Diotimos Library · Literary Fiction Collection · English Edition
The Keepers of the People
A Critical Edition of the 1898 Novel
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English Edition · Branch 33 of 254
Chapter I · Ralph Falcon Comes to Quivern Court · pp. 3–17
The Keepers of the People
p. 4Even as he admired, the child saw him; and her eyes opened wider in a look of pleasant, wondering recognition. She turned them on the reading girl and said, with a faint mischief in her tone, “Ruth, dear, the Fairy Prince is here, and — and — your ankles.”
The feet flashed under the skirt; the lady looked swiftly round, saw Ralph Falcon, sprang to her feet, and faced him with a fine flush in her cheeks, with quivering nostrils and flashing eyes — a very presentment of the statue behind her awakened to life and wrath.
“You are trespassing, sir!” she cried haughtily.
“Madam, a thousand pardons,” said Ralph Falcon gravely, with a bow so stiff as seemed almost to show him averse from the exercise. “I am seeking Lord Lisdor, and Quivern Court. I am Ralph Falcon.”
He spoke with an accent that showed him used to a softer tongue.
“Yes,” broke in the child, in a gentle, drawling voice. “You are Sir Ralph Falcon, the pirate, from the picture-gallery, our far-off cousin. I knew you at once, but your hair is black.”
Ralph Falcon’s inscrutable eyes turned to the child, and the set gravity of his face relaxed to the shadow of a smile.
“My grandfather,” he said.
“I am Lady Lisdor,” said the lady coldly. She was no more than a girl; but her face had softened as she gazed on the bigness of the stranger and his handsome face.
He bowed again, his stiff, unaccustomed bow; and there was a pause. “Perhaps,” said the child, “if we were to take Mr. Falcon to find George, it might seem — polite.”
Lady Lisdor flashed a chiding look at her, and said less coldly, “Will you let us be your guides, Mr. Falcon?”
“Thank you,” said Ralph Falcon; and stepped aside to let them pass down the path before him.
The child rose languidly, and led the way; Lady Lisdor followed on her heels, and at a turn in the path said in a very low voice, but not too low for his hearing, “You are the most detestable child in the world!”
The child turned her face, lighted by the most winning of smiles, and said in a whisper, “Oh, they’re awfully pretty ankles, don’t you know? you needn’t be distressed — besides, I do love pulling your leg.”
“Hateful little wretch!” said Lady Lisdor; and the child smiled again.
Socrates
Reading The Keepers of the People · Book I, Chapter I · Ralph Falcon Comes to Quivern Court · Book I, Chapter I · Ralph Falcon Comes to Quivern Court · pp. 3–17
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Edgar Jepson’s The Keepers of the People begins as a late-Victorian lost-kingdom romance and becomes an unsettling political argument. Ralph Falcon moves from an English country house to the hidden state of Varandaleel, where laughter, secrecy, violence, education, and the duties of rulers are tested against one another.
Historical Text
The novel was first published in London in 1898 by C. Arthur Pearson. This reading text follows the owner-supplied critical edition, whose copy-text is the Methuen Colonial Library issue of the same year digitised by the Internet Archive. The supplied editorial note records the edition’s corrections, normalisations, limits, and unresolved textual risks.
About This Edition
This English Edition preserves the complete supplied text and apparatus: the introduction, reading guide, key words, plot outline, editorial note, both books and all thirty chapters, and the end notes. Its reader branches end at paragraph boundaries, with the original chapter structure and chapter page references mapped to the 1898 printing.
Rights
Edgar Jepson’s 1898 novel is in the public domain. The introduction, reader’s guide, key words, outline, editorial note, notes, editorial arrangement, and design of the supplied edition are © 2026 Diotimos Editions.