Poor Anne in _Persuasion_ is tormented by “the younger boy, a remarkably stout forward child of two years old, ... as his aunt would not let him tease his sick brother, [he] began to fasten himself upon her, in such a way, that busy as she was about Charles, she could not shake him off. She spoke to him, ordered, entreated, insisted in vain. Once she did contrive to push him away, but the boy had the greater pleasure in getting upon her back again directly.” Perhaps to Anne this annoyance was a blessing in disguise, as it brought forward the whilom lover to her assistance, but that is beside the point! The children of Lady Middleton in _Sense and Sensibility_ are particularly badly behaved and odious. “Fortunately for those who pay their court through such foibles, a fond mother, though in pursuit of praise for her children the most rapacious of human beings, is likewise the most credulous; her demands are exorbitant, but she will swallow anything, and the excessive affection and endurance of the Miss Steeles towards her offspring were reviewed therefore by Lady Middleton without the smallest surprise or distrust. She saw with maternal complacency all the impertinent encroachments and mischievous tricks to which her cousins submitted. She saw their sashes untied, their hair pulled about their ears, their workbags searched and their knives and scissors stolen away, and felt no doubt of its being a reciprocal enjoyment. “‘John is in such spirits to-day!’ said she, on his taking Miss Steele’s pocket-handkerchief and throwing it out of the window, ‘he is full of monkey-tricks.’ “And soon afterwards on the second boy’s violently pinching one of the same lady’s fingers, she fondly observed, ‘How playful William is!’ “‘And here is my sweet little Anna-Maria,’ she added, tenderly caressing a little girl of three years old, who had not made a noise for the last two minutes; ‘and she is always so gentle and quiet, never was there such a quiet little thing!’ “But unfortunately in bestowing these embraces a pin in her ladyship’s head-dress slightly scratching the child’s neck produced from this pattern of gentleness such violent screams as could hardly be outdone by any creature professedly noisy ... her mouth stuffed with sugar-plums ... she still screamed and sobbed lustily, and kicked her two brothers for offering to touch her. . . . . . . . “‘I have a notion,’ said Lucy [to Elinor] ‘you think the little Middletons are too much indulged. Perhaps they may be the outside of enough, but it is so natural in Lady Middleton, and for my part I love to see children full of life and spirits; I cannot bear them if they are tame and quiet.’ “‘I confess,’ replied Elinor, ‘that while I am at Barton Park I never think of tame and quiet children with any abhorrence!’”