] Well, she was in her mid twenties, and had a fortune of only 2,000 pounds. Her father, recently passed away, was out of the picture. Why not marry the handsome proctor?

It might well have been chemistry with which George Austen's good looks had much to do. According to Jane Austen's nephew J.E. Austen-Leigh, George Austen was very good looking even when he got older. "Mr Austen was a remarkably good-looking man, both in his youth and his old age. During his year of office at Oxford he had been called 'the handsome Proctor'; and at Bath, when more than seventy years old, he attracted observation by his fine features and abundance of snow-white hair. "