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Chapter 14
An Unexpected Blow
Monday,
17 December 1804
MY HEART IS HEAVY, INDEED, AS I TAKE UP MY FAITHFUL pen, the better to comprehend the intelligence received so suddenly this morning — an intelligence at which my whole mind revolts. Madam Lefroy is dead.
She was suffered to depart this life on the very a
We learned the news of my brother James, by express — in all the clatter of a horse’s hoofs too hastily reined-in before the door of Green Park Buildings, and the apprehension of ill-tidings devoutly wished upon others. But it could not be put off; the letter was for ourselves; and the express desired to wait for an answer. Some injury to James we feared, or to Mary and the children, our remembrance of sudden death in that household being as yet too present.[67]
But it was of Ashe he wrote to us — and of my own dear A
James had met with her on the Saturday, in the neighbouring village of Overton, intent upon her shopping with a servant in tow. Madam remarked in passing that her horse was so stupid and lazy, she could barely make him stir; and so they had parted, with kind wishes on both sides. With what horror, then, did brother James learn later that the horse in question had bolted at the top of Overton Hill! The servant missing his grip upon the bridle, A
Why did not the presentiment of her passing strike me hard in that dreadful hour? Why were the clocks not suffered to stop, and the rain to cease to fall, and the world entire fall hideously rapt, in acknowledgement of its loss. A
I have laboured and laboured to comprehend — to reconcile with her death; but still I ca
Is it too absurd? It must, it ca
Tuesday,
18 December 1804
A SLEEPLESS NIGHT, AND A TEDIOUS MORNING HAVE FAILED to bring relief; and tho’ I thrust myself out-of-doors to trudge the Gravel Walk with Cassandra as silent companion, in brooding contemplation of mortality, no comfort could I find in exercise. I engaged in the melancholy review of my entire history with Madam Lefroy — the pleasant hours of companionship, in reading silently together in the library at Ashe; her delight in forming a sort of schoolroom, for the improvement of the poorer children in the parish, that they might with time learn their sums and letters; her ecstasy in conversation, and news of the world.
One episode only in our mutual acquaintance has still the power to cause me pain — and that is the part that Madam played in my ruined hopes of her nephew. Though at twenty Tom Lefroy was full young to fall in love, having neither profession nor fortune to recommend him, at nearly twenty-nine he now possesses both, and a wife into the bargain. Had Madam not interfered where interference was not wanted, I might have been happy these nine years at least; and I have never been disposed to consider her actions as anything but officious. Prudence, in matters of love, is all very well where character is lacking; but when two young people of sense and ability are truly attached, I ca
But Tom was sent away, and I was left to the derision of the neighbourhood, for having shewn too clearly my preference for his regard, and for having encouraged it on so little means as the twenty pounds per a
I have wondered, often, what the present Mrs. Tom Lefroy is like — how she looks, and behaves, and cares for her husband. But it does not do to dwell upon such things. There ca
My appetite is quite gone, and I find the enforced society of the household insupportable. I do not pretend to suffer these emotions alone — A
We returned from our walk, and Cassandra retired to her room for a period of silent reflection. I commenced to pace before the sitting-room fire like a caged beast, but at length my mother’s exclamations, and my father’s look of distress, urged me to adopt a chair, and open once more my journal for the recording of these thoughts.
THE CLOCK HAD STRUCK TWO, AND CASSANDRA HAD emerged from her solitary melancholy, when my mother bethought herself of her brother, Mr. Leigh-Perrot, and his formidable wife. The Leigh-Perrots have been acquainted with Madam Lefroy these twenty years at least, and should certainly wish the earliest intelligence of her untimely end; my mother was horrified at the notion of their learning it from anyone but herself; and between reproaches at having formed no thought of them, in the earliest hours of her misery, and the acutest anxiety to be with them directly, she would not be satisfied until we were bundled out-of-doors, and intent upon the Perrots’ lodgings in Paragon Buildings.
The brilliance of the sun stu
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James Austen’s first wife, A
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This description of A
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Jane ascribes similar feelings, in virtually the same language, to A
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Women rarely attended funerals in Austen’s day, it being considered the province of a family’s male members to follow the body to both chapel and cemetery. The best a bereaved woman might do was to read Divine Service in the privacy of her home. — Editors note.