E-text prepared by Thierry Alberto, Emmy, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net) Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustration and family trees. See 22536-h.htm or 22536-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/2/5/3/22536/22536-h/22536-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/2/5/3/22536/22536-h.zip) Transcriber's note: Obvious punctuation errors have been corrected. The title page lists the authors as Austen-Leigh. The text omits the hyphen. This was retained. Text that was superscripted in the original is enclosed within curly brackets preceded by a carat character. Example: Ser^{t,} In the interests of maintaining the integrity of the Austen letters, archaic or unusual spellings were retained as was inconsistent capitalization. For example: expence, acknowlegement; d'Arblay, D'Arblay. Readers who print this text should be warned that it contains family trees up to 209 characters in width. More detailed notes, including a list of corrections, will be found at the end of the text. JANE AUSTEN HER LIFE AND LETTERS A Family Record by WILLIAM AUSTEN-LEIGH and RICHARD ARTHUR AUSTEN-LEIGH With a Portrait London Smith, Elder & Co., 15 Waterloo Place 1913 [_All rights reserved_] [Illustration: J. Zoffany R. A. pinxit Emery Walker Ph. sc. Jane Austen see p. 62] PREFACE Since 1870-1, when J. E. Austen Leigh[1] published his _Memoir of Jane Austen_, considerable additions have been made to the stock of information available for her biographers. Of these fresh sources of knowledge the set of letters from Jane to Cassandra, edited by Lord Brabourne, has been by far the most important. These letters are invaluable as _memoires pour servir_; although they cover only the comparatively rare periods when the two sisters were separated, and although Cassandra purposely destroyed many of the letters likely to prove the most interesting, from a distaste for publicity. Some further correspondence, and many incidents in the careers of two of her brothers, may be read in _Jane Austen's Sailor Brothers_, by J. H. Hubback and Edith C. Hubback; while Miss Constance Hill has been able to add several family traditions to the interesting topographical information embodied in her _Jane Austen: Her Homes and Her Friends_. Nor ought we to forget the careful research shown in other biographies of the author, especially that by Mr. Oscar Fay Adams. During the last few years, we have been fortunate enough to be able to add to this store; and every existing MS. or tradition preserved by the family, of which we have any knowledge, has been placed at our disposal.