Lord Dunsany - Complete Works of Lord Dunsany

The Complete Works of

LORD DUNSANY

(1878-1957)

Contents

Delphi Classics 2017

Version 1

The Complete Works of

LORD DUNSANY

By Delphi Classics, 2017

Complete Works of Lord Dunsany

First published in the United Kingdom in 2017 by Delphi Classics.

Delphi Classics, 2017.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which it is published.

ISBN: 978 1 78656 084 1

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Park Square, London, near Regents Park Dunsanys birthplace

Although born in London, Edward John Morton Drax Plunkett, later eighteenth Baron Dunsany, was raised at his mothers house, Dunstall Priory near the village of Shoreham in Kent.

OR, THE CHRONICLES OF RODRIGUEZ

Lord Dunsanys first novel was published in 1922. Although issued simultaneously in Britain and America, the novel had different titles in each market in Britain, it was issued as The Chronicles of Rodriguez , while in America is was entitled Don Rodriguez: Chronicles of Shadow Valley .

It is an adventure story, as well as a coming of age narrative, set in the mythical golden age of Spain (in a preface, the author professes to being unable to give the reader the exact date of the setting). In the picaresque tradition of Cervantes masterpiece Don Quixote , the story relates, in a series of separate chronicles, the adventures of the title character as he attempts to find a place in the world, having been excluded from the inheritance of the family castle.

Title page of the first American edition

Title page of the British first edition

Frontispiece of the British first edition

HOW HE MET AND SAID FAREWELL TO MINE HOST OF THE DRAGON AND KNIGHT

Being convinced that his end was nearly come, and having lived long on earth (and all those years in Spain, in the golden time), the Lord of the Valleys of Arguento Harez, whose heights see not Valladolid, called for his eldest son. And so he addressed him when he was come to his chamber, dim with its strange red hangings and august with the splendour of Spain: O eldest son of mine, your younger brother being dull and clever, on whom those traits that women love have not been bestowed by God; and know my eldest son that here on earth, and for ought I know Hereafter, but certainly here on earth, these women be the arbiters of all things; and how this be so God knoweth only, for they are vain and variable, yet it is surely so: your younger brother then not having been given those ways that women prize, and God knows why they prize them for they are vain ways that I have in my mind and that won me the Valleys of Arguento Harez, from whose heights Angelico swore he saw Valladolid once, and that won me moreover also ... but that is long ago and is all gone now ... ah well, well ... what was I saying? And being reminded of his discourse, the old lord continued, saying, For himself he will win nothing, and therefore I will leave him these my valleys, for not unlikely it was for some sin of mine that his spirit was visited with dullness, as Holy Writ sets forth, the sins of the fathers being visited on the children; and thus I make him amends. But to you I leave my long, most flexible, ancient Castilian blade, which infidels dreaded if old songs be true. Merry and lithe it is, and its true temper singeth when it meets another blade as two friends sing when met after many years. It is most subtle, nimble and exultant; and what it will not win for you in the wars, that shall be won for you by your mandolin, for you have a way with it that goes well with the old airs of Spain. And choose, my son, rather a moonlight night when you sing under those curved balconies that I knew, ah me, so well; for there is much advantage in the moon. In the first place maidens see in the light of the moon, especially in the Spring, more romance than you might credit, for it adds for them a mystery to the darkness which the night has not when it is merely black. And if any statue should gleam on the grass near by, or if the magnolia be in blossom, or even the nightingale singing, or if anything be beautiful in the night, in any of these things also there is advantage; for a maiden will attribute to her lover all manner of things that are not his at all, but are only outpourings from the hand of God. There is this advantage also in the moon, that, if interrupters come, the moonlight is better suited to the play of a blade than the mere darkness of night; indeed but the merry play of my sword in the moonlight was often a joy to see, it so flashed, so danced, so sparkled. In the moonlight also one makes no unworthy stroke, but hath scope for those fair passes that Sevastiani taught, which were long ago the wonder of Madrid.