“Every Savage MUST Dance (on a Slave Ship)” —Thanks for Enlightening Us, Mr. Darcy

In Austen-L two weeks ago, Linda Thomas (coordinator of JASNA Ashland Oregon where I enjoyed giving a presentation to Linda’s small group of sharp elves a few weeks ago) posted the following about Jane Austen’s supposed admiration (in an 1813 letter to her sister) for Captain Pasley’s (then) famous book endorsing the English colonial system:

Linda: "…I read The Slave Ship: A Human History by Marcus Rediker (2007), whom I heard speak here in Ashland with Naomi Wallace for her play The Liquid Plain. After reading that the enslaved Africans aboard the slave ships were forced on deck to dance for an hour a day, as a form of exercise to keep them healthy, I have to wonder if JA knew about this from her sailor brothers, and if Mr. Darcy's "Every savage can dance" was an evocation of this practice. "

My eye was immediately caught, because earlier this year, I posted something highly resonant with Linda’s suggestion…

http://listserv.mcgill.ca/scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind1305b&L=austen-l&P=4800

......and in my earlier post, which I had entitled "Every Hottentot can dance", I presented two very suggestive passages in P&P where the word "slave" appears:

Chapter 24: "Elizabeth, to whom Jane very soon communicated the chief of all this, heard it in silent indignation. Her heart was divided between concern for her sister, and resentment against all others. To Caroline's assertion of her brother's being partial to Miss Darcy she paid no credit. That he was really fond of Jane, she doubted no more than she had ever done; and much as she had always been disposed to like him, she could not think without anger, hardly without contempt, on that easiness of temper, that want of proper resolution, which now MADE HIM THE SLAVE of his designing friends, and led him to SACRIFICE of his own happiness to the caprice of their inclination. Had his own happiness, however, been the only sacrifice, he might have been allowed to sport with it in whatever manner he thought best, but her sister's was involved in it, as she thought he must be sensible himself.

Chapter 29: "No governess! How was that possible? Five daughters brought up at home without a governess! I never heard of such a thing. Your mother MUST HAVE BEEN QUITE A SLAVE to your education." Elizabeth could hardly help smiling as she assured her that had not been the case. "Then, who taught you? who attended to you? Without a governess, you must have been neglected." "Compared with some families, I believe we were; but such of us as wished to learn never wanted the means. We were always encouraged to read, and had ALL THE MASTERS THAT WERE NECESSARY. Those who chose to be idle, certainly might."  "  END QUOTE

So, Linda’s brilliant catch seems to me to be fully in keeping with my earlier suggestion, and adds to the subtle portrayal by Jane Austen of the not-so-pleasing side of Darcy's personality. His bon mot to Sir William Lucas is actually quite witty, in a very dry way---but if my and Linda’s speculations are correct, that would make it a very amoral wit, as well.  

And…there are those who wonder what "trade" Bingley's family made its fortune in, and whether that is how Darcy and Bingley gravitated together. And...if Jane Austen did have this in mind, that is consistent with my view of her that she did not in any way approve of colonial slavery or the Royal Navy's supporting role in same. The portrait of the banal evil of Sir Thomas Bertram in Mansfield Park, as Rozema depicted in her 1999 adaptation, and as I have blogged on numerous occasions, is of course the most dramatic evidence of how JA felt about slavery.

Linda’s suggestion supports the implication that Darcy must callously supports English colonialism and the inhuman mass slavery that was its foundation, or else he would not joke about one of its barbarous practices so cavalierly.

By the way, here is the discussion in Rediker’s book that Linda was recalling:

“How did relations between captain and crew change once the enslaved came aboard?...the sailors carried out [the captain’s] orders to bring the enslaved onboard, to stow them below decks, to feed them, compel them to exercise (“dance”),…slowly transform them into commodities for the international labor market….the arrangement of decks on a slave ship—the hold, the lower deck, the main deck; how male slaves were chained together; how the enslaved were stowed below decks; how they were fed, guarded, and forced to ‘dance’ for exercise ..Sailors told Clarkson that the slave trade was not a ‘nursery’ for sailors, as its advocated insisted, but rather a cemetery….every single fact…can be found in the interviews Clarkson conducted with sailors…Physicians and slave traders alike believed that exercise would help to maintain the health of the enslaved. Therefore each afternoon the Africans would be required to dance (and also to sing, on many ships). This could take many forms, from something more or less freely chosen, accompanied by African instruments (more common among the women), to the dreary, forced clanking of chains (more common among the men)….”  END QUOTE

Rediker relies a great deal on Clarkson’s writing about slavery (which JA was very familiar with)- I wondered whether the famous abolitionist Clarkson’s books might have been Rediker’s primary source for the “dancing” on slave ships—if so, that would have been very strong evidence of JA’s familiarity with same.

Well, it turned out it was not just Clarkson who wrote about this “dancing”, it was also several other authors of anti-slavery writing at that time, many of which harked back to the published minutes from the 1788 session of Parliament, in which a bill to regulate slave ship practices was debated, and which I reproduce in full at the end of this post.

The most awful and relevant part of those Parliamentary minutes is the following sentence:

“After meals THEY WERE COMPELLED BY THE WHIP TO JUMP IN THEIR IRONS, WHICH

BY THE SLAVE-DEALERS WAS CALLED DANCING.”

The treble horror of whipping heavily shackled captives and calling it “dancing” is far beyond the pale of “normal” barbarity—it’s as bad as it ever gets.

So…if Darcy is actually joking about this practice-and I believe he is-it either suggests a callous endorsement of this practice by Darcy, OR….there is another possible alternative, which just occurred to me—what if the unspecified “trade” in which Sir William Lucas has made his fortune is in fact the “slave trade”? If so, this “joke”, unfunny as it is, could be Darcy discreetly alerting Sir William that Darcy knows this sordid fact about how his genial host got rich, and so he is not fooled by Sir William’s excessive show of courtesy and good manners.

In either event, if Darcy has indeed covertly alluded to this practice on slave ships, it puts the immediately succeeding dialog among Sir William, Darcy and Elizabeth, as to whether Lizzy will “dance” with Darcy, in a whole different light, at least in the minds of Darcy and Sir William, as

Lizzy seems totally oblivious to this slavery subtext.

Cheers, ARNIE
@JaneAustenCode on Twitter

1788 PARLIAMENTARY MINUTES RE BILL TO REGULATE SLAVE SHIP PRACTICES

“The last business of importance which engaged the attention of parliament, was a bill brought into the house by Sir William Dolben, member for the University of Oxford, a man of the highest integrity and respectability, to regulate the transportation of slaves from the coast of Africa to the West Indies. At the beginning of the year, a multitude of petitions had been presented from the different towns, cities, and counties of the kingdom, imploring in earnest and affecting terms the abolition of that superlatively nefarious and detestable traffic. A motion on the subject of these petitions was expected to be made by Mr. Wilberforce, member for Yorkshire; but in consequence of the long-protracted and unfortunate indisposition of that gentleman, Mr. Pitt on the _th of May moved a resolution, importing that the house would early in the next session proceed to take into consideration the state of the slave trade. The bill of Sir William Dolben, which was intended merely to establish a certain reasonable proportion between the number of slaves and the tonnage of the ships, was violently and obstinately opposed by petitions from the merchants of London and Liverpool concerned in the African trade. Counsel being therefore engaged, and witnesses examined, it appeared in evidence at the bar of the house, that five feet six inches in length, and sixteen inches in breadth, was the average space allotted to each slave. The lower deck of the vessel was entirely covered with bodies. The space between the floor of that deck and the roof above, in height about five feet eight inches, was divided by a platform, also covered with human bodies. The slaves were chained two and two by their hands and feet, and by means of ring-bolts fastened to the deck. In that sultry climate, their allowance was a pint of water each, per diem; and they were usually fed twice a day with yams and horse-beans.

After meals THEY WERE COMPELLED BY THE WHIP TO JUMP IN THEIR IRONS, WHICH

BY THE SLAVE-DEALERS WAS CALLED DANCING.

They had nor, as was emphatically stated, when stowed together, so much room as a man in his coffin, either in length or breadth. They drew their breath with laborious and anxious efforts, and many died of mere suffocation. The customary mortality of the voyage exceeded seventeen times the usual estimate of human life. A slave ship, when sull fraught with this cargo of wretchedness and abomination, exhibited at once the extremes of human depravity and human misery.

Mr. Pitt, who on various occasions has dropped the statesman to assume the nobler character of the philanthropist, declared with indignant eloquence, that "if, as had been asserted by the members for Liverpool, the trade could not be carried on in any other manner, he would retract what he had said on a former day, and, waving every farther discussion, give his instant vote for the annihilation of a traffic thus shocking to humanity. He trusted that the house, being now in possession of such evidence as was never before exhibited, would endeavour to extricate themselves from the guilt and remorse which every man ought to feel for having so long over-looked such cruelly and oppression." The bill was carried up June 18th to the House of Lords, where it was fated to encounter the determined opposition of Lord Thurlow. His lordship said, that the bill was full of inconsistency and nonsense. The French had lately offered premiums to encourage the African trade, and the natural presumption was, that we ought to do the same. This measure appeared to him very like a breach of parliamentary faith. As to himself, he scrupled not to say, "that if the fit of philanthropy which had slept so many years had been suffered to sleep one summer longer, it would have appeared to him more wise than to take up the subject in this disjointed manner." The Duke of Chandos ventured to predict a general insurrection of the negroes in the West Indies in consequence of the agitation of the present question. And Lord Sydney, who had once ranked amongst the friends of liberty, expressed in warm terms his admiration of the system of the slave laws established in Jamaica, and saw no room for any improvement. The bill was defended by the Duke of Richmond and Marquis Townshend in a manner which did honor to their understanding and feelings: and it finally passed by a considerable majority.

The king put an end to the session July 11, 1788, by a speech from the throne, in which he complimented the two houses on their attention and liberality.”

The Countess of Morley & “The Violent Friendship” of Emma Woodhouse & Harriet Smith

In Janeites & Austen L earlier today, Diana Birchall posted a link to her most recent blog post...

 http://austenauthors.net/jane-austen-and-countess-morley-by-diana-birchall

in which she wrote: “I always wondered about the Countess of Morley, who corresponded with Jane Austen, and was suspected of writing her novels.  She turns out to have been quite a well known artist and personality in her day, who flourished at beautiful Saltram in Devonshire, reformed a seriously rakish husband, and was admired by Sydney Smith.  The Dovegreyreader blog's visit to Saltram inspired me, and I was able to find out quite a lot about Lady Morley from ancient issues of the Jane Austen Society reports.”  

Diana, you’re on a roll! During the past few months, every week or two, you seem to roll out yet another topic that I find to be right up my own alley, in terms of what really interests me re JA’s life and writing at this advanced stage of my research, and this is another one. So, first of all, a big thank you to you, and by the time you reach the end of this post, you’ll know exactly why I am thankful! I had last looked in 2008 at the brief Emma-era correspondence of JA with Countess Morley, so it was high time for a revisiting, in light of all I’ve learned since then, and your post was the perfect prompt and inspiration, and it led me to several wonderful additions to my store of knowledge about our favorite author.

But first, I can tell you one tiny but juicy factoid I think you’re not aware of. You quoted from correspondence between Sydney Smith and Countess Morley which you found at that Byron Life & Times website, and that strangely connects to my factoid, which is that, at one point, Augusta Leigh---who of course you know was Byron's half sister, the one with whom he had an incestuous relationship----lived in the house of her friend Theresa Villiers. And perhaps you also are aware that Theresa Villiers was Countess Morley’s sister in law, and, what’s most important, was the recipient of the very same letter in which Countess Morley expressed her opinions about Emma, from which you quoted! So…one can wonder whether Countess Morley’s opinions about Jane Austen were actually communicated by her to Augusta Leigh, or even…Byron himself? (Maybe you (or Nancy, or another Byron-ite) can make something more of that factoid)

But now on to the meat of what I found today:

Diana wrote: "After she wrote to Jane Austen to compliment her on Emma, Jane wrote in her private list of opinions, “Countess of Morley delighted with it.”  Elsewhere, though, Lady Morley wrote less enthusiastically, saying that she did not like Emma as well as Mansfield Park or Pride and Prejudice. “There is such a total want of story & there is so very little to like in the heroine & so little to interest in the hero, who gives me only the idea of an elderly, sensible, good sort of man…with all the sense & cleverness w’ch Emma is represented to possess it is not natural that she sh’d have formed such a violent friendship with such a vulgar little fool as Harriet – then, surely, her talking characters talk too much…Still their conversations are certainly admirable. Mr. and Mrs. Elton are both charming people. – I have seen fifty such people as her.”

Diana, at the beginning of that mini-review of Emma, the Countess also wrote “Yet I think there is much of it that is admirable. Mr. Woodhouse, Mrs. Elton, Miss Bates & a few others are delightful….”  and also “The pages filled with Miss Bates & Mrs. Elton wd. make up one of the volumes & that is more than can well be afforded”.

So with that little bit of extra detail, we might be inclined to infer that Countess Morley really liked JA’s writing, but she wanted more story and less Miss Bates and Mrs. Elton. That latter critique seems to suggest that the Countess did not “get” that Miss Bates and Mrs. Elton actually ARE revealing important aspects of the (shadow) story. I.e., the Countess seems to be like Emma and so many readers of the novel who are led down a garden path of passive reading by JA, who don’t understand the many significant veiled meanings hidden in plain sight in the numerous otherwise irritating vocalizations of those two heavy-duty talkers.

But…I strongly resisted the inference of Countess Morley’s cluelessness, because, in 2008, when I last focused on her exchange of brief letters with JA (which you reproduced in your blog post), I was convinced at that time that these letters were completely parodic, a private joke between them, all about Emma. Particularly striking is the faux formality of the Countess’s “I am Madam Yr much obliged F.Morley” being immediately called and raised, so to speak, by JA’s “I am Madam Your Obliged and faithful Servt J. Austen”—and that latter closing salutation is of course a broad wink at the Dedication of Emma to the Prince of Whales (with an h):

“HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCE REGENT, THIS WORK IS BY HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS’S PERMISSION, MOST RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED, BY HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS’S DUTIFUL AND OBEDIENT HUMBLE SERVANT THE AUTHOR”

As a result of that echoing of the novel Dedication in those two letters, I have been of the opinion since 2008, and I remain so, that the Countess must have been in on the joke about the Dedication being itself totally insincere and parodic, and perhaps also about the Prince of Whales allusion in the charade in Chapter 9 of Emma.

So….how to then reconcile that sort of inside knowledge with the Countess’s apparent failure, as reflected in her letter to her sister in law, to understand the deeper structure of Emma?

That apparent paradox led me to turn to my most reliable workhorse for resolving such questions, which is to focus on unusual verbiage in the Countess’s letter, and see if it might be a clue to a concealed allusion of some kind. And boy, did that turn out to be a bull’s eye this time!

The verbiage in Countess Morley’s opinions about Emma which really caught my eye was the Gothic-tinged phrase “violent friendship” in the following sentence:  “with all the sense & cleverness w’ch Emma is represented to possess it is not natural that she sh’d have formed such a violent friendship with such a vulgar little fool as Harriet” 

When I searched Google Books for usages prior to 1815 of the phrase “ violent friendship”, there were only a very small number (one of them by Swift), and from that tiny sample, I found not one, but TWO of them had Jane Austen’s fingerprints all over them!

First, there was this passage from the letter written by the imaginary Elizabeth Homespun, in the parodic piece in The Mirror that Mrs. Morland gives to Catherine to read out of concern that Catherine (like Harriet Smith) has gotten a big head as a result of her extended visit among higher class people:

“I am not so silly, Mr. Mirror, but I can understand the meaning of all this. My Lady, it seems, is contented to have some humble friends in the country, whom she does not think worthy of her notice in town; but I am determined to shew her, that I have a prouder spirit than she imagines, and shall not go near her, either in town or country. What is more, my father shan't vote for her friend at next election, if I can help it. What vexes me beyond every thing else is, that I had been often telling my aunt and her daughters of the intimate footing I was on with Lady, and what a VIOLENT FRIENDSHIP we had for each other; and so, from envy, perhaps, they used to nick-name me THE COUNTESS, and Lady Leonora….”

I will return to that “hit” near the end of this post, but first I want to focus on the second, and (in my opinion, much more significant) usage I found in a work of fiction which was published a number of times during the late 18^th century, while JA was growing up, which confirmed my original faith that the Countess was not clueless at all. And what was most confirming was that it was in the very same sentence in her capsule review of Emma when she appears to criticize JA’s novel most strongly, that the Countess also gives what I immediately identified as an unmistakable hint that she understood one very subtle aspect of JA’s writing in Emma. See what you think.

So, before I show you that famous passage, first please reread the following famous & familiar two passages of expositional narration early in Emma:

Chapter 1: “Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her.

She was the youngest of the two daughters of a most affectionate, indulgent father; and had, in consequence of her sister's marriage, been mistress of his house from a very early period. Her mother had died too long ago for her to have more than an indistinct remembrance of her caresses; and her place had been supplied by an excellent woman as governess, who had fallen little short of a mother in affection.

Sixteen years had Miss Taylor been in Mr. Woodhouse's family, less as a governess than a friend, very fond of both daughters, but particularly of Emma. Between them it was more the intimacy of sisters. Even before Miss Taylor had ceased to hold the nominal office of governess, the mildness of her temper had hardly allowed her to impose any restraint; and the shadow of authority being now long passed away, they had been living together as friend and friend very mutually attached, and Emma doing just what she liked; highly esteeming Miss Taylor's judgment, but directed chiefly by her own.

The real evils, indeed, of Emma's situation were the power of having rather too much her own way, and a disposition to think a little too well of herself; these were the disadvantages which threatened alloy to her many enjoyments. The danger, however, was at present so unperceived, that they did not by any means rank as misfortunes with her.

Sorrow came—a gentle sorrow—but not at all in the shape of any disagreeable consciousness.—Miss Taylor married…. "Dear Emma bears every thing so well," said her father. "But, Mr. Knightley, she is really very sorry to lose poor Miss Taylor, and I am sure she will miss her more than she thinks for."  Emma turned away her head, divided between tears and smiles.”

Chapter 4: “As she sat one morning, looking forward to exactly such a close of the present day, a note was brought from Mrs. Goddard, requesting, in most respectful terms, to be allowed to bring Miss Smith with her; a most welcome request: for Miss Smith was a girl of seventeen, whom Emma knew very well by sight, and had long felt an interest in, on account of her beauty. A very gracious invitation was returned, and the evening no longer dreaded by the fair mistress of the mansion.

Harriet Smith was the natural daughter of somebody. Somebody had placed her, several years back, at Mrs. Goddard's school, and somebody had lately raised her from the condition of scholar to that of parlour-boarder. This was all that was generally known of her history. She had no visible friends but what had been acquired at Highbury, and was now just returned from a long visit in the country to some young ladies who had been at school there with her.

She was a very pretty girl, and her beauty happened to be of a sort which Emma particularly admired. She was short, plump, and fair, with a fine bloom, blue eyes, light hair, regular features, and a look of great sweetness, and, before the end of the evening, Emma was as much pleased with her manners as her person, and quite determined to continue the acquaintance.

She was not struck by any thing remarkably clever in Miss Smith's conversation, but she found her altogether very engaging—not inconveniently shy, not unwilling to talk—and yet so far from pushing, shewing so proper and becoming a deference, seeming so pleasantly grateful for being admitted to Hartfield, and so artlessly impressed by the appearance of every thing in so superior a style to what she had been used to, that she must have good sense, and deserve encouragement. Encouragement should be given. Those soft blue eyes, and all those natural graces, should not be wasted on the inferior society of Highbury and its connexions. The acquaintance she had already formed were unworthy of her…. “

Okay, now, keeping those two passages from Emma firmly in mind, along with Countess Morley’s brief comments about Emma, now read the following brief passage from Stephanie de Genlis’s Adelaide & Theodore, in the beginning of the inset story entitled “The History of the Duchess of C--, written by herself”, and in the exact words of the 1788 English translation which JA would have read: 

“I was born at Rome, SOLE HEIRESS OF AN IMMENSE FORTUNE, and of one of the most illustrious families in Italy. I received an excellent education; brought up by the best of mothers, CHERISHED BY A TENDER FATHER, and a family, of which I was the only hope; fortune and nature appeared UNITED in my favour; I attained my fifteenth year, WITHOUT HAVING EXPERIENCED A SINGLE SORROW, WITHOUT HAVING BEEN ONCE ILL, WITHOUT HAVING SHED ANY TEARS BUT THOSE OF TENDERNESS OR JOY. I loved to recall the past, I enjoyed with transport the present, and I only saw in the future as bright and happy a condition. I had had for A COMPANION, in my infancy, A YOUNG LADY, the daughter of a friend of my mother’s. I contracted for her a VIOLENT FRIENDSHIP. She was INGENUOUS, had sensibility, but NO EXPERIENCE; she could neither advise nor direct me; yet I had an unlimited confidence in her. I loved and respected my mother; but I did not look upon her as a friend, because she had permitted me to take another; she was even pleased at my forming so dangerous a connection. That imprudence cost me dear, and was the principal cause of all my misfortunes…”

First, I think you’ll agree it’s beyond question that the description of Emma in Chapter 1, and of her meeting Harriet in Chapters 4, are both strongly patterned after the early life of the Duchess of C—in the above, short expository passage. My ALL CAPS are the direct echoes I see, but I could write a whole blog post about all the indirect echoes in Emma of the Duchess’s story in A&T.  For those who’ve not read Adelaide & Theodore, here’s a brief summary courtesy of Mary Trouille, in 2010:

“A Gothic tale embedded in Genlis's 1782 novel Adèle et Théodore, the Histoire de la duchesse de C tells the story of an Italian duchess secretly imprisoned by her husband for nine years in a dungeon under his palace after he drugs her, simulates her death, and buries a waxen figure in her place. In a footnote to the 1804 edition of the novel, Genlis explains that the story is based on the experiences of the Italian Duchess of Cerifalco, whom Genlis met in Rome in 1776. The duchess’s tale quickly became so popular that Genlis published it in a separate edition in 1783; as Genlis’s fame as a writer and educator spread, both the novella and the novel from which it was drawn were reprinted numerous times and published in translation in England where they enjoyed considerable success as well. The Histoire de la Duchesse de C is a masterful blend of the sentimental and the Gothic genres and, as such, provides students with an excellent introduction to both literary traditions. Genlis's subtle analysis of the power relations between husband and wife shows keen psychological insight and constitutes the most compelling aspect of the duchess's story.” 

I could go on much longer, but I will conclude merely by pointing out that even though scholars like Susan Allen Ford and Gillian Dow have generally argued that the explicit allusion to Adelaide & Theodore in Emma points Austen readers to the Gothic subtexts underlying both Emma and Northanger Abbey, neither Dow nor Ford, nor any other Austen scholar I can detect (including Ellen Moody, who has herself written about the Duchess inset story), has understood that Jane Austen very specifically alluded to it in the beginning of Emma as I showed, above.

I further note that when one reads that Duchess inset story in relation to Emma, it strongly supports my case for a very subversive reading of the relationship of Emma and Knightley—i.e., that in the marriage of Emma and Knightley after the novel is over, JA is unmistakably suggesting that Emma, like the unfortunate Duchess, has married an older, powerful man who will in a variety of ways “imprison” Emma in his “castle”, i.e., Donwell Abbey, for a very long time, and it won’t be fun.

And so, coming full circle back to my initial quotations from Diana’s post, I am highly confident that Countess Morley, in her letter to her sister in law, was showing that she understood some or all of what I wrote in the preceding paragraphs, and that was why she referred to Emma’s “violent friendship” with the “vulgar fool” Harriet Smith! And perhaps this all also goes a ways toward explaining how the rumor started that Countess Morley was the author of JA’s first published novels—I am guessing that part of the private understanding between Jane Austen & the Countess, which leaks through their surviving correspondence, was that the Countess was free (and even desired by JA) to wink at the secret innards of JA’s novels in her communications with the literati of London. And the culmination of all that sly rumor-mongering was…the Dedication of Emma to the Prince of Whales!

Cheers, ARNIE

@JaneAustenCode on Twitter

Eleanor Tilney as “Very Pretty Cattle”: The Grotesque Picturesque of John Thorpe in Northanger Abbey

In Chapter 14 of Northanger Abbey, during an outing to the scenic vistas presented by Beechen Cliff looking down on Bath, Henry Tilney famously gives the heroine Catherine Morland  “a lecture on the picturesque” in which “his instructions were so clear that she soon began to see beauty in everything admired by him, and her attention was so earnest, that he became perfectly satisfied of her having a great deal of natural taste”.  That passage memorably concludes as follows:

“Delighted with her progress, and fearful of wearying her with too much wisdom at once, Henry suffered the subject [of the picturesque] to decline, and by an easy transition from a piece of rocky fragment and the withered oak which he had placed near its summit, to oaks in general, to forests, the enclosure of them, waste lands, crown lands and government, he shortly found himself arrived at politics; and from politics, it was an easy step to silence.”

Such Chapter 14 passage is the most obvious, explicit treatment of the picturesque in NA, and JA’s narrator, with typically understated and undermining irony, has it both ways. I.e., on the one hand, there is an apparent implication that Henry’s opinions on aesthetics are just too intellectually elevated for his bright but insufficiently educated young female companion to fully grasp. On the other hand, when we read, in Chapter 22, Catherine’s thoughts upon reaching Northanger Abbey….

“But now she should not know what was PICTURESQUE when she saw it. Such were her thoughts, but she kept them to herself…”

…we may wonder whether the narrator is slyly keeping to herself—but just barely—the highly subversive thought that Henry’s grandiose pontifications might just be so many castles built on intellectual sand. I.e., he has become so lost in his intellect that he has lost sight of what is (simply) beautiful-whereas Catherine retains her clear intuitive vision, and, like Miss Bates and Queen Gertrude, just sees what is.  

And JA otherwise very cleverly slips in a variety of subliminal prompts here and there via variants of the word “picture” popping up in narration and dialog, which broaden this theme of the picturesque in NA into a broader examination not merely of aesthetics but also of perception, imagination and epistemology---how we picture our world, how we know what we know. And, as I have opined on many occasions, I believe that in the end of the day, JA is wickedly suggesting to us that Catherine is the one who, like JA’s and Scott’s sharp elves, has a great deal of native ingenuity, sufficient to picture a truer version of reality to herself than Henry, for all his superior educational accomplishment.

In that broadened context re the picturesque, then, I now wish to bring to your attention another layer of meaning contained in a short passage in Chapter 11 of NA, where, I will argue, JA presents us with a disturbing, even grotesque, parody of the scene on Beechen Cliff. As I have already hinted in my Subject Line, I will show you John Thorpe in a new light, as Henry Tilney’s dark and disturbing “Hyde” to Henry Tilney’s “Jekyll” not only in obvious ways such as their radically different styles of courting of Catherine, but also in the realm of the picturesque as well.

Cutting to the chase, in Chapter 11 of Northanger Abbey, we read the following exchange between John Thorpe and Catherine Morland:

JT: "Well, I saw [Henry] at that moment turn up the Lansdown Road, driving a smart-looking girl."

CM: "Did you indeed?"

JT: "Did upon my soul; knew him again directly, and he seemed to have got some very pretty cattle too."

This entire post was actually prompted by a passing suggestion by an Austen scholar that I came across last night, regarding this Chapter 11 short passage, in which the scholar suggested that Thorpe, by "some very pretty cattle", was actually referring to the horses pulling Henry's carriage.

At first, I was absorbed in determining whether this was in fact a proper reading of Thorpe’s curious choice of words. Was "cattle" really a slang term actually used to describe carriage horses in JA's day? It seemed plausible, and it also fit with the fact that Thorpe, for all his primitiveness, nonetheless often speaks quite colorfully, sprinkling his speech with all sorts of slang, especially when speaking about his favorite subject--horses and carriages. He of all people would have been completely up to date on that subculture’s latest slang. And in that regard, I would not be surprised if someone with the OED in hand was able to confirm that this usage was out there during JA's era.

However, either way, even if that does turn out to have indeed been slang in use when JA wrote NA, I wish to suggest to you that JA deliberately chose to put that particular slang in John Thorpe’s mouth for a reason which the OED will never pick up on. I am suggesting that Thorpe, male chauvinist pig par excellence, is quite consciously, and with extreme vulgarity, referring, by "pretty cattle", not to Henry’s horses, but to Henry’s sister,  Eleanor Tilney, whose “smart” looks he has just taken note of in his first comment! In effect, Thorpe is sorta like the American cowboy in a western, who refers to an attractive woman as a  “fine filly”, but obviously, via the word “cattle”, without even the limited charm of “filly”. Thorpe buys and sells horses at the drop of a hat, and doesn’t that exact same mentality seem to inform his attitude toward women he wishes to marry?

In fact, it’s not just about the very primitive John Thorpe---as I've written in the past, there is a persistent covert theme running through all of JA's novels, in which she subliminally suggests that women in her world were treated like animals—when single, hunted like wild animal prey; and when married, kept & domesticated like farm animals. JA of course made this sad parallel overt at times in her letters---think of how she describes her pregnant-again-too-quickly niece Anna as "poor animal".

And Thorpe is exactly the kind of misogynist who pictures women this way, reducing them to the status of non-human beasts. Jill Heydt Stevenson was the first (I believe) to point out how Thorpe’s boasting about his horses has decidedly sexual connotations. However, JHS did not realize that this usage of “pretty cattle” by Thorpe is part and parcel of that same equine sexual innuendo.

I conclude by pointing out a crucial reason why JA in particular chose for John Thorpe to refer to Eleanor Tilney as “pretty cattle” as opposed to some other animal. Perhaps those of you of a scholarly bent who are already very familiar with the treatment of the picturesque in JA’s writing have guessed what I am about to point out, which is that Jane Austen’s most famous allusion to the picturesque theorizing of the giant of the field during her lifetime, Gilpin, just happens to involve actual “cattle”:

First, here is the famous passage in chapter 10 of Pride & Prejudice, in which JA invokes Gilpin:

Then taking the disengaged arm of Mr. Darcy, she left Elizabeth to walk by herself. The path just admitted three. Mr. Darcy felt their rudeness, and immediately said:

"This walk is not wide enough for our party. We had better go into the avenue."

But Elizabeth, who had not the least inclination to remain with them, laughingly answered:  "No, no; stay where you are. You are charmingly grouped, and appear to uncommon advantage. The PICTURESQUE would be spoilt by admitting a FOURTH. Good-bye."  She then ran gaily off…

And second, here is the passage to which, as dozens of Austen scholars have long since pointed out, Elizabeth is slyly pointing in William Gilpin’s Observations, Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty, Made in the Year 1772:  “Cattle are so large, that when they ornament a fore-ground, a few are sufficient. Two cows will hardly combine. Three make a good group-either united—or when one is a little removed from the other two. If you increase the group beyond three; one, or more, in proportion, must necessarily be a little detached. This detachment prevents heaviness, and adds VARIETY. It is the same principle applied to cattle, which we before applied to mountains and other objects.”

So, if you had any reservations about inferring that JA might have John Thorpe speak so crudely about Eleanor Tilney as “pretty cattle”, I hope that the above, virtually explicit allusion in P&P to two women and a man as cows or cattle lays those reservations to rest.

Cheers, ARNIE

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