little miss austin

After the performance, Alice and Wesley were still a little bit unfinished.

"You will take me to see the circus next weekend." She tugged on Henry's sleeve.

"Okay, no problem." Henry agreed without hesitation.

"Are you coming to see too?" She tugged on Wesley's sleeve again.

"I'll come to see you too." Wesley lowered his head and smiled at her. "I'll come to pick you up next week. Today I should bring the family carriage. With so many people now, it's hard to find a carriage."

They waited at the entrance of the theater for more than ten minutes before Tom found a carriage.

"Get in the car!" He opened the door and shouted at them.

Henry carried Alice into the car, and Tom put her beside him.The carriage is too small to move around, and when Henry gets on the carriage, he will be sitting opposite them.Henry thought that he probably didn't want to encounter the embarrassment of being in the same car last time again.

They first sent Alice back to Thomas' house, and Thomas invited them to stay for dinner.Wesley wanted to leave first, but Alice said you should stay, so he stayed.

Thomas asked what they played, Henry said that he went to the theater to watch a circus performance, Thomas asked Alice, was it good.

Alice nodded, "It's wonderful. I want to see it next week."

"Then you must hurry and write to Mrs. Austen and tell her how you are doing in London."

"I've got to write to everybody," Alice said enthusiastically.

After dinner, Henry, Tom, and Wesley all left, and Alice returned to her room, lit the candlesticks, and began to write letters.

I wrote letters to Pastor George, mother, Cathy, and Jane. I told my father about going to the circus to see a performance, told my mother about cousin Thomas’s family, and told Cathy about the new styles of dresses and wedding dresses in London. Jane's letter mainly talked about Tom and Wesley.

It is a very objective description of what the two of them said to her on the way and whether they took care of her.

Who Jane likes is her business, no matter how close her sister is, she can't control that much.Of course, for the sake of a comfortable life in the future, you must choose Wesley. With Wesley's personality, he doesn't do anything before marriage and is a good husband after marriage. He probably doesn't have much passion for life, but he doesn't have any problems with loyalty.Tom is hard to say, although Henry is very careful, he still revealed that Tom knows a lot of women in special occupations, half of the living expenses he got from his uncle Langlois was sent to his mother to support his younger siblings, I only use the remaining half and have to pay the rent. Living in London is a bit tight. He doesn't have the money to be a filial son of the volcano, but unexpectedly, those ladies who recognize money but don't recognize people can not accept his money.

Alice thinks the guy is too frivolous for Jane.But she couldn't tell Jane directly that Tom was among the women, so she racked her brains to hint.

After writing the letter, fold several letters separately, pour wax on it, and use a small "A·A" seal to stamp on the wax.The seal was custom-made at a wax paint shop when I went shopping a few days ago. It didn't cost a few pennies, which is quite cheap.

After washing up and lying on the bed, Alice seriously thought about her plan to make money and the future: this era is considered a relatively good one, the British industrial revolution is on the rise, the economy is taking off rapidly, the country is strong, there are many job opportunities, and the remaining population It is not too difficult to find a job that can support her, but she must not think about going to a factory to work in such a physical job. She can't stand the labor intensity; non-heavy manual labor is intensive like a textile factory. In large-scale factories, the proportion of female workers and child workers is as high as 80%, because the wages of female workers and child workers are very low. Female workers are only 70% of male workers, and child workers are as low as less than 40%.It is impossible for Austin's family to allow her to go out to work, so this option is immediately eliminated;

Then there are advanced, well-educated and age-appropriate young women like Jane. The best way out is to be a tutor. It is absolutely unimaginable for Jane, so it is impossible for Jane to go out to be a tutor, and it is impossible for Alice to consider this career in the future;

If they are older, around the age of 35, well-educated women, regardless of whether they are married or not, can receive female students to board at home. There will be no chastity problems, and the income is quite considerable, just like Pastor George. Taking care of students at home, earning about 100 pounds a year, a single woman can live a good life-but this time is too long, she is only 6 years old now, and it is not yet time to consider this career.

So in terms of career prospects, it is very bleak: ladies don't need to work, and they can't work. Once they work, your social class will plummet. A girl from a low-ranking noble family.But the problem with this profession is that it is not in the scope of her consideration at the age of 6.

and then?

Most of the daughters of country gentlemen with pensions in this era, including daughters of nobles, were married, or at least engaged, between the ages of eighteen and twenty.If Cathy has a stable annuity, she can already get married, and she doesn't have to wait for her fiancé to go abroad to earn enough money to get married. Cathy is 18 years old, and in a country like Steventon, she is absolutely Older unmarried young women.

Jane has also turned 20 years old, but she doesn't have a reliable suitor yet. Her mother Cassandra often mutters, why can't Jane take a good look at Wesley?They were of the right age, and Wesley was not too ugly to be seen. An annuity of £2000 a year was enough for the two of them to live comfortably.

Alice couldn't help thinking about her future: Briefly, she failed to get married. If Cathy's fiancé died of illness abroad according to the real history, there would be two "spinsters" in the Austin family who were not married.This may not sound good. After all, no matter what age, people are keen to discuss other people's privacy. Those who know will say that because the Austin family failed to provide enough dowry for their daughters, the daughters cannot get married. Those who don't know will not know. What nonsense.

Alice doesn't think that the only way for women to go is marriage, but the reality is so helpless. Besides, her mother will accept that Cathy is sad and never wants to get married, and she will accept that Jane can't find a like-minded partner and doesn't want to get married. Probably won't tolerate the youngest daughter anymore and doesn't want to get married.

This is a very real possibility based on the mother's personality considerations.

Then consider: what would I do?

She likes to tinker with small handicrafts, and what she does is really good. If it is changed to the 21st century, as a small shopkeeper of a certain treasure, she will probably be able to live comfortably for a few years. But in this era, craftsmen are craftsmen, and their social status is not very good. The social status of the businessman who opened the shop is also very low, unless it is a big businessman who has done a lot of business, then people can bend their waists for gold coins, and they may be knighted.The ancestors of the Austin family were big wool merchants, and their business was doing very well. However, England has a patrilineal inheritance system, which is to ensure that the family property will not be reduced from generation to generation. Therefore, the George Austin family is not very rich. No inheritance.

In this day and age, women have no property rights, and it is too difficult to start a business by themselves. Pastor George will let her stay at home and don’t deal with these moths. He can support her; mother is more likely to rush her to her What a young man with a handsome annuity.

So, the next consideration is: what can I do?

Since she is Jane Austen's younger sister, is it okay to make money by writing novels?However, it seems that Jane did not live a luxurious life on the novel manuscript fee, so this choice seems to be done after market research.

Well, yes, do market research first!That's it!

When Henry came to pick her up again, Alice asked him seriously: "If, I mean, if, I have a novel that I want to publish, who should I go to? Do I need to find a publishing agent? "

Henry was stunned by her question, "What? What do you mean?"

"I want to know the process of publishing a novel. Is this hard to figure out? Or are we going to find someone in the industry?"

"I haven't noticed. What?" Henry looked at her suspiciously.

"I wanted to ask for Jane, you know she likes to write." Jane was already writing a novel, which was no secret at home. "I think her writing is no worse than others! Since those ladies can publish their own novels, so can Jane."

Henry pondered for a while, "You're right. It just so happens that I'm fine these days, so I'll go find out."

In addition to asking Henry to inquire, she also wrote a letter to Wesley and asked Thomas's servant to send it to Wesley's apartment.He lived in a good part of the country near Hyde Park, with a whole small building belonging to Mrs Gresham, with carriages in and out, a housekeeper, valets, maids, and a whole host of people waiting on him.

After receiving Alice's letter, Wesley quickly wrote back and asked the servant to bring it back.Said that he would inquire for her, and asked her if she inquired for Jane.

Alice misappropriated her sister's name again, and wrote back that she wanted to inquire about the publishing process first, and then she had to see if Jane wanted to publish her work, and asked him not to tell Mrs. Gresham or Jane. .

By the time Henry took her to report to the Oxfordshire militia to sell fakes, Alice already had some preliminary understanding of London's publishing industry.

She knew that women couldn't sign publishing contracts in their own names.

And the most important thing is that the current form of publishing novels is not like she knows, signing contracts based on the number of words or royalties. The main problem is that the law on publishing is very irregular.

The author has something to say:

*Wesley may have been based on Jane Austen's 1802 suitor, Harris Big-Weather.Harris was born in 1781 and Jane was born in 1775. Harris was 5 and a half years younger than Jane.Jane and Harris' sisters are good friends, and the sisters also hope that Jane can marry their brother.Harris, who inherited a large fortune, was tall, shy and awkward, with a bit of a stutter.Jane agreed to Harris' proposal, but backtracked the next morning and hurried to her eldest brother James' house, where the engagement was annulled.