Cometh Up as a Flower by Rhoda Broughton (1867)

This concentrated, small-scene novel stands in sharp contrast to Broughton's other work from her inaugural year. Where Not Wisely, But Too Well seems a looking forward to the sprawling, hothouse works of the sensation novelists, this charming piece has a strong element of looking back to the unity and tightness of Jane Austen, among others. And charm is its strongest point - Broughton's humour and brightness of prose guarantee that. Eleanora Le Strange and her sister Dorothea are the head and the foil. Nelly is red-haired and passionate in a slightly unruly way, where Dolly is prettier and more calculating. The love of Nelly's life comes in the form of a penniless soldier; Dolly couldn't be more horrified at the prospect of her younger sister marrying no money, and engineers quietly behind the scenes for the problem to go away. What she doesn't calculate for, and can't because it's not in her nature, is that Nelly's love is all-consuming. Nelly is pushed, heartbroken, toward an ageing wealthy lord, only to realise Dolly's perfidy too late. The mid-Victorian scheme is then realised to the full with a quite un-Austenian conclusion; the star-crossed pair are doomed. Even this sadness charms, proving Broughton to be a skilled tensioner of tone.