PRIDE & PREJUDICE: JANE AUSTEN: CHAPTER FORTY ONE

The first week of their return was gone.  The second began.  The regiment's stay at Meryton was coming to an end.  All young ladies in the neighborhood were drooping apace.  The dejection was almost universal. The elder Miss Bennets alone were still able to eat, drink, and sleep; and follow the usual course of their employments.  Very frequently were they reproached for this insensibility of Kitty and Lydia, whose own misery was extreme, and who couldnot comprehend such hard-heartedness in any of the family.

"Good Heaven! What is to become of us? What are we to do?" would they often exclaim in the bitterness of the woe.  How can you be smiling so, Lizzy?"

Their affectionate mother shared all their grief, and she remembered what she herself endured on a similar occasion five and twenty years ago.

"I am sure," said she, "I cried for two days together when Colonel Miller's regiment went away.  I thought I should have broken my heart."  

"I am sure, I shall break mine."

"If one could but go to Brighton," said Mrs Bennet.

"Oh, yes! - if one could but go to Brighton! But papa is so disagreeable."

"A little sea-bathing would set me up forever."

"And my aunt Philips is sure it would do me a great deal of good," said Kitty.

Such were the kind of lamentations resounding perpetually through Longbourn house.  But the gloom of Lydia's was shortly cleared away; for she received an invitation from Mrs Forster, the wife of the colonel of the regiment to accompany her to Brighton.  This invaluable friend was a very young woman, and very lately married.  A resemblance in good humour and good spirits had recommended her and Lydia to each other, and out of their three months' acquaintance they had been intimate two.

The rapture of Lydia on this occasion, her adoration of Mrs Forster, the delight of Mrs Bennet, and the mortification of Kitty are scarcely to be described.  Wholly inattentive to her sisters' feelings, Lydia flew about the house in restless ecstasy, calling for everyone's congratulations, and laughing and talking with more violence than ever; while the luckless Kitty continued in the parlour repined at her fate in terms as as unreasonable as her accent was peevish.

"I cannot see why Mrs Forster should not ask me as well as Lydia," said she, "though I am not her particular friend.  I have just as much right to be asked as she has, and more too, for I am two years older."

In vain did Elizabeth attempt to make her reasonable, and Jane to make her resigned.  As for Elizabeth herself, this invitation was so far from exciting in her the same feelings as in her mother and Lydia, that she considered it as the death warrant of all possibility of common sense for the latter; and detestable as such a step make her were it known, she could not help secretly advising her father not to let her go.  She represented to him 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 possibility of her being yet more imprudent with such a companion at Brighton, where the temptations must be greater than at home.  He heard her attentively, and then said:

"Lydia will never be easy until she has exposed herself in some public place or other, and we can never expect her to do it with so little expense or inconvenience to her family as under the present circumstances."

"If you were aware," said Elizabeth, "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."

"Already arisen?" repeated Mr Bennett.  "What, has she frightened away some of your lovers?  Poor little Lizzy!  But do not be cast down.  Such squeamish youths as cannot bear to be connected with a little absurdity are not worth a regret.  Come, let me see the list of pitiful fellows who have been left aloof by Lydia's folly."

"Indeed, you are mistaken.  I have no such inquiries to resent.  It is not of particular, but of genaral evils, which I am now complaining.  Our importance, our responsibility in the world must be affected by the wild volatility, the assurance and disdain of all restraint which mark Lydia's character.  Excuse me, 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.  In this danger, Kitty also is comprehended.  She will follow Lydia."

Mr Bennet saw that her whole heart was in the subject, and affectionately taking her hand, said in reply:

"Don't make yourself uneasy, my love. Wherever you and Jane are known, you must be respected and valued; and you don't appear to less advantage for having a couple of very silly sisters.  We shall have no peace at Longbourn if Lydia does not go to Brighton.  Let her go, then.  Colonel Forster is a sensible man, and will keep her out of any real mischief; and she is lucky too, poor to be an object of prey to anybody.  At Brighton she will be of less importance even as a common flirt.  The officers will find women better worth their notice.  Let us hope, therefore, that her being there may teach her her own insignificance.  At any rate, she cannot grow many degrees worse, without authorising us to lock her up for the rest of her life."

With these words Elizabeth was forced to be contend, even though her opinion remained the same.  She did not want to increase her vexations by dwelling on them.

Lydia and her mother were unaware of the discussion between Mr Bennet and Elizabeth.  Lydia fancied that a visit to Brighton was a key to earthly happiness. For Mrs Bennet, it was a consolation against her husband's never intending to go there himself.

Elizabeth was now to see Mr Wickham for the last time.  On the last day of regiment's remaining at Meryton, he dined with other officers, at Longbourn.  He inquired her as to the manner in which she had spent her time at Hunsford.  She said that Colonel Fitzwilliam and Mr Darcy had been there at Rosings for three weeks.

"And you saw him frequently?" asked Wickham.

"Yes, almost every day."

"His manners are very different from his cousin's."

"Yes, very different.  But, I think Mr Darcy improves very much upon acquaintance."

"Indeed!" cried Mr Wickham, with a surprised look which did not escape her. "And pray, may I ask -" But checking himself, he added, in a grayer tone, "Is it in address that he improves? Has he designed to add civility to his ordinary style? - for I dare not hope," he continued in a lower and more serious tone, "that he is improved in essentials."

"Oh, no!" said Elizabeth, "In essentials, I believe, he is very much what he ever was."

While she spoke, Wickham looked as if scarcely knowing whether to rejoice over her words, or to distrust. There was something in her countenance which made him apprehensive and anxious, while she added:

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

Wickham's alarm now appeared in a heightened complexion and agitated look; for a few minutes he was silent, till, shaking off his embarassment, he turned to her again, and said in gentlest of accents:

"You, who so well know my feeling towards Mr Darcy, will readily comprehend how sincerely I must rejoice that he is wise enough to assume even the appearance of what is right. His pride, in that direction may be of service, If not to himself, to many others, for it must only deter him from such foul conduct as I have suffered by.  I only fear that the sort of cautiouness to which you have been alluding, is merely adopted on his visits to his aunt, of whose good opinion and judgement he stands much in awe.  His fear of her has always operated, I know, when they were together; and a good deal is to be imputed to his wish of forwarding the match with Miss de Bourgh, which I am certain he has very much at heart."

Elizabeth could not repress a smile at this, but she answered only by a slight inclination of the head.  She saw that he wanted to engage her on the old subject of his grievances, and she was in no humour to engage herself.  The rest of the evening passed without any attempt on his part to distinguish Elizabeth, and they parted with mutual civility.

When the party broke up, Lydia returned with Mrs Forster to Meryton from whence they were to set out early the next morning.  The separation between her and her family was rather noisy.  Kitty was the only one to shed tears; but she wept out of vexation and envy.

THE END