“Lizzy, you must not do so. You must not suspect me. It mortifies me. I assure you that I have now learnt to enjoy his conversation as an agreeable and sensible young man without having a wish beyond it. I am perfectly satisfied, from what his manners now are, that he never had any design of engaging my affection. It is only that he is blessed with greater sweetness of address, and a stronger desire of generally pleasing, than any other man.”
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[265] Along the level seas. Compare Virgil’s description of Camilla, who
Dryden’s Virgil, iii. 150.
Elizabeth smiled.
[264] “Ere Ilium and the Trojan tow’rs arose, In humble vales they built their soft abodes.”
[263] It was anciently believed that it was dangerous, if not fatal, to behold a deity. See Exod. xxxiii. 20; Judg. xiii. 22.
“It has been a very agreeable day,” said Miss Bennet to Elizabeth. “The party seemed so well selected, so suitable one with the other. I hope we may often meet again.”
Mrs. Bennet, in short, was in very great spirits: she had seen enough of Bingley’s behaviour to Jane to be convinced that she would get him at last; and her expectations of advantage to her family, when in a happy humour, were so far beyond reason, that she was quite disappointed at not seeing him there again the next day, to make his proposals.
[262] These words seem to imply the old belief, that the Fates might be delayed, but never wholly set aside.
“M^{rs}. Long and her nieces.” ]
Merrick’s Tryphiodorus, vi. 769, sqq.
[Illustration:
“Well, girls,” said she, as soon as they were left to themselves, “what say you to the day? I think everything has passed off uncommonly well, I assure you. The dinner was as well dressed as any I ever saw. The venison was roasted to a turn--and everybody said, they never saw so fat a haunch. The soup was fifty times better than what we had at the Lucases’ last week; and even Mr. Darcy acknowledged that the partridges were remarkably well done; and I suppose he has two or three French cooks at least. And, my dear Jane, I never saw you look in greater beauty. Mrs. Long said so too, for I asked her whether you did not. And what do you think she said besides? ‘Ah! Mrs. Bennet, we shall have her at Netherfield at last!’ She did, indeed. I do think Mrs. Long is as good a creature as ever lived--and her nieces are very pretty behaved girls, and not at all handsome: I like them prodigiously.”
Mrs. Bennet had designed to keep the two Netherfield gentlemen to supper; but their carriage was, unluckily, ordered before any of the others, and she had no opportunity of detaining them.
[260] “Hell is naked before him, and destruction hath no covering. He stretcheth out the north over the empty place, and hangeth the earth upon nothing. He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them.” Job xxvi. 6-8.
[261] “Swift from his throne the infernal monarch ran, All pale and trembling, lest the race of man,v Slain by Jove’s wrath, and led by Hermes’ rod, Should fill (a countless throng!) his dark abode.”
She could think of nothing more to say; but if he wished to converse with her, he might have better success. He stood by her, however, for some minutes, in silence; and, at last, on the young lady’s whispering to Elizabeth again, he walked away.
When the tea things were removed, and the card tables placed, the ladies all rose; and Elizabeth was then hoping to be soon joined by him, when all her views were overthrown, by seeing him fall a victim to her mother’s rapacity for whist players, and in a few moments after seated with the rest of the party. She now lost every expectation of pleasure. They were confined for the evening at different tables; and she had nothing to hope, but that his eyes were so often turned towards her side of the room, as to make him play as unsuccessfully as herself.
“Mrs. Annesley is with her. The others have been gone on to Scarborough these three weeks.”
“And quite alone? Have all her friends left her?”