Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters | Page 5

Francis befriended him, and sent him to Tonbridge School, and
that from Tonbridge he obtained a Scholarship (and subsequently a
Fellowship) at St. John's College, Oxford--the College at which, later
on, through George's own marriage, his descendants were to be
'founder's kin.' He returned to teach at his old school, occupying the
post of second master there in 1758, and in the next year he was again
in residence at Oxford, where his good looks gained for him the name
of 'the handsome proctor.' In 1760 he took Orders, and in 1761 was
presented by Mr. Knight of Godmersham--who had married a
descendant of his great-aunt, Jane Stringer--to the living of Steventon,
near Overton in Hampshire. It was a time of laxity in the Church, and
George Austen (though he afterwards became an excellent parish-priest)
does not seem to have resided or done duty at Steventon before the year
1764, when his marriage to Cassandra Leigh must have made the
rectory appear a desirable home to which to bring his bride.
Before we say anything of the Leighs, a few sentences must be devoted
to George Austen's relations of the half-blood--the Walters. With his
mother's son by her first husband, William Hampson Walter, he
remained on intimate terms. A good many letters are extant which
passed between the Austens and the Walters during the early married
life of the former, the last of them containing the news of the birth of
Jane. Besides this, William Walter's daughter, 'Phila,' was a constant
correspondent of George Austen's niece Eliza.
The Walter family settled in Lincolnshire, where they have held Church
preferment, and have also been well known in the world of sport.
Phila's brother James seems to have been at the same time an

exemplary parson, beloved by his flock, and also a sort of 'Jack
Russell,' and is said to have met his death in the hunting-field, by
falling into a snow-drift, at the age of eighty-four. His son Henry
distinguished himself in a more academical manner. He was second
wrangler in 1806, and a Fellow of St. John's. Nor was he only a
mathematician; for in June 1813 Jane Austen met a young man named
Wilkes, an undergraduate of St. John's, who spoke very highly of
Walter as a scholar; he said he was considered the best classic at
Cambridge. She adds: 'How such a report would have interested my
father!' Henry Walter was at one time tutor at Haileybury, and was also
a beneficed clergyman. He was known at Court; indeed, it is said that,
while he declined higher preferment for himself, he was consulted by
George IV and William IV on the selection of bishops.
The wife that George Austen chose belonged to the somewhat large
clan of the Leighs of Adlestrop in Gloucestershire, of which family the
Leighs[7] of Stoneleigh were a younger branch. Her father was the Rev.
Thomas Leigh, elected Fellow of All Souls at so early an age that he
was ever after called 'Chick Leigh,' and afterwards Rector of Harpsden,
near Henley.
Both these branches of the Leigh family descended from Sir Thomas
Leigh, Lord Mayor of London, behind whom Queen Elizabeth rode to
be proclaimed at Paul's Cross. He was rich enough and great enough to
endow more than one son with estates; but while the elder line at
Adlestrop remained simple squires, the younger at Stoneleigh rose to a
peerage. The latter branch, however, were now rapidly approaching
extinction, while the former had many vigorous scions. The family
records have much to say of one of the squires--Theophilus (who died
in 1724), the husband of Mary Brydges and the father of twelve
children, a strong character, and one who lived up to fixed, if rather
narrow, ideas of duty. We hear of his old-fashioned dress and elaborate
bows and postures, of his affability to his neighbours, and his just,
though somewhat strict, government of his sons. It is difficult to picture
to oneself a set of modern Oxford men standing patiently after dinner,
in the dining-parlour, as Theophilus's sons did, 'till desired to sit down
and drink Church and King.' Meanwhile, his brother-in-law, the Duke

of Chandos (the patron of Handel), used to send for the daughters to be
educated in the splendour of Canons (his place in Middlesex), and to
make such matches as he chose for them with dowries of £3000
a-piece.
Cassandra's father, Thomas, was the fourth son of Theophilus Leigh.
An older and better known brother was another Theophilus, Master of
Balliol for more than half a century.
The story of his election, in 1727, is remarkable. The Fellows of Balliol
could not agree in the choice of any one of their own body; and one set,
thinking it would be no disadvantage to have a duke's brother as