26, many of which make our hearts ache and our eyes overflow. He
read the pages of Jane Austen on the fourteenth of March, and on the
fifteenth he writes, "This morning I leave 39 Castle Street for the
last time." It was something to have written a book sought for by him
at such a moment. Even at Malta, in December, 1831, when the pressure
of disease, as well as of misfortune, was upon him, Sir Walter was
often found with a volume of Miss Austen in his hand, and said to a
friend, "There is a finishing-off in some of her scenes that is really
quite above everybody else."

Jane Austen's life-world presented such a limited experience that it
is marvellous where she could have found the models from which she
studied such a variety of forms. It is only another proof that the
secret lies in the genius which seizes, not in the material which is
seized. We have been told by one who knew her well, that Miss Austen
never intentionally drew portraits from individuals, and avoided,
if possible, all sketches that could be recognized. But she was so
faithful to Nature, that many of her acquaintance, whose characters
had never entered her mind, were much offended, and could not be
persuaded that they or their friends had not been depicted in some
of her less attractive personages: a feeling which we have frequently
shared; for, as the touches of her pencil brought out the light
and shades very quietly, we have been startled to recognize our own
portrait come gradually out on the canvas, especially since we are not
equal to the courage of Cromwell, who said, "Paint me as I am."

In the "Autobiography of Sir Egerton Brydges" we find the following
passage: it is characteristic of the man:--

"I remember Jane Austen, the novelist, a little child. Her mother was
a Miss Leigh, whose paternal grandmother was a sister of the first
Duke of Chandos. Mr. Austen was of a Kentish family, of which several
branches have been settled in the Weald, and some are still remaining
there. When I knew Jane Austen, I never suspected she was an
authoress; but my eyes told me that she was fair and handsome, slight
and elegant, with cheeks a little too full. The last time, I think,
I saw her was at Ramsgate, in 1803; perhaps she was then about
twenty-seven years old. Even then I did not know that she was addicted
to literary composition."

We can readily suppose that the spheres of Jane Austen and Sir Egerton
could not be very congenial; and it does not app