Austen Said:

“That it ought not to be attempted. Mr. Darcy has not authorised me to make his communication public. On the contrary, every particular relative to his sister was meant to be kept as much as possible to myself; and if I endeavour to undeceive people as to the rest of his conduct, who will believe me? The general prejudice against Mr. Darcy is so violent, that it would be the death of half the good people in Meryton to attempt to place him in an amiable light. I am not equal to it. Wickham will soon be gone; and therefore it will not signify to anyone here what he really is. Some time hence it will be all found out, and then we may laugh at their stupidity in not knowing it before. At present I will say nothing about it.”

“You are quite right. To have his errors made public might ruin him for ever. He is now, perhaps, sorry for what he has done, and anxious to re-establish a character. We must not make him desperate.”

Here was knowledge in which no one could partake;

nothing less than a perfect understanding between the parties could justify her in throwing off this last encumbrance of mystery.

“And then,”

“if that very improbable event should ever take place, I shall merely be able to tell what Bingley may tell in a much more agreeable manner himself. The liberty of communication cannot be mine till it has lost all its value!”

Jane was not happy.

a very tender affection for Bingley.

“I do not believe he will ever live at Netherfield any more.”

“No, nothing at all.”

“It was a subject which they could not mention before me.”

the justice of Mr. Darcy's objections; and never had she before been so much disposed to pardon his interference in the views of his friend.

as the death warrant of all possibility of common sense for the latter;

detestable as such a step must make her were it known,

secretly advising her father not to let her go.

all the improprieties of Lydia's general behaviour, the little advantage she could derive from the friendship of such a woman as Mrs. Forster, and the probability of her being yet more imprudent with such a companion at Brighton, where the temptations must be greater than at home.

“If you were aware,”

“of the very great disadvantage to us all which must arise from the public notice of Lydia's unguarded and imprudent manner — nay, which has already arisen from it, I am sure you would judge differently in the affair.”

“Indeed you are mistaken. I have no such injuries to resent. It is not of particular, but of general evils, which I am now complaining. Our importance, our respectability in the world must be affected by the wild volatility, the assurance and disdain of all restraint which mark Lydia's character. Excuse me, for I must speak plainly. If you, my dear father, will not take the trouble of checking her exuberant spirits, and of teaching her that her present pursuits are not to be the business of her life, she will soon be beyond the reach of amendment. Her character will be fixed, and she will, at sixteen, be the most determined flirt that ever made herself or her family ridiculous; a flirt too, in the worst and meanest degree of flirtation; without any attraction beyond youth and a tolerable person; and, from the ignorance and emptiness of her mind, wholly unable to ward off any portion of that universal contempt which her rage for admiration will excite. In this danger Kitty also is comprehended. She will follow wherever Lydia leads. Vain, ignorant, idle, and absolutely uncontrolled! Oh! my dear father, can you suppose it possible that they will not be censured and despised wherever they are known, and that their sisters will not be often involved in the disgrace?”

in the very gentleness which had first delighted her, an affectation and a sameness to disgust and weary.

the reproof contained in his believing, that however long, and for whatever cause, his attentions had been withdrawn, her vanity would be gratified, and her preference secured at any time by their renewal.

Colonel Fitzwilliam's and Mr. Darcy's having both spent three weeks at Rosings,

if he was acquainted with the former.

“Nearly three weeks.”

“Yes, almost every day.”

“Yes, very different. But I think Mr. Darcy improves upon acquaintance.”

“Oh, no!”

“In essentials, I believe, he is very much what he ever was.”

“When I said that he improved on acquaintance, I did not mean that either his mind or his manners were in a state of improvement, but that, from knowing him better, his disposition was better understood.”

he wanted to engage her on the old subject of his grievances,

the disadvantages which must attend the children of so unsuitable a marriage,

the evils arising from so ill-judged a direction of talents; talents, which, rightly used, might at least have preserved the respectability of his daughters, even if incapable of enlarging the mind of his wife.

though Kitty might in time regain her natural degree of sense, since the disturbers of her brain were removed, her other sister, from whose disposition greater evil might be apprehended, was likely to be hardened in all her folly and assurance by a situation of such double danger as a watering-place and a camp.

“But it is fortunate,”

“that I have something to wish for. Were the whole arrangement complete, my disappointment would be certain. But here, by carrying with me one ceaseless source of regret in my sister's absence, I may reasonably hope to have all my expectations of pleasure realised. A scheme of which every part promises delight can never be successful; and general disappointment is only warded off by the defence of some little peculiar vexation.”

by the following Christmas she might be so tolerably reasonable as not to mention an officer above once a day, unless, by some cruel and malicious arrangement at the War Office, another regiment should be quartered in Meryton.

there might have been time enough.

“But surely,”

“I may enter his county with impunity, and rob it of a few petrified spars without his perceiving me.”

she had no business at Pemberley,

She must own that she was tired of seeing great houses; after going over so many, she really had no pleasure in fine carpets or satin curtains.

The possibility of meeting Mr. Darcy, while viewing the place,

It would be dreadful!

it would be better to speak openly to her aunt than to run such a risk.

it could be the last resource, if her private inquiries as to the absence of the family were unfavourably answered.

whether Pemberley were not a very fine place? what was the name of its proprietor? and,

whether the family were down for the summer?

she had not really any dislike to the scheme.

a place for which nature had done more, or where natural beauty had been so little counteracted by an awkward taste.

to be mistress of Pemberley might be something!