Shameless Wayne: A Romance of the last Feud of Wayne and Ratcliffe — Reading Companion

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In Category - Historical Psychological Social Fiction

Authors: Sutcliffe, Halliwell, 1870-1932 Digital Source: Project Gutenberg Gutenberg Release Year: 2014 First Publication Year: Not confirmed

Key Word: Scotland -- Social life and customs -- Fiction; Vendetta -- Fiction Target Reader: Readers of public-domain and historical texts

Book Edition: Project Gutenberg digital edition Book Language: en

Edition facts

Words 144,217

Reading time 628 min

Text sections 15

The source record for Shameless Wayne: A Romance of the last Feud of Wayne and Ratcliffe — Reading Companion measures this digital text at 144,217 words, 10 hr 28 min estimated reading time, and 15 detected text sections.

The text analysis averages about 17.8 words per sentence, while the detected sections provide another way to judge how the source is divided.

Project Gutenberg metadata also associates the work with “Scotland -- Social life and customs -- Fiction,” connecting these edition facts with the source record’s subject description.

Source: Project Gutenberg record #47674

In Halliwell Sutcliffe's 1899 novel, a moorside feud between the Waynes and Ratcliffes is refracted through folk belief, domestic tension, and the tolling of a death bell. The opening chapter's sexton's wife measures time by stitches, not minutes, while the Brown Dog Barguest haunts the narrative as a portent of violence and loyalty.

Editorial Edition Score 4.8/5

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Description quality20 pts
Title & short description10 pts
Source metadata20 pts
Text length15 pts
Chapters / structure15 pts
EPUB file integrity20 pts

Total of 100 points, scaled to a 2.5-5.0 range. Editions with an empty description or a missing EPUB file are not scored.

Edition quality

File: pg47674

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I. Once for a Death II. And Twice for the Slayer’s Shrift III. The Lean Man of Wildwater IV. On Bog-Hole Brink V. A Love-tryst VI. The Brown Dog’s Step VII. The Lean Man’s Token VIII. A Stormy Burial IX. A Moorside Courtship X. What Crossed the Garden-Path XI. How the Ratcliffes Rode Out by Stealth XII. How They Fared Back to Wildwater XIII. April Snow XIV. How Wayne and Ratcliffe Met at Hazel Brigg XV. Mother-wit XVI. How Wayne of Marsh Rode up to Bents XVII. The Dog-dread XVIII. The Feud-wind Freshens XIX. How Wayne Kept the Pinfold XX. How They Waited at the Boundary-Stone XXI. What Chanced at Wildwater XXII. And What Chanced at Marsh XXIII. How Wayne Kept Faith XXIV. How the Lean Man Fought With Shameless Wayne XXV. And How He Drank With Him XXVI. Mistress Wayne Fares up to Wildwater XXVII. How the Lean Man Forgot the Feud

The little old woman sat up in the belfry tower, knitting a woollen stocking and tolling the death bell with her foot. She took two and seventy stitches between each stroke of the bell, and not the church-clock itself could reckon a minute more truly. Sharp of face she was, the Sexton’s wife, and her lips were forever moving in time to the click of her knitting-needles.

"By th’ Heart, ’tis little care his wife hed for him," she muttered presently. "Nobbut a poor half-hour o’ th’ bell, an’ him wi’ a long, cold journey afore him. Does she think a man’s soul can racket up to Heaven at that speed? Mebbe ’tis her pocket she cares for—two-an’-sixpence, an’ him a Wayne! One o’ th’ proud Waynes o’ Marsh, an’ all, th’ best-born folk i’ th’ moorside. Well, there’s men an’ there’s men, mostly wastrils, but we mud weel hev spared another better nor Anthony Wayne, that we could."

Her voice died down again, though her lips still moved and her needles chattered restlessly. The wind raced over the moor and in at the rusty grating, and twice the Sexton’s wife ceased knitting to brush away a cobweb, wind-driven against her cheek.

"An’ him to hev no more nor a half-hour’s tolling, poor mortal!" she said, breaking a long pause. "What ’ull he do when he gets to th’ Gate, an’ th’ bell hes stopped tolling, an’ there’s no Christian music to waft him in? But theer! What did I say o’ th’ wife when Anthony Wayne went an’ wedded again—a lass no older nor his own daughter, an’ not Marshcotes bred nawther. Nay, there’s no mak o’ gooid in ’t—two-an’-sixpence to buy a man’s soul God-speed, there niver war ony gooid i’ bringing furriners to Marshcotes. Little, milkblooded wench as she is, not fit to stand up agen a puff o’ wind. Well, I’ve a’most done wi’ th’ ringing—save I war to gi’e him another half-hour for naught, sin’ he war a thowt likelier nor th’ rest o’ th’ men-folk."

The little old woman smiled mirthlessly. For folk accounted her sharp of tongue and hard of heart, and she would never have done as much for any but a Wayne of Marsh House. Silence fell once again on the belfry tower, broken only by the click-click of the needles, the creak of the rope, the subdued thunder of the bell, the wailing frenzy of the wind as it drove the hailstones against the black old walls.

Eerie as the night was in the belfry, it was wilder yet in the bleak kirkyard without, free to the moor as it was, and full of corners where the wind hid itself to pipe a shriller note than it could compass in the open. The wind, a moon three-quarters full, a sky close packed with rain and sleet, fought hard together; and now the moon gained a moment’s victory, shimmering ghostly grey across the wet tombstones; and now the scudding wrack prevailed, hiding the moon outright. The sodden winter leaves were lifted from the mould, and danced to the tune of the raindrops pattering upward from the tombstones.

A figure crossed the moor and halted awhile at the church-yard gate—a slim figure, of a lissom strength and upright carriage which marked her as a Wayne of Marsh House. Like a sapling ash the girl had swayed and bent to the hurricane as she fought her way through the storm; but all that the wind could do it had done, and had left her unbroken—breathless only, and glad of the gate’s support for a moment.

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The novel begins not with a duel or a declaration of war, but with a little old woman in a belfry tower, knitting a woollen stocking and tolling the death bell with her foot. She takes two and seventy stitches between each stroke, her lips moving in time with the needles. The dead man is Anthony Wayne, and she begrudges the half-hour tolling his widow has paid for—two-and-sixpence for a man's soul-speed. This opening establishes a world where time, money, and ritual are intimately measured, and where the living judge the dead by the quality of their send-off.

The feud between Wayne and Ratcliffe is not yet in motion, but the ground is prepared: the sexton's wife calls the widow a 'milkblooded wench' and a 'furriner,' hinting at the insular, suspicious community that will shape the conflict. The wind races over the moor and cobwebs brush the woman's cheek; the landscape itself seems to press in on human affairs.

The Tolling of Time and the Weight of Custom

The opening chapter uses the death bell as a metronome for the community's values. The sexton's wife counts stitches and minutes with equal precision, and her monologue reveals a hierarchy of worth: a Wayne deserves more than a half-hour's tolling, but the widow's parsimony—or poverty—has shortchanged the dead man's journey. The bell is not merely a signal; it is a transaction, a measure of respect, and a source of gossip. The woman's muttered criticism of the widow—'not Marshcotes bred nawther'—foreshadows the novel's preoccupation with belonging and exclusion. Later, the Brown Dog Barguest appears as a different kind of omen, one that cannot be bought or measured. When Mistress Wayne claims to have seen the dog fawn on her son Ned, the Lean Man's skepticism crumbles; the dog's whimper and shaggy coat become a tangible dread. The contrast between the bell's mechanical tolling and the dog's uncanny visitation sets up a tension between the ordered world of custom and the unruly forces of superstition and fate.

Voices of the Moorside: Dialect and Dread

Sutcliffe renders the speech of his moorland characters in a dense dialect that carries its own rhythm and judgment. The sexton's wife says 'nobbut a poor half-hour o' th' bell' and 'there's no mak o' gooid in 't'; her words are as sharp as her knitting needles. Nanny Witherlee, the dream-eyed woman who watched Wayne's body, speaks in the same register: 'ye've getten th' second-sight' and 'yourn 'ull be th' greatest help of all.' The dialect is not merely local color; it is a marker of insider knowledge, of a world where Barguest is real and where a woman who has seen the Brown Dog is both feared and trusted. When Nicholas Ratcliffe tries to dismiss the superstition—'Devil take thee! There's no such thing'—his standard English sets him apart from the moor folk, but his sweat and backward glance betray him. The novel uses these vocal contrasts to map the characters' relationships to the landscape and its legends. The Lean Man's sneer that he would 'fight him with a dozen Waynes to back him' is undercut by Nanny's quiet certainty: 'ony one can see that Barguest hes getten his teeth in.'

The Feud as Family Drama: Janet's Predicament

By Chapter XIV, the feud has become a domestic trap for Janet, the granddaughter of the Lean Man. She fears for Shameless Wayne's life and dreads being forced into wedlock with a cousin; her grandfather has set Wayne's life as the price of her hand. The narrative notes that 'trouble, indeed, seemed closing in on Wildwater' during days of sun and snow and northeast winds—the weather itself mirrors the tightening noose. The Lean Man is failing in body and mind, 'as if he had been stricken by some unseen blade,' and he watches his own shadow fearfully. Janet's fondness for him is complicated by her terror of what he might do. The feud is not a matter of open battle but of bargains, threats, and the slow erosion of trust. Red Ratcliffe presses his suit with threats of telling all to old Nicholas, and Janet has no one to turn to. The excerpt gives no resolution, but it makes clear that the feud's violence is as much psychological as physical, and that the women of the story—Mistress Wayne, Nanny, Janet—are caught between loyalty and survival.

Readers should attend to the novel's use of dialect and folk belief as more than decoration: they are the language of power and prophecy. The Brown Dog Barguest is not a mere ghost story; it is a measure of who sees clearly and who is blind. The feud between Wayne and Ratcliffe is conducted through bargains, threats, and the slow erosion of trust, and the women—the sexton's wife, Mistress Wayne, Nanny, Janet—are its sharpest observers. The novel rewards attention to the weight of a half-hour's tolling, the pattern of a knitting needle, and the sound of a dog's whimper on the wind.

Those stitches in the sexton’s wife’s hands brought back a quieter sort of clock, the kind that measures hours by endurance rather than sound. I thought of The Mysteries of London, v. 1/4 — Reading Companion, where the city’s pulse feels similarly unhurried, even amid turmoil. Both seem to wait for something—a bell, a page—rather than chase it.