The Small House at Allington

Anthony Trollope's The Small House at Allington (serialized 1862–64) is the fifth of the six Chronicles of Barsetshire and one of the most beloved and most argued-over books he ever wrote. Written for the Cornhill Magazine and illustrated by John Everett Millais, whose drawings fixed its heroine in the public imagination, it is a quietly heartbreaking study of constancy, ambition, and a love that will not be replaced.

At the Small House at Allington live the widowed Mrs. Dale and her two daughters, dependent on the grudging charity of the Squire of the Great House. Into this settled world comes Adolphus Crosbie — clever, charming, and ambitious — who courts the younger daughter, Lily Dale, and wins her whole heart. But going on to stay with the grand de Courcy family, Crosbie is dazzled by the chance to marry into the aristocracy, and throws Lily over for an earl's cold, faded daughter. His punishment is a loveless marriage that quickly curdles; Lily's is a broken heart she will not let anyone mend.

Faithfully and hopelessly in love with Lily stands Johnny Eames, an awkward, good-hearted young clerk who has adored her since childhood and now, rising in the world, loves her still. Everyone wishes them married — but Lily, having once given her heart wholly, declares she cannot give it again, and refuses him gently and absolutely. Trollope refuses to tidy the book up: the wedding the reader expects never comes, and the deliberately un-tidy ending is the source of the novel's lasting, aching power. Here, too, a grave young man named Plantagenet Palliser makes his first appearance, bridging Barsetshire and the great Palliser novels to come.

This edition presents the complete public-domain text of the 1864 novel in clean, readable typesetting prepared for the modern e-reader.