JANE AUSTEN 69 



thing of the parents of Lady Bertram, but we may 

 suspect that her Ladyship inherited from her 

 mother the soft and cushiony character of which she 

 is a great example. Mrs. Price, with her small 

 income and large family, was unfortunately of the 

 same easy and futile temper. Edward Bertram is 

 obviously his father the Baronet over again, with 

 all his kindness and extreme respectability, while 

 what will ultimately grow into Sir Thomas' pom- 

 posity is like the delicate tissues of the sucking 

 pig in Charles Lamb's essay, not to be described 

 by the gross terms applicable to the adult, "Oh, 

 call it not fat I but an indefinable sweetness grow- 

 ing up to it," etc. The elder brother, Tom, who 

 began life as a cheerful, irresponsible person, falls 

 under the family curse in consequence of a mysteri- 

 ous fever, so that he doubtless inherited the fatal 

 tiendency from Sir Thomas, together with a certain 

 insouciance and want of heart, which one can 

 imagine to be forms of Lady Bertram's emptiness 

 and Mrs. Norris's hardness. 



This is a subject on which a Mendelian inquirer 

 might endlessly speculate, but the characters in 

 fiction being even less Susceptible to experiment 

 than our living friends and acquaintance, the 

 interest of the matter is soon exhausted. 



It is to be regretted that Miss Austen did not 

 allow the characters of one novel to appear in the 

 next. It is true that this would have upset plots 

 in an absurd way, but I should Hke to know what 

 would have happened if, when Henry Tilney had 

 made up his mind that he was in love with Catherine, 

 EUzabeth Bennet had appeared ? He would 



