This edition of Jane Austen's letters was edited by
Fanny Knight's son Edward Hugessen
Knatchbull-Hugessen (the first Baron Brabourne, lived 1829-1893), and was
published in 1884. It's neither complete (about two thirds of the letters now
known to have survived are included), nor are the texts of the letters
necessarily always transcribed with minute scholarly fidelity, but it's out of
copyright, and includes many annotations and quaint comments on the
letters. (The latest edition of Jane Austen's
letters came out in 1995.)
The dedication is to Queen Victoria. (In 1946 a
great-grandson of Lord Brabourne married a great-great-granddaughter of
Victoria.)
I've restored a number of small
passages originally omitted from the printed letters (based on later editions),
and also added some extracts from letters printed in Austen-Leigh's
Memoir.
In addition to this HTML version, the Letters are also
available as a single plain ASCII e-text file,
compressed in binary .zip format <320793 bytes> -- see
explanation of ".zip" here. (Everything in the plain ASCII e-text may be considered in the public domain.)
Letters of Jane Austen, edited with an introduction and critical
remarks by Edward, Lord Brabourne (London: Bentley, 1884). [This
e-text represents the version reprinted in vols. 11 and 12 of The Novels
and Letters of Jane Austen (Complete in Twelve Volumes), edited by
Reginald Brimley Johnson (New York: 1906).]
LETTERS OF JANE AUSTEN
A MEMOIR
"He knew of no one but himself who was inclined to the work.
This is no uncommon motive. A man sees something to be done,
knows of no one who will do it but himself, and so is driven
to the enterprise."
Help's Life of Columbus, ch I.
MADAM
It was the knowledge that your Majesty so highly appreciated the works of
Jane Austen which emboldened me to ask permission to dedicate to your Majesty
these volumes, containing as they do numerous letters of that authoress, of
which, as her grand-nephew, I have recently become possessed. These letters
are printed, with the exception of a very few omissions which appeared
obviously desirable, just as they were written, and if there should be found
in them, or in the chapters which accompany them, anything which may interest
or amuse your Majesty, I shall esteem myself doubly fortunate in having been
the means of bringing them under your Majesty's notice.
I am, Madam,
Your Majesty's very humble
and obedient subject,
BRABOURNE.
IT is right that some explanation should be given of the manner
in which the letters now published came into my possession.
The Rev. J. E. Austen Leigh, nephew to Jane Austen, and first cousin to my
mother Lady Knatchbull, published in 1869 a "Memoir" of his aunt, and
supplemented it by a second and enlarged edition in the following year, to
which he added the hitherto unpublished tale, "Lady Susan," for the
publication of which he states in his preface that he had "lately received
permission from the author's niece, Lady Knatchbull, of Provender, Kent, to
whom the autograph copy was given." It seems that the autograph copy of
another unpublished tale, "The Watsons" had been given to Mr. Austen Leigh's
half-sister, Mrs. Lefroy, and that each recipient took a copy of what was
given to the other, by which means Mr. Austen Leigh became acquainted with the
existence and contents of "Lady Susan," and knowing that it was the property
of my mother, wrote to ask her permission to attach it to, and publish it
with, the second edition of his "Memoir." My mother was at that time unable
to attend to business, and my youngest sister, who lived with her, replied to
the request, giving the desired permission on her behalf, but stating at the
same time that the autograph copy had been lost for the last six years, that
any letters which existed could not be found, and that my mother was not in a
fit state to allow of any search being made. It so happened that no reference
was made to me, and I only knew of the request having been made and granted
when I saw the tale in print. But on my mother's death, in December, 1882,
all her papers came into my possession, and I not only found the original copy
of "Lady Susan" -- in
Jane Austen's own handwriting -- among the other books
in the Provender library, but a square box full of letters, fastened up
carefully in separate packets, each of which was endorsed "For Lady
Knatchbull," in the handwriting of my great-aunt, Cassandra Austen, and with
which was a paper endorsed, in my mother's handwriting, "Letters from my dear
Aunt Jane Austen, and two from Aunt Cassandra after her decease," which paper
contained the letters written to my mother herself. The box itself had been
endorsed by my mother as follows: --
"Letters from Aunt Jane to Aunt Cassandra at different periods of
her life -- a few to me -- and some from Aunt Cassandra to me after At. Jane's
death."
This endorsement bears the date August, 1856, and was probably made the
last time my mother looked at the letters. At all events, a comparison of
these letters with some quoted by Mr. Austen Leigh makes it abundantly clear
that they have never been in his hands, and that they are now presented to the
public for the first time. Indeed, it is much to be regretted that the
"Memoir" should have been published without the additional light which many of
these letters throw upon the "Life," though of course no blame attaches to
Mr. Austen Leigh in the matter.
The opportunity, however, having been lost,
and "Lady Susan" already published, it remained for me to consider whether the
letters which had come into my possession were of sufficient public interest
to justify me in giving them to the world. They had evidently, for the most
part, been left to my mother by her Aunt Cassandra Austen; they contain the
confidential outpourings of Jane Austen's soul to her beloved sister,
interspersed with many family and personal details which, doubtless, she would
have told to no other human being. But to-day, more than seventy long years
have rolled away since the greater part of them were written; no one now
living can, I think, have any possible just cause of annoyance at their
publication, whilst, if I judge rightly, the public never took a deeper or
more lively interest in all that concerns Jane Austen than at the present
moment. Her works, slow in their progress towards popularity, have achieved
it with the greater certainty, and have made an impression the more permanent
from its gradual advance. The popularity continues, although the customs and
manners which Jane Austen describes have changed and varied so much as to
belong in a great measure to another age. But the reason of its continuance
is not far to seek. Human nature is the same in all ages of the world, and
"the inimitable Jane" (as an old friend of mine used always to call her) is
true to Nature from first to last. She does not attract our imagination by
sensational descriptions or marvellous plots; but, with so little "plot" at
all as to offend those who read only for excitement, she describes men and
women exactly as men and women really are, and tells her tale of ordinary,
everyday life with such truthful delineation, such bewitching simplicity, and,
moreover, with such purity of style and language, as have rarely been
equalled, and perhaps never surpassed.
This being the case, it has seemed to me that the letters which show what
her own "ordinary, everyday life" was, and which afford a picture of her such
as no history written by another person could give so well, are likely to
interest a public which, both in Great Britain and America, has learned to
appreciate Jane Austen. It will be seen that they are ninety-four in number,
ranging in date from 1796 to 1816 -- that is to say, over the last twenty
years of her life. Some other letters, written to her sister Cassandra,
appear in Mr. Austen Leigh's book, and it would seem that at Cassandra's
death, in 1845, the correspondence must have been divided, and whilst the bulk
of it came to my mother, a number of letters passed into the possession of
Mr. Austen Leigh's sisters, from whom he obtained them. These he made use of
without being aware of the existence of the rest.
However this may be, it is certain that I am now able to present to the
public entirely new matter, from which may be gathered a fuller and more
complete knowledge of Jane Austen and her "belongings" than could otherwise
have been obtained. Miss Tytler, indeed, has made a praiseworthy effort to
impart to the world information respecting the life and works of her favourite
authoress, but her "Life" is little more than a copy of Mr. Austen Leigh's
Memoir. I attempt no "Memoir" that can properly be so called, but I give the
letters as they were written, with such comments and explanations as I think
may add to their interest. I am aware that in some of the latter I have
wandered somewhat far away from Jane Austen, having been led aside by
allusions which awaken old memories and recall old stories. But whilst my
"addenda" may be read or skipped as the reader pleases, they do not detract
from the actual value of the genuine letters which I place before him. These,
I think, can hardly fail to be of interest to all who desire to know more of
the writer; and, although they form no continuous narrative and record no
stirring events, it will be remarked that, amid the most ordinary details and
most commonplace topics, every now and then sparkle out the same wit and
humour which illuminate the pages of "Pride and Prejudice," "Mansfield Park,"
"Emma," &c., and which have endeared the name of Jane Austen to many
thousands of readers in English speaking homes.
BRABOURNE.
May, 1884.
- Letters of Jane Austen, Brabourne edition
- Famous quotes from the letters (or quotes that should be famous)
- General Topics Index to the letters
- Index of allusions to books and authors in Jane Austen's writings
- Info on Jane Austen's siblings
- Austen family Genealogical chart
- Notes on letters in Pride and Prejudice and the society of Jane Austen's day
- Map of Bath ca. 1800
- Letters of Jane Austen to her sister Cassandra Austen
- [Letters to Fanny Knight] 1814-1816
[Includes Jane Austen's advice to Fanny Knight on her love-life]
- [Letters to Anna Austen Lefroy, 1814-1816]
[Includes Jane Austen's advice to Anna on her attempt to write a novel.]
- [Letters from Cassandra Austen to Fanny Knight, 1817]
- Letters from Miss Cassandra Austen to her niece Miss Knight, after the death of her sister Jane, July 18, 1817.
- [Poetry, Backwards letter]
- APPENDICES
- [Appendix I. Correspondence with Mr. Clarke, from Austen-Leigh's Memoir]
- [Appendix] II. [Bridges family Clothing inventories, Account books, Engagement announcements.]
- [Appendix] III. [Letters from Mrs. Knight]
- [Other excerpts from letters in Austen-Leigh's Memoir]
- [i.] -- Steventon, Saturday evening, Nov 8th. (1800).
- [ii.] -- Steventon, Wednesday evening, Nov. 12th. (1800).
- [iii.] -- Manydown, Wednesday Feb 11th (1801).
- [iv.] -- Paragon (Bath) Tuesday May 26th (1801).
- [v.] -- Lyme, Friday, Sept. 14 (1804).
- [vi.] -- 25 Gay Street (Bath), Monday, April 8, 1805.
- [vii.] -- Gay St. Sunday Evening, April 21 (1805).
- [viii.] -- Chawton, Friday, January 29 (1813).
- [ix.] -- Chawton, Thursday, February 4 (1813).
- [x.] -- (February 9 and January 24 1813).
- [xi.] -- Sloane Street, Thursday, May 20 (1813).
- [xii.] -- Henrietta Street, Wednesday, March 2 (1814).
- [xiii. to Edward Austen] -- Chawton, July 9, 1816.
- [xiv. to Edward Austen] -- Chawton, Monday, Dec. 16th (1816).
- [xv. to Alethea Bigg] -- Chawton, January 24, 1817.
THE END
Search the Jane Austen letters e-text for files containing any of the keywords:
For an explanation of this search, go to the separate search form page.
(See also the general topics index to the
letters, self-deprecatory comments by Jane
Austen on her own epistolary handwriting, as compared with Cassandra's,
her opinion on the infidelities of the Prince and
Princess of Wales, and an image of a letter to her brother Frank in the form of a poem, congratulating him on the birth of a son, and looking forward to the Austen women's move to Chawton -- these last
two from letters not in the Brabourne edition.)
- "I do not want people to be
very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal."
- -- letter of December 24, 1798
- "You will have a great deal of unreserved discourse with Mrs. K., I
dare say, upon this subject, as well as upon many other of our family
matters. Abuse everybody but me."
- -- letter of January 7 1807
- [To her sister Cassandra, on the birth of a son to one of their sisters-in-law:]
"I give you joy of our new nephew, and hope if he ever comes to be hanged
it will not be till we are too old to care about it."
- -- letter of April 25, 1811
- [On another of their nephews, then about three years old:]
"I shall think with tenderness and delight on his beautiful and smiling
countenance and interesting manner, until a few years have turned him into an
ungovernable, ungracious fellow."
- -- letter of October 27 1798
- "I had a very pleasant evening, however, though you will probably find
out that there was no particular reason for it; but I do not think it worth
while to wait for enjoyment until there is some real opportunity for it."
- -- letter of January 21 1799
- "At length the day is come on which I am to flirt my last
with Tom Lefroy, and when you receive this
it will be over. My tears flow at
the melancholy idea."
- -- letter of January 16, 1796
- [At a ball, where being introduced is a prerequisite before a gentleman
can ask a lady with whom he is unacquainted to dance:]
"There was one gentleman, an officer of the Cheshire, a very good-looking
young man, who, I was told, wanted very much to be introduced to me, but as
he did not want it quite enough to take much trouble in effecting it, we
never could bring it about."
- -- letter of January 8 1799
- "Next week [I] shall begin my operations on my hat, on which you know my
principal hopes of happiness depend."
- -- letter of October 27 1798
- [Love advice to her niece Fanny Knight:] "There are such beings in the world -- perhaps one
in a thousand -- as the creature you and I should think perfection; where
grace and spirit are united to worth, where the manners are equal to the
heart and understanding; but such a person may not come in your way, or,
if he does, he may not be the eldest son of
a man of fortune, the near relation of your particular friend, and belonging
to your own county."
- -- letter of November 18, 1814
- "He seems a very harmless sort of young man, nothing to like or dislike in
him -- goes out shooting or hunting with the two others all the morning,
and plays at whist and makes queer faces in the evening."
- -- letter of September 23, 1813
- [To her niece Anna, referring to
characters in a novel that Anna was then writing:]
"His having been in love with the aunt gives... an additional
interest... I like the idea -- a very proper compliment to an aunt! I rather
imagine indeed that nieces are seldom chosen but out of compliment to some
aunt or another. I daresay Ben [Anna's husband] was in love with me once, and
would never have thought of you if he had not supposed me dead of a scarlet
fever."
- -- letter of late 1814
- "At the bottom of Kingsdown Hill we met a gentleman in a buggy, who, on
minute examination, turned out to be Dr. Hall -- and Dr. Hall in such very deep
mourning that either his mother, his wife, or himself must be dead."
- -- letter of May 17 1799
- "As an inducement to subscribe, Mrs. Martin [the circulating-library proprietor] tells me that her collection
is not to consist only of novels, but of every kind of literature,
&c. She might have spared this pretension to our family, who are great
novel-readers and not ashamed of being so; but it was necessary,
I suppose, to the self-consequence of half her subscribers."
- -- letter of December 18, 1798
- "He and I should not in the least agree, of
course, in our ideas of novels and heroines. Pictures of perfection, as
you know, make me sick and wicked"
- -- letter of March 23 1817
- "I could no more write a [historical] 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 other people, I am sure
I should be hung before I had finished the first chapter."
- -- letter of April 1st 1816
- "I have read [Byron's] The Corsair, mended my petticoat,
and have nothing else to do."
- -- letter of March 5, 1814
- [On the appearance of a second printing of
Sense and Sensibility:]
"Since I wrote last, my 2nd edit. has stared me in the face. [...] I cannot
help hoping that many will feel themselves obliged to buy it. I shall
not mind imagining it a disagreeable duty to them, so as they do it."
- -- letter of November 6th 1813
- "I... do not think the worse of him for having a brain so very different
from mine. ... And he deserves better treatment than to be obliged to read any
more of my works."
- -- letter of March 23 1817
- "I often wonder how you can find time for what you do,
in addition to the care of the house; and how good Mrs. West could have
written such books and collected so many hard works, with all her family
cares, is still more a matter of astonishment! Composition seems to me
impossible with a head full of joints of mutton and doses of rhubarb."
- -- letter of September 8 1816
- [On arriving in London:] "Here I am once more in this scene of
dissipation and vice, and I begin already to find my morals corrupted."
- -- letter of August 1796
- [On visiting a fashionable ladies' boarding school in London:]
"the weather...left me only a few minutes to sit with Charlotte Craven. She
looks very well, and her hair is done up with an elegance to do credit to any
education. Her manners are as unaffected and pleasing as ever... I was shewn
upstairs into a drawing-room, where she came to me, and the appearance of the
room, so totally unschool-like, amused me very much; it was full of modern
elegancies, and if it had not been for some naked cupids over the mantlepiece,
which must be a fine study for girls, one should never have smelt instruction."
- -- letter of May 20, 1813
- "Unluckily however, I see nothing to be glad of, unless I make it
a matter of Joy that Mrs. Wylmot has another son, & that Lord Lucan has
taken a Mistress, both of which Events are of course joyful to the Actors."
[i.e. participants]
- -- letter of February 8th 1807
- "Poor woman! how can she honestly be breeding again?"
- -- letter of October 1 1808
- [On Mrs. Deede's giving birth to another child:]
"I would
recommend to her and Mr. D. the simple regimen of separate rooms."
- -- letter of February 20, 1817
- "I believe I drank too much wine last night at Hurstbourne; I know not how
else to account for the shaking of my hand to-day. You will kindly make
allowance therefore for any indistinctness of writing, by attributing it to
this venial error."
- -- letter of November 20 1800
- [At a ball:] "Mrs. B. and two young women were of the same party,
except when Mrs. B. thought herself obliged to leave them to run round
the room after her drunken husband. His avoidance, and her pursuit, with the
probable intoxication of both, was an amusing scene."
- -- letter of May 12 1801
- "Fanny and the two little girls... revelled last night in Don
Juan, whom we left in hell at half-past eleven. ... The girls... still
prefer Don Juan; and I must say that I have seen nobody on the
stage who has been a more interesting character than that compound of cruelty
and lust."
- -- letter of September 15, 1813
- "You know how interesting the purchase of a sponge-cake is to me."
- -- letter of June 15, 1808
- [On preparing for the move from Steventon
to Bath:] "You are very kind in planning presents for me to make, and my
mother has shown me exactly the same attention; but as I do not choose to have
generosity dictated to me, I shall not resolve on giving my cabinet to Anna
till the first thought of it has been my own."
- -- letter of January 8 1801
- "Dr. Gardiner was married yesterday to Mrs. Percy and her three
daughters."
- -- letter of June 11 1799
- "My mother looks forward with as much certainty as you can do to our
keeping two maids... We plan having a steady cook and a young, giddy
housemaid, with a sedate, middle-aged man, who is to undertake the double
office of husband to the former and sweetheart to the latter. No children, of
course, to be allowed on either side."
- -- letter of Jan 3, 1801
- "I cannot anyhow continue to find people agreeable; I respect
Mrs. Chamberlayne for doing her hair well, but cannot feel a more tender
sentiment. Miss Langley is like any other short girl, with a broad nose and
wide mouth, fashionable dress and exposed bosom. Adm. Stanhope is a
gentleman-like man, but then his legs are too short and his tail too long."
- -- letter of May 12, 1801
- [On buying a "sprig" for her sister's hat:] "I cannot help thinking that
it is more natural to have flowers grow out of the head than fruit. What do you
think on that subject?"
- -- letter of June 11 1799
- [On the Peninsular War:] "How horrible it is to have so many people killed! And what a blessing that
one cares for none of them!"
- -- letter of May 31, 1811
- "You express so little anxiety about my being murdered under Ash Park
Copse by Mrs. Hulbert's servant, that I have a great mind not to tell you
whether I was or not"
- -- letter of January 8 1799
- "Kill poor Mrs. Sclater if you like it while you are at Manydown."
- -- letter of February 9 1813
- "I learnt from Mrs. Tickars's young lady, to my high amusement, that
the stays [corsets] now are not made to force the bosom up at all; that was a
very unbecoming, unnatural fashion."
- -- letter of September 15 1813
- "You deserve a longer letter than this; but it is my unhappy fate seldom
to treat people so well as they deserve."
- -- letter December 24 1798
- "I shall not tell you anything more of Wm. Digweed's china, as your
silence on the subject makes you unworthy of it."
- -- letter of December 27, 1808
- "Your silence on the subject of our ball makes me suppose your curiosity
too great for words."
- -- letter of January 24, 1809
- "Fanny Austen's match is quite news, and I am sorry she has behaved so
ill. There is some comfort to us in her misconduct, that we have not a
congratulatory letter to write."
- -- letter of June 20 1808
- "Miss Bigg... writes me word that Miss Blachford is married. but
I have never seen it in the Paper. And one may be as well be single, if the
Wedding is not to be in print."
- -- letter of late 1814
- [On having a little extra spending cash:] "I sent my answer... which I
wrote without much effort, for I was rich, and the rich are always
respectable, whatever be their style of writing."
- -- letter of June 20 1808
- "I find, on looking into my affairs, that instead of being very rich I am
likely to be very poor... as we are to meet in Canterbury I need not have
mentioned this. It is as well, however, to prepare you for the sight of a
sister sunk in poverty, that it may not overcome your spirits."
- -- letter of August 24 1805
- "We found only Mrs. Lance at home, and whether she boasts any
offspring besides a grand pianoforte did not appear. ... They will not come
often, I dare say. They live in a handsome style and are rich, and she seemed
to like to be rich, and we gave her to understand that we were far from being
so; she will soon feel therefore that we are not worth her acquaintance."
- -- letter of January 7 1807
- [On the weather:]
- "We have been exceedingly busy ever since you went away. In the first
place we have had to rejoice two or three times every day at your having such
very delightful weather for the whole of your journey..."
- -- letter of October 25 1800
- "How do you like this cold weather? I hope you have all been
earnestly praying for it as a salutary relief from the dreadful mild and
unhealthy season preceding it, fancying yourself half putrified from the want
of it, and that now you all draw into the fire, complain that you never felt
such bitterness of cold before, that you are half starved, quite frozen, and
wish the mild weather back again with all your hearts."
- -- letter of January 25th 1801
- "I am sorry my mother has been suffering, and am afraid this
exquisite weather is too good to agree with her. I enjoy it all over me, from
top to toe, from right to left, longitudinally, perpendicularly, diagonally;
and I cannot but selfishly hope we are to have it last till Christmas --
nice, unwholesome, unseasonable, relaxing, close, muggy weather."
- -- letter of December 2 1815
- "The Webbs are really gone! When I saw the waggons at the door, and
thought of all the trouble they must have in moving, I began to reproach
myself for not having liked them better; but since the waggons have
disappeared my conscience has been closed again, and I am excessively glad
they are gone."
- -- letter of September 28 1814
- "By
the bye, as I must leave off being young, I find many Douceurs in being a sort
of chaperon [at dances], for I am put on the Sofa near the Fire & can
drink as much wine as I like."
- -- letter of November 6th 1813
- "I bought a Concert Ticket and a sprig of flowers for my old
age." [She was then 37.]
- -- letter of November 3rd 1813
- "[I] am very well satisfied with his notice of me -- ``A pleasing-looking
young woman'' -- that must do; one cannot pretend to anything better now;
thankful to have it continued a few years longer!"
- -- letter of April/May 1811
- "Our ball was rather more amusing than I expected. ... The melancholy
part was, to see so many dozen young women standing by without partners, and
each of them with two ugly naked shoulders! It was the same room in
which we danced fifteen years ago! I thought it all over, and in spite of the
shame of being so much older, felt with thankfulness that I was quite as
happy now as then."
- -- letter of December 9, 1808
- [Jane Austen had a running joke with her family about her marrying the
poet Crabbe, whose poetry she admired:]
"No, I have never seen [news of]
the death of Mrs. Crabbe. I have only just been making out from one of
his prefaces that he probably was married. ... Poor woman! I will comfort
him as well as I can, but I do not undertake to be good to her
children. She had better not leave any."
- -- letter of October 18, 1813
- "I am to meet Mrs. Harrison, and we are to talk about Ben and
Anna [a young engaged couple]. ``My dear
Mrs. Harrison,'' I shall say, ``I am afraid the young man has some of your
family madness, and though there often appears to be something of madness in
Anna too, I think she inherits more of it from her mother's family than from
ours.'' That is what I shall say, and I think she will find it difficult to
answer me."
- -- letter of November 3rd 1813
- "Ben and Anna walked here... and she
looked so pretty, it was quite a pleasure to see her, so young and so
blooming, and so innocent, as if she had never had a wicked thought in her
life, which yet one has some reason to suppose she must have had, if we
believe the doctrine of original sin."
- -- letter of February 20, 1817
- "I do not like the Miss Blackstones; indeed, I was always determined not
to like them, so there is the less merit in it."
- -- letter of January 8 1799
- "I will not say that your mulberry-trees are dead, but I am afraid
they are not alive."
- -- letter of May 31 1811
- "Expect a most agreeable letter, for not being overburdened with subject
(having nothing at all to say), I shall have no check to my genius from
beginning to end."
- -- letter of January 21 1801
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