Two Notes on Jane Austen 217 TWO NOTES ON JANE AUSTEN A word in Jane Austen's Persuasion, Vol. IT, Ch. iv has been missed by the dictionaries and not elsewhere explained, I believe. It occurs in the following passage: He thought her [Anne] 'less thin in her person, in her cheeks, her skin, her complexion, greatly unproved clearer, fresher. Had she been using anything in particular?' 'No, nothing.' 'Merely Gowland,' he supposed. ... 'I should recommend Gowland, the constant use of Gowland during the spring months. . . . You see how it has carried away her [Mrs. Clay's] freckles.' The printing of the word with a capital suggests a name for some medical preparation, and this proves to be the case. Dr. J. S. Billings, in his National Medical Directory, mentions Gowland's lotion as "a solution of mercuric chloride 1, ammon- ium chloride 1, in emulsion of bitter almonds 480 parts." Dr. H. Hager, in Handbuch der pharmaceutischen Praxis, calls it "Liquor cosmeticus Gowland" and "Gowland's liquor." He defines it as a "cosmeticum gegen Flecke, Bliithchen, Finnen, . . . mittelst Compressen aufzulegen." The Catalogue of the Surgeon General's Library at Washington refers to an article upon it as late as 1845, in the Ann. Soc. med. chir. de- Bruges VI, 138-44. This, called "Quelques experiences sur la. composition de la liqueur de Gowland, " shows that it was still used a generation after Persuasion was written. Of the Gowland referred to I know nothing except that the name is English. The Gentleman's Magazine of 1800 refers to the marriage of an Anne Gowland, daughter of the late Thomas Gowland of Billeter street, London, and three years later to the marriage of an Eliza Gowland, only daughter of Thomas Gowland, Esq., in Baker street. The name is honor- ably borne today by Dr. William Gowland, Emeritus professor of metallurgy in the London School of Mines. None of these may have any connection with the man whose preparation, we
gather, Jane Austen was mildly ridiculing.
