Tuesday, 14 March 1826: 'I have amused myself occasionally very pleasantly during the few last days by reading over Lady Morgan's novel of O'Donnel which has some striking and beautiful passages of situation and description and in the comic part is very rich and entertaining. I do not remember being so much pleased with it at first -- there is a want of story always fatal to a book the first reading and it is well if it gets the chance of a second [...] 'Also read again and for the third time at least Miss Austen's very finely written novel of Pride and Prejudice. That young lady had a talent for describing the involvements and feelings and characters of ordinary life which is to me the most wonderful I ever met with [...] What a pity such a gifted creature died so early.'