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The Keepers of the People
A Critical Edition of the 1898 Novel
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English Edition · Branch 81 of 254
Chapter VIII · An Offer of a Crown · pp. 77–86
The Keepers of the People
p. 85“And you are tired of her? Well, one always tires of a woman,” said Ralph Falcon.
“I somehow think it would have been different if we had had a child. I fancy we should have kept fonder of one another, don’t you know?” said Lord Lisdor.
“It is likely; but I am not so sure of it,” said Ralph Falcon.
On his way to bed Lord Lisdor knocked at the door of Lady Lisdor’s room, and entered in obedience to her “You may come in, George.”
She was lying back in an easy chair, very listless, an open book beside her. Her hair fell about her in a cloud, and her feet, very white, and very beautifully shaped, peeped from under her dressing-gown.
“Am I interrupting you?” he said.
“No,” she said dreamily. “You may talk to me.”
“I came to tell you that Agnes Freshington has promised to marry Ralph,” he said, sitting down on a facing chair.
“Yes; it is a pity,” she said.
“Well, I don’t see the makings of much domestic happiness myself,” he said; “yet the girl’s in love with him.”
“A fancy,” said Lady Lisdor: “she’s too much in love with herself for it to last.”
“That’s so; but he is not in love with her.”
“Why should he be?” said Lady Lisdor.
“That’s exactly what he would say himself,” said Lord Lisdor.
“Oh, she is not the right kind of woman for him at all! She’s not a nice girl, you know, George!”
“She isn’t; but she’s very smart,” said Lord Lisdor.
“She could never make him happy,” said Lady Lisdor.
“And she herself?” he said.
“Oh, it will be all her own fault. She will interfere; and men like to be left alone. Ralph above all,” said Lady Lisdor.
“You’ve sized him up pretty correctly,” said Lord Lisdor.
“After all she’s only a new-fangled kind of fool,” said Lady Lisdor.
They were silent awhile, both thoughtful. At last he said, “Well, it certainly partakes of the nature of the distinctly rum. Good-night, child, and do not spoil your pretty eyes reading too much.”
Lady Lisdor lay thinking for a long while, in an angry mood, at loggerheads with Fortune. Then, when she tried to sleep, sleep would not for a long while come; and in the end she fell into a dreamland full of trouble.
Socrates
Reading The Keepers of the People · Book I, Chapter VIII · An Offer of a Crown · Book I, Chapter VIII · An Offer of a Crown · pp. 77–86
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.