Unaccountable, however, as the circumstances of his release
might appear to the whole family, it was certain that Edward was free;
and to what purpose that freedom would be employed was easily
pre-determined by all;- for after experiencing the blessings of one
imprudent engagement, contracted without his mother's consent, as he
had already done for more than four years, nothing less could be
expected of him in the failure of that than the immediate
contraction of another.
His errand at Barton, in fact, was a simple one. It was only to
ask Elinor to marry him; and considering that he was not altogether
inexperienced in such a question, it might be strange that he should
feel so uncomfortable in the present case as he really did, so much in
need of encouragement and fresh air.
How soon he had walked himself into the proper resolution,
however, how soon an opportunity of exercising it occurred, in what
manner he expressed himself, and how he was received, need not be
particularly told. This only need be said;- that when they all sat
down to table at four o'clock, about three hours after his arrival, he
had secured his lady, engaged her mother's consent, and was not only
in the rapturous profession of the lover, but, in the reality of
reason and truth, one of the happiest of men. His situation indeed was
more than commonly joyful. He had more than the ordinary triumph of
accepted love to swell his heart, and raise his spirits. He was
released, without any reproach to himself, from an entanglement
which had long formed his misery, from a woman whom he had long ceased
to love; and elevated at once to that security with another, which
he must have thought of almost with despair, as soon as he had learned
to consider it with desire. He was brought, not from doubt or
suspense, but from misery to happiness; and the change was openly
spoken in such a genuine, flowing, grateful cheerfulness, as his
friends had never witnessed in him before.
His heart was now open to Elinor; all its weaknesses, all its
errors confessed, and his first boyish attachment to Lucy treated with
all the philosophic dignity of twenty-four.
"It was a foolish, idle inclination on my side," said he, "the
consequence of ignorance of the world, and want of employment. Had
my mother given me some active profession when I was removed at
eighteen from the care of Mr. Pratt, I think, nay, I am sure, it would
never have happened; for though I left Longstaple with what I thought,
at the time, a most unconquerable preference for his niece, yet, had I
then had any pursuit, any object to engage my time and keep me at a
distance from her for a few months, I should very soon have outgrown
the fancied attachment, especially by mixing more with the world, as
in such case I must have done. But instead of having any thing to
do, instead of having any profession chosen for me, or being allowed
to choose myself, I returned home to be completely idle; and for the
first twelvemonth afterwards I had not even the nominal employment,
which belonging to the university would have given me, for I was not
entered at Oxford till I was nineteen. I had therefore nothing in
the world to do, but to fancy myself in love; and as my mother did not
make my home in every respect comfortable, as I had no friend, no
companion in my brother, and disliked new acquaintance, it was not
unnatural for me to be very often at Longstaple, where I always felt
myself at home, and was always sure of a welcome; and accordingly I
spent the greatest part of my time there from eighteen to nineteen:
Lucy appeared every thing that was amiable and obliging. She was
pretty too- at least I thought so then; and I had seen so little of
other women, that I could make no comparisons, and see no defects.
Considering every thing, therefore, I hope, foolish as our
engagement was, foolish as it has since in every way proved, it was
not at the time an unnatural or an inexcusable piece of folly."
The change which a few hours had wrought in the minds and the
happiness of the Dashwoods, was such- so great- as promised them all
the satisfaction of a sleepless night. Mrs. Dashwood, too happy to
be comfortable, knew not how to love Edward, nor praise Elinor enough,
how to be enough thankful for his release without wounding his
delicacy, nor how at once to give them leisure for unrestrained
conversation together, and yet enjoy, as she wished, the sight and
society of both.
Marianne could speak her happiness only by tears. Comparisons
would occur- regrets would arise; and her joy, though sincere as her
love for her sister, was of a kind to give her neither spirits nor
language.
But Elinor,- how are her feelings to be described? From the moment
of learning that Lucy was married to another, that Edward was free, to
the moment of his justifying the hopes which had so instantly
followed, she was every thing by turns but tranquil. But when the
second moment had passed, when she found every doubt, every solicitude
removed, compared her situation with what so lately it had been,-
saw him honourably released from his former engagement,- saw him
instantly profiting by the release, to address herself and declare
an affection as tender, as constant as she had ever supposed it to
be,- she was oppressed, she was overcome by her own felicity; and
happily disposed as is the human mind to be easily familiarised with
any change for the better, it required several hours to give
sedateness to her spirits, or any degree of tranquillity to her heart.
Edward was now fixed at the cottage at least for a week; for
whatever other claims might be made on him, it was impossible that
less than a week should be given up to the enjoyment of Elinor's
company, or suffice to say half that was to be said of the past, the
present, and the future; for though a very few hours spent in the hard
labor of incessant talking will despatch more subjects than can really
be in common between any two rational creatures, yet, with lovers it
is different. Between them no subject is finished, no communication is
even made, till it has been made at least twenty times over
.
Lucy's marriage, the unceasing and reasonable wonder among them
all, formed of course one of the earliest discussions of the lovers;
and Elinor's particular knowledge of each party made it appear to her,
in every view, as one of the most extraordinary and unaccountable
circumstances she had ever heard. How they could be thrown together,
and by what attraction Robert could be drawn on to marry a girl, of
whose beauty she had herself heard him speak without any admiration- a
girl, too, already engaged to his brother, and on whose account that
brother had been thrown off by his family- it was beyond her
comprehension to make out. To her own heart it was a delightful
affair, to her imagination it was even a ridiculous one, but to her
reason, her judgment, it was quite a puzzle.
Edward could only attempt an explanation by supposing, that,
perhaps, at first accidentally meeting, the vanity of the one had been
so worked on by the flattery of the other, as to lead by degrees to
all the rest. Elinor remembered what Robert had told her in Harley
Street, of his opinion of what his own mediation in his brother's
affairs might have done, if applied to in time. She repeated it to
Edward.
"That was exactly like Robert," was his immediate observation.
"And that," he presently added, "might perhaps be in his head when the
acquaintance between them first began. And Lucy, perhaps, at first
might think only of procuring his good offices in my favour. Other
designs might afterward arise."
How long it had been carrying on between them, however, he was
equally at a loss with herself to make out; for at Oxford, where he
had remained for choice ever since his quitting London, he had had
no means of hearing of her but from herself, and her letters to the
very last were neither less frequent nor less affectionate than usual.
Not the smallest suspicion, therefore, had ever occurred to prepare
him for what followed; and when at last it burst on him in a letter
from Lucy herself, he had been for sometime, he believed, half
stupefied between the wonder, the horror, and the joy of such a
deliverance. He put the letter into Elinor's hands.
"Dear Sir,
Being very sure I have long lost your affections, I have
thought myself at liberty to bestow my own on another, and have no
doubt of being as happy with him as I once used to think I might be
with you; but I scorn to accept a hand while the heart was
another's. Sincerely wish you happy in your choice, and it shall not
be my fault if we are not always good friends, as our near
relationship now makes proper. I can safely say I owe you no ill-will,
and am sure you will be too generous to do us any ill offices. Your
brother has gained my affections entirely; and as we could not live
without one another, we are just returned from the altar, and are
now on our way to Dawlish for a few weeks; which place your dear
brother has great curiosity to see, but thought I would first
trouble you with these few lines, and shall always remain,
Your sincere well-wisher, friend, and sister,
Lucy Ferrars.
"I have burnt all your letters, and will return your picture the
first opportunity. Please to destroy my scrawls- but the ring with
my hair you are very welcome to keep."
Elinor read and returned it without any comment.
"I will not ask your opinion of it as a composition," said Edward.
"For worlds would not I have had a letter of hers seen by you in
former days. In a sister it is bad enough, but in a wife! how I have
blushed over the pages of her writing and I believe I may say that
since the first half year of our foolish business this is the only
letter I ever received from her, of which the substance made me any
amends for the defect of the style."
"However it may have come about," said Elinor, after a pause,
"they are certainly married; and your mother has brought on herself
a most appropriate punishment. The independence she settled on Robert,
through resentment against you, has put it in his power to make his
own choice; and she has actually been bribing one son with a
thousand a year to do the very deed which she disinherited the other
for intending to do. She will hardly be less hurt, I suppose, by
Robert's marrying Lucy, than she would have been by your marrying
her."
"She will be more hurt by it, for Robert always was her favourite.
She will be more hurt by it, and on the same principle will forgive
him much sooner."
In what state the affair stood at present between them Edward knew
not, for no communication with any of his family had yet been
attempted by him. He had quitted Oxford within four-and-twenty hours
after Lucy's letter arrived, and with only one object before him,
the nearest road to Barton, had had no leisure to form any scheme of
conduct, with which that road did not hold the most intimate
connection. He could do nothing till he were assured of his fate
with Miss Dashwood; and by his rapidity in seeking that fate, it is to
be supposed, in spite of the jealousy with which he had once thought
of Colonel Brandon, in spite of the modesty with which he rated his
own deserts, and the politeness with which he talked of his doubts, he
did not, upon the whole, expect a very cruel reception. It was his
business, however, to say that he did, and he said it very prettily.
What he might say on the subject a twelvemonth after must be
referred to the imagination of husbands and wives.
That Lucy had certainly meant to deceive, to go off with a
flourish of malice against him in her message by Thomas, was perfectly
clear to Elinor; and Edward himself, now thoroughly enlightened on her
character, had no scruple in believing her capable of the utmost
meanness of wanton ill-nature. Though his eyes had been long opened,
even before his acquaintance with Elinor began, to her ignorance and a
want of liberality in some of her opinions, they had been equally
imputed, by him, to her want of education; and till her last letter
reached him, he had always believed her to be a well-disposed,
good-hearted girl, and thoroughly attached to himself. Nothing but
such a persuasion could have prevented his putting an end to an
engagement, which, long before the discovery of it laid him open to
his mother's anger, had been a continual source of disquiet and regret
to him.
"I thought it my duty," said he, "independent of my feelings, to
give her the option of continuing the engagement or not, when I was
renounced by my mother, and stood to all appearance without a friend
in the world to assist me. In such a situation as that, where there
seemed nothing to tempt the avarice or the vanity of any living
creature, how could I suppose, when she so earnestly, so warmly
insisted on sharing my fate, whatever it might be, that anything but
the most disinterested affection was her inducement? And even now, I
cannot comprehend on what motive she acted, or what fancied
advantage it could be to her, to be fettered to a man for whom she had
not the smallest regard, and who had only two thousand pounds in the
world. She could not foresee that Colonel Brandon would give me a
living."
"No; but she might suppose that something would occur in your
favour; that your own family might in time relent. And at any rate,
she lost nothing by continuing the engagement, for she has proved that
it fettered neither her inclination nor her actions. The connection
was certainly a respectable one, and probably gained her consideration
among her friends; and, if nothing more advantageous occurred, it
would be better for her to marry you than be single."
Edward was, of course, immediately convinced that nothing could
have been more natural than Lucy's conduct, nor more self-evident than
the motive of it.
Elinor scolded him, harshly as ladies always scold the
imprudence which compliments themselves for having spent so much
time with them at Norland, when he must have felt his own inconstancy.
"Your behaviour was certainly very wrong," said she; "because,
to say nothing of my own conviction, our relations were all led away
by it to fancy and expect what, as you were then situated, could never
be."
He could only plead an ignorance of his own heart, and a
mistaken confidence in the force of his engagement.
"I was simple enough to think, that because my faith was
plighted to another, there could be no danger in my being with you;
and that the consciousness of my engagement was to keep my heart as
safe and sacred as my honour. I felt that I admired you, but I told
myself it was only friendship; and till I began to make comparisons
between yourself and Lucy, I did not know how far I was got. After
that, I suppose, I was wrong in remaining so much in Sussex; and the
arguments with which I reconciled myself to the expediency of it
were no better than these:- The danger is my own; I am doing no injury
to anybody but myself."
Elinor smiled, and shook her head.
Edward heard with pleasure of Colonel Brandon's being expected
at the cottage, as he really wished, not only to be better
acquainted with him, but to have an opportunity of convincing him,
that he no longer resented his giving him the living of Delaford.
"Which, at present," said he, "after thanks so ungraciously
delivered as mine were on the occasion, he must think I have never
forgiven him for offering."
Now he felt astonished himself that he had never yet been to the
place. But so little interest had be taken in the matter, that he owed
all his knowledge of the house, garden, and glebe, extent of the
parish, condition of the land, and rate of the tithes, to Elinor
herself, who had heard so much of it from Colonel Brandon, and heard
it with so much attention, as to be entirely mistress of the subject.
One question after this only remained undecided between them;
one difficulty only was to be overcome. They were brought together
by mutual affection, with the warmest approbation of their real
friends; their intimate knowledge of each other seemed to make their
happiness certain, and they only wanted something to live upon. Edward
had two thousand pounds, and Elinor one, which, with Delaford
living, was all that they could call their own; for it was
impossible that Mrs. Dashwood should advance anything; and they were
neither of them quite enough in love to think that three hundred and
fifty pounds a year would supply them with the comforts of life.
Edward was not entirely without hopes of some favourable change in
his mother towards him; and on that he rested for the residue of their
income. But Elinor had no such dependence; for, since Edward would
still be unable to marry Miss Morton, and his choosing herself had
been spoken of in Mrs. Ferrars's flattering language as only a
lesser evil than his choosing Lucy Steele, she feared that Robert's
offence would serve no other purpose than to enrich Fanny.
About four days after Edward's arrival Colonel Brandon appeared,
to complete Mrs. Dashwood's satisfaction, and to give her the
dignity of having, for the first time since her living at Barton, more
company with her than her house would hold. Edward was allowed to
retain the privilege of first comer, and Colonel Brandon, therefore,
walked every night to his old quarters at the Park; from whence he
usually returned in the morning, early enough to interrupt the lover's
first tete-a-tete before breakfast.
A three weeks' residence at Delaford, where, in his evening
hours at least, he had little to do but to calculate the disproportion
between thirty-six and seventeen, brought him to Barton in a temper of
mind which needed all the improvement in Marianne's looks, all the
kindness of her welcome, and all the encouragement of her mother's
language, to make it cheerful. Among such friends, however, and such
flattery, he did revive. No rumour of Lucy's marriage had yet
reached him: he knew nothing of what had passed; and the first hours
of his visit were consequently spent in hearing and in wondering.
Everything was explained to him by Mrs. Dashwood; and he found fresh
reason to rejoice in what he had done for Mr. Ferrars, since
eventually it promoted the interest of Elinor.
It would be needless to say, that the gentlemen advanced in the
good opinion of each other, as they advanced in each other's
acquaintance, for it could not be otherwise. Their resemblance in good
principles and good sense, in disposition and manner of thinking,
would probably have been sufficient to unite them in friendship,
without any other attraction; but their being in love with two
sisters, and two sisters fond of each other, made that mutual regard
inevitable and immediate, which might otherwise have waited the effect
of time and judgment.
The letters from town, which a few days before would have made
every nerve in Elinor's body thrill with transport, now arrived to
be read with less emotion that mirth. Mrs. Jennings wrote to tell
the wonderful tale, to vent her honest indignation against the jilting
girl, and pour forth her compassion towards poor Mr. Edward, who,
she was sure, had quite doted upon the worthless hussy, and was now,
by all accounts, almost brokenhearted, at Oxford. "I do think," she
continued, "nothing was ever carried on so sly; for it was but two
days before Lucy called and sat a couple of hours with me. Not a
soul suspected anything of the matter, not even Nancy, who, poor soul!
came crying to me the day after, in a great fright for fear of Mrs.
Ferrars, as well as not knowing how to get to Plymouth; for Lucy, it
seems, borrowed all her money before she went off to be married, on
purpose, we suppose, to make a show with, and poor Nancy had not seven
shillings in the world; so I was very glad to give her five guineas to
take her down to Exeter, where she thinks of staying three or four
weeks with Mrs. Burgess, in hopes, as I tell her, to fall in with
the Doctor again. And I must say that Lucy's crossness not to take
her along with them in the chaise is worse than all. Poor Mr.
Edward, I cannot get him out of my head, but you must send for him to
Barton, and Miss Marianne must try to comfort him."
Mr. Dashwood's strains were more solemn. Mrs. Ferrars was the
most unfortunate of women- poor Fanny had suffered agonies of
sensibility- and he considered the existence of each, under such a
blow, with grateful wonder. Robert's offence was unpardonable, but
Lucy's was infinitely worse. Neither of them were ever again to be
mentioned to Mrs. Ferrars; and even, if she might hereafter be induced
to forgive her son, his wife should never be acknowledged as her
daughter, nor be permitted to appear in her presence. The secrecy with
which everything had been carried on between them was rationally
treated as enormously heightening the crime, because, had any
suspicion of it occurred to the others, proper measures would have
been taken to prevent the marriage; and he called on Elinor to join
with him in regretting that Lucy's engagement with Edward had not
rather been fulfilled, than that she should thus be the means of
spreading misery farther in the family. He thus continued:-
"Mrs. Ferrars has never yet mentioned Edward's name, which does
not surprise us; but, to our great astonishment, not a line has been
received from him on the occasion. Perhaps, however, he is kept silent
by his fear of offending; and I shall, therefore, give him a hint,
by a line to Oxford, that his sister and I both think a letter of
proper submission from him, addressed perhaps to Fanny, and by her
shown to her mother, might not be taken amiss; for we all know the
tenderness of Mrs. Ferrars's heart, and that she wishes for nothing so
much as to be on good terms with her children."
This paragraph was of some importance to the prospects and conduct
of Edward. It determined him to attempt a reconciliation, though not
exactly in the manner pointed out by their brother and sister.
"A letter of proper submission!" repeated he; "would they have
me beg my mother's pardon for Robert's ingratitude to her, and
breach of honour to me? I can make no submission. I am grown neither
humble nor pentinent by what has passed. I am grown very happy; but
that would not interest. I know of no submission that is proper for me
to make."
"You may certainly ask to be forgiven," said Elinor, "because
you have offended; and I should think you might now venture so far
as to profess some concern for having ever formed the engagement which
drew on you your mother's anger."
He agreed that he might.
"And when she has forgiven you, perhaps a little humility may be
convenient while acknowledging a second engagement, almost as
imprudent in her eyes as the first."
He had nothing to urge against it, but still resisted the idea
of a letter of proper submission; and, therefore, to make it easier to
him, as he declared a much greater willingness to make mean
concessions by word of mouth than on paper, it was resolved that,
instead of writing to Fanny, he should go to London, and personally
entreat her good offices in his favour. "And if they really do
interest themselves," said Marianne, in her new character of
candour, "in bringing about a reconciliation, I shall think that
even John and Fanny are not entirely without merit."
After a visit on Colonel Brandon's side of only three or four
days, the two gentlemen quitted Barton together. They were to go
immediately to Delaford, that Edward might have some personal
knowledge of his future home, and assist his patron and friend in
deciding on what improvements were needed to it; and from thence,
after staying there a couple of nights, he was to proceed on his
journey to town.
Sense and Sensibility - Chapter 48 Sense and Sensibility Sense and Sensibility - Chapter 50