The Planter’s Daughter and the Rector’s Son; or, Scenes at Richmond in which is Portrayed, A Gambler’s Fate. An Interesting Domestic Tale. [London, Cloth Fair]: Orlando Hodgson, ca. 1832.
(190 x 120 mm) pp. 24. Simple stitched booklet. Staining to the two outermost wrapping bifolia. Overall GOOD condition.
This short tale is intended to be “a warning to the idle, the dissolute, and the profligate.” A typically 19th century moralising story, the overwrought high-drama serves to emphasise how one immoral life will ruin all around it. Young Barbara’s father is killed in a tragic commemoration of her birthday and her mother’s death day. Zamoa, an enslaved person whom Barbara’s father has taken from a cruel master, becomes her custodian, and brings her to England, and more tragedy ensues as she becomes involved with two gentlemen— betrothed to one— and gambling brings down the family. Zamoa ultimately returns to his undisclosed native land, his mind "stamped with a never-fading melancholia." Yikes.