YM RAED YSSAC,--I hsiw uoy a yppah wen raey. Ruoy xis snisuoc emac ereh
yadretsey, dna dah hcae a eceip fo ekac. Siht si elttil Yssac's
yadhtrib, dna ehs si eerht sraey dlo. Knarf sah nugeb gninrael Nital ew
deef eht Nibor yreve gninrom. Yllas netfo seriuqne retfa uoy. Yllas
Mahneb sah tog a wen neerg nwog. Teirrah Thgink semoc yreve yad ot daer
ot Tnua Ardnassac. Doog eyb ym raed Yssac.
Tnua Ardnassac sdnes reh tseb evol, dna os ew od lla.
Ruoy etanoitceffa tnua,
ENAJ NETSUA.
NOTWAHC, Naj. 8.
_Note by Lord Brabourne._
In January, 1817, she wrote of herself as better and able to walk into
Alton, and hoped in the summer she should be able to walk back. In April
her father in a note to Mrs. Lefroy says: "I was happy to have a good
account of herself written by her own hand, in a letter from your Aunt
Jane; but all who love, and that is all who know her, must be anxious on
her account." We all know how well grounded that anxiety was, and how
soon her relations had to lament over the loss of the dearest and
brightest member of their family.
And now I come to the saddest letters of all, those which tell us of the
end of that bright life, cut short just at the time when the world might
have hoped that unabated intellectual vigor, supplemented by the
experience brought by maturer years, would have produced works if
possible even more fascinating than those with which she had already
embellished the literature of her country. But it was not to be. The
fiat had gone forth,--the ties which bound that sweet spirit to earth
were to be severed, and a blank left, never to be filled in the family
which her loved and loving presence had blessed, and where she had been
so well and fondly appreciated. In the early spring of 1817 the
unfavorable symptoms increased, and the failure of her health was too
visible to be neglected. Still no apprehensions of immediate danger were
entertained, and it is probable that when she left Chawton for
Winchester in May, she did not recognize the fact that she was bidding a
last farewell to "Home." Happy for her if it was so, for there are few
things more melancholy than to look upon any beloved place or person
with the knowledge that it is for "the last time." In all probability
this grief was spared to Jane, for even after her arrival at Winchester
she spoke and wrote as if recovery was hopeful; and I fancy that her
relations were by no means aware that the end was so near.
_Note by Lord Brabourne._
Cassandra's letters tell the tale of the event in words that require no
addition from me. They are simple and affecting,--the words of one who
had been stricken by a great grief, but whose religion stood her in
good stead, and enabled her to bear it with fortitude. The firm and
loving bond of union which had ever united the Austen family, naturally
intensified their sorrow at the loss of one of their number, and that
the one of whom they had been so proud as well as so fond. They laid her
within the walls of the old cathedral which she had loved so much, and
went sorrowfully back to their homes, with the feeling that nothing
could replace to them the treasure they had lost. And most heavily of
all must the blow have fallen upon the only sister, the correspondent,
the companion, the other self of Jane, who had to return alone to the
desolate home, and to the mother to whose comforts the two had hitherto
ministered together, but who would henceforward have her alone on whom
to rely. . . .
_Letters from Miss Cassandra Austen to her niece Miss
Knight, after the death of her sister Jane, July 18,
1817._