Persuasion

ir Walter Elliot, of Kellynch Hall, in Somersetshire, was a man who,for his own amusement, never took up any book but the Baronetage; therehe found occupation for an idle hour, and consolation in a distressedone; there his faculties were roused into admiration and respect, bycontemplating the limited remnant of the earliest patents; there anyunwelcome sensations, arising from domestic affairs changed naturallyinto pity and contempt as he turned over the almost endless creationsof the last century; and there, if every other leaf were powerless, hecould read his own history with an interest which never failed. Thiswas the page at which the favourite volume always opened: "ELLIOT OF KELLYNCH HALL."Walter Elliot, born March 1, 1760, married, July 15, 1784, Elizabeth,daughter of James Stevenson, Esq. of South Park, in the county ofGloucester, by which lady (who died 1800) he has issue Elizabeth, bornJune 1, 1785; Anne, born August 9, 1787; a still-born son, November 5,1789; Mary, born November 20, 1791."Precisely such had the paragraph originally stood from the printer'shands; but Sir Walter had improved it by adding, for the information ofhimself and his family, these words, after the date of Mary's birth--"Married, December 16, 1810, Charles, son and heir of Charles Musgrove,Esq. of Uppercross, in the county of Somerset," and by inserting mostaccurately the day of the month on which he had lost his wife.