Jane and the Man of the Cloth

by Stephanie Barron

  1 In her letter to Cassandra, written from Lyme Sept 14, 1804, Austen refers to Miss Armstrong without revealing her Christian name; in another letter dated April 21, 1805, she mentions renewing the acquaintance in Bath. We learn here for the first time that Miss Armstrong’s name was Lucy. — Editor’s nete.

  2 Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832) is best known as a wealthy lawyer of the Georgian period who advocated Utilitarianism: the belief that society should be regulated by inherent principles, much as his rough contemporary Adam Smith (1723-1790) believed economies operated by self-evident market forces. Chief among these principles was that social action should produce the “greatest good for the greatest number”—a frankly democratic notion. Bentham attracted a coterie of “philosophical radicals,” who, by 1815, advocated universal suffrage in England. Reverend Austen is referring here, however, to a famous passage from Bentham’s 1789 work, Introduction to the Principles of Morals and legislation. —Editor’s note. 3 Mr. Sidmouth is paraphrasing Kant The philosopher actually wrote that he was unable to find “any being capable of laying claim to the distinction of being the final end of creation.” (Critique of Judgment, 1790). —Editors note.

  4 The search for fossils was well advanced along the Dorset coast by the time Austen visited it in 1804. A local schoolgirl, Mary Anning, would be credited with the discovery of the world’s first ichthyosaur in the cliffs between Lyme and Charmouth in 1811, when she was just twelve years old. —Editor’s note.

  5 Ann RadclifTe Is best remembered for the Gothic romance, The Mysteries of Udolpho, which Austen satirized in Northanger Abbey. She was, along with her contemporaries Maria Edgeworth, Charlotte Smith, and Fanny Burney, one of the women novelists Austen read and admired. —Editor’s note.

  6 Nuncheon was a common term for food taken between breakfast and dinner—which in the country was usually eaten in the late afternoon, around four o’clock—since the term luncheon, or lunch, did not exist. —Editor’s note.

  7 Eliza refers here to the March 1804 execution of the Due D’Enghien, who was of royal Bourbon blood. Napoleon had the duke seized, imprisoned, secredy uied, and executed, in the wake of several Royalist plots to dethrone him. —Editor’s note.

  8 Venturers were what we might call venture capitalists—titled or simply wealthy gentlemen who invested in others’ business ventures. —Editor’s note.

  9 The cutter Jane describes probably came about near Charton Bay, two miles west of Lyme proper; this was a lonely stretch of shoreline favored by smugglers. —Editor’s note.

  10 Captain Fielding is referring to the Royal Navy practice of pressing smuggling captains into active service when apprehended. Such seamen were known 10 be remarkably skilled, from long experience of landing on difficult coasts in bad weather and under cover of darkness; exactly the sort of captains the Royal Navy needed in time of war. —Editor’s note.

  11 The Pinny, in Austen’s time, was a heavily wooded wilderness a short walking distance from town. She describes it in Persuasion as possessed of 4tgrcen chasms between romantic rocks, where the scat tered forest trees and orchards of luxuriant growth declare that many a generation must have passed away since the first partial falling of the cliff prepared the ground for such a state….” There were to be additional land-tails in subsequent years, the most spectacular of which took place in 1839. It was the ideal place for a smugglers’ band to meet —Editor’s note.

  12 Jane alludes here to the whittle—a shawl of red wool traditionally worn by the women of Lyme’s laboring class. By the turn of the eighteenth century, however, the tradition was on the wane, as Lymc residents of all classes were increasingly exposed to the cosmopolitan dress of fashionable visitors. —Editor’s note.

  8 September 1804

  Dawn

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  I HAVE PUT ASIDE MY FOOLSCAP AND MY EFFORTS TO FORM EMMA Watson to my liking—a more wrongheaded heroine I have never encountered, so intent is she upon ceding the stage to her spiteful sisters and the ridiculous Tom Mus-grave1—and taken down this journal once more to record all that has unfolded since yester e’en. I had progressed only so far, in relating the chief of that tumultuous day, when Mr. Dagliesh appeared at my brother Henry’s dispatching. And so I must set down something of how the surgeon’s assistant came again to Wings cottage.

  We had partaken of a little refreshment, and decidedly superior tea—an excellent Darjeeling—in Captain Fielding’s attractive blue and white drawing-room, and had then quitted the house to observe the last slanting rays of sunlight in the gentleman’s garden. Captain Fielding reveals himself as a devotee of the rose, on a scale that rivals the Empress Josephine, for almost the entirety of his grounds is given over to beds of that noble flower— though sadly for us, well past its blooming.

  “But this is charming, Captain Fielding!” my sister exclaimed; among the Austens, she is the true lover of the garden and its healthful exercise, and is possessed of a remarkable taste in the arranging of beds and successive waves of seasonal bloom. “Utterly delightful! And in June, when the roses flower, it must be a veritable Eden!”

  “Eden must not be considered as approaching it, Miss Austen,” the Captain replied. “For my garden has no snakes.”

  “But what energy and industry has been here applied!” Cassandra continued. “And you are not even resident in the place very long.”

  “No—but where application is steady, and the means exist for the furthering of work, all manner of change may be swifdy effected. I have had teams of men labouring here to rival Crawford’s fossil pits. Where we stand this very moment, was only two years ago a pitiful stretch of downs, replete with scrub heath and the occasional fox den.”

  “Extraordinary,” Lucy Armstrong said quiedy, and gazed around her with a wistful air. “I remember this place some months ago, Captain Fielding, when you entertained us all at dinner. The roses were then in bloom— and a glorious sight it was.” She gave me a brief smile, as though lost in a pretty memory, and moved on down the path with my sister.

  Captain Fielding offered his left arm, which I gladly accepted, and we followed behind. The Captain employs a walking cane when attempting a greensward, and must progress more slowly as a result, so that Cassandra and Miss Armstrong were soon at some little distance from ourselves.

  “I venture to hope, Miss Jane Austen, that you shall again walk among these flowers, when their scent fills the air with a headiness unequalled, and their petals suggest a grace that can only be found in your lovelier form/’ my companion said, in a lowered tone.

  I blushed and turned away; for the import of his words was unmistakable. But I affected not to understand him, and said only, “I hope I shall often have reason to visit Lyme. It is a place and a society that has become quite dear to me. To fix one’s residence by the sea, is, I believe, to live in the greatest privilege and the most salubrious circumstance.”

  “You dislike Bath, then?”

  “Who can feel otherwise, who is consigned to spend the entire year through, in a place destined for pleasure parties and occasional travellers? The sameness, and yet the constant parting with friends, happy in their return to quieter homes; the bustle, and the self-importance, and yet the nothingness of the town; the white glare of its buildings, the fearful drains, the endless parade of the fashionable and the foolish, hopeful of cures from the sluggish waters—no, Captain Fielding, I cannot love Bath. It is become a prison to my spirit, however gilded the trappings of the cage.”

  “I regret to hear it,” he said slowly. “But you will have some weeks yet in Lyme.”

  “Yes,” I said, recovering. “We intend to remain here through November. I cherish every day, and count out those remaining, as though I turn the rarest pearls along a string.”

  The Captain raised his fair head, and gazed into the distance, his eyes narrowing. “Miss Austenl” he cried. “Miss Armstrong! We are losing the light, I fear, and must turn back.”

  “And what is that place my sister has come to?” I enquir
ed, in gazing upon a prettyish little wilderness some yards before us.

  “It is my temple ruin,” Captain Fielding said abruptly, “a colonnade of stone, in wisteria and hedgerose. Your sister has found it necessary to rest some few moments, but she cannot remain there.”

  I must have looked my surprise at his terse words, so clearly expressive of a proprietary interest in the place, rather than in Cassandra’s state; but in a moment, I understood the cause of Captain Fielding’s distress.

  “I must chide myself for an overactive enthusiasm in exhibiting these grounds—and in so vigourous a manner,” he said, “for assuredly the walk has proved too much for her delicate health.”

  And indeed, Cassandra was slumped upon a bench in an attitude of great fatigue, while Lucy Armstrong searched frantically among her green muslin pockets for what I imagined to be some errant smelling salts. The enquiring eyes of a stone wood nymph, arranged over a little door that stood ajar in the temple’s wall, looked down upon the tableau. That the door shielded an area for the storage of garden implements, I readily discerned; for a huddle of indiscriminate shapes, cloaked in sailcloth, was revealed by the setting sun—and a clever usage it was for a wilderness ruin. Captain Fielding’s house is entirely fitted out with such similarly charming notions— reflective, perhaps, of a man accustomed to tight quarters on a ship. I had observed the snug arrangement of his bookshelves and desk, the latter article having a removable surface for writing in one’s chair, as we earlier passed through the library; and indeed, little that the Captain owns is designed purely for ornament, or for a single purpose, serving a variety of duties in ways that are decidedly ingenious. I thought of Frank, whose life is similarly efficient in its organisation, and shook my head fondly at my brother’s plans to marry.2 Mary Gibson should make a sad business of Frank’s tidy habits.

  As we approached, Cassandra raised her head, her countenance suffused with pain. “I have overtaxed my strength, dearest Jane,’” she said, “and must run the risk of offending you, Captain Fielding, with my plea for a return to Wings cottage.”

  He turned from securing the door beneath the nymph’s head, and cried, “It shall be done with the greatest dispatch. A moment only is required for the summoning of Jarvis. But tell me, Miss Austen—can you attempt the walk to the house?”

  “If Jane will support me on the one hand, and Miss Armstrong on the other, it may be done,” Cassandra replied, and slowly regained her feet with an air of grim resolution. I hastened to her side and suffered her to rest her weight against my shoulder, my arm around her waist and my heartbeat rendered the more rapid by a fearsome anxiety. A quick glance at Captain Fielding revealed the agony of regret that suffused his countenance; and I knew as though he had spoken aloud, that his mind was a turmoil of recrimination and anger at the disability that prevented him from providing greater assistance. But a lame man, dependent upon a cane for his own support, was hardly likely to serve as a prop for my suffering sister; and so I left him to sort out his manly feelings in peace, and turned my attention where it was the more necessary.

  We had progressed perhaps one half the full length of the garden walk, when Cassandra begged to rest upon a bench; such dizzyness as overwhelmed her, coupled with a throbbing at the temples, nearly dropping her where she stood. I bit my lip, and wished for some greater aid— my brother, perhaps, or even Eliza—while Lucy Armstrong satisfied her tender feelings in repeated enquiries of Cassandra, and the triumphant production of the smelling salts. At last my sister rose, and managed to regain the house; whereupon Captain Fielding sent for his carriage and bade the housemaid fetch some brandy. This last having been administered, Cassandra sat back upon the settee with streaming eyes and a choking cough, unaccustomed as she is to strong spirits; and turned to me with all the terror of her infirmity upon her face.

  “Jane!” she cried, though her voice was but a whisper; “I had thought myself completely recovered! It was not so very great an injury; the rest of my dear family suffered little from the coach’s overturning; and? am several days removed from the event. And yet my present pain is unbearable. Can it be that I have received a greater knocking than was at first understood? Or that Mr. Dagliesh has mistaken the extent of the malady?”

  “Such fretful thoughts cannot improve your prospects for the remainder of our travel home,” I said gendy, as the sound of wheels upon the gravel revealed the barouche as even then standing before the door. “We will consult with Mr. Dagliesh as soon as ever we may.”

  Captain Fielding assisted us to the carriage with the greatest concern alive upon his countenance, and urged the coachman to achieve his two-miles’ journey with all possible speed, though mindful not to jar the lady. And so, with these conflicting orders setded upon his head, poor Jarvis clucked to the horses, and we were off.

  The ride itself was uneventful, being spent chiefly in the sort of silence that only arises from great perturbation of spirit; and I sighed with relief as the barouche began the descent into Broad Street, and the cheerful lights of Wings cottage appeared through the growing dusk.

  We were not to be afforded the comfort of an uneventful arrival, however—for Cassandra had only to set foot to paving stone, before crumpling in a faint upon the ground.

  AND SO MR. DAGLIESII WAS SUMMONED AT THE BEHEST OF MY brother Henry, who was even then within the cottage awaiting our return, the better to give his fondest adieux—for he and Eliza depart for Weymouth today, to tour the town and observe the embarkation of the Royal Family.3 From thence they should travel to Ibthorpe, and by a leisurely route return to No. 16 Michael’s Place, and their neat little home. But at the outcry and bustle from the very gate, my dear brother rushed to our assistance; and his anxiety was the more extreme, from being motivated by surprise. Miss Armstrong and 1 were more sanguine, having journeyed in some anticipation of the event.

  I may say that Mr. Dagliesh was very angry; he regarded us all as having precipitated a dangerous relapse, by our determination to force Cassandra over-early into activity; and he ordered the strictest quiet, the administration of broth, and the application alternately of ice and warm compresses, for the relief of my sister’s throbbing temples. The poor surgeon’s assistant stood some few minutes by her bedside, holding her wrist between his fingers as though intent upon her pulse; but I knew him to be utterly inattentive to the flutter of Cassandra’s heart, so clearly were his thoughts fixed upon the agony within his own.

  He departed not long thereafter, in search of some ice from the Golden Lion, and assuring us of his return at the earliest hour of the morning; and it remained only for us to determine the wisest course. The consultation of Dagliesh’s superior, Mr. Carpenter, was much canvassed, and rejected by my mother, who had learned something to that gendeman’s detriment from a recent Lyme acquaintance, one Miss Bonham, who claimed a persistent nervous fever. Henry at last voiced the thought chief within all our minds—that Cassandra should accompany himself and Eliza on their return to London, that trip being expedited by the amendment of the plan, and a determination to proceed with all possible swiftness towards Michael’s Place; for the opinion of a physician, with all the experience of a city practice, should be solicited as soon as possible. My father agreed; my mother lamented and groaned at this loss of her favourite; and I felt a pang at the loneliness I should undoubtedly feel in Cassandra’s absence.

  “Should not I accompany you, Henry, the better to nurse my sister?” I asked, in a lowered tone, as my mother hastened to the kitchen for a warm poultice.

  “Eliza shall amply supply your place, Jane; for, you know, she was many years in attendance upon poor Hastings.4 Better that you remain to comfort my mother and father.” Henry smiled and patted my arm. “Despite the events of this evening, I do not believe Cassandra to be in any real danger; a bit of peace and quiet, and restorative sleep, shall soon reverse the indifferent state of her health.”

  I GAZE UPON HER NOW, AS SHE SLUMBERS SHLL JN THE EARLY WATCH of morning, and pray that it may be
so. In a few hours she shall be torn from me, and all the delightful prospects of our Lyme visit o’erthrown; I shall have no one but Miss Armstrong for rambling the Cobb, or climbing the chasms of the Pinny, and my solitary visits to Mr. Milsop’s glove counter shall be melancholy indeed. Poor Mr. Dagliesh shall feel it acutely, I am afraid—but Cassandra was afforded little time to return him anything but gratitude, for his attentive and solicitous care; a deeper emotion— an emotion capable of displacing the unfortunate Tom Fowle in her heart—would require such lightness of spirit and limitless days as are presently denied her.

  And what of myself? Exists there the seed of feeling, that I might try what limitless days and lightness of spirit may do? And if there be a seed—in whose favour planted?

  I had occasion to lie awake much of the night in contemplation of the vagaries of the heart—due, perhaps, to the shallow breathing of my sister tossing beside me, or perhaps to the contrariety of my own heart’s impulses. 1 have ever been possessed of too passionate a nature, however I would cloak it in a general appearance of sobriety and sense. It has led me to care too readily and too deeply, for men whose circumstances are utterly unequal to my own—being separated the one from the other by either a gulf in fortune, or a disparity in nature that does not recommend of happiness. Geoffrey Sidmouth belongs most clearly to the latter. A more reasonable woman should give her heart without reservation to the gallant Captain, whose apparent good nature, firm principles, and forthright contempt for all that is ignoble, proclaim him to be the stuff of which England is made. And yet my heart is unmoved by Percival Fielding; I find him possessed of intelligence and integrity, and wish him more blessed by cleverness and good humour.

  And beyond all this, is a something more—a want of that which I cannot quite define. The Captain speaks and behaves entirely as he ought; and yet I cannot feel that he is open. There is an affectation of openness—he was surely frankness itself yesterday, in discussing the smugglers” affairs—and yet I have the creeping certainty that he is open by design, and that only when it suits his purpose.