Later we discover that Glyde is impoverished, and is marrying for money. This perhaps indicates a character flaw, but really not a very remarkable one. In the late Victorian Era it was not unusual for the English nobility to marry American heiresses, an arrangement that suited both parties. The 'noble man' would receive a large dowry with which to prop up his failing revenues, and the woman would receive an English title as would the children of their union. In this context Glyde must not be condemned for marrying for money, but perhaps he may be charged with being less than open in his intentions? Having said that his lawyer Merriman makes Sir Percival's position transparently clear.

We are also tempted by Collins into condemning Glyde because his parents weren't married. But in days when divorces were uncommon, difficult to obtain, expensive, and considered to be scandalous it wasn't uncommon for people to live together as man and wife, even though unmarried. This was especially true of members of the working classes for whom divorce was a virtual impossibility. Glyde then should not be condemned because of his illegitimacy. The question then remains should he be condemned by us because he attempts to conceal his parents' marital status in order to inherit his father's estate. Here one can only follow ones own sense of conscience. Forgery is, of course a criminal offence, and one which at the time Glyde committed it was punishable by death. Legally he shouldn't have forged the entry in the church register, but we must then ask if his actions weren't those of a desperate man seeking an outlet from an unjust law? It must have seemed so to Glyde at the time, yet as we discover there is evil within the act itself.

The fact remains that in law there is a legitimate heir to the Blackwater Estate, and it's not Glyde. Someone then will be defrauded by Glyde's action. Moreover Glyde involves, and bribes, Sarah Anne Catherick who now holds a deadly secret over him. This secret is like Damocles sword and always pointed at him. His secret is so great that he doesn't even share it with his most trusted accomplice Count Fosco, and he causes Anne Catherick to be committed to a 'mad house' just because she uttered a few careless words about it.

The 'secret' is the key to Glyde's character, it explains his ill-tempers, his desperate need to hold onto 'his' estates ~ for his land has already cost him far too much! It can be argued that the lesser crime of forgery inevitably led to the greater ones of kidnap, and false imprisonment.

As the story unfolds Glyde becomes a more and more desperate man. In the end it is this desperation that takes him to the vestry at Old Welmington in which through accident he meets his death. Had he simply left matters as they were he might well have argued, in an age prior to forensic science, that the discrepancy between the two registers was an oversight, or he might have simply fled to the continent. As it is Sir Percival Glyde suffers the death of a pantomime scoundrel, for despite the 'reasonableness' of much of his actions when set in context, this is how, Collins throughout the book, portrays him.