Dearest Cousin Jane (5 page)

December 1786

O
h it is so exciting! Cousin Eliza is to be with us for the Christmas holidays! She is to be accompanied by Aunt Philla, of course, but best of all by her little baby. How young he is to have so many grand names, some of them of kings, but what credit his mother pays to her famous godfather by making Hastings his first name. It is rather shocking that he is six months old and as yet unchristened, but Eliza’s charming letter to Papa explained that she wanted so much to have ‘dear uncle George’ perform the ceremony and had been putting off the christening in the hope that the Comte would be able to join them. Alas, the Comte is still too occupied with his land in France to come, and we shall miss James, too, as he has gone to France himself—at least we hope he has reached the Comte by now, as the last letter from him told us he was marooned in Jersey by high winds and treacherous seas.

‘How romantic that sounds.’ I said to Cassandra. ‘Imagine, to be marooned on a small island, what an adventure! I wonder if they speak English there?’

My sister, ever practical, replied: ‘You would not find sailing over rough seas very agreeable I am sure. Did you not feel indisposed by the motion of the carriage when we last went to Monk Sherborne?
And that is not above six miles away. And anyway, even if they do not speak English I imagine James could make himself understood in French or even Latin—a man about to go to Oxford could be relied upon for that surely.’

‘But Cassy, do you not wish that we, too, could go to visit the Comte? What he is doing with clearing the land sounds so courageous and perhaps we could help?’

My sister laughed: ‘What, dig with picks and shovels like the French peasants?’

‘No, no, but perhaps seeing plans for how it will be planted with grass and trees and what animals they may later keep?’

‘Jane, we cannot even go into the lanes hereabouts in winter when they are muddy, as ladies’ shoes are not robust enough. Do not let your imagination run on so—or if you do, put it into your stories.’

‘Perhaps I may, but I do not know enough about France to set a story there—indeed I know nothing of anywhere except our village.’

‘Well, talk to Eliza when she is here; she will tell you tales I am sure. My mother says she is a lady who has a vivid imagination, just like you.’

‘I know Mama does not like me to scribble as I do, but she encourages the boys and she herself composes rhymes and odes, so why am I in the wrong?’

Cassandra soothed me as usual: ‘You are not in the wrong dearest, but girls are expected to be modest and to be content with womanly activities, you know.’

I sighed. ‘I know, I think I shall take to concealing my notebook under my sewing on the worktable. I think having our cousin here will give me lots to write about!’

December 17th, 1786

Yesterday Eliza and I celebrated our birthdays together! How lovely it is that this most enchanting of cousins shares my birthday. Well, not the exact day, of course, but only one week apart. It feels very old to be eleven but dear Eliza is twenty-five! She was here at Steventon when I was born—I am not sure I had known this before. Mama said she had told me the story, but I do not remember and of course I do not remember my birth! Aunt Philla was here to attend Mama and it was one of the coldest days in an exceptionally cold winter.

‘My dear,’ said Eliza, ‘I remember so well that had they wished for a doctor none would have been available as the snow was so deep in the lane that no carriage had passed down it for days.’

‘Well,’ joined in my aunt, ‘since my dear sister Austen had given birth six times before, it was hardly likely she would need a doctor.’

‘And did you see me born, cousin?’ I asked

‘Jane, you forget yourself,’ said my mother sharply. ‘Unmarried girls do not attend lyings in, as you would do well to remember.’

Eliza looked at me and winked imperceptibly. She seemed to know already that Mama does not always approve of me and it was comforting to know she was on my side. Cassandra always is, of course, and often protects me when Mama is cross, but she would not openly take my side as Eliza now did.

‘Oh, dear aunt, Jane is naturally curious about her birth, as we all are. Why, my own dear Mama has given me a detailed account of mine, and I assure you it was helpful when it was my turn to give birth.’

‘It will be a long time before Jane is in that position,’ returned my mother, ‘or Cassandra either, so please let us be modest in our conversation.’ My mother had reddened and soon made an excuse to
leave the room on account of ensuring that the cook had set the fowl bones to boil before retiring.

Eliza and Aunt Philla Hancock have been here one week now. There was such excitement as we waited in the lane for the sound of their carriage. They were not to travel post as my aunt had said it was impossible to carry all that they needed for such an extended stay, but had hired a coach and four to bring them, baby Hastings, and their two maids to pay their first visit to Hampshire since Eliza was a small girl. We did not often see a smart carriage in our part of the world, so Henry, Frank, Cassandra, and I waited near the gate to see who would be first to hear the hooves.

How thrilling it was to hear the carriage and to see my aunt and cousin waving from the window! When they stepped down I was amazed by their apparel—so grand and rich it was. I had not seen such velvets and fine trimmings, even on her ladyship in the manor church. Eliza smelled divine, some sweet scent like lily of the valley, and greeted us all with kisses on both cheeks and little cries of
‘enchanté’, ‘si jolie’, ‘quel plaisir’.
I saw Henry blush deep red when she drew back from kissing him and said: ‘Why cousin, I should no longer embrace you as a boy, you have grown into a man and a handsome one at that.’

My aunt was more reserved, but you could see her real pleasure as she embraced Mama and my father, saying, ‘Dearest brother, how I miss your wise counsel,’ with tears of joy in her eyes. My mother, too, was pleased to see Aunt Philla, but I saw her frown a little as she took Hastings from the nursemaid.

‘How does this little one?’ said Mama. ‘He is a little on the small side is he not? We must feed him up while he is here.’

‘He is a little tired from our journey perhaps,’ said my aunt, and I saw her and my mother exchange meaningful looks as they went indoors.

It seemed to take us hours to get our visitors settled in. There was so much to be unloaded and taken upstairs. It was lucky that our boy boarders from my father’s school had gone home for the Christmas holidays, else I do not know how we should have fitted them in. As it was, one of their maids had to stay with a family in the village and the nursemaid had only a little mattress in the room she shared with Hastings.

‘I am sorry, Philla, that you and Eliza must share a room.’ said my mother, ‘but this is a humble parsonage, as you know. And it cannot compare with the grand house I hear you have taken in London—Orchard Street is it not?’

Eliza laughed, such a pretty tinkling laugh she has. ‘Why aunt, we hope that you and dear uncle and the children will visit us there soon, and as for sharing a room, my dear mother and I have done that many times before and in fact prefer it. But in one thing I can assure you, this parsonage is far superior to any London dwelling.’

I was curious, since I had never been to London, and plucked up the courage to ask this pretty creature who had descended on our plain house like some exotic bird: ‘Pray why is that cousin?’

‘Why, dear little Jane, because it contains all my beautiful family and for that, there can be no substitute.’

When Cassy and I went to bed that night, I could not wait to hear what my sister thought of our visitors.

‘Is she not like a princess? Do you not think her enchanting?’ I asked.

Cassy was reserved: ‘I like her well enough, and she seems inordinately pleased to be here. Though I cannot help thinking it must seem very dull after the French court and the fashionable resorts that she seems to frequent.’

‘But that is what is so lovely about her—she tells us these exciting tales yet seems more than content with our humble home.’

Cassy frowned. ‘I cannot quite understand her, but one thing I do know is that the baby does not thrive.’

I was alarmed. ‘How so? What do you know of babies?’

‘Not a great deal I own, but I heard Aunt Philla telling Mama that she fears he is not developing as he should and Mama said that he reminded her of our brother George.’

‘George? Oh no! Do not say that Hastings, too, will have to be sent away! There seemed no sign of those dreadful fits that poor George suffers and there is no sign either that he cannot speak.’

‘He is too young for speech, of course’—My sister spoke with authority—‘but George did not start the fits until he was two years old, you know. We shall have to watch and wait.’

Cassandra’s warning about little Hastings was alarming, but apart from that I have had nothing but pleasure in our visitors. I have never had such a birthday celebration as the one we had yesterday. We ate dinner later that usual—not until five thirty in the afternoon, whereas we are accustomed to dine not long after three in the winter.

Cook had dressed a turkey and we even had side dishes of stuffings and sauces. Wine was served throughout the meal, instead of just at the end, as Aunt Philla had brought some with her and Cassandra and I were permitted a glass each, watered of course.

Afterwards we had some sweetmeats that Eliza calls bon-bons and Henry told me my father drank two glasses of port when we left the ‘gentlemen’ at the table and returned to the parlour. Of course the gentlemen were only Papa, Henry, and Frank, Charles having already been put to bed, and I have never known us to follow this custom before, but Eliza said, ‘Now, ladies, shall we leave the gentlemen to their port and nuts while we ladies gossip about them in the other room?’

I thought my mother would protest, but she smiled quite indulgently and agreed. ‘Yes, I suppose we must teach our young men fashionable manners so that they know how to conduct themselves at Oxford, and no doubt James will return to us with his head quite full of such ideas,’ and she rose quite grandly and led we ladies out. It was most exciting!

I could not wait to return to the parlour, as Eliza had been in the middle of telling me some wonderful stories of the French queen, Marie Antoinette, and the daring man who ascended over Paris in a hot-air balloon. As we sat by the fire I begged her to tell me more.

‘Where, was I? Oh yes, the ball at Versailles. Well, there were thousands of lights and gold and silver as far as the eye could see. But that was as nothing compared to the opera at the Tuileries—do you remember Mama?—when they had five hundred horses upon the stage!’

‘Yes, I remember,’ said my aunt, ‘and they made such a clatter you could not hear the music!’

‘Talking of music,’ said Papa as he returned to the parlour with the other ‘gentlemen’, ‘we have hired a pianoforte especially for your visit. Will you not favour us, Eliza?’

‘I will, dear uncle, but not until I have given my dear Jane her birthday gift.’

I was amazed. We were not accustomed to much in the way of birthday gifts in our household. Mama gave me a new thimble at breakfast and Cassandra had drawn me a sweet sketch of Frank’s pony Squirrel. But Eliza now drew my attention to a parcel standing on top of the pianoforte.

‘I notice, Jane, what a great reader you are and have decided always to bring you books that you would not receive elsewhere, though I know you have the free run of your father’s library.’

I saw a slight look of alarm on my mother’s face and knew she was wondering if the gift would be suitable. But I drew out of the package a set of Berquin’s
L’ami des enfants,
which we had read at the Abbey School and which had always delighted me.

‘Oh thank you, cousin,’ I cried, truly delighted. ‘Look Cassy, so you remember Madame La Tournelle making us read aloud and correcting our pronunciation?’

‘Your French is very good,’ said Eliza, ‘and I am sure this will make it even better.’

I glowed at receiving such praise from her, even while being embarrassed that my birthday gift to her had been only a needle case that I had worked myself.

For the rest of the evening she played and sang to us. I noticed that Henry could not take his eyes off her. At fifteen, it was the first time I had seen him look admiringly at a woman. But then, I, too, wanted nothing more than to look at her and think of the stories I could weave around her.

January 1787

Quel horreur!
Our visitors are to leave us today. The boarders are to return and in truth there is no room for them after next Sunday. Eliza has said I may write to her in London and that she will look forward to receiving word from me.

‘And, Jane, if you should feel inclined to send me something more than letters, I should be delighted.’

‘More than letters?’ I was puzzled.

She smiled. ‘Do not think that you have concealed from everyone that you write as well as read—I have seen that small notebook of yours you know.’

‘Seen it? You do not mean you have read it?’

‘Of course not,’ she reassured me. ‘But I know your brothers compose a little. Have James and Henry not written sketches for your family theatricals?’

‘Well yes, but that is for men to do, I would not presume—’

‘Women must and should presume,’ she interrupted. ‘You need not tell your mama. I say only, if you should wish to send me something, I will read it with pleasure. And if not, why, it matters not, we shall be together again next Christmas.’

I can hardly wait.

1788

I
have never experienced before so thorough a racketing life and had no idea it could be equal to how I now find it.

When my cousin Eliza—or
cousine
, as she persists in calling me; ‘My dear it is how my husband the Comte denotes you’—invited me to stay with her in London, I was, I confess, a little reluctant. I do not find myself equal to the social round in which she exists and prefer the quiet life that is our custom in the country. But to tell the truth, I did not want to offend her again as I felt I had done last Christmas when I had been invited to join her at my aunt and uncle’s at Steventon. I know she thought I refused to go because I disapproved of the acting they were all so keen to undertake. True, I do disapprove of ladies appearing in public in such productions as were proposed and I was, as I told Eliza at the time, concerned about leaving my mother unattended during the Christmas season, but the real reason I refused was because I felt there would be no comfort and little privacy at the rectory. Indeed, Aunt Cassandra promised me ‘only a place to hide your head’ so that I was not even sure I would have a bed, let alone a bedroom, and also made it quite clear I would not be welcome if I did not act.

I knew that Uncle George and Aunt Cassandra were to visit Orchard Street later in the year, so I felt that if I showed I was willing
to visit Eliza this might by a means of patching up any feelings that had been ruffled and enable me to do it in the comfort of what Eliza had assured me was a spacious and comfortable lodging.

In that she was right—the house in which she and Aunt Philla live in great style is large and even luxurious and they are kind and affectionate to me. But I cannot much longer tolerate the pace at which they live their lives. Our mornings are spent in ridiculous calls from one door to another without ever being let in, our afternoons in drinking tea with affable and lively company, our evenings at theatres, balls, and concerts. They are constantly trying to do things for my pleasure and the coach with the coronet emblem is ever at my disposal, but oh! how I long for a simple walk in Kensington Gardens, which I can only occasionally prevail on them to allow.

I confess though that it was splendid to be able to write to Mama and relate our visit to St James’s and to tell her that we had been invited to a party given by the Duchess of Cumberland.

Of course, Eliza has some very fine apparel, which nothing of mine is equal to. She was able to lend me one of her dresses with an embroidered bodice and a skirt so large and heavy that I thought I should have toppled over. Rosalie, my cousin’s maid, had to add some lace at the hem as Eliza is so much shorter than me, and I had to tuck more lace at the neck, else I should have been ashamed to be seen in anything cut so low.

I had great enjoyment in one of our outings, though its cause was a sad one. Eliza’s godfather, the great Warren Hastings, is brought to trial in Westminster Hall and we attended one day from ten o’clock in the morning until four in the afternoon. It was very exhausting, but I had the satisfaction of hearing the great orators of whom I had only heard tell—Sheridan and Burke and Fox—the latter with a most dark and saturnine countenance. I was very struck by Sheridan’s eloquence and by the long queues which formed to hear him, as though
this were an entertainment. Hastings himself looked pale, and I was most amazed by how small in stature he is. He is impeached and tales of his corruption abound. Of course, Eliza and my aunt refuse to believe any of the accusations and defend him violently whenever his name is mentioned. Clearly they believe his defence that his actions, however cruel or unjust they may have seemed, were entirely necessary in the situation in which he operated.

‘You simply must realise my dear,’ said Aunt Hancock, ‘that India is not England, nor anything like.’

‘Nor even France, nor anywhere in Europe,’ Eliza joined in. ‘In India, arbitrary powers without any restraint are quite normal, and it is the only thing that the natives understand.’

I did not say so to them, but it is my belief that even natives understand oppression and injustice, and I can scarce believe that charges as serious as ‘high crimes and misdemeanours’ would have been brought if there were no evidence. I heard Mr Sheridan himself assert that ‘Hastings’ transgressions are many,’ and I believe it will be so proved.

In spite of being on trial as a criminal, Hastings and his wife continue to live in great style. They even have their own box at the Opera to which we went one evening. I think there is a great cachet—one of Eliza’s words—to being his goddaughter but if I were in her position now, I should be ashamed to be associated with the scandal and humiliation of this trial. But the more intimately I know Eliza, the more I realise that very little makes her ashamed. I know not if she has heard the gossip about her parentage but do not think she would even find illegitimacy shameful. For instance, she simply refuses to believe that her son is not normal. He cannot yet stand or talk, though he makes a great deal of noise. He has frequent fits and to all who see him it is obvious that his faculties are impaired. I know my aunt Cassandra compares him to her unfortunate son
George and fears he will never be right. But Eliza only talks lightly of him proceeding at his own pace or of his having inordinate trouble cutting his teeth.

They are to convey me home soon and go on to Ramsgate with the little one, as Eliza is convinced that the sea bathing will do him a world of good.

Tunbridge Wells, Kent

Oh! How good it is to be home again. I understood that Eliza and my aunt were to return to France as soon as they came back from Ramsgate—what a scandal it is that the babe has not yet even met his papa—but I have heard today from Eliza that they have delayed their journey yet again because of some disturbance in a town called Rennes, which it seems would have made it dangerous to travel. This is the woman who has willingly travelled in pursuit of pleasure to areas where there are known highwaymen and footpads. She seemed to think nothing of danger when she travelled into Surrey last year, yet when it comes to rejoining her husband she fears for her safety!

But of course she is not to stay quietly at home as would be fitting, but is visiting Oxford. I know this is because her cousins James and Henry are there at present, and I suppose she continues to flirt with them both outrageously.

I could scarce believe the impudence in her letter that arrived this morning telling me of this visit. She actually aspires to be a Fellow—is there no limit to her outrageousness?

How typical of Eliza to be taken in by ‘ton’ and so dismissive of one of our great monuments. I hope she is not setting her cap at Henry. He is ten years her junior and she is married. But now I have spent time with her, I see these facts would be of no consequence to her if she has her heart set upon him. I fear there will be trouble ahead.