V — Val ladolid to Vanoc (Part 3 of 3)

Vanity Fair, the name of a periodical noted for its caricatures, started by signor Pelligrini, under the signature of “Ape.”

Vanity Fair, a novel by Thackeray (1848). Becky (Rebecca) Sharp, the daughter of a poor painter, dashing, selfish, unprincipled, and very clever, contrives to marry Rawdon Crawley, afterwards his excellency colonel Crawley, C.B.,governor of Coventry Island. Rawdon expected to have a large fortune left him by his aunt, Miss Crawley, but was disinherited on account of his marriage with Becky, then a poor governess. Becky contrives to live in splendour on “nothing a year,” gets introduced at court, and is patronized by lord Steyne earl of Gaunt; but this intimacy giving birth to a great scandal, Becky breaks up her establishment, and is reduced to the lowest Bohemian life. Afterwards she becomes the “female companion” of Joseph Sedley, a wealthy “collector,” of Boggley Wollah, in India. Having insured his life and lost his money, he dies suddenly under very suspicious circumstances, and Becky lives for a time in a splendour on the Continent. Subsequently she retires to Bath, where she assumes the character of a pious lady Bountiful, given to all good works.

The other part of the story is connected with Amelia Sedley, daughter of a wealthy London stock-broker, who fails, and is reduced to indigence. Captain George Osborne, the son of a London merchant, marries Amelia, and old Osborne disinherits him. The young people live for a time together, when George is killed in the battle of Waterloo. Amelia is reduced to great poverty, but is befriended by captain Dobbin, who loves her to idolatry, and after many years of patience and great devotion, she consents to marry him.

Becky Sharp rises from nothing to splendour, and then falls; Amelia falls from wealth to indigence, and then rises.

Vanity of Human Wishes (The), a poem by Dr. Johnson, in imitation of Juvenal’s Satieres (1749, good).

Vanoc, son of Merlin, one of the knights of the Round Table.