Evelina, or A young lady's entrance into the world : autograph manuscript fragment, undated [before 1778].

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Record ID: 
381921
Accession number: 
MA 35.1
Author: 
Burney, Fanny, 1752-1840.
Date: 
undated [before 1778].
Credit: 
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1905.
Description: 
1 item (2 pages) ; 26.2 x 19.5 cm
Notes: 

With a heading at the top of the sheet: "specimen of the feigned hand in which Evelina was written for disguise to Mr. Lowndes."
Part of a watermark is visible.
It is known that Burney had copied out, in a disguised hand, the first volume of Evelina (from which this chapter comes) by the winter of 1776. This fragment has a number of unusual features. They include the fact that Burney makes an autograph correction which is reflected in the first edition of the novel (the line "she, involuntarily, snuft up [so much?], that the pain & surprise made her scream aloud" is corrected to "she, involuntarily, snuft up such a quantity, that the pain & surprise made her scream aloud"); that the chapter ends with the sentence "I will write again to-morrow" which does not appear in the first edition; and that Burney stops copying midway through the verso. Because of the presence of the correction, it seems most likely that Burney made this copy at some point before the publication of the first edition in 1778, instead of other scenarios (for instance, copying over a section from the book post-publication to demonstrate the hand she'd devised). This is the only known extant leaf from Evelina in the "feigned hand."
Thomas Lowndes was the bookseller to whom Burney's brother Charles brought part of the manuscript of Evelina in December 1776.

Summary: 

A manuscript fragment from Letter XIX of Evelina, beginning "the use of all this?" and ending "I will write again to-morrow"; followed by a horizontal line and the heading of the next chapter, "Letter X / Evelina in Continuation." (The next chapter in the novel is in fact "Letter XX.")

Provenance: 
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan from the London dealer Quaritch in July 1905 as part of a collection of Burney's correspondence and fragments of manuscripts, bound in three volumes. Disbound in 1925.