David Alfred Bywaters's Crossword Cavalcade & Fortnightly Victorian Novel Recommender. Every Saturday! Either a new language-torturing puzzle or an old novel by an unjustly neglected Victorian author. Why waste time on other amusements?

Novel 348: Eleanor Frances Poynter, The Failure of Elisabeth (1890)

David Roberts, Kurfürstliche Burg, Eltville, on the Rhine, Germany
David Roberts, Kurfürstliche Burg, Eltville, on the Rhine, Germany

An innocent young lady falls in love with a stingy old clergyman.

For Poynter, see Novels 145 and 195.

“A little too long” but “a pleasing, wholesome story” with “carefully drawn distinctive characters.” Athenaeum, May 10, 1890

“The characters . . . are carefully drawn” and the “style . . . is at once strong, flowing, and lucid.” Academy, June 7, 1890

“The story contains some very lifelike and entertaining sketches of the manners and customs of British subjects habitually resident in foreign boarding-houses.” Saturday Review, June 21, 1890

Download this fortnight’s novel:

v.1 https://books.google.com/books?id=2Z9UAAAAYAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&dq=poynter%20failure%20of%20elisabeth&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false

v.2 https://books.google.com/books?id=9MpUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false

v.3 https://books.google.com/books?id=FaNUAAAAYAAJ&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&dq=The_Failure_of_Elisabeth&pg=PP5#v=onepage&q&f=false