I've been rereading Pride and Prejudice for the five hundredth time and in the meantime scrubbing soot out of the stove pipe, shoving a recalcitrant mower through too-long grass, harvesting bucketloads of filthy potatoes, and wondering what Mr. Darcy would think about it all. It seems likely that I would make a better wife for Mr. Collins, which is too depressing an idea to consider any further. But of course, in truth I have reached the age of Mrs. Bennet and should be content with chaperoning balls, playing whist, and striving to protect my seventeen-year-old from the predations of charming yet portionless females.

Here's a sonnet by William Cowper. Fanny Price, heroine of Austen's Mansfield Park, was a Cowper fan, as was Jane herself. It's rather hard to see why, but I am trying.

Sonnet to William Wilberforce, Esquire

William Cowper

Thy country, Wilberforce, with just disdain,

Hears thee, by cruel men and impious call'd

Fanatic, for thy zeal to loose th' enthrall'd

From exile, public sale, and slav'ry's chain.

Friend of the poor, the wrong'd, the fetter-gall'd,

Fear not lest labour such as thine be vain.

Thou hast achiev'd a part; hast gain'd the ear

Of Britain's senate to thy glorious cause;

Hope smiles, joy springs, and though cold caution pause

And wave delay, the better hour is near

That shall remunerate thy toils severe

By peace for Afric, fenced with British laws.

Enjoy what thou hast won, esteem and love

From all the Just on earth, and all the Blest above.

No wonder, when faced with such ponderous, flat-footed epistles, Alexander Pope became jaded and sarcastic. For a bit of eighteenth-century variety, perhaps you'd like to read a few lines from his very cranky Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot:

Why am I ask'd, what next shall see the light?

Heav'ns! was I born for nothing but to write?

Has Life no Joys for me? or (to be grave)

Have I no Friend to serve, no Soul to save?