ly that, having passed the three
score years and ten usually allotted to man's strength, and being
unaccustomed to write for publication, I might well distrust my ability
to complete the work, but that I also knew the extreme scantiness of the
materials out of which it must be constructed. The grave closed over my
aunt fifty-two years ago; and during that long period no idea of writing
her life had been entertained by any of her family. Her nearest
relatives, far from making provision for such a purpose, had actually
destroyed many of the letters and papers by which it might have been
facilitated. They were influenced, I believe, partly by an extreme
dislike to publishing private details, and partly by never having assumed
that the world would take so strong and abiding an interest in her works
as to claim her name as public property. It was therefore necessary for
me to draw upon recollections rather than on written documents for my
materials; while the subject itself supplied me with nothing striking or
prominent with which to arrest the attention of the reader. It has been
said that the happiest individuals, like nations during their happiest
periods, have no history. In the case of my aunt, it was not only that
her course of life was unvaried, but that her own disposition was
remarkably calm and even. There was in her nothing eccentric or angular;
no ruggedness of temper; no singularity of manner; none of the morbid
sensibility or exaggeration of feeling, which not unfrequently
accompanies great talents, to be worked up into a picture. Hers was a
mind well balanced on a basis of good sense, sweetened by an affectionate
heart, and regulated by fixed principles; so that she was to be
distinguished from many other amiable and sensible women only by that
peculiar genius which shines out clearly enough in her works, but of
which a biographer can make little use. The motive which at last induced
me to make the attempt is exactly expressed in the passage prefixed to
these pages. I thought that I saw something to be done: knew of no one
who could do it but myself, and so was driven to the enterprise. I am
glad that I have been able to finish my work. As a family record it can
scarcely fail to be interesting to those relatives who must ever set a
high value on their connection with Jane Austen, and to them I especially
dedicate it; but as I have been asked to do so, I also submit it to the
censure of the public, wi