LETTERS OF JANE AUSTEN
My father and mother made the same match
for you last night, and are very much pleased
with it. He is a beauty of my mother’s.
Yours affectionately,
Miss Austen, Godmersham Park,
Faversham, Kent.
――――
1799
The third division consists of four letters written from Bath in May and June, 1799, when Mr. and Mrs. Austen of Godmersham had taken a house for a month, in order that the former might “try the waters” for the benefit of his health, which was supposed to be delicate; the experiment seems to have been successful, for he lived fifty-three years longer, dying at Godmersham in December, 1852, at the good old age of eighty-two. Cassandra had stayed at home with her father at Steventon, and Mrs. Austen and Jane had accompanied the Godmersham party. These letters contain little more than ordinary chit-chat, and for the most part explain themselves. There is another allusion to “Pride and Prejudice” under the name of “First Impressions,”
which Martha Lloyd seems to have been
