Petty France, Gloucestershire a result of this the speed through the two hamlets was reduced to 40 MPH. Badminton and Hawkesbury Upton are also nearby. The Manor House in Petty France was built in 1812 for Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool, prime minister from 1812 to 1827. The house has seen the likes of Lord Wellington, and has been in the ownership of the poet Wordsworth's family, Lord and Lady Apsley and the Duke of Beaufort; today it is a hotel. In her novel Northanger Abbey (written in 1803, but not published until 1817), Jane Austen mentions Petty France as a dull
Northanger Abbey it is not until the shocking wrongdoing against her brother that Catherine entirely separates herself from their friendship, stating that she may never speak to Isabella again, and is not as upset as she thought she would be. As this scene takes place almost immediately after Catherine's lesson about Gothic novels, it is a clear sign of her increasing maturity. Reading as a valuable tool for personal growth. In one of Austen's narrator's boldest proclamations, the narrator of "Northanger Abbey" exclaims upon the significance of reading novels, writing: "I will not adopt that ungenerous and impolitic custom so common with