Origins of baseball the hand. Another early print reference is Jane Austen's novel "Northanger Abbey", originally written 1798-1799. In the first chapter the young English heroine Catherine Morland is described as preferring "cricket, base ball, riding on horseback and running about the country to books". About the same time, Austen's cousin Cassandra Cooke mentioned baseball in her novel "Battleridge". In her 1820s "Village Sketch" "Jack Hatch", author Mary Russell Mitford wrote: In 1828, William Clarke of London published the second edition of "The Boy’s Own Book", which included rules for rounders (the oldest known use of that name), and contains the first printed
Persuasion (novel) "Persuasion" that she had a novel "which may appear about a twelvemonth hence." John Murray published "Persuasion", together with "Northanger Abbey", in a four-volume set, printed in December 1817 but dated 1818. The first advertisement appeared on December 17, 1817. The Austen family retained copyright of the 1,750 copies, which sold rapidly. Henry Austen supplied a "Biographical Notice" of his sister in which her identity is revealed and she is no longer an anonymous author. The Canadian scholar Sheila Johnson Kindred suggested parts of the novel were inspired by the career of Austen's brother, Charles Austen, a Royal Navy officer,