THE TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF VARNEY THE VAMPYRE, AND CONCLUSION.
The manuscript which the clergyman had read with so much interest, here
abruptly terminated. He was left to conclude that Varney after that
had been resuscitated; and he was more perplexed than ever to come to
any opinion concerning the truth of the narration which he had now
concluded.
It was one week after he had finished the perusal of Varney’s papers
that the clergyman read in an English newspaper the following statement.
“We extract from the _Algemeine Zeitung_ the following most curious
story, the accuracy of which of course we cannot vouch for, but still
there is a sufficient air of probability about it to induce us to
present it to our readers.
“Late in the evening, about four days since, a tall and
melancholy-looking stranger arrived, and put up at one of the principal
hotels at Naples. He was a most peculiar looking man, and considered by
the persons of the establishment as about the ugliest guest they had
ever had within the walls of their place.
“In a short time he summoned the landlord, and the following
conversation ensued between him and the strange guest.
“‘I want,’ said the stranger, ‘to see all the curiosities of Naples,
and among the rest Mount Vesuvius. Is there any difficulty?’
“‘None,’ replied the landlord, ‘with a proper guide.’
“A guide was soon secured, who set out with the adventurous Englishman
to make the ascent of the burning mountain.
“They went on then until the guide did not think it quite prudent to go
any further, as there was a great fissure in the side of the mountain,
out of which a stream of lava was slowly issuing and spreading itself
in rather an alarming manner.
“The ugly Englishman, however, pointed to a secure mode of getting
higher still, and they proceeded until they were very near the edge of
the crater itself. The stranger then took his purse from his pocket and
flung it to the guide saying,—
“‘You can keep that for your pains, and for coming into some danger
with me. But the fact was, that I wanted a witness to an act which I
have set my mind upon performing.’
“The guide says that these words were spoken with so much calmness,
that he verily believed the act mentioned as about to be done was some
scientific experiment of which he knew that the English were very fond,
and he replied,—
“‘Sir, I am only too proud to serve so generous and so distinguished a
gentleman. In what way can I be useful?’
“‘You will make what haste you can,’ said the stranger, ‘from the
mountain, inasmuch as it is covered with sulphurous vapours, inimical
to human life, and when you reach the city you will cause to be
published an account of my proceedings, and what I say. You will
say that you accompanied Varney the Vampyre to the crater of Mount
Vesuvius, and that, tired and disgusted with a life of horror, he flung
himself in to prevent the possibility of a reanimation of his remains.’
Before the guide could utter anything but a shriek, Varney took one
tremendous leap, and disappeared into the burning mouth of the mountain.
[Illustration: The death of Varney the Vampyre.]
THE END.
Transcriber’s Notes
• This book was originally published in “penny dreadful” form,
without authorship. It is generally considered to have been
co-written by James Malcolm Rymer and Thomas Preskett Prest.
• The serial “Varney the Vampyre” began publication in 1845 and
was such a success that it ran for two solid years of lurid and
shocking weekly installments. It was published in novel format in
1847, which included the preface, and again in 1853. The cover
shows the front wrapper of the first number from the 1853 parts
edition of Varney, from a photograph discovered in the New York
Public Library.
• The spelling of “Vampyre” is inconsistent. The title page and
page headings use “Vampyre”, the 1853 cover uses “Vampire”, and
both are used in the text (about 965 vampyre, 55 vampire).
• Main scans source is the 1970 Arno Press 3-volume reprint of the
1847 edition, excluding copyrighted additional material. Chapters
136 & 137 were missing, the text was recovered from other
editions.
• The Table of Contents was added by the transcriber, see
additional note there about numbering issues.
• Misnumbered pages were corrected.
• Other variations in spelling, hyphenation, and names were also
retained, such as:
- show/shew
- Henry/Harry Bannerworth
- ferryman/fisherman
• Spelling of foreign language phrases without diacritics, like
tete-a-tete for tête-à-tête, is retained.
• In other words, the text was left as printed as much as possible,
except obvious (to the transcriber) typographical errors have
been silently corrected.
• There are many chapter numbering issues, it was attempted to
keep them in sequence with the printed text and later editions.
Some numbers were skipped, but there seems to be no lapse in the
story from the previous chapter to the next. Many chapters were
misnumbered, these were corrected. Actual chapter count is 232.
• Illustrations were at regular intervals for printing, with page
references. They have been moved to the relevant paragraphs.
Captions are provided by the transcriber; some are adapted from a
different (1853?) printing.
• Internal transcriber’s notes are indicated by {curly braces}.
• Originally posted at PG with just 96 chapters; completely redone,
images improved, and missing material restored in 2026.
• Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
• Text enclosed by pluses is in small caps (+small caps+).
• Text enclosed by equals is in antiqua (=antiqua=).