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 qualification, the total inattention to it,
in the ordinary school-system for boys, the consequently natural, yet in
some instances almost unnatural, degree of ignorance and uncouthness
of men, of sensible and well-informed men, when suddenly 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 management 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 felt that distinctness and energy may
have weight in recommending 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 success; 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 satisfying; 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, shewing 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 longing 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 thoughts 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 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 threadbare in all common hands; who can say anything new or
striking, anything that rouses the attention without offending 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 composition. 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, entreating 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 undertones were to be well tried, he sank as quietly as possible
into a corner, turned his back, and took up a newspaper, very sincerely
wishing that dear little Fanny might be persuaded 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 desirable
Estate in South Wales”; “To Parents and Guardians”; and a “Capital
season'd 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. Crawford, and avoid both his looks and
inquiries; 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 entreat 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 neighbourhood, he went on, reurging 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 entreaty 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 like 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 speaking--“perhaps,
sir, I thought it was a pity you did not always know yourself as well as
you seemed to do at that moment.”
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 entreat the explanation of. The opportunity
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. 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 tea-board, 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 without some profit to the speaker.
CHAPTER XXXV
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 reserve, 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.
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 unnatural 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. 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 -that-, 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 attachment; 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 born for.”
“Oh! never, never, never! he never will succeed with me.” And 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.”
“I must hope better things. I am aware, more aware than Crawford can be,
that the man who means to make you love him (you having due notice of
his intentions) must have very uphill work, for there are all your early
attachments and habits in battle array; and before he can get your heart
for his own use he has to unfasten it from all the holds upon things
animate and inanimate, which so many years' growth have confirmed, and
which are considerably tightened for the moment by the very idea
of separation. I know that the apprehension of being forced to quit
Mansfield will for a time be arming you against him. I wish he had not
been obliged to tell you what he was trying for. I wish he had known you
as well as I do, Fanny. Between us, I think we should have won you. My
theoretical and his practical knowledge together could not have failed.
He should have worked upon my plans. I must hope, however, that time,
proving him (as I firmly believe it will) to deserve you by his steady
affection, will give him his reward. I cannot suppose that you have not
the -wish- to love him--the natural wish of gratitude. You must have
some feeling of that sort. You must be sorry for your own indifference.”
“We are so totally unlike,” said Fanny, avoiding a direct answer, “we
are so very, very different in all our inclinations and ways, that
I consider it as quite impossible we should ever be tolerably happy
together, even if I -could- like him. There never were two people more
dissimilar. We have not one taste in common. We should be miserable.”
“You are mistaken, Fanny. The dissimilarity is not so strong. You are
quite enough alike. You -have- tastes in common. You have moral and
literary tastes in common. You have both warm hearts and benevolent
feelings; and, Fanny, who that heard him read, and saw you listen to
Shakespeare the other night, will think you unfitted as companions? You
forget yourself: there is a decided difference in your tempers, I allow.
He is lively, you are serious; but so much the better: his spirits will
support yours. It is your disposition to be easily dejected and to fancy
difficulties greater than they are. His cheerfulness will counteract
this. He sees difficulties nowhere: and his pleasantness and gaiety will
be a constant support to you. Your being so far unlike, Fanny, does not
in the smallest degree make against the probability of your happiness
together: do not imagine it. I am myself convinced that it is rather a
favourable circumstance. I am perfectly persuaded that the tempers
had better be unlike: I mean unlike in the flow of the spirits, in
the manners, in the inclination for much or little company, in the
propensity to talk or to be silent, to be grave or to be gay. Some
opposition here is, I am thoroughly convinced, friendly to matrimonial
happiness. I exclude extremes, of course; and a very close resemblance
in all those points would be the likeliest way to produce an extreme.
A counteraction, gentle and continual, is the best safeguard of manners
and conduct.”
Full well could Fanny guess where his thoughts were now: Miss Crawford's
power was all returning. He had been speaking of her cheerfully from the
hour of his coming home. His avoiding her was quite at an end. He had
dined at the Parsonage only the preceding day.
After leaving him to his happier thoughts for some minutes, Fanny,
feeling it due to herself, returned to Mr. Crawford, and said, “It
is not merely in -temper- that I consider him as totally unsuited to
myself; though, in -that- respect, I think the difference between us too
great, infinitely too great: his spirits often oppress me; but there is
something in him which I object to still more. I must say, cousin, that
I cannot approve his character. I have not thought well of him from the
time of the play. I then saw him behaving, as it appeared to me, so
very improperly and unfeelingly--I may speak of it now because it is all
over--so improperly by poor Mr. Rushworth, not seeming to care how he
exposed or hurt him, and paying attentions to my cousin Maria, which--in
short, at the time of the play, I received an impression which will
never be got over.”
“My dear Fanny,” replied Edmund, scarcely hearing her to the end, “let
us not, any of us, be judged by what we appeared at that period of
general folly. The time of the play is a time which I hate to recollect.
Maria was wrong, Crawford was wrong, we were all wrong together; but
none so wrong as myself. Compared with me, all the rest were blameless.
I was playing the fool with my eyes open.”
“As a bystander,” said Fanny, “perhaps I saw more than you did; and I do
think that Mr. Rushworth was sometimes very jealous.”
“Very possibly. No wonder. Nothing could be more improper than the whole
business. I am shocked whenever I think that Maria could be capable of
it; but, if she could undertake the part, we must not be surprised at
the rest.”
“Before the play, I am much mistaken if -Julia- did not think he was
paying her attentions.”
“Julia! I have heard before from some one of his being in love with
Julia; but I could never see anything of it. And, Fanny, though I hope I
do justice to my sisters' good qualities, I think it very possible that
they might, one or both, be more desirous of being admired by Crawford,
and might shew that desire rather more unguardedly than was perfectly
prudent. I can remember that they were evidently fond of his society;
and with such encouragement, a man like Crawford, lively, and it may
be, a little unthinking, might be led on to--there could be nothing very
striking, because it is clear that he had no pretensions: his heart was
reserved for you. And I must say, that its being for you has raised him
inconceivably in my opinion. It does him the highest honour; it shews
his proper estimation of the blessing of domestic happiness and pure
attachment. It proves him unspoilt by his uncle. It proves him, in
short, everything that I had been used to wish to believe him, and
feared he was not.”
“I am persuaded that he does not think, as he ought, on serious
subjects.”
“Say, rather, that he has not thought at all upon serious subjects,
which I believe to be a good deal the case. How could it be otherwise,
with such an education and adviser? Under the disadvantages, indeed,
which both have had, is it not wonderful that they should be what they
are? Crawford's -feelings-, I am ready to acknowledge, have hitherto
been too much his guides. Happily, those feelings have generally been
good. You will supply the rest; and a most fortunate man he is to attach
himself to such a creature--to a woman who, firm as a rock in her own
principles, has a gentleness of character so well adapted to recommend
them. He has chosen his partner, indeed, with rare felicity. He will
make you happy, Fanny; I know he will make you happy; but you will make
him everything.”
“I would not engage in such a charge,” cried Fanny, in a shrinking
accent; “in such an office of high responsibility!”
“As usual, believing yourself unequal to anything! fancying everything
too much for you! Well, though I may not be able to persuade you into
different feelings, you will be persuaded into them, I trust. I confess
myself sincerely anxious that you may. I have no common interest in
Crawford's well-doing. Next to your happiness, Fanny, his has the first
claim on me. You are aware of my having no common interest in Crawford.”
Fanny was too well aware of it to have anything to say; and they walked
on together some fifty yards in mutual silence and abstraction. Edmund
first began again--
“I was very much pleased by her manner of speaking of it yesterday,
particularly pleased, because I had not depended upon her seeing
everything in so just a light. I knew she was very fond of you; but yet
I was afraid of her not estimating your worth to her brother quite as
it deserved, and of her regretting that he had not rather fixed on
some woman of distinction or fortune. I was afraid of the bias of those
worldly maxims, which she has been too much used to hear. But it was
very different. She spoke of you, Fanny, just as she ought. She desires
the connexion as warmly as your uncle or myself. We had a long talk
about it. I should not have mentioned the subject, though very anxious
to know her sentiments; but I had not been in the room five minutes
before she began introducing it with all that openness of heart, and
sweet peculiarity of manner, that spirit and ingenuousness which are so
much a part of herself. Mrs. Grant laughed at her for her rapidity.”
“Was Mrs. Grant in the room, then?”
“Yes, when I reached the house I found the two sisters together by
themselves; and when once we had begun, we had not done with you, Fanny,
till Crawford and Dr. Grant came in.”
“It is above a week since I saw Miss Crawford.”
“Yes, she laments it; yet owns it may have been best. You will see her,
however, before she goes. She is very angry with you, Fanny; you must be
prepared for that. She calls herself very angry, but you can imagine her
anger. It is the regret and disappointment of a sister, who thinks her
brother has a right to everything he may wish for, at the first moment.
She is hurt, as you would be for William; but she loves and esteems you
with all her heart.”
“I knew she would be very angry with me.”
“My dearest Fanny,” cried Edmund, pressing her arm closer to him, “do
not let the idea of her anger distress you. It is anger to be talked
of rather than felt. Her heart is made for love and kindness, not for
resentment. I wish you could have overheard her tribute of praise;
I wish you could have seen her countenance, when she said that you
-should- be Henry's wife. And I observed that she always spoke of you
as 'Fanny,' which she was never used to do; and it had a sound of most
sisterly cordiality.”
“And Mrs. Grant, did she say--did she speak; was she there all the
time?”
“Yes, she was agreeing exactly with her sister. The surprise of your
refusal, Fanny, seems to have been unbounded. That you could refuse such
a man as Henry Crawford seems more than they can understand. I said what
I could for you; but in good truth, as they stated the case--you must
prove yourself to be in your senses as soon as you can by a different
conduct; nothing else will satisfy them. But this is teasing you. I have
done. Do not turn away from me.”
“I -should- have thought,” said Fanny, after a pause of recollection and
exertion, “that every woman must have felt the possibility of a man's
not being approved, not being loved by some one of her sex at least, let
him be ever so generally agreeable. Let him have all the perfections
in the world, I think it ought not to be set down as certain that a man
must be acceptable to every woman he may happen to like himself. But,
even supposing it is so, allowing Mr. Crawford to have all the claims
which his sisters think he has, how was I to be prepared to meet him
with any feeling answerable to his own? He took me wholly by surprise.
I had not an idea that his behaviour to me before had any meaning; and
surely I was not to be teaching myself to like him only because he was
taking what seemed very idle notice of me. In my situation, it would
have been the extreme of vanity to be forming expectations on Mr.
Crawford. I am sure his sisters, rating him as they do, must have
thought it so, supposing he had meant nothing. How, then, was I to
be--to be in love with him the moment he said he was with me? How was I
to have an attachment at his service, as soon as it was asked for? His
sisters should consider me as well as him. The higher his deserts, the
more improper for me ever to have thought of him. And, and--we think
very differently of the nature of women, if they can imagine a woman so
very soon capable of returning an affection as this seems to imply.”
“My dear, dear Fanny, now I have the truth. I know this to be the truth;
and most worthy of you are such feelings. I had attributed them to you
before. I thought I could understand you. You have now given exactly
the explanation which I ventured to make for you to your friend and Mrs.
Grant, and they were both better satisfied, though your warm-hearted
friend was still run away with a little by the enthusiasm of her
fondness for Henry. I told them that you were of all human creatures the
one over whom habit had most power and novelty least; and that the very
circumstance of the novelty of Crawford's addresses was against him.
Their being so new and so recent was all in their disfavour; that you
could tolerate nothing that you were not used to; and a great deal more
to the same purpose, to give them a knowledge of your character. Miss
Crawford made us laugh by her plans of encouragement for her brother.
She meant to urge him to persevere in the hope of being loved in time,
and of having his addresses most kindly received at the end of about ten
years' happy marriage.”
Fanny could with difficulty give the smile that was here asked for. Her
feelings were all in revolt. She feared she had been doing wrong: saying
too much, overacting the caution which she had been fancying necessary;
in guarding against one evil, laying herself open to another; and to
have Miss Crawford's liveliness repeated to her at such a moment, and on
such a subject, was a bitter aggravation.
Edmund saw weariness and distress in her face, and immediately resolved
to forbear all farther discussion; and not even to mention the name
of Crawford again, except as it might be connected with what -must- be
agreeable to her. On this principle, he soon afterwards observed--“They
go on Monday. You are sure, therefore, of seeing your friend either
to-morrow or Sunday. They really go on Monday; and I was within a trifle
of being persuaded to stay at Lessingby till that very day! I had almost
promised it. What a difference it might have made! Those five or six
days more at Lessingby might have been felt all my life.”
“You were near staying there?”
“Very. I was most kindly pressed, and had nearly consented. Had I
received any letter from Mansfield, to tell me how you were all going
on, I believe I should certainly have staid; but I knew nothing that
had happened here for a fortnight, and felt that I had been away long
enough.”
“You spent your time pleasantly there?”
“Yes; that is, it was the fault of my own mind if I did not. They were
all very pleasant. I doubt their finding me so. I took uneasiness with
me, and there was no getting rid of it till I was in Mansfield again.”
“The Miss Owens--you liked them, did not you?”
“Yes, very well. Pleasant, good-humoured, unaffected girls. But I am
spoilt, Fanny, for common female society. Good-humoured, unaffected
girls will not do for a man who has been used to sensible women. They
are two distinct orders of being. You and Miss Crawford have made me too
nice.”
Still, however, Fanny was oppressed and wearied; he saw it in her looks,
it could not be talked away; and attempting it no more, he led her
directly, with the kind authority of a privileged guardian, into the
house.
CHAPTER XXXVI
Edmund now believed himself perfectly acquainted with all that Fanny
could tell, or could leave to be conjectured of her sentiments, and he
was satisfied. It had been, as he before presumed, too hasty a measure
on Crawford's side, and time must be given to make the idea first
familiar, and then agreeable to her. She must be used to the
consideration of his being in love with her, and then a return of
affection might not be very distant.
He gave this opinion as the result of the conversation to his father;
and recommended there being nothing more said to her: no farther
attempts to influence or persuade; but that everything should be left to
Crawford's assiduities, and the natural workings of her own mind.
Sir Thomas promised that it should be so. Edmund's account of Fanny's
disposition he could believe to be just; he supposed she had all those
feelings, but he must consider it as very unfortunate that she -had-;
for, less willing than his son to trust to the future, he could not
help fearing that if such very long allowances of time and habit were
necessary for her, she might not have persuaded herself into receiving
his addresses properly before the young man's inclination for paying
them were over. There was nothing to be done, however, but to submit
quietly and hope the best.
The promised visit from “her friend,” as Edmund called Miss Crawford,
was a formidable threat to Fanny, and she lived in continual terror of
it. As a sister, so partial and so angry, and so little scrupulous of
what she said, and in another light so triumphant and secure, she was in
every way an object of painful alarm. Her displeasure, her penetration,
and her happiness were all fearful to encounter; and the dependence of
having others present when they met was Fanny's only support in looking
forward to it. She absented herself as little as possible from Lady
Bertram, kept away from the East room, and took no solitary walk in the
shrubbery, in her caution to avoid any sudden attack.
She succeeded. She was safe in the breakfast-room, with her aunt, when
Miss Crawford did come; and the first misery over, and Miss Crawford
looking and speaking with much less particularity of expression than she
had anticipated, Fanny began to hope there would be nothing worse to be
endured than a half-hour of moderate agitation. But here she hoped too
much; Miss Crawford was not the slave of opportunity. She was determined
to see Fanny alone, and therefore said to her tolerably soon, in a low
voice, “I must speak to you for a few minutes somewhere”; words that
Fanny felt all over her, in all her pulses and all her nerves. Denial
was impossible. Her habits of ready submission, on the contrary, made
her almost instantly rise and lead the way out of the room. She did it
with wretched feelings, but it was inevitable.
They were no sooner in the hall than all restraint of countenance was
over on Miss Crawford's side. She immediately shook her head at Fanny
with arch, yet affectionate reproach, and taking her hand, seemed hardly
able to help beginning directly. She said nothing, however, but, “Sad,
sad girl! I do not know when I shall have done scolding you,” and had
discretion enough to reserve the rest till they might be secure of
having four walls to themselves. Fanny naturally turned upstairs, and
took her guest to the apartment which was now always fit for comfortable
use; opening the door, however, with a most aching heart, and feeling
that she had a more distressing scene before her than ever that spot had
yet witnessed. But the evil ready to burst on her was at least delayed
by the sudden change in Miss Crawford's ideas; by the strong effect on
her mind which the finding herself in the East room again produced.
“Ha!” she cried, with instant animation, “am I here again? The East
room! Once only was I in this room before”; and after stopping to look
about her, and seemingly to retrace all that had then passed, she added,
“Once only before. Do you remember it? I came to rehearse. Your cousin
came too; and we had a rehearsal. You were our audience and prompter.
A delightful rehearsal. I shall never forget it. Here we were, just in
this part of the room: here was your cousin, here was I, here were the
chairs. Oh! why will such things ever pass away?”
Happily for her companion, she wanted no answer. Her mind was entirely
self-engrossed. She was in a reverie of sweet remembrances.
“The scene we were rehearsing was so very remarkable! The subject of
it so very--very--what shall I say? He was to be describing and
recommending matrimony to me. I think I see him now, trying to be as
demure and composed as Anhalt ought, through the two long speeches.
'When two sympathetic hearts meet in the marriage state, matrimony
may be called a happy life.' I suppose no time can ever wear out the
impression I have of his looks and voice as he said those words. It was
curious, very curious, that we should have such a scene to play! If I
had the power of recalling any one week of my existence, it should be
that week--that acting week. Say what you would, Fanny, it should be
-that-; for I never knew such exquisite happiness in any other. His
sturdy spirit to bend as it did! Oh! it was sweet beyond expression. But
alas, that very evening destroyed it all. That very evening brought your
most unwelcome uncle. Poor Sir Thomas, who was glad to see you? Yet,
Fanny, do not imagine I would now speak disrespectfully of Sir Thomas,
though I certainly did hate him for many a week. No, I do him justice
now. He is just what the head of such a family should be. Nay, in sober
sadness, I believe I now love you all.” And having said so, with a
degree of tenderness and consciousness which Fanny had never seen in her
before, and now thought only too becoming, she turned away for a moment
to recover herself. “I have had a little fit since I came into this
room, as you may perceive,” said she presently, with a playful smile,
“but it is over now; so let us sit down and be comfortable; for as to
scolding you, Fanny, which I came fully intending to do, I have not
the heart for it when it comes to the point.” And embracing her very
affectionately, “Good, gentle Fanny! when I think of this being the
last time of seeing you for I do not know how long, I feel it quite
impossible to do anything but love you.”
Fanny was affected. She had not foreseen anything of this, and her
feelings could seldom withstand the melancholy influence of the word
“last.” She cried as if she had loved Miss Crawford more than she
possibly could; and Miss Crawford, yet farther softened by the sight of
such emotion, hung about her with fondness, and said, “I hate to leave
you. I shall see no one half so amiable where I am going. Who says we
shall not be sisters? I know we shall. I feel that we are born to
be connected; and those tears convince me that you feel it too, dear
Fanny.”
Fanny roused herself, and replying only in part, said, “But you are
only going from one set of friends to another. You are going to a very
particular friend.”
“Yes, very true. Mrs. Fraser has been my intimate friend for years. But
I have not the least inclination to go near her. I can think only of the
friends I am leaving: my excellent sister, yourself, and the Bertrams in
general. You have all so much more -heart- among you than one finds in
the world at large. You all give me a feeling of being able to trust and
confide in you, which in common intercourse one knows nothing of. I wish
I had settled with Mrs. Fraser not to go to her till after Easter, a
much better time for the visit, but now I cannot put her off. And when
I have done with her I must go to her sister, Lady Stornaway, because
-she- was rather my most particular friend of the two, but I have not
cared much for -her- these three years.”
After this speech the two girls sat many minutes silent, each
thoughtful: Fanny meditating on the different sorts of friendship in the
world, Mary on something of less philosophic tendency. -She- first spoke
again.
“How perfectly I remember my resolving to look for you upstairs, and
setting off to find my way to the East room, without having an idea
whereabouts it was! How well I remember what I was thinking of as I came
along, and my looking in and seeing you here sitting at this table at
work; and then your cousin's astonishment, when he opened the door, at
seeing me here! To be sure, your uncle's returning that very evening!
There never was anything quite like it.”
Another short fit of abstraction followed, when, shaking it off, she
thus attacked her companion.
“Why, Fanny, you are absolutely in a reverie. Thinking, I hope, of one
who is always thinking of you. Oh! that I could transport you for a
short time into our circle in town, that you might understand how your
power over Henry is thought of there! Oh! the envyings and heartburnings
of dozens and dozens; the wonder, the incredulity that will be felt at
hearing what you have done! For as to secrecy, Henry is quite the hero
of an old romance, and glories in his chains. You should come to London
to know how to estimate your conquest. If you were to see how he is
courted, and how I am courted for his sake! Now, I am well aware that
I shall not be half so welcome to Mrs. Fraser in consequence of his
situation with you. When she comes to know the truth she will, very
likely, wish me in Northamptonshire again; for there is a daughter of
Mr. Fraser, by a first wife, whom she is wild to get married, and
wants Henry to take. Oh! she has been trying for him to such a degree.
Innocent and quiet as you sit here, you cannot have an idea of the
-sensation- that you will be occasioning, of the curiosity there will
be to see you, of the endless questions I shall have to answer! Poor
Margaret Fraser will be at me for ever about your eyes and your teeth,
and how you do your hair, and who makes your shoes. I wish Margaret were
married, for my poor friend's sake, for I look upon the Frasers to be
about as unhappy as most other married people. And yet it was a most
desirable match for Janet at the time. We were all delighted. She could
not do otherwise than accept him, for he was rich, and she had nothing;
but he turns out ill-tempered and -exigeant-, and wants a young woman,
a beautiful young woman of five-and-twenty, to be as steady as himself.
And my friend does not manage him well; she does not seem to know how
to make the best of it. There is a spirit of irritation which, to say
nothing worse, is certainly very ill-bred. In their house I shall call
to mind the conjugal manners of Mansfield Parsonage with respect. Even
Dr. Grant does shew a thorough confidence in my sister, and a certain
consideration for her judgment, which makes one feel there -is-
attachment; but of that I shall see nothing with the Frasers. I shall
be at Mansfield for ever, Fanny. My own sister as a wife, Sir Thomas
Bertram as a husband, are my standards of perfection. Poor Janet has
been sadly taken in, and yet there was nothing improper on her side:
she did not run into the match inconsiderately; there was no want of
foresight. She took three days to consider of his proposals, and during
those three days asked the advice of everybody connected with her whose
opinion was worth having, and especially applied to my late dear aunt,
whose knowledge of the world made her judgment very generally and
deservedly looked up to by all the young people of her acquaintance, and
she was decidedly in favour of Mr. Fraser. This seems as if nothing were
a security for matrimonial comfort. I have not so much to say for my
friend Flora, who jilted a very nice young man in the Blues for the sake
of that horrid Lord Stornaway, who has about as much sense, Fanny, as
Mr. Rushworth, but much worse-looking, and with a blackguard character.
I -had- my doubts at the time about her being right, for he has not even
the air of a gentleman, and now I am sure she was wrong. By the bye,
Flora Ross was dying for Henry the first winter she came out. But were I
to attempt to tell you of all the women whom I have known to be in love
with him, I should never have done. It is you, only you, insensible
Fanny, who can think of him with anything like indifference. But are you
so insensible as you profess yourself? No, no, I see you are not.”
There was, indeed, so deep a blush over Fanny's face at that moment as
might warrant strong suspicion in a predisposed mind.
“Excellent creature! I will not tease you. Everything shall take its
course. But, dear Fanny, you must allow that you were not so absolutely
unprepared to have the question asked as your cousin fancies. It is not
possible but that you must have had some thoughts on the subject, some
surmises as to what might be. You must have seen that he was trying to
please you by every attention in his power. Was not he devoted to you
at the ball? And then before the ball, the necklace! Oh! you received
it just as it was meant. You were as conscious as heart could desire. I
remember it perfectly.”
“Do you mean, then, that your brother knew of the necklace beforehand?
Oh! Miss Crawford, -that- was not fair.”
“Knew of it! It was his own doing entirely, his own thought. I am
ashamed to say that it had never entered my head, but I was delighted to
act on his proposal for both your sakes.”
“I will not say,” replied Fanny, “that I was not half afraid at the time
of its being so, for there was something in your look that frightened
me, but not at first; I was as unsuspicious of it at first--indeed,
indeed I was. It is as true as that I sit here. And had I had an idea
of it, nothing should have induced me to accept the necklace. As to your
brother's behaviour, certainly I was sensible of a particularity: I had
been sensible of it some little time, perhaps two or three weeks; but
then I considered it as meaning nothing: I put it down as simply being
his way, and was as far from supposing as from wishing him to have any
serious thoughts of me. I had not, Miss Crawford, been an inattentive
observer of what was passing between him and some part of this family in
the summer and autumn. I was quiet, but I was not blind. I could not
but see that Mr. Crawford allowed himself in gallantries which did mean
nothing.”
“Ah! I cannot deny it. He has now and then been a sad flirt, and
cared very little for the havoc he might be making in young ladies'
affections. I have often scolded him for it, but it is his only fault;
and there is this to be said, that very few young ladies have any
affections worth caring for. And then, Fanny, the glory of fixing one
who has been shot at by so many; of having it in one's power to pay off
the debts of one's sex! Oh! I am sure it is not in woman's nature to
refuse such a triumph.”
Fanny shook her head. “I cannot think well of a man who sports with any
woman's feelings; and there may often be a great deal more suffered than
a stander-by can judge of.”
“I do not defend him. I leave him entirely to your mercy, and when he
has got you at Everingham, I do not care how much you lecture him. But
this I will say, that his fault, the liking to make girls a little
in love with him, is not half so dangerous to a wife's happiness as a
tendency to fall in love himself, which he has never been addicted to.
And I do seriously and truly believe that he is attached to you in a way
that he never was to any woman before; that he loves you with all his
heart, and will love you as nearly for ever as possible. If any man ever
loved a woman for ever, I think Henry will do as much for you.”
Fanny could not avoid a faint smile, but had nothing to say.
“I cannot imagine Henry ever to have been happier,” continued Mary
presently, “than when he had succeeded in getting your brother's
commission.”
She had made a sure push at Fanny's feelings here.
“Oh! yes. How very, very kind of him.”
“I know he must have exerted himself very much, for I know the parties
he had to move. The Admiral hates trouble, and scorns asking favours;
and there are so many young men's claims to be attended to in the same
way, that a friendship and energy, not very determined, is easily put
by. What a happy creature William must be! I wish we could see him.”
Poor Fanny's mind was thrown into the most distressing of all its
varieties. The recollection of what had been done for William was always
the most powerful disturber of every decision against Mr. Crawford; and
she sat thinking deeply of it till Mary, who had been first watching
her complacently, and then musing on something else, suddenly called
her attention by saying: “I should like to sit talking with you here all
day, but we must not forget the ladies below, and so good-bye, my dear,
my amiable, my excellent Fanny, for though we shall nominally part in
the breakfast-parlour, I must take leave of you here. And I do take
leave, longing for a happy reunion, and trusting that when we meet
again, it will be under circumstances which may open our hearts to each
other without any remnant or shadow of reserve.”
A very, very kind embrace, and some agitation of manner, accompanied
these words.
“I shall see your cousin in town soon: he talks of being there tolerably
soon; and Sir Thomas, I dare say, in the course of the spring; and your
eldest cousin, and the Rushworths, and Julia, I am sure of meeting again
and again, and all but you. I have two favours to ask, Fanny: one is
your correspondence. You must write to me. And the other, that you will
often call on Mrs. Grant, and make her amends for my being gone.”
The first, at least, of these favours Fanny would rather not have been
asked; but it was impossible for her to refuse the correspondence; it
was impossible for her even not to accede to it more readily than
her own judgment authorised. There was no resisting so much apparent
affection. Her disposition was peculiarly calculated to value a fond
treatment, and from having hitherto known so little of it, she was the
more overcome by Miss Crawford's. Besides, there was gratitude towards
her, for having made their -tete-a-tete- so much less painful than her
fears had predicted.
It was over, and she had escaped without reproaches and without
detection. Her secret was still her own; and while that was the case,
she thought she could resign herself to almost everything.
In the evening there was another parting. Henry Crawford came and
sat some time with them; and her spirits not being previously in the
strongest state, her heart was softened for a while towards him, because
he really seemed to feel. Quite unlike his usual self, he scarcely said
anything. He was evidently oppressed, and Fanny must grieve for him,
though hoping she might never see him again till he were the husband of
some other woman.
When it came to the moment of parting, he would take her hand, he would
not be denied it; he said nothing, however, or nothing that she heard,
and when he had left the room, she was better pleased that such a token
of friendship had passed.
On the morrow the Crawfords were gone.
CHAPTER XXXVII
Mr. Crawford gone, Sir Thomas's next object was that he should be
missed; and he entertained great hope that his niece would find a blank
in the loss of those attentions which at the time she had felt, or
fancied, an evil. She had tasted of consequence in its most flattering
form; and he did hope that the loss of it, the sinking again into
nothing, would awaken very wholesome regrets in her mind. He watched her
with this idea; but he could hardly tell with what success. He hardly
knew whether there were any difference in her spirits or not. She
was always so gentle and retiring that her emotions were beyond his
discrimination. He did not understand her: he felt that he did not; and
therefore applied to Edmund to tell him how she stood affected on the
present occasion, and whether she were more or less happy than she had
been.
Edmund did not discern any symptoms of regret, and thought his father
a little unreasonable in supposing the first three or four days could
produce any.
What chiefly surprised Edmund was, that Crawford's sister, the friend
and companion who had been so much to her, should not be more visibly
regretted. He wondered that Fanny spoke so seldom of -her-, and had so
little voluntarily to say of her concern at this separation.
Alas! it was this sister, this friend and companion, who was now the
chief bane of Fanny's comfort. If she could have believed Mary's future
fate as unconnected with Mansfield as she was determined the brother's
should be, if she could have hoped her return thither to be as distant
as she was much inclined to think his, she would have been light of
heart indeed; but the more she recollected and observed, the more deeply
was she convinced that everything was now in a fairer train for Miss
Crawford's marrying Edmund than it had ever been before. On his side the
inclination was stronger, on hers less equivocal. His objections, the
scruples of his integrity, seemed all done away, nobody could tell
how; and the doubts and hesitations of her ambition were equally got
over--and equally without apparent reason. It could only be imputed to
increasing attachment. His good and her bad feelings yielded to love,
and such love must unite them. He was to go to town as soon as some
business relative to Thornton Lacey were completed--perhaps within a
fortnight; he talked of going, he loved to talk of it; and when once
with her again, Fanny could not doubt the rest. Her acceptance must be
as certain as his offer; and yet there were bad feelings still remaining
which made the prospect of it most sorrowful to her, independently, she
believed, independently of self.
In their very last conversation, Miss Crawford, in spite of some amiable
sensations, and much personal kindness, had still been Miss Crawford;
still shewn a mind led astray and bewildered, and without any suspicion
of being so; darkened, yet fancying itself light. She might love, but
she did not deserve Edmund by any other sentiment. Fanny believed there
was scarcely a second feeling in common between them; and she may be
forgiven by older sages for looking on the chance of Miss Crawford's
future improvement as nearly desperate, for thinking that if Edmund's
influence in this season of love had already done so little in clearing
her judgment, and regulating her notions, his worth would be finally
wasted on her even in years of matrimony.
Experience might have hoped more for any young people so circumstanced,
and impartiality would not have denied to Miss Crawford's nature that
participation of the general nature of women which would lead her to
adopt the opinions of the man she loved and respected as her own. But
as such were Fanny's persuasions, she suffered very much from them, and
could never speak of Miss Crawford without pain.
Sir Thomas, meanwhile, went on with his own hopes and his own
observations, still feeling a right, by all his knowledge of human
nature, to expect to see the effect of the loss of power and consequence
on his niece's spirits, and the past attentions of the lover producing a
craving for their return; and he was soon afterwards able to account for
his not yet completely and indubitably seeing all this, by the prospect
of another visitor, whose approach he could allow to be quite enough to
support the spirits he was watching. William had obtained a ten days'
leave of absence, to be given to Northamptonshire, and was coming, the
happiest of lieutenants, because the latest made, to shew his happiness
and describe his uniform.
He came; and he would have been delighted to shew his uniform there too,
had not cruel custom prohibited its appearance except on duty. So the
uniform remained at Portsmouth, and Edmund conjectured that before Fanny
had any chance of seeing it, all its own freshness and all the freshness
of its wearer's feelings must be worn away. It would be sunk into a
badge of disgrace; for what can be more unbecoming, or more worthless,
than the uniform of a lieutenant, who has been a lieutenant a year or
two, and sees others made commanders before him? So reasoned Edmund,
till his father made him the confidant of a scheme which placed Fanny's
chance of seeing the second lieutenant of H.M.S. Thrush in all his glory
in another light.
This scheme was that she should accompany her brother back to
Portsmouth, and spend a little time with her own family. It had occurred
to Sir Thomas, in one of his dignified musings, as a right and desirable
measure; but before he absolutely made up his mind, he consulted his
son. Edmund considered it every way, and saw nothing but what was right.
The thing was good in itself, and could not be done at a better time;
and he had no doubt of it being highly agreeable to Fanny. This was
enough to determine Sir Thomas; and a decisive “then so it shall be”
closed that stage of the business; Sir Thomas retiring from it with some
feelings of satisfaction, and views of good over and above what he had
communicated to his son; for his prime motive in sending her away had
very little to do with the propriety of her seeing her parents again,
and nothing at all with any idea of making her happy. He certainly
wished her to go willingly, but he as certainly wished her to be
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