During the night the “pitch-mannikin” dug a grave on the spot where Irma had loved to lie in the sun.  She was buried there early next morning.  Hansei and Peter and Dr. Gunther carried the corpse, and Walpurga with her child formed the procession.

* * * * *

JANE AUSTEN

Sense and Sensibility

Jane Austen, daughter of the rector of Steventon, in North Hampshire, England, was born there on December 16, 1775, and received her education from her father, a former Fellow of St. John’s College, Oxford.  Her life was spent in the country or in country towns, chiefly at the village of Chawton, near Winchester.  She died, unmarried, at Winchester on July 18, 1817, and was buried in the cathedral.  The novels of Jane Austen may be divided into two groups.  The first three—­“Sense and Sensibility,” “Pride and Prejudice,” and “Northanger Abbey”—­were all written, in first draft, at any rate, between 1792 and 1798.  These are the novels composed during the author’s residence at Steventon, which she left in 1801.  There succeeded an interval of practically fourteen years (1798-1812), during which time the novelist let her mind lie absolutely fallow.  As a natural consequence of the comparatively secluded life which Jane Austen led, the society with which she deals in her novels is a rather restricted one.  It is the world of the country gentleman and of the upper professional class.  From a very early age Jane Austen had a taste for writing tales, and the first draft of “Sense and Sensibility “—­then called “Elinor and Marianne”—­was composed as early as 1792.  The book was recast under its present title between 1797 and 1798, and again revised prior to its publication in 1811.  In addition to the six novels on which her fame is based—­all of which were issued anonymously—­Jane Austen has to her credit some agreeable “Letters,” a fragment of a story called “The Watsons,” and a sort of novelette which bears the name of “Lady Susan.”

I.—­The Dashwoods of Norland Park

Mr. Henry Dashwood, of Norland Park, Sussex, died leaving his widow and his three daughters, Elinor, Marianne and Margaret, to the generosity of Mr. John Dashwood, his son by his first wife and the heir to his estate.  Mr. John, who, apart from the family inheritance, had received one fortune from his mother and another with his wife, was at first disposed to increase the portions of his sisters by giving them a thousand pounds apiece; but under the persuasion of his wife he finally resolved that it would be absolutely unnecessary, if not highly indecorous, to do more for his father’s widow and children than such kind of neighbourly acts as looking out for a comfortable small house for them, helping them to remove their things, and sending them presents of fish and game whenever they were in season.