 11. Declining health of Jane Austen. Elasticity of her spirits. Her resignation and humility her death. Early in the year 1816 some family troubles disturbed the usually tranquil course of Jane Austen's life, and it's probable that the inward malady, which was to prove ultimately fatal, was already felt by her. For some distant friends whom she visited in the spring of that year thought that her health was somewhat impaired, and observed that she went about her old haunts and recalled old recollections connected with them in a particular manner as if she did not expect ever to see them again. It's not surprising that under these circumstances some of her letters were of a graver tone than had been customary with her and expressed resignation rather than cheerfulness. In reference to these troubles in a letter to her brother Charles after mentioning that she had been laid up with an attack of bilious fever she says, I live upstairs for the present and am coddled. I am the only one of the party who has been so silly, but a weak body must excuse weak nerves. And again to another correspondent, but I am getting too near complaint. It has been the appointment of God, however secondary causes may have operated. But the elasticity of her spirits soon recovered their tone. It was in the latter half of that year when she addressed the two following lively letters to a nephew, one while he was at Winchester school, the other soon after he had left it. Chorten, July 9th, 1816 My dear E, many thanks, a thank for every line and as many to Mr. W. Didgeweed for coming. We have been wanting very much to hear of your mother and are happy to find she continues to mend, but her illness must have been a very serious one indeed. When she is really recovered she ought to try change of air and come over to us. Tell your father that I am very much obliged to him for his share of your letter and most sincerely join in the hope of her being eventually much the better for her present discipline. She has the comfort moreover of being confined in such weather as gives one little temptation to be out. This is really too bad and has been too bad for a long time, much worse than anyone can bear and I begin to think it will never be fine again. This is a finesse of mine for I have often observed that if one writes about the weather it is generally completely changed before the letter is read. I wish it may prove so now and that when Mr. W. Didgeweed reaches Steventon tomorrow he may find you have had a long series of hot dry weather. We are a small party at present, only Grand Mama, Mary Jane and myself. Yolden's coach cleared off the rest yesterday. I am glad you recollected to mention your being come home. My heart began to sink within me when I had got so far through your letter without it being mentioned. I was dreadfully afraid that you might be detained at Winchester by severe illness, confined to your bed perhaps and quite unable to hold a pen and only dating from Steventon in order, with a mistaken sort of tenderness, to deceive me. But now I have no doubt of your being at home. I am sure you would not say it so seriously unless it actually were so. We saw a countless number of post-chases full of boys passed by yesterday morning, full of future heroes, legislators, fools and villains. You have never thanked me for my last letter which went by the cheese. I cannot bear not to be thanked. You will not pay as a visit yet of course. We must not think of it. Your mother must get well first and you must go to Oxford and not be elected. After that a little change of scene may be good for you and your physician I hope will order you to the sea or to a house by the side of a very considerable pond. Oh, it rains again. It beats against the window. Mary Jane and I have been wet through once already today. We set off in the donkey carriage for Farringdon as I wanted to see the improvement Mr. Wolves is making, but we were obliged to turn back before we got there, but not soon enough to avoid a pelter all the way home. We met Mr. Wolves. I talked of it being bad weather for the hay, and he returned me the comfort of it being much worse for the wheat. We hear that Mrs. S. does not quit Tangier. Why and wherefore? Do you know that our browning is gone? You must prepare for a William when you come, a good-looking lad, civil and quiet, and seemingly likely to do. Goodbye. I'm sure Mr. W. D. will be astonished at my writing so much, for the paper is so thin that he will be able to count the lines if not to read them. Yours affectionately, Jane Austen. In the next letter will be found her description of her own style of composition, which has already appeared in the notice prefixed to North Hanger Abbey and Persuasion. Chorten, Monday, December the 16th, 1816. My dear E, one reason for my writing to you now is that I may have the pleasure of directing to you Esquire. I give you joy of having left Winchester. Now you may own how miserable you were there. Now it will gradually all come out, your crimes and your miseries, how often you went up by the mail to London and threw away fifty guineas at a tavern, and how often you were on the point of hanging yourself, restrained only, as some ill-natured aspersion upon poor old Winton has it, by the want of a tree within some miles of the city. Charles Knight and his companions passed through Chorten about nine this morning, later than it used to be. Uncle Henry and I had a glimpse of his handsome face, looking all health and good humour. I wonder when you will come and see us. I know what I rather speculate upon, but shall say nothing. We think Uncle Henry in excellent looks. Look at him this moment, and think so too, if you have not done it before. And we have the great comfort of seeing decided improvement in Uncle Charles, both as to health, spirits and appearance. And they are each of them so agreeable in their different way, and harmonise so well that their visit is thorough enjoyment. Uncle Henry writes very superior sermons. You and I must try to get hold of one or two, and put them into our novels. It would be a fine help to a volume, and we could make our heroine read it aloud on a Sunday evening, just as well as Isabella Wardaw in the Antiquary is made to read History of the Heart's Demon in the Ruins of St. Ruth, though I believe, on recollection, Lovell is the reader. By the by, my dear A, I am quite concerned for the loss your mother mentions in her letter. Two chapters and a half to be missing is monstrous. It is well that I have not been to Stephenton lately, and therefore cannot be suspected of perloining them. Two strong twigs and a half towards a nest of my own would have been something. I do not think, however, that any theft of that sort would be really useful to me. What should I do with your strong manly vigorous sketches full of variety and glow? How could I possibly join them on to the little bit, two inches wide, of ivory on which I work with so fine a brush as produces little effect after much labour? You will hear from Uncle Henry how well Anna is. She seems perfectly recovered. Ben was here on Saturday to ask Uncle Charles and me to dine with them, as to-morrow, but I was forced to decline it. The walk is beyond my strength, though I am otherwise very well, and this is not a season for donkey carriages, and, as we do not like to spare Uncle Charles, he has declined it too. Tuesday. Aha! Mr. E., I doubt you are seeing Uncle Henry at Stephenton to-day. The weather will prevent your expecting him, I think. Tell your father, without Cass' love and mine, that the pickled cucumbers are extremely good, and tell him also, tell him what you will. No, don't tell him what you will, but tell him that Grandmama begs him to make Joseph Hall pay his rent if he can. You must not be tired of reading the word Uncle, for I have not done with it. Uncle Charles thanks your mother for her letter. It was a great pleasure to him to know that the parcel was received, and gave so much satisfaction, and he begs her to be so good as to give three shillings for him to dame staples, which shall be allowed for in the payment of her debt here. Adieu, amiable! I hope Caroline behaves well to you. Yours affectionately. J. Austin. I cannot tell how soon she was aware of the serious nature of her malady. By God's mercy it was not attended with much suffering, so that she was able to tell her friends, as in the foregoing letter, and perhaps sometimes to persuade herself that accepting want of strength she was otherwise very well. But the progress of the disease became more and more manifest as the year advanced. The usual walk was at first shortened, and then discontinued, and air was sought in a donkey carriage. Gradually too her habit of activity within the house ceased, and she was obliged to lie down much. The sitting-room contained only one sofa, which was frequently occupied by her mother, who was more than seventy years old. Jane would never use it, even in her mother's absence, but she contrived a sort of couch for herself, with two or three chairs, and was pleased to say that this arrangement was more comfortable to her than a real sofa. Her reasons for this might have been left to be guessed, but for the importunities of a little niece, which obliged her to explain that if she herself had shown any inclination to use the sofa, her mother might have scrupled being on it so much as was good for her. It is certain, however, that the mind did not share in this decay of the bodily strength. Persuasion was not finished before the middle of August in that year, and the manner in which it was then completed affords proof that neither the critical nor the creative powers of the author were at all impaired. The book had been brought to an end in July, and the re-engagement of the Here and the Heroine affected in a totally different manner in a scene laid at Admiral Croft's lodgings. But her performance did not satisfy her. She thought it tame and flat, and was desirous of producing something better. This weighed upon her mind, the more so probably on account of the weak state of her health, so that one night she retired to rest in very low spirits. But such depression was little in accordance with her nature and was soon shaken off. The next morning she awoke to much cheerful views and brighter inspirations. The sense of power revived, and imagination resumed its course. She cancelled the Condemn chapter and wrote two others entirely different in its stead. The result is what we possess, the visit of the Musgrove party to Bath, the crowded and animated scenes at the White Heart Hotel, and the charming conversation between Captain Harville and Anne Elliot, overheard by Captain Wentworth, by which the two faithful lovers were at last led to understand each other's feelings. The tenth and eleventh chapters of persuasion then, rather than the actual winding up of the story, contain the latest of her printed compositions, her last contribution to the entertainment of the public. Perhaps it may be thought that she has seldom written anything more brilliant and that, independent of the original manner in which the Dinoumont is brought about, the pictures of Charles Musgrove's good-natured boyishness and of his wife's jealous selfishness would have been incomplete without these finishing strokes. The cancelled chapter exists in manuscript. It's certainly inferior to the two which were substituted for it, but it was such as some writers and some readers might have been contented with, and it contains touches which scarcely any other hand could have given, the suppression of which may be almost a matter of regret. The following letter was addressed to her friend Miss Big, then staying at Stretham with her sister, the wife of the Reverend Herbert Hill, Uncle of Robert Salvy. It appears to have been written three days before she began her last work, which will be noticed in another chapter, and shows that she was not at the time aware of the serious nature of her malady. Chorten, January 24th, 1817 My dear Aletheia, I think at time there should be a little writing between us, though I believe the epistolary debt is on your side, and I hope this will find all at Stretham party well, neither carried away by the flood, nor rheumatic through the damps. Such mild weather is, you know, delightful to us, and though we have a great many ponds and a fine running stream through the meadows on the other side of the road, it is nothing but what beautifies us and does to talk of. I have certainly gained strength through the winter, and am not far from being well, and I think I understand my own case now so much better than I did, as to be able, by care, to keep off any serious return of illness. I am convinced that Bile is at the bottom of all I have suffered, which makes it easy to know how to treat myself. You'll be glad to hear thus much of me, I'm sure. We have just had a few days' visit from Edward, who brought us a good account of his father, and the very circumstance of his coming at all, of his father's being able to spare him, is itself a good account. He grows still and still improves in appearance, at least in the estimation of his aunts, who love him better and better as they see the sweet temper and warm affections of the boy confirmed in the young man. I tried hard to persuade him that he must have some message for William, but in vain. This is not a time of year for donkey carriages, and our donkeys are necessarily having so long a run of luxurious idleness that I suppose we shall find they have forgotten much of their education when we use them again. We do not use two at once, however. Don't imagine such excesses. Our new clergyman is expected here very soon, perhaps in time to assist Mr. Papillon on Sunday. I shall be very glad when the first hearing is over. It will be a nervous hour for our pew, though we hear that he acquits himself with as much ease and collectedness as if he had been used to it all his life. We have no chance, we know, of seeing you between Streatham and Winchester. You go the other road, and are engaged to two or three houses. If there should be any change, however, you know how welcome you would be. We have been reading the poets' pilgrimage to Waterloo, and generally with much approbation. Nothing will please all the world, you know, but parts of it suit me better than much that he has written before. The opening, the pro-him, I believe he calls it, is very beautiful. Poor man, one cannot but grieve for the loss of the son fondly described. Has he at all recovered it? What do Mr. and Mrs. Hill know about his present state? Yours, affectionately, J. Austin. The real object of this letter is to ask you for a receipt, but I thought it gentile not to let it appear early. We remember some excellent orange wine at many down, made from civil oranges entirely or chiefly. I should be very much obliged to you for the receipt if you can command it within a few weeks. On the day before, January 23rd, she had written to her niece in the same hopeful tone. I feel myself getting stronger than I was, and can so perfectly walk to Alton, or back again without fatigue, that I hope to be able to do both when summer comes. Alas, summer came to her only on her deathbed. March the 17th is the last date to be found in the manuscript on which she was engaged, and as the watch of the drowned man indicates the time of his death, so does this final date seem to fix the period when her mind could no longer pursue its accustomed course. And here I cannot do better than quote the words of the niece to whose private records of her aunt's life and character I have been so often indebted. I do not know how early the alarming symptoms of her malady came on. It was in the following March that I had the first idea of her being seriously ill. It had been settled that about the end of that month, or the beginning of April, I should spend a few days at Chawton in the absence of my father and mother who were just then engaged with Mr Lee Parrott in arranging her late husband's affairs. But Aunt Jane became too ill to have me in the house, and so I went instead to my sister Mrs LaFroy at Wired's. The next day we walked over to Chawton to make inquiries after her aunt. She was then keeping her room but said she would see us, and we went up to her. She was in her dressing-gown and was sitting quite like an invalid in an armchair, but she got up and kindly greeted us and then, pointing to seats which had been arranged for us by the fire, she said, There is a chair for the married lady and a little stool for you, Caroline. It's strange, but those trifling words were the last of hers that I can remember, for I retain no recollection of what was said by anyone in the conversation that ensued. I was struck by the alteration in herself. She was very pale, her voice was weak and low, and there was about her a general appearance of debility and suffering, but I have been told that she never had much acute pain. She was not equal to the exertion of talking to us, and our visit to the sick-room was a very short one. Aunt Cassandra soon taking us away. I do not suppose we stayed a quarter of an hour, and I never saw Aunt Jane again. In May 1817 she was persuaded to remove to Winchester for the sake of medical advice from Mr. Leiford. The Leifords have, for some generations, maintained a high character in Winchester for medical skill, and the Mr. Leiford of that day was a man of more than provincial reputation, in whom great London practitioners expressed confidence. Mr. Leiford spoke encouragingly. It was not, of course, his business to extinguish hope in his patient, but I believe that he had from the first very little expectation of a permanent cure. All that was gained by the removal from home was the satisfaction of having done the best that could be done, together with such alleviations of suffering as superior medical skill could afford. Jane and her sister Cassandra took lodgings in College Street. They had two kind friends living in the close, Mrs. Heathcote and Miss Big, the mother and aunt of the present Sir William Heathcote of Hursley, between whose family and ours a close friendship has existed for several generations. These friends did all that they could to promote the comfort of the sisters during the sad sojourn in Winchester, both by their society and by supplying those little conveniences in which a lodging-house was likely to be deficient. It was shortly after settling in these lodgings that she wrote to a nephew the following characteristic letter no longer alas in her former strong, clear hand. Mrs. David's College Street, Winton, Tuesday, May 27th. There is no better way, my dearest E, of thanking you for your affectionate concern for me during my illness than by telling you myself as soon as possible that I continue to get better. I will not boast of my handwriting, neither that nor my face have yet recovered their proper beauty, but in other respects I gain strength very fast. I am now out of bed from nine in the morning to ten at night. Upon the sofa it is true, but I eat my meals without Cassandra in a rational way and can employ myself and walk from one room to another. Mr. Leifert says he will cure me, and if he fails I shall draw up a memorial and lay it before the dean and chapter and have no doubt of redress from that pious learned and disinterested body. Our lodgings are very comfortable. There is a neat little drawing room with a bow window overlooking Dr. Gobell's garden. Thanks to the kindness of your father and mother in sending me their carriage, my journey hither on Saturday was performed with very little fatigue, and had it been a fine day I think I should have felt none. But it distressed me to see Uncle Henry and William Knight, who kindly attended us on horseback, riding in the rain almost the whole way. We expect a visit from them tomorrow and they will stay the night, and on Thursday, which is a confirmation and a holiday, we are to get Charles out to breakfast. We have had but one visit from him, poor fellow, as he is in sick room, but he hopes to be out tonight. We see Mrs. Heathcote every day, and William is to call upon us soon. God bless you, my dear E! If ever you are ill, may you be as tenderly nursed as I have been. May the same blessed alleviations of anxious, sympathising friends be yours. And may you possess, as I dare say you will, the greatest blessing of all, in the consciousness of not being unworthy of their love. I could not feel this. Your very affectionate aunt, J.A. The following extract from a letter, which has been before printed, written soon after the former, breathes the same spirit of humility and thankfulness. I will only say further that my dearest sister, my tender, watchful, indefatigable nurse, has not been made ill by her exertions. As to what I owe her, and the anxious affection of all my beloved family on this occasion, I can only cry over it, and pray God to bless them more and more. Throughout her illness she was nursed by her sister, and often assisted by her sister-in-law, my mother. Both were with her when she died. Two of her brothers, who were clergymen, lived near enough to Winchester to be in frequent attendance, and to administer the services suitable for a Christian's deathbed. While she used the language of hope to her correspondence, she was fully aware of her danger, though not appalled by it. It's true that there was much to attach her to life. She was happy in her family. She was just beginning to feel confidence in her own success, and, no doubt, the exercise of her great talents was an enjoyment in itself. We may well believe that she would gladly have lived longer, but she was enabled without dismay or complaint to prepare for death. She was a humble-believing Christian. Her life had been passed in the performance of home duties and the cultivation of domestic affections without any self-seeking or craving after applause. She had always sought, as it were by instinct, to promote the happiness of all who came within her influence, and doubtless she had her reward in the peace of mind which was granted her in her last days. Her sweetness of temper never failed. She was ever considerate and grateful to those who attended on her. At times, when she felt rather better, her playfulness of spirit revived, and she amused them even in their sadness. Once, when she thought herself near her end, she said what she imagined might be her last words to those around her, and particularly thanked her sister-in-law for being with her, saying, You have always been a kind sister to me, Mary. When the end at last came, she sank rapidly, and on being asked by her attendance whether there was anything she wanted, her reply was nothing but death. These were her last words. In quietness and peace, she breathed her last on the morning of July 18th, 1817. On the 24th of that month, she was buried in Winchester Cathedral, near the centre of the North Isle, almost opposite to the beautiful chantry tomb of William of Wickham. A large slab of black marble in the pavement marks the place. Her own family only attended the funeral. Her sister returned to her desolated home, there to devote herself for ten years to the care of her aged mother, and to live much on the memory of her lost sister, till called many years later to rejoin her. Her brothers went back sorrowing to their several homes. They were very fond and very proud of her. They were attached to her by her talents, her virtues, and her engaging manners, and each loved afterwards to fancier resemblance in some niece or daughter of his own to the dear sister Jane, perfect equal they yet never expected to see. End of chapter 11 CHAPTER 12 THE CANCELLED CHAPTER CHAPTER 10 OF PERSUASION With all this knowledge of Mr. Elliot and this authority to impart it, Anne left Westgate buildings, her mind deeply busy in revolving what she had heard, feeling, thinking, recalling, and foreseeing everything, shocked at Mr. Elliot, sighing over future callage, and pained for Lady Russell whose confidence in him had been entire. The embarrassment which must be felt from this hour in his presence, how to behave to him, how to get rid of him, what to do by any of the party at home, where to be blind, where to be active, it was altogether a confusion of images and doubts, a perplexity and agitation which she could not see the end of. And she was in Gay Street and still so much engrossed that she started on being addressed by Admiral Croft as if he were a person unlikely to be met there. It was within a few steps of his own door. You are going to call upon my wife, said he. She will be very glad to see you. Anne denied it. No, she really had not time. She was in her way home. But while she spoke, the Admiral had stepped back and knocked at the door, calling out, Yes, yes, do go in. She is all alone. Go in and rest yourself. Anne felt so little disposed at this time to be in company of any sort that it vexed her to be thus constrained, but she was obliged to stop. Since you are so very kind, said she, I will just ask Mrs. Croft how she does, but I really cannot stay five minutes. You are sure she is quite alone? The possibility of Captain Wentworth had occurred, and most fearfully anxious was she to be assured, either that he was within or that he was not, which might have been a question. Oh, yes, quite alone. Nobody but her man to a maker with her, and they have been shut up together this half hour, so it must be over soon. Her man to a maker? Then I am sure my calling now would be most inconvenient. Indeed, you must allow me to leave my card and be so good as to explain it afterwards to Mrs. Croft. No, no, not at all, not at all. She will be very happy to see you. Mind, I will not swear that she has not something particular to say to you, but that will all come out in the right place. I give no hints. Why, Miss Elliot, we begin to hear strange things of you, smiling in her face. But you have not much the look of it as grave as a little judge. Anne blushed. Aye, aye, that will do now. It is all right. I thought we were not mistaken. She was left to guess at the direction of his suspicions. The first wild idea had been of some disclosure from his brother-in-law, but she was ashamed the next moment and felt how far more probable it was that he should be meaning Mr. Elliot. The door was opened, and the man evidently beginning to deny his mistress when the sight of his master stopped him. The admiral enjoyed the joke exceedingly. Anne thought his triumph over Stephen rather too long. At last, however, he was able to invite her upstairs, and stepping before her said, I will just go up with you myself and show you in. I cannot stay because I must go to the post-office, but if you will only sit down for five minutes I am sure Sophie will come and you will find nobody to disturb you. There is nobody but Frederick here. Opening the door as he spoke. Such a person to be passed over as nobody to her. Being allowed to feel quite secure, indifferent at her ease, to have it burst on her that she was to be the next moment in the same room with him. No time for recollection, for planning behaviour or regulating manners. There was time only to turn pale before she had passed through the door and met the astonished eyes of Captain Wentworth, who was sitting by the fire pretending to read, and prepared for no greater surprise than the admiral's hasty return. Equally unexpected was the meeting on each side. There was nothing to be done, however, but to stifle feelings and to be quietly polite, and the admiral was too much on the alert to leave any troublesome pause. He repeated again what he had said before about his wife and everybody, insisted on Anne's sitting down and being perfectly comfortable, was sorry he must leave her himself, but was sure Mrs. Croft would be down very soon, and would go upstairs and give her notice directly. Anne was sitting down, but now she arose again to entreat him not to interrupt Mrs. Croft and re-urge the wish of going away and calling another time. But the admiral would not hear of it, and if she did not return to the charge with unconquerable perseverance or did not with a more passive determination walk quietly out of the room, as certainly she might have done, may she not be pardoned? If she had no horror of a few minutes tete-a-tete with Captain Wentworth, may she not be pardoned for not wishing to give him the idea that she had?" She receded herself, and the admiral took leave, but on reaching the door said, Frederick, a word with you, if you please. Captain Wentworth went to him, and instantly, before they were well out of the room, the admiral continued, as I am going to leave you together it is but fair I should give you something to talk of, and so, if you please. Here the door was very firmly closed. She could guess by which of the two, and she lost entirely what immediately followed, but it was impossible for her not to distinguish parts of the rest, for the admiral, on the strength of the doors being shut, was speaking without any management of voice, though she could hear his companion trying to check him. She heard her own name, and Kellynch repeatedly. She was very much disturbed. She knew not what to do or what to expect, and among other agonies felt the possibility of Captain Wentworth's not returning into the room at all, which, after her consenting to stay, would have been too bad for language. They seemed to be talking of the admiral's lease of Kellynch. She heard him say something about the lease being signed or not signed. That was not likely to be a very agitating subject, but then followed. I hate to be at an uncertainty. I must know it once. Sophie thinks the same. Then, in a lower tone, Captain Wentworth seemed remonstrating, wanting to be excused, wanting to put something off. Foo-foo! answered the admiral. Now is the time. If you will not speak, I will stop it. Very well, sir, very well, sir, followed with some impatience from his companion, opening the door as he spoke. You will, then, you promise you will, replied the admiral in all the power of his natural voice, unbroken even by one thin door. Yes, sir, yes. And the admiral was hastily left, the door was closed, and the moment arrived in which Anne was alone with Captain Wentworth. She could not attempt to see how he looked, but he walked immediately to a window as if irresolute and embarrassed, and for about the space of five seconds she repented what she had done, censured it as unwise, blushed over it as indelicate. She longed to be able to speak of the weather or the concert, but could only compass the relief of taking a newspaper in her hand. The distressing pause was over, however, he turned round in half a minute, and coming towards the table where she sat, said in a voice of effort and constraint. You must have heard too much already, madam, to be in any doubt of my having promised admiral Croft to speak to you on a particular subject, and this conviction determines me to do so, however repugnant to my to all my sense of propriety to be taking so great a liberty. You will acquit me of impertinence I trust by considering me as speaking only for another, and speaking by necessity, and the admiral is a man who can never be thought impertinent by anyone who knows him as you do. His intentions are always the kindest and the best, and you will perceive he is actuated by none other in the application which I am now with very peculiar feelings obliged to make. He stopped, but merely to recover breath to expect any answer. And listened as if her life depended on the issue of his speech. He proceeded with a forced alacrity. The admiral, madam, was this morning confidently informed that you were upon my soul I am quite at a loss ashamed breathing and speaking quickly the awkwardness of giving information of this kind to one of the parties you can be at no loss to understand me. It was very confidently said that Mr. Elliott that everything was settled in the family for a union between Mr. Elliott and yourself. It was added that you were to live at Kellynch, that Kellynch was to be given up. This the admiral knew could not be correct, but it occurred to him that it might be the wish of the parties. And my commission from him, madam, is to say that if the family wish it such lease of Kellynch shall be canceled and he and my sister will provide themselves with another home without imagining themselves to be doing anything which, under similar circumstances, would not be done for them. This is all, madam, a very few words in reply from you will be sufficient, that I should be the person commissioned on this subject is extraordinary and believe me, madam, it is no less painful. A very few words, however, will put an end to awkwardness and distress we may both be feeling. Anne spoke a word or two, but they were unintelligible and before she could command herself he added, if you will only tell me that the admiral may address a line to Sir Walter it will be enough. Pronounce only the words, he may and I shall immediately follow him with your message. No, sir, said Anne. There is no message. You are right. The admiral is misinformed. I do justice to the kindness of his intentions but he is quite mistaken. There is no truth in any such report. He was a moment silent. She turned her eyes towards him for the first time since his re-entering the room. His colour was varying and he was looking at her with all the power and keenness which she believed no other eyes than his possessed. No truth in any such report, he repeated. No truth in any part of it? None. He had been standing by a chair enjoying the relief of leaning on it or of playing with it. He now sat down, drew it a little nearer to her and looked with an expression which had something more than penetration in it, something softer. Her countenance did not discourage. It was a silent but a very powerful dialogue on his supplication, on hers acceptance. Still a little nearer and a hand was taken and pressed and— Anne, my own dear Anne, bursting forth in all the fullness of exquisite feeling and all suspense and indecision were over. They were reunited. They were restored to all that had been lost. They were carried back to the past with only an increase of attachment and confidence, and only such a flutter of present delight as made them little fit for the interruption of Mrs. Croft when she joined them not long afterwards. She, probably, in the observations of the next ten minutes saw something to suspect and though it was hardly possible for a woman of her description to wish the man to a maker had imprisoned her longer, she might be very likely wishing some storm to break the windows above or a summons to the admiral's shoemaker below. Fortune favoured them all, however, in another way, in a gentle, steady reign, just happily set in as the admiral returned and Anne rose to go. She was earnestly invited to stay dinner. A note was dispatched to Camden Place and she stayed, stayed till ten at night and during that time the husband and wife, either by the wife's contrivance or by simply going on in their usual way, were frequently out of the room together, gone upstairs to hear a noise or downstairs to settle their accounts or upon the landing to trim the lamp and these precious moments were turned to so good an account that all the most anxious feelings of the past were gone through. Before they parted at night Anne had the felicity of being assured that in the first place so far from being altered for the worst she had gained inexpressibly in personal loveliness and that as to character hers was now fixed on his mind as perfection itself maintaining the just medium of fortitude and gentleness that he had never ceased to love and prefer her, though it had been only at upper cross that he had learnt to do her justice and only at Lyme that he had begun to understand his own feelings that at Lyme he had received lessons of more than one kind the passing admiration of Mr. Elliott had at least roused him and the scene on the cob and at Captain Harville's had fixed her superiority. In his preceding attempts to attach himself to Louisa Musgrove the attempts of anger and peak he protested that he had continually felt the impossibility of really caring for Louisa though till that day till the leisure for reflection which followed it he had not understood the perfect excellence of the mind with which Louisa's could so ill bear comparison or the perfect the unrivaled hold it possessed over his own there he had learnt to distinguish between the steadiness of principle and the obstinacy of self-will between the darings of heedlessness and the resolution of a collected mind there he had seen everything to exalt in his estimation the woman he had lost and there had begun to deplore the pride the folly the madness of resentment which had kept him from trying to regain her when thrown in his way from that period to the present had his penance been the most severe he had no sooner been free from the horror and remorse attending the first few days of Louisa's accident no sooner had begun to feel he had begun to feel himself though alive not at liberty he found that he was considered by his friend Harville an engaged man the Harvills entertained not a doubt of a mutual attachment between him and Louisa and though this to a degree was contradicted instantly it yet made him feel that perhaps by her family by everybody by herself even the same idea might be held that he was not free in honour though if such were to be the conclusion too free alas in heart he had never thought justly on this subject before and he had not sufficiently considered that his excessive intimacy at uppercross must have its danger of ill consequence in many ways and that while trying whether he could attach himself to either of the girls he might be exciting unpleasant reports if not raising unrequited regard he found too late that he had entangled himself and that precisely as he became thoroughly satisfied of his not caring for Louisa at all he must regard himself as bound to her if her feelings for him or what the Harvills supposed it determined him to leave Lyme and await her perfect recovery elsewhere he would gladly weaken by any fair means whatever sentiment or speculations concerning them might exist and he went therefore into Shropshire meaning after a while to return to the Crofts at Kellidge and act as he found requisite he had remained in Shropshire lamenting the blindness of his own pride and the blunders of his own calculations till at once released from Louisa by the astonishing felicity of her engagement with Benwick Bath, Bath had instantly followed in thought and not long in fact to Bath, to arrive with hope, to be torn by jealousy at the first sight of Mr. Elliott, to experience all the changes of each at the concert to be miserable by the morning's circumstantial report to be now more happy than language could express or any heart but his own be capable of he was very eager and very delightful in the description of what he had felt at the concert the evening seemed to have been made up of exquisite moments the moment of her stepping forward in the octagon room to speak to him the moment of Mr. Elliott's appearing and tearing her away and one or two subsequent moments marked by returning hope or increasing despondency were dwelt on with energy to see you, cried he in the midst of those who could not be my well-wishers to see your cousin close by you laughing and smiling and feel all the horrible eligibility and proprieties of the match to consider it as the certain wish of every being who could hope to influence you even if your own feelings were reluctant or indifferent to consider what powerful support would be his was it not enough to make the fool of me which I appeared how could I look on without agony was not the very sight of the friend who sat behind you was not the recollection of what had been the knowledge of her influence the indelible, immovable impression of what persuasion had once done was it not all against me you should have distinguished replied Anne you should not have suspected me now the case so different and my age so different if I was wrong in yielding to persuasion once remember it was to persuasion exerted on the side of safety not of risk when I yielded I thought it was to duty but no duty could be called in aid here in marrying a man indifferent to me all risk would have been incurred and all duty violated perhaps I ought to have reasoned thus he replied but I could not I could not derive benefit from the late knowledge I had acquired of your character I could not bring it into play it was overwhelmed, buried in those earlier feelings which I had been smarting under year after year I could think of you only as one who had yielded one who had given me up who had been influenced by anyone rather than by me I saw you with the very person who had guided you in that year of misery I had no reason to believe her of less authority now the force of habit was to be added I should have thought said Anne that my manner yourself might have spared you much or all of this no no your manner might be only the ease which your engagement to another man would give I left you in this belief and yet I was determined to see you again my spirits rallied with the morning and I felt that I had still a motive for remaining here the admirals news indeed was a revulsion since that moment I have been divided what to do I have confirmed this would have been my last day in Bath there was time for all this to pass with such interruptions only as enhanced the charm of the communication and Bath could hardly contain any other two beings at once so rationally and so rapturously happy as during that evening occupied the sofa of Mrs. Croft's drawing room in Gay Street Captain Wentworth had taken care to meet the admiral as he returned into the house by him as to Mr. Elliott and Kellynch and the delicacy of the admiral's good nature kept him from saying another word on the subject to Anne. He was quite concerned lest he might have been giving her pain by touching on a tender part who could say? She might be liking her cousin better than he liked her and upon recollection if they had been to marry at all why should they have waited so long when the evening closed it is probable that the admiral received some new ideas from his wife whose particularly friendly manner in parting with her gave Anne the gratifying persuasion of her seeing and approving it had been such a day to Anne the hours which had passed since her leaving Camden Place had done so much she was almost bewildered almost too happy in looking back it was necessary to sit up half the night and lie awake the remainder to comprehend with composure her present state and pay for the over-plus of bliss by headache and fatigue then follows Chapter 11 i.e. Chapter 12 in the published book and at the end is written Phineas July 18 1816 and of Chapter 12 read by Kara Schellenberg on September 12th 2007 in Oceanside, California Chapter 13 of Memoir of Jane Austen this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Memoir of Jane Austen by James Edward Austin Lee Chapter 13 The Last Work Jane Austen was taken from us how much unexhausted talent perished with her how largely she might yet have contributed to the entertainment of her readers if her life had been prolonged cannot be known but it is certain that the mine at which she had so long labored was not worked out and that she was still diligently employed in collecting fresh materials from it persuasion had been finished in August 1816 sometime was probably given to correcting it for the press but on the 27th of the following January she began a new novel and worked at it up to the 17th of March the chief part of this manuscript is written in her usual firm and neat hand but some of the latter pages seem to have been first traced in pencil probably when she was too weak to sit long at her desk and written over in ink afterwards the quantity produced does not indicate any decline of power or industry for in those seven weeks twelve chapters had been completed it is more difficult to judge of the quality of a work so little advanced it had received no name there was scarcely any indication what the course of the story was to be nor was any heroine yet perceptible who, like Fanny Price or Anne Elliot, might draw round her the sympathies of the reader such an unfinished fragment cannot be presented to the public but I am persuaded that some of Jane Austen's admirers will be glad to learn something about the latest creations which were forming themselves in her mind and therefore as some of the principal characters were already sketched in with a vigorous hand I will try to give an idea of them illustrated by extracts from the work the scene is laid at Sandaton a village on the Sussex coast just struggling into notoriety as a bathing-place under the patronage of the two principal proprietors of the parish Mr. Parker and Lady Denim Mr. Parker was an amiable man with more enthusiasm than judgment whose somewhat shallow mind overflowed with the one idea of the prosperity of Sandaton together with a jealous contempt of the rival village of Brinshore where a similar attempt was going on to the regret of his much-enduring wife he had left his family mansion with all of its ancestral comforts of gardens, shrubberies, and shelter situated in a valley some miles inland and had built a new residence a Trafalgar house on the bare brow of the hill overlooking Sandaton and the sea exposed to every wind that blows but he will confess to no discomforts nor suffer his family to feel any from the change the following extract brings him before the reader, mounted on his hobby he wanted to secure the promise of a visit and to get as many of the family as his own house would hold to follow him to Sandaton as soon as possible and, healthy as all the hay-woods undeniably were, he foresaw that every one of them would be benefited by the sea he held it indeed as certain that no person however upheld for the present by fortuitous aids of exercise and spirit in assemblance of health could be really in a state of secure and permanent health without spending at least six weeks by the sea every year the sea air and sea bathing together were nearly infallible one or the other of them being a match for every disorder of the stomach the lungs or the blood they were anti-spasmodic, anti-pulmonary, anti-bilius and anti-rheumatic nobody could catch cold by the sea nobody wanted appetite by the sea nobody wanted spirits nobody wanted strength they were healing, softening, relaxing fortifying and bracing seemingly just as was wanted sometimes one, sometimes the other if the sea breeze failed the sea bath was the certain corrective and when bathing disagreed it was evidently designed by nature for the cure his eloquence however could not prevail Mr. and Mrs. Haywood never left home the maintenance, education, and fitting out of fourteen children demanded a very quiet, settled, careful course of life and obliged them to be stationary and healthy at Willingdon what Prudence had first enjoined was now rendered pleasant by habit they never left home and they had a gratification in saying so Lady Denims was a very different character she was a rich, vulgar widow with a sharp but narrow mind who cared for the prosperity of Sanditon only so far as it might increase the value of her own property she is thus described Lady Denim had been a rich, misbraritan born to wealth, but not to education her first husband had been a Mr. Hollis a man of considerable property in the country of which a large share of the parish of Sanditon with manner and mansion-house formed apart he had been an elderly man when she married him her own age about thirty her motives for such a match could be little understood at the distance of forty years but she had so well nursed and pleased Mr. Hollis that at his death he left her everything all his estates and all at her disposal after a widowhood of some years she had been induced to marry again the late Sir Harry Denim of Denim Park in the neighborhood of Sanditon succeeded in removing her and her large income to his own domains but he could not succeed in the views of permanently enriching his family which were attributed to him she had been too wary to put anything out of her own power and when on Sir Harry's death she returned again to her own house at Sanditon she was said to have made this boast that though she had got nothing but her title from the family yet she had given nothing for it for the title it was to be supposed that she married Lady Denim was indeed a great lady beyond the common wants of society for she had many thousands a year to bequeath and three distinct sets of people to be courted by her own relations who might very reasonably wish for her original thirty pounds among them the legal heirs of Mr. Hollis who might hope to be more indebted to her sense of justice than he had allowed them to be to his and those members of the Denim family for whom her second husband had hoped to make a good bargain by all these or by branches of them she had no doubt been long and still continued to be well attacked and of these three divisions Mr. Parker did not hesitate to say that Mr. Hollis's kindred were the least in favour and Sir Henry Denim's the most the former he believed had done themselves irremediable harm by expressions of very unwise resentment at the time of Mr. Hollis's death the latter to the advantage of being the remnant of a connection which she had certainly valued joined those of having been known to her from their childhood and of being always at hand to pursue their interests by seasonable attentions but another claimant was now to be taken into account a young female relation whom Lady Denim had been induced to receive into her family after having always protested against any such addition and often enjoyed the repeated defeat she had given to every attempt of her own relations to introduce this young lady or that young lady as a companion at Sanditon House she had brought back with her from London last Mikkelmas a Miss Clara Brereton who bid fair to vie in favour with Sir Edward Denim and to secure for herself and her family that share of the accumulated property which they certainly had the best right to inherit Lady Denim's character comes out in a conversation which takes place at Mr. Parker's tea-table the conversation turned entirely upon Sanditon its present number of visitants and the chances of a good season it was evident that Lady Denim had more anxiety more fears of loss than her co-ajuter she wanted to have the place fill faster and seemed to have many harassing apprehensions of the lodgings being in some instances under let to report that a large boarding school was expected she replies oh well no harm in that they will stay there six weeks and out of such a number who knows but some may be consumptive and want asses milk and I have two milch asses at this very time but perhaps the little missus may hurt the furniture I hope they will have a good sharp governess to look after them but she wholly disapproved of Mr. Parker's wish to secure the residents of a medical man amongst them why what should we do with a doctor here it would only be encouraging our servants and the poor to fancy themselves ill if there was a doctor at hand oh pray let us have none of that tribe at Sanditon we go on very well as we are there is the sea and the downs and my milch asses and I have told Mrs. Whitby that if anybody inquires for a chamber horse they may be supplied at a fair rate poor Mr. Hollis's chamber horse as good as new and what can people want more I have lived seventy years in the world and never took physics except twice and never saw the face of a doctor in all my life on my own account and I really believe if my poor dear Sir Harry had never seen one neither he would have been alive now ten fees one after another did the men take who sent him out of the world I beseech you Mr. Parker no doctors here this ladies character comes out more strongly in a conversation with Mr. Parker's guest Miss Charlotte Haywood Sir Edward Denham with his sister Esther and Clara Brereton have just left them Charlotte accepted an invitation from Lady Denham to remain with her on the terrace while the others adjourned to the library Lady Denham like a true great lady talked and talked only of her own concerns and Charlotte listened taking hold of Charlotte's arm with the ease of one who felt that any notice from her was a favour and communicative from the same sense of importance or from a natural love of talking she immediately said in a tone of great satisfaction and with a look of arch sagacity Miss Esther wants me to invite her and her brother to spend a week with me at Sanditon House as I did last summer but I shan't she has been trying to get round me every way with her praise of this and her praise of that but I saw what she was about I saw through it all I am not very easily taken in my dear Charlotte can think of nothing more harmless to be said than the simple enquiry of Sir Edward and Miss Denham yes my dear my young folks as I call them sometimes for I take them very much by the hand and had them with me last summer about this time for a week from Monday to Monday and very delighted and thankful they were for they are very good young people my dear I would not have you think that I only notice them for poor dear Harry's sake no no they are very deserving themselves or trust me they would not be so much in my company I am not the woman to help anybody blindfold I always take care to know what I am about and who I have to deal with before I stir a finger I do not think I was ever overreached in my life and that is a good deal for a woman to say that has been twice married poor dear Sir Harry between ourselves thought at first to have got more but with a bit of a sigh he is gone and we must not find fault with the dead nobody could live happier together than us and he was a very honorable man quite the gentleman of ancient family and when he died I gave Sir Edward his gold watch this was said with a look at her companion which implied its right to produce a great impression and seeing no rapturous astonishment on Charlotte's countenance she added quickly he did not bequeath it to his nephew my dear it was no bequest it was not in the will he only told me and that but once that he should wish his nephew to have his watch but it need not have been binding if I had not chose it very kind indeed very handsome said Charlotte absolutely forced to affect admiration yes my dear and it is not the only kind thing I have done by him I have been a very liberal friend to Sir Edward and poor young man he needs it bad enough for though I am only the dowager my dear and he is the heir things do not stand between us in the way they usually do between those two parties not a shilling do I receive from the denim estate Sir Edward has no payments to make me he don't stand up or most believe me it is I that help him indeed he is a very fine young man and particularly elegant in his address this was said chiefly for the sake of saying something but Charlotte directly saw that it was laying her open to suspicion by Lady Denham's giving a shrewd glance at her and replying yes yes he's very well to look at and it is to be hoped that somebody of large fortune will think so for Sir Edward must marry for money he and I often talk that matter over a handsome young man like him will go smirking and smiling about and paying girls compliments but he knows he must marry for money and Sir Edward is a very steady young man in the main and has got very good notions Sir Edward Denham said Charlotte with such personal advantages may be almost sure of getting a woman of fortune if he chooses it this glorious sentiment seemed to quite remove suspicion I my dear that is very sensibly said and if we could but get a young heiress to Sanditon but heiresses are monstrous scares I do not think we have had an heiress here nor even a co since Sanditon has been a public place families come after families but as far as I can learn there are not one in a hundred of them that have any real property landed or funded an income perhaps but no property clergymen may be or lawyers from town or half-pay officers or widows with only a jointure and what can such people do to anybody except just as they take our empty houses and between ourselves I think they are great fools for not staying at home now if we could get a young heiress to be sent here for her health and as soon as she got well she would never fall in love with Sir Edward and Miss Esther must marry somebody of fortune too she must get a rich husband ah, young ladies that have no money are very much to be pitied after a short pause if Miss Esther thinks to talk me into inviting them to come and stay at Sanditon house she will find herself mistaken matters are altered with me since last summer you know I have Miss Clara with me now which makes a great difference I should not choose to have my two housemaids taken up all the morning and dusting out bedrooms they have Miss Clara's room to put to rights as well as mine every day if they had hard work they would want higher wages Charlotte's feelings were divided between amusement and indignation she kept her own countenance and kept a civil silence but without attempting to listen any longer and only conscious that Lady Denham was still talking in the same way allowed her own thoughts to form themselves into such meditation as this she is thoroughly mean I had no expectation of anything so bad Mr. Parker spoke too mildly of her he is too kind-hearted to see clearly and their very connection misleads him he has persuaded her to engage in the same speculation and because they have so far the same object in view he fancies that she feels like him in other things but she is very, very mean I can see no good in her poor Miss Braritan and it makes everybody mean about her it's poor Sir Edward and his sister how far nature meant them to be respectable I cannot tell but they are obliged to be mean in their civility to her and I am mean too in giving her my attention with the appearance of coinciding with her thus it is when rich people are sorted Mr. Parker has two unmarried sisters of singular character they live together Diana the younger always takes the lead and the elder follows in the same track it is their pleasure to fancy themselves invalids to a degree and in a manner never experienced by others but from a state of exquisite pain and utter prostration Diana Parker can always rise to be officious in the concerns of all her acquaintance and to make incredible exertions where they are not wanted it would seem that they must always be either very busy for the good of others or else extremely ill themselves some natural delicacy of constitution in fact with an unfortunate turn for medicine especially quack medicine had given them an early tendency at various times to various disorders the rest of their suffering was from their own fancy the love of distinction and the love of the wonderful they had charitable hearts and many amiable feelings but a spirit of restless activity and the glory of doing more than anybody else had a share in every exertion of benevolence and there was vanity in all they did as well as in all they endured these peculiarities come out in the following letter of Diana Parker to her brother my dear Tom, we were much grieved at your accident and if you had not described yourself as having fallen into such very good hands I should have been with you at all hazards the day after the receipt of your letter though it found me suffering under a more severe attack than usual of my old grievance, spasmodic bile and hardly able to crawl from my bed to the sofa but how were you treated? send me more particulars in your next if indeed a simple sprain as you denominated nothing would have been so judicious as friction friction by the hand alone supposing it could be applied immediately two years ago I happened to be calling on Mrs. Sheldon when her coachman sprained his foot as he was cleaning the carriage and could hardly limp into the house but by the immediate use of friction alone steadily persevered in with his ankle with my own hands for four hours without intermission he was well in three days pray never run into peril again in looking for an apothecary on our account for had you the most experienced man in his line settled at Sanditon it would be no recommendation to us we have entirely done with the whole medical tribe we have consulted physician after physician in vain till we are quite convinced that they can do nothing for us and that we must trust to our knowledge by our own wretched constitutions for any relief but if you think it advisable for the interests of the place to get a medical man there I will undertake the commission with pleasure and have no doubt of succeeding I could soon put the necessary irons in the fire as for getting to Sanditon myself it is an impossibility I grieve to say that I cannot attempt it but my feelings tell me too plainly that in my present state the sea air would probably be the death of me and in truth I doubt whether Susan's nerves would be equal to the effort she has been suffering much from headache and six leeches a day for ten days together relieved her so little that we thought it right to change our measures and being convinced on examination that much of the evil lay in her gums I persuaded her to attack the disorder there she has accordingly had three teeth drawn and is decidedly better but her nerves are good deal deranged and she can only speak in a whisper and fainted away this morning on poor Arthur's trying to suppress a cough within a week of the date of this letter in spite of the impossibility of moving and of the fatal effects to be apprehended from the sea air Diana Parker was at Sanditon with her sister she had flattered herself that by her own indefatagable exertions and by setting at work the agency of many friends she had induced two large families to take houses at Sanditon it was to expedite these politic views that she came and though she met with some disappointment of her expectation yet she did not suffer in health such were some of the dramatis personae already dressed and prepared for their parts they are at least original and unlike any that the author had produced before the success of the piece must have depended on the skill with which these parts might be played but a few will be inclined to distrust the skill of one who had so often succeeded if the author had lived to complete her work it is probable that these personages have grown into as mature and individuality of character and have taken as permanent a place amongst our familiar acquaintance as Mr. Bennett or John Thorpe Mary Musgrove or Ant Norris herself End of Chapter 13 Chapter 14 of Memoir of Jane Austen This is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Gesine Memoir of Jane Austen by James Edward Austen Lee Chapter 14 Postscript When first I was asked to put together a memoir of my aunt I saw reasons for declining the attempt It was not only that having passed the three score years in ten usually allotted to men's strength and being undercustomed to write for publication I had well distrust my ability to complete the work but that I also knew the extreme scantiness of the materials out of which it might be constructed The grave closed over my aunt 52 years ago and during that long period no idea of writing her life had been entertained by any of her family Her nearest relatives far from making provisions for such a purpose had actually destroyed many of the letters and papers that might have been facilitated They were influenced, I believe partly by an extreme dislike to publishing private details and partly by never having assumed that the world would take so strong and abiding an interest in her works as to claim her name as public property It was therefore necessary for me to draw upon recollections rather than on written documents for my materials While the subject itself supplied me with nothing striking or prominent with which to arrest the attention of the reader It has been said that the happiest individuals like nations during their happiest periods have no history In the case of my aunt it was not only that her course of life was unvaried but that her own disposition was remarkably calm and even There was in her nothing eccentric or angular no ruggedness of temper no singularity of manner none of the morbid sensibility or exaggeration of feeling which not unfrequently accompanies great talents to be worked up into a picture hers was a mind well balanced on a basis of good sense sweetened by an affectionate heart and regulated by fixed principles so that she was to be distinguished from many other amiable and sensible women only by that peculiar genius which shines out clearly enough in her works but of which a biographer can make little use The motive which had last induced me to make the attempt is exactly expressed in the passage prefixed to these pages I thought that I saw something to be done knew of no one who could do it but myself and so was driven to the enterprise I am glad that I have been able to finish my work As a family record it can scarcely fail to be interesting to those relatives that are high value on their connection with Jane Austen and to them I especially dedicated but as I have been asked to do so I also submitted to the centre of the public with all its faults both of deficiency and redundancy I know that its value in their eyes must depend not on any merits of its own but on the degree of estimation in which my aunt's works may still be held and indeed I shall esteem it of the longest testimonies ever born to her talents if for her sake an interest can be taken in so poorer a sketch as I have been able to draw Bravic Ridge September 7th 1869 Post script printed at the end of the first edition omitted from the second Since these pages were in type I have read with astonishment the strange misrepresentation of my aunt's manners Miss Mitford in a letter which appears in her lately published life volume 1 page 305 Miss Mitford does not profess to have known Jane Austen herself but to report what had been told her by her mother having stated that her mother before her marriage was well acquainted with Jane Austen and her family she writes thus Mama says that she was then the prettiest, silliest most affected husband hunting butterfly she ever remembers the editor of Miss Mitford's life very properly observes in a note how different this description is from every other account of Jane Austen from whatever quarter certainly it is so totally at variance with a modest simplicity of character which I have attributed to my aunt that if it could be supposed to have a semblance of truth it must be equally injurious to her memory and to my trustworthiness as her biographer fortunately I am not driven to put my authority in competition with that of Miss Mitford nor to ask which ought to be considered the better witness in this case because I am able to prove by a reference to dates that Miss Mitford must have been under a mistake and that her mother could not possibly have known what she was supposed to have reported in as much as Jane Austen at the time referred to Miss Mitford was the daughter of Dr Russell rector of Ash a parish adjoining Steventon so that the families of Austen and Russell must at a time have been known to each other but the date assigned by Miss Mitford for the termination of the acquaintance is the time of her mother's marriage this took place in October 1785 when Jane who had been born in September 1775 was not quite ten years old in point of fact however Miss Russell's opportunities of observing Jane Austen must have come to an end still earlier for a conduct to Russell's death in January 1783 his widow and daughter removed from the neighbourhood so that all intercourse between the families ceased when Jane was little more than seven years old all persons who undertake to narrate from hearsay things which are supposed to have taken place before they were born are reliable to error and are apt to call in imagination to the aid of memory and hence it arises that many a fancy piece has been substituted for genuine history I do not care to correct the inaccurate account of Jane Austen's manners in afterlife because Miss Mitford candidly expresses a doubt whether she had not been misinformed on that point November 17th 1869 end of chapter 14 recorded by Gazine in September 2007