BATH
At the end of 1800, Mr. Austen made up his mind to put his son James
into the rectory at Steventon as _locum tenens_, and himself retire to
live at Bath. In those days parents were not quite so communicative to
their children as they are now; many things were decided without being
discussed in full family conclave, as propriety dictates at present,
and the change of plan does not seem to have been mooted to the girls
at all, so that, “coming in one day from a walk, as they entered the
room their mother greeted them with the intelligence: ‘Well, girls, it
is all settled. We have decided to leave Steventon and go to Bath.’ To
Jane, who had been from home, and who had not heard much before about
the matter, it was such a shock that she fainted away ... she loved
the country, and her delight in natural scenery was such that she would
sometimes say it must form one of the delights of heaven.” (From Family
MSS. quoted by Constance Hill, in _Jane Austen, Her Homes and Her
Friends_.)
The break up of the home of one’s childhood is no trifling matter, and
it often carries with it removal from many friends and neighbours whose
society has become an integral part of life. It is no wonder that the
blow was severe, yet Jane was of a cheerful disposition, a disposition
that could make its own happiness anywhere, and it was not long before
she entered with alacrity into all the needful preparations.
She wrote not long after, “I get more and more reconciled to the idea
of our removal. We have lived long enough in this neighbourhood; the
Basingstoke balls are certainly on the decline; there is something
interesting in the bustle of going away, and the prospect of spending
future summers by the sea or in Wales is very delightful. For a time we
shall now possess many of the advantages which I have often thought of
with envy in the wives of sailors or soldiers. It must not be generally
known, however, that I am not sacrificing a great deal in quitting
the country, or I can expect to inspire no tender interest in those we
leave behind.”
Mr. Austen was perfectly justified in his decision to stop work;
he was then seventy, and had held the two livings for thirty-six
years, his son James was ready to take them up, he was living in the
neighbourhood, and had been of assistance to his father for some time
past. We learn this from many casual sentences in the letters, such
as the following: “James called by my father’s desire on Mr. Bayle
to enquire into the cause of his being so horrid. Mr. Bayle did not
attempt to deny his being horrid, and made many apologies for it; he
did not plead his having a drunken self, he talked only of a drunken
foreman, etc., and gave hopes of the tables being at Steventon on
Monday se’nnight next.”
Mr. Austen died in 1805, only four years after the removal, which shows
that he had not withdrawn from active life at all too soon. In giving
up country life he had to give up also many of the hobbies in which he
had taken delight; his pigs and his sheep could not accompany him to
Bath. References to these animals often occur in his daughter’s lively
letters. “My father furnishes him [Edward] with a pig from Cheesedown;
it is already killed and cut up, but it is not to weigh more than
nine stone; the season is too far advanced to get him a larger one. My
mother means to pay herself for the salt and the trouble of ordering it
to be cured, by the spareribs, the souse, and the lard.”
“Mr. Lyford gratified us very much yesterday by his praises of my
father’s mutton, which they all think was the finest that was ever
ate.”
“You must tell Edward that my father gave twenty-five shillings apiece
to Seward for his last lot of sheep.”
In Bath, pigs, poultry, and a garden would be impossible, but there
would be compensating advantages. The country life had but narrow
interests, and trifles had to be made the most of.
Jane’s letters for the last few years before leaving Steventon show
some of the decadence due to trivial surroundings, and her remarks are
apt to be spiced with unkindness. Evidently her sister-in-law, James’s
wife, was not a favourite; she objected to her husband’s being so much
at Steventon, though Jane notes that he persevered in coming “in spite
of Mary’s reproaches.” But Jane’s sharpness is also extended to her
remarks on her acquaintances. “The Debaries persist in being afflicted
at the death of their uncle, of whom they now say they saw a great deal
in London.”
Poor Debaries, it is quite possible that his death had showed them how
much they had cared for him, at all events, after his death they could
have had nothing to gain by any display of affection!
After a small ball Jane writes: “There were very few beauties, and
such as there were were not very handsome. Miss Iremonger did not look
well, and Mrs. Blount was the only one much admired. She appeared
exactly as she did in September, with the same broad face, diamond
bandeau, white shoes, pink husband, and fat neck. The two Miss Coxes
were there; I traced in one the remains of the vulgar, broad-featured
girl who danced at Enham eight years ago; the other is refined into a
nice composed-looking girl like Catherine Bigg. I looked at Sir Thomas
Champneys and thought of poor Rosalie; I looked at his daughter, and
thought her a queer animal with a white neck.” And later she adds:
“I had the comfort of finding out the other evening who all the fat
girls with long noses were that disturbed me at the 1st H. ball.” It
is obvious that a wider horizon would do the writer of these remarks no
harm.
The income which the family would have is indicated in the following
remark of Jane’s made about this time: “My father is doing all in his
power to increase his income, by raising his tithes, etc., and I do not
despair of getting very nearly six hundred a year.”
Once the great fact of the removal was settled, there remained the
minor difficulty as to which part of Bath would be the best to live
in; of this Jane writes: “There are three parts of Bath which we have
thought of as likely to have houses in them—Westgate Buildings, Charles
Street, and some of the short streets leading from Laura Place or
Pulteney Street. Westgate Buildings, though quite in the lower part
of the town, are not badly situated themselves. The street is broad
and has rather a good appearance. Charles Street, however, I think is
preferable. The buildings are new, and its nearness to Kingsmead Fields
would be a pleasant circumstance. Perhaps you may remember, or perhaps
you may forget, that Charles Street leads from the Queen’s Square
Chapel to the two Green Park Streets. The houses in the streets near
Laura Place I should expect to be above our price. Gay Street would
be too high, except only the lower house on the left hand side as you
descend. Towards that my mother has no disinclination; it used to be
lower rented than any other house in the row, from some inferiority in
the apartments. But above all others her wishes are at present fixed
on the corner house in Chapel Row which opens into Prince Street.
Her knowledge of it, however, is confined only to the outside, and
therefore she is equally uncertain of its being really desirable as
of its being to be had. In the meantime she assures you that she will
do everything in her power to avoid Trim Street, although you have not
expressed the fearful presentiment of it, which was rather expected. We
know that Mrs. Perrot will want to get us into Oxford Buildings, but we
all unite in particular dislike of that part of the town, and therefore
hope to escape.” This was from Steventon in January 1801.
The Mrs. Perrot is the aunt, Mrs. Leigh-Perrot, before mentioned,
she was sister-in-law to Mrs. Austen, and her husband had taken the
additional name of Perrot. It was from him that Mr. Austen-Leigh
inherited the additional name of Leigh when he came into the estate.
The Austen family seem to have been almost as much in the habit of
changing their names as of marrying twice.
The topography of the letter can only be appreciated by those who
know Bath, and requires little comment. The various streets mentioned
are still existing, and we can pass through the despised Trim Street,
survey the house in Gay Street lower rented than the others, or cross
over the river to Laura Place to see the neighbourhood Jane feared
would be too expensive, just as well now, as she could then.
In May of 1801, Jane, with her father and mother, went to Bath and
stayed with Mr. and Mrs. Leigh-Perrot at Paragon, in order to hunt for
a house. Paragon remains unchanged, the doorways enclosed by pent-house
and pilasters remain the very type of late eighteenth-century
architecture.
It is easy to imagine the difficulties that had to be encountered by
the Austens in their quest.
“In our morning’s circuit we looked at two houses in Green Park
Buildings, one of which pleased me very well. We walked all over it
except into the garret; the dining-room is of a comfortable size, just
as large as you like to fancy it; the second room about fourteen feet
square. The apartment over the drawing-room pleased me particularly,
because it is divided into two, the smaller one, a very nice sized
dressing-room which upon occasion might admit a bed. The aspect is
south-east. The only doubt is about the dampness of the offices, of
which there were symptoms.”
“Yesterday morning we looked into a house in Seymour Street which
there is reason to suppose will soon be empty; as we are assured from
many quarters that no inconvenience from the river is felt in those
buildings, we are at liberty to fix on them if we can. But this house
was not inviting; the largest room downstairs was not much more than
fourteen feet square, with a western aspect.”
“I went with my mother to look at some houses in New King Street,
towards which she felt some kind of inclination, but their size has now
satisfied her. They were smaller than I expected to find them; one in
particular out of the two was quite monstrously little; the best of the
sitting-rooms not as large as the little parlour at Steventon, and the
second room in every floor about capacious enough to admit a very small
single bed.”
“Our views on G.P. Buildings seem all at an end; the observation of
the damp still remaining in the offices of a house which has only
been vacated a week, with reports of discontented families and putrid
fevers, has given the _coup-de-grace_. We have now nothing in view.”
Anyone who has ever been house-hunting will sympathise with the
difficulties sketched in these remarks. It was finally decided that
the family should go to 4 Sydney Place, and later they removed to the
despised Green Park Buildings after all.
The sale of the effects at Steventon had begun before the family left,
and continued after.
“My father and mother, wisely aware of the difficulty of finding in
all Bath such a bed as their own, have resolved on taking it with them;
all the beds, indeed, that we shall want are to be removed.... I do not
think it will be worth while to remove any of our chests of drawers, we
shall be able to get some of a much more commodious sort, made of deal,
and painted to look very neat ... we have thought at times of removing
the sideboard, or a Pembroke table, or some other piece of furniture,
but on the whole it has ended in thinking that the trouble and risk of
the removal would be more than the advantage of having them at a place
where everything may be purchased.”
In another letter she imagines that the appraisement of the furniture
for sale will amount to about two hundred pounds, and when actually at
Bath she sends the following details:—
“Sixty-one guineas and a half for the three cows gives one some
support under the blow of only eleven guineas for the tables. Eight
for my pianoforte is about what I really expected to get.” “Mr. Bent
seems bent upon being very detestable, for he values the books at only
seventy pounds. Ten shillings for Dodsley’s Poems, however, please
me to the quick, and I do not care how often I sell them again for as
much.”
Sydney Place is on the east side of the River overlooking Sydney
Gardens, which had been opened for public entertainment in 1795; the
following description of the Gardens is given in a guide contemporary
with Jane’s residence in Bath. “The Kennet and Avon Canal runs through
the garden, with two elegant cast-iron bridges thrown over it, after
the manner of the Chinese. There are swings, bowling greens, and a
Merlin’s swing in the labyrinth. During the summer are public nights,
with music, fireworks, and superb illuminations.” Before Jane herself
lived here, while she was staying in Queen Square with her brother
and his family, she had been to a grand gala in Sydney Gardens, with
illuminations, and fireworks which “surpassed” her expectations. It
was a pleasant part of Bath, and probably the Austens were comfortable
enough here. The house is still standing; it is one of a solid uniform
row facing nearly due east, and bears a plate stating “Here lived
Jane Austen from 1801-1805,” an inscription not quite accurate as the
Austens left in 1804. It is one great charm of Bath that, electric
trams and modern buildings notwithstanding, the place is so very much
the same as it was when Jane knew it. The narrow intricate streets,
the little courts and passages, and jutting houses are everywhere to be
seen. The town is essentially late eighteenth century, and the modern
buildings are mere additions that do not in any way interfere with its
character.
The beautiful abbey had in her time been more or less repaired, and
the choir was used as a parish church. But the pinnacles were added
to the spire only in 1834, and the complete restoration took place in
1874. The Pump Room, near at hand, was built in 1796, replacing one
which had existed for forty-five years. If we except a few trifles,
such as electric pendants to the great central chandelier, we see it as
it was in Jane’s day. The fluted pilasters running up to the ceiling
are very characteristic of the florid Georgian taste. In a print of
the interior of the Pump Room, dated 1804, we see all the women,
even the attendants, with bare arms and necks, quite uncovered,—a
fashion revived in 1905,—and some of the women wear a kind of modified
poke-bonnet with “coquelicot” plumes. In the alcove at the end is a
statue of fat little Beau Nash, who was the regenerator and in some
sense the maker of Bath.
But Nash’s name is associated even more with the Assembly Rooms than
the Pump Room. The Assembly Rooms are some distance from the Pump
Rooms and the Baths, being situated not far from the famous crescent.
In Jane’s time there were two sets of Assembly Rooms, upper and lower,
governed by two different masters of the ceremonies, positions which
were much coveted. In 1820 the Lower Rooms were burnt down and not
rebuilt, but the Upper are still used, and the names over the doors
of the rooms, Card-room, Tea-room, etc., recall many a scene in Jane
Austen’s novels.
Bath really began to be fashionable in the early part of Queen Anne’s
reign, but it was Nash who consolidated its attractions, and brought it
up to its highest pitch of popularity.
[Illustration: FAÇADE OF THE PUMP ROOM, BATH, IN THE
EIGHTEENTH CENTURY]
When he went there “the amusements of the place were neither elegant
nor conducted with delicacy. General society among people of rank or
fortune was by no means established. The nobility still preserved
a tincture of Gothic haughtiness, and refused to keep company with
the gentry at any of the public entertainments of the place. Smoking
in the rooms was permitted; gentlemen and ladies appeared in a
disrespectful manner at public entertainments in aprons and boots.
With an eagerness common to those whose pleasures come but seldom,
they generally continued them too long, and thus they were rendered
disgusting by too free an enjoyment. If the company liked each other
they danced till morning. If any person lost at cards he insisted on
continuing the game till luck should turn. The lodgings for visitants
were paltry, though expensive, the dining-rooms and other chambers
were floored with boards coloured brown with soot and small beer to
hide the dirt; the walls were covered with unpainted wainscot, the
furniture corresponded with the meanness of the architecture; a few oak
chairs, a small looking-glass, with a fender and tongs, composed the
magnificence of these temporary habitations. The city was in itself
mean and contemptible, no elegant buildings, no open streets, no
uniform squares.”
Thither Nash came in 1705. He was the man of all others to organise
fashionable entertainments. Under his severe, yet fatherly rule, the
place sprang quickly into popularity. Houses were built, streets
repaved, balls and entertainments followed each other in quick
succession. An Assembly Room was built, and good music engaged; but it
was not until 1769, eight years after Nash’s death, that the present
building was erected. Nash’s code of rules continued in force for long
after his death, before which he had sunk from the position of esteem
which he had once enjoyed. His rules throw some light on the conduct of
these delightful assemblies, and are worth quoting—
1. That a visit of ceremony at first coming, and another at going
away, are all that are expected or desired by ladies of quality
and fashion—except impertinents.
2. That ladies coming to the ball appoint a time for their
footmen coming to wait on them home, to prevent disturbance and
inconvenience to themselves and others.
3. That gentlemen of fashion never appearing in a morning before
the ladies in gowns and caps show breeding and respect.
4. That no person take it ill that anyone goes to another’s play
or breakfast and not theirs; except captious by nature.
5. That no gentleman give his ticket for the balls to any but
gentlewomen. N.B.—Unless he has none of his acquaintance.
6. That gentlemen crowding before the ladies at the ball show
ill manners; and that none do so for the future except such as
respect nobody but themselves.
7. That no gentleman or lady takes it ill that another dances
before them; except such as have no pretence to dance at all.
8. That the elder ladies and children be content with a second
bench at a ball, as being past or not come to perfection.
9. That the younger ladies take notice how many eyes observe
them.
10. That all whisperers of lies or scandal be taken for their
authors.
11. That all repeaters of such lies and scandal be shunned by the
company; except such as have been guilty of the same crime.
Nash’s rigour in regard to appearances in the case of top-boots is
elsewhere mentioned, he disliked quite as much the aprons which smart
ladies then wore on many occasions, and when the Duchess of Queensberry
entered one evening in one of these, he snatched it off and flung it
over the back benches among the ladies’ maids.
The rules for balls were probably very much the same when Jane Austen
attended them as when Nash was living. Everything was to be performed
in proper order. Each ball was to open with a minuet danced by two
persons of the highest distinction present. When the minuet concluded
the lady was to return to her seat, and Mr. Nash was to bring the
gentleman a new partner. The minuets generally continued two hours. At
eight the country dances began, ladies of quality according to their
rank standing up first. About nine o’clock a short interval was allowed
for rest, and for the gentlemen to help their partners to tea, the ball
having begun, it must be remembered, about six. The company pursued
their amusements until the clock struck eleven, when the music ceased
instantly; and Nash never allowed this rule to be broken, even when the
Princess Amelia herself pleaded for one dance more.
Among other rules was one mentioned by Mr. Austen-Leigh, that
ladies who intended to dance minuets were requested to wear lappets
to distinguish them. Also, in order that every lady may have an
opportunity of dancing, gentlemen should change their partners every
two dances. We see in this last rule how the transition from one
partner for the whole evening to the continual change of partners came
to pass.
After returning from Lyme Regis in the autumn of 1804, the Austens left
Sydney Place, and went to Green Park Buildings, which had been among
the houses first considered. They were here when Mr. Austen’s death
occurred in January 1805; and then Mrs. Austen and her daughters moved
into lodgings in Gay Street.
Mrs. Lybbe Powys gives us a lively word-picture of Bath in 1805—
“The Dress Ball, Upper Rooms immensely crowded at ten; but the number
of card parties quite spoilt the balls, as ‘tis fashionable to attend
five or six before you go to the room. It was endeavoured to alter
these hours, but fortunately for the old people, and those who drink
the waters, it was not permitted, and at eleven, if in the middle of
a dance, the music stops. But I suppose ‘tis reckoned vulgar to come
early, one sees nothing of the dancing or company for the crowds. The
rooms are not half so agreeable as they were some years ago, when the
late London hours were not thought of; and how prejudicial must they
be to the health of all, is very visible in the young as in the old....
Sixteen thousand strangers at Bath in the season 1805!”
Of Bath itself we hear in the satirical skit called _The New Guide_—
“Of all the gay places the world can afford,
By gentle and simple for pastime adored,
Fine balls, and fine concerts, fine buildings and springs,
Fine walks and fine views and a thousand fine things,
Not to mention the sweet situation and air,
What place, my dear mother, with Bath can compare?”
There is little reason to doubt that Jane would thoroughly enjoy
the change afforded by such constant opportunity for diversion, such
delightful mingling with a crowd in which her bright humour must have
found frequent opportunities for indulgence.
As we have seen, she had written her first Bath book, _Northanger
Abbey_, many years before, and while she sat in the Pump Room, awaited
a partner in the Assembly Rooms, or shopped in Milsom Street, she must
have recalled her own creations, Catherine Morland and Isabella Thorpe,
Henry Tilney and Mrs. Allen, quite as vividly as if they were real
persons of her acquaintance.
The second Bath book, _Persuasion_, was not written until many years
after, yet these two, chronologically so far apart, topographically so
near each other, have always been, owing to conditions of length, bound
together.
This is Jane’s own account of her first ball after coming to live at
Bath: “I dressed myself as well as I could, and had all my finery much
admired at home. By nine o’clock my uncle, aunt, and I entered the
Rooms, and linked Miss Winstone on to us. Before tea it was rather a
dull affair; but then tea did not last long, for there was only one
dance, danced by four couple, think of four couple surrounded by about
an hundred people dancing in the Upper Rooms at Bath! After tea we
cheered up; the breaking up of private parties sent some scores more
to the ball, and though it was shockingly and inhumanly thin for this
place, there were people enough, I suppose, to have made five or six
very pretty Basingstoke assemblies.”
It is interesting to compare this with her account of her heroine,
Catherine Morland’s first appearance: “Mrs. Allen was so long in
dressing, that they did not enter the ball-room till late. The season
was full, the room crowded, and the two ladies squeezed in as well as
they could. As for Mr. Allen he repaired directly to the card-room
and left them to enjoy a mob by themselves. With more care for the
safety of her new gown than for the comfort of her protegée, Mrs.
Allen made her way through the throng of men by the door, as swiftly
as the necessary caution would allow; Catherine, however, kept close
at her side, and linked her arm too firmly within her friend’s to be
torn asunder by any common effort of a struggling assembly. But to
her utter amazement she found that to proceed along the room was by no
means the way to disengage themselves from the crowd; it seemed rather
to increase as they went on; whereas she had imagined that when once
fairly within the door, they should easily find seats, and be able
to watch the dances with perfect convenience. But this was far from
being the case; and though by unwearied diligence they gained even the
top of the room, their situation was just the same; they saw nothing
of the dancers, but the high feathers of some of the ladies. Still
they moved on, something better was yet in view; and by a continued
exertion of strength and ingenuity they found themselves at last in
the passage behind the highest bench. Here there was something less of
crowd than below; and hence Miss Morland had a comprehensive view of
all the company beneath her, and of all the dangers of her late passage
through them. It was a splendid sight, and she began, for the first
time that evening, to feel herself at a ball, she longed to dance, but
she had not an acquaintance in the room.... Everybody was shortly in
motion for tea, and they must squeeze out like the rest ... and when
they at last arrived in the tea-room ... they were obliged to sit down
at the end of a table, at which a large party were already placed,
without having anything to do there, or anybody to speak to except
each other.... After some time they received an offer of tea from one
of their neighbours; it was thankfully accepted, and this introduced
a light conversation with the gentleman who offered it, which was the
only time that anybody spoke to them during the evening, till they were
discovered and joined by Mr. Allen when the dance was over.
“‘Well, Miss Morland,’ said he directly, ‘I hope you have had an
agreeable ball.’
“‘Very agreeable indeed,’ she replied, vainly endeavouring to hide a
great yawn.”
But poor Catherine was much more fortunate in her second essay, being
introduced to Henry Tilney, the hero, who captivated her girlish
admiration, and who at last, struck by her _naïvété_ and earnest
affection for himself, fell in love with her and made her his wife.
In _Northanger Abbey_, Jane places the Thorpes in Edgar Buildings,
which she always spells “Edgar’s,” the Tilneys in Milsom Street, and
Catherine Morland with the Allens in Pulteney Street. Her topography is
always very exact and unimpeachable. Milsom Street also plays a large
part in _Persuasion_. It is here that Anne comes across Admiral Croft
looking into a print shop window, from whence he accompanies her back
to Camden Place where her father and sister are, and in the course
of the walk Anne learns, to her infinite relief, that Louisa Musgrove
is engaged to Captain Benwick, so that the terrible thought that she
might hear any day of her engagement to Captain Wentworth is dispelled
for ever. In Milsom Street also, while sheltering in a shop from the
rain, she first sees Captain Wentworth after his arrival in Bath, and
on his coming accidentally into the same shop with some friends, both
he and she are unable to hide their signs of perturbation. But it
is at a concert in the Upper Rooms that Anne goes through far worse
disquietude, while, with the tormenting uncertainty of an undeclared
love, she sits wondering whether he will come to speak to her or not.
It is at the White Hart Inn, which overlooked the entrance to the Pump
Room Arcade, that the real crisis of the book takes place. Here Anne,
on coming to spend the day with her sister Mary, Mrs. Charles Musgrove,
who is staying there with her husband, finds Captain Harville and
Captain Wentworth. It is her conversation with the former that reveals
to the latter her own unchanged feelings, and gives him the courage to
write her a letter declaring once more his own love, after the lapse of
many years. Anne is thereby rewarded for her gentle loyalty, and when
in going up Union Street with her brother-in-law she is overtaken by
Captain Wentworth, and handed over to his charge, mutual explanations
are made and mutual happiness reached.
Certainly to the lovers of Jane Austen’s books these characters people
the streets quite as vividly as any flesh-and-blood persons who have
ever lived in them.