Austen Said:

it be a great extenuation.

Allowances, large allowances,

must be made for the ideas of those who spoke. She heard it all under embellishment. All that sounded extravagant or irrational in the progress of the reconciliation might have no origin but in the language of the relators.

there being something more than immediately appeared, in Mr Elliot's wishing, after an interval of so many years, to be well received by them.

In a worldly view, he had nothing to gain by being on terms with Sir Walter; nothing to risk by a state of variance. In all probability he was already the richer of the two, and the Kellynch estate would as surely be his hereafter as the title. A sensible man, and he had looked like a very sensible man, why should it be an object to him? She could only offer one solution; it was, perhaps, for Elizabeth's sake. There might really have been a liking formerly, though convenience and accident had drawn him a different way; and now that he could afford to please himself, he might mean to pay his addresses to her. Elizabeth was certainly very handsome, with well-bred, elegant manners, and her character might never have been penetrated by Mr Elliot, knowing her but in public, and when very young himself. How her temper and understanding might bear the investigation of his present keener time of life was another concern and rather a fearful one.

he might not be too nice, or too observant if Elizabeth were his object;

"Oh! no, that must have been quite accidental. In general she has been in very good health and very good looks since Michaelmas."

she should venture to suggest that a gown, or a cap, would not be liable to any such misuse,

Mrs Clay decidedly thought it Mr Elliot's knock."

He was quite as good-looking as he had appeared at Lyme, his countenance improved by speaking, and his manners were so exactly what they ought to be, so polished, so easy, so particularly agreeable, that she could compare them in excellence to only one person's manners. They were not the same, but they were, perhaps, equally good.

His enquiries, however, produced at length an account of the scene she had been engaged in there, soon after his leaving the place.

"an accident,"

Mr Elliot to Lady Russell, in the wish of really comprehending what had passed, and in the degree of concern for what she must have suffered in witnessing it.

He staid an hour with them. The elegant little clock on the mantel-piece had struck "eleven with its silver sounds," and the watchman was beginning to be heard at a distance telling the same tale, before Mr Elliot or any of them seemed to feel that he had been there long.

her first evening in Camden Place could have passed so well!

there had just been a decent pretence on the lady's side of meaning to leave them.

Mrs Clay to have said,

"That must not be any reason, indeed. I assure you I feel it none. She is nothing to me, compared with you;"

"No, nothing."

"No, nothing at all."

If Elizabeth could but have heard this!

Such personal praise might have struck her,

But everything must take its chance. The evil of a marriage would be much diminished, if Elizabeth were also to marry. As for herself, she might always command a home with Lady Russell.

Lady Russell should see nothing suspicious or inconsistent, nothing to require more motives than appeared, in Mr Elliot's great desire of a reconciliation.

"Elizabeth."

She could determine nothing at present. In that house Elizabeth must be first; and she was in the habit of such general observance as "Miss Elliot," that any particularity of attention seemed almost impossible. Mr Elliot, too, it must be remembered, had not been a widower seven months. A little delay on his side might be very excusable.

she was the inexcusable one, in attributing to him such imaginations; for though his marriage had not been very happy, still it had existed so many years that she could not comprehend a very rapid recovery from the awful impression of its being dissolved.

However it might end, he was without any question their pleasantest acquaintance in Bath: she saw nobody equal to him; and it was a great indulgence now and then to talk to him about Lyme, which he seemed to have as lively a wish to see again, and to see more of, as herself.

His value for rank and connexion

was greater than hers. It was not merely complaisance, it must be a liking to the cause, which made him enter warmly into her father and sister's solicitudes on a subject which

unworthy to excite them.

disappointed.

better things from their high ideas of their own situation in life,

a wish that they had more pride;

they were nothing. There was no superiority of manner, accomplishment, or understanding. Lady Dalrymple had acquired the name of "a charming woman," because she had a smile and a civil answer for everybody. Miss Carteret, with still less to say, was so plain and so awkward, that she would never have been tolerated in Camden Place but for her birth.

"My idea of good company, Mr Elliot, is the company of clever, well-informed people, who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company."

"Yes,"

"we shall, indeed, be known to be related to them!"

"I certainly do think there has been by far too much trouble taken to procure the acquaintance. I suppose"

"I have more pride than any of you; but I confess it does vex me, that we should be so solicitous to have the relationship acknowledged, which we may be very sure is a matter of perfect indifference to them."

"Well,"

"I certainly am proud, too proud to enjoy a welcome which depends so entirely upon place."

his wishing to promote her father's getting great acquaintance was more than excusable in the view of defeating her.

It would excite no proper interest there.

Neither the dissipations of the past -- and she had lived very much in the world -- nor the restrictions of the present, neither sickness nor sorrow seemed to have closed her heart or ruined her spirits.

She could scarcely imagine a more cheerless situation in itself than Mrs Smith's.

She had been very fond of her husband: she had buried him. She had been used to affluence: it was gone. She had no child to connect her with life and happiness again, no relations to assist in the arrangement of perplexed affairs, no health to make all the rest supportable. Her accommodations were limited to a noisy parlour, and a dark bedroom behind, with no possibility of moving from one to the other without assistance, which there was only one servant in the house to afford, and she never quitted the house but to be conveyed into the warm bath.

she had moments only of languor and depression, to hours of occupation and enjoyment. How could it be?

this was not a case of fortitude or of resignation only.

A submissive spirit might be patient, a strong understanding would supply resolution, but here was something more; here was that elasticity of mind, that disposition to be comforted, that power of turning readily from evil to good, and of finding employment which carried her out of herself, which was from nature alone. It was the choicest gift of Heaven;