Lydia and Wickham's lack of children
Posted by Roger V on July 18, 1998 at 00:17:35:
In response to It had crossed my mind, too ;-), written by Caroline on July 14, 1998 at 18:12:11
I always got the impression from the concluding chapter of the book that Lydia and Wickham never had any children. I realze that JA also says nothing about Elizabeth's and Jane's children, so that alone may weaken my stand on that subject...
However, JA does tell us a bit of how Lydia and Wickham traveled about, and IMHO she would have mentioned the hardships placed on any children by this constant moving from pillar to post. I'd also be inclined to believe that if they DID have any children, there's a good chance they would have been dumped on Elizabeth or Jane much of the time. Jane and Elizabeth were both the type of person who would not want to see children growing up in such an atmosphere, so they might have been willing to take on this responsiblity for the clildren's sake, but certainly not for Lydia's or Wickhams's sake.....
However, my belief is still that the Wickhams never had any children at all... perhaps a bout of a certain "social disease" might have left Wickham unable to father children. Also, there is the possibility that Mrs. Yonge might have knowledge of how one terminates an unwanted pregnancy....
- I got the same impression... Gayle 13:27:19 7/19/98
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