Penny Dreadfuls, 1867 · page 157 of 300
Roving Jack, The Pirate Hunter — page 157: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Roving Jack, the Pirate Hunter This is an interior page of a Victorian penny dreadful featuring both a wood-engraved illustration and running prose text. The illustration depicts a dramatic scene aboard a ship where a central figure in light clothing stands between two armed men in formal dress. The text describes an action sequence in which the hero, Roving Jack, hangs from a column while the villain Rotaldo attempts to cut the cord holding him. The passage reveals that Tomaz Sebastien, "the liberated" character, has intervened to stop Rotaldo's murderous plan.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
' = ——< =-—-.-----. te set oe —- ~ —- ROVING JACK, THE PIRATE HUNTER. .<.—-—)—— = = Simi IG CIME WBMES CISbI ESRI at atere “4 SS ‘ ay w eel dh WS i PX \ / (a \ ‘N en we! \\ = STZ iF ye wa ae / i ALLL WD fy) WD if / Wii) UL / Mey / / WM [] JONATHAN WILD ATPE SPDs TO ARREST PAUL PEVERILL.—‘Sve nex! Number. Though greatly shaken, our hero maintained his grasp. | Finding him rapidly making his descent, the brutal Rotaldo, muttering curses between his teeth, proceeded to saw with vigour the frail cord. Roving Jack gazed upwards, then cast his eyes to the ground beneath. He was still more than one hundred feet from it. “Ho, ho,” bellowed the pirate ; “not so fast, my young spark, not so fast. You shall reach your destination without further efforts of your own— aye, and somewhat quicker too di “That fate shall be your own, miscreant !”’ shrieked a voice, in close proximity. There Wee aed and Rotaldo rolled heavily No. 23. over the edge of the column, which he grasped with a tenacity of desperation and despair, His glowing eyeballs glared on his assailant. It was the liberated Tomaz Sebastien. His deadly foe, Sebastien, after the encounter in © the dungeon, had been watching Rotaldo. He perceived that he had been stunned and not disabled. Profiting by the darkness of the place, he had concealed himself, thinking most likely when, the pirate: had recovered himself he would attempt to do further mischief. A precaution wisely taken, as the present circum- -Stance shows, Rotaldo still hung to the stonework, and would