finds that the finger is crooked so that the jewel may not be withdrawn, whilst that night a phantom claims him as her spouse. With difficulty is he freed from the thrall of the succubus.
In 1845 there was published at the Columbian Press Weston-super-mare, a little book entitled The Last of the Vampires, by Smyth Upton. The chief, some critics might say the only, merit of this tale is its excessive rarity. The narrative is somewhat curiously divided into Epochs, the first of which takes place in 1769, the second in 1777, the third and last in 1780. Chapter I opens in an English village named Frampton, but in Chapter II “we find ourselves upon the borders of Bohemia” in the Castle Von Oberfels. Four chapters of no great length and somewhat disconnected in their sequence comprise the First Epoch. A little later we meet with the mysterious Lord de Montfort, and apparently he has just committed a murder, since he is one of the two men who stand in a dreary outhouse adjoining Montfort Abbey. “Red blood, yet warm, stains their murderous hands, and is seen also in pools upon the floor; the same marks are observable, also, on their clothes.” “The scene is a fearful one; it is one of those of which the mere recital makes the blood run cold,” and the writer wisely does not attempt the task. In the penultimate chapter of this extraordinary production we are introduced to “a certain young German, the Baron Von Oberfels,” who weds Mary Learmont, the elder daughter of “Sir James Learmont, who being a Baronet, was, moreover, a Knight of the Bath and M.P.” Unfortunately the Baron “was one of that horrible class, the Vampires! He had sold his soul to the evil one, for the enjoyment of perpetual youth; being bound, besides, to what are understood to be the penalties of that wretched and accursed race. Every tenth year a female was sacrificed to his infernal master. Mary Learmont was to be the next victim; may she escape the threatened doom.” But apparently, so far as I can gather, she is not so lucky for we are vaguely told: “The Baron and his bride departed on his wedding tour. Her father and mother never hear of her more.” A page or two later there is “a midnight wedding” at the Castle Von Oberfels. Of the bride we are told nothing save that she had a “fair presence.” “The Baron Von Oberfels was there, once more arrayed in the
