne.

"Peace, mocking fiend!" cried Surrey furiously.

"I laugh to think how you are deceived," said Herne. "Would you behold your mistress now? — would you see how she conducts herself during your absence?"

"If you choose to try me, I will not oppose the attempt," replied Surrey; "but it will be futile."

"Remove the relic from your person," rejoined Herne. "Place it upon the table, within your grasp, and you shall see her."

Surrey hesitated; but he was not proof against the low mocking laugh of the demon.

"No harm can result from it," he cried at length, detaching the relic from his neck, and laying it on the table.

"Extinguish the light!" cried Herne, in a commanding voice.

Surrey instantly sprang to his feet, and dashed the lamp off the table. "Behold!" cried the demon.

And instantly a vision, representing the form and lineaments of the Fair Geraldine to the life, shone forth against the opposite wall of the chamber. At the feet of the visionary damsel knelt a shape resembling the Duke of Richmond. He was pressing the hand extended to him by the Fair Geraldine to his lips, and a smile of triumph irradiated his features.

"Such is man's friendship — such woman's constancy!" cried Herne. "Are you now satisfied?"

"I am, that you have deceived me, false spirit!" cried the earl. "I would not believe the Fair Geraldine inconstant, though all hell told me so."

A terrible laugh broke from the demon, and the vision faded away. All became perfect darkness, and for a few moments the earl remained silent. He then called to the demon, but receiving no answer, put forth his hand towards the spot where he had stood. He was gone.

Confounded, Surrey returned to the table, and searched for the relic, but, with a feeling of indescribable anguish and self-reproach, found that it had likewise disappeared. [Book Two, "Herne the Hunter," Chapter IV, "How Herne the Hunter showed the Earl of Surrey the Fair Geraldine in a Vision," p. 105, facing the illustration]

Commentary

Richmond and Geraldine have left Windsor separately in the past few days; Although the incarcerated Earl of Surrey believes that she has been sent to Greenwich Palace, he is unsure of the whereabouts of his friend. Subconsciously he must have concerns about her fidelity and his friend's reliability, but he has suppressed these doubts and concentrated on translating the Aeneid of Virgil. At midnight, the demonic Herne the Hunter appears in Surrey's room in the Norman Tower to tempt him to lose his faith in both his friend and his lover.

In Book One, Chapter VI, the Fair Geraldine had bestowed upon Surrey a powerful relic in order to protect him from evil:

"Your grace is highly flattering," she said. "But, with all faith in beauty and purity, I should place most reliance in a relic I possess — the virtue of which has often been approved against evil spirits. It was given by a monk — who had been sorely tempted by a demon, and who owed his deliverance to it​—​to my ancestor, Luigi Geraldi of Florence; and from him it descended to me."

​

"Would I had an opportunity of proving its efficacy!" exclaimed the Earl of Surrey.

"You shall prove it, if you choose," rejoined the Fair Geraldine. "I will give you the relic on condition that you never part with it to friend or foe.​[Book One, "Anne Boleyn," Chapter VI, "How the Fair Geraldine bestowed a relic upon her lover. . . ," p. 50]​

Now in the text facing the Cruikshank illustration, Surrey breaks his word in order to see Herne's proffered vision of the Fair Geraldine that the tempter has promised — providing that Surrey remove the relic from around his neck.

In the dark plate, Cruikshank minimizes Herne's antlers by giving him, as Ainsworth has suggested, "a tall, conical black cap" (104). Although we cannot assess the expression on Surrey's face, turned away from us, Herne's triumphant gesture towards the projected scene suggests that it is having a powerful effect on the young aristocrat. On the table is a book, presumably his Latin text for which he has been preparing a translation. The figures of the kneeling Duke of Richmond and the Fair Geraldine glow in the centre of the composition, flanked by two dimly lit windows (which should, of course, admit no light since the hour is past midnight). The relic that she has entrusted to her lover is apparently on the floor between Herne and Surrey. The reader actually encounters the mysterious scene before reading Herne's offer to show Surrey his mistress "now" (105), by which the demon implies that at this moment Richmond is wooing Geraldine at Greenwich.

References

Ainsworth, William Harrison. "Preface" to Rookwood. A Romance. With 12 illustrations by George Cruikshank. London: George Routledge, 1882. Pp. xxxiii-xxxviii.

Ainsworth, William Harrison. Windsor Castle. An Historical Romance. Illustrated by George Cruikshank and Tony Johannot. With designs on wood by W. Alfred Delamotte. London: Routledge, 1880. Based on the Henry Colburn edition of 1844.

Chesson, Wilfred Hugh. George Cruikshank. The Popular Library of Art. London: Duckworth, 1908.

Jerrold, Blanchard. The Life of George Cruikshank. In Two Epochs. Illustrated by George Cruikshank. 2 vols. London: Chatto and Windus, 1882.

Johnson, E. D. H. "The George Cruikshank Collection at Princeton." George Cruikshank: A Revaluation. Ed. Robert L. Patten. Princeton, NJ: Princeton U. P., 1974, rpt. 1992. Pp. 1-34.

Patten, Robert L. Chapter 30, "The 'Hoc' Goes Down." George Cruikshank's Life, Times, and Art, vol. 2: 1835-1878. Rutgers, NJ: Rutgers U. P., 1991; London: The Lutterworth Press, 1996. Pp. 153-186.

Vann, J. Don. "Windsor Castle in Ainsworth's Magazine, June 1842-June 1843." Victorian Novels in Serial. New York: MLA, 1985. P. 23.

Worth, George J. William Harrison Ainsworth. New York: Twayne, 1972.

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