Why do the characters sometimes talk about themselves in the third person? It is really confusing!
Mr Elton is 100% referring to himself.
Emma(page 69 line 1…) Penguin English library
made her quite sorry to acknowledge that they had transcribed it some pages ago already.
‘Why will not you write one yourself for us, Mr Elton?’ said she; ‘that is the only security for its freshness; and nothing could be easier to you.’
‘Oh, no! he had never written, hardly ever, any thing of the kind in his life. The stupidest fellow! He was afraid not even Miss Woodhouse’ – he stopt a moment – ‘or Miss Smith could inspire him.”
The very next day however produced some proof of inspir- ation. He called for a few moments, just to leave a piece of paper on the table containing, as he said, a charade, which a friend of his had addressed to a young lady, the object of his admiration,
by Ok_Length2747
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The lines from Mr. Elton aren’t direct quotes, Austen is paraphrasing what he said, probably to show that he said a longer line with a bunch of nonsense that wasn’t worth quoting directly.