Part 43 (2/2)

It must have been somewhere about this ti the MS of _Northanger Abbey_ An unsuccessful attempt to secure the publication of the novel in the year 1809 has already been noticed; but we learn from the _Memoir_ that after four works of hers had been published, and so for her) negotiated with the publisher who had bought it, and found hin all claiain was concluded and the otiator had the satisfaction of inforhtly esteemed was by the author of _Pride and Prejudice_[315]

Meanwhile, Jane had been for soun before she went to London in the autumn of 1815 for the publication of _E the winter must certainly have interrupted its coh-spirited and more tender in its description of a stricken heart than anything she had attempted before

In May, Cassandra and Jane left Chawton to spend three weeks at Cheltenha with their brother at Steventon, and with the Fowles at Kintbury on the way, and again at Steventon on their return

Jane e in her did not escape the notice of her friends But whatever was the exact state of her health during the first half of this year, it did not prevent her fro able, on July 18, to write 'Finis' at the end of the first draft of _Persuasion_; and thereby hangs an interesting tale, which we cannot do better than relate in the words of the _Meht to an end in July; and the re-engagement of the hero and heroine effected in a totally different s But her perforht it ta 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 hter inspirations; the sense of power revived; and iination resumed its course She cancelled the condemned chapter, and wrote two others, entirely different, in its stead The result is that we possess the visit of the Musgrove party to Bath; the crowded and ani 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 entertainht that she has seldo inal ht about, the pictures of Charles Musgrove's good-natured boyishness and of his wife's jealous selfishness would have been inco strokes The cancelled chapter exists in manuscript It is certainly inferior to the thich were substituted for it; but it was such as soht have been contented with; and it contained touches which scarcely any other hand could have given, the suppression of which ret[316]

For the cancelled chapter in _Persuasion_, and for other posthus of the author, ill refer our readers to the second edition of the _Memoir_ They will not fail to note the delicate touches put to the characters of the Crofts by the Ad' Mrs Croft, and by the frequent excursions of husband and wife together 'upstairs to hear a noise, or downstairs to settle their accounts, or upon the landing to triether into a higher province of fiction, where the deepest emotion and the most delicate humour are blended in one scene: a scene that ht have had later masterpieces of a different type from that of their predecessors

_Persuasion_ is of about the saer Abbey_, and it seems natural to suppose that there was some purpose in this similarity, and that the torks were intended to be published together--as in the end they were--each as a two-volume novel She certainly conteer Abbey_ (which at that stage bore the name of _Catherine_) after she had recovered it in 1816, and when she wrote the 'advertisement' which appears in the first edition of the book Yet afterwards she see to fanny Knight, March 13, 1817, she says:--

I _will_ answer your kind questions more than you expect _Miss Catherine_ is put upon the shelf for the present, and I do not know that she will ever co ready for publication, which may perhaps appear about a twelveth of _Catherine_ This is for yourself alone

_Catherine_ is of course _Northanger Abbey_, and the 'so again to fanny, March 23, telling her she will not like it, and adding 'You ood for me'

Two remarkable points in these extracts are: the statement that _Persuasion_ was 'ready for publication,' but was not to appear for a twelvemonth, and the idea that the character of the heroine was, as it were, imposed upon the author by an external force which she was powerless to resist The intended delay in publishi+ng _Persuasion_ shoilling she was to let anything go till she was quite sure she had polished it to the utine that, had health returned, the one co story of Mrs Sht to life by touches which she kneell how to i _Catherine_ at all, it was not unnatural She ht reasonably hesitate to put an iht (and we know that she _did_) feel that the social usages of sixteen years ago, which she was describing in this tale, were no longer those of the day; and it was possible that a satire on Mrs Radcliffe was not what the public noanted The ed the publication of her novels after her death, thought differently; and we are grateful to theiven her by her friends, she would have produced soer Abbey_ or _Persuasion_ It must have been in the course of the year 1816 that she drew up the following 'plan of a novel, according to hints fro below the naave the hints

Scene to be in the country Heroine, the daughter of a clergy lived much in the world, had retired from it, and settled on a curacy with a very small fortune of his own He, the ined, perfect in character, temper, and manners, without the s the hter from one year's end to the other Heroine,[318] a faultless character herself, perfectly good, with much tenderness and sentihly accoenerally speaking) everything that thewo inequally well on the pianoforte and harp, and singing in the first style Her person quite beautiful,[321]

dark eyes and plump cheeks Book to open with the description of father and daughter, who are to converse in long speeches, elegant language, and a tone of high serious sentihter's earnest request, to relate to her the past events of his life This narrative will reach through the greater part of the first volume; as besides all the circue, it will couished naval character about the Court; his going afterwards to Court hireat variety of characters and involved hi with his opinion of the benefits of tithes being done away, and his having buried his own randh Priest of the parish in which she died refusing to pay her remains the respect due to them The father to be of a very literary turn, an enthusiast in literature, nobody's enee of his pastoral duties, the model of an exemplary parish priest[323] The heroine's friendshi+p to be sought after by a young wohbourhood, of talents and shrewdness, with light eyes and a fair skin, but having a considerable degree of wit[324]; heroine shall shrink from the acquaintance Fro variety of adventures Heroine and her father never above a fortnight together in one place[325]: he being driven from his curacy by the vile arts of soher with unrelenting passion No sooner settled in one country of Europe than they are necessitated to quit it and retire to another, always ed to leave them This will, of course, exhibit a wide variety of characters, but there will be nofroood[326] will be unexceptionable in every respect, and there will be no foibles or weaknesses but with the wicked, ill be completely depraved and infamous, hardly a resemblance of huress of her first removal, heroine must meet with the hero[327]--all perfection, of course, and only prevented fro his addresses to her by sooes somebody falls in love with her, and she receives repeated offers of e, which she always refers wholly to her father, exceedingly angry that _he_[328] should not be first applied to Often carried away by the anti-hero, but rescued either by her father or the hero Often reduced to support herself and her father by her talents, and work for her bread; continually cheated and defrauded of her hire; worn down to a skeleton, and now and then starved to death At last, hunted out of civilised society, denied the poor shelter of the hue, they are compelled to retreat into Ka his end approaching, throws hiround, and, after four or five hours of tender advice and parental admonition to his miserable child, expires in a fine burst of literary enthusiasainst holders of tithes Heroine inconsolable for some time, but afterwards crawls back towards her for into the hands of anti-hero; and at last, in the very nick of ti a corner to avoid hi just shaken off the scruples which fettered hi off in pursuit of her The tenderest and completest _eclaircissehout the whole work heroine to be in the h style The name of the work not to be _Emma_,[330] but of same sort as _Sense and Sensibility_ and _Pride and Prejudice_[331]

FOOTNOTES:

[311] The article would, of course, have been an impossibility had the _Review_ been published punctually, _E till late in December 1815

[312] From information kindly supplied by Mr John Murray

[313] After a short mention of _Sense and Sensibility_ and _Pride and Prejudice_ (in which Sir Walter unkindly suggests that Lizzie Bennet in refusing Darcy 'does not perceive that she has done a foolish thing until she accidentally visits a very handso to her ad a long quotation, to _E up, he declares as follows:--

'Perhaps the readerspecimen, both the merits and faults of the author

The former consist much in the force of a narrative, conducted with ue, in which the characters of the speakers evolve themselves with dramatic effect The faults, on the contrary, arise from the minute detail which the author's plan comprehends Characters of folly or simplicity, such as those of old Woodhouse and Miss Bates, are ridiculous when first presented, but if too often brought forward or too long dwelt upon, their prosing is apt to become as tiresome in fiction as in real society'

Had not Sir Walter found it necessary to be so so frivolous as a novel, his praise would probably have been e in his diary, under date March 14, 1826:--

'Read again, for the third time at least, Miss Austen's finely written novel of _Pride and Prejudice_ That young lady has a talent for describing the involves and characters of ordinary life, which is toBo strain I can do ; but the exquisite touch which renders ordinary co from the truth of the description and the sentiifted creature died so early!'

[314] No division or bitterness seems to have been caused in the fa affection which united them

[315] _Memoir_, p 130