little miss austin

Oliver was also unwilling to talk about this topic, and followed Ivo to divert Alice's thoughts smoothly.

Alice herself didn't have much interest in this, but she just felt that the feminist pioneer back then had now been reduced to a topic of gossip.Ladies' minds are always relatively narrow, and their interests are all piled up on the relationship between men and women.Some people think that Mary Wollstonecraft is very unfortunate, and some people think that her stupidity has caused misfortune. They also ironically satirize in a bitter tone that since feminism is now, it is possible to not need men, so that she will not be pregnant, so she will not be pregnant. Will die from puerperal fever.

Alice thought it a bogus proposition, but she was too young to really argue with the ladies, and besides, mother would have fainted with fright at what she said.

Mom had a slightly better education than the average woman, but in that respect, too, she was no different than any other woman.

At this time, the men on the island were not discussing feminism or the radical idea of ​​overthrowing the monarchy, but the political situation in the country on the other side.

Since the beginning of this year, Britain and France have been negotiating an armistice agreement. Before the French people overthrew the monarchy, established a republic, and hanged King Louis XVI and Queen Marie Antoinette, the situation in France has been very turbulent. In addition, the British The army marched to the battlefield in France, and the conflict between the two countries intensified.

The gentlemen mentioned Napoleon Bonaparte, who had risen a few years earlier from an obscure Corsican officer to Commander-in-Chief of the Paris Garrison, when Napoleon had just turned twenty-six to become the most important military commander in France.After the Brumaire coup, Napoleon, who was just 26 years old, became the consul of the First French Republic.

This meant that the young Corsican became the highest political and military leader of France.

Men were obsessed with Napoleon's military victories--a common muscularity--and reviled him as a war madman.

The Austen family was also concerned about the war between Britain and France, the cause of which was, of course, the two Austen boys serving on a naval ship.Mom couldn't sleep if she didn't hear from them for months; Francis and Charles were on separate warships and rarely saw each other, but both wrote home as much as they could.Francis is more competitive, eager to have an encounter with the French warship at sea.Charles is relatively peaceful, but he also said that the fastest way to get promoted is of course to participate in the battle.

Boys generally yearn for the life of gold and iron horses. Several boys, including Byron, think that Napoleon is very powerful-but it would be better if he is not French.

Alice is very worried about her two elder brothers. She always feels that they should retire and go home. Anyway, the family is rich now, so it would be good for them to come back and help manage the company. When the company develops a steam printing machine in the future, Henry will definitely not be able to do it alone. .She hopes to open branches in both continental Europe and North America. Paris is the best location. It is currently the most radical and free-spirited city in Europe, which means that the printing volume of various reading materials and political pamphlets is huge. , There are many printing factories, and the sales of new printing machines are bound to be considerable.

My mother has no firm idea about this proposal. For a while, she thinks that it is good for the youngest two sons to retire and return to China. At the same time, she thinks that going to the Naval Academy is their own choice, and she cannot force them to give up their ideals. .

The Austin mother and daughter stayed on the Isle of Wight until the end of August, and returned to Southampton by ferry with Baron Bondfield, father and son, and Mr. Hastings.Baron Bondfield and his son were going to Devonshire, Mr. Hastings was going to London, and Austen and her daughter were going to stay at Edward's house, so they parted ways.

After staying in Southampton for another two weeks, the Austin mother and daughter set off for London with the Edward family.

There are many children in Edward's family, and they are noisy all the way.

The Edwards with their three younger children: William, Elizabeth, and Mariana; Cathy, in the car with a nanny, with the two oldest children: Fanny, little Edward; Mrs. Austen and Alice with the other two Boys: Little George, little Henry.

Little George, who has the same name as his grandfather, is almost 6 years old; Little Henry, who has the same name as his uncle Henry, has just turned 4 years old.

Mrs. Austin loves her grandchildren very much. Although the little ones are noisy, they are all cute and well-bred. Fanny is only 8 and a half years old, and she is already a far more well-behaved little lady than Alice when she was a child. .

However, the bad thing is that it made my mother think of Henry and Eliza.Jane is already pregnant, she can be regarded as relieved for her, but Henry still has no children, so she is even more anxious.

A new house in Austin outside London has been built. It is a small two-story brick and wood building, which is half the size of the Vicarage in Steventon.The front yard is spacious, and there is a stepped swimming pool in the backyard. At this time, there is no cement. It is made of stones cut into neat specifications, and then decorated with mosaic tiles, which are non-slip and leak-proof. At this time, there is no water inside.

There are two cisterns built on the roof to provide water for the toilets in the house, but the hot water still needs to be transported by a cargo lift.The bathroom is equipped with the best porcelain toilet currently available on the market. It cannot automatically flush the water and needs to manually pull the water release switch, but it is already much better than the wooden toilet.

There are 6 bedrooms on the second floor. The master bedroom is larger and is for parents with a separate bathroom; the other 5 bedrooms are slightly smaller with 2 bathrooms.

Downstairs are functional rooms such as study, living room, housework room, kitchen, laundry room, etc. The servants' housing is on the side of the house, and there are rows of comfortable log cabins built for two people.There are also tool sheds, stables, carriage sheds, etc. built on the other side.

Mrs. Austin asked Alice why she hadn't set aside a vegetable patch after her inspection.

Alice raised her forehead, took out the map and pointed to the reserved vegetable field, which was about ten minutes away from the house, and stayed beside the woods.Mom thinks it's a bit far away, but it's true that it's a bit messy and unsightly if it stays near the house, so I don't care about it.

The children ran happily in the new house, screaming.

Both Edward and his wife felt that the new house was very good.It’s not as big as the Goldmusham Manor, but it’s enough for the Austin couple to bring Cathy and Alice to live. According to Alice, the interior of the new house is quite modern and equipped with some trendy household equipment that can be bought in the market. It should be able to live in more comfortable.Besides, the house can be expanded in the future, but Alice bought a rather large piece of land.

When it comes to buying land, Edward admires that his little sister can earn a lot of money, and she is willing to use the money to buy land and build a house. The land for the new home is not restricted by the inheritance law, and it will definitely be left to Alice at that time.Alice and Henry proposed to establish a family trust fund, and he strongly agreed with it. After all, the Goethemusham Manor can only be left to little Edward in the future, and he has several sons. These fields are not enough to distribute to all the children, and I have to worry about the future dowry of the three daughters, and the financial pressure is also great.

After seeing the new house, Mrs. Austen immediately went into the city to visit Jane.

Jane is 4 months pregnant, but can barely tell from the outside.The style of skirts in this period is tight under the chest, and then there are slender and looser skirts underneath, which can well cover the belly, and the bulging belly cannot be seen until the late pregnancy.

Tom hadn't come home from work, and Jane entertained her mother, brother and sister, and a bunch of nephews and nieces by herself.

The small two-story building became very lively.

There are 7 children who can have fun wherever they go. Mom and Cathy are careful not to let the children bump into Jane. Sister-in-law Elizabeth and Alice are busy restraining the children and taking them to the playroom.

Alice had only been with the children for less than half an hour, and she was on the verge of breaking down.

Children are little angels on the outside and little devils on the inside. They have many problems and are never satisfied.

Boys get into fights every five minutes together, and it has nothing to do with upbringing, it has to do with children's rambunctious nature.Fanny is the eldest daughter and the most well-behaved one. She will help Elizabeth take care of her sisters; even with a nanny, it is a difficult task to take care of 5 energetic boys at the same time. Alice just watched Elizabeth's busy energy , I feel that having so many children is simply the scariest thing in the world.

Alice was sure again that she didn't like children, and she didn't want to have children in the future. Even if her mother wanted to talk about it, she wasn't going to change her mind.

Jane's body was beyond the expectation of her mother and sisters. It was very good. Even the morning sickness in the first trimester was not serious. She should eat and drink, and her appetite was not affected at all.

Mom was very pleased.

Edward usually stayed in hotels when he passed through London, and this time he still booked a room in the hotel where he usually stayed. The whole family was noisy everywhere they went.Because of the little Thomas incident, the mother is now very strict with the children. Edward is not allowed to take the children out casually. After visiting Jane, she is busy sending them back to Kent.

Mum stayed in London with Cathy and Alice.Mr. Hastings did not buy a house in London, but someone lent him a very luxurious apartment, where he lived when he had to stay in London for seven years because of the legal proceedings.So he invited Austin's mother and daughter to live with him, and the mother and daughter moved there.

Mrs. Austen has become very busy in London.In addition to visiting Jane every now and then, he was also busy with the interior decoration of the new house in the suburbs.

I had to put up the wallpaper first, and it took almost a month just to put up the wallpaper; at the same time, I started to measure the size and buy various curtains and curtains.The advantage of London is that there are many shops, so it is very convenient to buy anything. Of course, you have to shop around. Cathy has been busy going to various shops to shop around all day long, and finally she has selected several kinds of fabrics.To furnish the whole new house, a lot of fabrics are needed, and it can definitely be regarded as a big customer. The merchant specially sent someone to re-measure the size, including curtain rods and the like, which can be customized together, so it was spent again. More than 1 pounds.

Mom was shocked at first when she saw the bill: it was more than the Austin family spent in a year!

But Alice said, it’s not bad, Mom, don’t save money for me!

Mom didn't know if what she said was true, but she found out after asking Henry that it was really not short of money, so she started shopping happily.

All the furniture had to be bought or made to order. Alice insisted on a big bed, saying that she didn't want to sleep in a single bed, and encouraged Cathy to change to a big bed, so all the beds were made to order as double beds.

Bedding was also an expense, Alice wanted the best of everything, one set was not enough for a bedroom, at least a spare set was needed, and the bedding alone cost another £200.

And servants.It is not easy to find experienced and loyal servants. First decide how many servants you want, and then go to the employment agency to register the employment needs. The selection of servants will continue until the end of October.

Vegetables have started to grow in the vegetable field beside the woods.

I also wrote to Reverend George who was alone in Bath, asking him to come to London before the end of November.

Alice has nothing to do, and she is still studying with Mr. Hastings for the past few months. Hastings will stay in London until after Christmas, and they will return to Daylesford together.

The Reverend George had not yet left Bath, and another misfortune befell Austen, London.

Eliza's son, Little Hastings, was ill.

He became ill very quickly, with a high fever, vomiting, sore throat, and a bright red rash all over his body, and was dying a few days later.

After Mrs. Austin went to visit Little Hastings, she came back and changed all her clothes, took a good bath, and then asked Cathy to tell Alice that she was not allowed to go out during this period and stayed honestly in the apartment. London may There is a scarlet fever epidemic.

Scarlet fever was foreign to Alice.With the advancement of medicine in later generations, babies will be given a lot of vaccines after birth, and there are very few children infected with scarlet fever.Scarlet fever occurs frequently among children. Doctors in this era already know that scarlet fever bacteria are spread by air droplets, so once an outbreak occurs, not going out is the best protective measure.

Alice had been vaccinated against smallpox a few years ago, and then all seven of Edward’s children had been vaccinated against smallpox. Little Hastings had also been vaccinated against smallpox, but it was not smallpox that took his life, but scarlet fever. .

A few days later, 15-year-old Earl Hastings Floyd died of illness.

Eliza was devastated, and so was Henry.

When the Reverend George arrived in London, he attended the funeral of little Hastings.

Mr. Hastings was very emotional, saying that he did not expect Eliza's child to die prematurely. He felt the unfairness of fate and felt the same sadness for the goddaughter.

"I had amended my will to leave him part of my property." Hastings sighed. "I didn't expect—"

Alice didn't know how to comfort him, so she could only say, "This kind of thing can't be predicted in advance."

"Yes, what a pity. Look, I am almost 70 years old and still alive, but the 15-year-old boy is already dead." The old man shed tears sadly, probably thinking of his son who died young.

Alice also felt very sorry.But germs are ruthless, and they will kill you if they say they will kill you, without ambiguity.Eliza is just such a child. She is about to turn 40 years old, which means she has lost her fertility in this age. It is probably impossible for her and Henry to have any more children.Thinking that Edward has so many children, but Henry has none, I feel that there is really no reason to say such a thing.

Unlike Alice, who made up her mind to never marry and have children, Eliza wanted to become a mother again, but fate not only did not give her another child, but took away the child she already had. How could she not despair ?

Mrs. Austen could not care about worrying about Henry's heir at this time.Because scarlet fever is highly contagious, she did not let Jane and Alice go to Henry's house to visit little Hastings, but let Cathy go.Cathy has been to Henry's house, and she has to change all her clothes and take a shower before she can see Alice.Mom is worried that Alice will be infected too. The fatality rate of scarlet fever is very high now, and it is slightly lower than smallpox, because it mainly infects children under the age of 15, and the incidence rate of adults is not high, but if Jane is infected Contagious, it may affect the baby in her womb.

Jane could only write letters to Eliza, and her mother refused to let Elisa write back to Jane, saying that she was afraid that there would be germs on the letter paper.

Jane also felt sorry for her brother and cousin, and not even the hit of "Sense and Sensibility" could appease her.

While Mrs. Austen was busy decorating her new house, various newspapers in London were starting to preview "Sense and Sensibility".A round of newspaper advertisements was made, and the "Austin Book Club" was promoted in various bookstores in London. The booklets were sent free of charge. Just fill in one page of the booklet and send it to "Austin and Ferrero Publishing House" with 1 pound. You will receive a beautifully printed booklet, in which, in addition to the advertisement of the upcoming novel, there are several book reviews, a beautiful hand-painted print, a booklet for the book club is mailed every month, and 12 books are collected. If you send a stamp and return it to the publishing house before November, you will receive an unexpected Christmas gift. The publishing house will choose a novel from this year's published novels and give it away for free.

At the beginning, the promotion of this book club plan was not good. After all, this is a benefit that you pay first, and you will not be able to enjoy it until a year later. Who knows if you will give it away at that time?Early promotion plans still rely on acquaintances.

Of course, Lucinda could not leave behind any activities of her friends, actively participated, and encouraged her relatives and friends to participate in the activities. Basically, her relatives and friends were not short of the £1, so she took part in it to save face, and the money was not much anyway.

Tom also promoted book clubs in the court system and bar colleges and got some people to join them.

By the end of November, the "Austin Book Club" had almost 11 members, so the first issue of the journal was mailed before Christmas.

The first printing of the first edition of "Sense and Sensibility" was 1000 copies, and pre-sales began in early September. It was officially launched at the beginning of the month. In the first week plus pre-sale sales, it was less than 9 copies. However, 100 copies were sold in the second week, and another 10 copies were sold in the next two weeks. The sales volume of about 200 books per week has become the best-selling book in various bookstores in London in the fourth quarter.

This achievement far exceeds similar novels on the market in the same period, and also far exceeds the sales volume of the first book of an ordinary author. It can be said to be a very good achievement.

The publishing house has not returned the book payment from the bookstore, but based on the sales volume, Jane can get at least 400 pounds of manuscript fees.

When Jane learned of this number, she almost froze.

——This is a number that she has never imagined, and this is just one book and two months.

Henry said that the second edition has already started printing, and this time a little more, about 1500 copies, will be sold in bookstores for a few more months.Mr. Ferrero said that according to the popularity of the novel, people will always come to buy the book, so there will be a long-term income.For publishing houses, the number of published novels depends on the number of piles. Even if no new books are released, there will be a lot of settlements every quarter or half a year; for writers, there will also be a relatively stable income. If it is printed, there will be another income.

This form of work is very suitable for Jane, even if she has a child, she can also create at home. She and Tom will have an annual income of more than 1000 pounds next year, so they can live a very good life.

After Pastor George arrived in London, the Austin family soon moved into their new home.

Throughout December, the Austin house was in a mess, and my mother had to get used to the new house, the new servants, and a lot of things waiting for her to deal with, so she really didn't have the mood to mourn little Hastings.

And because he saw several of Edward's children, he secretly discussed with Henry whether he would like to adopt one of Edward's sons?Henry didn't want to think about it, but his mother said, there must be an heir to your property in the future, right?In the past, because of little Hastings, this problem was not serious, but now, you have no biological children and no stepson, what about your property?Shouldn't he choose a nephew to leave for him in the future?Or choose a nephew to bring up early, just like Mr. Langlois and Tom, you can let go of the adoption, just take over and raise it.

After discussing with Eliza, Henry reluctantly agreed.

Mother discussed it again with the Reverend George, who thought it would be a good idea. It happened quite often, as did Mr. Knight and Edward, Langlois and Tom, Lady Gresham and Wesley.

So Pastor George wrote to ask Edward, would he be willing to put one of his sons in Henry's house to raise him?Not being adopted for the time being, just to see if the child can get along with Uncle Henry.

Edward went to discuss with his wife again, and finally decided to let little Henry go to his uncle's house, but it would have to wait until next spring. Elizabeth was worried about the sanitation of Henry's house, and the germs would have to dissipate for a few months.

Letters came and went, and it was finally arranged for little Henry to go to London before Christmas.

Alice is 12 years old.

In fact, this year has passed quite quickly, but there are always some flaws in life, such as little Thomas and little Hastings.

The money-making plan is in order, and the publishing business is also doing well.

The economy has improved, the living environment has changed, and several major events in life seem to be going well.

It’s a bit funny to think that a few years ago she was still saving private house money one pound by one pound-she still kept the 1 pounds, which was her struggle history as a child.

What were you thinking at the time?Do you want to write novels, become a writer, and make £1000 a year?

Now that the goal of earning 1000 pounds a year has already been achieved, does she still want to become a writer?

She pondered, "being famous" doesn't seem to be a shameful thing. Because she has the thinking of the 21st century, she has never thought that being "famous" is ashamed to say it. It may be an advanced way of thinking in this era, but what about being a human being? , the important thing is to be happy, as long as I want to do it, I will do it, it's that simple.

Writing is a very personal thing, and each creator gets different enjoyment from it. For her, it was the kind of—how should I put it? Probably everyone has a "desire to create". Write what you think in your heart, write down what you think and get it in the form of words, publicize it, get the love or sympathy of others, get praise, and get satisfaction.

For "fame", Alice is very eager; but after becoming famous, she is actually not very conscious.

As for other things, most of them haven't thought about it yet.

Moonlight shone in from the window, the curtains were not drawn, and the moonlight shone coldly on the desk in front of the window.

On the table is a typewriter, inkwells, some dip pens, a pencil, and two different stacks of paper.

On the other side lay a typewritten manuscript, the first page of which reads "An English Horror Story, Fengshan Park", By A. Austen, October, 1801th, 10.

———The end of the first volume