While out walking one day, Mina encounters Mr. Swales, who tells her that he senses his own death is likely not far off. Swales see a ship drifting about offshore as if no one were at the helm. Swales assures Mina that they will surely hear more about it. Two newspaper clippings indicate that the ship Mina and Mr. Swales have seen, a vessel called the Demeter, later washes up on the shore at Whitby during a terrific storm. Its crew is nowhere to be found, while its captain, dead and clasping a crucifix, is discovered tied to the wheel.
When the ship runs aground, a huge dog leaps from the hold and disappears into the countryside. The trip starts off well, but ten days into the voyage, a crewmember is found missing. Soon thereafter, another sailor spots a tall, thin man who is not like any of the crew. A search of the ship finds no stowaways, but every few days another sailor disappears. The crew becomes numb with fear, and the first mate begins to go mad.
By the time the ship reaches the English coast, only four men remain to sail it. A great fog settles over them, preventing them from reaching harbor. After two more sailors vanish, the first mate goes below to find the intruder, only to rush out of the hold and throw himself into the sea. Mina describes the night of the dreaded storm, her fears for Jonathan, and her concern for Lucy, who continues to sleepwalk. Swales, who was found dead with a broken neck and a look of horror on his face.
In Gothic literature, the battle between well-defined forces of good and evil frequently dominates plots. In Dracula , that battle is largely waged over the fate of its female protagonists, Lucy Westenra and Mina Murray.
Neither Mina nor Lucy is a particularly profound character—instead, both represent the Victorian ideal of female virtue. Lord Godalming is still physically shaken by the deaths of his father, Mrs. Westenra, and Lucy. Unable to restrain himself any longer, he breaks down and cries like a baby on Mina's breast. In Chapter 18, Dr. Seward notes that Mina Harker wishes to see Renfield. He takes her to Renfield's room, and Renfield, curiously, asks them to wait until he tidies things up.
He simply swallowed all the flies and spiders in the boxes. Van Helsing arrives and is pleased to discover that all the records — diaries, journals, etc. Mina Harker, in her journal September 30th , recalls in detail many of the things known about vampires, a subject which prior to this time she has been ignorant of. Van Helsing presents many conclusions about the nosferatu or the "Un-Dead" : 1 They do not die; 2 can be as strong as twenty men; 3 can direct the elements — storms, fog, thunder, etc.
The problem which the vampire's adversary must overcome is how to deal successfully with all of these obstacles. They all make a pact to work together in order to see how "the general powers arrayed against us can be controlled and to consider the limitations of the vampire. From the world's information about vampires, it is known that: 1 the vampire cannot die due to the passing of time; 2 the vampire flourishes on the blood of human beings; 3 the vampire grows younger after feeding on blood; 4 its physical strength and vital faculties are refreshed by blood; 5 it cannot survive without blood; 6 it can survive for great lengths of time without any nourishment; 7 it throws no shadow; 8 it makes no reflection in a mirror; 9 it has the strength of many; 10 it can control wild packs of wolves and can become a wolf as the Count did when his ship arrived at Whitby ; 11 the vampire can transform itself into a bat; 12 it can appear in a mist, which it itself can create; 13 the vampire can travel on moonlight rays as elemental dust; 14 it can become so small and transparent that it can pass through the tiniest crevices; and 15 it can see perfectly in the dark.
Its limitations are as follows: 1 it cannot enter a household unless it is summoned first; 2 its power ceases at daylight; 3 in whatever form it is in when daylight comes, it will remain in that form until sunset; 4 the vampire must always return to the unhallowed earth of its coffin, which restores its strength this, of course, is the purpose of the fifty cases of earth ; 5 garlic is abhorrent to a vampire; 6 the crucifix, holy water, and holy wafers the host are anathemas; 7 it is rendered inactive if a wild rose is placed over it; and 8 death occurs when a wooden stake is driven through the heart, the head cut off, and garlic stuffed in the mouth.
As Van Helsing concludes his lecture, Quincey Morris leaves the room, and a shot is heard outside. Morris explains that he saw a bat and fired at it. On October 1st, early in the morning, Dr. Seward records that as they were about to leave the asylum, he received an urgent message from Renfield.
The others ask if they may attend the meeting with Renfield, and they are astonished at the brilliance and lucidity of Renfield's plea to be released immediately.
His scholarly logic and perfect elocution are that of a totally sane man. His request is denied. In Chapter 19, in his journal, Jonathan Harker records that Seward believes Renfield's erratic behavior to be directly influenced by the immediate proximity of Count Dracula.
Later, as they are about to enter Dracula's Carfax residence, Van Helsing distributes objects which will protect each of them from the vampire. The house, they discover, is musty, dusty, and malodorous. They immediately search out the chapel and, to their horror, they can find only twenty-nine of the original fifty boxes of earth. The "New Woman" was a term used to describe progressive women, who asserted their independence from men.
The "New Woman" was not only more sexually independent, but also more physically independent in other ways—these progressive women actually exercised by cycling, playing tennis, or going on long walks, and ate as much as they felt like, instead of eating tiny portions to maintain their wasp-like figures. So when Mina says that she and Lucy ate enough to "shock the 'New Woman,'" she means they ate a ton. It's like saying, "we ate more hot dogs than Takeru Kobayashi at an eating contest. It seems like a random reference, but it's important.
Let's look at the second reference: It's about the power dynamics between men and women before marriage. Who should do the proposing? And how much should they see of each other before marriage? According to traditional Victorian social morality, men and women should only see each other in very controlled, chaperoned settings before agreeing to marry. And the idea that women should do the proposing is also mind-blowing for the time period. Is Stoker poking fun at the idea of the "New Woman"?
How independent is she? Mina is a very intelligent, well-educated woman. She's a schoolteacher, which means she earns her own income before her marriage and is financially independent her parents are dead, so she doesn't really have a choice in the matter.
But even while working full time, she studies alongside Jonathan, who is working to become a lawyer. She says she "want[s] to keep up with Jonathan's studies" and that she has been "practicing shorthand" 5.
So Mina works full time and has been staying caught up with Jonathan's law school reading? Does the woman never sleep? But she's not doing it because she wants to be a lawyer herself, she's doing it so that she'll "be able to be useful to Jonathan" after they're married 5. So Mina is a strange, contradictory combination of strong intellect and submissiveness—she's the one who figures out where Dracula's likely to go next She's financially and intellectually independent, but not really sexually independent—we hardly ever hear her described physically, and her relationship with Jonathan seems strangely sexless.
If Mina seems to be sexless, maybe it's because everyone is too busy thinking of her as a mother figure. Mina's admiration for the men who help kill Dracula is pretty extreme—she frequently remarks on how lucky she is to have so many good, strong men to look out for her. But she looks out for them, too—just after meeting Arthur Holmwood, she lets him have a good cry on her shoulder: He stood up and then sat down again, and the tears rained down his cheeks.
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