Becoming Jane Austen
The True Love Story That Inspired
the Classic Novels
by John Spence
Part of a continuing series.
The Austens' own troubles at this time must have made Susannah's discontent with her home seem particularly trivial. In George's letter in July he mentions the difficulty he and his wife were facing: their four year old, little George suffered from fits and was not developing normally. Susannah had asked how the child was, and George replied: "I am much obliged to you for your kind wish of George's improvement, God knows only how far it will come to pass, but from the best judgement I can form at present, we must not be too sanguine on this head; be it as it may, we have this comfort, he cannot be a bad or a wicked child." Even on such an emotionally charged subject, George was philosophical and unsentimental, though tender.
Jane Austen
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A few months later Cassandra wrote that they had more or less given up hope that the boy would not be disabled: "My poor little George is come to see me to-day, he seems pretty well, though he had a fit lately: it was near a twelvemonth since he had one before, so was in hopes they had left him, but must not flatter myself so now." She seems to imply that the boy was already living apart from the family, as he was to do for the rest of his life. He eventually lived with the same family as his mother's disabled brother and may have been in their care from the time he left Steventon. Not only was this a deep emotional loss to the Austens, it had financial implications as well. Little George must, as his godfather Tysoe Hancock later bluntly said, "be provided for without the least hopes of his being able to assist himself." The Austens would have to find the money to pay for his keep.
Hancock was always worried about money; his chief personal concern was to make a fortune to leave to his own daughter, Betsy. He and his wife and daughter had returned to England in 1765, hoping to live on the wealth he had acquired in India, but after three years it was clear that England was more expensive than they had expected. In 1768 he went back to India to try to make more money, leaving Phila and Betsy in England, where they often visited the Austens at Steventon. Phila wrote regularly to him of the increase in the Austens' family, and Tysoe replied with growing disapproval and incomprehension. He could not understand how George and Cassandra could be, as it seemed to him, so irresponsible.
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