THERE can be no doubt that the general colouring of Jane Austen's early life was bright. She lived with indulgent parents, in a cheerful home which afforded an agreeable variety of society. To these sources of enjoyment must be added, in her case, the first stirrings of talent within her, and the absorbing interest of original composition. It is impossible to say at how early an age she began to write. There is extant an old copy-book containing several tales, some of which seem to have been composed while she was quite a girl. These stories are of a slight and flimsy texture, and are generally intended to be nonsensical; but the nonsense has much spirit in it. Perhaps the most remarkable thing about them is the pure and idiomatic English in which they are composed, quite different from the over-ornamented style which might be expected from a very young writer. She herself was afterwards of opinion that she had devoted too much time to composition at this period of her life; for she advised a niece, who had shown an early aptitude for such pursuits, to write no more till she should be turned sixteen, adding that it would have been better for herself if she had read more, and written less, before that age. But between these childish effusions and the composition of her living works, there intervened another stage of her progress, during which she produced several tales, not without merit, but which she considered unworthy of publication.