Clara
and Perdita are faintly etched, but Evadne, the Greek artist, who
cherishes a passion for Raymond, and dies fighting against the
Turks, has more colour and body than the other women, though she
is somewhat theatrical. Mrs. Shelley conveys emotion more
faithfully than character, and the overwrought sensibilities and
dark forebodings of the diminished party of survivors who leave
England to distract their minds by foreign travel are artfully
suggested. The leaping, gesticulating figure, whom their jaded
nerves and morbid fancy transform into a phantom, is a delirious
ballet-dancer; and the Black Spectre, mistaken for Death
Incarnate, proves only to be a plague-stricken noble, who lurks
near the party for the sake of human society. These "reasonable"
solutions of the apparently supernatural remind us of Mrs.
Radcliffe's method, and Mrs. Shelley shows keen psychological
insight in her delineation of the state of mind which readily
conjures up imaginary terrors. When Lionel Verney is left alone
in the universe, her power seems to flag, and instead of the
final crescendo of horror, which we expect at the end of the
book, we are left with an ineffective picture of the last man in
Rome in 2005 deciding to explore the countries he has not yet
viewed. As he wanders amid the ruins he recalls not only "the
buried Caesars," but also the monk in _The Italian_, of whom he
had read in childhood--a striking proof of Mrs. Shelley's faith
in the permanence of Mrs. Radcliffe's fame.

Though the style of _The Last Man_ is often tediously prolix and
is disfigured by patches of florid rhetoric and by inappropriate
similes scattered broadcast, occasional passages of wonderful
beauty recall Shelley's imagery; and, in conveying the pathos of
loneliness, personal feeling lends nobility and eloquence to her
style. With so ambitious a subject, it was natural that she
should only partially succeed in carrying her readers with her.
Though there are oases, the story is a somewhat tedious and
dreary stretch of narrative that can only be traversed with
considerable effort.

Mrs. Shelley's later works--_Perkin Warbeck_ (1830), a historical
novel; _Lodore_ (1835), which describes the early life of Shelley
and Harriet; _Falkner_ (1837), which was influenced by _Caleb
Williams_--do not belong to the history of the novel of terror;
but some of her short tales, contributed to periodicals and
collected in 1891, have gruesome and supernatural themes