“That the manner in which she treated the dreadful crime committed by her brother and my sister (with whom lay the greater seduction I pretended not to say), but the manner in which she spoke of the crime itself, giving it every reproach but the right; considering its ill consequences only as they were to be braved or overborne by a defiance of decency and impudence in wrong—and last of all, and above all, recommending to us a compliance, a compromise, an acquiescence in the continuance of the sin, on the chance of a marriage which, thinking as I now thought of her brother, should rather be prevented than sought—all this together most grievously convinced me that I had never understood her before.

“It had been the creature of my own imagination, not Miss Crawford, that I had been too apt to dwell on for many months past. Perhaps, it was best for me. I had less to regret in sacrificing a friendship, feelings, hopes which must, at any rate, have been torn from me now. And yet—could I have restored her to what she had appeared to me before! I would infinitely prefer any increase of the pain of parting, for the sake of carrying with me the right of tenderness and esteem.

“This is what I said, the purport of it; but, as you may imagine, not spoken so collectedly or methodically as I have repeated it to you.

“She was astonished, exceedingly astonished—more than astonished. I saw her change countenance. She turned extremely red—nay, it was more a deathly black, where sanguinity is unhealthy and forced to the surface of the skin like a shadow of death. I imagined I saw a mixture of many feelings: a great, though short struggle; half a wish of yielding to truths, half a sense of shame, but—habit carried it.

“She would have laughed if she could. It was a sort of laugh, as she answered, ‘A pretty good lecture, upon my word. Was it part of your last sermon? At this rate you will soon reform everybody at Mansfield and Thornton Lacey; and when I hear of you next, it may be as a celebrated preacher in some great society of Methodists, or as a missionary into foreign parts.’ She tried to speak carelessly, but she was not so careless as she wanted to appear.

“I only said in reply, that from my heart I wished her well, and earnestly hoped that she might soon learn to think more justly, and not owe the most valuable knowledge we could any of us acquire—the knowledge of ourselves and of our duty—to the lessons of affliction, and immediately left the room. I had gone a few steps, Fanny, when I heard the door open behind me.