Cassandra’s Portrait of Jane

Cassandra’s portrait of Jane measures about four inches square,

And is said to be “not such a good likeness.”

For,

It seems,

No eminent painter of the day

Lured the good Miss Austen

To his studio to capture her essence in oils,

No sculptor attempted to hew her form out of cool marble,

And no place was reserved in Poet’s Corner for her tired bones.

Today,

Though,

Walk down Princes Street and observe

The Scott Monument towering majestic,

Old Watty and his faithful hound glaring down at passing shoppers,

Though no ladies queue to stroke the moleskin trousers of

Ivanhoe

And there are precious few television re-enactments of

The Waverley novels

These days.