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"The Nurse came quickly around the corner of the wall, holding Lady Glyde by the arm."
John McLenan
26 May 1860
11.8 cm high by 8.8 cm wide (4 ½ by 3 ½ inches), vignetted, p. 325; p. 177 in the 1861 volume.
Twenty-sixth regular illustration for Collins's The Woman in White: A Novel (1860).
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
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"The Nurse came quickly around the corner of the wall, holding Lady Glyde by the arm." — staff artist John McLenan's twenty-seventh composite woodblock engraving for Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White: A Novel, Instalment 27, published on 26 May 1860 in Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization, Vol. IV, "The Second Epoch; "The Narrative of Walter Hartright, Resumed. II," p. 325; p. 177 in the 1861 volume. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
It was hastily agreed between them that Miss Halcombe should return early the next morning and wait out of sight among the trees — always, however, keeping near the quiet spot of ground under the north wall. The nurse could fix no time for her appearance, caution requiring that she should wait and be guided by circumstances. On that understanding they separated.
Miss Halcombe was at her place, with the promised letter and the promised bank-notes, before ten the next morning. She waited more than an hour and a half. At the end of that time the nurse came quickly round the corner of the wall holding Lady Glyde by the arm. The moment they met Miss Halcombe put the bank-notes and the letter into her hand, and the sisters were united again.
The nurse had dressed Lady Glyde, with excellent forethought, in a bonnet, veil, and shawl of her own. Miss Halcombe only detained her to suggest a means of turning the pursuit in a false direction, when the escape was discovered at the Asylum. She was to go back to the house, to mention in the hearing of the other nurses that Anne Catherick had been inquiring latterly about the distance from London to Hampshire, to wait till the last moment, before discovery was inevitable, and then to give the alarm that Anne was missing. The supposed inquiries about Hampshire, when communicated to the owner of the Asylum, would lead him to imagine that his patient had returned to Blackwater Park, under the influence of the delusion which made her persist in asserting herself to be Lady Glyde, and the first pursuit would, in all probability, be turned in that direction. [Part 27: "Hartright's Narrative. II," p. 325; p. 176 in the 1861 volume.]
Collins, Wilkie. The Woman in White: A Novel. New York: Harper & Bros., 1861 (first printing, 15 August 1860; reissued in single-column format in 1902, 548 pages).
Collins, Wilkie. The Woman in White: A Novel. Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization. Illustrated by John McLenan. Vols. III-IV (26 November 1859 through 8 September 1860).
Collins, Wilkie. The Woman in White. Ed. Maria K. Bachman and Don Richard Cox. Illustrated by Sir John Gilbert and F. A. Fraser. Toronto: Broadview, 2006.
Peters, Catherine. "Chapter Twelve: The Woman in White (1859-1860)." The King of the Inventors: A Life of Wilkie Collins. London: Minerva Press, 1992. 205-25.
Vann, J. Don. "The Woman in White in All the Year Round, 26 November 1859 — 25 August 1860." Victorian Novels in Serial. New York: MLA, 1985. Pp. 44-46.
Created 20 July 2024