CHAWTON, Sunday (Sept. 8, 1816).
MY DEAREST CASSANDRA,--I have borne the arrival of your letter to-day
extremely well; anybody might have thought it was giving me pleasure. I
am very glad you find so much to be satisfied with at Cheltenham. While
the waters agree, everything else is trifling.
A letter arrived for you from Charles last Thursday. They are all safe
and pretty well in Keppel St., the children decidedly better for
Broadstairs; and he writes principally to ask when it will be convenient
to us to receive Miss P., the little girls, and himself. They would be
ready to set off in ten days from the time of his writing, to pay their
visits in Hampshire and Berkshire, and he would prefer coming to Chawton
first.
I have answered him, and said that we hoped it might suit them to wait
till the last week in Septr., as we could not ask them sooner, either on
your account or the want of room. I mentioned the 23rd as the probable
day of your return. When you have once left Cheltenham, I shall grudge
every half-day wasted on the road. If there were but a coach from
Hungerford to Chawton! I have desired him to let me hear again soon.
He does not include a maid in the list to be accommodated; but if they
bring one, as I suppose they will, we shall have no bed in the house
even then for Charles himself,--let alone Henry. But what can we do?
We shall have the Gt. House quite at our command; it is to be cleared of
the Papillons' servants in a day or two. They themselves have been
hurried off into Essex to take possession,--not of a large estate left
them by an uncle, but to scrape together all they can, I suppose, of the
effects of a Mrs. Rawstorn, a rich old friend and cousin suddenly
deceased, to whom they are joint executors. So there is a happy end of
the Kentish Papillons coming here.
No morning service to-day, wherefore I am writing between twelve and one
o'clock. Mr. Benn in the afternoon, and likewise more rain again, by the
look and the sound of things. You left us in doubt of Mrs. Benn's
situation, but she has bespoke her nurse. . . . The F. A.'s dined with
us yesterday, and had fine weather both for coming and going home, which
has hardly ever happened to them before. She is still unprovided with a
housemaid.
Our day at Alton was very pleasant, venison quite right, children well
behaved, and Mr. and Mrs. Digweed taking kindly to our charades and
other games. I must also observe, for his mother's satisfaction, that
Edward at my suggestion devoted himself very properly to the
entertainment of Miss S. Gibson. Nothing was wanting except Mr. Sweeney;
but he, alas! had been ordered away to London the day before. We had a
beautiful walk home by moonlight.
Thank you, my back has given me scarcely any pain for many days. I have
an idea that agitation does it as much harm as fatigue, and that I was
ill at the time of your going from the very circumstance of your going.
I am nursing myself up now into as beautiful a state as I can, because I
hear that Dr. White means to call on me before he leaves the country.
_Evening._--Frank and Mary and the children visited us this morning. Mr.
and Mrs. Gibson are to come on the 23rd, and there is too much reason to
fear they will stay above a week. Little George could tell me where you
were gone to, as well as what you were to bring him, when I asked him
the other day.
Sir Tho. Miller is dead. I treat you with a dead baronet in almost every
letter.
So you have C. Craven among you, as well as the Duke of Orleans and Mr.
Pocock. But it mortifies me that you have not added one to the stock of
common acquaintance. Do pray meet with somebody belonging to yourself. I
am quite weary of your knowing nobody.
Mrs. Digweed parts with both Hannah and old cook: the former will not
give up her lover, who is a man of bad character; the latter is guilty
only of being unequal to anything.
Miss Terry was to have spent this week with her sister, but as usual it
is put off. My amiable friend knows the value of her company. I have not
seen Anna since the day you left us; her father and brother visited her
most days. Edward and Ben called here on Thursday. Edward was in his way
to Selborne. We found him very agreeable. He is come back from France,
thinking of the French as one could wish,--disappointed in everything.
He did not go beyond Paris.
I have a letter from Mrs. Perigord; she and her mother are in London
again. She speaks of France as a scene of general poverty and misery: no
money, no trade, nothing to be got but by the innkeepers, and as to her
own present prospects she is not much less melancholy than before.
I have also a letter from Miss Sharp, quite one of her letters; she has
been again obliged to exert herself more than ever, in a more
distressing, more harassed state, and has met with another excellent old
physician and his wife, with every virtue under heaven, who takes to her
and cures her from pure love and benevolence. Dr. and Mrs. Storer are
their Mrs. and Miss Palmer--for they are at Bridlington. I am happy to
say, however, that the sum of the account is better than usual. Sir
William is returned; from Bridlington they go to Chevet, and she is to
have a young governess under her.
I enjoyed Edward's company very much, as I said before, and yet I was
not sorry when Friday came. It had been a busy week, and I wanted a few
days' quiet and exemption from the thought and contrivancy which any
sort of company gives. I often wonder how you can find time for what you
do, in addition to the care of the house; and how good Mrs. West could
have written such books and collected so many hard words, with all her
family cares, is still more a matter of astonishment. Composition seems
to me impossible with a head full of joints of mutton and doses of
rhubarb.
_Monday._--Here is a sad morning. I fear you may not have been able to
get to the Pump. The two last days were very pleasant. I enjoyed them
the more for your sake. But to-day it is really bad enough to make you
all cross. I hope Mary will change her lodgings at the fortnight's end;
I am sure, if you looked about well, you would find others in some odd
corner to suit you better. Mrs. Potter charges for the name of the High
St.
Success to the pianoforte! I trust it will drive you away. We hear now
that there is to be no honey this year. Bad news for us. We must
husband our present stock of mead, and I am sorry to perceive that our
twenty gallons is very nearly out. I cannot comprehend how the fourteen
gallons could last so long.
We do not much like Mr. Cooper's new sermons. They are fuller of
regeneration and conversion than ever, with the addition of his zeal in
the cause of the Bible Society.
Martha's love to Mary and Caroline, and she is extremely glad to find
they like the pelisse. The Debarys are indeed odious! We are to see my
brother to-morrow, but for only one night. I had no idea that he would
care for the races without Edward. Remember me to all.
Yours very affectionately,
J. AUSTEN.
Miss AUSTEN, Post-Office, Cheltenham.
_Note by Lord Brabourne._
I insert here a letter of Jane Austen's written backwards, addressed to
her niece "Cassy," daughter of Captain Charles Austen (afterwards
Admiral) when a little girl.