When reading historical novels, it is all too easy to point the finger at the wilder heroines and declare, “She would NEVER have done that!” After all, surely all girls pre-1900 were terribly well-behaved and didn’t dare step outside convention? Surely the idea that they ran around or slept with men before they were married was preposterous, let alone for girls higher up the social scale? Surely this is just a case of writers imagining what they need? Well…no. It isn’t. A