EVERYMAN'S LIBRARY EDITED BY ERNEST RHYS FICTION MANSFIELD PARK WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY R. BRIMLEY JOHNSON THE PUBLISHERS OF cVE^X^^^^L^ LlB%^%r WILL BE PLEASED TO SEND FREELY TO ALL APPLICANTS A LIST OF THE PUBLISHED AND PROJECTED VOLUMES TO BE COMPRISED UNDER THE FOLLOWING TFIIRTEEN HEADINGS: TRAVEL SCIENCE FICTION THEOLOGY & PHILOSOPHY HISTORY ^ CLASSICAL FOR YOUNG PEOPLE ESSAYS ^ ORATORY POETRY & DRAMA BIOGRAPHY REFERENCE ROMx^lNCE ■4^ IN FOUR STYLES OF BINDING : CLOTPI, FLAT BACK, COLOURED TOP ; LEATHER, ROUND CORNERS, GILT TOP; LIBRARY | BINDING IN CLOTH, & QUARTER PIGSKIN f London : J. M. DENT & SONS, Ltd. New York: E. P. DUTTON 3c CO. 4 First Issue or this Edition Reprinted February 1906 April 190G; January 19 10 I lliinois Wesleyan Usivtrsity INTRODUCTION Miss Austen alludes in her letter to her brother Henry's opinion of this book: — "His approbation is hitherto even equal to my wishes. He says it is different from the other two^ but does not appear to think it all inferior. He has only married Mrs. R. He took to Lady B. and Mrs. N. most kindly, and gives great praise to the drawing of the characters. He understands them all, likes Fanny, and, I think, foresees how it will all be. . . . He is going on with Mansfield Park. He admires H. Crawford; I mean properly, as a clever, pleasant man.'' Again, three days later: — Henry has tlxis moment said he likes my M. P. better and better; he is in the third volume. I believe now he has changed his mind as to foreseeing the end; he said yesterday, at least, that he defied anybody to say whether H. C. would be reformed or would forget Fanny in a fortnight." On another occasion Miss Austen also writes that one of her friends had a great idea of being Fanny Price,'' and that Edmund Bertram, like her other special favourite, Mr. Kjiightley, was " very far from being what I know English gentlemen often are." She told her family that the " some- thing considerable " which Mrs. Norris contributed to William's outfit was one pound. R. Brimley Johnson. vu / ... viii MAdi&FlELD PA%K BIBLIOGRAPHY Pride and Prejudice, written between October, 1796, and August, 1797, first published in 181 3, and a second edition the same vear, third edition 1817; Sense and Sensibility, written in its present forin between November, 1797, and 1798, though a portion was extracted from an earlier manuscript, in the form of letters, entitled ** Elinor and Mari- anne," first published in 181 1, second edition 1813; Northanger Abbey, written during 1798, and first published in 1818; Mansfield Park, written between 181 1 and 18 14, and first published in 1814; second edition in 1816; Emma, written betv/een 181 1 and 1816, and first published in 18 16; Persuasion, wTitten between 181 1 and 181 6, and first published in 1818. In this edition the novels are printed from the last editions revised by the author, certain obvious misprints, some of which do not occur in the earlier editions, being corrected. All such corrections are indicated by the words being enclosed in square brackets. MANSFIELD PARK CH.4PrE\^I About thirty years ago, Miss Maria Ward, of Huntingdon with only seven thousand pounds, had the good luck to captivate Sir Thomas Bertram, of Mansfield Park, in the county of Northampton, and to be thereby raised to the rank of a baronet's lady, with all the comforts and consequences of an handsome house and large income. All Huntingdon exclaimed on the greatness of the match, and her uncle, the lawyer, himself, allowed her to be at least three thousand pounds short of any equitable claim to it. She had two sisters to be benefited by her elevation; and such of their acquaintance as thought Miss Ward and Miss Frances quite as handsome as Miss Maria, did not scruple to predict their marrying with almost equal advantage. But there certainly are not so many men of large fortune in the world as there are pretty women to deserve them. Miss Ward, at the end of half-a-dozen years, found herself obliged to be attached to the Rev. Mr. Norris, a friend of her brother-in-lav/, with scarcely any private fortune, and Miss Frances fared yet worse. Miss Ward's match, indeed, when it came to the point, was not contemptible ; Sir Thomas being happily able to give his friend an income in the living of Mansfield ; and Mr. and Mrs. Norris began their career of conjugal felicity with very little less than a thousand a-year. But Miss I Frances married, in the common phrase, to disoblige her family, and by fixing on a lieutenant of marines, without education, fortune, or connections, did it very thoroughly. She could hirdly have made a more untoward choice. Sir Thomas Bertram had interest, which, from principle as well \ as pride — from a general wish of doing right, and a desire of A 2 3>mate Nature, with little observation; her attention was all lor men and women, her talents for the light and lively. In looking back after Edmund, however, when there was any stretch of road behind them, or when he gained on them in ascending a considerable hill, they were united, and a there he is " broke at the same moment from them both, more than once. For the first seven miles Miss Bertram had very little real comfort; her prospect always ended in Mr. Crawford and her sister sitting side by side, full of conversation and merri- ment; and to see only his expressive profile as he turned with a smile to Julia, or to catch the laugh of the other, was a perpetual source of irritation, which her own sense of pro- priety could but just smooth over. When Julia looked back, it was with a countenance of delight, and whenever she spoke to them, it was in the highest spirits: " her view of the country was charming, she wished they could all see it," etc.; but her only offer of exchange was addressed to Miss Craw- ford, as they gained the summit of a long hill, and was not more inviting than this: Here is a fine burst of country. I wish you had my seat, but I dare say you will not take it, let me press you ever so much; " and Miss Crawford could hardly answer, before they were moving again at a good pace. When they came within the influence of Sotherton associa- tions, it was better for Miss Bertram, who might be said to have two strings to her bow. She had Rushworth-feelings, and Crawford-feelings, and in the vicinity of Sotherton, the former had considerable effect. Mr. Rushworth's conse- quence was hers. She could not tell Miss Crawford that " those woods belonged to Sotherton; " she could not care- lessly observe that " she believed that it was now all Mr. Rush- worth's property on each side of the road,'' without elation of heart; and it was a pleasure to increase with their approach to the capital freehold mansion, and ancient manorial resi- dence of the family, with all its rights of court-leet and court-baron. " Now, we shall have no more rough road. Miss Crawford; our difficulties are over. The rest of the way is such as it ought to be. Mr. Rushworth has made it since he succeeded to the estate. Here begins the village. Those cottages are mA^KSFIELD PA%K 69 really a disgrace. The church spire is reckoned reh?-arkably handsome. I am glad the church is not so close to the great house as often happens in old places. The annoyance of the bells must be terrible. There is the parsonage; a tidy- looking house, and I understand the clergyman and his wife are very decent people. Those are alms-houses, built by some of the family. To the right is the steward's house; he is a very respectable man. Now, we are coming to the lodge- gates; but we have nearly a mile through the park still. It is not ugly, you see, at this end ; there is some fine timber, but the situation of the house is dreadful. We go down hill to it for half a mile, and it is a pity, for it would not be an ill-looking place if it had a better approach." Miss Crawford was not slow to admire; she pretty well guessed Miss Bertram's feelings, and made it a point of honour to promote her enjoyment to the utmost. Mrs. Norris was all delight and volubility; and even Fanny had something to say in admiration, and might be heard with complacency. Her eye was eagerly taking in everything within her reach ; and after being at some pains to get a viev/ of the house, and observing that it was a sort of building which she could not look at but with respect," she added. Now, where is the avenue? The house fronts the east, I perceive. The avenue, therefore, must be at the back of it. Mr. Rushworth talked of the west front." " Yes, it is exactly behind the house; begins at a little distance, and ascends for half-a-mile to the extremity of the grounds. You may see something of it here — something of the more distant trees. It is oak entirely." Miss Bertram could now speak with decided information of what she had known nothing about, when Mr. Rushworth had asked her opinion; and her spirits were in as happy a flutter as vanity and pride could furnish, when they drove up to the spacious stone steps before the principal entrance. CH^PTE'E^IX Mr. Rushworth was at the door to receive his fair lady; and the whole party were welcomed by him with due atten- tion. In the drawing-room they were met with equal MASiSFlELD PA1{K cordiality by the mother, and Miss Bertram had all the dis- tinction with each that she could wish. After the business oi arriving was over, it was first necessary to eat, and the doors were thrown open to admit them through one or two intermediate rooms into the appointed dining-parlour, where a collation was prepared with abundance and elegance. Much was said, and much was ate, and all went well. The particular object of the day was then considered. How would Mr. Crawford like, in what manner would he choose, to take a survey of the grounds ? Mr. Rushworth mentioned his curricle. Mr. Crawford suggested the greater desirable- ness of some carriage which might convey more than two. To be depriving themselves of the advantage of other eyes and other judgments, might be an evil even beyond the loss of present pleasure." Mrs. Rushworth proposed that the chaise should be taken also; but this was scarcely received as an amendment: the young ladies neither smiled nor spoke. Her next proposi- tion, of shewing the house to such of them as had not been there before, was more acceptable, for Miss Bertram was pleased to have its size displayed, and all were glad to be doing something. The whole party rose accordingly, and under Mrs. Rush- worth's guidance were shewn through a number of rooms, all lofty, and many large, and amply furnished in the taste of fifty years back, with shining floors, solid mahogany, rich damask, marble, gilding, and carving, each handsome in its way. Of pictures there were abundance, and some few good, but the larger part were family portraits, no longer anything to anybody but Mrs. Rushworth, who had been at great pains to learn all that the housekeeper could teach, and was now almost equally well qualified to shew the house. On the present occasion, she addressed herself chiefly to Miss Craw- ford and Fanny, but there was no comparison in the willing- ness of their attention; for Miss Crawford, who had seen scores of great houses, and cared for none of them, had only the appearance of civilly listening, while Famiy, to whom everything was almost as interesting as it was new, attended with unaffected earnestness to all that Mrs. Rushworth could relate of the family in former times, its rise and grandeur, regal visits and loyal efforts, delighted to connect anything with history already known^ or warm her imagination scenes of the past. The situation of the house excluded the possibility of much prospect from any of the rooms; and while Fanny and some of the others were attending Mrs. Rushworth^ Henry Craw- ford was looking grave and shaking his head at the windows. Every room on the west front looked across a lawn to the beginning of the avenue immediately beyond tall iron palisades and gates. Having visited many more rooms than could be supposed to be of any other use than to contribute to the window tax, and find employment for housemaids, " Now/' said Mrs. Rushworth, " we are coming to the chapel, which properly we ought to enter from above, and look down upon : but as we are quite among friends, I will take you in this way, if you will excuse me." They entered. Fanny's imagination had prepared her for something grander than a mere spacious, oblong room, fitted up for the purpose of devotion: with nothing more striking or more solemn than the profusion of mahogany, and the crimson velvet cushions appearing over the ledge of the family gallery above. " I am disappointed," said she, in a low voice to Edmund. This is not my idea of a chapel. There is nothing awful here, nothing melancholy, nothing grand. Here are no aisles, no arches, no inscriptions, no banners. No banners, cousin, to be ' blown by the night wind of heaven.' No signs that a * Scottish monarch sleeps below.' " " You forget, Fanny, how lately all this has been built, and for how confined a purpose, compared with the old chapels of castles and monasteries. It was only for the private use of the family. They have been buried, I suppose, in the parish church. There you must look for the banners and the atchievements." " It was foolish of me not to think of all that; but I am disappointed." Mrs. Rushworth began her relation. " This chapel was fitted up as you see it, in James the Second's time. Before that period, as I understand, the pews were only wainscot; and there is some reason to think that the linings and cushions of the pulpit and family seat were only purple cloth; but this MASiS FIELD PAliK jt quite certain. It is a handsome chapel^ and was ^rmerly in constant use both morning and evening. Prayers were always read in it by the domestic chaplain, within the memory of many; but the late Mr. Rushworth left it off." " Every generation has its improvements/' said Miss Crawford, with a smile, to Edmund. Mrs. Rushworth was gone to repeat her lesson to Mr. Craw- ford; and Edmund, Fanny and Miss Crawford, remained in a cluster together. " It is a pity," cried Fanny, " that the custom should have been discontinued. It was a valuable part of former times. There is something in a chapel and chaplain so much in character with a great house, with one's ideas of what such a household should be ! A whole family assembling regularly for the purpose of prayer is fine ! " Very fiine, indeed," said Miss Crawford, laughing. " It must do the heads of the family a great deal of good to force all the poor housemaids and footmen to leave business and pleasure, and say their prayers here twice a-day, while they are inventing excuses themselves for staying away." That is hardly Fanny's idea of a family assembling," said Edmund. " If the master and mistress do not attend them- selves, there must be more harm than good in the custom." " At any rate, it is safer to leave people to their own devices on such subjects. Everybody likes to go their own way — to choose their own time and manner of devotion. The obligation of attendance, the formality, the restraint, the length of time — altogether it is a formidable thing, and what nobody likes; and if the good people who used to kneel and gape in that gallery could have foreseen that the time would ever come when men and women might lie another ten minutes in bed, when they woke with a headache, without danger of reprobation, because chapel was missed, they would have jumped with joy and envy. Cannot you imagine with what unwilling feelings the former belles of the house of Rush- worth did many a time repair to this chapel? The young Mrs. Eleanors and Mrs. Bridgets — starched up into seeming piety, but with heads full of something very different — especially if the poor chaplain were not worth looking at — and, in those days, I fancy parsons were very inferior even to what they are now." MAJiSFIELD PA'RK 73 For a few moments she was unanswered. Fanny coloured and looked at Edmund^ but felt too angry for speech; and he needed a little recollection before he could say, Your lively mind can hardly be serious even on serious subjects. You have given us an amusing sketch, and human nature cannot say it was not so. We must all feel at times the diffi- culty of fixing our thoughts as we could wish; but if you are supposing it a frequent thing, that is to say, a weakness grown into a habit from neglect, what could be expected from the private devotions of such persons? Do you think the minds which are suffered, which are indulged in wanderings in a chapel, would be more collected in a closet? " " Yes, very likely. They would have two chances at least in their favour. There would be less to distract the attention from without, and it would not be tried so long." " The mind which does not struggle against itself under one circumstance, would find objects to distract it in the other J I believe; and the influence of the place and of example may often rouse better feelings than are begun with. The greater length of the service, however, I admit to be some- times too hard a stretch upon the mind. One wishes it were not so ; but I have not yet left Oxford long enough to forget what chapel prayers are." While this was passing, the rest of the party being scattered about the chapel, Julia called Mr. Crawford's attention to her sister, by saying, " Do look at Mr. Rushworth and Maria, standing side by side, exactly as if the ceremony were going to be performed. Have not they completely the air of it? " Mr. Crawford smiled his acquiescence, and stepping for- ward to Maria, said, in a voice which she only could hear, " I do not like to see Miss Bertram so near the altar." Starting, the lady instinctively moved a step or two, but recovering herself in a moment, affected to laugh, and asked him, in a tone not much louder, If he would give her away ?" " I am afraid I should do it very awkwardly," was his reply, with a look of meaning. Julia, joining them at the moment, carried on the joke. " Upon my word, it is really a pity that it should not take place directly, if we had but a proper license, for here we are altogether, and nothing in the world could be more snug and pleasant." And she talked and laughed about it with so 74 MA3^FIELD PA'B^ little caution, as to catch the comprehension of Mr. Rush- worth and his mother, and expose her sister to the whispered gallantries of her lover, while Mrs. Rushworth spoke with proper smiles and dignity of its being a most happy event to her whenever it took place. " If Edmund were but in orders ! " cried Julia, and running to where he stood with Miss Crawford and Fanny: " My dear Edmund, if you were but in orders now, you might perform the ceremony directly. How unlucky that you are not ordained; Mr. Rushworth and Maria are quite ready.'* Miss Crawford's countenance, as Julia spoke, might have amused a disinterested observer. She looked almost aghast under the new idea she was receiving. Fanny pitied her. How distressed she will be at what she said just now," passed across her mind. " Ordained! " said Miss Crawford; " what, are you to be a clergyman? " " Yes; I shall take orders soon after my father's return; probably at Christmas." Miss Crawford rallying her spirits, and recovering her com- plexion, replied only, " If I had known this before, I would have spoken of the cloth with more respect," and turned the subject. The chapel was soon afterwards left to the silence and stillness which reigned in it, with few interruptions, through- out the year. Miss Bertram, displeased with her sister, led the way, and all seemed to feel that they had been there long enough. The lower part of the house had been now entirely shown, and Mrs. Rushworth, never weary in the cause, would have proceeded towards the principal staircase, and taken them through all the rooms above, if her son had not interposed with a doubt of there being time enough. " For if," said he, with the sort of self-evident proposition which many a clearer head does not always avoid, " we are too long going over the house, we shall not have time for what is to be done out of doors. It is past two, and we are to dine at five." Mrs. Rushworth submitted ; and the question of surveying the grounds, with the who and the how was likely to be more fully agitated, and Mrs. Norris was beginning to arrange by what junction of carriages and horses most could be done, mAD" much, and that he should certainly have come back for her, had she not been tired already; but this was not quite sufficient to do away with the pain of having been left a whole hour, when he had talked of only a few minutes, nor to banish the sort of curiosity she felt, to know what they had been conversing about all that time; and the result of the whole was to her J14J3^FIELD PA1{K 87 disappointment and depression, as they prepared by general agreement, to return to the house. On reaching the bottom of the steps to the terrace, Mrs. Rushworth and Mrs. Norris presented themselves at the top, just ready for the wilderness, at the end of an hour and a half from their leaving the house. Mrs. Norris had been too well employed to move faster. Whatever cross accidents had occurred to intercept the pleasures of her nieces, she had found a morning of complete enjoyment; for the house- keeper, after a great many courtesies on the subject of pheasants, had taken her to the dairy, told her all about their cows, and given her the receipt for a famous cream cheese; and since Julia's leaving them, they had been met by the gardener, with whom she had made a most satisfactory acquaintance, for she had set him right as to his grandson's illness, convinced him that it was an ague, and promised him a charm for it; and he, in return, had shown her all his choicest nursery of plants, and actually presented her with a very curious specimen of heath. On this rencontre they all returned to the house together, there to lounge away the time as they could with sofas, and chit-chat, and Quarterly Reviews, till the return of the others, and the arrival of dinner. It was late before the Miss Bertrams and the two gentlemen came in, and their ramble did not appear to have been more than partially agreeable, or at all productive of anything useful with regard to the object of the day. By their own accounts they had been all walking after each other, and the junction which had taken place at last seemed, to Fanny's observation, to have been as much too late for re-establishing harmony, as it confessedly had been for determining on any alteration. She felt, as she looked at Julia and Mr. Rushworth, that hers was not the only dissatisfied bosom amongst them; there was gloom on the face of each. Mr. Crawford and Miss Bertram were much more gay, and she thought that he was taking particular pains, during dinner, to do away any little resentment of the other two, and restore general good humour. Dinner was soon followed by tea and coffee, a ten miles' drive home allowed no waste of hours; and from the time of their sitting down to table, it was a quick succession of busy nothings till the carriage came to the door, and Mrs. Norris, 88 MAd^^FlELD FA%Ki having fidgeted about, and obtained a few pheasants' eggs and a cream cheese from the housekeeper, and made abun- dance of civil speeches to Mrs. Rushworth, was ready to lead the way. At the same moment, Mr. Crawford, approaching Julia, said, I hope I am not to lose my companion, unless she is afraid of the evening air in so exposed a seat." The request had not been foreseen, but was very graciously received, and Julia's day was likely to end almost as well as it began. Miss Bertram had made up her mind to something different, and was a little disappointed; but her conviction of being really the one preferred, comforted her under it, and enabled her to receive Mr. Rushworth's parting attentions as she ought. He was certainly better pleased to hand her into the barouche than to assist her in ascending the box, and his complacency seemed confirmed by the arrangement. Well, Fanny, this has been a fine day for you, upon my word," said Mrs. Norris, as they drove through the park. Nothing but pleasure from beginning to end ! I am sure you ought to be very much obliged to your aunt Bertram and me, for contriving to let you go. A pretty good day's amusement you have had! " Maria was just discontented enough to say directly, I think you have done pretty well yourself, ma'am. Your lap seems full of good things, and here is a basket of something between us, which has been knocking my elbow unmercifully." My dear, it is only a beautiful little heath, which that nice old gardener would make me take; but if it is in your way, I will have it in my lap directly. There, Fanny, you shall carry that parcel for me ; take great care of it : do not let it fall; it is a cream cheese, just like the excellent one we had at dinner. Nothing would satisfy that good old Mrs. Whitaker, but my taking one of the cheeses. I stood out as long as I could, till the tears almost came into her eyes, and I knew it was just the sort that my sister would be delighted with. That Mrs. Whitaker is a treasure! She was quite shocked when I asked her whether wine was allowed at the second table, and she has turned away two housemaids for wearing white gowns. Take care of the cheese, Fanny. Now I can manage the other parcel and the basket very well." ^Vhat else have you been spunging? " said Maria, half pleased that Sotherton should be so complimented. mAD^ay was not yet overcome, in spite of all that Edmund could do. Oh! we do not want to disturb you from your seat. We do not want your present services. We shall only want you in our play. You must be Cottager's wife.'' ''Me!" cried Fanny, sitting down again with a most frightened look. Indeed you must excuse me. I could not act anything if you were to give me the world. No, indeed, I cannot act." Indeed, but you must, for we cannot excuse you. It need not frighten you; it is a nothing of a part, a mere nothing, not above half-a-dozen speeches altogether, and it will not much signify if nobody hears a word you say, so you may be as creep-mouse as you like, but we must have you to look at." " If you are afraid of half-a-dozen speeches," cried Mr. Rushworth, what would you do with such a part as mine? I have forty-two to learn." It is not that I am afraid of learning by heart," said Fanny, shocked to find herself at that moment the only speaker in the room, and to feel that almost every eye was upon her; but I really cannot act." Yes, yes, you can act well enough for us. Learn your part, and we will teach you all the rest. You have only two scenes, and as I shall be Cottager, I'll put you in and push you about, and you will do it very well, I'll answer for it." No, indeed, Mr. Bertram, you must excuse me. You / cannot have an idea. It would be absolutely impossible for me. If I were to undertake it, I should only disappoint you." \ Phoo ! Phoo ! Do not be so shamefaced. You'll do it ^''very well. Every allowance will be made for you. We do not expect perfection. You must get a brown gown, and a white apron, and a mob cap, and we must make you a few wrinkles, and a little of the crowsfoot at the corner of your eyes, and you will be a very proper, little old woman." You must excuse me, indeed you must excuse me," cried Fanny, growing more and more red from excessive agitation, and looking distressfully at Edmund, who was kindly observ- ing her; but unwilling to exasperate his brother by inter- ference, gave her only an encouraging smile. Her entreaty had no effect on Tom ; he only said again what he had said 3IA3^FIELD PA1{K 123 before^ and it was not merely Tom^ for the requisition was now backed by Maria, and Mr. Crawford^ and Mr. Yates, with an urgency which differed from his but in being more gentle or more ceremonious, and which altogether was quite over- powering to Fanny; and before she could breathe after it, Mrs. Norris completed the whole, by thus addressing her in a whisper at once angry and audible: — What a piece of work here is about nothing, I am quite ashamed of you, Fanny, to make such a difficulty of obliging your cousins in a trifle of this sort — so kind as they are to you ! Take the part with a good grace, and let us hear no more of the matter, I entreat. Do not urge her, madam," said Edmund. ''It is not fair to urge her in this manner. You see she does not like to act. Let her choose for herself, as well as the rest of us. Her judgment may be quite as safely trusted. Do not urge her any more." I am not going to urge her," repKed Mrs. Norris sharply; " but I shall think her a very obstinate, ungrateful girl, if she does not do what her aunt and cousins wish her; very ungrateful, indeed, considering who and what she is." Edmund was too angry to speak; but Miss Crawford look- ing for a moment with astonished eyes at Mrs. Norris, and then at Fanny, whose tears were beginning to show them- selves, immediately said, with some keenness, '' I do not like my situation; this place is too hot for me," and moved away her chair to the opposite side of the table, close to Fanny, saying to her, in a kind, low whisper, as she placed herself, '' Never mind, my dear Miss Price, this is a cross evening; everybody is cross and teasing, but do not let us mind them ; " and with pointed attention continued to talk to her and endeavour to raise her spirits, in spite of being out of spirits herself. By a look at her brother, she prevented any farther entreaty from the theatrical board, and the really good feelings by which she was almost purely governed, were rapidly restoring her to all the little she had lost in Edmund's favour. Fanny did not love Miss Crawford; but she felt very much obliged to her for her present kindness; and when, from taking notice of her work, and wishing she could work as well, and begging for the pattern, and supposing Fanny was now 124 mA^KSFIELD PA'IiK preparing for her appearance, as of course she would come out when her cousin was married, Miss Crawford proceeded to inquire if she had heard lately from her brother at sea, and said that she had quite a curiosity to see him, and imagined him a very fine young man, and advised Fanny to get his picture drawn before he went to sea again, — she could not help admitting it to be very agreeable flattery, or help listen- ing, and answering with more animation than she had intended. The consultation upon the play still went on, and Miss Crawford's attention was first called from Fanny, by Tom Bertram's telling her, with infinite regret, that he found it absolutely impossible for him to undertake the part of Anhalt in addition to the butler : he had been most anxiously trying to make it out to be feasible, but it would not do; he must give it up. " But there will not be the smallest difficulty in filling it/' he added. We have but to speak the word; we may pick and choose. I could name, at this moment, at least six young men within six miles of us, who are wild to be admitted into our company, and there are one or two that would not disgrace us ; I should not be afraid to trust either of the Olivers or Charles Maddox. Tom Oliver is a very clever fellow, and Charles Maddox is as gentlemanlike a man as you will see anywhere, so I will take my horse early to-morrow morning, and ride over to Stoke, and settle with one of them." While he spoke, Maria was looking apprehensively round at Edmund in full expectation that he must oppose such an enlargement of the plan as this : so contrary to all their first protestations; but Edmund said nothing. After a moment's thought, Miss Crawford calmly replied, " As far as I am concerned, I can have no objection to anything that you all tliink eligible. Have I ever seen either of the gentlemen? Yes, Mr. Charles Maddox dined at my sister's one day, did not he, Henr}'-? A quiet looking young man. I remember him. Let him be applied to, if you please, for it will be less unpleasant to me than to have a perfect stranger." Charles Maddox was to be the man. Tom repeated his resolution of going to him early on the morrow; and though Julia, who had scarcely opened her lips before, observed in a sarcastic manner, and with a glance first at Maria, and then at Edmund, that the Mansfield theatricals would enliven the whole neighbourhood exceedingly/' Edmund still held his peace, and showed his feelings only by a determined gravity. I am not very sanguine as to our play/' said Miss Crawford, in an under voice to Fanny, after some considera- tion; and I can tell Mr. Maddox that I shall shorten some of his speeches, and a great many of my own, before we rehearse together. It will be very disagreeable, and by no means what I expected." CH^PTE%^XVI It was not in Miss Crawford's power to talk Fanny into any real forgetfulness of what had passed. When the evening was over, she went to bed full of it, her nerves still agitated by the shock of such an attack from her cousin Tom, so public and so persevered in, and her spirits sinking under her aunt's unkind reflection and reproach. To be called into notice in such a manner, to hear that it was but the prelude to something so infinitely worse, to be told that she must do what was so impossible as to act ; and then to have the charge of obstinacy and ingratitude follow it, enforced with such a hint at the dependence of her situation, had been too distressing at the time to make the remembrance when she was alone much less so, especially with the superadded dread of what the morrow might produce in continuation of the subject. Miss Crawford had protected her only for the time ; and if she were applied to again among themselves with all the authoritative urgency that Tom and Maria were capable of, and Edmund perhaps away, what should she do ? She fell asleep before she could answer the question, and found it quite as puzzling when she awoke the next morning. The little white attic, which had continued her sleeping room ever since her first entering the family, proving incompetent to suggest any reply, she had recourse, as soon as she was dressed, to another apartment more spacious and more meet for \^alking about in and thinking, and of which she had now 126 mAO^FIELb PA%K for some time been almost equally mistress. It had been their schoolroom ; so called till the Miss Bertrams would not allow it to be called so any longer, and inhabited as such to a later period. There Miss Lee had lived, and there they had read and written, and talked and laughed, till within the last three years, when she had quitted them. The room had then become useless, and for some time was quite deserted, except by Fanny, when she visited her plants, or wanted one of the books, which she was still glad to keep there, from the deficiency of space and accommodation in her little chamber above: but gradually, as her value for the comforts of it increased, she had added to her possessions, and spent more of her time there; and having nothing to oppose her, had so naturally and so artlessly worked herself into it, that it was now generally admitted to be her's. The East room, as it had been called ever since Maria Bertram was sixteen, was now considered Fanny's, almost as decidedly as the white attic: the smallness of the one making the use of the other so evidently reasonable, that the Miss Bertrams, with every superiority in their own apartments, which their own sense of superiority could demand, were entirely appro\dng it; and Mrs. Norris, having stipulated for there never being a fire in it on Fanny's account, was tolerably resigned to her having the use of what nobody else wanted, though the terms in which she sometimes spoke of the indulgence seemed to imply that it was the best room in the house. The aspect was so favourable, that even without a fire it was habitable in many an early spring and late autumn morning, to such a willing mind as Fanny's; and while there was a gleam of sunshine, she hoped not to be driven from it entirely, even when winter came. The comfort of it in her hours of leisure was extreme. She could go there after anything unpleasant below, and find immediate consolation in some pursuit, or some train of thought at hand. Her plants, her books — of which she had been a collector from the first hour of her commanding a shilling — her writing-desk, and her works of charity and ingenuity, were all within her reach; or if indisposed for employment, if nothing but musing would do, she could scarcely see an object in that room which had not an interesting remembrance connected with it. Everything was a friend, or bore her thoughts to 3\4A3iSFIELD PA%K 127 a friend; and though there had been sometimes much of suffering to her; though her motives had often been mis- understood^ her feelings disregarded^ and her comprehension undervalued; though she had known the pains of tyranny^ of ridicule^ and neglect; yet almost every recurrence of either had led to something consolatory; her aunt Bertram had spoken for her^ or Miss Lee had been encouraging, or, what was yet more frequent or more dear, Edmund had been^ her champion and her friend ; he had supported her cause or^ explained her meaning; he had told her not to cry, or had given her some proof of affection which made her tears delightful, and the whole was now so blended together, so harmonised by distance, that every former affliction had its charm. The room was most dear to her, and she would not have changed its furniture for the handsomest in the house, though what had been originally plain, had suffered all the ill-usage of children; and its greatest elegancies and orna- ments were a faded footstool of Julia's work, too ill done for the drawing-room, three transparencies, made in a rage for transparencies, for the three lower panes of one window, where Tintern Abbey held its station between a cave in Italy and a moonlight lake in Cumberland, a collection of family profiles, thought unworthy of being anywhere else, over the mantel-piece, and by their side, and pinned against the wall^ a small sketch of a ship sent four years ago from the Mediter- ranean by William, with H.M.S. Antwerp at the bottom, in letters as tall as the main-mast. To this nest of comforts Fanny now walked down to try its influence on an agitated, doubting spirit, to see if by looking at Edmund's profile she could catch any of his counsel, or by giving air to her geraniums she might inhale a breeze of mental strength herself. But she had more than fears of her own perseverance to remove : she had begun to feel undecided as to what she ought to do ; and as she walked round the room her doubts were increasing. Was she right in refusing what was so warmly asked, so strongly wished for — what might be so essential to a scheme on which some of those to whom she owed the greatest complaisance had set their hearts? Was it not ill-nature, selfishness, and a fear of exposing herself? And would Edmund's judgment, would his persuasion of Sir Thomas's disapprobation of the whole, be enough ta 128 3\4A3^FIELD PA%K justify her in a determined denial in spite of all the rest? It would be so horrible to her to act^ that she was inclined to suspect the truth and purity of her own scruples ; and as she looked around her, the claims of her cousins to being obliged were strengthened by the sight of present upon present that she had received from them. The table between the windows was covered with work-boxes and netting-boxes which had been given her at different times, principally by Tom; and she grew bewildered as to the amount of the debt which all these kind remembrances produced. A tap at the door roused her in the midst of this attempt to find her way to her duty, and her gentle come in " was answered by the appear- ance of one, before whom all her doubts were wont to be laid. Her eyes brightened at the sight of Edmund. " Can I speak with you, Fanny, for a few minutes? said he. " Yes, certainly." I want to consult. I want your opinion." " My opinion! " she cried, shrinking from such a compli- ment, highly as it gratified her. " Yes, your advice and opinion. I do not know what to do. This acting scheme gets worse and worse, you see. They have chosen almost as bad a play as they could, and now, to complete the business, are going to ask the help of a young man very slightly known to any of us. This is the end of all the privacy and propriety which was talked about at first. I know no harm of Charles Maddox; but the excessive intimacy which must spring from his beng admitted among us in this manner is highly objectionable, the more than intimacy — the familiarity. I cannot think of it with any patience ; and it does appear to me an evil of such magnitude as must, if possible, be prevented. Do not you see it in the same light .^^ " ^*Yes; but what can be done.^ Your brother is so determined? " There is but one thing to be done, Fanny. I must take Anhalt myself. I am well aware that nothing else will quiet Tom." Fanny could not answer him. It is not at all what I like," he continued. " No man can like being driven into the appearance of such incon- {MANSFIELD PA%K 129 sistency. After being known to oppose the scheme from the beginning, there is absurdity in the face of my joining them now J when they are exceeding their first plan in every respect; but I can think of no other alternative. Can you, Fanny? No/' said Fanny slowly, " not immediately, but " But what? I see your judgment is not with me. Think it a httle over. Perhaps you are not so much aware as I am of the mischief that way, of the unpleasantness that must arise from a young man's being received in this manner; domesticated among us; authorised to come at all hours, and placed suddenly on a footing which must do away all restraints. To think only of the license which every rehearsal must tend to create. It is all very bad! Put yourself in Miss Crawford's place, Fanny. Consider what it would be to act Amelia with a stranger. She has a right to be felt for, because she evidently feels for herself. I heard enough of what she said to you last night, to understand her unwillingness to be acting with a stranger; and as she probably engaged in the part with different expectations — perhaps without considering the subject enough to know what was likely to be — it would be ungenerous, it would be really wrong to expose her to it. Her feelings ought to be respected. Does it not strike you so, Fanny ? You hesitate." I am sorry for Miss Crawford; but I am more sorry to see you drawn in to do what you had resolved against, and what you are known to think will be disagreeable to my uncle. It will be such a triumph to the others ! " " They will not have much cause of triumph when they see how infamously I act. But, however, triumph there certainly will be, and I must brave it. But if I can be the means of restraining the publicity of the business, of limiting the exhibition, of concentrating our folly, I shall be well repaid. As I am now, I have no influence, I can do nothing: I have offended them, and they will not hear me; but when I have put them in good humour by this concession, I am not without hopes of persuadmg them to confine the representa- tion within a much smaller circle than they are now in the high road for. This will be a material gain. My object is to confine it to Mrs. Rushworth and the Grants. Will not this be worth gaining? " Yes, it will be a great point." " But still it has not your approbation. Can you mention any other measure by which I have a chance of doing equal good?'' " No, I cannot think of anything else.'' " Give me your approbation, then, Fanny. I am not comfortable without it." ^'Oh, cousin!" " If you are against me, I ought to distrust myself, and yet . But it is absolutely impossible to let Tom go on in this way, riding about the country in quest of anybody who can be persuaded to act — no matter whom : the look of a gentleman is to be enough. I thought you would have entered more into Miss Crawford's feelings." " No doubt she will be very glad. It must be a great relief to her," said Fanny, trying for greater warmth of manner. She never appeared more amiable than in her behaviour to you last night. It gave her a very strong claim on my good-will." " She was very kind, indeed, and I am glad to have her spared " She could not finish the generous effusion. Her conscience stopt her in the middle, but Edmund was satisfied. I shall walk down immediately after breakfast," said he, and am sure of giving pleasure there. And now, dear Fanny, I will not interrupt you any longer. You want to be reading. But I could not be easy till I had spoken to you, and come to a decision. Sleeping or waking, my head has 'been full of this matter all night. It is an evil, but I am. certainly making it less than it might be. If Tom is up, I shall go to him directly and get it over, and when we meet at breakfast we shall be all in high good humour at the prospect of acting the fool together with such unanimity. You in the meanwhile v/ill be taking a trip into China, I suppose. How does Lord Macartney go on? (opening a volume on the table and then taking up some others.) And here are Crabbe's Tales, and the Idler, at hand to relieve you, if you tire of your great book. I admire your little establish- ment exceedingly ; and as soon as I am gone, you will empty your head of all this nonsense of acting, and sit comfortably down to your table. But do not stay here to be cold." mAV^SFIELD PA%K 131 He went ; but there was no reading, no China, no com- posure for Fanny. He had told her the most extraordinary, the most inconceivable, the most unwelcome news; and she could think of nothing else. To be acting! After all his objections — objections so just and so pubhc! After all that she had heard him say, and seen him look, and known him to be feeling. Could it be possible? Edmund so incon- sistent! Was he not deceiving himself? Was he not wrong? Alas! it was all Miss Crawford's doing. She had seen her influence in every speech, and was miserable. The' doubts and alarms as to her own conduct, which had previously distressed her, and which had all slept while she listened to him, were become of little consequence now. This deeper anxiety swallowed them up. Things should take their course; she cared not how it ended. Her cousins might attack, but could hardly tease her. She was beyond their reach; and if at last obliged to yield — no matter — it vvas all misery now. CH^PTE^ XVII It was, indeed, a trimphant day to Mr. Bertram and Maria. Such a victory over Edmund's discretion had been beyond their hopes, and was most delightful. There was no longer anything to disturb them in their darling project, and they congratulated each other in private on the jealous weakness to which they attributed the change, with all the glee of feelings gratified in every way. Edmund might still look grave, and say he did not like the scheme in general, and must disapprove the play in particular; their point was gained ; he was to act, and he was driven to it by the force of selfish inclinations only. Edmund had descended from that moral elevation which he had maintained before, and they were both as much the better as the happier for the descent. They behaved very well, however, to him on the occasion, betraying no exultation beyond the lines about the comers of the mouth, and seemed to think it as great an escape to be quit of the intrusion of Charles Maddox, as if they had been 132 ^A3<^FIELD PAT{K forced into admitting him against their inclination. '* To have it quite in their own family circle was what they had particularly wished. A stranger among them would have been the destruction of all their comfort; " and when Edmund, pursuing that idea, gave a hint of his hope as to the limita- tion of the audience, they were ready, in the complaisance of the moment, to promise anything. It was all good humour and encouragement. Mrs. Norris offered to contrive his dress, Mr. Yates assured him that Anhalt's last scene with the Baron admitted a good deal of action and emphasis, and Mr. Rushworth undertook to count his speeches. Perhaps,'' said Tom, " Fanny may be more disposed to oblige us now. Perhaps you may persuade her^ No, she is quite determined. She certainly will not act.'' " Oh! very well." And not another word was said; but Fanny felt herself again in danger, and her indifference to the danger was beginning to fail her already. There were not fewer smiles at the Parsonage than at the Park on this change in Edmund ; Miss Crawford looked very lovely in her's, and entered with such an instantaneous renewal of cheerfulness into the whole affair, as could have but one effect on him. " He was certainly right in respecting such feelings; he was glad he had determined on it." And the morning wore away in satisfactions very sweet, if not very sound. One advantage resulted from it to Fanny; at the earnest request of Miss Crawford, Mrs. Grant had, with her usual good humour, agreed to undertake the part for which Fanny had been wanted ; and this was all that occurred to gladden her heart during the day; and even this, when imparted by Edmund, brought a pang with it, for it was Miss Crawford to whom she was obliged; it was Miss Crawford whose kind exertions were to excite her gratitude, and whose meiit in making them was spoken of with a glow of admira- tion. She was safe ; but peace and safety were unconnected here. Her mind had been never farther from peace. She could not feel that she had done wrong herself, but she was disquieted in every other way. Her heart and her judgment were equally against Edmund's decision: she could not acquit his unsteadiness, and his happiness under it made her wretched. She was full of jealousy and agitation. Iviiss Crawford came with looks of gaiety which seemed an insult, MA^KSFIELD PA%K 133 with friendly expressions towards herself which she could hardly answer calmly. Everybody around her was gay and busy^ prosperous and important; each had their object of interest^ their part, their dress, their favourite scene, their friends and confederates: all were finding employment in consultations and comparisons, or diversion in the playful conceits they suggested. She alone was sad and insignificant ; she had no share in anything; she might go or stay; she might be in the midst of their noise, or retreat from it to the solitude of the East room, without being seen or missed. She could almost think anything would have been preferable to this. Mrs. Grant was of consequence: her good nature had honourable mention: her taste and her time were con- sidered; her presence was wanted; she was sought for and attended, and praised; and Fanny was at first in some danger of envying her the character she had accepted. But reflec- tion brought better feelings, and shewed her that Mrs. Grant was entitled to respect, which could never have belonged to her ; and that, had she received even the greatest, she could never have been easy in joining a scheme which, considering only her uncle, she must condemn altogether. ' Fanny's heart was not absolutely the only saddened one amongst them, as she soon began to acknowledge to herself. Julia was a sufferer, too, though not quite so blamelessly. Henry Crawford had trifled with her feelings; but she had very long allowed, and even sought his attentions with a jealousy of her sister so reasonable as ought to have been their cure ; and now that the conviction of his preference for Maria had been forced on her, she submitted to it without any alarm for Maria's situation, or any endeavour at rational tranquillity for herself. She either sat in gloomy silence, wrapt in such gravity as nothing could subdue, no curiosity touch, no wit amuse; or allowing the attentions of Mr. Yates, was talking with forced gaiety to him alone, and ridiculing the acting of the others. For a day or two after the affront was given Henry Craw- ford had endeavoured to do it away by the usual attack of gallantry and compliment, but he had not cared enough about it to persevere against a few repulses; and becoming soon too busy with his play to have time for more than one flirtation, he grew indifferent to the quarrel, or rather thought 134 mJHSFIELD PA%K it a lucky occurrence, as quietly putting an end to what might ere long have raised expectations in more than Mrs. Grant. She was not pleased to see Julia excluded from the play, and sitting by disregarded ; but as it was not a matter which really involved her happiness, as Henry must be the best judge of his own, and as he did assure her, with a most persuasive smile, that neither he nor Julia had ever had a serious thought of each other, she could only renew her former caution as to the elder sister, entreat him not to risk his tranquillity by too much admiration there, and then gladly take her share in anything that brought cheerfulness to the young people in general, and that did so particularly promote the pleasure of the two so dear to her. I rather wonder Julia is not in love with Henry,'' was her observation to Mary. I dare say she is," replied Mary coldly. I imagine both sisters are." Both! no, no, that must not be. Do not give him a hint of it. Think of Mr. Rushworth! " You had better tell Miss Bertram to think of Mr. Rush- worth. It may do her some good. I often think of Mr. Rushworth's property and independence, and wish them in other hands; but I never think of him, A man might represent the county with such an estate; a man might escape a profession and represent the county." I dare say he will be in parliament soon. W\itn Sir Thomas comes, I dare say he will be in for some borough, but there has been nobody to put him in the way of doing anything yet." " Sir Thomas is to achieve many mighty things when he comes home," said Mary, after a pause. Do you remember Hawkins Browne's ' Address to Tobacco,' in imitation of Pope?— ' Blest leaf! whose aromatic gales dispense To Templars modesty, to Parsons sense.' I will parody them — Blest Knight! whose dictatorial looks dispense To Children affluence, to Rushworth sense. Will not that do, Mrs. Grant Everything seems to depend upon Sir Thomas's return." 3IJ0iSFIELD PA%K 135 " You will find his consequence very just and reasonable when you see him in his family, I assure you. I do not think we do so well without him. He has a fine dignified manner, which suits the head of such a house, and keeps everybody in their place. Lady Bertram seems more of a cypher now than when he is at home; and nobody else can keep Mrs. Norris in order. But, Mary, do not fancy that Maria Bertram cares for Henry. I am sure Julia does not, or she would not have flirted as she did last night with Mr. Yates ; and though he and Maria are very good friends, I think she likes Sotherton too well to be inconstant.'' " I would not give much for Mr. Rush worth's chance, if Henry stept in before the articles were signed.'' " If you have such a suspicion, something must be done; and as soon as the play is all over, we will talk to him seri- ously, and make him know his own mind; and if he means nothing, we will send him off, though he is Henry, for a time." Julia did suffer, however, though Mrs. Grant discerned it not, and though it escaped the notice of many of her own family likewise. She had loved, she did love still, and she had all the suffering which a warm temper and a high spirit were likely to endure under the disappointment of a dear, though irrational hope, with a strong sense of ill-usage. Her heart was sore and angry, and she was capable only of angry consolations. The sister with whom she was used to be on easy terms was now become her greatest enemy: they were aliena^ted from each other; and Julia was not superior to the hope of some distressing end to the attentions which were still carrying on there, some punishment to Maria for conduct so shameful towards herself as well as towards Mr. Rushworth. With no material fault of temper, or difference of opinion, to prevent their being very good friends while their interests were the same, the sisters, under such a trial as this, had not affection or principle enough to make them merciful or just, to give them honour or compassion. Maria felt her triumph, and pursued her purpose, careless of Julia; and Julia could never see Maria distinguished by Henry Crawford without trusting that it would create jealousy, and bring a public disturbance at last. Fanny saw and pitied much of this in Julia ; but there was no outward fellowship between them. Julia made no com- 136 31A3^FIELD PA%K munication, and Fanny took no liberties. They were two solitary sufferers^ or connected only by Fanny's consciousness. The inattention of the two brothers and the aunt to Julia's discomposure, and their blindness to its true cause, must be imputed to the fulness of their own minds. They were totally preoccupied. Tom was engrossed by the concerns of his theatre, and saw nothing that did not immediately relate to it. Edmund, between his theatrical and his real part — between Miss Crawford's claims and his own conduct — be- tween love and consistency, was equally unobservant; and Mrs. Norris was too busy in contriving and directing the general little matters of the company, superintending their various dresses with economical expedient, for which nobody thanked her, and saving, with delighted integrity, half-a- crown here and there to the absent Sir Thomas, to have leisure for watching the behaviour, or guarding the happiness of his daughters. Everything was now in a regular train; theatre, actors, actresses, and dresses, were all getting forward ; but though no other great impediments arose, Fanny found, before many days were past, that it was not all uninterrupted enjoyment to the party themselves, and that she had not to witness the continuance of S'ach unanimity and delight, as had been almost too much for her at first. Everybody began to have their vexation. Edmund had many. Entirely against his judgment, a scene-painter arrived from town, and was at work, much to the increase of the expenses, and, what was worse, of the eclat of their proceedings; and his brother, instead of being really guided by him as to the privacy of the representation, was giving an invitation to every family who came in his way. Tom himself began to fret over the scene- painter's slow progress, and to feel the miseries of waiting. He had learned his part — all his parts, for he took every trifling one that could be united with the butler, and began to be impatient to be acting; and every day thus unemployed JklJO^FIELD PA%K 137 was tending to increase his sense of the insignificance of all his parts together, and make him more ready to regret that some other play had not been chosen. Fanny, being always a very courteous listener, and often the only listener at hand, came in for the complaints and the distresses of most of them. She knew that Mr. Yates was in general thought to rant dreadfully; that Mr. Yates was dis- appointed in Henry Crawford ; that Tom Bertram spoke so quick he would be unintelligible; that Mrs. Grant spoiled everything by laughing; that Edmund was behind-hand with his part, and that it was a misery to have anything to do with Mr. Rush worth, who was wanting a prompter through every speech. She knew, also, that poor Mr. Rushworth could seldom get anybody to rehearse with him: his com- plaint came before her as well as the rest; and so decided to her eye was her cousin Maria's avoidance of him, and so needlessly often the rehearsal of the first scene between her and Mr. Crawford, that she had soon all the terror of other complaints from him, V/ So far from being all satisfied and all enjoying, she found everybody requiring something they had not, and giving occasion of discontent to the others. Every- body had a part either too long or too short; nobody would attend as they ought; nobody would remember on which side they w^ere to come in ; nobody but the complainer would observe any directions. Fanny believed herself to derive as much innocent enjoy- ment from the play as any of them; Henry Crawford acted well, and it was a pleasure to her to creep into the theatre, and attend the rehearsal of the first act, in spite of the feel- ings it excited in some speeches for Maria. Maria, she also thought, acted well, too well; and after the first rehearsal or two, Fanny began to be their only audience, and sometimes as prompter, sometimes as spectator, was often very useful. As far as she could judge, Mr. Crawford was considerably the best actor of all; he had more confidence than Edmund, ' more judgment than Tom, more talent and taste than Mr. Yates. She did not like him as a man, but she must admit him to be the best actor, and on this point there were not many who differed from her. Mr. Yates, indeed, exclaimed against his tameness and insipidity; and the day came at last, when Mr. Rushworth turned to her with a black look, 138 3iA:K§FIELD PA1{K and said, " Do you think there is anything so very fine in all this? For the life and soul of me, I cannot admire him; and between ourselves, to see such an undersized, little, mean- looking man, set up for a fine actor, is very ridiculous in my opinion." From this moment there was a return of his former jealousy, which Maria, from increasing hopes of Crawford, was at little pains to remove, and the chances of Mr. Rush- worth's ever attaining to the knowledge of his two-and-forty speeches became much less. As to his ever making anything tolerable of them, nobody had the smallest idea of that except his mother; she, indeed, regretted that his part was not more considerable, and deferred coming over to Mansfield till they were forward enough in their rehearsal to comprehend all his scenes ; but the others aspired at nothing beyond his remem- bering the catch-word, and the first line of his speech, and being able to follow the prompter through the rest. Fanny, in her pity and kind-heartedness, was at great pains to teach him how to learn, giving him all the helps and directions in her power, trying to make an artificial memory for him, and learning every word of his part herself, but without his being much the forwarder. Many uncomfortable, anxious, apprehensive feelings she certainly had; but with all these, and other claims on her time and attention, she was as far from finding herself without employment or utility amongst them, as without a companion in uneasiness; quite as far from having no demand on her leisure as on her compassion. The gloom of her first anticipations was proved to have been unfounded. She was occasionally useful to all; she was perhaps as much at peace as any. There was a great deal of needlework to be done, moreover, in which her help was wanted; and that Mrs. Norris thought her quite as well off as the rest, was evident by the manner in which she claimed it: — Come, Fanny," she cried, these are fine times for you, but you must not be always walking from one room to the other, and doing the lookings-on at your ease, in this way ; I want you here. I have been slaving myself till I can hardly stand, to contrive Mr. Rushworth's cloak without sending for any more satin; and now I think you may give me your help in putting it together. There are mA3<^FIELD PJ^ 139 but three seams^ you may do them in a trice. It would be lucky for me if I had nothing but the executive part to do. You are best off, I can tell you: but if nobody did more than you J we should not get on very fast." Fanny took the work very quietly, without attempting any defence; but her kinder aunt Bertram observed on her behalf — " One cannot wonder, sister, that Fanny should be de- lighted; it is all new to her, you know; you and I used to be very fond of a play ourselves, and so am I still; and as soon as I am a Uttle more at leisure, I mean to look in at their rehearsals too. What is the play about, Fanny, you have never told me? "Oh! sister, pray do not ask her now; for Fanny is not one of those who can talk and work at the same time. It is about Lovers' Vows." " I believe," said Fanny to her aunt Bertram, " there will be three acts rehearsed to-morrow evening, and that will give you an opportunity of seeing all the actors at once." " You had better stay till the curtain is hung," interposed Mrs. Norris; " the curtain will be hung in a day or two — there is very little sense in a play without a curtain — and I am much mistaken if you do not find it draw up into very handsome festoons." Lady Bertram seemed quite resigned to waiting. Fanny did not share her aunt's composure; she thought of the morrow a great deal, for if the three acts were rehearsed, Edmund and Miss Crawford would then be acting together for the first time ; the third act would bring a scene between them which interested her most particularly, and which she was longing and dreading to see how they would perform. The whole subject of it was love — a marriage of love was to be described by the gentleman, and very little short of a declaration of love be made by the lady. She had read, and read the scene again with many painful, many wondering emotions, and looked forward to their representation of it as a circumstance almost too interesting. She did not believe they had yet rehearsed it, even in private. Hie morrow came, the plan for the evening continued, and Fanny's consideration of it did not become less agitated. She worked very diligently under her aunt's directions, 140 OdADiSFIELD PAT{K but her diligence and her silence concealed a very absent, anxious mind ; and about noon she made her escape with her work to the East room^ that she might have no concern in another^ and, as she deemed it, most unnecessary rehearsal of the first act, which Henry Crawford was just proposing, desirous at once of having her time to herself, and of avoid- ing the sight of Mr. Rushworth. A glimpse, as she passed through the hall, of the two ladies walking up from the Parsonage, made no change in her wish of retreat, and she worked and meditated in the East room, undisturbed, for a quarter of an hour, when a gentle tap at the door was followed by the entrance of Miss Crawford. "Am I right? Yes; this is the East room. My dear Miss Price, I beg your pardon, but I have made my way to you on purpose to entreat your help.'' Fanny, quite surprised, endeavoured to show herself mistress of the room by her civilities, and looked at the bright bars of her empty grate with concern. " Thank you; 1 am quite warm, very warm. Allow me to stay here a little while, and do have the goodness to hear me my third act. I have brought my book, and if you would but rehearse it with me, I should be so obliged! I came here to-day intending to rehearse it with Edmund — by ourselves — against the evening, but he is not in the way; and if he were, I do not think I could go through it with him, till I have hardened myself a little; for really there is a speech or two . You will be so good, won't you? " Fanny was most civil in her assurances, though she could not give them in a very steady voice. " Have you ever happened to look at the part I mean? " continued Miss Crawford, opening her book. " Here it is. I did not think much of it at first — but, upon my word . There, look at that speech, and that, and that. How am I ever to look him in the face and say such things ? Could you do it? But then he is your cousin, which makes all the differ- ence. You must rehearse it with me, that I may fancy you him, and get on by degrees. You have a look of his sometimes." " Have I? I will do my best with the greatest readiness; but I must read the part, for I can say very little of it." " None of it, I suppose. You are to have the book, of course. Now for it. We must have two chairs at hand for mAJiSFIELD PA%K 141 you to bring forward to the front of the stage. There — very good school-room chairs, not made for a theatre, I dare say ; much more fitted for Httle girls to sit and kick their feet against when they are learning a lesson. What would your governess and your uncle say to see them used for such a purpose? Could Sir Thomas look in upon us just now, he would bless himself, for we are rehearsing all over the house. Yates is storming away in the dining-room. I heard him as I came upstairs, and the theatre is engaged of course by those in- defatigable rehearsers, Agatha and Frederick. If they are not perfect, I shall be surprised. By-the-bye, I looked in upon them five minutes ago, and it happened to be exactly at one of the times when they were trying not to embrace, and Mr. Rushworth was with me. I thought he began to look a little queer, so I turned it ofE as well as I could, by whispering to him, * We shall have an excellent Agatha, there is something so maternal in her manner, so completely maternal in her voice and countenance.' Was not that well done of me? He brightened up directly. Now for my soliloquy." She began, and Fanny joined in with all the modest feeling which the idea of representing Edmund was so strongly calculated to inspire; but with looks and voice so truly feminine, as to be no very good picture of a man. With such an Anhalt, however, Miss Crawford had courage enough; and they had got through half the scene, when a tap at the door brought a pause, and the entrance of Edmund, the next moment, suspended it all. Surprise, consciousness, and pleasure, appeared in each of the three on this unexpected meeting; and as Edmund was come on the very same business that had brought Miss Crawford, consciousness and pleasure were likely to be more than momentary in them. He, too, had his book, and was seeking Fanny, to ask her to rehearse with him, and help him to prepare for the evening, without knowing Miss Crawford to be in the house; and great was the joy and animation of being thus thrown together, of comparing schemes, and sympathising in praise of Fanny's kind offices. She could not equal them in their warmth. Her spirits sank under the glow of theirs, and she felt herself becoming too nearly nothing to both, to have any comfort in having been sought by either. They must now rehearse together. 142 , 3^A3^FIELD PA'RK Edmund proposed^ urged^ entreated it, till the lady, not very unwilling at first, could refuse no longer, and Fanny was wanted only to prompt and observe them. She was invested, indeed, with the office of judge and critic, and earnestly desired to exercise it and tell them all their faults; but from doing so every feeling within her shrank — she could not, would not, dared not, attempt it: had she been otherwise qualified for criticism, her conscience must have restrained her from venturing at disapprobation. She believed herself to feel too much of it in the aggregate for honesty or safety in particulars. To prompt them must be enough for her; and it was sometimes more than enough; for she could not always pay attention to the book. In watching them she forgot herself; and, agitated by the increasing spirit of Edmund's manner, had once closed the page and turned away exactly as he wanted help. It was imputed to very reasonable weariness, and she was thanked and pitied ; but she deserved their pity more than she hoped they would ever surmise. At last the scene was over, and Fanny forced herself to add her praise to the compliments each was giving the other; and when again alone, and able to recall the whole, she was inclined to believe their performance would, indeed, have such nature and feeling in it as must ensure their credit, and make it a very suffering exhibition to herself. Whatever might be its effect, however, she must stand the brunt of it again that very day. The first regular rehearsal of the three first acts was certainly to take place in the evening: Mrs. Grant and the Crawfords were engaged to return for that purpose as soon as they could after dinner; and every one concerned was looking forward with eagerness. There seemed a general diffusion of cheerfulness on the occasion. Tom was enjoying such an advance towards the end; Edmund was in spirits from the morning's rehearsal, and little vexations seemed everywhere smoothed away. All were alert and impatient; the ladies moved soon, the gentlemen soon followed them, and with the exception of Lady Bertram, Mrs. Norris, and Julia, everybody was in the theatre at an early hour; and, having lighted it up as well as its unfinished state admitted, were waiting only the arrival of Mrs. Grant and the Craw- fords to begin. mAO^FIELD PA%K They did not wait long for the Crawfords, but there was no Mrs. Grant. She could not come. Dr. Grants professing an indisposition, for which he had little credit with his fair sister-m-law, could not spare his wife. " Dr. Grant is ill/' said she, with mock solemnity. He has been ill ever since he did not eat any of the pheasant to-day. He fancied it tough, sent away his plate, and has been suffering ever since." Here was disappointment! Mrs. Grant's non-attendance was sad indeed. Her pleasant manners and cheerful con- formity made her always valuable amongst them ; but now she was absolutely necessary. They could not act, they could not rehearse with any satisfaction without her. The comfort of the whole evening was destroyed. What was to be done } Tom, as Cottager, was in despair. After a pause of perplexity, some eyes began to be turned towards Fanny, and a voice or two to say, If Miss Price would be so good as to read the part." She was immediately surrounded by supplications, everybody asked it, even Edmund said, " Do, Fanny, if it is not very disagreeable to you." But Fanny still hung back. She could not endure the idea of it. Why was not Miss Crawford to be applied to as well? Or why had not she rather gone to her own room, as she had felt to be safest, instead of attending the rehearsal at all? She had known it would irritate and distress her; she had known it her duty to keep away. She was properly punished. " You have only to read the part," said Henry Crawford, with renewed entreaty. " And I do believe she can say every word of it," added Maria, " for she could put Mrs. Grant right the other day in twenty places. Fanny, I am sure you know the part." Fanny could not say she did not; and as they all per- severed, as Edmund repeated his wish, and with a look of even fond dependence on her good nature, she must yield. She would do her best. Everybody was satisfied; and she was left to the tremors of a most palpitating heart, while the others prepared to begin. They did begin; and being too much engaged in their own noise to be struck by an [unusual] noise in the other part of the house, had proceeded some way, when the door of the 144 31 ASiS FIELD PA%K room was thrown open, and Julia, appearing at it, with a face all aghast, exclaimed, My father is come I He is in the hall at this moment." How is the consternation of the party to be described ? To the greater number it was a moment of absolute horror. Sir Thomas in the house ! All felt the instantaneous conviction. Not a hope of imposition or mistake was harboured anywhere. Julia's looks were an evidence of the fact that made it indis- putable; and after the first starts and exclamations, not a word was spoken for half a minute; each with an altered countenance was looking at some other, and almost each was feeling it a stroke the most unwelcome, most ill-timed, most appalling ! Mr. Yates might consider it only as a vexatious interruption for the evening, and Mr. Rushworth might imagine it a blessing; but every other heart was sinking under some degree of self-condemnation or undefined alarm, every other heart was suggesting, " What will become of us? what is to be done now? '' It was a terrible pause; and terrible to every ear were the corroborating sounds of opening doors and passing footsteps. Julia was the first to move and speak again. Jealousy and bitterness had been suspended: selfishness was lost in the common cause; but at the moment of her appearance, Frederick was listening with looks of devotion to Agatha's narrative, and pressing her hand to his heart; and as soon as she could notice this, and see that, in spite of the shock of her words, he still kept his station and retained her sister's hand, her wounded heart swelled again with injury, and looking as red as she had been white before, she turned out of the room, saying, / need not be afraid of appearing before him." Her going roused the rest; and at the same moment the two brothers stepped forward, feeling the necessity of doing something. A very few words between them were sufficient. The case admitted no difference of opinion ; they must go to mA:KSFIELD PA%K 145 the drawing-room directly. Maria joined them with the same intent_, just then the stoutest of the three; for the very cir- cumstance which had driven Julia away was to her the sweetest support. Henry Crawford's retaining her hand at such a moment, a moment of such peculiar proof and im- portance, was worth ages of doubt and anxiety. She hailed it as an earnest of the most serious determination, and was equal even to encounter her father. They walked off, utterly heedless of Mr. Rushworth's requested question of, Shall I go too ? Had not I better go too ? Will not it be right for me to go too.^ " but they were no sooner through the door than Henry Crawford undertook to answer the anxious inquiry, and, encouraging him by all means to pay his respects to Sir Thomas without delay, sent him after the others with delighted haste. Fanny was left with only the Crawfords and Mr. Yates. She had been quite overlooked by her cousins; and as her own opinion of her claims on Sir Thomas's affection was much too humble to give her any idea of classing herself with his children, she was glad to remain behind and gain a little breathing-time. Her agitation and alarm exceeded all that was endured by the rest, by the right of a disposition which not even innocence could keep from suffering. She was nearly fainting: all her former habitual dread of her uncle was returning, and with it compassion for him and for almost every one of the party on the development before him, with solicitude on Edmund's account indescribable. She had found a seat, where in excessive trembling she was enduring all these fearful thoughts, while the other three, no longer under any restraint, were giving vent to their feelings of vexa- tion, lamenting over such an unlooked-for premature arrival as a most untoward event, and without mercy whistling poor Sir Thomas had been twice as long on his passage, or were still in Antigua. The Crawfords were more warm on the subject than Mr. Yates, from better understanding the family, and judging more clearly of the mischief that must ensue. The ruin of the play was to them a certainty: they felt the total destruc- tion of the scheme to be inevitably at hand; while Mr. Yates considered it only as a temporary interruption, a disaster for the evening, and could even suggest the possibiUty of the 146 :mao^field pa%k rehearsal being renewed after tea, when the bustle of receiv- ing Sir Thomas were over, and he might be at leisure to be amused by it. The Crawfords laughed at the idea; and having soon agreed on the propriety of their walking quietly home and leaving the family to themselves, proposed Mr. Yates's accompanying them and spending the evening at the Parsonage. But Mr. Yates, having never been with those who thought much of parental claims, or family confidence, could not perceive that anything of the kind was necessary ; and therefore, thanking them, said, " he preferred remaining where he was, that he might pay his respects to the old gentleman handsomely, since he was come; and besides, he did not think it would be fair by the others, to have everybody run away.'' Fanny was just beginning to collect herself, and to feel that if she staid longer behind it might seem disrespectful, when this point was settled, and being commissioned with the brother and sister's apology, saw them preparing to go as she quitted the room herself to perform the dreadful duty of appearing before her uncle. Too soon did she find herself at the drawing-room door; and after pausing a moment for what she knew would not come, for a courage which the outside of no door had ever supplied to her, she turned the lock in desperation, and the lights of the drawing-room, and all the collected family, were before her. As she entered, her own name caught her ear. Sir Thomas was at that moment looking round him, and saying, But where is Fanny? Why do not I see my httie Fanny ? " — and, on perceiving her, came forward with a kindness which astonished and penetrated her, calling her his dear Fanny, kissing her affectionately, and obsei*\'ing vvdth decided pleasure how much she was grown! Fanny knew not how to feel, nor where to look. She was quite oppressed. He had never been so kind, so very kind to her in his life. His manner seemed changed, his voice was quick from the agitation of joy; and all that had been awful in his dignity seemed lost in tenderness. He led her nearer the light and looked at her again — inquired particularly after her health, and then correcting himself, observed, that he need not inquire, for her appearance spoke sufiiciently on that point. A fine blush having succeeded the previous paleness of her face, mA^KSFIELD PA%K 147 he was justified in his belief of her equal improvement in health and beauty. He inquired next after her family^ especially William; and his kindness altogether was such as made her reproach herself for loving him so little^ and thinking his return a misfortune; and when, on having courage to lift her eyes to his face, she saw that he was grown thinner, and had the burnt, fagged, worn look of fatigue and a hot climate, every tender feeling was increased, and she was miserable in considering how much unsuspected vexation was probably ready to burst on him. Sir Thomas was indeed the life of the party, who at his suggestion now seated themselves round the fire. He had the best right to be the talker; and the delight of his sensa- tions in being again in his own house, in the centre of his family, after such a separation, made him communicative and chatty in a very unusual degree; and he was ready to give every information as to his voyage, and answer every ques- tion of his two sons almost before it was put. His business in Antigua had latterly been prosperously rapid, and he came directly from Liverpool, having had an opportunity of making his passage thither in a private vessel, instead of waiting for the packet; and all the little particulars of his proceedings and events, his arrivals and departures, were most promptly delivered, as he sat by Lady Bertram and looked with heart- felt satisfaction on the faces around him — interrupting him- self more than once, however, to remark on his good fortune in finding them all at home — coming unexpectedly as he did — all collected together exactly as he could have wished, but dared not depend on. Mr. Rush worth v/as not forgotten; a most friendly reception and warmth of hand-shaking had already met him, and with pointed attention he was now included in the objects most intimately connected with Mansfield. There was nothing disagreeable in Mr. Rush- worth's appearance, and Sir Thomas was liking him already. By not one of the circle was he Hstened to with such un- broken, unalloyed enjoyment as by his wife, who was really extremely happy to see him, and whose feelings were so warmed by his sudden arrival, as to place her nearer agitation than she had been for the last twenty years. She had been almost fluttered for a few minutes, and still remained so sensibly animated as to put away her work, move Pug from 148 3iA3iSFIELD PA%K her side, and give all her attention and all the rest of her sofa to her husband. She had no anxieties for anybody to cloud her pleasure: her own time had been irreproachably spent during his absence: she had done a great deal of carpet work^ and made many yards of fringe; and she would have answered as freely for the good conduct and useful pursuits of all the young people as for her own. It was so agreeable to her to see him again^ and hear him talk^ to have her ear amused and her whole comprehensions filled by his narratives^ that she began particularly to feel how dreadfully she must have missed him, and how impossible it would have been for her to bear a lengthened absence. Mrs. Norris was by no means to be compared in happiness to her sister. Not that she was incommoded by many fears of Sir Thomas's disapprobation when the present state of his house should be known, for her judgment had been so blinded that, except by the instinctive caution with which she had whisked away Mr. Rushworth's pink satin cloak as her brother-in-law entered, she could hardly be said to shew any sign of alarm; but she was vexed by the manner of his return. It had left her nothing to do. Instead of being sent for out of the room^ and seeing him first, and having to spread the happy news through the house. Sir Thomas, with a very reasonable dependence, perhaps, on the nerves of his wife and children, had sought no confidant but the butler, and had been following him almost instantaneously into the drawing-room. Mrs. Norris felt herself defrauded of an office on which she had always depended, whether his arrival or his death were to be the thing unfolded; and was now trying to be in a bustle without having anything to bustle about, and labouring to be important where nothing was wanted but tranquillity and silence. Would Sir Thomas have consented to eat, she might have gone to the house- keeper with troublesome directions, and insulted the footmen with injunctions of despatch; but Sir Thomas resolutely declined all dinner: he would take nothing, nothing till tea came — he would rather wait for tea. Still Mrs. Norris was at intervals urging something different; and in the most interesting moment of his passage to England, when the alarm of a French privateer was at the height, she burst through his recital with the proposal of soup. " Sure, my mJDiSFlELD PA%K dear Sir Thomas, a basin of soup would be a i. a. thing for you than tea. Do have a basin of soup.'' Sir Thomas could not be provoked. " Still tht anxiety for everybody's comfort, my dear Mrs. Norris/ his answer. ^' But indeed I would rather have nothing L ' tea." " Well, then, Lady Bertram, suppose you speak for tea directly; suppose you hurry Baddeley a little; he seems behind hand to-night." She carried this point, and Sir Thomas's narrative proceeded. At length there was a pause. His immediate communica- tions were exhausted, and it seemed enough to be looking joyfully around him, now at one, now at another of the beloved circle; but the pause was not long: in the elation of her spirits Lady Bertram became talkative, and what were the sensations of her children upon hearing her say, " How do you think the young people have been amusing themselves lately, Sir Thomas ? They have been acting. We have been all alive with acting." Indeed! and what have you been acting? " " Oh! they'll tell you all about it." The all will soon be told," cried Tom hastily, and with affected unconcern; " but it is not worth while to bore my father with it now. You will hear enough of it to-morrow, sir. We have just been trying, by v/ay of doing something, and amusing my mother, just within the last week, to get up a few scenes, a mere trifle. We have had such incessant rains almost since October began, that we have been nearly confined to the house for days together. I have hardly taken out a gun since the 3rd. Tolerable sport the first three days, but there has been no attempting anything since. The first day I went over Mansfield Wood, and Edmund took the copses beyond Easton, and we brought home six brace between us, and might each have killed six times as many; but we respect your pheasants, sir, I assure you, as much as you could desire. I do not think you will find your woods by any means worse stocked than they were. I never saw Mansfield Wood so full of pheasants in my life as this year. I hope you will take a day's sport there yourself, sir, soon." For the present the danger was over, and Fanny's sick feelings subsided; but when tea was soon afterwards brought 3\4A3KSFIELD PA%K Thomas^ getting up^ said that he found that he ,J be any longer in the house without just looking iS own dear room, every agitation was returning. He gone before anything had been said to prepare him for ue change he must find there; and a pause of alarm followed his disappearance. Edmund was the first to speak — " Something must be done/' said he. " It is time to think of our visitors/' said Maria, still feeling her hand pressed to Henry Crawford's heart, and caring little for anything else. " Where did you leave Miss Craw- ford, Fanny? " Fanny told of their departure, and delivered their message. Then poor Yates is all alone," cried Tom. I will go and fetch him. He will be no bad assistant when it all comes out." To the theatre he went, and reached it just in time to witness the first meeting of his father and his friend. Sir Thomas had been a good deal surprised to find candles burning in his room; and on casting his eye round it, to see other symptoms of recent habitation and a general air of confusion in the furniture. The removal of the book-case from before the billiard-room door struck him especially, but he had scarcely more than time to feel astonished at all this, before there were sounds from the billiard-room to astonish him still further. Some one was talking there in a very loud accent; he did not know the voice — more than talking — almost hallooing. He stepped to the door, rejoicing at that moment in having the means of immediate communica- tion, and, opening it, found himself on the stage of a theatre, and opposed to a ranting young man, who appeared likely to knock him down backwards. At the very moment of Yates perceiving Sir Thomas, and giving perhaps the very best start he had ever given in the whole course of his rehearsals, Tom Bertram entered at the other end of the room; and never had he found greater difficulty in keeping his counten- ance. His father's looks of solemnity and amazement on this, his first appearance on any stage, and the gradual metamorphosis of the impassioned Baron Wildenheim into the well-bred and easy Mr. Yates, making his bow and apology to Sir Thomas Bertram, was such an exhibition, such a piece of true acting, as he would not have lost upon any rMJO^FIELD PAI^K 151 account. It would be the last — in all probability — the last scene on that stage ; but he was sure there could not be a finer. The house would close with the greatest eclat. There was little time^ however^ for the indulgence of any images of merriment. It was necessary for him to step forward^ too^ and assist the introduction, and with many awkward sensations he did his best. Sir Thomas received Mr. Yates with all the appearance of cordiality which was due to his own character, but was really as far from pleased with the necessity of the acquaintance as with the manner of its commencement. Mr. Yates's family and connections were sufficiently known to him, to render his introduction as the " particular friend/' another of the hundred particular friends of his son, exceedingly unwelcome ; and it needed all the felicity of being again at home, and all the forbearance it could supply, to save Sir Thomas from anger on finding himself thus bewildered in his own home, making part of a ridiculous exhibition in the midst of theatrical nonsense, and forced in so untoward a moment to admit the acquaint- ance of a young man whom he felt sure of disapproving, and whose easy indifference and volubility in the course of the first five minutes seemed to mark him the most at home of the two. Tom understood his father's thoughts, and heartily wishing he might be always as well disposed to give them but partial expression, began to see more clearly than he had ever done before, that there might be some ground of offence, that there might be some reason for the glance his father gave towards the ceiling and stucco of the room ; and that when he inquired with mild gravity after the fate of the billiard-table, he was not proceeding beyond a very allowable curiosity. A few minutes were enough for such unsatisfactory sensations on each side; and Sir Thomas having exerted himself so far as to speak a few words of calm approbation in reply to an eager appeal of Mr. Yates, as to the happiness of the arrangement, the three gentlemen returned to the drawing-room together, Sir Thomas with an increase of gravity which was not lost on all. " I come from your theatre," said he, composedly, as he sat down; " I found myself in it rather unexpectedly. Its vicinity to my own room — but in every respect, indeed, it 152 04 A:KS FIELD PA%K took me by surprise^ as I had not the smallest suspicion of your acting having assumed so serious a character. It appears a neat job, however, as far as I could judge by candle- light, and does my friend Christopher Jackson credit/' And then he would have changed the subject, and sipped his coffee in peace over domestic matters of a calmer hue; but Mr. Yates, without discernment to catch Sir Thom.as's mean- ing, or diffidence, or delicacy, or discretion enough to allow him to lead the discourse while he mingled among the others with the least obtrusiveness himself, would keep him on the topic of the theatre, would torment liim with questions and remarks relative to it, and finally would make him hear the whole history of his disappointment at Ecclesford. Sir Thomas listened most politely, but found much to offend his ideas of decorum, and confirm his ill opinion of Mr. Yates's habits of thinking, from the beginning to the end of the story ; and when it was over, could give him no other assurance of sympathy than what a slight bow conveyed. " This was, in fact, the origin of our acting,'' said Tom, after a moment's thought. " My friend Yates brought the infection from Ecclesford, and it spread — as those things always spread, you know, sir — the faster, probably from your having so often encouraged the sort of thing in us formerly. It was like treading old ground again." Mr. Yates took the subject from his friend as soon as pos- sible, and immediately gave Sir Thomas an account of what they had done and were doing; told him of the gradual increase of their views, the happy conclusion of their first difficulties, and present promising state of affairs; relating everything with so blind an interest as made him not only totally unconscious of the uneasy movements of many of his friends as they sat, the change of countenance, the fidget, the hem ! of unquietness, but prevented him even from seeing the expression of the face on which his own eyes were fixed — from seeing Sir Thomas's dark brow contract as he looked with inquiring earnestness at his daughters and Edmund, dwelling particularly on the latter, and speaking a language, a remonstrance, a reproof, which he felt at his heart. Not less acutely was it felt by Fanny, who had edged back her chair behind her aunt's end of the sofa, and, screened from notice herself, saw all that was passing before her. Such a MJ3KSFIELD PA%K 153 look of reproach at Edmund from his father she could never have expected to witness; and to feel that it was in any degree deserved was an aggravation indeed. Sir Thomas's look implied^ On your judgment^ Edmund, I depended; what have you been about? " She knelt in spirit to her uncle, and her bosom swelled to utter, " Oh, not to him 1 Look so to all the others, but not to him I " Mr. Yates was still talking. " To own the truth. Sir Thom.as, we were in the middle of a rehearsal when you arrived this evening. We were going through the three first acts, and not unsuccessfully upon the whole. Our company is now so dispersed, from the Crawfords being gone home, that nothing more can be done to-night; but if you will give us the honour of your company to-morrow evening, I should not be afraid of the result. We bespeak your indulgence, you understand, as young performers; we bespeak your indulgence.'' " My indulgence shall be given, sir," repHed Sir Thomas gravely, but without any other rehearsal." And with a relenting smile he added, I come home to be happy and indulgent." Then turning away towards any or all of the rest, he tranquilly said, Mr. and Miss Crawford were men- tioned in my last letters from Mansfield. Do you find them agreeable acquaintance? " Tom v/as the only one at all ready with an answer, but he being entirely without particular regard for either, without jealousy either in love or acting, could speak very handsomely of both. Mr. Crawford was a most pleasant gentlemanlike man; his sister a sweet, pretty, elegant, lively girl." Mr. Rushworth could be silent no longer. I do not say he is not gentlemanlike, considering; but you should tell your father he is not above five feet eight, or he will be expecting a well-looking man." Sir Thomas did not quite understand this, and looked with some surprise at the speaker. If I must say what I think," continued Mr. Rushworth, *^ in my opinion it is very disagreeable to be always rehears- ing. It is having too much of a good thing. I am not so fond of acting as I was at first. I think we are a great deal better employed, sitting comiortably here among ourselves^ apd doing nothing." 154 MA^K^FIELD PA%K Sir Thomas looked again, and then replied with an ap- proving smile, I am happy to find our sentiments on this subject so much the same. It gives me sincere satisfaction. That I should be cautious and quick-sighted, and feel many- scruples which my children do not feel, is perfectly natural; and equally so that my value for domestic tranquillity, for a home which shuts out noisy pleasures, should much exceed theirs. But at your time of life to feel all this, is a most favourable circumstance for yourself, and for everybody con- nected with you; and I am sensible of the importance of having an ally of such weight.'' Sir Thomas meant to be giving Mr. Rushworth's opinion in better words than he could find himself. He was aware that he must not expect a genius in Mr. Rushworth; but as a well- judging, steady young man, with better notions than his elocution would do justice to, he intended to value him very highly. It was impossible for many of the others not to smile. Mr. Rushworth hardly knew what to do with so much meaning; but by looking, as he really felt, most ex- ceedingly pleased with Sir Thomas's good opinion, and saying scarcely anything, he did his best towards preserving that good opinion a little longer. CH^PTE^^XX Edmund's first object the next morning was to see his father alone, and give him a fair statement of the whole acting scheme, defending his own share in it as far only as he could then, in a soberer moment, feel his motives to deserve, and acknowledging, with perfect ingenuousness, that his conces- sion had been attended with such partial good as to make his judgment in it very doubtful. He was anxious, while vindicating himself, to say nothing unkind of the others; but there was only one amongst them whose conduct he could mention without some necessity of defence or palliation. " We have all been more or less to blame," said he, " every one of us, excepting Fanny. Fanny is the only one who has judged rightly throughout; who has been consistent. H^r MAJiSFIELD FA%K 155 feelings have been steadily against it from first to last. She never ceased to think of what was due to you. You will find Fanny everything you could wish." Sir Thomas saw all the impropriety of such a scheme among such a party^ and at such a time, as strongly as his son had ever supposed he must; he felt it too much, indeed, for many words; and having shaken hands with Edmund, meant to try to lose the disagreeable impression, and forget how much he had been forgotten himself as soon as he could, after the house had been cleared of every object enforcing the remem- brance, and restored to its proper state. He did not enter into any remonstrance with his other children : he was more willing to believe they felt their error, than to run the risk of investigation. The reproof of an immediate conclusion of everything, the sweep of every preparation, would be sufficient. There was one person, however, in the house, whom he could not leave to learn his sentiments merely through his conduct. He could not help giving Mrs. Norris a hint of his having hoped, that her advice might have been interposed to prevent what her judgment must certainly have disapproved. The young people had been very inconsiderate in forming the plan; they ought to have been capable of a better decision themselves ; but they were young ; and, excepting Edmund, he believed, of unsteady characters; and with greater sur- prise, therefore, he must regard her acquiescence in their wrong measures, her countenance of their unsafe amusements, than that such measures and such amusements should have been suggested. Mrs. Norris was a little confounded and as nearly being silenced as ever she had been in her life ; for she was ashamed to confess having never seen any of the impro- priety which was so glaring to Sir Thomas, and would not have admitted that her influence was insufficient — that she might have talked in vain. Her only resource was to get out of the subject as fast as possible, and turn the current of Sir Thomas's ideas into a happier channel. She had a great deal to insinuate in her own praise as to general attention to the interest and comfort of his family, much exertion and many sacrifices to glance at in the form of hurried walks and sudden removals from her own fireside, and many excellent hints of distrust and economy to Lady Bertram and Edmund Z56 PA%K to detail^ whereby a most considerable saving had always arisen, and more than one bad servant been detected. But her chief strength lay in Sotherton. Her greatest support and glory was in having formed the connection with the Rush- worths. There she was impregnable. She took to herself all the credit of bringing Mr. Rushworth's admiration of Maria to any ejffect. If I had not been active/' said she, and made a point of being introduced to his mother, and then prevailed on my sister to pay the first visit, I am as certain as I sit here that nothing would have come of it ; for Mr. Rushworth is the sort of amiable modest young man who wants a great deal of encouragement, and there were girls enough on the catch for him if we had been idle. But I left no stone unturned. I was ready to move heaven and earth to persuade my sister, and at last I did persuade her. You know the distance to Sotherton ; it was in the middle of winter, and the roads almost impassable, but I did persuade her.'' " I know how great, how justly great, your influence is with Lady Bertram and her children, and am the more con- cerned that it should not have been — " " My dear Sir Thomas, if you had seen the state of the roads that day ! I thought we should never have got through them, though we had the four horses of course ; and poor old coachman would attend us, out of his great love and kind- ness, though he was hardly able to sit the box on account of the rhemnatism which I had been doctoring him for ever since Michaelmas. I cured him at last; but he was very bad all the winter — ^and this was such a day, I could not help going to him up in his room before we set off to advise him not to venture : he was putting on his wig ; so I said, ' Coach- man, you had much better not go ; your Lady and I shall be very safe; you know how steady Stephen is, and Charles has been upon the leaders so often now, that I am sure there is no fear.' But, however, I soon found it would not do; he was bent upon going, and as I hate to be worrying and offi- cious, I said no more; but my heart quite ached for him at ever jolt, and when we got into the rough lanes about Stoke, where, what with frost and snow upon beds of stones, it was worse than anything you can imagine, I was quite in an agony about him. And then the poor horses tool To see mAHSFIELD PA%K 157 them straining away ! You know how I alwa3^s feel for the horses. And when we got to the bottom of Sandcroft Hill, what do you think I did ? r You will laugh at me ; but I got out and walked up. I did indeed. It might not be saving them much^ but it was somethings and I could not bear to sit at my ease, and be dragged up at the expense of those noble animals. I caught a dreadful cold, but that I did not regard. My object was accomplished in the visit." " I hope we shall always think the acquaintance worth any trouble that might be taken to establish it. There is nothing very striking in Mr. Rushworth's manners, but I was pleased last night with what appeared to be his opinion on one sub- ject; his decided preference of a quiet family party to the bustle and confusion of acting. He seemed to feel exactly as one could wish." Yes, indeed, and the more you know of him the better I you will like him. He is not a shining character, but he has a thousand good qualities; and is so disposed to look up to you, that I am quite laughed at about it, for everybody con- siders it as my doing. ' Upon my word, Mrs. Norris,' said Mrs. Grant, the other day, ' if Mr. Rushworth were a son of your own, he could not hold Sir Thomas in greater respect.' " Sir Thomas gave up the point, foiled by her evasions, dis- armed by her flattery; and was obliged to rest satisfied with the conviction that where the present pleasure of those she loved was at stake, her kindness did sometimes overpower her judgment. It was a busy morning with him. Conversation with any of them occupied but a small part of it. He had to reinstate himself in all the wonted concerns of his Mansfield life; to see his steward and his bailiff ; to examine and compute, and, in the intervals of business, to walk into his stables and his gardens, and nearest plantations ; but active and methodical, he had not only done all this before he resumed his seat as master of the house at dinner, he had also set the carpenter ' to work in pulling down what had been so lately put up in the billiard-room, and given the scene-painter his dismissal, ' long enough to justify the pleasing belief of his being then at least as far off as Northampton. The scene-painter was ..J gone, having spoilt only the floor of one room, ruined all the coachman's sponges, and made five of the under servants idle 158 mA3iSFIELD PA%K and dissatisfied; and Sir Thomas was in hopes that another day or two would suffice to wipe away every outward memento of what had been^ even to the destruction of every unbound copy of Lovers' Vows " in the house^ for he was burning all that met his eye. Mr. Yates was beginning now to understand Sir Thomas's intentions, though as far as ever from understanding their source. He and his friend had been out with their guns the chief of the morning, and Tom had taken the opportunity of explaining, with proper apologies for his father's particularity, what was to be expected. Mr. Yates felt it as acutely as might be supposed. To be a second time disappointed in the same way was an instance of very severe ill luck; and his indignation was such, that had it not been for delicacy to- wards his friend, and his friend's youngest sister, he beheved he should certainly attack the baronet on the absurdity of his proceedings, and argue him into a little more rationality. He believed this very stoutly while he was in Mansfield Wood, and all the way home; but there was a something in Sir Thomas, when they sat round the same table, which made Mr. Yates think it wiser to let him pursue his own way, and feel the folly of it without opposition. He had known many disagreeable fathers before, and often been struck with the inconveniences they occasioned, but never, in the whole course of his life, had he seen one of that class, so unintelli- gibly moral, so infamously tyrannical as Sir Thomas. He v/as not a man to be endured but for his children's sake, and he might be thankful to his fair daughter Julia that Mr. Yates did yet mean to stay a few days longer under his roof. The evening passed with external smoothness, though almost every mind was ruffled; and the music which Sir Thomas called for from his daughters helped to conceal the w^ant of real harmony. Maria was in a good deal of agita- tion. It was of the utmost consequence to her that Crawford should now lose no time in declaring himself, and she was disturbed that even a day should be gone by without seeming to advance that point. She had been expecting to see him the whole morning, and all the evening, too, was still expect- ing him. Mr. Rushworth had set off early with the great news for Sotherton; and she had fondly hoped for such an inmiediate eclaircissement as might save him the trouble of mA:KSFIELD PA%K 159 ever coming back again. But they had seen no one from the Parsonage, not a creature, and had heard no tidings beyond a friendly note of congratulation and inquiry from Mrs. Grant to Lady Bertram. It was the first day for many, many weeks, in which the families had been wholly divided. Four- and-twenty hours had never passed before, since August began, without bringing them together in some way or other. It was a sad anxious day; and the morrow, though differ- ing in the sort of evil, did by no means bring less. A few moments of feverish enjoyment were followed by hours of acute suffering. Henry Crawford was again in the house: he walked up with Dr. Grant, who was anxious to pay his respects to Sir Thomas, and at rather an early hour they were ushered into the breakfast room, where were most of the family. Sir Thomas soon appeared, and Maria saw with delight and agitation the introduction of the man she loved to her father. Her sensations were indefinable, and so were they a few minutes afterwards upon hearing Henry Crawford, who had a chair between herself and Tom, ask the latter in an under voice, whether there were any plans for resuming the play after the present happy interruption (with a cour- teous glance at Sir Thomas), because, in that case, he should make a point of returning to Mansfield at any time required by the party : he was going away immediately, being to meet his uncle at Bath without delay : but if there were any pros- pect of a renewal of Lovers' Vows, he should hold himself positively engaged, he should break through every other claim; he should absolutely condition with his uncle for attending them whenever he might be wanted. The play should not be lost by his absence. From Bath, Norfolk, London, York; wherever I may be," said he: ''I will attend you from any place in England, at an hour's notice." It was well at that moment that Tom had to speak and not his sister. He could immediately say with easy fluency, " I am sorry you are going; but as to our play, that is all over — entirely at an end — (looking significantly at his father). The painter was sent off yesterday, and very little will remain of the theatre to-morrow. I knew how that would be from the first. It is early for Bath. You will find nobody there." It is about my uncle's usual time." i6o aiAJ<^FIELD PA%K When do you think of going? " I may, perhaps, get as far as Banbury to-day." "Whose stables do you use at Bath?" was the next question; and while this branch of the subject was under discussion, Maria, who wanted neither pride nor resolution, was preparing to encounter her share of it with tolerable calmness. To her he soon turned, repeating much of what he had already said, with only a softened air and stronger expressions of regret. But what availed his expressions or his air ? He was going, and, if not voluntarily going, voluntarily intend- ing to stay away; for, excepting what might be due to his uncle, his engagements were all self-imposed. He might talk of necessity, but she knew his independence. The hand which had so pressed her's to his heart! the hand and the heart were alike motionless and passive now! Her spirit supported her, but the agony of her mind was severe. She had not long to endure what arose from listening to language which his actions contradicted, or to bury the tumult of her feelings under the restraint of society ; for general civilities soon called his notice from her, and the farewell visit, as it then became openly acknowledged, was a very short one. He was gone — he had touche.1 her hand for the last time, he had made his parting bow, and she might seek directly all that solitude could do for her. Henry Crawford was gone, gone from the house, and within two hours afterwards from the parish; and so ended all the hopes his selfish vanity had raised in Maria and Julia Bertram. Julia could rejoice that he was gone. His presence was beginning to be odious to her ; and if Maria gained him not, she was now cool enough to dispense with any other revenge. She did not want exposure to be added to desertion. Henry Crawford gone, she could even pity her sister. With a purer spirit did Fanny rejoice in the intelligence. She heard it at dinner, and felt it a blessing. By all the others it was mentioned with regret; and his merits honoured with due gradation of feeling, from the sincerity of Edmund's too partial regard, to the unconcern of his mother speaking entirely by rote. Mrs. Norris began to look about her, and wonder that bis falling in love with Julia had come to nothing : and could almost fear that she had been remiss herself in rMJS^FIELD PA%K i6i forwarding it; but with so many to care for, how was it possible for even her activity to keep pace with her wishes ? Another day or two, and Mr. Yates was gone Hkewise. In his departure Sir Thomas felt the chief interest; wanting to be alone with his family, the presence of a stranger superior to Mr. Yates must have been irksome; but of him, trifling and confident, idle and expensive, it was every way vexatious. In himself he was wearisome, but as the friend of Tom and the admirer of Julia he became offensive. Sir Thomas had been quite indifferent to Mr. Crawford's going or staying; but his good wishes for Mr. Yates's having a pleasant journey, as he walked with him to the hall door, were given with genuine satisfaction. Mr. Yates had staid to see the destruc- tion of every theatrical preparation at Mansfield, the removal of everything appertaining to the play: he left the house in all the soberness of its general character; and Sir Thomas hoped, in seeing him out of it, to be rid of the worst object connected with the scheme, and the last that must be inevitably reminding him of its existence. Mrs. Norris contrived to remove one article from his sight that might have distressed him. The curtain over which she had presided with such talent and such success, went off with her to her cottage, where she happened to be particularly in want of green baize. CH^PTE%^XXI Sir Thomas's return made a striking change in the ways of the family, independent of Lovers' Vows. Under his govern- ment, Mansfield was an altered place. Some members of their society sent away, and the spirits of many others saddened — it was all sameness and gloom compared with the past — a sombre family party rarely enlivened. There was little intercourse with the Parsonage. Sir Thomas, drawing baxk from intimacies in general, was particularly disinclined, at this time, for any engagements but in one quarter. The Rushworth's were the only addition to his own domestic f circle which he could solicit. i62 MADiSFIELD FA%K Edmund did not wonder that such should be his father's feelings, nor could he regret anything but the exclusion of \ the Grants. " But they/' he observed to Fanny, " have a claim. They seem to belong to us; they seem to be part of ourselves. I could wish my father were more sensible of their , very great attention to my mother and sisters while he was j away. I am afraid they may feel themselves neglected. : But the truth is, that my father hardly knows them. They | had not been here a twelvemonth when he left England. If j he knew them better, he would value their society as it ^ deserves; for they are in fact exactly the sort of people he \ would like. We are sometimes a little in want of animation among ourselves: my sisters seem out of spirits, and Tom is certainly not at his ease. Dr. and Mrs. Grant would enliven us, and make our evenings pass away with more enjoyment even to my father." " Do you think so? " said Fanny: in my opmion, my uncle would not like any addition. I think he values the very quietness you speak of, and that the repose of his own family circle is all he wants. And it does not appear to me that we are more serious than we used to be — I mean before my uncle went abroad. As well as I can recollect, it was always much the same. There was never much laughmg m his presence; or, if there is any difference it is not more I think than such an absence has a tendency to produce at first. There must be a sort of shyness; but I cannot recollect that our evenings formerly were ever merry, except when my uncle was in town. No young people's are, I suppose, when those they look up to are at home." " I believe you are right, Fanny," was his reply, after a short consideration. I believe our evenings are rather returned to what they were, than assuming a new character. The novelty was in their being lively. Yet, how strong the impression that only a few weeks will give! I have been feeling as if we had never lived so before." " I suppose I am graver than other people," said Fanny. " The evenings do not appear long to me. I love to hear my uncle talk of the West Indies. I could listen to him for an hour together. It entertains me more than many other things have done; but then I am unlike other people, I dare say." " Why should vou dare say that ? " (smiling). Do you mAD^FIELD PA%K 163 want to be told that you are only unlike other people in being more wise and discreet? But when did you, or anybody, ever get a compliment from me, Fanny? Go to my father if you want to be complimented. He will satisfy you. Ask your uncle what he thinks, and you will hear compliments enough: and though they may be chiefly on your person, you must put up with it, and trust to his seeing as much beauty of mind in time." Such language was so new to Fanny that it quite em- barrassed her. Your uncle thinks you very pretty, dear Fanny — and that is the long and the short of the matter. Anybody but myself would have made something more of it, and anybody but you would resent that you had not been thought very pretty before; but the truth is, that your uncle never did admire you till now — and now he does. Your complexion is so improved ! — and you have gained so much countenance ! — and your figure — nay, Fanny, do not turn away about it — it is but an uncle. If you cannot bear an uncle's admiration, what is to become of you ? You must really begin to harden yourself to the idea of being worth looking at. You must ^ try not to mind growing up into a pretty woman." Oh ! don't talk so, don't talk so," cried Fanny, distressed by more feelings than he was aware of; but seeing that she was distressed, he had done with the subject, and only added more seriously, — " Your uncle is disposed to be pleased with you in every respect; and I only wish you would talk to him more. You are one of those who are too silent in the evening circle." " But I do talk to him more than I used. I am sure I do. Did not you hear me ask him about the slave-trade last night?" " I did — and was in hopes the question would be followed ; up by others. It would have pleased your uncle to be inquired of farther." ! " And I longed to do it — but there was such a dead silence ! [ And while my cousins were sitting by without speaking a 1 word, or seeming at all interested in the subject, I did not I like — I thought it would appear as if I wanted to set myself j off at their expense^ by shewing a curiosity and pleasure in his iunformation which he must wish his ow^n daughters to feel." \ 1 64 3liA3 but that does not make it less amazing, that the same soil and the same sun should nurture plants differing in the first rule and law of their existence. You will think me rhapsodising; but when I am out of doors, especially when I am sitting out of doors, I am very apt to get into this sort of wondering strain. One cannot fix one's eyes on the commonest natural production without finding food for a rambling fancy." To say the truth," replied Miss Crawford, I am some- thing like the famous Doge at the court of Lewis XIV. ; and may declare that I see no wonder in this shrubbery equal to seeing myself in it. If anybody had told me a year ago that this place would be my home, that I should be spending month after month here, as I have done, I certainly should not have believed them. I have now been here nearly five months; and, moreover, the quietest five months I ever passed." Too quiet for you, I beHeve." " I should have thought so theoretically myself, but," and her eyes brightened as she spoke, take it all and all, I never spent so happy a summer. But then," with a more thought- ful air and lowered voice, " there is no saying what it may lead to." Fanny's heart beat quick, and she felt quite unequal to surmising or sohciting anything more. Miss Crawford; however, with renewed animation, soon wexxt on : — 174 mA:H^FIELD FA%K " I am conscious of being far better reconciled to a country residence than I had ever expected to be. I can even sup- pose it pleasant to spend lialj the year in the country^ under certain circumstances, very pleasant. An elegant, moderate sized house in the centre of family connections; continual engagements among them; commanding the first society in the neighbourhood ; looked-up to, perhaps, as leading it even more than those of larger fortune, and turning from the cheer- ful round of such amusements to nothing worse than a tete- a-tete with the person one feels most agreeable in the world. There is nothing frightful in such a picture, is there. Miss Price? One need not envy the new Mrs. Rushworth with such a home as thair Envy Mrs. Rushvv^orth! " v/as all that Fanny attempted to say. " Come, come, it v/ould be very unhandsome in us to be severe on Mrs. Rushworth, for I look forward to our owing her a great many gay, brilliant, happy hours. I expect we shall be all very much at Sother- ton another year. Such a match as Miss Bertram has made is a public blessing ; for the first pleasures of Mr. Rushworth's wife must be to fill her house, and give the best balls in the country.*' Fanny was silent, and Miss Crawford relapsed into thought- fulness, till suddenly looking up at the end of a few minutes, she exclaimed, Ah! here he is." It was not Mr. Rush- worth, however, but Edmund, who then appeared walking towards them with Mrs. Grant. My sister and Mr. Bertram. I am so glad your eldest cousin is gone, that he may be Mr. Bertram again. There is something in the sound of Mr. Edmund Bertram so formal, so pitiful, so younger-brother- like, that I detest it.'' How differently we feel! " cried Fanny. To me, the sound of Mr. Bertram is so cold and nothing-meaning, so entirely without warmth or character! It just stands for a gentleman, and that's all. But there is nobleness in the name of Edmund. It is a name of heroism and renown; of kings, princes, and knights; and seems to breathe the spirit of chivalry and warm affections." I grant you the name is good in itself, and Lord Edmund or Sir Edmund sound delightfully; but sink it under the chill, the annihilation of a Mr. and Mr. Edmund is no more than Mr. John or Mr. Thomas. Well, shall we join and dis- appoint them of half their lecture upon sitting down out of doors at this time of year, by being up before they can begin ? " Edmund met them with particular pleasure. It was the first time of his seeing them together since the beginning of that better acquaintance which he had been hearing of with great satisfaction. A friendship between two so very dear to him was exactly what he could have wished : and to the credit of the lover's understanding, be it stated, that he did not by any means consider Fanny as the only, or even as the greater gainer by such a friendship. Well," said Miss Crawford, and do you not scold us for our imprudence ? What do you think we have been sitting down for but to be talked to about it, and entreated and supplicated never to do so again ? " Perhaps I might have scolded," said Edmund, if either of you had been sitting down alone; but while you do wrong together, I can overlook a great deal." They cannot have been sitting long," cried Mrs. Grant, " for when I went up for my shawl I saw them from the staircase window, and then they were walking." And really," added Edmund, the day is so mild, that your sitting down for a few minutes can be hardly thought imprudent. Our weather must not always be judged by the calendar. We may sometimes take greater liberties in November than in May." Upon my word," cried Miss Crawford, you are two of the most disappointing and unfeeling kind friends I ever met with ! There is no giving you a moment's uneasiness. You do not know how much we have been suffering, nor what chills we have felt! But I have long thought Mr. Bertram one of the worst subjects to work on, in any little manoeuvre against common sense, that a woman could be plagued with. I had very little hope of him from the first; but you, Mrs. Grant, my sister, my own sister, I think I had a right to alarm you a little." Do not flatter yourself, my dearest Mary. You have not the smallest chance of moving me. I have my alarms, but they are quite in a different quarter; and if I could have altered the weather, you would have had a good sharp east wind blowing on you the whole time — for here are some of my plants which Robert will leave out because the nights are 176 FIELD PA%K so mild^ and I know the end of it will be^ that we shall have a sudden change of weather^ a hard frost setting in all at once, taking everybody (at least Robert) by surprise, and I shall lose every one; and what is worse, cook has just been telling me that the turkey, which I particularly wished not to be dressed till Sunday, because I know how much more Dr. Grant would enjoy it on Sunday after the fatigues of the day, will not keep beyond to-morrow. These are something like grievances, and make me think the weather most unseasonably close.'' " The sweets of housekeeping in a country village 1 said Miss Crawford, archly. Commend me to the nurseryman and the poulterer.'' My dear child, commend Dr. Grant to the deanery of Westminster or St. Paul's, and I should be as glad of your nurseryman and poulterer as you could be. But we have no such people in Mansfield. What would you have me do? " "Oh! you can do nothing but what you do already: be plagued very often, and never lose your temper." ' ' Thank you ; but there is no escaping these little vexations, Mary, live where we may ; and when you are settled in town and I come to see you, I dare say I shall find you with yours, in spite of the nurseryman and the poulterer — or perhaps on their very account. Their remoteness and unpunctuality, or their exorbitant charges and frauds, will be drawing forth bitter lamentations." " I mean to be too rich to lament or to feel anything of the sort. A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of. It certainly may secure all the myrtle and turkey part of it." " You intend to be very rich? " said Edmund, with a look which, to Fanny's eye, had a great deal of serious meaning. To be sure. Do not you? Do not we all? " " I cannot intend anything which it must be so completely beyond my power to command. Miss Crawford may chuse 1 her degree of wealth. She has only to fix on her number of | thousands a year, and there can be no doubt of their coming. My intentions are only not to be poor." " By moderation and economy, and bringing down your wants to your income, and all that. I understand you — and a very proper plan it is for a person at your time of life, with MADiSFIELD PA1{K such limited means and indifferent connections. What can you want but a decent maintenance? You have not much time before you ; and your relations are in no situation to do anything for you^ or to mortify you by the contrast of their own wealth and consequence — Be honest and poor, by all means — but I shall not envy you ; I do not much think I shall even respect you. I have a much greater respect for those that are honest and rich.'' " Your degree of respect for honesty, rich or poor, is precisely what I have no manner of concern with. I do not mean to be poor. Poverty is exactly what I have determined against. Honesty, in the something between, in the middle state of worldly circumstances, is all that I am anxious for your not looking down on.'' " But I do look down upon it, if it might have been higher. I must look down upon anything contented with obscurity when it might rise to distinction." " But how may it rise.? How may my honesty at least rise to any distinction .^^ " This was not so very easy a question to answer, and occa- sioned an " Oh! " of some length from the fair lady before she could add, " You ought to be in parliament, or you should have gone into the army ten years ago." " That is not much to the purpose now; and as to my being in parliament, I believe I must wait till there is an especial assembly for the representation of younger sons who have little to live on. No, Miss Crawford," he added, in a more serious tone, " there are distinctions which I should be miserable if I thought myself without any chance — absolutely without chance or possibility of obtaining — but they are of a different character." A look of consciousness, as he spoke, and what seemed a consciousness of manner on Miss Crawford's side as she made some laughing answer, was sorrowful food for Fanny's observation; and finding herself quite unable to attend as she ought to Mrs. Grant, by whose side she was now following the others, she had nearly resolved on going home immedi- ately, and only waited for courage to say so, when the sound of the great clock at Mansfield Park, striking three, made her feel that she had really been much longer absent than usual, and brought the previous self-inquiry of whether she should 1 78 JidJDiSFIELD PJJiK take leave or not just then, and how, to a very speedy issue With undoubting decision she directly began her adieus; and Edmund began at the same time to recollect, that his mother had been inquiring for her, and that he had walked down to the Parsonage on purpose to bring her back. Fanny's hurry increased ; and without in the least expect- ing Edmund's attendance, she would have hastened away alone; but the general pace was quickened, and they all accompanied her into the house through which it was necessary to pass. Dr. Grant was in the vestibule, and as they stopt to speak to him she found, from Edmund's manner, that he did mean to go with her. He, too, was taking leave. She could not but be thankful. In the moment of parting, Edmund was invited by Dr. Grant to eat his mutton with him the next day ; and Fanny had barely time for an unpleasant feeling on the occasion, when Mrs. Grant, with sudden recollection, turned to her, and asked for the pleasure of her company too. This was so new an attention, so perfectly new a circumstance in the events of Fanny's life, that she was all surprise and embarrassment; and while stammering out her great obligation, and her — but she did not suppose it would be in her power," was looking at Edmund for his opinion and help. But Edmund, delighted with her having such an happiness offered, and ascertaining with half a look, and half a sentence, that she had no objection but on her aunt's account, could not imagine that his mother would make any difficulty of sparing her, and therefore gave his decided open advice that the invitation should be accepted; and though Fanny would not venture, even on his encourage- ment, to such a flight of audacious independence, it was soon settled, that if nothing were heard to the contrary, Mrs. Grant might expect her. And you know what your dinner will be," said Mrs. Grant, smiling — the turkey, and I assure you a very fine one; for, my dear," turning to her husband, " cook insists upon the turkey's being dressed to-morrow." " Very well, very well," cried Dr. Grant, all the better; I am glad to hear you have anything so good in the house. But Miss Price and Mr. Edmund Bertram, I dare say, would tiike their chance. We none of us want to hear the bill of fare. A friendly meeting, and not a fine dinner, is all we ^JJiS FIELD PJ'S^. (^jy have in view. A turkey^ or a goose^ or a leg of mutton, or whatever you and your cook chuse to give us." The two cousins walked home together; and, except in the immediate discussion of this engagement, which Edmund spoke of with the warmest satisfaction, as so particularly desirable for her in the intimacy which he saw with so much pleasure established, it was a silent walk ; for having finished that subject, he grew thoughtful and indisposed for any other. CH^PTE'F^XXIII " But why should Mrs. Grant ask Fanny ? " said Lady Bertram. How came she to think of asking Fanny Fanny never dines there, you know, in this sort of way. I cannot spare her, and I am sure she does not want to go. Fanny, you do not want to go, do you? " " If you put such a question to her," cried Edmund, preventing his cousin's speaking, Fanny will immediately say. No; but I am sure, my dear mother, she would like to go; and I can see no reason why she should not." " I cannot imagine why Mrs. Grant should think of asking her? She never did before. She used to ask your sisters now and then, but she never asked Fanny." " If you cannot do without me, ma'am " said Fanny, in a self-denying tone. But my mother will have my father with her all the evening." " To be sure, so I shall." " Suppose you take my father's opinion, ma'am." " That's well thought of. So I will, Edmund. I will ask Sir Thomas, as soon as he comes in, whether I can do without her." As you please, ma'am, on that head; but I meant my father's opinion as to the propriety of the invitation's being accepted or not; and I think he will consider it a right thing by Mrs. Grant, as well as by Fanny, that being the fir si invitation it should be accepted." i8o MA^KSFIELD PA%K " I do not know. We will ask him. But he will be very much surprised that Mrs. Grant should ask Fanny at all.'' There was nothing more to be said, or that could be said^ to any purpose, till Sir Thomas were present; but the subject involving, as it did, her own evening's comfort for the morrow, was so much uppermost in Lady Bertram's mind, that half an hour afterwards, on his looking in for a minute in his way from his plantation to his dressing-room, she called him back again, when he had almost closed the door, with " Sir Thomas, stop a moment — I have something to say to you." Her tone of calm languor, for she never took the trouble of raising her voice, was always heard and attended to; and Sir Thomas came back. Her story began; and Fanny immediately slipped out of the room; for to hear herself the subject of any discussion with her uncle was more than her nerves could bear. She was anxious, she knew — more anxious perhaps than she ought to be — for what was it after all whether she went or staid? but if her uncle were to be a great while considering and deciding, and with very grave looks, and those grave looks directed to her, and at last decide against her, she might not be able to appear properly sub- missive and indifferent. Her cause, meanwhile, went on well. It began, on Lady Bertram's part, with — I have something to tell you that will surprise you. Mrs, Grant has asked Fanny to dinner." Well," said Sir Thomas, as if waiting more to accomplish the surprise. Edmund wants her to go. But how can I spare her? " She will be late," said Sir Thomas, taking out his watch; " but what is your difficulty? " Edmund found himself obliged to speak and fill up the blanks in his mother's story. He told the whole ; and she had only to add, So strange! for Mrs. Grant never used to ask her." " But is it not very natural," observed Edmund, that Mrs. Grant should wish to procure so agreeable a visitor for her sister? " Nothing can be more natural," said Sir Thomas, after a short deUberation; nor, were there no sister in the case, could anything, in my opinion, be more natural. Mrs. m A 3^ FIELD PA'JiK i8i Grant's shewing civility to Miss Price^ to Lady Bertram's niece^ could never want explanation. The only surprise I can feel is^ that this should be the -first time of its being paid. Fanny was perfectly right in giving only a conditional answer. She appears to feel as she ought. But as I conclude that she must wish to go, since all young people like to be together, I can see no reason why she should be denied the indulgence." But can I do without her, Sir Thomas? " " Indeed I think you may." " She always makes tea, you know, when my sister is not here." " Your sister, perhaps, may be prevailed on to spend the day with us, and I shall certainly be at home." Very well, then, Fanny may go, Edmund." The good news soon followed her. Edmund knocked at her door in his way to his own. Well, Fanny, it is all happily settled, and without the smallest hesitation on your uncle's side. He had but one opinion. You are to go." " Thank you, I am so glad," was Fanny's instinctive reply; though when she had turned from him and shut the door, she could not help feeling, And yet why should I be glad? for am I not certain of seeing or hearing something there to pain me ? " In spite of this conviction, however, she was glad. Simple as such an engagement might appear in other eyes, it had novelty and importance in her's, for excepting the day at Sotherton, she had scarcely ever dined out before; and though now going only half a mile, and only to three people, still it was dining out, and all the little interests of prepara- tion were enjoyments in themselves. She had neither sym- pathy nor assistance from those who ought to have entered into her feelings and directed her taste; for Lady Bertram never thought of being useful to anybody, and Mrs. Norris, when she came on the morrow, in consequence of an early call and invitation from Sir Thomas, was in a very ill humour, and seemed intent only on lessening her niece's pleasure, both present and future, as much as possible. Upon my word, Fanny, you are in high luck to meet with such attention and indulgence ! You ought to be very much obliged to Mrs. Grant for thinking of you, and to your aunt 1 82 mA^KSFIELD PATQC for letting you go, and you ought to look upon it as some- thing extraordinary; for I hope you are aware that there is no real occasion for your going into company in this sort of way, or ever dining out at all ; and it is what you must not depend upon ever being repeated. Nor must you be fancying that the invitation is meant as any particular compliment to you ; the compliment is intended to your uncle and aunt and me. Mrs. Grant thinks it a civility due to us to take a little notice of you, or else it would never have come into her head, and you may be very certain, that if your cousin Julia had been at home, you would not have been asked at all." Mrs. Norris had now so ingeniously done away all Mrs. Grant's part of the favour, that Fanny, who found herself expected to speak, could only say that she was very much obliged to her aunt Bertram for sparing her, and that she was endeavouring to put her aunt's evening work in such a state as to prevent her being missed. Oh! depend upon it, your aunt can do very well without you, or you would not be allowed to go. 1 shall be here, so you may be quite easy about your aunt. And I hope you will have a very agreeable day, and find it all mighty delightful. But I must observe that five is the very awkwardest of all possible numbers to sit down to table; and I cannot but be surprised that such an elegant lady as Mrs. Grant should not contrive better ! And round their enormous great wide table, too, which fills up the room so dreadfully ! Had the Doctor been contented to take my dining table when I came away, as anybody in their senses would have done, instead of having that absurd new one of his own, which is wider, literally wider than the dinner table here, how infinitely better it would have been! and how much more he would have been respected! for people are never respected when they step out of their proper sphere. Remember that, Fanny. Five — only five to be sitting round that table. However, you will have dinner enough on it for ten, I dare say." Mrs. Norris fetched breath, and went on again. " The nonsense and folly of people's stepping out of their rank and trying to appear above themselves, makes m^e think it right to give you a hint, Fanny, now that you are going into company without any of us; and I do beseech and entreat you not to be putting yourself forward, and talking MADiSFIELD PA%K 183 and giving your opinion as if you were one of your cousins, as if you were dear Mrs. Rushworth or Julia. That will never do^ believe me. Remember, wherever you are, you must be the lowest and last; and though Miss Crawford is in a manner at home at the Parsonage, you are not to be taking place of her. And as to coming away at night, you are to stay just as long as Edmund chuses. Leave him to settle that.^^ " Yes, ma'am, I should not think of anything else." " And if it should rain, which I think exceedingly likely, for I never saw it more threatening for a wet evening in my life, you must manage as well as you can, and not be ex- pecting the carriage to be sent for you. I certainly do not go home to-night, and, therefore, the carriage will not be out on my account; so you must make up your mind to what may happen, and take your things accordingly." Her niece thought it perfectly reasonable. She rated her own claims to comfort as low even as Mrs. Norris could; and when Sir Thomas, soon afterwards, just opening the door, said, Fanny, at what time would you have the carriage come round? " she felt a degree of astonishment which made it impossible for her to speak. My dear Sir Thomas 1 " cried Mrs. Norris, red with anger, " Fanny can walk." ''Walk!" repeated Sir Thomas, in a tone of most un- answerable dignity, and coming farther into the room. '' My niece walk to a dinner engagement at this time of the year I Will twenty minutes after four suit you? " Yes, sir," was Fanny's humble answer, given with the feelings almost of a criminial towards Mrs. Norris ; and not bearing to remain with her in what might seem a state of triumph, she followed her uncle out of the room, having staid behind him only long enough to hear these words spoken in angry agitation: — *' Quite unnecessary ! a great deal too kind ! But Edmund goes; true, it is upon Edmund's account. I observed he was hoarse on Thursday night." But this could not impose on Fanny. She felt that the carriage was for herself, and herself alone; and her uncle's consideration of her, coming immediately after such repre- sentations from her aunt, cost her some tears of gratitude when she was alone. 1 84 mA:K§FIELD PA%K. The coachman drove round to a minute; another minute brought down the gentleman; and as the lady had, with a most scrupulous fear of being late, been many minutes seated in the drawing-room, Sir Thomas saw them off in as good time as his own correctly punctual habits required. " Now I must look at you, Fanny,'' said Edmund, with the kind smile of an affectionate brother, and tell you how I like you; and as well as I can judge by this light, you look very nicely indeed. What have you got on? " The new dress that my uncle was so good as to give me on my cousin's marriage. I hope it is not too fine; but I thought I ought to wear it as soon as I could, and that I might not have such another opportunity all the winter. I hope you do not think me too fine." A woman can never be too fine while she is all in white. No, I see no finery about you; nothing but what is perfectly proper. Your gown seems very pretty. I like these glossy spots. Has not Miss Crawford a gown something the same.^ " In approaching the Parsonage they passed close by the stable-yard and coach-house. Hey-day ! " said Edmund, " here's company, here's a carriage ! who have they got to meet us ? " And letting down the side-glass to distinguish, 'Tis Crawford's, Crawford's barouche, I protest! There are his own two men pushing it back into its old quarters. He is here, of course. This is quite a surprise, Fanny. I shall be very glad to see him." There was no occasion, there was no time for Fanny to say how very differently she felt; but the idea of having such another to observe her, was a great increase of the trepida- tion with which she performed the very aweful ceremony of walking into the drawing-room. In the drawing-room Mr. Crawford certainly was ; having been just long enough arrived to be ready for dinner; and the smiles and pleased looks of the three others standing round him, showed how welcome was his sudden resolution of coming to them for a few days on leaving Bath. A very cordial meeting passed between him and Edmund ; and with the exception of Fanny, the pleasure was general ; and even to hey, there might be some advantage in his presence, since every addition to the party must rather forward her mAD<^FIELD PA%K 185 favourite indulge ice of being suffered to sit silent and un- attended to. Sh^ vms soon aware of this herself ; for though she must submit, as her own propriety of mind directed, in spite of her aunt Norris's opinion, to being the principal lady in company, and to all the little distinctions consequent thereon, she found, while they were at table, such a happy flow of conversation prevailing, in which she was not required to take any part — there was so much to be said between the brother and sister about Bath, so much between the two young men about hunting, so much of politics between Mr. Crawford and Dr. Grant, and of everything and all together between Mr. Crawford and Mrs. Grant, as to leave her the fairest prospect of having only to listen in quiet, and of passing a very agreeable day. She could not compliment the newly-arrived gentleman, however, with any appearance of interest, in a scheme for extending his stay at Mansfield, and sending for his hunters from Norfolk, which, suggested by Dr. Grant, advised by Edmund, and warmly urged by the two sisters, was soon in possession of his mind, and which he seemed to want to be encouraged even by her to resolve on. Her opinion was sought as to the probable continuance of the open weather, but her answers were as short and indifferent as civility allowed. She could not wish him to stay, and would much rather not have him speak to her. Her two absent cousins, especially Maria, were much in her thoughts on seeing him; but no embarrassing re- membrance affected his spirits. Here he was again on the same ground where all had passed before, and apparently as willing to stay and be happy without the Miss Bertrams, as if he had never known Mansfield in any other state. She heard them spoken of by him only in a general way, till they were all re-assembled in the drawing-room, when Edmund, being engaged apart in some matter of business with Dr. Grant, which seemed entirely to engross them, and Mrs. Grant occupied at the tea-table, he began talking of them 'v^dth more particularity to his other sister. With a significant smile, which made Fanny quite hate him, he said, " So Rushworth and his fair bride are at Brighton, I understand ; happy man! " " Yes, they have been there about a fortnight. Miss Price, have they not? And Julia is with them." 1 86 mJHSFIELD PA%^ " And Mr. Yates^ I presume, is not far of." " Mr. Yates! Oh! we hear nothing of VTr. Yates. I do not imagine he figures much in the letters to Mansfield Park ; do you, Miss Price? I think my friend Julia knows better than to entertain her father with Mr. Yates." " Poor Rushworth and his two-and-forty speeches ! " continued Crawford. " Nobody can ever forget them. Poor fellow ! I see him now — his toil and his despair. Well, I am much mistaken if his lovely Maria will ever want him to make two-and-forty speeches to her; " adding, with a momentary seriousness, She is too good for him — much too good." And then changing his tone again to one of gentle gallantry, and addressing Fanny, he said, " You were Mr. Rushworth's best friend. Your kindness and patience can never be forgotten, your indefatigable patience in trying to make it possible for him to learn his part — in trying to give him a brain which nature had denied — to mix up an understanding for him out of the superfluity of your own! He might not have sense enough himself to estimate your kindness, but I may venture to say that it had honour from all the rest of the party." Fanny coloured, and said nothing. " It is as a dream, a pleasant dream !" he exclaimed, breaking forth again, after a few minutes' musing. " I shall always look back on our theatricals with exquisite pleasure. There was such an interest, such an animation, such a spirit diffused. Everybody felt it. We were all alive. There was employ- ment, hope, solicitude, bustle, for every hour of the day. Always some little objection, some little doubt, some little anxiety to be got over. I never was happier." With silent indignation, Fanny repeated to herself, Never happier! — never happier than when doing what you must know was not justifiable ! — never happier than when behaving so dishonourably and unfeelingly! Oh! what a corrupted mind ! " ^ We were unlucky. Miss Price," he continued, in a lower tone, to avoid the possibility of being heard by Edmund, and not at all aware of her feelings, " we certainly were very unlucky. Another week, only one other week, would have been enough for us. I think if we had had the disposal cf events — if Mansfield Park had had the government of the MA^KSFIELD PJ%K 187 winds just for a week or two^ about the equinox, there would have been a difference. Not that we would have endangered his safety by any tremendous weather — but only by a steady contrary wind, or a calm. I think, Miss Price, we would have indulged ourselves with a week's calm in the Atlantic at that season." He seemed determined to be answered; and Fanny avert- ing her face, said with a firmer tone than usual, As far as I am concerned, sir, I would not have delayed his return for a day. My uncle disapproved it all so entirely when he did arrive, that in my opinion everything had gone quite far enough." She had never spoken so much at once to him in her life before, and never so angrily to any one ; and when her speech was over, she trembled and blushed at her own daring. He was surprised ; but after a few moments' silent consideration of her, replied in a calmer, graver tone, and as if the candid result of conviction, I believe you are right. It was more pleasant than prudent. We were getting too noisy." And then turning the conversation, he would have engaged her on some other subject, but her answers were so shy and reluctant that he could not advance in any. Miss Crawford, who had been repeatedly eyeing Dr. Grant and Edmund, now observed, " Those gentlemen must have some ve^-y interesting point to discuss." " The most interesting in the world," replied her brother — " how to make money ; how to turn a good income into a better. Dr. Grant is giving Bertram instructions about the living he is to step into so soon. I find he takes orders in a few weeks. They were at it in the dining-parlour. I am glad to hear Bertram will be so well off. He will have a very pretty income to make ducks and drakes with, and earned without much trouble. I apprehend he will not have less than seven hundred a year. Seven hundred a year is a fine thing for a younger brother; and as of course he will still live a home, it will be all for his menus plaisirs ; and a sermon at Christmas and Easter, I suppose, will be the sum total of sacrifice." His sister tried to laugh off her feelings by saying,'^ Nothing amuses me more th^Tx the easy manner with which everybody settles the abunda ace of those who ha^^e a great deal less than 1 88 r!MJV^FIELD PA1{K themselves. You would look rather blank, Henr}', if youf menus plaisirs were to be limited to seven hundred a year." " Perhaps I might; but all that you know is entirely comparative. Birthright and habit must settle the business. Bertram is certainly well off for a cadet of even a baronet's family. By the time he is four or five and twenty he will have seven hundred a year, and nothing to do for it/' Miss Crawford could have said that there would be a something to do and to suffer for it, which she could not think lightly of; but she checked herself and let it pass; and tried to look calm and unconcerned when the two gentlemen shortly afterwards joined them. " Bertram," said Henry Crawford, I shall make a point of coming to Mansfield to hear you preach your first sermon. I shall come on purpose to encourage a young beginner. When is it to be? Miss Price, will not you join me in en- couraging your cousin ! Will not you engage to attend with your eyes steadil}^ fixed on him the whole time — as I shall do — not to lose a word; or only looking off just to note down any sentence pre-eminently beautiful? We w411 provide ourselves with tablets and a pencil. When will it be ? You must preach at Mansfield, you know, that Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram may hear you." " I shall keep clear of you, Crawford, as long as I can," said Edmund; " for you would be more likely to disconcert me, and I should be more sorry to see you trying at it than almost any other man." " Will he not feel this? " thought Fanny. No, he can feel nothing as he ought." The party being now all united, and the chief talkers attracting each other, she remained in tranquillity; and as a whist table was formed after tea — formed really for the amusement of Dr. Grant, by his attentive wife, though it was not to be supposed so — and Miss Crawford took her harp, she had nothing to do but to listen; and her tranquillity remained undisturbed the rest of the evening, except when Mr. Crawford now and then addressed to her a question or observation, which she could not avoid answering. Miss Crawford was too much vexed by what had passed to be in a humour for anything but music. With that she soothed herself and amused her friend. mAHSFIELD PA%K 189 The assurance of Edmund's being so soon to take orders, coming upon her Hke a blow that had been suspended, and still hoped uncertain and at a distance, was felt with re- sentment and mortification. She was very angry with him. She had thought her influence more. She had begun to think of him ; she felt that she had, with great regard, with almost decided intentions; but she would now meet him with his own cool feelings. It was plain that he could have no serious views, no true attachment, by fixing himself in a situation which he must know she would never stoop to. She would learn to match him in his indifference. She would henceforth admit his attentions without any idea beyond immediate amusement. If he could so command his affections, her^s should do her no harm. CH^PTE%^XXIV Henry Crawford had quite made up his mind by the next morning to give another fortnight to Mansfield, and having sent for his hunters, and written a few lines of explanation to the Admiral, he looked round at his sister as he sealed and threw the letter from him, and seeing the coast clear of the rest of the family, said, with a smile, " And how do you think I mean to amuse myself, Mary, on the days that I do not hunt ? I am grown too old to go out more than three times a-week; but I have a plan for the intermediate days, and what do you think it is.^ " " To walk and ride with me, to be sure." " Not exactly, though I shall be happy to do both, but that would be exercise only to my body, and I must take care of my mind. Besides, that would be all recreation and indulgence, without the wholesome alloy of labour, and I do not like to eat the bread of idleness. No, my plan is to make Fanny Price in love with me." Fanny Price! Nonsense! No, no. You ought to be satisfied with her two cousins." " But I cannot be satisfied without Fanny Price, without making a small hole in Fanny Price's heart. You do not seem properly aware of her claims to notice. When we 190 mA3<^FIELD PA%K talked of her last night, you none of you seemed sensible of the wonderful improvement that has taken place in her looks within the last six weeks. You see her every day, and therefore do not notice it; but I assure you she is quite a different creature from what she was in the autumn. She was then merely a quiet, modest, not plain-looking girl, but she is now absolutely pretty. I used to tliink she had neither complexion nor countenance; but in that soft skin of her's, so frequently tinged with a blush as it was yesterday, there is decided beauty ; and from what I observed of her eyes and mouth, I do not despair of their being capable of expression enough v/hen she has anything to express. And then, her air, her manner, her tout ensemble, is so indescribably improved! She must be grown two inches, at least, since October.'' " Phoo ! phoo ! This is only because there were no tall women to compare her with, and because she has got a new gown, and you never saw her so well dressed before. She is just what she was in October, believe me. The truth is, that she was the only girl in company for you to notice, and you must have a somebody. I have always thought her pretty — not strikingly pretty — but * pretty enough,' as people say; a sort of beauty that grows on one. Her eyes should be darker, but she has a sweet smile ; but as for this wonderful degree of improvement, I am sure it may all be resolved into a better style of dress, and your having nobody else to look at; and therefore, if you do set about a flirtation with her, you never will persuade me that it is in compliment to her beauty, or that it proceeds from anything but your ov/n idleness and folly." Her brother gave only a smile to this accusation, and soon afterwards said, " I do not quite know what to make of Miss Fanny. I do not understand her. I could not tell what she would be at yesterday. What is her character.? Is she solemn? Is she queer.? Is she prudish? Why did she draw back and look so grave at me ? I could hardly get her to speak. I never was so long in company with a girl in my Kfe, trying to entertain her, and succeed so ill ! Never met with a girl who looked so grave on me ! I must try to get the better of this. Her looks say, * I will not like you, I am determined not to like you; * and I say she shall." mA3^, this must be my iiYst feeling; but my second, which you shall have as sincerely, is, that I approve your choice from my soul, and foresee your happiness as heartily as I wish and desire it. You will have a sweet little wife; all gratitude and devotion. Exactly what you deserve. What an amazing match for her! Mrs. Norris often talks of her luck; mAV^SFIELD PA%IL 243 what will she say now ? The delight of all the family^ indeed ! And she has some true friends in it ! How they will rejoice ! But tell me all about it! Talk to me for ever. When did you begin to think seriously about her? " Nothing could be more impossible than to answer such a question^ though nothing could be more agreeable than to have it asked. How the pleasing plague had stolen on him " he could not say; and before he had expressed the same sentiment with a little variation of words three times over^ his sister eagerly interrupted him with Ah, my dear Henry^ and this is what took you to London ! This was your business! You chose to consult the Admiral before you made up your mind." But this he stoutly denied. He knew his uncle too well to consult him on any matrimonial scheme. The Admiral hated marriage, and thought it never pardonable in a young man of independent fortune. When Fanny is known to him/' continued Henry, he will doat on her. She is exactly the woman to do away every prejudice of such a man as the Admiral, for she is exactly such a woman as he thinks does not exist in the world. She is the very impossibility he would describe, if indeed he has now delicacy of language enough to embody his own ideas. But till it is absolutely settled — settled beyond all interference, he shall know nothing of the matter. No, Mary, you are quite mistaken. You have not discovered my business yet." Well, well, I am satisfied. I know now to whom it must relate, and am in no hurry for the rest. Fanny Price! wonderful, quite wonderful! That Mansfield should have done so much for — that you should have found your fate in Mansfield! But you are quite right; you could not have chosen better. There is not a better girl in the world, and you do not want for fortune ; and as to her connections, they are more than good. The Bertrams are undoubtedly some of the first people in this country. She is niece to Sir Thomas Bertram; that will be enough for the world. But go on, go on. Tell me more. What are your plans ? Does she know her own happiness? " " No." " What are vou waiting for? " 244 3iA3^FIELD PA%K For — for very little more than opportunity. Mary, she is not like her cousins; but I think I shall not ask in vain." " Oh no ! you cannot. Were you even less pleasing — sup- posing her not to love you already (of which, however, I can have little doubt) — you would be safe. The gentleness and gratitude of her disposition would secure her all your own immediately. From my soul I do not think she would marry you without love ; that is, if there is a girl in the world capable of being uninfluenced by ambition, I can suppose it her ; but ask her to love you, and she will never have the heart to refuse." As soon as her eagerness could rest in silence, he was as happy to tell as she could be to listen; and a conversation followed almost as deeply interesting to her as to himself, though he had in fact nothing to relate but his own sensations, nothing to dwell on but Fanny's charms. Fanny's beauty of face and figure, Fanny's graces of manner and goodness of heart, were the exhaustless theme. The gentleness, modesty, and sweetness of her character were warmly expatiated on; that sweetness which makes so essential a part of every woman's worth in the judgment of man, that though he sometimes loves where it is not, he can never believe it absent. Her temper he had good reason to depend on and to praise. He had often seen it tried. Was there one of the family, excepting Edmund, who had not in some way or other continually exercised her patience and forbearance? Her affections were evidently strong. To see her with her brother! What could more delightfully prove that the warmth of her heart was equal to its gentleness? What could be more encouraging to a man who had her love in view? Then, her understanding was beyond every suspicion, quick and clear: and her manners were the mirror of her own modest and elegant mind. Nor was this all. Henry Crawford had too much sense not to feel the worth of good principles in a wife, though he was too little accustomed to serious reflection to know them by [their] proper name ; but when he talked of her having such a steadiness and regularity of conduct, such a high notion of honour, and such an ob- servance of decorum as might warrant any man in the fullest dependence on her faith and integrity, he expressed what was inspired by the knowledge of her being well principled and religious. Mi ^lA^iSFIELD PA%K 245 " I could so wholly and absolutely confide in her/' said he, " and that is what I want." Well might his sistef, believing as she really did that his opinion of Fanny Price was scarcely beyond her merits, rejoice in her prospects. The more I think of it/' she cried^ " the more am I con- vinced that you are doing quite right; and though I should never have selected Fanny Price as the girl most likely to attach you^ I am now persuaded she is the very one to make you happy. Your wicked project upon her peace turns out a clever thought indeed. You will both find your good in it.'' It was bad, very bad in me against such a creature; but I did not know her then; and she shall have no reason to lament the hour that first put it into my head. I will make her very happy, Mary; happier than she has ever yet been herself, or ever seen anybody else. I will not take her from Northamptonshire. I shall let Everingham, and rent a place in this neighbourhood; perhaps Stanwix Lodge. I shall let a seven years' lease of Everingham. I am sure of an excel- lent tenant at half a word. I could name three people now, who would give me my own terms and thank me." " Ha! " cried Mary; " settle in Northamptonshire! That is pleasant I Then we shall be all together." When she had spoken it, she recollected herself, and wished it unsaid; but there was no need of confusion; for her brother saw her only as the supposed inmate of Mansfield Parsonage, and replied but to invite her in the kindest manner to his own house, and to claim the best right in her. You must give us more than half your time," said he. " I cannot admit Mrs. Grant to have an equal claim with Fanny and myself, for we shall both have a right in you. Fanny will be so truly your sister! " Mary had only to be grateful and give general assurances; but she was now very fully purposed to be the guest of neither brother nor sister many months longer. " You will divide your year between London and Northamptonshire? " " Yes." " That's right; and in London, of course, a house of your own; no longer with the Admiral. My dearest Henry, the 246 mAOiSFIELD PA%K. advantage to you of getting away from the Admiral before your manners are hurt by the contagion of his^ before you have contracted any of his fooHsh opinions^ or learned to sit over your dinner^ as if it were the best blessing of life ! You are not sensible of the gain^ for your regard for him has blinded you; but^ in my estimation^ your marrying early may be the saving of you. To have seen you grow like the Admiral in word or deed^ look or gesture^ would have broken my heart." " Well^ well^ we do not think quite alike here. The Ad- miral has his faults^ but he is a very good man, and has been more than a father to me. Few fathers would have let me have my own way half so much. You must not prejudice Fanny against him. I must have them love one another." Mary refrained from saying what she felt, that there could not be two persons in existence whose characters and manners were less accordant: time would discover it to him; but she could not help this reflection on the Admiral. " Henry, I think so highly of Fanny Price that if I could suppose the next Mrs. Crawford would have half the reason which my poor ill-used aunt had to abhor the very name, I would pre- vent the marriage, if possible ; but I know you : I know that a wife you loved would be the happiest of women, and that even when you ceased to love, she would yet find in you the liberality and good-breeding of a gentleman." The impossibility of not doing everything in the world to make Fanny Price happy, or of ceasing to love Fanny Price, was of course the groundwork of his eloquent answer. " Had you seen her this morning, Mary," he continued, " attending with such ineffable sweetness and patience to all the demands of her aunt's stupidity, working with her, and for her, her colour beautifully heightened as she leant over the work, then returning to her seat to finish a note which she was previously engaged in writing for that stupid woman's service, and all this with such unpretending gentleness, so much as if it were a matter of course that she was not to have a moment at her own command, her hair arranged as neatly as it always is, and one little curl falling forward as she wrote, which she now and then shook back, and in the midst of all this, still speaking at intervals to me, or listening, and as if she liked to listen, to what I said. Had you seen her so, 3\dA3^FIELD PJ'T^K 247 Mary, you would not have implied the possibility of her power over my heart ever ceasing." My dearest Henry," cried Mary, stopping short, and smiling in his face, " how glad I am to see you so much in love! It quite delights me. But what will Mrs. Rushworth and Julia say? " " I care neither what they say nor what they feel. They will now see what sort of woman it is that can attach me, that can attach a man of sense. I wish the discovery may do them any good. And they will now see their cousin treated as she ought to be, and I wish they may be heartily ashamed of their own abominable neglect and unkindness. They will be angry,'' he added, after a moment's silence, and in a cooler tone; Mrs. Rushworth will be very angry. It will be a bitter pill to her; that is, like other bitter pills, it will have two moments' ill flavour, and then be swallowed and forgotten; for I am not such a coxcomb as to suppose her feelings more lasting than other women's, though / was the object of them. Yes, Mary, my Fanny will feel a differ- ence, indeed; a daily, hourly difference, in the behaviour of every being who approaches her; and it will be the comple- tion of my happiness to know that I am the doer of it, that I am the person to give the consequence so justly her due. Now she is dependent, helpless, friendless, neglected, for- gotten." Nay, Henry, not by all; not forgotten by all ; not friend- less or forgotten. Her cousin Edmund never forgets her." Edmund! True, I believe he is (generally speaking), kind to her, and so is Sir Thomas in his way ; but it is the way of a rich, superior, longworded, arbitrary uncle. What can Sir Thomas and Edmund together do, what do they do for her happiness, comfort, honour, and dignity in the world, to what I shall do " Henry Crawford was at Mansfield Park again the next morning, and at an earlier hour than common visiting warrants. The two ladies were together in the breakfast- 248 aiADiSFIELD PA%K room^ and, fortunately for him, Lady Bertram was on the very point of quitting it as he entered. She was almost at the door, and not chusing by any means to take so much trouble in vain, she still went on, after a civil reception, a short sentence about being waited for, and a Let Sir Thomas know," to the servant. Henry, overjoyed to have her go, bowed and watched her off, and without losing another moment, turned instantly to Fanny, and, taking out some letters, said, with a most animated look, I must acknowledge myself infinitely obliged to any creature who gives me such an opportunity of seeing you alone: I have been wishing it more than you can have any idea. Knowing as I do what your feelings as a sister are, I could hardly have borne that any one in the house should share with you in the first knowledge of the news I now bring. He is made. Your brother is a lieutenant. I have the infinite satisfaction of congratulating you on your brother's promotion. Here are the letters which announce it, this moment come to hand. You will, perhaps, like to ^ee them." Fanny could not speak, but he did not want her to speak. To see the expression of her eyes, the change of her com- plexion, the progress of her feelings, their doubt, confusion, and felicity was enough. She took the letters as he gave them. The first was from the Admiral to inform his nephew, in a few words, of his having succeeded in the object he had undertaken, the promotion of young Price, and enclosing two more, one from the Secretary of the First Lord to a friend, whom the Admiral had set to work in the business; the other from that friend to himself, by which it appeared that his lordship had the very great happiness of attending ±0 the recommendation of Sir Charles; that Sir Charles was much delighted in having such an opportunity of proving his regard for Admiral Crawford, and that the circumstance of Mr. William Price's commission as Second Lieutenant of H.M. Sloop Thrush," being made out, was spreading general joy through a wide circle of great people. While her hand was trembling under these letters, her eye Tunning from one to the other, and her heart swelling with emotion, Crawford thus continued, with unfeigned eagerness, to express his interest in the event: — mA^KSFIELD PA%^ 249 " I will not talk of my own happiness/' said he, " great as it is, for I think only of yours. Compared with you, who has a right to be happy ? I have almost grudged myself my own prior knowledge of what you ought to have known before all the world. I have not lost a moment, however. The post was late this morning, but there has not been since a moment's delay. How impatient, how anxious, how wild I have been on the subject, I will not attempt to describe; how severely mortified, how cruelly disappointed, in not having it finished while I was in London ! I was kept there from day to day in the hope of it, for nothing less dear to me than such an object would have detained me half the time from Mansfield. But though my uncle entered into my wishes with all the warmth I could desire, and exerted himself immediately, there were difficulties from the absence of one friend, and the engagements of another, which at last I could no longer bear to stay the end of, and knowing in what good hands I left the cause, I came away on Monday, trusting that many posts would not pass before I should be followed by such very letters as these. My uncle, who is the very best man in the world, has exerted himself, as I knew he would, after seeing your brother. He was delighted with him. I would not allow myself yesterday to say how delighted, or to repeat half that the Admiral said in his praise. I deferred it all till his praise should be proved the praise of a friend, as this day does prove it. 'Now I may say that even / could not require William Price to excite a greater interest, or be followed by warmer wishes and higher commendation, than were most voluntarily bestowed by my uncle after the evening they had passed together.*' "Has this been all your doing, then.^ '' cried Fanny. " Good heaven ! how ver^r^ very kind ! Have you really — was it by your desire.^ I beg your pardon, but I am be- wildered. Did Admiral Crawford apply.? How was it.? I am stupefied.'' Henry was most happy to make it more intelligible, by beginning at an earlier stage, and explaining very particularly what he had done. His last journey to London had been undertaken with no other view than that of introducing her brother in Hill Street, and prevailing on the Admiral to exert whatever interest he might have for getting him on. This 250 OdAD^^FIELD PA%K bad been bis business. He bad communicated it to no creature; be bad not breatbed a syllable of it even to Mary; while uncertain of tbe issue^ be could not bave borne any participation of bis feelings^ but this bad been bib business; and be spoke witb sucb a glow of wbat bis solicitude bad been, and used sucb strong expressions, was so abounding in tbe deepest interest, in twofold motives , in views and wishes more than could he told, that Fanny could not bave remained insensible of bis drift, bad she been able to attend ; but her heart was so full and her senses still so astonished, that she could listen but imperfectly even to wbat be told her of William, and saying only when he paused, How kind ! bow very kind! Oh, Mr. Crawford, we are infinitely obliged to you! Dearest, dearest William!" She jumped up and moved in baste towards the door, crying out, " I will go to my uncle. My uncle ought to know it as soon as possible.'' But this could not be suffered. The opportunity was too fair, and bis feelings too impatient. He was after her immediately. " She must not go, she must allow him five minutes longer," and be took her hand and led her back to her seat, and was in the middle of his further explanation, before she had suspected for what she was detained. When she did understand it, bov/ever, and found herself expected to believe that she bad created sensations which his heart had never known before, and that everything he bad done for William was to be placed to the account of his excessive and unequalled ■.ttachment to her, she was exceedingly distressed, and for some moments unable to speak. She considered it all as nonsense, as mere trifling and gallantry, which meant only to deceive for the hour; she could not but feel that it was treating her improperly and unworthily, and in such a wa}'- as she bad not deserved; but it was like himself, and entirely of a piece with what she had seen before; and she would not allow herself to show half the displeasure she felt, because be had been conferring an obligation, which no want of delicacy on his part could make a trifle to her. While her heart was still bounding witb joy and gratitude on Wiliam's behalf, she could not be severely resentful of anything that injured only herself; and after having twice drawn back her hand, and twice attempted in vain to turn away from him, she got up, and said only, with much agitation, " Don't, Mr. mAHSFIELD PA%K 251 Crawford;, pray don't! I beg you would not. This is a sort of talking which is very unpleasant to me. I must go away. I cannot bear it." But he was still talking on^ describing his affection^ soliciting a return^, and^, finally^ in words so plain as to bear but one meaning even to her, offering himself, hand^ fortune, everything to her acceptance. It was so; he had said it. Her astonishment and confusion increased; and though still not knowing how to suppose him serious, she could hardly stand. He pressed for an answer. " No, no, no! " she cried, hiding her face. This is all nonsense. Do not distress me. I can hear no more of this. Your kindness to William makes me more obliged to you than words can express ; but I do not want, I cannot bear, I must not listen to such — ^No, no, don't think of me. But you are not thinking of me. I know it is all nothing." She had burst away from him, and at that moment Sir Thomas was heard speaking to a servant in his way towards the room they were in. It was no time for further assurances or entreaty, though to part with her at a moment when her modesty alone seemed, to his sanguine and pre-assured mind, to stand in the way of the happiness he sought, was a cruel necessity. She rushed out at an opposite door from the one her uncle was approaching, and was walking up and down the East room in the utmost confusion of contrary feeling, before Sir Thomas's politeness or apologies were over, or he had reached the beginning of the joyful intelligence which his visitor came to communicate. She was feeling, thinking, trembling, about everything; agitated, happy, miserable, infinitely obliged, absolutely angry. It was all beyond belief! He was inexcusable, in- comprehensible! But such were his habits, that he could do nothing without a mixture of evil. He had previously made her the happiest of human beings, and now he had insulted — she knew not vv^hat to say — how to class, or how to regard it. She would not have him be serious, and yet what could excuse the use of such words and offers, if they meant but to trifle? But William was a lieutenant. That was a fact beyond a doubt, and without an alloy. She would think of it for ever and forget all the rest. Mr. Crawford would certainly never 252 3iA3iSFIELD PA%K address her so again; he must have seen how unwelcome it was to her; and in that case^ how gratefully she could esteem him for his friendship to William ! She would not stir farther from the East room than the head of the great staircase^ till she had satisfied herself of Mr. Crawford's having left the house; but when convinced of his being gone^ she was eager to go down and be with her uncle, and have all the happiness of his joy as well as her own, and all the benefit of his information or his conjectures as to what would now be William's destination. Sir Thomas was as joyful as she could desire, and very kind and communi- cative; and she had so comfortable a talk with him about William as to make her feel as if nothing had occurred to vex her, till she found, towards the close, that Mr. Crawford was engaged to return and dine there that very day. This was a most unwelcome hearing, for though he might think nothing of what had passed, it would be quite distressing to her to see him again so soon. She tried to get the better of it; tried very hard, as the dinner hour approached, to feel and appear as usual ; but it was quite impossible for her not to look most shy and uncom- fortable when their visitor entered the room. She could not have supposed it in the power of any concurrence of circum- stances to give her so many painful sensations on the first day of hearing of William's promotion. Mr. Crawford was not only in the room — he was soon close to her. He had a note to deliver from his sister. Fanny could not look at him, but there was no consciousness of past folly in his voice. She opened her note immediately, glad to have anything to do, and happy, as she read it, to feel that the fidgettings of her aunt Norris, who was also to dine there, screened her a little from view. " My dear Fanny — for so I may now always call you, to the infinite relief of a tongue that has been stumbling at Miss Price for at least the last six weeks: I cannot let my brother go without sending you a few lines of general congratulation, and giving my most joyful consent and approval. Go on, my dear Fanny, and without fear; there can be no difficulties worth naming. I chuse to suppose that the assurance of my consent will be something; so you may smile upon him with mA2<^FlELD PA%K 253 your sweetest smiles this afternoon^ and send him back to me even happier than he goes. — Yours affectionately^ " M. C." These were not expressions to do Fanny any good; for though she read in too much haste and confusion to form the clearest judgment of Miss Crawford's meaning, it was evident that she meant to compliment her on her brother's attach- ment, and even to appear to believe it serious. She did not know what to do, or what to think. There was wretchedness in the idea of its being serious; there was perplexity and agitation every way. She was distressed whenever Mr. Craw- ford spoke to her, and he spoke to her much too often ; and she was afraid there was a something in his voice and manner in addressing her very different from what they were when he talked to the others. Her comfort in that day's dinner was quite destroyed: she could hardly eat anything; and when Sir Thomas good-hum ouredly observed, that joy had taken away her appetite, she was ready to sink with shame, from the dread of Mr. Crawford's interpretation; for though nothing could have tempted her to turn her eyes to the right hand, where he sat, she felt that his were immediately directed towards her. She was more silent than ever. She would hardly join even when William was the subject, for his commission came all from the right hand too, and there was pain in the connection. She thought Lady Bertram sat longer than ever, and began to be in despair of ever getting away; but at last they were in the drawing-room, and she was able to think as she would, while her aunts finished the subject of William's appointment in their own style. Mrs. Norris seemed as much delighted with the saving it would be to Sir Thomas as with any part of it. ISlow William would be able to keep himself, which would make a vast difference to his uncle, for it was unknown how much he had cost his uncle; and, indeed, it would make som.e difference in her presents too. She was very glad that she had given William what she did at parting, very glad, indeed, that it had been in her power, without material inconveni- ence, just at that time to give him something rather consi- 254 mA^KSFIELD PA%K derable; that is, for her, with her limited means, for now it would all be useful in helping to fit up his cabin. She knew he must be at some expense, that he would have many things to buy, though to be sure his father and mother would be able to put him in the way of getting everything very cheap ; but she was very glad she had contributed her mite tow^ards it.'' I am glad you gave him something considerable,'' said Lady Bertram, with [most] unsuspicious calmness, for / gave him only £io." " Indeed ! " cried Mrs. Norris, reddening. Upon my word, he must have gone off with his pockets well lined, and at no expense for his journey to London either! " Sir Thomas told me £io would be enough." Mrs. Norris being not at all inclined to question its suffi- ciency began to take the matter in another point. It is amazing," said she, how much young people cost their friends, what with bringing them up and putting them out in the world ! They little think how much it comes to, or what their parents, or their uncles and aunts pay for them in the course of the year. Now, here are my sister Price's children; take them all together, I dare say nobody would believe what a sum they cost Sir Thomas every year, to say nothing of what / do for them." " Very true, sister, as you say. But, poor things ! they cannot help it; and you know it makes very little difference to Sir Thomas. Fanny, William must not forget my shawl, if he goes to the East Indies; and I shall give him a com- mission for anything else that is worth having. I wish he may go to the East Indies, that I may have my shawl. I think I will have two shawls, Fanny." Fanny, meanwhile, speaking only when she could not help it, was very earnestly trying to understand what Mr. and Miss Crawford were at. There was everything in the world against their being serious, but his words and manner. Everything natural, probable, reasonable, was against it ; all their habits and ways of thinking, and all her own demerits. How could she have excited serious attachment in a man w^ho had seen so many, and been admired by so many, and flirted with so many, infinitely her superiors; who seemed so httle open to serious impressions, even where pains had been taken to please him; who thought so slightly, so carelessly, so un- mAS^FIELD PA%K 255 feelingly on all such points ; who was everything to every- body, and seemed to find no one essential to him? And further, how could it be supposed that his sister, with all her high and worldly notions of matrimony, would be forwarding anything of a serious nature in such a quarter? Nothing could be more unnatural in either. Fanny was ashamed of her own doubts. Everything might be possible rather than serious attachment, or serious approbation of it towards her. She had quite convinced herself of this before Sir Thomas and Mr. Crawford joined them. The difficulty was in main- taining the conviction quite so absolutely after Mr. Crawford was in the room ; for once or twice a look seemed forced on * her which she did not know how to class among the common •meaning; in any other man, at least, she would have said I that it meant something very earnest, very pointed. But she still tried to believe it no more than what he might often have expressed towards her cousins and fifty other women. She thought he was wishing to speak to her unheard by the rest. She fancied he was trying for it the whole evening at intervals, whenever Sir Thomas was out of the room, or at. all engaged with Mrs. Norris, and she carefully refused him every opportunity. At last — it seemed an at last to Fanny's nervousness, though, not remarkably late — he began to talk of going away; but the comfort of the sound was impaired by his turning to her the next moment, and saying, " Have you nothing to send to Mary ? No answer to her note ? She will be disappointed if she receives nothing from you. Pray write to her, if it be only a line." Oh yes ! certainly," cried Fanny, rising in haste, the haste of embarrassment and of wanting to get away — I will write directly." She went accordingly to the table, where she was in the habit of writing for her aunt, and prepared her materials without knowing what in the world to say. She had read : Miss Crawford's note only once, and how to reply to anything [ so imperfectly understood was most distressing. Quite un- I practised in such sort of notewriting, had there been time for ! scruples and fears as to style she would have felt them in ; abundance : but something must be instantly written ; and •with only one decided feeling, that of wishing not to appear- 256 ^JOiSFIELD PA%K to think anything really intended, she wrote thus, in great trembling both of spirits and hand : — " I am very much obliged to you, my dear Miss Crawford, for your kind congratulations, as far as they relate to my dearest William. The rest of your note I know means nothing; but I am so unequal to anything of the sort, that I hope you will excuse my begging you to take no further notice. I have seen too much of Mr. Crawford not to under- stand his manners ; if he understood me as well, he would, I dare say, behave differently. I do not know what I write, but it would be a great favour of you never to mention the subject again. With thanks for the honour of your note, I remain, dear Miss Crawford, etc., etc.'* The conclusion was scarcely intelligible from increasing ^ fright, for she found that Mr. Crawford, under pretence of receiving the note, was coming towards her. " You cannot think I mean to hurry you," said he, in an ' under voice, perceiving the amazing trepidation with which she made up the note; " you cannot think I have any such object. Do not hurry yourself, I entreat.'' ''Oh! I thank you; I have quite done, just done; it will be ready in a moment; I am very much obliged to you; if you will be so good as to give that to Miss Crawford." The note was held out, and must be taken; and as she instantly and with averted eyes walked towards the fire-place, where sat the others, he had nothing to do but to go in good earnest. Fanny thought she had never known a day of greater agitation, both of pain and pleasure ; but happily, the pleasure was not of a sort to die with the day ; for every day v/ould restore the knowledge of William's advancement, whereas the pain, she hoped, would return no more. She had no doubt that her note must appear excessively ill-written, that the language would disgrace a child, for her distress had allowed no arrangement; but at least it would assure them both of her being neither imposed on nor gratified by Mr. -Crawford's attentions. mA3<^FIELD PA'KK 257 CHJPTE'FiXXXII Fanny had by no means forgotten Mr. Crawford when she awoke the next morning; but she remembered the purport of her note, and was not less sanguine as to its effect than she had been the night before. If Mr. Crawford would but go away! That was what she most earnestly desired; go and take his sister with him, as he was to do, and as he returned to Mansfield on purpose to do. And why it was not done already she could not devise, for Miss Crawford certainly wanted no delay. Fanny had hoped, in the course of his yesterday's visit, to hear the day named; but he had only noken of their journey as what would take place ere long. Having so satisfactorily settled the conviction her note J vould convey, she could not but be astonished to see Mr. Crawford, as she accidentally did, coming up to the house again, and at an hour as early as the day before. His coming might have nothing to do with her, but she must avoid seeing him if possible; and being then on her way upstairs, she resolved there to remain, during the whole of his visit, unless actually sent for; and as Mrs. Norris was still in the house, there seemed little danger of her being wanted. She sat some time in a good deal of agitation, listening, trembling, and fearing to be sent for every moment; but as no footsteps approached the East room, she grew gradually composed, could sit down, and be able to employ herself, and able to hope that Mr. Crawford had come and would go without her being obliged to know anything of the matter. Nearly half an hour had passed, and she was grov/ing very comfortable, when suddenly the sound of a step in regular approach was heard; a heavy step, an unusual step in that ; part of the house; it was her uncle's; she knew it as well as his voice; she had trembled at it as often, and began to I tremble again, at the idea of his coming up to speak to her, : whatever might be the subject. It was indeed Sir Thomas, who opened the door and asked if she were there, and if he might come in. The terror of his former occasional visits to that room seemed all renewed, and she felt as if he were going jj to examine her again in French and English. 258 3IA3^FIELD PA%K She was all attention, however, in placing a chair for him, and trying to appear honoured; and in her agitation, had quite overlooked the deficiencies of her apartment, till he, stopping short as he entered, said, with much surprise, " Why have you no fire to-day? " There was snow on the ground, and she was sitting in a shawl. She hesitated. " I am not cold, sir: I never sit here long at this time of year.^' " But vou have a fire in general ? " " No, sir." "How comes this about? Here must be some mistake. I understood that you had the use of this room by way of , making you perfectly comfortable. In your bedchamber I know you cannot have a fire. Here is some great misappre- hension which must be rectified. It is highly unfit for you to sit, be it only half an hour a day, without a fire. You are not strong. You are chilly. Your aunt cannot be aware of this." Fanny would rather have been silent; but being obliged to speak, she could not forbear, in justice to the aunt she loved best, from saying something in which the words " my aunt Norris " were distinguishable. " I understand," cried her uncle, recollecting himself, and not wanting to hear more: " I understand. Your aunt Norris has always been an advocate, and very judiciously, for young people's being brought up without unnecessary ) indulgences; but there should be moderation in everything. She is also very hardy herself, which of course will influence her in her opinion of the wants of others. And on another account, too, I can perfectly comprehend. I know what her sentiments have always been. The principle was good in itself, but it may have been, and I believe has been, carried too far in your case. I am aware that there has been some- times, in some points, a misplaced distinction; but I think too well of you, Fanny, to suppose you will ever harbour resentment on that account. You have an understanding! which will prevent you from receiving things only in part,! and judging partially by the event. You will take in thej whole of the past, you will consider times, persons, andJ . probabilities, and you will feel that they were not least your : OdAS^FIELD PATiK 259 friends who were educating and preparing you for that mediocrity of condition which seemed to be your lot. Though their caution may prove eventually unnecessary, it was kindly meant; and of this you may be assured, that every advantage of affluence will be doubled by the little privations and restrictions that may have been imposed. I am sure you will not disappoint my opinion of you, by failing at any time to treat your aunt Norris with the respect and attention that are due to her. But enough of this. Sit down, my dear. I must speak to you for a few minutes, but I will not detain you long." Fanny obeyed, with eyes cast down and colour rising. After a moment's pause, Sir Thomas, trying to suppress a smile, went on. " You are not aware, perhaps, that I have had a visitor this morning. I had not been long in my own room, after break- fast, when Mr. Crawford was shewn in. His errand you may probably conjecture." Fanny's colour grew deeper and deeper; and her uncle, perceiving that she was embarrassed to a degree that made either speaking or looking up quite impossible, turned away his own eyes, and without any farther pause proceeded in his account of Mr. Crawford's visit. Mr. Crawford's business had been to declare himself the lover of Fanny, make decided proposals for her, and entreat the sanction of the uncle, who seemed to stand in the place of her parents; and he had done it all so well, so openly, so liberally, so properly, that Sir Thomas, feeling, moreover, his own replies, and his own remarks to have been very much to the purpose, was exceedingly happy to give the particulars of their conversation, and, little aware of what was passing in his niece's mind, conceived, that by such details he must be gratifying her far more than himself. He talked, therefore, for several minutes without Fanny's daring to interrupt him. She had hardly even attained the wish to do it. Her mind was in too much confusion. She had changed her position; and, with her eyes fixed intently on one of the windows, was listening to her uncle in the utmost perturbation and dismay. For a moment he ceased, but she had barely become conscious of it, when, rising from his chair, he said, and now, Fanny, having performed one part of my commission, and shewn 26o 3iA3^FIELD PA%K you everything placed on a basis the most assured and satis- factory, I may execute the remainder by prevailing on you to accompany me downstairs, where, though I cannot but presume on having been no unacceptable companion myself, I must submit to your finding one still better worth listening to. Mr. Crawford, as you have perhaps foreseen, is yet in the house. He is in my room, and hoping to see you there.'' There was a look, a start, an exclamation, on hearing this, which astonished Sir Thomas ; but what was his increase of astonishment on hearing her exclaim — " Oh I no, sir, I cannot, indeed I cannot go down to him. Mr. Crawford ought to know — he must know that; I told him enough yesterday to convince him; he spoke to me on this subject yesterday, and I told him without disguise that it was very disagreeable to me, and quite out of my power to return his good opinion.'' " I do not catch your meaning," said Sir Thomas, sitting down again. " Out of your power to return his good opinion ? What is all this ? I know he spoke to you yesterday, and (as far as I understand) received as much encouragement to proceed as a well-judging young woman could permit herself to give. I was very much pleased with what I collected to have been your behaviour on the occasion; it shewed a discretion highly to be commended. But now, when he has made his overtures so properly, and honourably — what are your scruples now ? " " You are mistaken, sir," cried Fanny, forced by the anxiety of the moment even to tell her uncle that he was wrong; " you are quite mistaken. How could Mr. Crawford say such a thing } I gave him no encouragement yesterday. On the contrary, I told him, I cannot recollect my exact words, but I am sure I told him that I would not listen to him, that it was very unpleasant to me in every respect, and that I begged him never to talk to me in that manner again. I am sure I said as much as that and more ; and I should have said still more, if I had been quite certain of his meaning anything seriously ; but I did not like to be, I could not bear to be, imputing more than might be intended. I though it might all pass for nothing with Am." She could say no more; her breath was almost gone. " Am I to understand," said Sir Thomas, after a few moments' silence, " that you mean to refuse Mr. Crawford? " 31 A3iS FIELD PA%k 261 Yes, sir." " Refuse him?" Yes, sir." ''Refuse Mr. Crawford I Upon what plea? For what reason? " " I — I cannot like him, sir, well enough to marry him." "This is very strange!" said Sir Thomas, in a voice of calm displeasure. " There is something in this which my comprehension does not reach. Here is a young man wishing to pay his addresses to you, with everything to recommend him ; not merely situation in life, fortune, and character, but with more than common agreeableness, with address and conversation pleasing to everybody. And he is not an acquaintance of to-day; you have now known him some time. His sister, moreover, is your intimate friend, and he has been doing that for your brother, which I should suppose would have been almost sufficient recommendation to you, had there been no other. It is very uncertain when my interest might have got William on. He has done it already." " Yes," said Fanny, in a faint voice, and looking down with fresh shame ; and she did feel almost ashamed of herself, after such a picture as her uncle had drawn, for not liking Mr. Crawford. " You must have been aware," continued Sir Thomas presently, " you must have been some time aware of a par- ticularity in Mr. Crawford's manners to you. This cannot have taken you by surprise. You must have observed his attentions; and though you always received them very properly (I have no accusation to make on that head), I never perceived them to be unpleasant to you. I am half inclined to think, Fanny, that you do not quite know your own feelings." " Oh yes, sir ! indeed I do. His attentions were always — what I did not like." Sir Thomas looked at her with deeper surprise. " This is beyond me," said he. " This requires explanation. Young as you are, and having seen scarcely any one, it is hardly possible that your affections " He paused and eyed her fixedly. He saw her lips formed into a m, though the sound was inarticulate, but her face was like scarlet. That, however, in so modest a girl might 262 mAS^FIELD PJI^ be very compatible with innocence; and chusing at least to appear satisfied, he quickly added, " No, no, I know that is quite out of the question; quite impossible. Well, there is nothing more to be said." And for a few minutes he did say nothing. He was deep in thought. His niece was deep in thought likewise, trying to harden and prepare herself against farther questioning. She would rather die than own the truth ; and she hoped by a little reflection to fortify herself beyond betraying it. Independently of the interest which Mr. Crawford's choice seemed to justify," said Sir Thomas, beginning again, and very composedly, " his wishing to marry at all so early is recommendatory to me. I am an advocate for early marriages, where there are means in proportion, and would have every young man, with a sufficient income, settle as soon after four-and-twenty as he can. This is so much my opinion, that I am sorry to think how little likely my own eldest son, your cousin, Mr. Bertram, is to marry early; but at present, as far as I can judge, matrimony makes no part of his plans or thoughts. I wish he were more likely to fix." Here was a glance at Fanny. " Edmund, I consider, from his dispositions and habits, as much more likely to marry early than his brother. He, indeed, I have lately thought has seen the woman he could love, which, I am convinced, my eldest son has not. Am I right? Do you agree with me, my dear? " Yes, sir." It was gently, but it was calmly said, and Sir Thomas was easy on the score of the cousins. But the removal of his alarm did his niece no service ; as her unaccountableness was confirmed his displeasure increased; and getting up and walking about the room, with a frown, which Fanny could picture to herself, though she dared not lift up her eyes, he shortly afterwards, and in a voice of authority, said, " Have you any reason, child, to think ill of Mr. Crawford's temper? " No, sir." She longed to add, " but of his principles I have; " but her heart sunk under the appalling prospect of discussion, ex- planation, and probably non-conviction. Her ill opinion of him was founded chiefly on observations, which, for her cousins' sake, she could scarcely dare mention to their father. mAO^FIELD PA%K 263 Maria and Julia, and especially ?tlaria, were so closely im- plicated in Mr. Crawford's misconduct, that she could not give his character, such as she believed it, without betraying them. She had hoped that, to a man like her uncle, so dis- cerning, so honourable, so good, the simple acknowledgment of settled dislike on her side, would have been sufficient. To her infinite grief she found it was not. Sir Thomas came towards the table where she sat in trembling wretchedness, and with a good deal of cold stern- ness, said, " It is of no use, I perceive, to talk to you. We had better put an end to this most mortifying conference. Mr. Crawford must not be kept longer waiting. I will, therefore, only add, as thinking it my duty to mark my opinion of your conduct, that you have disappointed every expectation I had formed, and proved yourself of a character the very reverse of what I had supposed. For I had, Fanny, as I think my behaviour must have shewn, formed a very favourable opinion of you from the period of my return to England. I had thought you peculiarly free from wilfulness of temper, self-conceit, and every tendency to that indepen- dence of spirit which prevails so much in modem days, even in young women, and which in young women is offensive and disgusting beyond all common offence. But you have now shewn me that you can be wilful and perverse ; that you can and will decide for yourself, without any consideration or deference for those who have surely some right to guide you, without even asking their advice. You have shewn yourself very, very different from anything that I had imagined. The advantage or disadvantage of your family, of your parents, your brothers and sisters, never seems to have had a moment's share in your thoughts on this occasion. How they might be benefited, how they must rejoice in such an establishment for you, is nothing to you. You think only of yourself, and be- cause you do not feel for Mr. Crawford exactly what a young heated fancy imagines to be necessary for happiness, you resolve to refuse him at once, without wishing even for a little time to consider of it, a little more time for cool consideration, and for really examining your own inclinations; and are, in a wild fit of folly, throwing away from you such an opportunity of being settled in life, eligibly, honourably, nobly settled, as will, probably, never occur to you again. Here is a young 264 3\4AV<^FIELD PAT{K man of sense, of character, of temper, of manners, and of fortune, exceedingly attached to< you, and seeking your hand in the most handsome and disinterested way; and let me tell you, Fanny, that you may live eighteen years longer in the world, without being addressed by a man of half Mr. Crawford's estate, or a tenth part of his merits. Gladly would I have bestowed either of my own daughters on him. Maria is nobly married; but had Mr. Crawford sought Julia's hand, I should have given it to him with superior and more heartfelt satisfaction than I gave Maria's to Mr. Rushworth." After half a moment's pause: " And I should have been very much surprised had either of my daughters, on receiving a proposal of marriage at any time which might carry with it only half the eligibility of this, immediately and peremptorily, and without paying my opinion or my regard the compliment of any consultation, put a decided negative on it. I should have been much surprised and much hurt, by such a pro- ceeding. I should have thought it a gross violation of duty and respect. You are not to be judged by the same rule. You do not owe me the duty of a child. But, Fanny, if your heart can acquit you of ingratitude " He ceased. Fanny was by this time crying so bitterly, that, angry as he was, he would not press that article farther. Her heart was almost broke by such a picture of what she appeared to him; by such accusations, so heavy, so multi- plied, so rising in dreadful gradation ! Self-willed, obstinate, selfish, and ungrateful. He thought her all this. She had deceived his expectations; she had lost his good opinion. What was to become of her? " I am very sorry," said she, inarticulately, through her tears, " I am very sorry, indeed." " Sorry! yes, I hope you are sorry; and you will probably have reason to be long sorry for this day's transactions." If it were possible for me to do otherwise " said she, with another strong effort; " but I am so perfectly convinced that I could never make him happy, and that I should be miserable myself." Another burst of tears; but in spite of that burst, and in spite of that great black word miserable, which served to introduce it. Sir Thomas began to think a little relenting, a little change of inclination, might have something to do with mASiSFIELD PA%K 265 it; and to augur favourably from the personal entreaty of the young man himself. He knew her to be very timid, and exceedingly nervous; and thought it not improbable that her mind might be in such a state as a little time, a little pressing, a little patience, and a little impatience, a judicious mixture of all on the lover's side, might work their usual effect on. If the gentleman would but persevere, if he had but love enough to persevere. Sir Thomas began to have hopes; and these reflections having passed across his mind and cheered it, " Well," said he, in a tone of becoming gravity, but of less anger, well, child, dry up your tears. There is no use in these tears; they can do no good. You must now come downstairs with me. Mr. Crawford has been kept waiting too long already. You must give him your own answer; we cannot expect him to be satisfied with less ; and you only can explain to him the grounds of that misconception of your sentiments, which, unfortunately for himself, he certainly has imbibed. I am totally unequal to it." But Fanny showed such reluctance, such miser}'", at the idea of going down to him, that Sir Thomas, after a little consideration, judged it better to indulge her. His hopes from both gentleman and lady suffered a small depression in consequence; but when he looked at his niece, and saw the state of feature and complexion which her crying had brought her into, he thought there might be as much lost as gained by an immediate interview. With a few words, therefore, of no particular meaning, he walked off by himself, leaving his poor niece to sit and cry over what had passed, with very wretched feelings. Her mind was all disorder. The past, present, future, everything was terrible. But her uncle's anger gave her the severest pain of all. Selfish and ungrateful ! to have appeared so to him ! She was miserable for ever. She had no one to take her part, to counsel, or speak for her. Her only friend was absent. He might have softened his father; but all, perhaps all, would think her selfish and ungrateful. She might have to endure the reproach again and again; she might hear it, or see it, or know it to exist for ever in every connection about her. She could not but feel some resent- ment against Mr. Crawford ; yet, if he really loved her, and were unhappy too ! It was all wretchedness together. 266 mAO^FIELD PA^K In about a quarter of an hour her uncle returned ; she was almost ready to faint at the sight of him. He spoke calmly, however, without austerity, without reproach, and she revived a little. There was comfort, too, in his words, as well as his manner, for he began with, Mr. Crawford is gone: he has just left me. I need not repeat what has passed. I do not want to add to anything you may now be feeling, by an account of what he has felt. Suffice it, that he has behaved in the most gentlemanlike and generous manner, and has confirmed me in a most favourable opinion of his understanding, heart, and temper. Upon my representation of what you were suffering, he immediately, and with the greatest delicacy, ceased to urge to see you for the present.^' Here Fanny, who had looked up, looked down again. Of course," continued her uncle, " it cannot be supposed but that he should request to speak with you alone, be it only for five minutes; a request too natural, a claim too just to be denied. But there is no time fixed; perhaps to-morrow, or whenever your spirits are composed enough. For the present you have only to tranquiUise yourself. Check these tears; they do but exhaust you. If, as I am willing to suppose, you wish to show me any observance, you will not give way to these emotions, but endeavour to reason yourself into a stronger frame of mind. I advise you to go out ; the air will do you good ; go out for an hour on the gravel ; you will have the shrubbery to yourself, and will be the better for air and exercise. And, Fanny (turning back again for a moment), I shall make no mention below of what has passed ; I shall not even tell your aunt Bertram. There is no occasion for spreading the disappointment; say nothing about it your- self."^ This was an order to be most joyfully obeyed; this was an act of kindness which Fanny felt at her heart. To be spared from her aunt Norris's interminable reproaches! he left her in a glow of gratitude. Anything might be bearable rather than such reproaches. Even to see Mr. Crawford would be less overpowering. ^ She walked out directly as her uncle recommended, and { followed his advice throughout, as far as she could; did check her tears ; did earnestly try to compose her spirits and strengthen her mind. She wished to prove to him that she mAViSFIELD PA%K 267 did desire his comfort, and sought to regain his favour; and he had given her another strong motive for exertion, in keep- ing the whole affair from the knowledge of her aunts. Not to excite suspicion by her look or manner, was now an object worth attaining ; and she felt equal to almost anything that might save her from her aunt Norris. She was struck, quite struck, when, on returning from her walk and going into the East room again, the first thing which caught her eye was a fire lighted and burning. A fire ! it seemed too much; just at that time to be giving her such an indulgence was exciting even painful gratitude. She wondered that Sir Thomas could have leisure to think of such a trifle again; but she soon found, from the voluntary information of the housemaid, who came in to attend it, that so it was to be every day. Sir Thomas had given orders for it. " I must be a brute, indeed, if I can be really ungrateful 1 " said she, m soliloquy. " Heaven defend me from being ungrateful ! She saw nothing more of her uncle, nor of her aunt Norris, till they met at dinner. Her uncle's behaviour to her was then as nearly as possible what it had been before; she was sure he did not mean there should be any change, and that it was only her own conscience that could fancy any; but her aunt was soon quarrelling with her; and when she found how much and how unpleasantly her having only walked out without her aunt's knowledge could be dwelt on, she felt all the reason she had to bless the kindness which saved her from the same spirit of reproach, exerted on a more momentous subject. " If I had known you were going out, I should have got you just to go as far as my house with some orders for Nanny," said she, " which I have since, to my very great inconvenience, been obliged to go and carry myself. I could very ill spare the time, and you might have saved me the trouble, if you v/ould only have been so good as to let us know you were going out. It would have made no difference to you, I suppose, whether you had walked in the shrubbery or gone to my house." " I recommended the shrubbery to Fanny as the driest place," said Sir Thomas. 268 a^JOiSFIELD PA1{K " Oh ! " said Mrs. Norris, with a moment's check, " that was very kind of you, Sir Thomas, but you do not know how dry the path is to my house. Fanny would have had quite as good a walk there, I assure you, with the advantage of being of some use, and obliging her aunt: it is all her fault. If she would but have let us know she was going out — ; but there is a something about Fanny, I have often observed it before — she likes to go her own way to work ; she does not like to be dictated to; she takes her own independent walk whenever she can; she certainly has a little spirit of secrecy, and inde- pendence, and nonsense, about her, which I would advise her to get the better of." As a general reflection on Fanny, Sir Thomas thought nothing could be more unjust, though he had been so lately expressing the same sentiments himself, and he tried to turn the conversation: tried repeatedly before he could succeed; for Mrs. Norris had not discernment enough to perceive, either now, or at any other time, to what degree he thought well of his niece, or how very far he was from wishing to have his own children's merits set off by the depreciation of hers. She was talking at Fanny, and resenting this private walk half through the dinner. It was over, however, at last; and the evening set in with more composure to Fanny, and more cheerfulness of spirits than she could have hoped for after so stormy a morning; but she trusted, in the first place, that she had done right; that her judgment had not misled her. For the purity of her intentions she could answer; and she was willing to hope, secondly, that her uncle's displeasure was abating, and would abate farther as he considered the matter with more im- partiality, and felt, as a good man must feel, how wretched, and how unpardonable, how hopeless, and how wicked it was, to marry without affection. When the meeting with which she was threatened for the morrow was past, she could not but flatter herself that the subject would be finally concluded, and Mr. Crawford once gone from Mansfield, that everything would soon be as if no such subject had existed. She would not, could not believe, that Mr. Crawford's affection for her could distress him long; his mind was not of that sort. London would soon bring its cure. In London he would soon learn to wonder at his mACiSFIELD PATiK 269 k I' infatuation^ and be thankful for the right reason in her which had saved him from its evil consequences. While Fanny's mind was engaged in these sort of hopes, her uncle was, soon after tea, called out of the room; an occurrence too common to strike her, and she thought nothing of it till the butler re-appeared ten minutes after- wards, and advancing decidedly towards herself, said, Sir Thomas wishes to speak with you, ma'am, in his own room." Then it occurred to her what might be going on ; a suspicion rushed over her mind which drove the colour from her cheeks ; but instantly rising, she was preparing to obey, when Mrs. Norris called out, Stay, stay, Fanny! what are you about? where are you going? don't be in such a hurry. Depend ' upon it, it is not you who are wanted; depend upon it, [it] is me (looking at the butler); but you are so very eager to put yourself forward. What should Sir Thomas want you for? It is me, Baddeley, you mean; I am coming this moment. You mean me, Baddeley, I am sure; Sir Thomas wants me, not Miss Price." But Baddeley was stout. No, ma'am, it is Miss Price; I am certain of its being Miss Price." And there was a half smile with the words, which meant, I do not think you would answer the purpose at all." Mrs. Norris, much discontented, was obliged to compose herself to work again; and Fanny, walking off in agitating consciousness, found herself, as she anticipated, in another minute alone with Mr. Craw^ford. CH^PTE1{^XXXIII The conference was neither so short nor so conclusive as the lady had designed. The gentleman was not so easily satis- fied. He had all the disposition to persevere that Sir Thomas could wish him. He had vanity, which strongly inclined him in the first place to think she did love him, though she might not know it herself ; and which, secondly, when con- strained at last to admit that she did know her own present feelings, convinced him that he should be able in time to make those feelings what he wished. 270 mADiSFIELD PA%K He was in love, very much in love; and it was a love which, operating on an active, sanguine spirit, of more warmth than delicacy, made her affection appear of greater consequence because it was withheld, and determined him to have the glory, as well as the felicity, of forcing her to love him. He would not despair: he would not desist. He had every well-grounded reason for solid attachment; he knew her to have all the worth that could justify the warmest hopes of lasting happiness with her; her conduct at this time by speaking the disinterestedness and delicacy of her character (qualities which he believed most rare indeed), was of a sort to heighten all his wishes, and confirm all his resolu- tions. He knew not that he had a pre-engaged heart to attack. Of that he had no suspicion. He considered her rather as one who had never thought on the subject enough to be in danger; who had been guarded by youth, a youth of mind as lovely as of person ; whose modesty had prevented her from understanding his attentions, and who was still overpowered by the suddenness of addresses so wholly unex- pected, and the novelty of a situation which her fancy had never taken into account. Must it not follow of course, that, when he was understood, he should succeed ? He believed it fully. Love such as his, in a man like himself, must with perseverance secure a return, and at no great distance ; and he had so much delight in the idea of obliging her to love him in a very short time, that her not loving him now was scarcely regretted. A little difficulty to be overcome was no evil to Henry Crawford. He rather derived spirits from it. He had been apt to gain hearts too easily. His situation was new and animating. To Fanny, however, who had known too much opposition all her life to find any charm in it, all this was unintelligible. She found that he did mean to persevere; but how he could, after such language from her as she felt herself obb'ged to use, was not to be understood. She told him that she did not love him, could not love him, was sure she never should love him; that such a change was quite impossible; that the subject was most painful to her; that she must intreat him never to mention it again, to allow her to leave him at once, and let it be considered as concluded for ever. And when 3^A3iSFIELD PA%K 271 farther pressed^ had added, that in her opinion their disposi- tions were so totally dissimilar, as to make mutual affection incompatible; and that they were unfitted for each other by nature, education, and habit. All this she had said, and with the earnestness of sincerity; yet this was not enough^ for he inmiediately denied there being anything uncongenial in their characters, or anything unfriendly in their situations ; and positively declared, that he would still love, and still hope I Fanny knew her own meaning, but was no judge of her own manner. Her manner was incurably gentle; and she was not aware how much it concealed the sternness of her pur- pose. Her diffidence, gratitude, and softness, made every expression of indifference seem almost an effort of self-denial; seem, at least, to be giving nearly as much pain to herself as to him. Mr. Crawford was no longer the Mr. Crawford who, as the clandestine, insidious, treacherous admirer of Maria Bertram, had been her abhorrence, whom she had hated to see or to speak to, in whom she could believe no good quality to exist, and whose power, even of being agreeable, she had barely acknowledged. He was now the Mr. Crawford who was addressing herself with ardent, disinterested love ; whose feelings were apparently become all that was honourable and upright, whose views of happiness were all fixed on a marriage of attachment; who was pouring out his sense of her merits, describing and describing again his affection, proving, as far as words could prove it, and in the language, tone, and spirit of a man of talent, too, that he sought her for her gentleness and her goodness; and to complete the whole, he was now the Mr. Crawford who had procured William's promotion ! Here was a change, and here were claims which couM not but operate 1 She might have disdained him in all the dignity of angry virtue, in the grounds of Sotherton, or the theatre at Mansfield Park; but he approached her now with rights that demanded different treatment. She must be courteous, and she must be compassionate. She must have a sensation of being honoured, and whether thinking of herself or her brother, she must have a strong feeling of gratitude. The effect of the whole was a manner so pitying and agitated, and words intermingled with her refusal so expressive of obliga- tion and concern, that to a temper of vanity and hope like Crawford's, the truth, or at least the strength of her indiffer- 272 mA3^FIELD PA%K ence, might well be questionable; and he was not so irrational as Fanny considered him, in the professions of persevering, assiduous, and not desponding attachment which closed the interview. It was with reluctance that he suffered her to go ; but there was no look of despair in parting to bely his words, or give her hopes of his being less unreasonable than he professed himself. Now she was angr}^ Some resentment did arise at a perseverance so selfish and ungenerous. Here was again a want of delicacy and regard for others which had formerly so struck and disgusted her. Here was again a something of the same Mr. Crawford whom she had so reprobated before. How evidently was there a gross want of feeling and humanity where his own pleasure was concerned ; and alas ! how always known no principle to supply as a duty what the heart was deficient in ! Had her own affections been as free as perhaps they ought to have been, he never could have engaged them. So thought Fanny, in good truth and sober sadness, as she sat musing over that too great indulgence and luxury of a fire upstairs ; wondering at the past and present; wondering at what was yet to come, and in a nervous agitation which made nothing clear to her, but the persuasion of her being never under any circumstances able to love Mr. Crawford, and the felicity of having a fire to sit over and think of it. Sir Thomas was obliged, or obliged himself, to wait till the morrow for a knowledge of what had passed between the young people. He then saw Mr. Crawford, and received his account. The first feeling was disappointment: he had hoped better things ; he had thought that an hour's intreaty from a young man like Crawford could not have worked so little change on a gentle-tempered girl like Fanny ; but there was speedy comfort in the determined views and sanguine perseverance of the lover; and when seeing such confidence of success in the principal. Sir Thomas was soon able to depend on it himself. Nothing was omitted, on his side, of civility, compliment, or kindness, that might assist the plan. Mr. Crawford's steadiness was honoured, and Fanny was praised, and the connection was still the most desirable in the world. At Mansfield Park Mr. Crawford would always be welcome ; he had only to consult his own judgment and feelings as to the mA3^FIELD PA'RK 273 frequency of his visits, at present or in future. In all his niece's family and friends, there could be but one opinion, one wish on the subject; the influence of all who loved her must incline one way. Everything was said that could encourage, every en- couragement received with grateful joy, and the gentlemen parted the best of friends. Satisfied that the cause was now on a footing the most proper and hopeful. Sir Thomas resolved to abstain from all farther importunity with his niece, and to show no open interference. Upon her disposition he believed kindness might be the best way of working. Intreaty should be from one quarter only. The forbearance of her family on a point, respecting which she could be in no doubt of their wishes, might be their surest means of forwarding it. Accordingly, on this principle. Sir Thomas took the first opportunity of saying to her, with a mild gravity, intended to be overcoming, " Well, Fanny, I have seen Mr. Crawford again, and learnt from him exactly how matters stand between you. He is a most extraordinary young man, and whatever be the event, you must feel that you have created an attachment of no common character; though, young as you are, and little acquainted with the transient, varying, unsteady nature of love, as it generally exists, you cannot be struck as I am with all that is wonderful in a perseverance of this sort against discouragement. With him, it is entirely a matter of feeling : he claims no merit in it; perhaps is entitled to none. Yet, having chosen so well, his constancy has a respectable stamp. Had his choice been less unexceptionable, I should have condemned his persevering.'' " Indeed, sir," said Fanny, " I am very sorry that Mr. Crawford should continue to 1 know that it is paying me a very great compliment, and I feel most undeservedly honoured; but I am so perfectly convinced, and I have told him so, that it never will be in my power " " My dear," interrupted Sir Thomas, " there is no occasion for this. Your feelings are as well known to me as my wishes and regrets must be to you. There is nothing more to be said or done. From this hour, the subject is never to be revived between us. You will have nothing to fear, or to be agitated about. You cannot suppose me capable of trying to 274 (MA:>i&FIELD FA%K persuade you to marry against your inclinations. Your happiness and advantage are all that I have in view, and nothing is required of you but to bear with Mr. Crawford's endeavours to convince you that they may not be incom- patible with his. He proceeds at his own risk. You are on safe ground. I have engaged for your seeing him whenever he calls^ as you might have done had nothing of this sort occurred. You will see him with the rest of us, in the same manner, and, as much as you can, dismissing the recollection of everything unpleasant. He leaves Northamptonshire so soon, that even this slight sacrifice cannot be often demanded. The future must be very uncertain. And now, my dear Fanny, this subject is closed between us." The promised departure was all that Fanny could think of with much satisfaction. Her uncle's kind expressions, however, and forbearing manner, were sensibly felt; and when she considered how much of the truth was unknown to him, she believed she had no right to wonder at the line of conduct he pursued. He, who had married a daughter to Mr. Rushworth: romantic delicacy was certainly not to be expected from him. She must do her duty, and trust that time might make her duty easier than it now was. She could not, though only eighteen, suppose Mr. Craw- ford's attachment would hold out for ever; she could not but imagine that steady, unceasing discouragement from herself would put an end to it in time. How much time she might, in her own fancy, allot for its dominion, is another concern. It would not be fair to inquire into a young lady's exact estimate of her own perfections. In spite of his intended silence. Sir Thomas found himself once more obliged to mention the subject to his niece, to prepare her briefly for its being imparted to her aunts; a measure which he would still have avoided, if possible, but which became necessary from the totally opposite feelings of Mr. Crawford, as to any secrecy of proceeding. He had no idea of concealment. It was all known at the Parsonage, where he loved to talk over the future with both his sisters, and it would be rather gratifying to him to have enlightened witnesses of the progress of his success. When Sir Thomas understood this, he felt the necessity of making his ownx wife and sister-in-law acquainted with the business without delay; 3iA:KSFIELD PA%K 275 though, on Fanny's account, he almost dreaded the effect of the communication to Mrs. Norris as much as Fanny herself. He deprecated her mistaken but well-meaning zeal. Sir Thomas, indeed, was, by this time, not very far from classing Mrs. Norris as one of those well-meaning people who are always doing mistaken and very disagreeable things. Mrs. Norris, however, relieved him. He pressed for the strictest forbearance and silence towards their niece; she not only promised, but did observe it. She only looked her increased ill-will. Angry she was : bitterly angry ; but she was more angry with Fanny for having received such an offer^ than for refusing it. It was an injury and affront to Julia, who ought to have been Mr. Crawford's choice; and, inde- pendently of that, she disliked Fanny, because she had neglected her; and she would have grudged such an elevation to one whom she had been always trying to depress. Sir Thomas gave her more credit for discretion on the occasion than she deserved; and Fanny could have blessed her for allowing her only to see her displeasure, and not to hear it. Lady Bertram took it differently. She had been a beauty, and a prosperous beauty, all her life ; and beauty and wealth were all that excited her respect. To know Fanny to be sought in marriage by a man of fortune, raised her, therefore, very much in her opinion. By convincing her that Fanny was very pretty, which she had been doubting about before, and that she would be advantageously married, it made her feel a sort of credit in calling her niece. " Well, Fanny,'' said she, as soon as they were alone together afterwards, and she really had known something like impatience to be alone with her, and her countenance, as she spoke, had extraordinary animation; " Well, Fanny, I have had a very agreeable surprise this morning. I must just speak of it once, I told Sir Thomas I must once, and then I shall have done. I give you joy, my dear niece." And looking at her complacently, she added, " Humph, we certainly are a handsome family ! " Fanny coloured, and doubted at first what to say; when hoping to assail her on her vulnerable side, she presently answered — " My dear aunt, you cannot wish me to do differently 276 3^JDiSFIELD PA^ from what I have done, I am sure. You cannot wish me to' ^ marry ; for you would miss me, should not you ? Yes, I am sure you would miss me too much for that." No, my dear, I should not think of missing you, when such an offer as this comes in your way. I could do very well without you, if you were married to a man of such good estate as Mr. Crawford. And you must be aware, Fanny, that it is every young woman's duty to accept such a very unexceptionable offer as this.'' This was almost the only rule of conduct, the only piece of advice, which Fanny had ever received from her aunt in the course of eight years and a half. It silenced her. She felt , how unprofitable contention would be. If her aunt's feelings j were against her, nothing could be hoped from attacking her understanding. Lady Bertram was quite talkative. " I will tell you what, Fanny," said she, " I am sure he fell in love with you at the ball ; I am sure the mischief was done that evening. You did look remarkably well. Every- body said so. Sir Thomas said so. And you know you had Chapman to help you to dress. I am very glad I sent Chap- man to you. I shall tell Sir Thomas that I am sure it was done that evening." And still pursuing the same cheerful thoughts, she soon afterwards added, " And I will tell you what, Fanny, which is more than I did for Maria, the next time Pug has a litter you shall have a puppy." CH^PTE%^XXXIF Edmund had great things to hear on liis return. Many surprises were awaiting him. The first that occurred was not least in interest: the appearance of Henry Crawford and his sister walking together through the village as he rode into it. He had concluded — he had meant them to be far distant. His absence had been extended beyond a fortnight purposely to avoid Miss Crawford. He was returning to Mansfield with spirits ready to feed on melancholy re- membrances, and tender associations, when her own fair self was before him, leaning on her brother's arm, and he found himself receiving a welcome, unquestionably friendly, from 31A3<^FIELD PA^I^K 277 the woman whom, two moments before, he had been thinking of as seventy miles off, and as farther, much farther, from him in inclination than any distance could express. Her reception of him was of a sort which he could not have hoped for, had he expected to see her. Coming as he did from such a purport fulfilled as had taken him away, he would have expected anything rather than a look of satisfac- tion, and words of simple, pleasant meaning. It was enough to set his heart in a glow, and to bring him home in the properest state for feeling the full value of the other joyful surprises at hand. William's promotion, with all its particulars, he was soon master of; and with such a secret provision of comfort within his own breast to help the joy, he found in it a source of most gratifying sensation, and unvarying cheerfulness all dinner-time. After dinner, when he and his father were alone, he had Fanny's history; and then all the great events of the last fortnight, and the present situation of matters at Mansfield were known to him. Fanny suspected what was going on. They sat so much longer than usual in the dining-parlour, that she was sure they must be talking of her; and when tea at last brought them away, and she was to be seen by Edmund again, she felt dreadfully guilty. He came to her, sat down by her, took her hand, and pressed it kindly; and at that moment she thought that, but for the occupation and the scene which the tea-things afforded, she must have betrayed her emotion in some unpardonable excess. He was not intending, however, by such action, to be con- veying to her that unqualified approbation and encourage- ment which her hopes drew from it. It was designed only to express his participation in all that interested her, and to tell her that he had been hearing what quickened every feel- ing of affection. He was, in fact, entirely on his father's side of the question. His surprise was not so great as his father's at her refusing Crawford, because, so far from supposing her to consider him with anything like a preference, he had always believed it to be rather the reverse, and could imagine her to be taken perfectly unprepared, but Sir Thomas could not regard the connection as more desirable than he did. It 278 MASiSFlELD PA%K had every recommendation to him; and while honouring her ror what she had done under the influence of her present indifference^ honouring her in rather stronger terms than Sir Thomas could quite echo^ he was most earnest in hoping, and sanguine in believing, that it would be a match at last, and that, united by mutual affection, it would appear that their dispositions were as exactly fitted to make them blessed in each other, as he was now beginning seriously to consider them. Crawford had been too precipitate. He had not given her time to attach herself. He had begun at the wrong end. With such powers as his, however, and such a disposi- tion as hers, Edmund trusted that everything would work out a happy conclusion. Meanwhile, he saw enough of Fanny^s embarrassment to make him scrupulously guard against exciting it a second time, by any word, or look, or movement. Crawford called the next day, and on the score of Edmund's return, Sir Thomas felt himself more than licensed to ask him to stay dinner; it was really a necessary compliment. He staid of course, and Edmund had then ample opportunity for observing how he sped with Fanny, and what degree of immediate encouragement for him might be extracted from her manners ; and it was so little, so very, very little (every chance, every possibility of it, resting upon her embarrass- ment only : if there was not hope in her confusion, there was hope in nothing else), that he was almost ready to wonder at his friend's perseverance. Fanny was worth it all; he held her to be worth every effort of patience, every exertion of mind, but he did not think he could have gone on himself with any woman breathing, without something more to warm his courage than his eyes could discern in hers. He was very willing to hope that Crawford saw clearer, and this was the most comfortable conclusion for his friend that he could come to from all that he observed to pass before, and at, and after dinner. In the evening a few circumstances occurred which he thought more promising. When he and Crawford walked into the drawing-room, his mother and Fanny were sitting as intently and silently at work as if there were nothing else to care for. Edmund could not help noticing their apparently deep tranquillity. " We have not been so silent all the time," replied his mAD^SFIELD PA'RK 279 mother. " Fanny has been reading to me, and only put the book down upon hearing you coming." And sure enough there was a book on the table which had the air of being very recently closed: a volume of Shakespeare. " She often reads to me out of those books; and she was in the middle of a very fine speech of that man's — what's his name, Fanny — when we heard your footsteps." Crawford took the volume. " Let me have the pleasure of finishing that speech to your ladyship," said he. "I shall find it immediately." And by carefully giving way to the inclination of the leaves, he did find it, or within a page or two, quite near enough to satisfy Lady Bertram, who assured him, as soon as he mentioned the name of Cardinal Wolsey, that he had got the very speech. Not a look, or an offer of help had Fanny given; not a syllable for or against. All her attention was for her work. She seemed determined to be interested by nothing else. But taste was too strong in her. She could not abstract her mind five minutes ; she was forced to listen; his reading was capital, and her pleasure in good reading extreme. To good reading, however, she had been long used; her uncle read well, her cousins all, Edmund very well, but in Mr. Crawford's reading there was a variety of excel- lence beyond what she had ever met with. The King, the Queen, Buckingham, Wolsey, Cromwell, all were given in turn; for with the happiest knack, the happiest power of jumping and guessing, he could always alight at will on the best scene, or the best speeches of each; and whether it were dignity or pride, or tenderness or remorse, or whatever were to be expressed, he could do it with equal beauty. It was truly dramatic. His acting had first taught Fanny what pleasure a play might give, and his reading brought all his acting before her again; nay, perhaps with greater enjoy- ment, for it came unexpectedly, and with no such drawback as she had been used to suffer in seeing him on the stage with Miss Bertram. Edmund watched the progress of her attention, and was amused and gratified by seeing how she gradually slackened in the needle-work, which at the beginning, seemed to occupy her totally ; how it fell from her hand while she sat motionless over it, and at last, how the eyes which had appeared so studiously to avoid him throughout the day, were turned and 28o mAO^SFIELD PAVJC fixed on Crawford; fixed on him for minutes, fixed on him, in short, till the attraction drew Crawford's upon her, and the book was closed, and the charm was broken. Then she was shrinking again into herself, and blushing and working as hard as ever; but it had been enough to give Edmund encouragement for his friend, and as he cordially thanked him, he hoped to be expressing Fanny's secret feelings too. " That play must be a favourite with you," said he; " you read as if you knew it well." " It will be a favourite, I believe, from this hour," replied Crawford; "but I do not think I have had a volume of Shakespeare in my hand before since I was fifteen. I once saw Henry the Eighth acted, or I have heard of it from some- body who did, I am not certain which. But Shakespeare one gets acquainted with without knowing how. It is a part of an Englishman's constitution. His thoughts and beauties are so spread abroad that one touches them everywhere ; one is intimate with him by instinct. No man of any brain can open at a good part of one of his plays without falling into the flow of his meaning immediately." " No doubt one is familiar with Shakespeare in a degree," said Edmund, " from one's earliest years. His celebrated passages are quoted by everybody ; they are in half the books we open, and we all talk Shakespeare, use his similes, and describe with his descriptions; but this is totally distinct from giving his sense as you gave it. To know him in bits and scraps is common enough; to know him pretty thoroughly is, perhaps, not uncommon; but to read him well aloud is no every-day talent." " Sir, you do me honour," was Crawford's answer, with a bow of mock gravity. Both gentlemen had a glance at Fanny, to see if a word of accordant praise could be extorted from her; yet both feel- ing that it could not be. Her praise had been given in her attention ; that must content them. Lady Bertram's admiration was expressed, and strongly too. It was really like being at a play," said she. " I wish Sir Thomas had been here." Cniwford was excessively pleased. If Lady Bertram, with all her incompetency and languor, could feel this, the 31AD<^FIELD J^/l^ 281 inference of what her niece, alive and enlightened as she was, must feel, was elevating. " You have a great turn for acting, I am snre, Mr. Craw- ford,'' said her ladyship soon afterwards; "and I will tell you what, I think you will have a theatre, some time or other, at your house in Norfolk. I mean when you are settled there. I do, indeed. I think you will fit up a theatre at your house in Norfolk." Do you, ma'am? " cried he, with quickness. " No, nvO, that will never be. Your ladyship is quite mistaken. No^ theatre at Everingham ! Oh, no ! " And he looked at Fanny with an expressive smile, which evidently meant, that lady will never allow a theatre at Everingham." \ Edmund saw it all, and saw Fanny so determined not to 1 see it, as to make it clear that the voice was enough to convey the full meaning of the protestation; and such a quick consciousness of compliment, such a ready compre- hension of a hint, he thought, was rather favourable than not. The subject of reading aloud was farther discussed. The two young men were the only talkers, but they, standing by the fire, talked over the too common neglect of the qualifi- cation, the total inattention to it, in the ordinary school- system for boys, the consequently natural, yet in some instances almost unn>atural, degree of ignorance and uncouth- ness of men, of sensible and well-informed men, when sud- denly called to the necessity of reading aloud, which had fallen within their notice, giving instances of blunders, and failures with their secondary causes, the want of manage- ment of the voice, of proper modulation and emphasis, of foresight and judgment, all proceeding from the first cause : want of early attention and habit; and Fanny was listening again with great entertainment. Even in my profession," said Edmund, with a smile, how little the art of reading has been studied! how little a clear manner, and good delivery, have been attended to ! I speak rather of the past, however, than the present. There is now a spirit of improvement abroad; but among those who were ordained twenty, thirty, forty years ago, the larger number, to judge by their performance, must have thought reading was reading, and preaching was preaching. It is different now. The subject is more justly considered. It is 282 ^A.\SFIELD PA%K felt that distinctness and energy may have weight in recom-^ mending the most solid truths; and besides there is more general observation and taste, a more critical knowledge diffused than formerly; in every congregation there is a larger proportion who know a little of the matter, and who can judge and criticise." ^ Edmund had already gone through the service once since his ordination; and upon this being understood, he had a variety of questions from Crawford as to his feelings and suc- cess; questions, which being made, though with the vivacity of friendly interest and quick taste, without any touch of that spirit of banter or air of levity which Edmund knew to be most offensive to Fanny, he had true pleasure in satisfy- ing; and when Crawford proceeded to ask his opinion and give his own as to the properest manner in which particular passages in the service should be delivered, showing it to be a subject on which he had thought before, and thought with judgment, Edmund was still more and more pleased. This would be the way to Fanny's heart. She was not to be won by all that gallantry and wit and good-nature together, could do; or at least, she would not be won by them nearly so soon, without the assistance of sentiment and feeling, and seriousness on serious subjects. Our liturgy," observed Crawford, " has beauties, which not even a careless, slovenly style of reading can destroy; but it has also redundancies and repetitions which require good reading not to be felt. For myself, at least, I must confess being not always so attentive as I ought to be " (here was a glance at Fanny); that nineteen times out of twenty, I am thinking how such a prayer ought to be read, and long- ing to have it to read myself. Did you speak? " stepping eagerly to Fanny, and addressing her in a softened voice ; and upon her saying No," he added, " Are you sure you did not speak? I saw your lips move. I fancied you might be going to tell me I ought to be more attentive, and not allow my Sioughts to wander. Are not you going to tell me so? " No, indeed, you know your duty too well for me to — even supposing " She stopt, felt herself getting into a puzzle, and could not be prevailed on to add another word, not by dint of several minutes of supplication and waiting. He then returned to ^AO^FIELD FA%K 283 his former station^ and went on as if there had been no such tender interruption. '' A sermon, well delivered, is more uncommon even than prayers well read. A sermon, good in itself, is no rare thing. It is more difficult to speak well than to compose well ; that is, the rules and trick of composition are oftener an object of study. A thoroughly good sermon, thoroughly well delivered, is a capital gratification. I can never hear such a one without the greatest admiration and respect, and more than half a mind to take orders and preach myself. There is something in the eloquence of the pulpit, when it is really eloquence, which is entitled to the highest praise and honour. The preacher who can touch and affect such an heterogeneous mass of hearers, on subjects limited, and long worn thread- bare in all common hands; who can say anything new or striking, anything that rouses the attention, without offend- ing the taste, or wearing out the feelings of his hearers, is a man whom one could not in his public capacity honour enough. I should like to be such a man." Edmund laughed. I should indeed. I never listened to a distinguished preacher in my life without a sort of envy. But then, I must have a London audience. I could not preach but to the educated ; to those who were capable of estimating my com- position. And I do not know that I should be fond of preaching often; now and then, perhaps, once or twice in the spring, after being anxiously expected for half-a-dozen Sundays together; but not for a constancy; it would not do for a constancy.'' Here Fanny, who could not but listen, involuntarily shook her head, and Crawford was instantly by her side again, intreating to know her meaning ; and as Edmund perceived, by his drawing in a chair, and sitting down close by her, that it was to be a very thorough attack, that looks and under- tones were to be well tried, he sank as quietly as possible into a comer, turned his back, and took up a newspaper, very sincerely wishing that dear little Fanny might be per- suaded into explaining away that shake of the head to the satisfaction of her ardent lover; and as earnestly trying to bury every sound of the business from himself in murmurs of his own, over the various advertisements of A most 284 mAS^FIELD PA1{K desirable Estate in South Wales;" ''To Parents and Guardians; " and a '' Capital seasoned Hunter." Fanny, meanwhile, vexed with herself for not having been as motionless as she was speechless, and grieved to the heart to see Edmund's arrangements, was trying by everything in the power of her modest, gentle nature, to repulse Mr. Craw- ford, and avoid both his looks and enquiries; and he, unrepulsable, was persisting in both. ''What did that shake of the head mean?" said he. " What was it meant to express? Disapprobation, I fear. But of what? What had I been saying to displease you? Did you think me speaking improperly, lightly, irreverently on the subject? Only tell me if I was. Only tell me if I was wrong. I want to be set right. Nay, nay, I intreat you ; for one moment put down your work. What did that shake of the head mean? " In vain was her " Pray, sir, don't; pray, Mr. Crawford; " repeated twice over ; and in vain did she try to move away. In the same low, eager voice, and the same close neighbour- hood, he went on, re-urging the same questions as before. She grew more agitated and displeased. " How can you, sir? You quite astonish me; I wonder how you can " " Do I astonish you? " said he. " Do you wonder? Is there anything in my present intreaty that you do not understand ? I will explain to you instantly all that makes me urge you in this manner, all that gives me an interest in what you look and do, and excites my present curiosity. I will not leave you to wonder long." In spite of herself, she could not help half a smile, but she said nothing. " You shook your head at my acknowledging that I should not Ifke to engage in the duties of a clergyman always for a constancy. Yes, that was the word. Constancy: I am not afraid of the word. I would spell it, read it, write it with anybody. I see nothing alarming in the word. Did you think I ought? " '* Perhaps, sir," said Fanny, wearied at last into speak- ing; "perhaps, sir, I thought it was a pity you did not always know yourself as well as you seemed to do at that moment." {MANSFIELD PA^ 285 Crawford, delighted to get her to speak at any rate, was \ determined to keep it up; and poor Fanny, who had hoped to silence him by such an extremity of reproof, found herself sadly mistaken, and that it was only a change from one object of curiosity and one set of words to another. He had always something to intreat the explanation of. The oppor- tunity was too fair. None such had occurred since his seeing her in her uncle's room, none such might occur again before his leaving Mansfield. Lady Bertram's being just on the other side of the table was a trifle, for she might always be considered as only half awake, and Edmund's advertisements were still of the first utility. Well," said Crawford, after a course of rapid questions and reluctant answers; " I am happier than I was, because I now understand more clearly your opinion of me. You think me unsteady; easily swayed by the whim of the moment, easily tempted, easily put aside. With such an opinion, no wonder that . But we shall see. It is not by protestations that I shall endeavour to convince you I am wronged; it is not by telling you that my affections are steady. My conduct shall speak for me ; absence, distance, time shall speak for me. They shall prove that, as far as you can be deserved by anybody, I do deserve you. You are infinitely my superior in merit; all that I know. You have qualities which I had not before supposed to exist in such a degree in any human creature. You have some touches of the angel in you beyond what — not merely beyond what one sees, because one never sees anything like it — ^but beyond what one fancies might be. But still I am not frightened. It is not by equality of merit that you can be won. That is out of the question. It is he who sees and worships your merit the strongest, who loves you most devotedly, that has the best right to a return. There I build my confidence. By that right I do and will deserve you; and when once convinced that my attachment is what I declare it, I know you too well not to entertain the warmest hopes. Yes, dearest, sweetest Fanny. Nay — " (seeing her draw back displeased) — " forgive me. Perhaps I have as yet no right; but by what other name can I call you ? Do you suppose you are ever present to my imagination under any other? No, it is * Fanny ' that I think of all day, and dream of all night. 286 mAO^FIELD PJ'1{K You have given the name such reality of sweetness, that nothing else can now be descriptive of you." Fanny could hardly have kept her seat any longer, or have refrained from at least trying to get away in spite of all the too public opposition she foresaw to it, had it not been for the sound of approaching relief, the very sound which she had been long watching for, and long thinking strangely, delayed. The solemn procession, headed by Baddeley, of teaboard, urn, and cake-bearers, made its appearance, and delivered her from a grievous imprisonment of body and mind. Mr. Crawford was obliged to move. She was at liberty, she was busy, she was protected. Edmund was not sorry to be admitted again among the number of those who might speak and hear. But though the conference had seemed full long to him, and though on looking at Fanny he saw rather a flush of vexation, he inclined to hope that so much could not have been said and listened to, with- out some profit to the speaker. Edmund had determined that it belonged entirely to Fanny to chuse whether her situation with regard to Crawford should be mentioned between them or not; and that if she did not lead the way, it should never be touched on by him; but after a day or two of mutual resen^e, he was induced by his father to change his mind, and try what his influence might do for his friend. A day, and a very early day, was actually fixed for the Crawfords* departure; and Sir Thomas thought it might be as well to make one more effort for the young man before he left Mansfield, that all his professions and vows of unshaken attachment might have as much hope to sustain them as possible. Sir Thomas was most cordially anxious for the perfection of Mr. Crawford's character in that point. He wished him. to be a model of constancy; and fancied the best means of effecting it would be by not trying him too long. mA^KSPlELD PA%K 287 Edmund was not unwilling to be persuaded to engage in the business; he wanted to know Fanny's feelings. She had been used to consult him in every difficulty^ and he loved her too well to bear to be denied her confidence now ; he hoped to be of service to her, he thought he must be of service to her; whom else had she to open her heart to ? If she did not need counsel, she must need the comfort of communication. Fanny estranged from him, silent, and reserved, was an un- natural state of things; a state which he must break through, and which he could easily learn to think she was wanting him to break through. " I will speak to her, sir: I will take the first opportunity of speaking to her alone," was the result of such thoughts as these; and upon Sir Thomas's information of her being at that very time walking alone in the shrubbery, he instantly joined her. I am come to walk with you, Fanny,'' said he. " Shall I } " Drawing her arm within his. " It is a long while since we have had a comfortable walk together." She assented to it all rather by look than word. Her spirits were low. " But, Fanny," he presently added, " in order to have a comfortable walk, something more is necessary than merely pacing this gravel together. You must talk to me. I know you have something on your mind. I know what you are thinking of. You cannot suppose me uninformed. Am I to hear of it from everybody but Fanny herself " Fanny, at once agitated and dejected, replied, " If you hear of it from everybody, cousin, there can be nothing for me to tell." " Not of facts, perhaps ; but of feelings, Fanny. No one but you can tell me them. I do not mean to press you, however. If it is not what you wish yourself, I have done. I had thought it might be a relief." " I am afraid we think too differently, for me to find any relief in talking of what I feel." " Do you suppose that we think differently.^ I have no idea of it. I dare say, that on a comparison of our opinions, they would be found as much alike as they have been used to be: to the point — I consider Crawford's proposals as most advantageous and desirable, if you could return his affection. 288 mASiSFIELD PA^K I consider it as most natural that all your family should wish you could return it; but that as you cannot^ you have done exactly as you ought in refusing him. Can there be any disagreement between us here? " " Oh^ no ! But I thought you blamed me. I thought you were against me. This is such a comfort ! " " This comfort you might have had sooner, Fanny, had you sought it. But how could you possibly suppose me against you? How could you imagine me an advocate for marriage without love? Were I even careless in general on such matters, how could you imagine me so where your happiness was at stake? " My uncle thought me wrong, and I knew he had been talking to you." As far as you have gone, Fanny, I think you perfectly right. I may be sorry, I may be surprised: though hardly thai, for you had not had time to attach yourself: but I think you perfectly right. Can it admit of a question? It is disgraceful to us if it does. You did not love him ; nothing could have justified your accepting him." Fanny had not felt so comfortable for days and days. So far your conduct has been faultless, and they were quite mistaken who wished you to do otherwise. But the matter does not end here. Crawford's is no common attach- ment; he perseveres, with the hope of creating that regard which had not been created before. This, we know, must be a work of time. But " (with an affectionate smile), " let him succeed at last, Fanny, let him succeed at last. You have proved yourself upright and disinterested, prove yourself grateful and tender-hearted ; and then you will be the perfect model of a woman, which I have always believed you bom for." "Oh! never, never, never! he never will succeed with me." And as she spoke with a warmth which quite astonished Edmund, and which she blushed at the recollection of herself, when she saw his look, and heard him reply, Never ! Fanny ! — so very determined and positive ! This is not like yourself, your rational self." " I mean," she cried, sorrowfully correcting herself, that I think I never shall, as far as the future can be answered for; I think I never shall return his regard." mASiSFIELD PA%K 289 " I must hope better things. I am aware, more aware lan Crawford can be, that the man who means to make you )ve him (you having due notice of his intentions) must have ery up-hill work, for there are all your early attachments nd habits in battle array; and before he can get your heart )r his own use he has to unfasten it from all the holds upon [lings animate and inanimate, which so many years' growth ave confirmed, and which are considerably tightened for tie moment by the very idea of separation. I know that the pprehension of being forced to quit Mansfield will for a time e arming you against him. I wish he had not been obliged 0 tell you what he was trying for. I wish he had known ou as well as I do, Fanny. Between us, I think we should ave won you. My theoretical and his practical knowledge ogether, could not have failed. He should have worked pon my plans. I must hope, however, that time proving ; im (as I firmly believe it will), to deserve you by his steady ffection, will give him his reward. I cannot suppose that 'OU have not the wish to love him — the natural wish of ratitude. You must have some feeling of that sort. You lust be sorry for your own indifference.'' We are so totally unlike," said Fanny, avoiding a direct nswer, " we are so very, very different in all our inclinations nd ways, that I consider it as quite impossible we should ver be tolerably happy together, even if I cotdd hke him. ?here never were two people more dissimilar. We have not 1 tne taste in common. We should be miserable." ' " You are mistaken, Fanny. The dissimilarity is not so trong. You are quite enough alike. You have tastes in ommon. You have moral and literary tastes in common. Ion have both warm hearts and benevolent feeUngs ; and, M'anny, who that heard him read, and saw you Hsten to ihakespeare the other night, will think you unfitted as com- >anions? You forget yourself: there is a decided difference Q your tempers, I allow. He is lively, you are serious ; but . 0 much the better; his spirits will support yours. It is your lisposition to be easily dejected and to fancy difficulties greater than they are. His cheerfulness will counteract this, le sees difficulties nowhere: and his pleasantness and gaiety nil be a constant support to you. Your being so far unlike, ^'anny, does not in the smallest degree make against the K 290 mA3