tive effort
demands.

Chawton was a charming village, about a mile from Alton, and deep in the
country; although two main roads from Gosport and Winchester
respectively joined on their way towards London just in front of the
Austens' cottage. Indeed, the place still refuses to be modernised, in
spite of three converging railways, and a necessary but civil notice in
the corner requesting motorists to 'drive slowly through the village.'
The venerable manor-house (then always called the 'Great House') is on
the slope of a hill above the Church, surrounded by garden, meadows, and
trees, and commanding a view over the intervening valley to a hill
opposite, crowned with a beech wood and known as 'Chawton Park.' The
cottage is in the centre of the village, and, as it actually abuts on
the road, the Austens could easily see or be seen by travellers. It is
supposed to have been built as a posting inn, but it had lately been
occupied by Edward Austen's steward. The author of the _Memoir_
describes his uncle's improvements to the place in the following
words[207]:--

A good-sized entrance and two sitting-rooms made
the length of the house, all intended originally
to look upon the road; but the large drawing-room
window was blocked up and turned into a book-case,
and another opened at the side which gave to view
only turf and trees, as a high wooden fence and
hornbeam hedge shut out the Winchester road, which
skirted the whole length of the little domain.

He goes on to speak of the garden laid out at the same time, which
proved a great interest to the party of ladies, and in which old Mrs.
Austen worked vigorously, almost to the end of her days, often attired
in a green round smock like a labourer's: a costume which must have been
nearly as remarkable as the red habit of her early married life.

Jane Austen was now between thirty-three and thirty-four years old. She
was absolutely free from any artistic self-consciousness, from any
eccentricity of either temper or manner. 'Hers was a mind well balanced
on a basis of good sense, sweetened by an affectionate heart, and
regulated by fixed principles; so that she was to be distinguished from
many other amiable and sensible women only by that peculiar genius which
shines out clearly . . . in her works.'[208] Her tastes were as normal as
her nature. She read English literature with eagerness, attracted