RARE. ESTCm locates only 3 copies. Although the plot takes on all the hues of melodrama in volume II, this short novel possesses plenty of vitality, and while dealing with the usual upper class vices of gaming and duelling, one of its concerns is to examine the difficult legal and emotional circumstances surrounding illegitimacy. The hero, Forester, is an illegitimate child who having lost a benevolent and loving mother is allowed no communication at all with his remote, aristocratic father. But the most memorable character in this story of blighted romance is the beautiful but depraved Emily Burgiss, woman "as she ought not to be," who, though responsible for the hero's death, shows a strength of character and contempt for male adoration which makes her an interesting precursor of Thackeray's Becky Sharp.