What Jane Austen Didn't Tell Us!. Austen Alliance
of his undying love, Humphrey asked if he might approach her father to ask for her hand.
She laughed gaily: “La, Mr. Bennet, you have been so long about it that I feared I would have to accept Lieutenant Jeffreys’s offer. Do, for pity’s sake speak to Papa tonight, for I am all impatience to order my wedding clothes!”
Accompanied as it was by an adoring look, her “intended” scorned to notice his angel’s rather vulgar response. Further quotations from the Immortal Bard now seemed inappropriate as well as unnecessary. Humphrey kissed her soft, flushed cheek: “I will go to him immediately, dearest!”
Mr. Gardiner was pleased to encourage Humphrey’s suit, and marriage articles of £5,000 were arranged.
They were married soon after Jane’s eighteenth birthday and settled at Longbourn to begin the serious business of producing an heir. If Humphrey noticed that his wife was relying heavily on her mother and Mrs. Hill for running the household, he thought it rather clever of that lovely creature to solicit their expert assistance.
Less agreeable was his realization that the new Mrs. Bennet seemed to have lost all interest in hearing him speak of estate matters, the wars with France, or any other significant subjects. He could not help but notice that she tapped her foot when he read aloud the poetry that had “delighted” her just weeks ago—more than once he thought she dozed off during passages he found particularly moving.
And she had found her tongue!
During their courtship she had been pleasingly attentive, speaking typically only to ask his opinion or pay him some compliment. Now she nattered incessantly: “Oh, Mr. Bennet, I saw the most adorable bonnet at the milliner’s, trimmed with little blue feathers! I know you will admire it when I wear it with my blue spencer ... the Gouldings’ ball is next week, and you must be certain the horses are groomed to take us—they looked a little shabby last week when we went to the Longs.”
Endless, empty-headed drivel!
Mr. Bennet Senior took to taking his tea alone in his bedchamber to escape her mindless chatter for at least part of the day. Humphrey began to wonder what kind of bargain he had made.
Just when he was beginning to tire of his bride’s constant prattle, she proudly announced that she was with child. What joy! Both Bennet men now willingly endured her gay, empty babble and frequent complaints of illness. They were nothing to the family’s expectations!
During her confinement, Mr. Bennet Senior weakened alarmingly but clung to life, determined to hold his grandson and namesake in his arms before he died. Alas, after the birth of a lovely little girl, christened Jane, he left them.
Confined to Longbourn during the mourning period, Humphrey returned to his plan for establishing a library. He removed the estate carpenters from their work on the stables to fill his proposed sanctuary with shelves worthy of housing his cherished volumes—and the purchases that were to swell his collection. A special shelf was to be devoted to books that had belonged to his mother. Avidly, he began to read advertisements for book sales and undertook to correspond with select publishers about purchases.
Mrs. Bennet was disagreeably surprised by his taking over the well-positioned parlor: “Oh, Mr. Bennet, I had planned to make this my sitting room because of its lovely view.” She sighed. “Well, I suppose I can make do with that upstairs room at the back of the house.”
Mr. Bennet did not share with her why he had claimed this room for his own, and decided that it was necessary to establish early rules for his refuge: “My dear, since this room will house books which are not to your pleasure but have significant monetary value, I will keep the door closed and require anyone wishing to enter to knock first.”
The year of mourning finally passed, crape and bombazine were packed away. Spirits now lifted, Mrs. Bennet found herself again with child. She presented her husband with another girl. He was pleased to name this daughter Elizabeth in honor of his mother.
But neither Elizabeth nor little Jane could inherit the estate. Mrs. Bennet’s duty not yet done, she was quickly in the breeding way again. And Mr. Bennet once again caught his wife’s happy expectation and certainty of a son and heir.
Sitting in his new library, he reflected: My son will be ambitious, he will take over the work of Longbourn; his enterprise will sweeten his sisters’ dowries and provide the Bennet line with continuity.
This child was a boy, but he was not meant to be, a man-child lost before his time. Humphrey could not forget the bloody, tiny unfinished body he had demanded Mrs. Hill show to him.
All his study of Greek tragedy had not prepared him for the depth of his sorrow, the helplessness that pierced his heart upon viewing that pitiful sight. His wife was in great need of his comfort, but lost as he was in his own mourning, he could offer none.
It was her carelessness that caused this awful loss!
The night of the accident that led to this terrible tragedy haunted him still. When he closed his eyes, he could see his wife, dizzy from too much wine and heavy with child, missing her step and plunging down that flight of stairs. It might be unreasonable, but when Mrs. Bennet reached out to him for comfort, that blame in which he held her surged up to chill his response.
“The less said, the better,” he grimly concluded, priding himself on his silent self-control. Trusting to time to relieve his sorrow, Mr. Bennet sought solace in Milton.
More and more he retreated into his library, where neither wife nor children were allowed without his permission. There, he could conduct the business of the estate, or as little of that business as he could bring himself to face. He never fully lost his distaste for matters agricultural and now trusted Schilling to manage everything. Accepting his employer’s indifference, Schilling involved him as little as possible in the practicalities of running Longbourn.
Mr. Bennet devoted almost all his time to building a respectable collection of books and folios ranging from Alighieri to Voltaire. He found this occupation—adding to his library—brought him immense pleasure.
He continued to perform his marital duty and more little girls appeared: Mary, Kitty, Lydia. With his first two daughters, Mr. Bennet had been an engaged father, drawn to little Jane by her beauty and serenity—so like and unlike her mother—and drawn even more to little Elizabeth by her quick intelligence—so very like his own.
During the first years of his marriage, he had retained hope that the next birth would be the heir. With the loss of his unborn son, he changed. Jane and Elizabeth were still welcome in his company and library, but he resigned the other children to their mother to entertain and educate.
One morning while their youngest child was only a few years out of leading strings, Mrs. Bennet burst into her husband’s library, hysterical. “We are lost, Mr. Bennet! I am quite certain there will be no more children. My time is over. We will never have a son now. We are lost, lost!” She sobbed deeply and moved toward him for consolation.
Humphrey stepped back, inexpressibly shocked. Mrs. Bennet had betrayed him! Longbourn had been in the Bennet family since his father’s grandfather’s time, and now she would deliver it—house, lands, income from crops and rents—to his Collins cousins. The Bennet heritage meant nothing to this silly woman!
“Thank you, Mrs. Bennet, for sharing this important intelligence.” Backing still farther away, “I have much to do today, my dear. I am quite busy. You will please close the door as you leave.”
When she was gone, Humphrey sat at his writing table with his head in his hands and wept.
I have betrayed my solemn trust ... I was a fool to marry an empty-headed woman ... unable to provide Longbourn with an heir! Unable to provide me with companionship!
He looked around his library, his sanctuary, and for the first time perceived not the books but his own culpability.
These volumes reproach me. Surely I could have devised a way to provide for my poor girls. Purchasing books to entertain only myself rather than saving to enrich their dowries! What a fraud I am—neither scholar nor father—and