and Jane and Elizabeth Bennet do the same. Elizabeth, we feel, might have been quite capable of amusing herself in moderation with some of her admirers, but the heroines of Mansfield Park, Emma, and Persuasion are allowed no confidantes, and indulge in no "mere pastime." Emma might be quoted as an exception to this rule; but the exception is only apparent, not real. Anne Elliot and Fanny Price are assailed by unwelcome suitors after they have learnt the state of their own feelings, and it is a subtle touch of nature that the matter is one of unmixed pain to them. All this is unmistakably the finished work of the ripened matured woman writing of what she knows and has seen, not that of the brilliant girl, whose genius enables her to guess with marvellous accuracy at the feelings she knows little of. Another sure mark of maturity is the importance given to the older personages in these stories. There is, indeed, no incompleteness in the delicate touches which portray Mr. Bennet or Mrs. John Dashwood, but they are intended as subordinate to the chief characters; whereas Lady Bertram, Sir Walter Elliot, and Mr. Woodhouse are quite as important to us as their sons and daughters, if not more so, for Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram are more necessary to our enjoyment than Tom or Julia, and we doubt if anyone could make up to us for losing Mrs. Norris or Miss Bates.
Mansfield Park is the ancestral home of the Bertram family, and Sir Thomas Bertram is the worthy, aristocratic, and high-bred, albeit somewhat pompous and formal, owner of the property, which is a very good one. He has two sons, Tom and Edmund, and two daughters, Maria and Julia. Lady Bertram is "a woman of very tranquil feelings, and a temper remark-
