It bears the subtitle A Romance : Being a Record of the Growth of an English Gentleman during the years 1685–1687, under strange and difficult circumstances / written some while afterwards in his own hand, and now edited by / A.E.W.

Sir Julian lies in Bristol gaol, having been arrested for treasonously harbouring rebels in the aftermath of Monmouth's failed 1685 rebellion, and he faces trial at the assizes before the infamous Judge Jeffries in a week's time.

Morrice is smuggled into Sir Julian's cell the night before the execution, and is asked by his friend to settle a debt of honour on his behalf.

As Lukstein lies dying, his new wife Ilga (now Countess Luckstein) comes down a spiral stair and walks slowly across the room and out onto the terrace; she is asleep and sees nothing.

Morrice makes his escape, accidentally leaving behind a small locked gold box given to him by Sir Julian which, though he does not realise it, contains a miniature of Miss Marston.

Unable to settle, he accepts an invitation from his cousin Lord Elmscott to visit London, where all the talk is of the beautiful young widow, Countess Lukstein.

She has at last learned the truth of her late husband's infidelity from Jack Larke and Lord Elmscott, who had carried out investigations of their own when Morrice did not return from his last visit to Castle Lukstein.

In his 1923 review of contemporary authors, Arthur St John Adcock said that the publication of The Courtship of Morrice Buckler in 1896 had instantly established Mason as an extraordinarily popular novelist.