We know, now, that all Lady Russell's interference did was to shorten the life Anne and Frederick shared by nearly eight years. But, in fairness, that's in hindsight.
I'm surprised, particularly since it was mentioned in the earlier thread, that no one had brought up the example from an earlier Austen novel of what might have happened had the marriage gone through.
Consider the case of Miss Frances Ward and Lt. Price of the Royal Marines. A case that, in essentials, pretty much corresponds to the case of Anne and Frederick. Miss Ward, a lovely refined girl from a good family, with a dowry of £7000, falls in love with a dashing military officer, with reasonably good prospects but no current advantages, and marries him. Within a few short years, after she's already racked up a few babies, he's grievously wounded in combat, invalided out of active service, and beached on half-pay. Bitter about the end of his career, he lapses into alcoholism, while his once beautiful wife loses her youth and her looks raising a houseful of kids. And they had 7 G's to start on, which is 7 G's more than Anne and Frederick would've had.
Naturally, my sympathies are all with a young couple in love, but, the snobbish objections (and they were present; no doubt about that) aside, Lady Russell's concerns were not all unwarranted.
And what's more, I think Frederick should've been savvy enough to realize that. When Anne, who found herself doing something so against her own heart, tried to tell him this (and it's easy to infer that her reluctance must have been apparent to anyone who took the time to notice it), he should have been more sympathetic. For him to expect the decisive resolution that was part of his own character in a sheltered, gently raised girl of 19 (and recall that Frederick would have been living the rough-and-tumble life of a young Navy officer from about the age of 12 or 13, so he was, in experience
much older than Anne), it was on him to try to come up with a compromise that would keep them together, yet satisfy the misgivings in Anne that had been instilled by Lady Russell.
Failing to do this much, it was Frederick who, when all his hopes for his future had proven out,
and decided not to two years later, considered,
and rejected, getting back in touch with Anne and renewing the engagement.
So, yeah, at least some of the objections were valid, and Miss Austen herself must have realized given the example of Lt. and Mrs. Price, and yeah, it was, even allowing for the disappointment of a broken engagement, largely Fred's fault they didn't get together again until seven or eight years later.
JIM
