" THE MOLLUSC " AND JANE AUSTEN.
1.11.0 TRH EDITOR OP THIS .SPIICTATOR."
Sin,—There will doubtless be a snowstorm of able letters against " C. M. D. D.'s " extraordinary proposition to take Mrs. Norris from " Mansfield Park" and export her to Rosings to fight it out with Lady Catherine de Bourgh, or to Hartfield to interfere with our dear " Emma" (Spectator, December 14th). The playwright is often cruel in his treat. ment, but surely such a " nice derangement of epitaphs " as this was never projected even by Mrs. Malaprop. Some years ago, in a note of admiration for " The Bores of Jane Austen" published in the Fortnightly Review, I drew up a doubtless imperfect list of her devout lovers. It includes George 1V., who ordered a copy of "Pride and Prejudice" to be placed in all his palaces, much to his credit; Sir Walter Scott, whose obiter dictum is classic ; Lord Macaulay ;
who owned to having read "Pride and Prejudice" seventeen times ; Sydney Smith, the adorer of meek Fanny Price ; Archbishop Whately,the champion of "Emma"; Dr. Whewell, of Trinity; and Mary Russell Mitford. Surely their ghosts would join the eminent critics of to-day who have handsomely avowed their devotion to "All perfect Austen" in protesting against such sacrilege. Mr. Pollock, Professor Goldwin Smith, Pro- fessor Saintsbury, who would fain have married Darcy's arch Elizabeth, and Mr. Andrew Lang, who in his fascinating "Letters to Dead Authors" does homage with such exquisite discernment, would surely be aghast at the idea of jumbling these masterpieces into one incongruous whole,.—butchering them to make the "simple domestic drama" nobody wants. The idea is merely a plea for the necessity of a Censor after all. We may quote Lord Carlisle's "keepsake" tribute of 1825 :—
"Oh Mrs. Bennet, Mrs. Norris too, While memory survives we'll dream of you; And Mr. Woodhouse whose abstemious lip, Must thin, but not too thin, his gruel sip ; Miss Bates our idol, though the village bore, And Mrs. Elton ardent to explore.
While the clear style flows on without pretence, With unstained purity and unmatched sense."
The Mollusc theory is interesting. Mrs. Allen of "Northanger " supports it, but let us leave our permanent delights unspoilt.
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