Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters Part 53

It is the third edition that has here gone astray and misled all the others.

6. Chapter LIV, when Bingley and Darcy have been dining at Longbourn, we read in Mr. Johnson's edition, as well as in the Hampshire and Winchester Editions:--

The gentlemen came; and she thought he looked as if he would have answered her hopes; but alas! the ladies had crowded round the table, where Miss Bennet was taking tea, and Elizabeth pouring out the coffee.

This is an ingenious little misprint; for what Miss Bennet, who was one of the hostesses, was doing was not _taking_ tea, of course, but _making_ tea. The early editions and Bentley all read 'making.'

7. Chapter LIV, where Jane is trying to persuade Elizabeth that she is in no danger of falling in love with Bingley again, Bentley's edition reads:--

'You are very cruel,' said her sister [i.e.

Elizabeth], 'you will not let me smile, and are provoking me to it every moment.'

'How hard it is in some cases to be believed! And how impossible in others! But why should you wish to persuade me that I feel more than I acknowledge?'

'That is a question which I hardly know how to answer.'

Now, if we turn to the first three editions, we find the pa.s.sage broken up as follows:--

'You are very cruel,' said her sister, 'you will not let me smile, and are provoking me to it every moment.'

'How hard it is in some cases to be believed! And how impossible in others!'

'But why should you wish to persuade me that I feel more than I acknowledge?'

'That is a question which I hardly know how to answer.'

This is the only pa.s.sage which we can correct on the authority of the author herself. In a letter dated February 4, 1813, she says, referring to the first edition of _Pride and Prejudice_: 'The greatest blunder in printing is in p. 220, l. 3, where two sentences are made into one.'

Unfortunately, in trying to correct the mistake, Bentley's edition fell into another, and Mr. Johnson was the first to break up the sentences correctly. The pa.s.sage should of course run:--

'You are very cruel,' said her sister, 'you will not let me smile, and are provoking me to it every moment.'

'How hard it is in some cases to be believed!'

'And how impossible in others!'

'But why should you wish to persuade me that I feel more than I acknowledge?'

'That is a question which I hardly know how to answer.'

8. Chapter LV, when Jane's engagement to Bingley had been arranged, Bentley's edition, following the third edition, reads:--

Elizabeth, who was left by herself, now smiled at the rapidity and ease with which an affair was finally settled, that had given them so many previous months of surprise and vexation.

'Surprise' does not seem nearly so suitable a word as 'suspense,' which is found in the first and second editions.

9. Chapter LV, where Jane is talking to Elizabeth about Bingley. Mr.

Johnson's editions, following the first three editions, read:--

'Would you believe it, Lizzie, that when he went to town last November, he really loved me, and nothing but a persuasion of my being indifferent would have prevented his coming down again!'

'He made a little mistake, to be sure; but it is to the credit of his modesty.'

This naturally introduced a panegyric from Jane on his diffidence, and the little value he put on his own good qualities.

Elizabeth was pleased to find that he had not betrayed the interference of his friends; for, though Jane had the most generous and forgiving heart in the world, she knew it was a circ.u.mstance which must prejudice her against him.

As this last paragraph stands, 'him' can hardly refer to anyone else but Bingley, which makes nonsense. Nothing was likely to prejudice Jane against him; besides, it was not his 'friends' who had interfered, but his 'friend' Darcy. There can be no doubt, therefore, that we ought to read, with Bentley's edition, 'friend,' and then 'him' will refer to Darcy, against whom Lizzie was very anxious on her own account that Jane should not be prejudiced.

10. Chapter LVI, when Lady Catherine is trying to browbeat Elizabeth, Mr. Johnson reads, in his edition of 1892, following the first two editions (which, however, have a comma after 'accomplished'):--

'While in their cradles, we planned the union: and now, at the moment when the wishes of both sisters would be accomplished in their marriage, to be prevented by a young woman of inferior birth, of no importance in the world, and wholly unallied to the family?'

Most editions, however, following the third, merely alter the interrogation to an exclamation mark; but it is by no means certain that we ought not to read '_is_ their marriage' instead of '_in_ their marriage,' placing the comma three words earlier: then we can keep the interrogation. So the edition published by George Allen in 1894.

'MANSFIELD PARK'

1. Chapter VIII: Bentley's edition, following the first and second editions, reads:--

Mrs. Rushworth proceeded next, under the conviction that everybody must be wanting to see Sotherton, to include Miss Crawford in the invitation; and though Miss Grant, who had not been at the trouble of visiting Mrs. Rushworth, on her coming into the neighbourhood, civilly declined it on her own account, she was glad to secure any pleasure for her sister; and Mary, properly pressed and persuaded, was not long in accepting her share of the civility.

Inasmuch as there is no such character as 'Miss Grant' in the book, all other editions read 'Mrs. Grant.' Dr. Verrall, in the pages of the _Cambridge Review_, defended 'Miss Grant,' provided that 'Miss' were placed between inverted commas, as well as the previous 'Miss Crawford'; he believed Mrs. Rushworth to have been a blundering kind of person, who desired to invite Miss Crawford, but while naming 'Miss Crawford'

addressed herself to Mrs. Grant. Otherwise (if we read 'Mrs. Grant'), Dr. Verrall argued, there was not the slightest occasion for Mrs. Grant to decline the invitation on her own account, for she had not been in any way invited; nor would there have been any need for Mary to be 'properly pressed and persuaded,' and then to accept 'her share' of the civility. Dr. Verrall's suggestion is ingenious, but not quite convincing.

2. Chapter VIII: Bentley's edition, following the first and second editions, reads:--

When Edmund, therefore, told her in reply, as he did when she would give him the hearing, that she need not distress herself on Mrs. Rushworth's account, because he had taken the opportunity, as he walked with her through the hall, of mentioning Miss Price as one who would probably be of the party, and had directly received a very sufficient invitation for her cousin, &c.

'_Her_ cousin' would certainly seem to be a mistake; and all other editions accordingly alter 'her' to 'his.' Dr. Verrall, however, defends 'her'; and would read 'and had directly received a very sufficient invitation for her cousin,' on the ground that Mrs. Rushworth, not quite understanding who was meant by Miss Price, thought she was cousin to the Miss Price who she had previously heard would remain at home with Lady Bertram. Some such explanation, Dr. Verrall thought, would alone account for the 'very sufficient' invitation.

3. Chapter X, p. 106, where f.a.n.n.y Price says to Mr. Rushworth, who on returning with the key finds Miss Bertram and Mr. Crawford have gone into the park without waiting for him:--

'They desired me to stay--my cousin Maria charged me to say that you would find them at that knoll, or thereabouts.'

So all the editions read; but Dr. Verrall would emend to 'They desired me to say--my cousin,' &c., on the ground that f.a.n.n.y, who was the soul of truth, had not been desired to stay. But, for the matter of that, neither had her cousin Maria charged her to say anything, for it was Crawford who had suggested that 'Miss Price will be so good as to tell him, that he will find us near that knoll.' However, the emendation is attractive, as it shows f.a.n.n.y trying to make the best case she can for Maria by eliminating Crawford's share in the transaction.

4. Chapter XXIV: All editions read:--

This dear William would soon be amongst them.

There could be no doubt of his obtaining leave of absence immediately, for he was still only a midshipman; and as his parents, from living on the spot, must already have seen him and be seeing him perhaps daily, his direct holidays might with justice be instantly given to his sister.

The expression 'his direct holidays,' meaning 'his actual holidays,' is intelligible enough, but did not satisfy Dr. Verrall, who suggested 'derelict' as a naval expression to imply holidays on which no one had a claim, and which might therefore be given to Mansfield Park. Like many of Dr. Verrall's emendations, its ingenuity is greater than its probability.

5. Chapter x.x.xIII, p. 340:--

Here again was a something of the same Mr.

Crawford whom she had so reprobated before. How evidently was there a gross want of feeling and humanity where his own pleasure was concerned; and alas! how always known no principle to supply as a duty what the heart was deficient in.