Page:Jane Austen (Sarah Fanny Malden 1889).djvu/118

 of it to them would be nothing compared with the benevolence of the action.'

"Lady Bertram agreed with her instantly. 'I think we cannot do better,' said she; 'let us send for the child.'

"Sir Thomas could not give so instantaneous and unqualified a consent; he debated and hesitated: it was a serious charge; a girl so brought up must be adequately provided for, or there would be cruelty instead of kindness in taking her from her family. He thought of his own four children, of his two sons, of cousins in love, &c.; but no sooner had he deliberately begun to state his objections than Mrs. Norris interrupted him with a reply to them all, whether stated or not.

My dear Sir Thomas, I perfectly comprehend you, and do justice to the generosity and delicacy of your notions, which, indeed, are quite of a piece with your general conduct; and I entirely agree with you in the main as to the propriety of doing everything one could by way of providing for a child one had, in a manner, taken into one's own hands; and I am sure I should be the last person in the world to withhold my mite upon such an occasion. Having no children of my own, who should I look to in any little matter I may ever have to bestow but the children of my sisters? and I am sure Mr. Norris is too just—but you know I am a woman of few words and professions. Do not let us be frightened from a good deed by a trifle. Give a girl an education, and introduce her properly into the world, and ten to one but she has the means of settling well without further expense to anybody. A niece of ours, Sir Thomas, I may say, or at least of yours, would not grow up in this neighbourhood