Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Moonstone, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Detective Methods and Genre Standards
Intention, Identity, and Personality
Science and Religion
Gender and Victorian Morality
Class, Wealth, and Nobility
British Imperialism
Summary
Analysis
The solicitor Mathew Bruff explains his dual purposes in writing. First, he wants to explain “certain points of interest which have thus far been left in the dark,” namely Rachel and Godfrey’s real motives for ending the engagement—which Bruff alone knows. Secondly, his conversations with one of the three Indians and Mr. Murthwaite are quite relevant to the story of the Moonstone.
Bruff’s dry, factual, and purpose-driven narration is as far as one might get from Clack’s maniacal moral ravings. He aims to both tie up a loose end in her account and return the Moonstone to the center of the novel’s plot.
Themes
“The true story of the broken marriage engagement” starts many years before, at the deathbed of Sir John Verinder, who always avoided making a will—when he finally obliged, he dictated: “Everything to my wife. That’s my will.” And then he returned to his nap. Although Bruff would ordinarily object to this, he knew Julia was trustworthy and competent in business (unlike almost all other women, he remarks). And, indeed, shortly after Sir John’s death, Julia drew up her own, much more elaborate will, which Bruff did not bother to revisit until she received her final diagnosis—her “sentence of death”—in 1848. She wanted to make some minor changes, so she asked Bruff to prepare a second will—the one for which Miss Clack served as a witness. The only difference involving Rachel was the process for determining a guardian.
John Verinder’s apparent laziness and ineptitude at managing his estate contrasts with Julia’s precision and diligence; in their relationship, the stereotypical gender roles are reversed (although Bruff makes a point of reinforcing them). Validating Betteredge’s utmost respect for Lady Julia, this revelation proves that her primary concern was protecting Rachel and the others around her. In this sense, her uncompromising benevolence and selflessness are quite the opposite of her sinister, egotistical, lawbreaking brother, “the wicked Colonel” John Herncastle (not to be confused with her husband, who was also named John).
Themes
A few weeks after Julia signs her second will, Bruff receives news that someone from the firm Skipp and Smalley has paid to examine the will (which is perfectly legal, but unusual). Luckily, Bruff has close ties to this firm, which often takes up cases he turns down. Mr. Smalley explains that he cannot reveal his reasoning for viewing the will without breaking his attorney-client privilege, and Bruff recklessly threatens to cut off his relationship with Smalley if he does not learn who asked to see the will. Smalley obliges: it is Godfrey Ablewhite.
Bruff’s discovery proves that Godfrey was not entirely forthcoming about his motives for proposing to Rachel and then withdrawing from this proposal. It also, incidentally, proves that Bruff is excellent at his job. He is as concerned with protecting the Verinders as Julia is. The importance of the will suggests that Godfrey was seeking some material benefit, and, regardless, the reader can now safely dismiss Miss Clack’s fantastical portrait of him.
Themes
Bruff explains that the will leaves Rachel with houses and a steady income, but no means of liquidating the family’s property. Bruff sees that Godfrey wanted to marry Rachel for her money—and knows that he cannot get that money because of the will’s structure. So Bruff jumps on the opportunity to take Rachel to Brighton and gets Rachel to admit that she is “marrying in despair,” but that she believes Godfrey genuinely loves her. She realizes that Bruff has “something to tell [her] about Godfrey” and he explains his reservations. They walk together as she grows pale and withdrawn. Knowing that she is independent and thoughtful (unlike “the mass of her sex”), Bruff gives her time to think. After a long silence, she asks him to shoot down “any rumours of my marriage” in London and explains that she has decided to cut off the engagement.
Through her will, Julia manages to protect Rachel even after her death. Bruff carries out these plans and saves Rachel, not only from the scheming Godfrey, but for a better marriage when she can find one based on love instead of mere security. Bruff also excepts Rachel from his blanket assessments of “her sex,” which shows how Collins both exposes and breaks stereotypes through Rachel and his other female characters (with the exception of Clack, of course). Rachel takes her decision immediately, and the reader can now resolve Miss Clack’s confusion at how the engagement fell apart so abruptly.
Themes
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Bruff asks if Rachel has some woman in her life to turn to for advice. She admits that she does not, so Bruff does his best to substitute, and suggests that she tell Godfrey honestly that she knows of his motives, and that it is in his best interest to at least outwardly agree with her reasons for ending the engagement. But Rachel says she cannot bear “the shame” of degrading Godfrey to his face, and that she will simply declare that it is over and better for both of them to be apart, regardless of Godfrey’s response. Bruff warns her not to “brave public opinion […] at the command of private feeling,” but she said she has already taken this risk with the Moonstone. Bruff grows confused and Rachel never clarifies this, leaving him conflicted and uneasy when he returns to London at the end of the day.
Again, Bruff seems to believe in some essential personality difference between men and women, apparently one so strong that gender should be the most important criterion in determining whom Rachel should ask for advice. However, circumstances defeat his assumptions. Rachel’s vague words about the Moonstone again suggest that she is hiding something, and her willingness to put “private feeling” above “public opinion” attests to her lack of interest in conventional markers of status (which is why the conflicted, status-seeking Mr. Ablewhite grows so furious with her).
Themes
That night, back in London, Mr. Ablewhite the elder comes to visit Bruff and declare that Godfrey has accepted Rachel’s decision to end the engagement. This confirms that Godfrey was simply looking for “a large sum of money” by a definite date through his prospective marriage to Rachel, and that he eagerly gave up on the engagement once he realized he would not get this windfall. But Mr. Ablewhite’s behavior showed Bruff that he would be “merciless” when confronting Rachel, and Miss Clack’s narrative shows how Bruff decided to cope with this danger. He ends his first chapter by affirming “that Miss Verinder found the quiet and repose which she sadly needed” by staying with Bruff and his family.
Indeed, given what Bruff explained about Franklin in the last chapter, the important fact about Godfrey’s debts is that they are imminent: he needs to find money as soon as possible, even by desperate means (whereas Franklin’s creditors prefer to keep building up his interest). Bruff ultimately played a crucial role in ensuring Rachel’s safety by going to Brighton, mediating her argument with Ablewhite, and, most of all, taking guardianship of her after the fact. Indeed, he seems to be the exemplary gentleman Clack mistakenly saw in Godfrey.
Themes
