A virtuous young lady loves a landscape painter, her childhood playmate.
For Hunt, see Novel 039; above is a painting by her husband, who was, like the novel’s hero, a landscape painter.
It combines “shrewd observation with an excellent style of simple English.” Athenaeum, December 18, 1880
“In these days of the multiplication of words and darkening of knowledge, the reviewer is generally thankful and grateful for signs of excellence in any one branch of novel-writing—for a well-conceived plot, for clever condensations, for life-like characters. What must be his feelings, therefore, towards a writer who excels in a high degree in each of these branches, and gives us a book containing characters which become as real to us as Mr. Elton and Mr. Collins have done, and fragments of conversation and description which will for ever be interwoven with the subjects of which they treat.” Academy, January 8, 1881
A contrasting view:
“The reviewer . . . has found the ‘Casket’ so unusually leaden he can do little more than raise the lid and clap it to again.” New York Times, March 13, 1881
Download this fortnight’s novel:
v.1 https://archive.org/details/leadencasketnove01hunt