"Exactly what a brother should be"? The failures of brotherly love.

Ford, Susan Allen

"'WHAT STRANGE CREATURES brothers are!'" Mary Crawford cries before she mocks the failures of fraternal correspondents (MP 69-70). With that exception, she claims to be fully pleased with Henry's brotherly behavior. "'[G]ood-nature itself,'" her brother will fetch her harp in his barouche (69); he is, she claims, "'in every other respect exactly what a brother should be, . . . loves me, consults me, confides in me, and will talk to me by the hour together'" (70). Of course, Henry's "utmost kindness" is limited to mobility: Mary has "tried in vain to persuade her brother to settle with her at his own country-house" (47); unsurprisingly, "he could not accommodate his sister in an article of such importance, but he escorted her ... into Northamptonshire, and as readily engaged to fetch her away again at half an hour's notice, whenever she were weary of the place" (47). Possibly London has provided Mary with as few models for what a brother could be as it has for a clergyman's influence.

The conduct literature of the day affords little more in the way of help. Exactly what should a brother be? Some writers assert that the role played by sisters or daughters is more significant to the family than that of brothers. In his Sermons to Young Women (1766), James Fordyce explains that "the honour and peace of a family are ... much more dependant on the conduct of daughters than of sons" (1: 17). Writing forty years later, Jane West in her Letters to a Young Lady (1806) agrees: "A girl is, unquestionably, a more tender care than a boy; every error is more glaring, and comes more feelingly to our hearts and bosoms. A false step is here irretrievable" (224). While Tom Bertram's "extravagance" is "so great" (26) that the "'urgency of [-his] debts'" (27) affects the family's financial and moral government, Maria's error provokes a more substantive reconfiguration of the family. Of course, these sisters and daughters targeted by the conduct books are also future mothers. In fact, in her two conduct books, Mrs. West spends more time instructing young women how to raise sons to be good brothers than she does reminding the young men themselves what is required.

In the world outside the novels, the world that conduct books were trying to reach, the fraternal role underwent some change over the course of the eighteenth century. The definition of the family altered, as Randolph Trumbach and others have suggested, from a patriarchal and authoritarian model to one characterized by the ties of affection. Ruth Perry points out that in a family system defined by the conjugal bond, the inherited ties between parents and children and among siblings become less significant than those chosen or constructed by husband and wile (1-2). Following evolutionary psychologist Frank J. Sulloway, Peter W. Graham sees sibling relationships in terms of competition "for the parental attention and favor that will help them to survive, thrive, and eventually reproduce." Valerie Sanders argues that "ambivalence is [the] keynote [of the sibling relationship], and instability its underlying condition" (1). The fraternal role thus becomes somewhat difficult to define, not to mention fraught with the anxieties social change brings. In Austen's novels brothers are rarely foregrounded, but those brothers--in particular those brothers who stand as negative exemplars--might suggest some of the tensions residing within the family, particularly for daughters and wives.

One reason for the scanty advice on sibling relationships provided by the conduct writers is a desire to believe--perhaps contrary to fact--that family ties are naturally loving. In The Beauties of History (1770), L. M. Stretch declares that "Nothing can approach nearer to sell-love than fraternal affection; and there is but a short remove from our own concerns and happiness to theirs who came from the same stock, and are partakers of the same blood" (1:37). The Rev. William Dodd, in his Sermons to Young Men (1771), defines fraternal love as "certainly one of the most natural propensities of the human heart," which "every tiling" about our "mode of living" is "calculated to improve and strengthen":

   Born of the same parents, brothers and sisters hang at the same
   breast, and drink the same milk; fed beneath the same roof, they
   share the same united and tender cares, the same ideas are
   impressed, and they are taught to regard each other as cemented by
   ties of the most endearing and indissoluble sort. No wonder ...
   that a mutual and increasing prepossession for each other gains
   upon the heart; while custom unites with nature, and both are
   strengthened by parental wisdom and solicitude. (54)

Many of the instructive histories included in Stretch's The Beauties of History, Dodd's Sermons, Mrs. Pilkington's A Mirror for the Female Sex (1799, modeled on Dodd's work), and the 1790s editions of The Beauties of History (also based on Dodd) reinforce the triumph of brotherly affection in sacrifice, forgiveness, protection.

The frequently quoted hymn to fraternal affection in Manfield Park might come straight from one of these conduct books:

   Children of the same family, the same blood, with the same first
   associations and habits, have some means of enjoyment in their
   power, which no subsequent connections can supply; and it must be
   by a long and unnatural estrangement, by a divorce which no
   subsequent connection can justify, if such precious remains of the
   earliest attachments are ever entirely outlived. Too often, alas!
   it is so.--Fraternal love, sometimes almost every thing, is at
   others, worse than nothing. (273-74)

The context of this passage, however, as well as its register might suggest a subtle irony on Austen's part. The paragraph describing Fanny and William's felicity, from which this passage is drawn, is preceded by the approving gaze of Sir Thomas and Edmund and followed by that of Henry Crawford: at its beginning, "Sir Thomas could not but observe [the relationship] with complacency, even before Edmund had pointed it out to him" (273); at its end, 'An affection so amiable was advancing each in the opinion of all who had hearts to value any thing good. Henry Crawford was as much struck with it as any" (274). Fanny here is being constructed as valuable niece and William as worthy nephew, both repaying the "'creditable'" patronage of Sir Thomas (7); and fraternal affection becomes a visible moral sign of that investment. Dodd underscores such a reading: "those who excel in Fraternal Love ... will not only have the greatest probability of worldly success; but they will certainly find that, which is indeed one great means of worldly advancement; they will find real honour attending them: They will obtain all the advantages which accompany good reputation" (1:59). Almost immediately, worldly advancement is held out to both the Prices: within a fortnight, Henry visits Admiral Crawford to secure William's promotion; in less than four weeks from that vision of fraternal felicity, he offers marriage to Fanny.

The presence or absence of fraternal affection is certainly central to the depiction of virtue or vice, as L. M. Stretch's highly charged language suggests: "[n-]othing ... can be more horrible than discord and animosity among members so allied; and nothing so beautiful as harmony and love" (1:37). (1) Edmund Bertram's version of this sentiment is expressed more colloquially: "'Family squabbling is the greatest evil of all, and we had better do any thing than be altogether by the ears'" (151). Or again, from Dodd, "as brothers are to each other the best and most faithful of friends; so are they, when disunited, too often the most bitter and prejudicial of enemies"; "Fraternal hatred is even proverbial for the bitterest hatred" (1:57, 58).

Austen's novels suggest this extreme only through what seem to be the remains of sentimental fiction. In Sense and Sensibility, the horrors of fraternal discord appear in Colonel Brandon's inset narrative of brotherly competition for their cousin Eliza (a cousin who has been raised as a sister). Despite its roots in the sentimental novel, watered by the rhetoric of conduct books, the fractured relationship between Colonel Brandon and his elder brother is conveyed in simple and restrained language: "'My brother had no regard for her; his pleasures were not what they ought to have been, and from the first he treated her unkindly'" (234). Colonel Brandon's feeling and concern are opposed to his brother's lack of those qualities, repetition emphasizing his condetonation of that absence: "'He imagined, and calmly could he imagine it, that [Eliza's] extravagance and consequent distress had obliged her to dispose of [her allowance] for some immediate relief'" (235). In fact, this history pays more attention to the fallen woman than the treacherous brother. Brandon's narrative tracks the sister-love Eliza; his brother returns to his story only to die, a death remarked merely because it leaves to the younger brother "'the possession of the family property'" (236). Edward and Robert Ferrars enact a comic version of this brotherly discord, fraternal treachery that allows the happy ending. In Northanger Abbey, Austen invokes this narrative to parody it. As soon as Captain Frederick Tilney is introduced to the novel and to Catherine, we're assured that "his admiration of her was not of a very dangerous kind; not likely to produce animosities between the brothers, nor persecutions to the lady. He cannot be the instigator of the three villains in horsemen's great coats, by whom she will hereafter be forced into a travelling-chaise and four, which will drive off with incredible speed" (133).

The acknowledgment that fraternal bonds might need to be strengthened and the advice that does exist in the literature of conduct and education together provide a picture of both what a brother should be and where he might fail. Mary Crawford's list of the acts of the ideal brother--he loves, consults, confides, talks--comes too short. According to the conduct writers, a good brother sets an example, offers assistance and advice, and is available for protection. The brothers depicted in Austen's novels often fail in their performance of these roles. Moreover, envy and tyranny can infect the fraternal relationship.

It's not surprising in a genre that aims to provide a model for behavior that one significant duty of a brother (or of a sister) is to provide an example of good conduct. Mentoria: or, the Young Lady's Instructor (1778), a book given by Jane Austen in 1801 to her eight-year-old niece Anna (Gilson 433), teaches through the mode of a dramatic conversation between Mentoria, her pupils, Lady Louisa and Lady Mary, and their brother, Lord George, an occasional visitor to the schoolroom. (2) The obvious duty to "love and be kind to" our brothers and sisters is immediately followed up with an ethic of instruction: "Be ... particularly cautious to set a good example, to excite emulation in those who are your elders, and to afford a pattern worthy of imitation to those who are younger" (232-33). Jane West ends her Letters" Addressed to a Young Man, for which the putative audience is her own son Thomas, by reminding him of this awful responsibility: "the conduct of one often leads a whole family, by imitation, to vice or to virtue" (3:394). So Tom Bertram's "inclination to act" (144), aided by Henry Crawford's enthusiasm, entangles his siblings.

Another duty owed by both brothers and sisters is assistance to siblings. Hester Chapone's Letters" on the Improvement of the Mind (1773) tells its reader to be a "useful and engaging friend ... particularly to your sister and brothers, who ought ever--unless they should prove unworthy--to be your nearest and dearest friends, whose interest and welfare you are bound to desire as much as your own" (1:85). Dodd defines this aspect of brotherly love as advantageous to the entire family: "That family can scarcely fail of fortune and felicity, who, brought up together in love, are early taught to consider each other's interests as one, and continue through life mutually to serve and assist each other" (Sermons 1:56). John Dashwood's conversation with Fanny about his promise to his dying father invokes this language, assist and assistance ringing six times in the space of five pages. In the last of these, John Dashwood repeats the lesson that Fanny has taught him more effectively than any moralizer: "'I will strictly fulfil my engagement by such acts of assistance and kindness to them as you have described'" (14).

An obstacle to the kind of friendly assistance that the conduct and educational literature requires is envy, the fraternal failing most commonly cited. Thomas Gisborne speculates that diversity of profession limits competitive behavior: brothers "may forward each other; but they cannot clash. They move on in parallel lines" (Female Sex 387): (3) The prodigal son parable, however, is commonly related in these books as a warning against fraternal envy, and its emotional truth recognized. For example, even though Mentoria retells the story with advantages, giving the elder brother "an obdurate heart" and having him "exaggerate his brother's transgressions" (215), Lord George asks Mentoria whether the elder brother "had not ... some cause to be displeased" (215). The answer is no. Dodd warns against the result: "when brother is set against brother, ... the house, divided against itself, totters to its fall" (Sermons 1:57). Among Austen's fictional brothers, envy is rare, or at least rarely depicted. Tom Bertram, the most prodigal of brothers and sons, is welcomed back and nursed by Edmund. In Pride and Prejudice, the relationship between Darcy and Wickham, old Mr. Darcy's godson, brought up as "'inmates of the same house, sharing the same amusements, objects of the same parental care'" (90), is defined by Wickham in terms of "'jealousy'": "'Had the late Mr. Darcy liked me less, his son might have borne with me better; but his father's uncommon attachment to me, irritated him.... He had not a temper to bear the sort of competition in which we stood--the sort of preference which was often given me'" (89-90). Elizabeth Bennet finds this familiar narrative all too credible.

Brotherly advice is another kind of assistance recommended by the conduct writers. It's no accident that in his Sermons Fordyce uses the fraternal relationship as a model that justifies his advice-giving. Fraternal affection disguises, or at least mediates, the authority of the sermonizer: "Suppose me speaking to you as a brother" (1:85); "hearken to a brother" (1:127). This brotherly function is attractive and potentially practical. Dr. John Gregory, in A Father's Legacy to His Daughters, instructs his daughters to make confidants of their brothers, who can provide a perspective useful, but not always safely available, to young women. "If your brothers should have the good fortune to have hearts susceptible of friendship, to possess truth, honour, sense, and delicacy of sentiment, they are the fittest and most unexceptionable confidants" (28-29).

Austen's bad brothers often neglect this role. Despite their vaunted closeness, Mary Crawford does not confide to her brother her feelings for Edmund, even twice breaking off in embarrassment as she realizes she has almost revealed her plans to live at Thornton Lacey (339, 342); Henry seems not to notice any special interest his sister might have in his friend until late in the novel (471). Similarly, Catherine Morland confides her interest in Henry Tilney to Isabella rather than to her own brother. Although Dr. Gregory argues that a brotherly confidant can provide "every advantage which you could hope for from the friendship of men, without any of the inconveniencies that attend such connexions with our sex" (29), he is careful in his use of the conditional: "If your brothers should have ... hearts"; "If your brothers should ... possess truth, honour, sense, and delicacy." His children were not yet adults at the time of composition, and his virtuous "if" suggests some doubt of the fraternal care his sons will provide, a doubt about their very moral identity.

Under the terms of primogeniture, brothers--particularly the eldest brothers--are deemed protectors by the writers of conduct books. One of Jane West's concluding reminders to her son is that "[t]he duty of an eldest son is in some degree paternal" (3:394). (4) When Edmund Bertram, for example, presumes to represent Sir Thomas's likely objection to the theatrical project, Tom asserts his position in the family: "'Manage your own concerns, Edmund, and I'll take care of the rest of the family.... I have quite as great an interest in being careful of his house as you can have'" (149). Given the politics of gender, protection--particularly sexual protection--is necessarily part of a brother's relationship to his sister. Dodd urges "a solicitous endeavour to guard the honour, to defend the rights, to promote the happiness of those sisters, who have a greater, a more affecting claim upon your love, as being by providence ordained more defenceless, to bless you with the exquisite honour and happiness of protecting them" (Sermons 1:60). (5)

But brotherly protection might sometimes demand more than safeguarding sexuality or giving advice on matters of conduct or love. Unusual among these sermonizers and educators, Gisborne in An Enquiry into the Duties of Men (1794) interprets protection in a practical--i.e., a financial-sense. Instructing the private gentleman on his parental duty, he charges him to "studiously cherish in the elder brother an affectionate, and, as it were, parental regard for his other sons and daughters, that, in the event of his own death, they may not be at a loss for a protector" (2:460). Although he doesn't challenge this system of inheritance, Gisborne recognizes the moral obligation to mitigate its inequities (2:464-65). This advice seems born of necessity. In A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1794) Mary Wollstonecraft contends that girls are often "dependent on not only the reason, but the bounty of their brothers" (66) and, earlier, in A Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790), points to the "unnatural crimes" of primogeniture in which "[t]he younger children have been sacrificed to the eldest son" (46). Clara Reeve remarks in Plans of Education (1792) that "women stand in need of protectors in every stage of their journey through life." Where are those protectors to be found? She states, baldly, "Brothers generally look on sisters as incumbrances on families" (122). Wollstonecraft presents the picture of a sister "viewed with averted looks as an intruder, an unnecessary burden on the benevolence of the master of the house, and his new partner" (URW66).

In Pride and Prejudice, of course, after Charlotte Lucas accepts Mr. Collins's proposal out of motives of prudence, her brothers are among the members of the family who celebrate: they are, pointedly, "relieved from their apprehension of Charlotte's dying an old maid" (137), their fear that they will be responsible for her support. But Austen explores the inequities and tensions of primogeniture most fully and with the bitterest irony in Sense and Sensibility, in which John Dashwood's desire to look "'liberal and handsome!'" (6) is countered by the supposed needs of his own child (and future children) as Fanny asks, "How could he answer it to himself to rob his child, and his only child too, of so large a sum?" (9). The brother's wife, as Mary Wollstonecraft predicts, defines these sisters as intruders: "what possible claim could the Miss Dashwoods, who were related to him only by half blood, which she considered as no relationship at all, have on his generosity to so large an amount" (9-10). John Dashwood limits his "'anxiety for [his sisters'] welfare and prosperity'" (258) to a desire that others will supply them. What "affection and pleasure" remains is "just enough to make a very creditable appearance in Mr. Gray's shop" (252), underscoring the way economic realities have redefined affective relationships.

It's left to the women writers of conduct books to address the issue of fraternal tyranny. Murry's Mentoria, indeed, condemns such behavior without respect to gender: "You are bound ... to instruct and protect those who are younger. You should treat them on all occasions with tenderness and love; nor ever seek an opportunity to dispute with, or tease them" (232-33). Wollstonecraft sees tyranny in the conventions of sexual behavior produced by a depraved system of education: "a mixture of gallantry and despotism ... leads the very men who are the slaves of their mistresses to tyrannize over their sisters, wives, and daughters" (VRW 24). While the conservative Jane West stands opposed to Wollstonecraft in almost every way, she too criticizes a domestic despotism inculcated by education:

   I heard an eminent divine observe, "That men are taught to be
   domestic tyrants in early life, by the injudicious conduct of
   parents; who accustom their boys to expect such obsequiousness from
   their sisters, as imprints their minds with indelible opinions of
   the natural intrinsic superiority of man." "Do not regard what the
   girls say to you," is the common paternal precept; "Do as your
   brother bids you," is as frequently the injunction of the mother.
   (Letters to a Young Lady 3:220)

Although she targets the parents, and particularly the mother, Mrs. West agrees with Wollstonecraft that brotherly behavior is "the germ of domestic tyranny" when "contempt [is] one of the domestic lessons that are daily inculcated in the family" (222, 221):

   Surely, it would improve the boisterous schoolboy, if he were
   convinced that his manly dignity would be more unequivocally shown
   by promoting the happiness of his sisters than by burying their
   dolls, and putting pattens on their cats. Let him be taught (and he
   cannot imbibe this notion too early) that nature has designed him
   to be the protector and friend of women; and let every attempt to
   tyrannize over or insult the females of his family be reprobated,
   as a mark of mean selfish cowardice; not, as is too generally the
   case, recorded as a proof of wit, spirit, and intelligence.
   (221-22)

West's asperity at what others might see as lively or spirited boys breaks through.

In Sense and Sensibility, a novel in which Austen demonstrates anything but the love of children that her Victorian nephews and nieces celebrated in her, Lady Middleton's two boisterous boys tyrannize over the Misses Steele, with the "judicious" complicity of their victims (138) and the "maternal complacency" of their mother. Lady Middleton has not profited from Jane West's instruction. Though seeing "all the impertinent incroachments and mischievous tricks to which her cousins submitted, ... their sashes untied, their hair pulled about their ears, their work-bags searched, and their knives and scissars stolen away, [she] felt no doubt of its being a reciprocal enjoyment" (139).

   "John is in such spirits to-day!" said she, on his taking Miss
   Steele's pocket handkerchief, and throwing it out of window--"He is
   full of monkey tricks."

   And soon afterwards, on the second boy's violently pinching one
   of the same lady's fingers, she fondly observed, "How playful
   William is!" (139)

No wonder perhaps that Lady Middleton's "'sweet little Annamaria'" has already perfected the tactic of "violent screams" in response to any "emergency" (139-40). Such behavior looks forward also to the crude brotherly quizzing of John Thorpe, whose "fraternal tenderness" is demonstrated by his "ask[ing] each of [his younger sisters] how they did, and observ[ing] that they both looked very ugly" (44). The destructive and even violent willfulness of these brothers seems destined to lead to the kind of domestic tyranny West sees as too common.

Austen, then, provides us with a good sampling of bad brotherly behavior. Ruth Perry argues that "[b]rotherly love became a moral litmus test in eighteenth-century fiction, because although not required by law, it had the weight of custom as well as necessity behind it.... [I]t came to be a conventional ideal in fiction as it was eroded in life" (144). In Austen's fiction, brotherly love is an ideal often eroded. Most of Austen's bad brothers, however, are nonetheless relatively harmless to their siblings--sometimes because they're so recognizably bad, sometimes because their fraternal deficiencies are played for comic or parodic purposes. John Dashwood's refusal to fulfill his brotherly duties--a failure which sets the plot in motion--is a marked exception, but his sisters are able to proceed to felicity without his assistance. More interesting, perhaps, and more troubling are brothers like Edmund Bertram (of whom James Morland is a sketchy progenitor) and Fitzwilliam Darcy--brothers who are defined as friendly, affectionate, helpful, and trustworthy but who fail to provide the fraternal support required. Such a brother, apparently amiable and principled, might be distracted by the trajectory of his own romantic plot so that he not merely neglects but even exploits his sister. Or such a brother, despite his love for his sister, might in the pride of his intellect inhibit her development as his equal. These are bad brothers in good brothers' breeches, (6) and through them Austen illuminates in yet another way the inequities of her world.

Edmund Bertram is introduced into Mansfield Park as he consoles and advises Fanny "with all the gentleness of an excellent nature" (16). By virtue of Edmund's presence in Fanny's daily life, he becomes even more important than William: "always true to her interests, and considerate of her feelings, trying to make her good qualities understood, and to conquer the diffidence which prevented their being more apparent; giving her advice, consolation, and encouragement.... [H]is attentions were ... of the highest importance in assisting the improvement of her mind, and extending its pleasures" (24). Chapter 2 concludes by linking William and Edmund as fraternal sharers of Fanny's heart. Both we and Fanny carry this image of Edmund into the about-to-commence plot of the novel.

As that plot develops, however, and particularly once his attraction to Mary Crawford takes over, Edmund's definition as ideal brother suffers. There's no evidence, for example, that the kind of brotherly tutelage or care that he lavishes on Fanny is extended to either Maria or Julia; he doesn't recognize the feelings of jealousy or rejection that afflict either of his sisters. More important, distracted by his desire for Miss Crawford, he fails to heed the strictures of the conduct writers to protect his sisters from men of suspect morality: he ignores the attentions Henry Crawford pays to his sisters although he knows very well that Henry has been brought up by the libertine Admiral, a more dangerous education than that Mary has received from her aunt.

Even Edmund's attentive care for his adoptive sister suffers under the pressure of his interest in Mary Crawford. He re-appropriates the mare he's acquired for Fanny, for example, in order to teach Miss Crawford to ride, and his neglect of Fanny becomes matter for their love play (111). Further, in a clear parallel with James Morland, Edmund's loyalty to his adoptive sister is replaced by his attempts to please the brother of the woman he desires. James not only pushes Catherine toward intimacy with his friend but also allows her to suffer the physical restraint of Isabella and, more seriously, John Thorpe (101). (7) Edmund, despite Fanny's dismayed resistance, encourages intimacy with Henry. In the face of Henry's "very thorough attack" on Fanny after his reading from Henry VIII, Edmund "sank as quietly as possible into a corner, turned his back, and took up a newspaper, ... earnestly trying to bury every sound of the business from himself in murmurs of his own, over the various advertisements" (395). Somewhat disturbingly, Edmund envisions the courtship of Fanny as a battle--indeed a struggle against Fanny herself, whose "'early attachments, and habits, [are] in battle array,'" which his "'theoretical ... knowledge'" could have helped Henry win (402). There's no uncertainty as to which side Edmund takes: "'[L]et him succeed at last'" (401).

And what of Darcy, a character whose virtues and reformed manners are necessary to the novel's happy ending? His brother-function is a significant aspect of his nature. As a principal part of his strategy for blackening Darcy's character, Wickham, with characteristic subtlety, both acknowledges and undermines Darcy's brotherly identity: "'He has ... brotherly pride, which with some brotherly affection, makes him a very kind and careful guardian of his sister; and you will hear him generally cried up as the most attentive and best of brothers'" (91). Indeed, at Pemberley, Elizabeth's new perspective on Darcy begins with the fraternal: 'As a brother, a landlord, a master, ... how many people's happiness were in his guardianship!" (277). There are earlier indications of the quality of his brotherly role: Elizabeth has, of course, watched him write a long letter to his sister (52); his own description of Georgiana's "'affectionate heart'" as well as his attention to both her "'credit and feelings'" (224, 225) in ending the affair with Wickham suggests a loving connection.

But there is some evidence--evidence not supplied by Wickham--that hints at a more complex brotherly identity, shaded by the paternal authority inherent in the relationship. Darcy describes himself as "'a brother whom [Georgiana] almost looked up to as a father'" (224-25). Such paternal fraternal authority might be stifling: at the novel's conclusion, we're told that Darcy "always inspired in [Georgiana] a respect which almost overcame her affection" (430). Indeed, the "liberties" Elizabeth takes with Darcy are those that "a brother will not always allow"--apparently not even after his reform--"in a sister more than ten years younger than himself" (430). We might recall that the domestic tyranny described by Wollstonecraft and West is discerned first in brothers, its object shifting, as bad brothers become husbands, from sisters to wives. What, we might ask, will become of Mrs. Darcy?

WORKS CITED

Austen, Jane. The Cambridge Edition of the Works of Jane Austen. Gen. Ed. Janet Todd. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2005-2009.

Chapone, Hester. Letters on the Improvement of the Mind. 2 vols. Dublin, 1773. Vol. 2 of Female Education in the Age of Enlightenment. Ed. Janet Todd. London: Picketing, 1996.

Dodd, William. The Beauties of History; or, Pictures of Virtue and Kice. 1795. London, 1796.

--. Sermons to Young Men. 1771. 3 vols. London, 1773.

Fordyce, James. Sermons to Young Women, in Two Volumes. 3rd ed. London, 1766. Vol. 1 of Female Education in the Age of. Enlightenment. Ed. Janet Todd. London: Pickering, 1996.

Gilson, David. A Bibliography of Jane Austen. New Castle, DE: Oak Knoll, 1997.

Gisborne, Thomas. An Enquiry into the Duties of Men. 1794.2 vols. London, 1824.

--. An Enquiry into the Duties of the Female Sex. London, 1797.

Graham, Peter W. "Born to Diverge: An Evolutionary Perspective on Sibling Personality Development in Austen's Novels." Persuasions On-Line 25.1 (2004): n.p.

Gregory, John. A Father's Legacy to His Daughters. 1774. The Young Lady's Pocket Library, or Parental Monitor. Intro. Vivien Jones. Bristol: Thoemmes P, 1995.

Murry, Ann. Mentoria; or the Young Ladies' Instructor. 1778. London, 1807.

Perry, Ruth. Novel Relations: The Transformation of Kinship in English Literature and Culture, 1748-1818. Cambridge: CUE 2004.

Pilkington, Mrs. [Mary Hopkins]. A Mirror for the Female Sex: Historical Beauties for Young Ladies. London, 1799.

Reeve, Clara. Plans of Education. 1792. New York: Garland, 1974.

Sanders, Valerie. The Brother-Sister Culture in Nineteenth-Century Literature from Austen to Woolf New York: Palgrave, 2002.

Stretch, L. M. The Beauties of History: or, Pictures of Virtue and Vice. 2 vols. London, 1770.

Trumbach, Randolph. The Rise of the Egalitarian Family: Aristocratic Kinship and Domestic Relations in Eighteenth-Century England. New York: Academic P, 1978.

West, Jane. Letters Addressed to a Young Man. 3 vols. London, 1801.

--. Letters to a Young Lady. 3rd ed. 3 vols. London, 1806.

Wollstonecraft, Mary. A Vindication of the Rights of Men. 1790. Delmar, NY: Scholars' Facsimiles, 1975.

--. A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. 1794,. Ed. Carol H. Poston. 2nd ed. New York: Norton, 1988.

NOTES

(1.) "Affection, Fraternal" is the fourth category covered in Stretch's alphabetically-organized Beauties of History. It is preceded by 'Affection, Conjugal," "Affection, Parental," and 'Affection, Filial" and followed by 'Ambition," "Beneficence," "Chastity," etc.

(2.) The copy of Mentoria that Jane Austen gave to her niece Anna is on display at Jane Austen's House, Chawton.

(3.) Graham also makes the point, from a Darwinian perspective, that "[s]isters in a family ecosystem are bound to compete unless felicitous circumstances intervene."

(4.) Dr. Gregory's Legacy to his Daughters was published by his eldest son, James Gregory.

(5.) There's a bonus for such protection: like Mary and Martha, the sisters of Lazarus, "good sisters ... [b]y their piety and their prayers ... can often ... raise [a brother] from the death of sin to the life of righteousness and virtue" (60).

(6.) My thanks to Laurie Kaplan for this descriptive phrase.

(7.) In his concern for the woman he hopes to marry, James is "quite angry" at Catherine (101), an emotion suggesting not only the conflict between the conjugal and the fraternal but perhaps his own tendency toward fraternal tyranny.

Susan Allen Ford is Professor of English and Writing Center Coordinator at Delta State University in Cleveland, Mississippi. This essay is based partly on her research while a Visiting Fellow at Chawton House Library.