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Passage Illustrated: Louisa's Wilfulness Leads to an Accident.

There was too much wind to make the high part of the new Cobb pleasant for the ladies, and they agreed to get down the steps to the lower, and all were contented to pass quietly and carefully down the steep flight, excepting Louisa; she must be jumped down them by Captain Wentworth. In all their walks, he had had to jump her from the stiles; the sensation was delightful to her. The hardness of the pavement for her feet, made him less willing upon the present occasion; he did it, however. She was safely down, and instantly, to show her enjoyment, ran up the steps to be jumped down again. He advised her against it, thought the jar too great; but no, he reasoned and talked in vain, she smiled and said, “I am determined I will:” he put out his hands; she was too precipitate by half a second, she fell on the pavement on the Lower Cobb, and was taken up lifeless! There was no wound, no blood, no visible bruise; but her eyes were closed, she breathed not, her face was like death. The horror of the moment to all who stood around!

Captain Wentworth, who had caught her up, knelt with her in his arms, looking on her with a face as pallid as her own, in an agony of silence. “She is dead! she is dead!” screamed Mary, catching hold of her husband, and contributing with his own horror to make him immoveable; and in another moment, Henrietta, sinking under the conviction, lost her senses, too, and would have fallen on the steps, but for Captain Benwick and Anne, who caught and supported her between them.

“Is there no one to help me?” were the first words which burst from Captain Wentworth, in a tone of despair, and as if all his own strength were gone.

“Go to him, go to him,” cried Anne, “for heaven’s sake go to him. I can support her myself. Leave me, and go to him. Rub her hands, rub her temples; here are salts; take them, take them.” [Chapter 12, pp. 112-113]

Commentary: An Accident Underscores Anne's Continuing Feelings for Captain Wentworth

In Chapter 11, the Musgroves visit Lyme. Here, as the illustration shows, Louisa, one of Mary's sisters, after walking on the beach before breakfast, suffers a severe fall. After jumping from the top of the Cobb and down the stone steps wall, the headstrong Luisa, despite Captain Wentworth's warnings, jumps a second time, but her companion fails to "catch" her. The accident constitues a sort of climax since it brings Anne and Captain Wentworth, her former fiancé, together in a crisis, which makes them realize that they still have romantic feelings for each other.

At the head of Chapter 12, the illustration anticipates a moment eight pages later. The naval officer, apparently in full uniform, solicitously bends over the unconscious adolescent girl in a summer frock.The craggy, irregular staircase and massive supporting blocks of the Lower Cobb or embankment dominate the background, and immediately set the context for Louisa's accident. Wentworth seems to be checking her pulse, and we note, too, her hat turned upside down, lying near her shoulder. To avoid cluttering the composition, Cooke has not depicted the other characters in the beach-walking party: Captain Charles Benwick, Anne herself (witness to the accident, and focal character here), Henrietta, and the hysterical Mary.

Bibliography

Austen, Jane. Persuasion. The Novels of Jane Austen in Ten Volumes. Ed. R. Brimley Johnson. Illustrated by William Cubitt Cooke. London: J. M. Dent, & Co., 1894.

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Created 28 August 2025