A needy aristocrat enters into various fraudulent schemes.
In addition to writing novels, Frederick Wicks (1840-1910) owned the Glasgow Daily News and invented a printing machine. Here he involves a number of Dickensian caricatures in an unconventional plot concerned mainly with financial chicanery. The illustrations, by Romanian artist Jean de Paleologue, are excellent.
“The plot of it is ingenious and engaging; the characters and the incidents are well under control; the writing . . . is almost brilliant. Many of the chapters are humorous . . . the pages sparkle with epigrams.” National Review, November, 1892
“There is a completeness and rotundity in the delineation of the characters which gives them the air of being types of humanity . . . though . . . their dramatic individuality is not sacrificed. . . . It would be difficult to praise the style too highly.” Athenaeum, December 17, 1892
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