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- pride-and-prejudice
- text
- for my attentions to you last spring? Is nothing due to me on that
score? Let us sit down. You are to understand, Miss Bennet, that I came
here with the determined resolution of carrying my purpose; nor will I
be dissuaded from it. I have not been used to submit to any person’s
whims. I have not been in the habit of brooking disappointment.”
“_That_ will make your Ladyship’s situation at present more pitiable;
but it will have no effect on _me_.”
“I will not be interrupted! Hear me in silence. My daughter and my
nephew are formed for each other. They are descended, on the maternal
side, from the same noble line; and, on the father’s, from respectable,
honourable, and ancient, though untitled, families. Their fortune on
both sides is splendid. They are destined for each other by the voice of
every member of their respective houses; and what is to divide
them?--the upstart pretensions of a young woman without family,
connections, or fortune! Is this to be endured? But it must not, shall
not be! If you were sensible of your own good, you would not wish to
quit the sphere in which you have been brought up.”
“In marrying your nephew, I should not consider myself as quitting that
sphere. He is a gentleman; I am a gentleman’s daughter; so far we are
equal.”
“True. You _are_ a gentleman’s daughter. But what was your mother? Who
are your uncles and aunts? Do not imagine me ignorant of their
condition.”
“Whatever my connections may be,” said Elizabeth, “if your nephew does
not object to them, they can be nothing to _you_.”
“Tell me, once for all, are you engaged to him?”
Though Elizabeth would not, for the mere purpose of obliging Lady
Catherine, have answered this question, she could not but say, after a
moment’s deliberation,--
“I am not.”
Lady Catherine seemed pleased.
“And will you promise me never to enter into such an engagement?”
“I will make no promise of the kind.”
“Miss Bennet, I am shocked and astonished. I expected to find a more
reasonable young woman. But do not deceive yourself into a belief that I
will ever recede. I shall not go away till you have given me the
assurance I require.”
“And I certainly _never_ shall give it. I am not to be intimidated into
anything so wholly unreasonable. Your Ladyship wants Mr. Darcy to marry
your daughter; but would my giving you the wished-for promise make
_their_ marriage at all more probable? Supposing him to be attached to
me, would _my_ refusing to accept his hand make him wish to bestow it on
his cousin? Allow me to say, Lady Catherine, that the arguments with
which you have supported this extraordinary application have been as
frivolous as the application was ill-judged. You have widely mistaken my
character, if you think I can be worked on by such persuasions as these.
How far your nephew might approve of your interference in _his_ affairs,
I cannot tell; but you have certainly no right to concern yourself in
mine. I must beg, therefore, to be importuned no further on the
subject.”
“Not so hasty, if you please. I have by no means done. To all the
objections I have already urged I have still another to add. I am no
stranger to the particulars of your youngest sister’s infamous
elopement. I know it all; that the young man’s marrying her was a
patched-up business, at the expense of your father and uncle. And is
_such_ a girl to be my nephew’s sister? Is _her_ husband, who is the son
of his late father’s steward, to be his brother? Heaven and earth!--of
what are you thinking? Are the shades of Pemberley to be thus polluted?”
“You can _now_ have nothing further to say,” she resentfully answered.
“You have insulted me, in every possible method. I must beg to return to
the house.”
And she rose as she spoke. Lady Catherine rose also, and they turned
back. Her Ladyship was highly incensed.
“You have no regard, then, for the honour and credit of my nephew!
Unfeeling, selfish girl! Do you not consider that a connection with you
must disgrace him in the eyes of everybody?”
“Lady Catherine, I have nothing further to say. You know my sentiments.”
“You are then resolved to have him?”
“I have said no such thing. I am only resolved to act in that manner,
which will, in my own opinion, constitute my happiness, without
reference to _you_, or to any person so wholly unconnected with me.”
“It is well. You refuse, then, to oblige me. You refuse to obey the
claims of duty, honour, and gratitude. You are determined to ruin him in
the opinion of all his friends, and make him the contempt of the world.”
“Neither duty, nor honour, nor gratitude,” replied Elizabeth, “has any
possible claim on me, in the present instance. No principle of either
would be violated by my marriage with Mr. Darcy. And with regard to the
resentment of his family, or the indignation of the world, if the former
_were_ excited by his marrying me, it would not give me one moment’s
concern--and the world in general would have too much sense to join in
the scorn.”
“And this is your real opinion! This is your final resolve! Very well. I
shall now know how to act. Do not imagine, Miss Bennet, that your
ambition will ever be gratified. I came to try you. I hoped to find you
reasonable; but depend upon it I will carry my point.”
In this manner Lady Catherine talked on till they were at the door of
the carriage, when, turning hastily round, she added,--
“I take no leave of you, Miss Bennet. I send no compliments to your
mother. You deserve no such attention. I am most seriously displeased.”
Elizabeth made no answer; and without attempting to persuade her
Ladyship to return into the house, walked quietly into it herself. She
heard the carriage drive away as she proceeded upstairs. Her mother
impatiently met her at the door of her dressing-room, to ask why Lady
Catherine would not come in again and rest herself.
“She did not choose it,” said her daughter; “she would go.”
“She is a very fine-looking woman! and her calling here was prodigiously
civil! for she only came, I suppose, to tell us the Collinses were well.
She is on her road somewhere, I dare say; and so, passing through
Meryton, thought she might as well call on you. I suppose she had
nothing particular to say to you, Lizzy?”
Elizabeth was forced to give in to a little falsehood here; for to
acknowledge the substance of their conversation was impossible.
[Illustration:
“But now it comes out”
]
CHAPTER LVII.
[Illustration]
The discomposure of spirits which this extraordinary visit threw
Elizabeth into could not be easily overcome; nor could she for many
hours learn to think of it less than incessantly. Lady Catherine, it
appeared, had actually taken the trouble of this journey from Rosings
for the sole purpose of breaking off her supposed engagement with Mr.
Darcy. It was a rational scheme, to be sure! but from what the report of
their engagement could originate, Elizabeth was at a loss to imagine;
till she recollected that _his_ being the intimate friend of Bingley,
and _her_ being the sister of Jane, was enough, at a time when the
expectation of one wedding made everybody eager for another, to supply
the idea. She had not herself forgotten to feel that the marriage of her
sister must bring them more frequently together. And her neighbours at
Lucas Lodge, therefore, (for through their communication with the
Collinses, the report, she concluded, had reached Lady Catherine,) had
only set _that_ down as almost certain and immediate which _she_ had
looked forward to as possible at some future time.
In revolving Lady Catherine’s expressions, however, she could not help
feeling some uneasiness as to the possible consequence of her persisting
in this interference.