"How my brother, Mr. Suckling, sometimes flies about" for Jane Austen's "Emma" (1905) by Hugh Thomson (p. 275, Chapter XXXVI)

[Victorian Web Home —> Jane Austen —> Visual Arts —> Illustration —> Hugh Thomson —> Next]

"How my brother, Mr. Suckling, sometimes flies about"

Hugh Thomson

1905

Photomechanical reproduction of a pen-and-ink drawing

11 by 8.7 cm (4 ½ by 3 ½ inches), vignetted

Jane Austen, Emma, facing page 274.

For passage illustrated and commentary, see below.

Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.

[You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image, and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Passage Illustrated: Introducing Mr. Suckling, Mrs. Elton's spendthrift brother

“Indeed! — from Yorkshire, I think. Enscombe is in Yorkshire?”

“Yes, they are about 190 miles from London, a considerable journey.”

“Yes, upon my word, very considerable. Sixty-five miles farther than from Maple Grove to London. But what is distance, Mr. Weston, to people of large fortune? — You would be amazed to hear how my brother, Mr. Suckling, sometimes flies about. You will hardly believe me — but twice in one week he and Mr. Bragge went to London and back again with four horses.” [Chapter XXXVI, 274]

Commentary: Noveau Riche Mr. Suckling and his friend Bragge "flying about"

Upon initial inspection, the image of the fashionably dressed young men driving with abandon down the highway in a four-horse, light carriage conveys little meaning, other than offering a complement to the rapid journeys of Frank Churchill, as commented upon by his mother, Mrs. Weston. One presumes the right-hand youth is sounding the horn to warn slower traffic and cross-traffic of their precipitous approach on a rural road. Mrs. Elton seems to be proud of her brother’s headstrong journeys from the family estate; the picture complements her remark by suggesting the quality of the equipage and its dashing white horses, and the sporting figures of young Mr. Suckling and his ebullient friend.

Related Material

Bibliography

Austen, Jane. Emma. Ed. Austin Dobson. With forty pen-and-ink illustrations by Hugh Thomson. The Novels of Jane Austen. London: Macmillan, 1896, rpt. 1905.

Austen, Jane. Emma. Ed. R. Brimley Johnson. With coloured illustrations by C. E. Brock. The Novels and Letters of Jane Austen. 2 vols. New York & Philadelphia: Frank S. Holby, 1906.

Austen, Jane. Emma. Ed. George Justice. 4th edition. New York: W. W. Norton, 2011.

Austen, Jane. Emma: An Annotated Edition. Ed. Bharat Tandon. Cambridge, Mass., and London: Belknap Press of Harvard U. P., 2012.

Last modified 26 May 2026