Stanley John Weyman was born at Ludlow in Shropshire in 1855, the second son of a solicitor. He went to Shrewsbury School, then to Christ Church, Oxford, graduating in 1877 with a degree in history. With this degree he was not able to make much of a living for himself and prospects were discouraging. He was called to the Bar in 1881 and practiced law for "eight wretched years" never making more than £200 in any given year, and frequently angering judges with his nervous incompetence in court.
Novelist and Cornhill Magazine editor James Payn convinced him to undertake fiction. Weyman began publishing in 1883 with his short 'The Story of a Courtship' for The English Illustrated Magazine. But not until his first novel 'The House of the Wolf', set in 16th Century France, was he catapulted to fame in 1890. From 1890 onward, he was the lion of a very special and elegant literary form. His best books, including 'From the Memoirs of a Minister of France' (1893), 'A Gentleman of France' (1893), 'Under the Red Robe' (1894) and 'The Red Cockade' (1895) are all but without parallel in excellence. He died in 1928.
'The Wild Geese' was published in 1908. It is an Eighteenth century Irish romance of sea and land set in the time of George I. Though it is a marvelous heroic tale it was not one of his best sellers, and is now quite hard to find.
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