" Evidently this was not the whole
account of the matter, or there would have been no need for a formal
letter of farewell. We are very sorry to find the revered Mr.
Alexander Knox saying, in his correspondence with Bishop Jebb, that he
had a severer idea of Lady Austen than he should wish to put into
writing for publication, and that he almost suspected she was a very
artful woman. On the other hand, the unsentimental Mr. Scott is
reported to have said, "Who can be surprised that two women should be
continually in the society of one man and quarrel, sooner or later,
with each other?" Considering what Mrs. Unwin had been to Cowper, and
what he had been to her, a little jealousy on her part would not have
been highly criminal. But, as Southey observes, we shall soon see two
women continually in the society of this very man without quarrelling
with each other. That Lady Austen's behaviour to Mrs. Unwin was in the
highest degree affectionate, Cowper has himself assured us. Whatever
the cause may have been, this bird of paradise, having alighted for a
moment in Olney, took wing and was seen no more.
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