The Argosy, Vol. 21

# Edina by Mrs. Henry Wood

The Argos (January 1876) features the opening installment of "Edina" by Mrs. Henry Wood, author of East Lynne. The serial begins in the Cornish mining village of Trennach, where Dr. Hugh Raynor, an accomplished physician who has mysteriously settled into provincial practice, works with his handsome but irresolute nephew Frank. When miners refuse to descend into the pits after hearing the "Seven Whistlers"—sounds allegedly presaging disaster—Dr. Raynor recounts previous encounters with this superstition, including a pit accident years earlier. The narrative introduces various village characters: chemist Edmund Float, his brother Andrew (a miner with a mysterious burn), and Josiah Bell, a quarrelsome former clerk now laboring in the mines, who claims he heard the ominous sounds while returning home at midnight across the Bare Plain.