The Mysteries of Udolpho · Chapter
Chapter XLIX explained
Emily returns to La Vallée, experiencing a tender melancholy as she revisits the scenes of her childhood and her parents' memory.
What happens
Emily returns to La Vallée, experiencing a tender melancholy as she revisits the scenes of her childhood and her parents' memory. She visits Theresa, her father's old servant, and learns that Valancourt secretly provided Theresa with a cottage and support, revealing his enduring kindness and love for Emily despite their separation.
Themes in this chapter
Grief and Melancholy
Emily's return to La Vallée evokes a tender melancholy as she revisits memories of her parents and the scenes of her childhood.
Love and Separation
Emily's discovery of Valancourt's secret kindness rekindles her love and sorrow over their separation.
Virtue and Self-Command
Valancourt's anonymous charity to Theresa exemplifies virtue and self-command, while Emily struggles to contain her emotions upon learning of his goodness.
Characters to notice
- Emily St. Aubert
Returns to La Vallée, experiences melancholy and tender pleasure revisiting her parents' home, visits Theresa, and learns of Valancourt's secret kindness.
- Theresa
Old servant of St. Aubert, now living in a cottage provided by Valancourt; reveals Valancourt's generosity and love for Emily.
- Valancourt
Secretly provided Theresa with a cottage and support, demonstrating his continued benevolence and affection for Emily.
- Monsieur Barreaux
Venerable neighbor who visits Emily to welcome her back to La Vallée.
Key passages
“Ah happy hills! ah pleasing shade! Ah fields belov’d in vain! Where once my careless childhood stray’d, A stranger yet to pain! I feel the gales, that from ye blow, A momentary bliss bestow, As waving fresh their gladsome wing, My weary soul they seem to sooth.”
Emily recalls the happy hills and fields of her childhood, where she once wandered without sorrow, and finds that the breezes from those places bring her a brief comfort.
The epigraph sets the tone of nostalgic melancholy as Emily returns to La Vallée.
“For time had so far blunted the acuteness of her grief, that she now courted every scene, that awakened the memory of her friends; in every room, where she had been accustomed to see them, they almost seemed to live again; and she felt that La Vallée was still her happiest home.”
Time had softened Emily's grief so that she now sought out places that reminded her of her parents, and she felt that La Vallée remained her true home.
Describes Emily's emotional state upon returning to her childhood home.
“The Chevalier Valancourt! said Emily, trembling extremely. Yes, mademoiselle, he himself, though he made me promise not to tell; but how could one help, when one heard him ill spoken of?”
Emily is shocked to learn that Valancourt was the secret benefactor who provided Theresa with her cottage, despite having asked Theresa to keep it hidden.
Reveals Valancourt's secret kindness and Emily's emotional reaction.