Austen Said:

he must be supposing her to be thinking of Jane and Netherfield,

“I do not mean to say that a woman may not be settled too near her family. The far and the near must be relative, and depend on many varying circumstances. Where there is fortune to make the expenses of travelling unimportant, distance becomes no evil. But that is not the case here. Mr. and Mrs. Collins have a comfortable income, but not such a one as will allow of frequent journeys — and I am persuaded my friend would not call herself near her family under less than half the present distance.”

there was less captivating softness in Colonel Fitzwilliam's manners,

he might have the best informed mind.

all the perverseness of the mischance that should bring him where no one else was brought,

it was a favourite haunt of hers.

How it could occur a second time, therefore, was very odd! Yet it did, and even a third.

It seemed like wilful ill-nature, or a voluntary penance, for on these occasions it was not merely a few formal inquiries and an awkward pause and then away, but he actually thought it necessary to turn back and walk with her.

he was asking some odd unconnected questions — about her pleasure in being at Hunsford, her love of solitary walks, and her opinion of Mr. and Mrs. Collins's happiness;

of Rosings and her not perfectly understanding the house, he seemed to expect that whenever she came into Kent again she would be staying there too.

His words seemed to imply it. Could he have Colonel Fitzwilliam in his thoughts?

if he meant anything, he must mean an allusion to what might arise in that quarter.

“I did not know before that you ever walked this way.”

“No, I should have turned in a moment.”

“Do you certainly leave Kent on Saturday?”

“And if not able to please himself in the arrangement, he has at least pleasure in the great power of choice. I do not know anybody who seems more to enjoy the power of doing what he likes than Mr. Darcy.”

“In my opinion, the younger son of an earl can know very little of either. Now seriously, what have you ever known of self-denial and dependence? When have you been prevented by want of money from going wherever you chose, or procuring anything you had a fancy for?”

“Unless where they like women of fortune, which I think they very often do.”

“Is this,”

“meant for me?”

“and pray, what is the usual price of an earl's younger son? Unless the elder brother is very sickly, I suppose you would not ask above fifty thousand pounds.”

To interrupt a silence which might make him fancy her affected with what had passed,

“I imagine your cousin brought you down with him chiefly for the sake of having someone at his disposal. I wonder he does not marry, to secure a lasting convenience of that kind. But, perhaps, his sister does as well for the present, and, as she is under his sole care, he may do what he likes with her.”

“Are you indeed? And pray what sort of guardians do you make? Does your charge give you much trouble? Young ladies of her age are sometimes a little difficult to manage, and if she has the true Darcy spirit, she may like to have her own way.”

she had somehow or other got pretty near the truth.

“You need not be frightened. I never heard any harm of her; and I dare say she is one of the most tractable creatures in the world. She is a very great favourite with some ladies of my acquaintance, Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley. I think I have heard you say that you know them.”

“Oh! yes,”

“Mr. Darcy is uncommonly kind to Mr. Bingley, and takes a prodigious deal of care of him.”

“What is it you mean?”

“You may depend upon my not mentioning it.”

“Did Mr. Darcy give you reasons for this interference?”

“And what arts did he use to separate them?”

“I am thinking of what you have been telling me,”

“Your cousin's conduct does not suit my feelings. Why was he to be the judge?”

“I do not see what right Mr. Darcy had to decide on the propriety of his friend's inclination, or why, upon his own judgement alone, he was to determine and direct in what manner his friend was to be happy. But,”

“as we know none of the particulars, it is not fair to condemn him. It is not to be supposed that there was much affection in the case.”

so just a picture of Mr. Darcy,

It was not to be supposed that any other people could be meant than those with whom she was connected. There could not exist in the world two men over whom Mr. Darcy could have such boundless influence.

That he had been concerned in the measures taken to separate Mr. Bingley and Jane

the principal design and arrangement of them.

If his own vanity, however, did not mislead him, he was the cause, his pride and caprice were the cause, of all that Jane had suffered, and still continued to suffer. He had ruined for a while every hope of happiness for the most affectionate, generous heart in the world; and no one could say how lasting an evil he might have inflicted.

were Colonel Fitzwilliam's words; and those strong objections probably were, her having one uncle who was a country attorney, and another who was in business in London.

“To Jane herself,”

“there could be no possibility of objection; all loveliness and goodness as she is! — her understanding excellent, her mind improved, and her manners captivating. Neither could anything be urged against my father, who, though with some peculiarities, has abilities which Mr. Darcy himself need not disdain, and respectability which he will probably never reach.”

any objections there had material weight with Mr. Darcy, whose pride,

would receive a deeper wound from the want of importance in his friend's connections, than from their want of sense;

he had been partly governed by this worst kind of pride, and partly by the wish of retaining Mr. Bingley for his sister.

not to attend her cousins to Rosings, where they were engaged to drink tea.

They contained no actual complaint, nor was there any revival of past occurrences, or any communication of present suffering. But in all, and in almost every line of each, there was a want of that cheerfulness which had been used to characterise her style, and which, proceeding from the serenity of a mind at ease with itself and kindly disposed towards everyone, had been scarcely ever clouded.

Mr. Darcy's shameful boast of what misery he had been able to inflict,