The Annotated Mansfield Park

Chapter One About thirty years ago (1), Miss Maria Ward of Huntingdon (2), with only seven thousand pounds (3), had the good luck to captivate Sir Thomas Bertram, of Mansfield Park (4), in the county of Northampton (5), and to be thereby raised to the rank of a baronet's lady (6), with all the comforts and consequences of an handsome (7) house and large income. All Huntingdon exclaimed on the greatness (8) of the match, and her uncle, the lawyer (9), himself, allowed her to be at least three thousand pounds short of any equitable claim to it (10). She had two sisters to be benefited by her elevation; and such of their acquaintance as thought Miss Ward and Miss Frances quite as handsome (11) as Miss Maria (12), did not scruple (13) to predict their marrying with almost equal advantage. But there certainly are not so many men of large fortune in the world, as there are pretty women to deserve them (14). Miss Ward, at the end of half a dozen years, found herself obliged to be attached to the Rev. Mr. Norris (15), a friend of her brother- in-law, with scarcely any private fortune, and Miss Frances fared yet worse. Miss Ward's match, indeed, when it came to the point, was not contemptible, Sir Thomas being happily able to give his friend an income in the living of Mansfield (16), and Mr. and Mrs. Norris began their career of conjugal felicity with very little less than a thousand a year (17). But Miss Frances married, in the common phrase, to disoblige her family (18), and by fixing on (19) a Lieutenant of Marines (20), without education, fortune, or connections (21), did it very thoroughly. She could hardly have made a more untoward choice. ANNOTATIONS (on facing pages): This is the only time that Jane Austen states at the outset of a novel how many years earlier her story began. One reason is that this novel provides by far the longest narrative (lasting several chapters) of the events leading up to the main action, including the heroine's childhood. As usual, Austen is careful and accurate in her dating. The main action begins approximately twenty-seven years after this opening event and transpires over one year. The concluding events sketched in the last few pages would logically span about two years and possibly a little more. For more detail, see the chronology, p. 853. Huntingdon is a town in eastern England and the county seat of Hunting donshire. Since the time of this novel Huntingdonshire has been absorbed into the county of Cambridgeshire. In most wealthy families, women were allotted a fixed sum as their inheri tance. It would serve as a dowry and go to her husband upon her marriage. Grand homes were always given formal names. Many names included the word Park, for estates normally had ample grounds, and the name desig nated the grounds as well as the house. The county of Northampton, or Northamptonshire, is in the Midlands of England; it is to the immediate west of Huntingdonshire. Jane Austen, who was never in Northamptonshire, probably set her story there because its dis tance from Portsmouth, the home of the heroine, serves the plot by making travel between the two places difficult. Similar considerations determine her choice of settings for other novels. For these locations, see map, p. 882. A baronet was the highest rank in Britain below the aristocracy or peerage. It was a hereditary knighthood, which gave the holder the right to be known as Sir and his wife the right to be known as Lady but, unlike the peerage, conferred no legal or political privileges. Baronets and peers, as well as the untitled gentry who ranked just below them, derived most of their wealth from large landed estates, usually with grand residences like Mansfield Park at the center. This landed elite dominated British government and society. handsome : large. The word could also refer to the house's attractiveness, but in this context it probab