Jane Austen Read Free Page A

completed his naval studies at Portsmouth’s Royal Naval College, sailed aboard the Royal Naval vessel HMS Perseverance for the East Indies. In 1791, when Francis became a midshipman, his 12-year-old brother Charles followed in his footsteps as a pupil at the Royal Naval College, Portsmouth. A glittering career awaited them: Francis became Admiral of the Fleet and Charles, Rear Admiral and Commander-in-Chief of the East India and China Station.
    In that year, 1791, the Revd Austen’s uncle, Francis, died, leaving his nephew George the sum of £ 500. In December, Edward married Elizabeth Bridges and settled in a small house belonging to his wife’s family and situated at Rowling, about a mile from her family home of Goodnestone Park in Kent. (Edward was the first of Jane’s brothers to marry.)
    In March 1792 James became the second of Jane’s brothers to marry when he wedded Anne Mathew, daughter of General Edward Mathew, a former Governor of Granada. George Austen then made James his curate at Deane. Late in 1792 the Revd Tom Fowle, a former pupil of Jane’s father, became engaged to Jane’s sister Cassandra.
    France declared war on Great Britain and Holland on 1 February 1793. Henry had intended to become a clergyman but he now changed his plans; he postponed his ordination and instead, on 8 April, enlisted as a lieutenant in the Oxford Militia. In 1797 he became Captain and Adjutant.
    Thomas Knight II died in 1794. That September the 15-year-old Charles Austen left Portsmouth and joined HMS Daedalus as a midshipman. On 16 December, Jane’s 19th birthday, her father, recognising her talents as a writer, purchased a mahogany writing desk for her for the sum of 12 s .
    On 3 May 1795 James’s wife Anne Mathew died. In the same month, Francis sailed as a newly commissioned officer aboard the ship Glory , conveying troops of the 3rd Regiment of Foot to the West Indies. Lord Craven, who was Colonel of the regiment, invited Tom Fowle – his kinsman and Cassandra’s fiancé – to accompany him on the voyage as his private chaplain. In the event Tom died of yellow fever at Santo Domingo in February 1797 and was buried at sea. In his will, he left Cassandra the sum of £ 1,000.
    Jane lived vicariously through her brothers; their adventures were her adventures, their joys her joys, their heartaches her heartaches. This was particularly true of her naval brothers Francis and Charles. Whether they were thousands of miles away in foreign ports or on the high seas, or just down the road in Portsmouth, it made no difference.
    In September 1796 Jane told Cassandra that Francis had received his appointment ‘on Board the Captn John Gore,commanded by the Triton….’ Note that here she had amusingly transposed the name of the ship – Triton – and the name of its captain – Gore. The Triton is described by Jane as ‘a new [type] 32 Frigate, just launched at Deptford. – Frank is much pleased with the prospect of having Capt. Gore under his command.’ 2 This is another joke by Jane, for Francis is as yet a mere lieutenant who will not be made a commander for another two years. Jane is concerned for Henry, and in the same month she writes:
    Henry leaves us to-morrow for [Great] Yarmouth [Norfolk], as he wishes very much to consult his physician there, on whom he has great reliance. He is better than he was when he first came, though still by no means well. 3

    Notes
    1.­ David Nokes, Jane Austen: A Life (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997), p. 96.
    2.­ Letter from Jane Austen to Cassandra Austen, 18 September 1796.
    3.­ Letter from Jane Austen to Cassandra Austen, 1 September 1796.

9
Pride and Prejudice
    The novel began life as First Impressions (written by Jane between October 1796, when she was aged 21, and August 1797). It was revised in 1812, renamed Pride and Prejudice and published in January 1813 by Thomas Egerton.
    Mr Bennet and his wife have five daughters and it is Elizabeth, the second of them, who is the