Transcribed from the 1871 Richard Bentley and Son edition by Les Bowler.
A MEMOIR OF JANE AUSTEN.
[Jane Austen: Jane.jpg]
[Title Page: title.jpg]
PREFACE.
THE MEMOIR of my AUNT, JANE AUSTEN, has been received with more favour
than I had ventured to expect. The notices taken of it in the periodical
press, as well as letters addressed to me by many with whom I am not
personally acquainted, show that an unabated interest is still taken in
every particular that can be told about her. I am thus encouraged not
only to offer a Second Edition of the Memoir, but also to enlarge it with
some additional matter which I might have scrupled to intrude on the
public if they had not thus seemed to call for it. In the present
Edition, the narrative is somewhat enlarged, and a few more letters are
added; with a short specimen of her childish stories. The cancelled
chapter of 'Persuasion' is given, in compliance with wishes both publicly
and privately expressed. A fragment of a story entitled 'The Watsons' is
printed; and extracts are given from a novel which she had begun a few
months before her death; but the chief addition is a short tale never
before published, called 'Lady Susan.' {0a} I regret that the little
which I have been able to add could not appear in my First Edition; as
much of it was either unknown to me, or not at my command, when I first
published; and I hope that I may claim some indulgent allowance for the
difficulty of recovering little facts and feelings which had been merged
half a century deep in oblivion.
NOVEMBER 17, 1870.
CONTENTS.
Chapter I. _Introductory Remarks--Birth of Jane Austen--Her Family
Connections--Their Influence on her Writings_
Chapter II. _Description of Steventon--Life at Steventon--Changes of
Habits and Customs in the last Century_
Chapter III. _Early Compositions--Friends at Ashe--A very Old
Letter--Lines on the Death of Mrs. Lefroy--Observations on Jane Austen's
Letter-writing--Letters_
Chapter IV. _Removal from Steventon--Residence at Bath and at
Southampton--Settling at Chawton_
Chapter V. _Description of Jane Austen's person, character, and
tastes_
Chapter VI. _Habits of Composition resumed after a long interval--First
publication--The interest taken by the Author in the success of her
Works_
Chapter VII. _Seclusion from the literary world--Notice from the Prince
Regent--Correspondence with Mr. Clarke--Suggestions to alter her style of
writing_
Chapter VIII. _Slow growth of her fame--Ill success of first attempts at
publication--Two Reviews of her works contrasted_
Chapter IX. _Opinions expressed by eminent persons--Opinions of others
of less eminence--Opinion of American readers_
Chapter X. _Observations on the Novels_
Chapter XI. _Declining health of Jane Austen--Elasticity of her
spirits--Her resignation and humility--Her death_
Chapter XII. _The cancelled Chapter of 'Persuasion_'
Chapter XIII. _The last work_
Chapter XIV. _Postscript_
'He knew of no one but himself who was inclined to the work. This is
no uncommon motive. A man sees something to be done, knows of no one
who will do it but himself, and so is driven to the enterprise.'
HELPS' _Life of Columbus_, ch. i.
CHAPTER I.
_Introductory Remarks--Birth of Jane Austen--Her Family Connections--Their
Influence on her Writings_.
More than half a century has passed away since I, the youngest of the
mourners, {1} attended the funeral of my dear aunt Jane in Winchester
Cathedral; and now, in my old age, I am asked whether my memory will
serve to rescue from oblivion any events of her life or any traits of her
character to satisfy the enquiries of a generation of readers who have
been born since she died. Of events her life was singularly barren: few
changes and no great crisis ever broke the smooth current of its course.
Even her fame may be said to have been posthumous: it did not attain to
any vigorous life till she had ceased to exist. Her talents did not
introduce her to the notice of other writers, or connect her with the
literary world, or in any degree pierce through the obscurity of her
domestic retirement. I have therefore scarcely any materials for a
detailed life of my aunt; but I have a distinct recollection of her
person and character; and perhaps many may take an interest in a
delineation, if any such can be drawn, of that prolific mind whence
sprung the Dashwoods and Bennets, the Bertrams and Woodhouses, the
Thorpes and Musgroves, who have been admitted as familiar guests to the
firesides of so many families, and are known there as individually and
intimately as if they were living neighbours. Many may care to know
whether the moral rectitude, the correct taste, and the warm affections
with which she invested her ideal characters, were really existing in the
native source whence those ideas flowed, and were actually exhibited by
her in the various relations of life. I can indeed bear witness that
there was scarcely a charm in her most delightful characters that was not
a true reflection of her own sweet temper and loving heart. I was young
when we lost her; but the impressions made on the young are deep, and
though in the course of fifty years I have forgotten much, I have not
forgotten that 'Aunt Jane' was the delight of all her nephews and nieces.
We did not think of her as being clever, still less as being famous; but
we valued her as one always kind, sympathising, and amusing. To all this
I am a living witness, but whether I can sketch out such a faint outline
of this excellence as shall be perceptible to others may be reasonably
doubted. Aided, however, by a few survivors {3} who knew her, I will not
refuse to make the attempt. I am the more inclined to undertake the task
from a conviction that, however little I may have to tell, no one else is
left who could tell so much of her.
Jane Austen was born on December 16, 1775, at the Parsonage House of
Steventon in Hampshire. Her father, the Rev. George Austen, was of a
family long established in the neighbourhood of Tenterden and Sevenoaks
in Kent. I believe that early in the seventeenth century they were
clothiers. Hasted, in his history of Kent, says: 'The clothing business
was exercised by persons who possessed most of the landed property in the
Weald, insomuch that almost all the ancient families of these parts, now
of large estates and genteel rank in life, and some of them ennobled by
titles, are sprung from ancestors who have used this great staple
manufacture, now almost unknown here.' In his list of these families
Hasted places the Austens, and he adds that these clothiers 'were usually
called the Gray Coats of Kent; and were a body so numerous and united
that at county elections whoever had their vote and interest was almost
certain of being elected.' The family still retains a badge of this
origin; for their livery is of that peculiar mixture of light blue and
white called Kentish gray, which forms the facings of the Kentish
militia.
Mr. George Austen had lost both his parents before he was nine years old.
He inherited no property from them; but was happy in having a kind uncle,
Mr. Francis Austen, a successful lawyer at Tunbridge, the ancestor of the
Austens of Kippington, who, though he had children of his own, yet made
liberal provision for his orphan nephew. The boy received a good
education at Tunbridge School, whence he obtained a scholarship, and
subsequently a fellowship, at St. John's College, Oxford. In 1764 he
came into possession of the two adjoining Rectories of Deane and
Steventon in Hampshire; the former purchased for him by his generous
uncle Francis, the latter given by his cousin Mr. Knight. This was no
very gross case of plurality, according to the ideas of that time, for
the two villages were little more than a mile apart, and their united
populations scarcely amounted to three hundred. In the same year he
married Cassandra, youngest daughter of the Rev. Thomas Leigh, of the
family of Leighs of Warwickshire, who, having been a fellow of All Souls,
held the College living of Harpsden, near Henley-upon-Thames. Mr. Thomas
Leigh was a younger brother of Dr. Theophilus Leigh, a personage well
known at Oxford in his day, and his day was not a short one, for he lived
to be ninety, and held the Mastership of Balliol College for above half a
century. He was a man more famous for his sayings than his doings,
overflowing with puns and witticisms and sharp retorts; but his most
serious joke was his practical one of living much longer than had been
expected or intended. He was a fellow of Corpus, and the story is that
the Balliol men, unable to agree in electing one of their own number to
the Mastership, chose him, partly under the idea that he was in weak
health and likely soon to cause another vacancy. It was afterwards said
that his long incumbency had been a judgment on the Society for having
elected an _Out-College Man_. {5} I imagine that the front of Balliol
towards Broad Street which has recently been pulled down must have been
built, or at least restored, while he was Master, for the Leigh arms were
placed under the cornice at the corner nearest to Trinity gates. The
beautiful building lately erected has destroyed this record, and thus
'monuments themselves memorials need.'
His fame for witty and agreeable conversation extended beyond the bounds
of the University. Mrs. Thrale, in a letter to Dr. Johnson, writes thus:
'Are you acquainted with Dr. Leigh, {6} the Master of Balliol College,
and are you not delighted with his gaiety of manners and youthful
vivacity, now that he is eighty-six years of age? I never heard a more
perfect or excellent pun than his, when some one told him how, in a late
dispute among the Privy Councillors, the Lord Chancellor struck the table
with such violence that he split it. "No, no, no," replied the Master;
"I can hardly persuade myself that he _split_ the _table_, though I
believe he _divided_ the _Board_."'
Some of his sayings of course survive in family tradition. He was once
calling on a gentleman notorious for never opening a book, who took him
into a room overlooking the Bath Road, which was then a great
thoroughfare for travellers of every class, saying rather pompously,
'This, Doctor, I call my study.' The Doctor, glancing his eye round the
room, in which no books were to be seen, replied, 'And very well named
too, sir, for you know Pope tells us, "The proper _study_ of mankind is
_Man_."' When my father went to Oxford he was honoured with an
invitation to dine with this dignified cousin. Being a raw
undergraduate, unaccustomed to the habits of the University, he was about
to take off his gown, as if it were a great coat, when the old man, then
considerably turned eighty, said, with a grim smile, 'Young man, you need
not strip: we are not going to fight.' This humour remained in him so
strongly to the last that he might almost have supplied Pope with another
instance of 'the ruling passion strong in death,' for only three days
before he expired, being told that an old acquaintance was lately
married, having recovered from a long illness by eating eggs, and that
the wits said that he had been egged on to matrimony, he immediately
trumped the joke, saying, 'Then may the yoke sit easy on him.' I do not
know from what common ancestor the Master of Balliol and his great-niece
Jane Austen, with some others of the family, may have derived the keen
sense of humour which they certainly possessed.
Mr. and Mrs. George Austen resided first at Deane, but removed in 1771 to
Steventon, which was their residence for about thirty years. They
commenced their married life with the charge of a little child, a son of
the celebrated Warren Hastings, who had been committed to the care of Mr.
Austen before his marriage, probably through the influence of his sister,
Mrs. Hancock, whose husband at that time held some office under Hastings
in India. Mr. Gleig, in his 'Life of Hastings,' says that his son
George, the offspring of his first marriage, was sent to England in 1761
for his education, but that he had never been able to ascertain to whom
this precious charge was entrusted, nor what became of him. I am able to
state, from family tradition, that he died young, of what was then called
putrid sore throat; and that Mrs. Austen had become so much attached to
him that she always declared that his death had been as great a grief to
her as if he had been a child of her own.
About this time, the grandfather of Mary Russell Mitford, Dr. Russell,
was Rector of the adjoining parish of Ashe; so that the parents of two
popular female writers must have been intimately acquainted with each
other.
As my subject carries me back about a hundred years, it will afford
occasions for observing many changes gradually effected in the manners
and habits of society, which I may think it worth while to mention. They
may be little things, but time gives a certain importance even to
trifles, as it imparts a peculiar flavour to wine. The most ordinary
articles of domestic life are looked on with some interest, if they are
brought to light after being long buried; and we feel a natural curiosity
to know what was done and said by our forefathers, even though it may be
nothing wiser or better than what we are daily doing or saying ourselves.
Some of this generation may be little aware how many conveniences, now
considered to be necessaries and matters of course, were unknown to their
grandfathers and grandmothers. The lane between Deane and Steventon has
long been as smooth as the best turnpike road; but when the family
removed from the one residence to the other in 1771, it was a mere cart
track, so cut up by deep ruts as to be impassable for a light carriage.
Mrs. Austen, who was not then in strong health, performed the short
journey on a feather-bed, placed upon some soft articles of furniture in
the waggon which held their household goods. In those days it was not
unusual to set men to work with shovel and pickaxe to fill up ruts and
holes in roads seldom used by carriages, on such special occasions as a
funeral or a wedding. Ignorance and coarseness of language also were
still lingering even upon higher levels of society than might have been
expected to retain such mists. About this time, a neighbouring squire, a
man of many acres, referred the following difficulty to Mr. Austen's
decision: 'You know all about these sort of things. Do tell us. Is
Paris in France, or France in Paris? for my wife has been disputing with
me about it.' The same gentleman, narrating some conversation which he
had heard between the rector and his wife, represented the latter as
beginning her reply to her husband with a round oath; and when his
daughter called him to task, reminding him that Mrs. Austen never swore,
he replied, 'Now, Betty, why do you pull me up for nothing? that's
neither here nor there; you know very well that's only _my way of telling
the story_.' Attention has lately been called by a celebrated writer to
the inferiority of the clergy to the laity of England two centuries ago.
The charge no doubt is true, if the rural clergy are to be compared with
that higher section of country gentlemen who went into parliament, and
mixed in London society, and took the lead in their several counties; but
it might be found less true if they were to be compared, as in all
fairness they ought to be, with that lower section with whom they usually
associated. The smaller landed proprietors, who seldom went farther from
home than their county town, from the squire with his thousand acres to
the yeoman who cultivated his hereditary property of one or two hundred,
then formed a numerous class--each the aristocrat of his own parish; and
there was probably a greater difference in manners and refinement between
this class and that immediately above them than could now be found
between any two persons who rank as gentlemen. For in the progress of
civilisation, though all orders may make some progress, yet it is most
perceptible in the lower. It is a process of 'levelling up;' the rear
rank 'dressing up,' as it were, close to the front rank. When Hamlet
mentions, as something which he had 'for _three years taken_ note of,'
that 'the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier,' it
was probably intended by Shakspeare as a satire on his own times; but it
expressed a principle which is working at all times in which society
makes any progress. I believe that a century ago the improvement in most
country parishes began with the clergy; and that in those days a rector
who chanced to be a gentleman and a scholar found himself superior to his
chief parishioners in information and manners, and became a sort of
centre of refinement and politeness.
Mr. Austen was a remarkably good-looking man, both in his youth and his
old age. During his year of office at Oxford he had been called the
'handsome Proctor;' and at Bath, when more than seventy years old, he
attracted observation by his fine features and abundance of snow-white
hair. Being a good scholar he was able to prepare two of his sons for
the University, and to direct the studies of his other children, whether
sons or daughters, as well as to increase his income by taking pupils.
In Mrs. Austen also was to be found the germ of much of the ability which
was concentrated in Jane, but of which others of her children had a
share. She united strong common sense with a lively imagination, and
often expressed herself, both in writing and in conversation, with
epigrammatic force and point. She lived, like many of her family, to an
advanced age. During the last years of her life she endured continual
pain, not only patiently but with characteristic cheerfulness. She once
said to me, 'Ah, my dear, you find me just where you left me--on the
sofa. I sometimes think that God Almighty must have forgotten me; but I
dare say He will come for me in His own good time.' She died and was
buried at Chawton, January 1827, aged eighty-eight.
* * * * *
Her own family were so much, and the rest of the world so little, to Jane
Austen, that some brief mention of her brothers and sister is necessary
in order to give any idea of the objects which principally occupied her
thoughts and filled her heart, especially as some of them, from their
characters or professions in life, may be supposed to have had more or
less influence on her writings: though I feel some reluctance in bringing
before public notice persons and circumstances essentially private.
Her eldest brother James, my own father, had, when a very young man, at
St. John's College, Oxford, been the originator and chief supporter of a
periodical paper called 'The Loiterer,' written somewhat on the plan of
the 'Spectator' and its successors, but nearly confined to subjects
connected with the University. In after life he used to speak very
slightingly of this early work, which he had the better right to do, as,
whatever may have been the degree of their merits, the best papers had
certainly been written by himself. He was well read in English
literature, had a correct taste, and wrote readily and happily, both in
prose and verse. He was more than ten years older than Jane, and had, I
believe, a large share in directing her reading and forming her taste.
Her second brother, Edward, had been a good deal separated from the rest
of the family, as he was early adopted by his cousin, Mr. Knight, of
Godmersham Park in Kent and Chawton House in Hampshire; and finally came
into possession both of the property and the name. But though a good
deal separated in childhood, they were much together in after life, and
Jane gave a large share of her affections to him and his children. Mr.
Knight was not only a very amiable man, kind and indulgent to all
connected with him, but possessed also a spirit of fun and liveliness,
which made him especially delightful to all young people.
Her third brother, Henry, had great conversational powers, and inherited
from his father an eager and sanguine disposition. He was a very
entertaining companion, but had perhaps less steadiness of purpose,
certainly less success in life, than his brothers. He became a clergyman
when middle-aged; and an allusion to his sermons will be found in one of
Jane's letters. At one time he resided in London, and was useful in
transacting his sister's business with her publishers.
Her two youngest brothers, Francis and Charles, were sailors during that
glorious period of the British navy which comprises the close of the last
and the beginning of the present century, when it was impossible for an
officer to be almost always afloat, as these brothers were, without
seeing service which, in these days, would be considered distinguished.
Accordingly, they were continually engaged in actions of more or less
importance, and sometimes gained promotion by their success. Both rose
to the rank of Admiral, and carried out their flags to distant stations.
Francis lived to attain the very summit of his profession, having died,
in his ninety-third year, G.C.B. and Senior Admiral of the Fleet, in
1865. He possessed great firmness of character, with a strong sense of
duty, whether due from himself to others, or from others to himself. He
was consequently a strict disciplinarian; but, as he was a very religious
man, it was remarked of him (for in those days, at least, it was
remarkable) that he maintained this discipline without ever uttering an
oath or permitting one in his presence. On one occasion, when ashore in
a seaside town, he was spoken of as '_the_ officer who kneeled at
church;' a custom which now happily would not be thought peculiar.
Charles was generally serving in frigates or sloops; blockading harbours,
driving the ships of the enemy ashore, boarding gun-boats, and frequently
making small prizes. At one time he was absent from England on such
services for seven years together. In later life he commanded the
Bellerophon, at the bombardment of St. Jean d'Acre in 1840. In 1850 he
went out in the Hastings, in command of the East India and China station,
but on the breaking out of the Burmese war he transferred his flag to a
steam sloop, for the purpose of getting up the shallow waters of the
Irrawaddy, on board of which he died of cholera in 1852, in the seventy-
fourth year of his age. His sweet temper and affectionate disposition,
in which he resembled his sister Jane, had secured to him an unusual
portion of attachment, not only from his own family, but from all the
officers and common sailors who served under him. One who was with him
at his death has left this record of him: 'Our good Admiral won the
hearts of all by his gentleness and kindness while he was struggling with
disease, and endeavouring to do his duty as Commander-in-chief of the
British naval forces in these waters. His death was a great grief to the
whole fleet. I know that I cried bitterly when I found he was dead.' The
Order in Council of the Governor-General of India, Lord Dalhousie,
expresses 'admiration of the staunch high spirit which, notwithstanding
his age and previous sufferings, had led the Admiral to take his part in
the trying service which has closed his career.'
These two brothers have been dwelt on longer than the others because
their honourable career accounts for Jane Austen's partiality for the
Navy, as well as for the readiness and accuracy with which she wrote
about it. She was always very careful not to meddle with matters which
she did not thoroughly understand. She never touched upon politics, law,
or medicine, subjects which some novel writers have ventured on rather
too boldly, and have treated, perhaps, with more brilliancy than
accuracy. But with ships and sailors she felt herself at home, or at
least could always trust to a brotherly critic to keep her right. I
believe that no flaw has ever been found in her seamanship either in
'Mansfield Park' or in 'Persuasion.'
But dearest of all to the heart of Jane was her sister Cassandra, about
three years her senior. Their sisterly affection for each other could
scarcely be exceeded. Perhaps it began on Jane's side with the feeling
of deference natural to a loving child towards a kind elder sister.
Something of this feeling always remained; and even in the maturity of
her powers, and in the enjoyment of increasing success, she would still
speak of Cassandra as of one wiser and better than herself. In
childhood, when the elder was sent to the school of a Mrs. Latournelle,
in the Forbury at Reading, the younger went with her, not because she was
thought old enough to profit much by the instruction there imparted, but
because she would have been miserable without her sister; her mother
observing that 'if Cassandra were going to have her head cut off, Jane
would insist on sharing her fate.' This attachment was never interrupted
or weakened. They lived in the same home, and shared the same bed-room,
till separated by death. They were not exactly alike. Cassandra's was
the colder and calmer disposition; she was always prudent and well
judging, but with less outward demonstration of feeling and less
sunniness of temper than Jane possessed. It was remarked in her family
that 'Cassandra had the _merit_ of having her temper always under
command, but that Jane had the _happiness_ of a temper that never
required to be commanded.' When 'Sense and Sensibility' came out, some
persons, who knew the family slightly, surmised that the two elder Miss
Dashwoods were intended by the author for her sister and herself; but
this could not be the case. Cassandra's character might indeed represent
the '_sense_' of Elinor, but Jane's had little in common with the
'_sensibility_' of Marianne. The young woman who, before the age of
twenty, could so clearly discern the failings of Marianne Dashwood, could
hardly have been subject to them herself.
This was the small circle, continually enlarged, however, by the
increasing families of four of her brothers, within which Jane Austen
found her wholesome pleasures, duties, and interests, and beyond which
she went very little into society during the last ten years of her life.
There was so much that was agreeable and attractive in this family party
that its members may be excused if they were inclined to live somewhat
too exclusively within it. They might see in each other much to love and
esteem, and something to admire. The family talk had abundance of spirit
and vivacity, and was never troubled by disagreements even in little
matters, for it was not their habit to dispute or argue with each other:
above all, there was strong family affection and firm union, never to be
broken but by death. It cannot be doubted that all this had its
influence on the author in the construction of her stories, in which a
family party usually supplies the narrow stage, while the interest is
made to revolve round a few actors.
It will be seen also that though her circle of society was small, yet she
found in her neighbourhood persons of good taste and cultivated minds.
Her acquaintance, in fact, constituted the very class from which she took
her imaginary characters, ranging from the member of parliament, or large
landed proprietor, to the young curate or younger midshipman of equally
good family; and I think that the influence of these early associations
may be traced in her writings, especially in two particulars. First,
that she is entirely free from the vulgarity, which is so offensive in
some novels, of dwelling on the outward appendages of wealth or rank, as
if they were things to which the writer was unaccustomed; and, secondly,
that she deals as little with very low as with very high stations in
life. She does not go lower than the Miss Steeles, Mrs. Elton, and John
Thorpe, people of bad taste and underbred manners, such as are actually
found sometimes mingling with better society. She has nothing resembling
the Brangtons, or Mr. Dubster and his friend Tom Hicks, with whom Madame
D'Arblay loved to season her stories, and to produce striking contrasts
to her well bred characters.
[Steventon Parsonage: Parsonage.jpg]
CHAPTER II.
_Description of Steventon--Life at Steventon--Changes of Habits and
Customs in the last Century_.
As the first twenty-five years, more than half of the brief life of Jane
Austen, were spent in the parsonage of Steventon, some description of
that place ought to be given. Steventon is a small rural village upon
the chalk hills of north Hants, situated in a winding valley about seven
miles from Basingstoke. The South-Western railway crosses it by a short
embankment, and, as it curves round, presents a good view of it on the
left hand to those who are travelling down the line, about three miles
before entering the tunnel under Popham Beacon. It may be known to some
sportsmen, as lying in one of the best portions of the Vine Hunt. It is
certainly not a picturesque country; it presents no grand or extensive
views; but the features are small rather than plain. The surface
continually swells and sinks, but the hills are not bold, nor the valleys
deep; and though it is sufficiently well clothed with woods and
hedgerows, yet the poverty of the soil in most places prevents the timber
from attaining a large size. Still it has its beauties. The lanes wind
along in a natural curve, continually fringed with irregular borders of
native turf, and lead to pleasant nooks and corners. One who knew and
loved it well very happily expressed its quiet charms, when he wrote
True taste is not fastidious, nor rejects,
Because they may not come within the rule
Of composition pure and picturesque,
Unnumbered simple scenes which fill the leaves
Of Nature's sketch book.
Of this somewhat tame country, Steventon, from the fall of the ground,
and the abundance of its timber, is certainly one of the prettiest spots;
yet one cannot be surprised that, when Jane's mother, a little before her
marriage, was shown the scenery of her future home, she should have
thought it unattractive, compared with the broad river, the rich valley,
and the noble hills which she had been accustomed to behold at her native
home near Henley-upon-Thames.
The house itself stood in a shallow valley, surrounded by sloping
meadows, well sprinkled with elm trees, at the end of a small village of
cottages, each well provided with a garden, scattered about prettily on
either side of the road. It was sufficiently commodious to hold pupils
in addition to a growing family, and was in those times considered to be
above the average of parsonages; but the rooms were finished with less
elegance than would now be found in the most ordinary dwellings. No
cornice marked the junction of wall and ceiling; while the beams which
supported the upper floors projected into the rooms below in all their
naked simplicity, covered only by a coat of paint or whitewash:
accordingly it has since been considered unworthy of being the Rectory
house of a family living, and about forty-five years ago it was pulled
down for the purpose of erecting a new house in a far better situation on
the opposite side of the valley.
North of the house, the road from Deane to Popham Lane ran at a
sufficient distance from the front to allow a carriage drive, through
turf and trees. On the south side the ground rose gently, and was
occupied by one of those old-fashioned gardens in which vegetables and
flowers are combined, flanked and protected on the east by one of the
thatched mud walls common in that country, and overshadowed by fine elms.
Along the upper or southern side of this garden, ran a terrace of the
finest turf, which must have been in the writer's thoughts when she
described Catharine Morland's childish delight in 'rolling down the green
slope at the back of the house.'
But the chief beauty of Steventon consisted in its hedgerows. A
hedgerow, in that country, does not mean a thin formal line of quickset,
but an irregular border of copse-wood and timber, often wide enough to
contain within it a winding footpath, or a rough cart track. Under its
shelter the earliest primroses, anemones, and wild hyacinths were to be
found; sometimes, the first bird's-nest; and, now and then, the unwelcome
adder. Two such hedgerows radiated, as it were, from the parsonage
garden. One, a continuation of the turf terrace, proceeded westward,
forming the southern boundary of the home meadows; and was formed into a
rustic shrubbery, with occasional seats, entitled 'The Wood Walk.' The
other ran straight up the hill, under the name of 'The Church Walk,'
because it led to the parish church, as well as to a fine old
manor-house, of Henry VIII.'s time, occupied by a family named Digweed,
who have for more than a century rented it, together with the chief farm
in the parish. The church itself--I speak of it as it then was, before
the improvements made by the present rector--
A little spireless fane,
Just seen above the woody lane,
might have appeared mean and uninteresting to an ordinary observer; but
the adept in church architecture would have known that it must have stood
there some seven centuries, and would have found beauty in the very
narrow early English windows, as well as in the general proportions of
its little chancel; while its solitary position, far from the hum of the
village, and within sight of no habitation, except a glimpse of the gray
manor-house through its circling screen of sycamores, has in it something
solemn and appropriate to the last resting-place of the silent dead.
Sweet violets, both purple and white, grow in abundance beneath its south
wall. One may imagine for how many centuries the ancestors of those
little flowers have occupied that undisturbed, sunny nook, and may think
how few living families can boast of as ancient a tenure of their land.
Large elms protrude their rough branches; old hawthorns shed their annual
blossoms over the graves; and the hollow yew-tree must be at least coeval
with the church.
[Steventon Manor House: ManorHouse.jpg]
But whatever may be the beauties or defects of the surrounding scenery,
this was the residence of Jane Austen for twenty-five years. This was
the cradle of her genius. These were the first objects which inspired
her young heart with a sense of the beauties of nature. In strolls along
those wood-walks, thick-coming fancies rose in her mind, and gradually
assumed the forms in which they came forth to the world. In that simple
church she brought them all into subjection to the piety which ruled her
in life, and supported her in death.
The home at Steventon must have been, for many years, a pleasant and
prosperous one. The family was unbroken by death, and seldom visited by
sorrow. Their situation had some peculiar advantages beyond those of
ordinary rectories. Steventon was a family living. Mr. Knight, the
patron, was also proprietor of nearly the whole parish. He never resided
there, and consequently the rector and his children came to be regarded
in the neighbourhood as a kind of representatives of the family. They
shared with the principal tenant the command of an excellent manor, and
enjoyed, in this reflected way, some of the consideration usually awarded
to landed proprietors. They were not rich, but, aided by Mr. Austen's
powers of teaching, they had enough to afford a good education to their
sons and daughters, to mix in the best society of the neighbourhood, and
to exercise a liberal hospitality to their own relations and friends. A
carriage and a pair of horses were kept. This might imply a higher style
of living in our days than it did in theirs. There were then no assessed
taxes. The carriage, once bought, entailed little further expense; and
the horses probably, like Mr. Bennet's, were often employed on farm work.
Moreover, it should be remembered that a pair of horses in those days
were almost necessary, if ladies were to move about at all; for neither
the condition of the roads nor the style of carriage-building admitted of
any comfortable vehicle being drawn by a single horse. When one looks at
the few specimens still remaining of coach-building in the last century,
it strikes one that the chief object of the builders must have been to
combine the greatest possible weight with the least possible amount of
accommodation.
The family lived in close intimacy with two cousins, Edward and Jane
Cooper, the children of Mrs. Austen's eldest sister, and Dr. Cooper, the
vicar of Sonning, near Reading. The Coopers lived for some years at
Bath, which seems to have been much frequented in those days by clergymen
retiring from work. I believe that Cassandra and Jane sometimes visited
them there, and that Jane thus acquired the intimate knowledge of the
topography and customs of Bath, which enabled her to write 'Northanger
Abbey' long before she resided there herself. After the death of their
own parents, the two young Coopers paid long visits at Steventon. Edward
Cooper did not live undistinguished. When an undergraduate at Oxford, he
gained the prize for Latin hexameters on 'Hortus Anglicus' in 1791; and
in later life he was known by a work on prophecy, called 'The Crisis,'
and other religious publications, especially for several volumes of
Sermons, much preached in many pulpits in my youth. Jane Cooper was
married from her uncle's house at Steventon, to Captain, afterwards Sir
Thomas Williams, under whom Charles Austen served in several ships. She
was a dear friend of her namesake, but was fated to become a cause of
great sorrow to her, for a few years after the marriage she was suddenly
killed by an accident to her carriage.
There was another cousin closely associated with them at Steventon, who
must have introduced greater variety into the family circle. This was
the daughter of Mr. Austen's only sister, Mrs. Hancock. This cousin had
been educated in Paris, and married to a Count de Feuillade, of whom I
know little more than that he perished by the guillotine during the
French Revolution. Perhaps his chief offence was his rank; but it was
said that the charge of 'incivism,' under which he suffered, rested on
the fact of his having laid down some arable land into pasture--a sure
sign of his intention to embarrass the Republican Government by producing
a famine! His wife escaped through dangers and difficulties to England,
was received for some time into her uncle's family, and finally married
her cousin Henry Austen. During the short peace of Amiens, she and her
second husband went to France, in the hope of recovering some of the
Count's property, and there narrowly escaped being included amongst the
_detenus_. Orders had been given by Buonaparte's government to detain
all English travellers, but at the post-houses Mrs. Henry Austen gave the
necessary orders herself, and her French was so perfect that she passed
everywhere for a native, and her husband escaped under this protection.
She was a clever woman, and highly accomplished, after the French rather
than the English mode; and in those days, when intercourse with the
Continent was long interrupted by war, such an element in the society of
a country parsonage must have been a rare acquisition. The sisters may
have been more indebted to this cousin than to Mrs. La Tournelle's
teaching for the considerable knowledge of French which they possessed.
She also took the principal parts in the private theatricals in which the
family several times indulged, having their summer theatre in the barn,
and their winter one within the narrow limits of the dining-room, where
the number of the audience must have been very limited. On these
occasions, the prologues and epilogues were written by Jane's eldest
brother, and some of them are very vigorous and amusing. Jane was only
twelve years old at the time of the earliest of these representations,
and not more than fifteen when the last took place. She was, however, an
early observer, and it may be reasonably supposed that some of the
incidents and feelings which are so vividly painted in the Mansfield Park
theatricals are due to her recollections of these entertainments.
Some time before they left Steventon, one great affliction came upon the
family. Cassandra was engaged to be married to a young clergyman. He
had not sufficient private fortune to permit an immediate union; but the
engagement was not likely to be a hopeless or a protracted one, for he
had a prospect of early preferment from a nobleman with whom he was
connected both by birth and by personal friendship. He accompanied this
friend to the West Indies, as chaplain to his regiment, and there died of
yellow fever, to the great concern of his friend and patron, who
afterwards declared that, if he had known of the engagement, he would not
have permitted him to go out to such a climate. This little domestic
tragedy caused great and lasting grief to the principal sufferer, and
could not but cast a gloom over the whole party. The sympathy of Jane
was probably, from her age, and her peculiar attachment to her sister,
the deepest of all.
Of Jane herself I know of no such definite tale of love to relate. Her
reviewer in the 'Quarterly' of January 1821 observes, concerning the
attachment of Fanny Price to Edmund Bertram: 'The silence in which this
passion is cherished, the slender hopes and enjoyments by which it is
fed, the restlessness and jealousy with which it fills a mind naturally
active, contented, and unsuspicious, the manner in which it tinges every
event, and every reflection, are painted with a vividness and a detail of
which we can scarcely conceive any one but a female, and we should almost
add, a female writing from recollection, capable.' This conjecture,
however probable, was wide of the mark. The picture was drawn from the
intuitive perceptions of genius, not from personal experience. In no
circumstance of her life was there any similarity between herself and her
heroine in 'Mansfield Park.' She did not indeed pass through life
without being the object of warm affection. In her youth she had
declined the addresses of a gentleman who had the recommendations of good
character, and connections, and position in life, of everything, in fact,
except the subtle power of touching her heart. There is, however, one
passage of romance in her history with which I am imperfectly acquainted,
and to which I am unable to assign name, or date, or place, though I have
it on sufficient authority. Many years after her death, some
circumstances induced her sister Cassandra to break through her habitual
reticence, and to speak of it. She said that, while staying at some
seaside place, they became acquainted with a gentleman, whose charm of
person, mind, and manners was such that Cassandra thought him worthy to
possess and likely to win her sister's love. When they parted, he
expressed his intention of soon seeing them again; and Cassandra felt no
doubt as to his motives. But they never again met. Within a short time
they heard of his sudden death. I believe that, if Jane ever loved, it
was this unnamed gentleman; but the acquaintance had been short, and I am
unable to say whether her feelings were of such a nature as to affect her
happiness.
Any description that I might attempt of the family life at Steventon,
which closed soon after I was born, could be little better than a fancy-
piece. There is no doubt that if we could look into the households of
the clergy and the small gentry of that period, we should see some things
which would seem strange to us, and should miss many more to which we are
accustomed. Every hundred years, and especially a century like the last,
marked by an extraordinary advance in wealth, luxury, and refinement of
taste, as well as in the mechanical arts which embellish our houses, must
produce a great change in their aspect. These changes are always at
work; they are going on now, but so silently that we take no note of
them. Men soon forget the small objects which they leave behind them as
they drift down the stream of life. As Pope says--
Nor does life's stream for observation stay;
It hurries all too fast to mark their way.
Important inventions, such as the applications of steam, gas, and
electricity, may find their places in history; but not so the
alterations, great as they may be, which have taken place in the
appearance of our dining and drawing-rooms. Who can now record the
degrees by which the custom prevalent in my youth of asking each other to
take wine together at dinner became obsolete? Who will be able to fix,
twenty years hence, the date when our dinners began to be carved and
handed round by servants, instead of smoking before our eyes and noses on
the table? To record such little matters would indeed be 'to chronicle
small beer.' But, in a slight memoir like this, I may be allowed to note
some of those changes in social habits which give a colour to history,
but which the historian has the greatest difficulty in recovering.
At that time the dinner-table presented a far less splendid appearance
than it does now. It was appropriated to solid food, rather than to
flowers, fruits, and decorations. Nor was there much glitter of plate
upon it; for the early dinner hour rendered candlesticks unnecessary, and
silver forks had not come into general use: while the broad rounded end
of the knives indicated the substitute generally used instead of them.
{31}
The dinners too were more homely, though not less plentiful and savoury;
and the bill of fare in one house would not be so like that in another as
it is now, for family receipts were held in high estimation. A
grandmother of culinary talent could bequeath to her descendant fame for
some particular dish, and might influence the family dinner for many
generations.
Dos est magna parentium
Virtus.
One house would pride itself on its ham, another on its game-pie, and a
third on its superior furmity, or tansey-pudding. Beer and home-made
wines, especially mead, were more largely consumed. Vegetables were less
plentiful and less various. Potatoes were used, but not so abundantly as
now; and there was an idea that they were to be eaten only with roast
meat. They were novelties to a tenant's wife who was entertained at
Steventon Parsonage, certainly less than a hundred years ago; and when
Mrs. Austen advised her to plant them in her own garden, she replied,
'No, no; they are very well for you gentry, but they must be terribly
_costly to rear_.'
But a still greater difference would be found in the furniture of the
rooms, which would appear to us lamentably scanty. There was a general
deficiency of carpeting in sitting-rooms, bed-rooms, and passages. A
pianoforte, or rather a spinnet or harpsichord, was by no means a
necessary appendage. It was to be found only where there was a decided
taste for music, not so common then as now, or in such great houses as
would probably contain a billiard-table. There would often be but one
sofa in the house, and that a stiff, angular, uncomfortable article.
There were no deep easy-chairs, nor other appliances for lounging; for to
lie down, or even to lean back, was a luxury permitted only to old
persons or invalids. It was said of a nobleman, a personal friend of
George III. and a model gentleman of his day, that he would have made the
tour of Europe without ever touching the back of his travelling carriage.
But perhaps we should be most struck with the total absence of those
elegant little articles which now embellish and encumber our drawing-room
tables. We should miss the sliding bookcases and picture-stands, the
letter-weighing machines and envelope cases, the periodicals and
illustrated newspapers--above all, the countless swarm of photograph
books which now threaten to swallow up all space. A small writing-desk,
with a smaller work-box, or netting-case, was all that each young lady
contributed to occupy the table; for the large family work-basket, though
often produced in the parlour, lived in the closet.
There must have been more dancing throughout the country in those days
than there is now: and it seems to have sprung up more spontaneously, as
if it were a natural production, with less fastidiousness as to the
quality of music, lights, and floor. Many country towns had a monthly
ball throughout the winter, in some of which the same apartment served
for dancing and tea-room. Dinner parties more frequently ended with an
extempore dance on the carpet, to the music of a harpsichord in the
house, or a fiddle from the village. This was always supposed to be for
the entertainment of the young people, but many, who had little
pretension to youth, were very ready to join in it. There can be no
doubt that Jane herself enjoyed dancing, for she attributes this taste to
her favourite heroines; in most of her works, a ball or a private dance
is mentioned, and made of importance.
Many things connected with the ball-rooms of those days have now passed
into oblivion. The barbarous law which confined the lady to one partner
throughout the evening must indeed have been abolished before Jane went
to balls. It must be observed, however, that this custom was in one
respect advantageous to the gentleman, inasmuch as it rendered his duties
more practicable. He was bound to call upon his partner the next
morning, and it must have been convenient to have only one lady for whom
he was obliged
To gallop all the country over,
The last night's partner to behold,
And humbly hope she caught no cold.
But the stately minuet still reigned supreme; and every regular ball
commenced with it. It was a slow and solemn movement, expressive of
grace and dignity, rather than of merriment. It abounded in formal bows
and courtesies, with measured paces, forwards, backwards and sideways,
and many complicated gyrations. It was executed by one lady and
gentleman, amidst the admiration, or the criticism, of surrounding
spectators. In its earlier and most palmy days, as when Sir Charles and
Lady Grandison delighted the company by dancing it at their own wedding,
the gentleman wore a dress sword, and the lady was armed with a fan of
nearly equal dimensions. Addison observes that 'women are armed with
fans, as men with swords, and sometimes do more execution with them.' The
graceful carriage of each weapon was considered a test of high breeding.
The clownish man was in danger of being tripped up by his sword getting
between his legs: the fan held clumsily looked more of a burden than an
ornament; while in the hands of an adept it could be made to speak a
language of its own. {35} It was not everyone who felt qualified to make
this public exhibition, and I have been told that those ladies who
intended to dance minuets, used to distinguish themselves from others by
wearing a particular kind of lappet on their head-dress. I have heard
also of another curious proof of the respect in which this dance was
held. Gloves immaculately clean were considered requisite for its due
performance, while gloves a little soiled were thought good enough for a
country dance; and accordingly some prudent ladies provided themselves
with two pairs for their several purposes. The minuet expired with the
last century: but long after it had ceased to be danced publicly it was
taught to boys and girls, in order to give them a graceful carriage.
Hornpipes, cotillons, and reels, were occasionally danced; but the chief
occupation of the evening was the interminable country dance, in which
all could join. This dance presented a great show of enjoyment, but it
was not without its peculiar troubles. The ladies and gentlemen were
ranged apart from each other in opposite rows, so that the facilities for
flirtation, or interesting intercourse, were not so great as might have
been desired by both parties. Much heart-burning and discontent
sometimes arose as to _who_ should stand above _whom_, and especially as
to who was entitled to the high privilege of calling and leading off the
first dance: and no little indignation was felt at the lower end of the
room when any of the leading couples retired prematurely from their
duties, and did not condescend to dance up and down the whole set. We
may rejoice that these causes of irritation no longer exist; and that if
such feelings as jealousy, rivalry, and discontent ever touch celestial
bosoms in the modern ball-room they must arise from different and more
recondite sources.
I am tempted to add a little about the difference of personal habits. It
may be asserted as a general truth, that less was left to the charge and
discretion of servants, and more was done, or superintended, by the
masters and mistresses. With regard to the mistresses, it is, I believe,
generally understood, that at the time to which I refer, a hundred years
ago, they took a personal part in the higher branches of cookery, as well
as in the concoction of home-made wines, and distilling of herbs for
domestic medicines, which are nearly allied to the same art. Ladies did
not disdain to spin the thread of which the household linen was woven.
Some ladies liked to wash with their own hands their choice china after
breakfast or tea. In one of my earliest child's books, a little girl,
the daughter of a gentleman, is taught by her mother to make her own bed
before leaving her chamber. It was not so much that they had not
servants to do all these things for them, as that they took an interest
in such occupations. And it must be borne in mind how many sources of
interest enjoyed by this generation were then closed, or very scantily
opened to ladies. A very small minority of them cared much for
literature or science. Music was not a very common, and drawing was a
still rarer, accomplishment; needlework, in some form or other, was their
chief sedentary employment.
But I doubt whether the rising generation are equally aware how much
gentlemen also did for themselves in those times, and whether some things
that I can mention will not be a surprise to them. Two homely proverbs
were held in higher estimation in my early days than they are now--'The
master's eye makes the horse fat;' and, 'If you would be well served,
serve yourself.' Some gentlemen took pleasure in being their own
gardeners, performing all the scientific, and some of the manual, work
themselves. Well-dressed young men of my acquaintance, who had their
coat from a London tailor, would always brush their evening suit
themselves, rather than entrust it to the carelessness of a rough
servant, and to the risks of dirt and grease in the kitchen; for in those
days servants' halls were not common in the houses of the clergy and the
smaller country gentry. It was quite natural that Catherine Morland
should have contrasted the magnificence of the offices at Northanger
Abbey with the few shapeless pantries in her father's parsonage. A young
man who expected to have his things packed or unpacked for him by a
servant, when he travelled, would have been thought exceptionally fine,
or exceptionally lazy. When my uncle undertook to teach me to shoot, his
first lesson was how to clean my own gun. It was thought meritorious on
the evening of a hunting day, to turn out after dinner, lanthorn in hand,
and visit the stable, to ascertain that the horse had been well cared
for. This was of the more importance, because, previous to the
introduction of clipping, about the year 1820, it was a difficult and
tedious work to make a long-coated hunter dry and comfortable, and was
often very imperfectly done. Of course, such things were not practised
by those who had gamekeepers, and stud-grooms, and plenty of well-trained
servants; but they were practised by many who were unequivocally
gentlemen, and whose grandsons, occupying the same position in life, may
perhaps be astonished at being told that '_such things were_.'
I have drawn pictures for which my own experience, or what I heard from
others in my youth, have supplied the materials. Of course, they cannot
be universally applicable. Such details varied in various circles, and
were changed very gradually; nor can I pretend to tell how much of what I
have said is descriptive of the family life at Steventon in Jane Austen's
youth. I am sure that the ladies there had nothing to do with the
mysteries of the stew-pot or the preserving-pan; but it is probable that
their way of life differed a little from ours, and would have appeared to
us more homely. It may be that useful articles, which would not now be
produced in drawing-rooms, were hemmed, and marked, and darned in the old-
fashioned parlour. But all this concerned only the outer life; there was
as much cultivation and refinement of mind as now, with probably more
studied courtesy and ceremony of manner to visitors; whilst certainly in
that family literary pursuits were not neglected.
I remember to have heard of only two little things different from modern
customs. One was, that on hunting mornings the young men usually took
their hasty breakfast in the kitchen. The early hour at which hounds
then met may account for this; and probably the custom began, if it did
not end, when they were boys; for they hunted at an early age, in a
scrambling sort of way, upon any pony or donkey that they could procure,
or, in default of such luxuries, on foot. I have been told that Sir
Francis Austen, when seven years old, bought on his own account, it must
be supposed with his father's permission, a pony for a guinea and a half;
and after riding him with great success for two seasons, sold him for a
guinea more. One may wonder how the child could have so much money, and
how the animal could have been obtained for so little. The same
authority informs me that his first cloth suit was made from a scarlet
habit, which, according to the fashion of the times, had been his
mother's usual morning dress. If all this is true, the future admiral of
the British Fleet must have cut a conspicuous figure in the
hunting-field. The other peculiarity was that, when the roads were
dirty, the sisters took long walks in pattens. This defence against wet
and dirt is now seldom seen. The few that remain are banished from good
society, and employed only in menial work; but a hundred and fifty years
ago they were celebrated in poetry, and considered so clever a
contrivance that Gay, in his 'Trivia,' ascribes the invention to a god
stimulated by his passion for a mortal damsel, and derives the name
'Patten' from 'Patty.'
The patten now supports each frugal dame,
Which from the blue-eyed Patty takes the name.
But mortal damsels have long ago discarded the clumsy implement. First
it dropped its iron ring and became a clog; afterwards it was fined down
into the pliant galoshe--lighter to wear and more effectual to protect--a
no less manifest instance of gradual improvement than Cowper indicates
when he traces through eighty lines of poetry his 'accomplished sofa'
back to the original three-legged stool.
As an illustration of the purposes which a patten was intended to serve,
I add the following epigram, written by Jane Austen's uncle, Mr. Leigh
Perrot, on reading in a newspaper the marriage of Captain Foote to Miss
Patten:--
Through the rough paths of life, with a patten your guard,
May you safely and pleasantly jog;
May the knot never slip, nor the ring press too hard,
Nor the _Foot_ find the _Patten_ a clog.
At the time when Jane Austen lived at Steventon, a work was carried on in
the neighbouring cottages which ought to be recorded, because it has long
ceased to exist.
Up to the beginning of the present century, poor women found profitable
employment in spinning flax or wool. This was a better occupation for
them than straw plaiting, inasmuch as it was carried on at the family
hearth, and did not admit of gadding and gossiping about the village. The
implement used was a long narrow machine of wood, raised on legs,
furnished at one end with a large wheel, and at the other with a spindle
on which the flax or wool was loosely wrapped, connected together by a
loop of string. One hand turned the wheel, while the other formed the
thread. The outstretched arms, the advanced foot, the sway of the whole
figure backwards and forwards, produced picturesque attitudes, and
displayed whatever of grace or beauty the work-woman might possess. {41}
Some ladies were fond of spinning, but they worked in a quieter manner,
sitting at a neat little machine of varnished wood, like Tunbridge ware,
generally turned by the foot, with a basin of water at hand to supply the
moisture required for forming the thread, which the cottager took by a
more direct and natural process from her own mouth. I remember two such
elegant little wheels in our own family.
It may be observed that this hand-spinning is the most primitive of
female accomplishments, and can be traced back to the earliest times.
Ballad poetry and fairy tales are full of allusions to it. The term
'spinster' still testifies to its having been the ordinary employment of
the English young woman. It was the labour assigned to the ejected nuns
by the rough earl who said, 'Go spin, ye jades, go spin.' It was the
employment at which Roman matrons and Grecian princesses presided amongst
their handmaids. Heathen mythology celebrated it in the three Fates
spinning and measuring out the thread of human life. Holy Scripture
honours it in those 'wise-hearted women' who 'did spin with their hands,
and brought that which they had spun' for the construction of the
Tabernacle in the wilderness: and an old English proverb carries it still
farther back to the time 'when Adam delved and Eve span.' But, at last,
this time-honoured domestic manufacture is quite extinct amongst
us--crushed by the power of steam, overborne by a countless host of
spinning jennies, and I can only just remember some of its last struggles
for existence in the Steventon cottages.
CHAPTER III.
_Early Compositions--Friends at Ashe--A very old Letter--Lines on the
Death of Mrs. Lefroy--Observations on Jane Austen's
Letter-writing--Letters_.
I know little of Jane Austen's childhood. Her mother followed a custom,
not unusual in those days, though it seems strange to us, of putting out
her babies to be nursed in a cottage in the village. The infant was
daily visited by one or both of its parents, and frequently brought to
them at the parsonage, but the cottage was its home, and must have
remained so till it was old enough to run about and talk; for I know that
one of them, in after life, used to speak of his foster mother as
'Movie,' the name by which he had called her in his infancy. It may be
that the contrast between the parsonage house and the best class of
cottages was not quite so extreme then as it would be now, that the one
was somewhat less luxurious, and the other less squalid. It would
certainly seem from the results that it was a wholesome and invigorating
system, for the children were all strong and healthy. Jane was probably
treated like the rest in this respect. In childhood every available
opportunity of instruction was made use of. According to the ideas of
the time, she was well educated, though not highly accomplished, and she
certainly enjoyed that important element of mental training, associating
at home with persons of cultivated intellect. It cannot be doubted that
her early years were bright and happy, living, as she did, with indulgent
parents, in a cheerful home, not without agreeable variety of society. To
these sources of enjoyment must be added the first stirrings of talent
within her, and the absorbing interest of original composition. It is
impossible to say at how early an age she began to write. There are copy
books extant containing tales some of which must have been composed while
she was a young girl, as they had amounted to a considerable number by
the time she was sixteen. Her earliest stories are of a slight and
flimsy texture, and are generally intended to be nonsensical, but the
nonsense has much spirit in it. They are usually preceded by a
dedication of mock solemnity to some one of her family. It would seem
that the grandiloquent dedications prevalent in those days had not
escaped her youthful penetration. Perhaps the most characteristic
feature in these early productions is that, however puerile the matter,
they are always composed in pure simple English, quite free from the over-
ornamented style which might be expected from so young a writer. One of
her juvenile effusions is given, as a specimen of the kind of transitory
amusement which Jane was continually supplying to the family party.
THE MYSTERY.
AN UNFINISHED COMEDY.
DEDICATION.
TO THE REV. GEORGE AUSTEN.
SIR,--I humbly solicit your patronage to the following Comedy, which,
though an unfinished one, is, I flatter myself, as complete a _Mystery_
as any of its kind.
I am, Sir, your most humble Servant,
THE AUTHOR.
THE MYSTERY, A COMEDY.
_DRAMATIS PERSONAE_.
_Men_. _Women_.
Col. ELLIOTT. FANNY ELLIOTT.
OLD HUMBUG. Mrs. HUMBUG
YOUNG HUMBUG. _and_
Sir Edward Spangle Daphne.
and
Corydon.
ACT I.
SCENE I.--_A Garden_.
_Enter_ CORYDON.
_Corydon_. But hush: I am interrupted. [_Exit_ CORYDON.
_Enter_ OLD HUMBUG _and his_ SON, _talking_.
_Old Hum_. It is for that reason that I wish you to follow my advice.
Are you convinced of its propriety?
_Young Hum_. I am, sir, and will certainly act in the manner you have
pointed out to me.
_Old Hum_. Then let us return to the house. [_Exeunt_.