Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters Part 41

Two more letters were written by the author to her publisher while the work was in his hands.

On December 11, she writes:--

As I find that _Emma_ is advertised for publication as early as Sat.u.r.day next, I think it best to lose no time in settling all that remains to be settled on the subject, and adopt this method as involving the smallest tax on your time. . . .

. . . The t.i.tle-page must be '_Emma_, dedicated by permission to H.R.H. the Prince Regent.' And it is my particular wish that one set should be completed and sent to H.R.H. two or three days before the work is generally public. It should be sent under cover to the Rev. J. S. Clarke, Librarian, Carlton House. I shall subjoin a list of those persons to whom I must trouble you to forward also a set each, when the work is out; all unbound with 'From the Auth.o.r.ess' on the first page.[305]

. . . I return also _Mansfield Park_ as ready for a second edition, I believe, as I can make it.[306]

I am in Hans Place till the 16th; from that day inclusive, my direction will be Chawton, Alton, Hants.[307]

On receipt of this, Mr. Murray seems to have sent round a note immediately, asking if it really was Miss Austen's wish that the dedication should be placed on the t.i.tle-page, for we find Jane writing again the same day:--

DEAR SIR,--I am very much obliged by yours, and very happy to feel everything arranged to our mutual satisfaction. As to my direction about the t.i.tle-page, it was arising from my ignorance only, and from my having never noticed the proper place for a dedication. I thank you for putting me right. Any deviation from what is usually done in such cases is the last thing I should wish for. I feel happy in having a friend to save me from the ill effect of my own blunder.

On December 11, Jane resumed her correspondence with Mr. Clarke:--

DEAR SIR,--My _Emma_ is now so near publication that I feel it right to a.s.sure you of my not having forgotten your kind recommendation of an early copy for Carlton House, and that I have Mr.

Murray's promise of its being sent to His Royal Highness, under cover to you, three days previous to the work being really out. I must make use of this opportunity to thank you, dear Sir, for the very high praise you bestow on my other novels. I am too vain to wish to convince you that you have praised them beyond their merit. My greatest anxiety at present is that this fourth work should not disgrace what was good in the others. But on this point I will do myself the justice to declare that, whatever may be my wishes for its success, I am very strongly haunted by the idea that to those readers who have preferred _Pride and Prejudice_ it will appear inferior in wit; and to those who have preferred _Mansfield Park_, very inferior in good sense. Such as it is, however, I hope you will do me the favour of accepting a copy. Mr. Murray will have directions for sending one. I am quite honoured by your thinking me capable of drawing such a clergyman as you gave the sketch of in your note of November 16th. But I a.s.sure you I am _not_. The comic part of the character I might be equal to, but not the good, the enthusiastic, the literary. Such a man's conversation must at times be on subjects of science and philosophy, of which I know nothing; or at least occasionally abundant in quotations and allusions which a woman who, like me, knows only her own mother tongue, and has read little in that, would be totally without the power of giving. A cla.s.sical education, or at any rate a very extensive acquaintance with English literature, ancient and modern, appears to me quite indispensable for the person who would do any justice to your clergyman; and I think I may boast myself to be, with all possible vanity, the most unlearned and uninformed female who ever dared to be an auth.o.r.ess.

Believe me, dear Sir, Your obliged and faithful hum^{bl} Ser^{t,} JANE AUSTEN.

But Mr. Clarke had not finished with his suggestions, for he replied in a few days:--

Carlton House: Thursday [December 1815].

MY DEAR MADAM,--The letter you were so obliging as to do me the honour of sending, was forwarded to me in Kent, where, in a village, Chiddingstone, near Sevenoaks, I had been hiding myself from all bustle and turmoil and getting spirits for a winter campaign, and strength to stand the sharp knives which many a Shylock is wetting [_sic_] to cut more than a pound of flesh from my heart, on the appearance of _James the Second_.[308]

On Monday I go to Lord Egremont's at Petworth--where your praises have long been sounded as they ought to be--I shall then look in on the party at the Pavilion[309] for a couple of nights, and return to preach at Park Street Chapel, Green Street, on the Thanksgiving Day.

You were very good to send me _Emma_, which I have in no respect deserved. It is gone to the Prince Regent. I have read only a few pages, which I very much admired--there is so much nature and excellent description of character in everything you describe. Pray continue to write and make all your friends send sketches to help you--and _Memoires pour servir_, as the French term it. Do let us have an English clergyman after your fancy--much novelty may be introduced--show, dear Madam, what good would be done if tythes were taken away entirely, and describe him burying his own mother, as I did, because the High Priest of the Parish in which she died did not pay her remains the respect he ought to do. I have never recovered the shock. Carry your clergyman to sea as the friend of some distinguished naval character about a Court, you can then bring forward, like Le Sage, many interesting scenes of character and interest.

But forgive me, I cannot write to you without wishing to elicit your genius, and I fear I cannot do that without trespa.s.sing on your patience and good nature.

I have desired Mr. Murray to procure, if he can, two little works I ventured to publish from being at sea--sermons which I wrote and preached on the ocean, and the edition which I published of Falconer's _Shipwreck_.[310]

Pray, dear Madam, remember that beside my cell at Carlton House, I have another which Dr. Barne procured for me at No. 37 Golden Square, where I often hide myself. There is a small library there much at your service, and if you can make the cell render you any service as a sort of halfway house when you come to Town, I shall be most happy.

There is a maid servant of mine always there.

I hope to have the honour of sending you _James the Second_ when it reaches a second edition, as some few notes may possibly be then added.

Yours, dear Madam, very sincerely, J. S. CLARKE.

It is evident that what the writer of the above letter chiefly desired, was that Jane Austen should depict a clergyman who should resemble no one so much as the Rev. J. S. Clarke. This is borne out again in a further letter in which Mr. Clarke expressed the somewhat tardy thanks of his Royal master.

Pavilion: March 27, 1816.

DEAR MISS AUSTEN,--I have to return you the thanks of His Royal Highness, the Prince Regent, for the handsome copy you sent him of your last excellent novel. Pray, dear Madam, soon write again and again. Lord St. Helens and many of the n.o.bility, who have been staying here, paid you the just tribute of their praise.

The Prince Regent has just left us for London; and having been pleased to appoint me Chaplain and Private English Secretary to the Prince of Cobourg, I remain here with His Serene Highness and a select party until the marriage. Perhaps when you again appear in print you may chuse to dedicate your volumes to Prince Leopold: any historical romance, ill.u.s.trative of the history of the august House of Cobourg, would just now be very interesting.

Believe me at all times, Dear Miss Austen, Your obliged friend, J. S. CLARKE.

Jane's sensible reply put an end to any further suggestions:--

MY DEAR SIR,--I am honoured by the Prince's thanks and very much obliged to yourself for the kind manner in which you mention the work. I have also to acknowledge a former letter forwarded to me from Hans Place. I a.s.sure you I felt very grateful for the friendly tenor of it, and hope my silence will have been considered, as it was truly meant, to proceed only from an unwillingness to tax your time with idle thanks. Under every interesting circ.u.mstance which your own talent and literary labours have placed you in, or the favour of the Regent bestowed, you have my best wishes. Your recent appointments I hope are a step to something still better. In my opinion, the service of a court can hardly be too well paid, for immense must be the sacrifice of time and feeling required by it.

You are very, very kind in your hints as to the sort of composition which might recommend me at present, and I am fully sensible that an historical romance, founded on the House of Saxe Cobourg, might be much more to the purpose of profit or popularity than such pictures of domestic life in country villages as I deal in.

But I could no more write a romance than an epic poem. I could not sit seriously down to write a serious romance under any other motive than to save my life; and if it were indispensable for me to keep it up and never relax into laughing at myself or at other people, I am sure I should be hung before I had finished the first chapter. No, I must keep to my own style and go on in my own way, and though I may never succeed again in that, I am convinced that I should totally fail in any other.

I remain, my dear Sir, Your very much obliged, and sincere friend, J. AUSTEN.

Chawton, near Alton, April 1, 1816.

FOOTNOTES:

[288] _Chawton Manor and its Owners_, p. 171.

[289] Page 84.

[290] _Life of Mary Russell Mitford_, by the Rev. A. G. L'Estrange (Bentley, 1870). We ought to add that Miss Mitford's admiration increased with time. Thus, in August 1816, she speaks of _Emma_ 'the best, I think, of all her charming works'; and, at a later date, of her 'exquisite' _Persuasion_. In September 1817 she mentions her death as a 'terrible loss'; and a year afterwards, calls her 'our dear Miss Austen.'

[291] Box Hill, however, was seven miles from Highbury, whereas it is only three miles from Leatherhead.

[292] _Highways and Byways in Surrey_, by Eric Parker.

[293] In support of Cobham, it has been suggested that in chapter xi., where mention is made of this village, the author had forgotten to alter the name to Highbury. Jane knew Cobham as a halting-place on the way from Chawton to London (p. 292). Bookham is another possible claimant.

[294] Emperor of Russia, who with the King of Prussia was then visiting England.

[295] See p. 26.

[296] A visit of Jane to Scotland, of which no record is left in family tradition, is so improbable that we must imagine her to be referring to some joke, or possibly some forgotten tale of her own.

[297] One of our author's few inaccuracies is to be found in chapter xlii., where an 'orchard in blossom' is made to coincide with ripe strawberries. When her brother Edward next saw her, he said 'Jane, I wish you would tell me where you get those apple-trees of yours that come into bloom in July!' W. H. Pollock's _Jane Austen, etc._, pp.

90-91.

[298] No doubt the father of Sir Seymour Haden, and the introducer into England of the stethoscope. He lived at the corner of Hans Street and Sloane Street.

[299] Mr. Murray's 'reader' on this occasion was evidently William Gifford, the editor of the _Quarterly Review_, who writes under date Sept. 29, 1815: 'Of _Emma_ I have nothing but good to say. I was sure of the writer before you mentioned her. The MS. though plainly written has yet some, indeed many little omissions, and an expression may now and then be amended in pa.s.sing through the press. I will readily undertake the revision.' _Memoir of John Murray_ by Samuel Smiles (1891), vol. i.

p. 282.

[300] The present Mr. John Murray kindly informs us that the original edition of _Emma_ consisted of 2000 copies, of which 1250 were sold within a year.

[301] (?) _The Field of Waterloo_, by Sir Walter Scott.

[302] _Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk_; or possibly John Scott's _Paris Revisited in 1815_.

[303] The printer.