Page:Jane Austen (Sarah Fanny Malden 1889).djvu/81

 engagement; still more distressed by finding how long Elinor has had to bear the sorrow of it alone, and though at first, following her favourite theories, she declares that Elinor could never have really cared for Edward, or she could not have borne his desertion so calmly, she is gradually brought to a more reasonable frame of mind by her sister's earnest representations.

"'For four months, Marianne, I have had all this hanging on my mind without being at liberty to speak of it to a single creature, knowing that it would make you and my mother most unhappy whenever it was explained to you, yet unable to prepare you for it in the least. It was told me—it was, in a manner, forced on me—by the very person herself whose prior engagement ruined all my prospects, and told me, as I thought, with triumph. This person's suspicions, therefore, I have had to oppose by endeavouring to appear indifferent where I have been most deeply interested; and it has not been only once—I have had her hopes and exultation to listen to again and again. I have known myself to be divided from Edward for ever nothing has proved him unworthy, nor has anything declared him indifferent to me. I have had to contend against the unkindness of his sister and the insolence of his mother, and have suffered the punishment of an attachment without enjoying its advantages. And all this has been going on at a time when, as you too well know, it has not been my only unhappiness If I had not been bound to silence, perhaps nothing could have kept me entirely—not even what I owed to my dearest friends—from openly showing that I was very unhappy.'"

Marianne's warm heart is completely overcome, and her praiseworthy efforts at self-government are the result.