Chavenage: A Tale on the Cotswolds

James Burns, London,1845. Hardcover. First edition, first impression.8vo (21cm by 14cm), 158pp. Engraved frontispiece. Attractively rebound in half brown calf, marbled boards. Raised gilt bands and gilt lettered maroon and dark green labels to spine. New endpapers. Pages uncut. Previous owner s bookplate to front pastedown. Some light foxing and light soiling to first few pages. A good to very good copy. "Oliver Cromwell, Parliamentarian leader, sent his son in law, General Henry Ireton to Chavenage House to persuade Colonel Stephens, Knight of the Shire, to accede to the death of King Charles 1st. Stephens was reluctant. He wavered in his support for the execution of King Charles I, and it took all night for Ireton to convince him to join the cause. As legend has it, Colonel Stephens eventually agreed, but soon after his daughter returned and discovered what had happened. So horrified and angered was she at the shame that her father brought to the family name, that she cursed him, and soon after Colonel Stephens fell ill and died. At his funeral, as the story goes, a stagecoach driven by a headless horseman wearing the star and garter of Charles I drew up at the door. Colonel Stephens was seen by all assembled for the funeral to rise from his coffin, float across the courtyard, and enter the stagecoach to be driven away by the ghost of King Charles I.".…