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Passage Illustrated

"Though I now inspire you with terror and aversion," pursued Herne, "the time​will come when you will love me as passionately as I was beloved by one of whom you are the image."

And she is dead? "asked Mabel, with curiosity.

"Dead!" exclaimed Herne. "Thrice fifty years have flown since she dwelt​ ​ upon earth. The acorn which was shed in the forest has grown into a lusty oak, while trees at that time in their pride have fallen and decayed away. Dead! — yes, she has passed from all memory save mine, where she will ever dwell. Generations of men have gone down to the grave since her time — a succession of kings have lodged within the castle but I am still a denizen of the forest. For crimes I then committed I am doomed to wander within it, and I shall haunt it, unless released, till the crack of doom."​ [Chapter III, "In what manner Herne declared his Passion for Mabel,"​ page 263]

Commentary

Since the wood-engraving appears well into the novel, in both serial and volume form after the non-fiction antiquarian section on the history of Windsor Castle, Delamotte in all likelihood made the sketch for it in the summer of 1842, but probably had no inkling as to how Ainsworth would use it nine months later. Thus, it is not technically an "illustration" since it is unlikely that Delamotte had read what would turn out to be the accompanying text when he visited the castle. The sandstone cave in Windsor Forest was not a locale that Delamotte had visited and sketched in the summer of 1842 — if, indeed, such a place ever existed except in the realms of melodrama as Ainsworth's version of the robbers' hideout. The tower which Delamotte describes has little relevance to Herne's impassioned declaration his romantic interest to Mabel Lyndwood, who apparently resembles the young woman with whom he was in love when he was a mere mortal in the reign of King Richard the Second. Herne now tries to use Sir Thomas Wyat's life as a bargaining chip with the understandably reluctant reluctant Mabel.

Other Views and Related Material on Windsor Castle

• Windsor Castle from the Long Walk, Victorian additions and alterations by Sir Jeffry Wyattville
• Early twentieth-century view of the castle from the river
• The Frogmore Mausoleum, adjacent to the Long Walk
• Statue of Queen Victoria at the foot of Castle Hill, Windsor

References

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.

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.

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

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Last modified 1 January 2017