Chapter: The day passed much as the day before had done. Mrs. Hurst and Miss
Bingley had spent some hours of the morning with the invalid, who
continued, though slowly, to mend; and in the evening Elizabeth joined
their party in the drawing-room. The loo table, however, did not appear.
Mr. Darcy was writing, and Miss Bingley, seated near him, was watching
the progress of his letter, and repeatedly calling off his attention by
messages to his sister. Mr. Hurst and Mr. Bingley were at piquet, and
Mrs. Hurst was observing their game.

Elizabeth took up some needlework, and was sufficiently amused in
attending to what passed between Darcy and his companion. The perpetual
commendations of the lady either on his hand-writing, or on the evenness
of his lines, or on the length of his letter, with the perfect unconcern
with which her praises were received, formed a curious dialogue, and was
exactly in unison with her opinion of each.

"How delighted Miss Darcy will be to receive such a letter!"

He made no answer.

"You write uncommonly fast."

"You are mistaken. I write rather slowly."

"How many letters you must have occasion to write in the course of the
year! Letters of business too! How odious I should think them!"

"It is fortunate, then, that they fall to my lot instead of to yours."

"Pray tell your sister that I long to see her."

"I have already told her so once, by your desire."

"I am afraid you do not like your pen. Let me mend it for you. I mend
pens remarkably well."

"Thank you--but I always mend my own."

"How can you contrive to write so even?"

He was silent.

"Tell your sister I am delighted to hear of her improvement on the harp,
and pray let her know that I am quite in raptures with her beautiful
little design for a table, and I think it infinitely superior to Miss
Grantley's."

"Will you give me leave to defer your raptures till I write again?--At
present I have not room to do them justice."

"Oh! it is of no consequence. I shall see her in January. But do you
always write such charming long letters to her, Mr. Darcy?"

"They are generally long; but whether always charming, it is not for me
to determine."

"It is a rule with me, that a person who can write a long letter, with
ease, cannot write ill."

"That will not do for a compliment to Darcy, Caroline," cried her
brother--"because he does _not_ write with ease. He studies too much for
words of four syllables.--Do not you, Darcy?"

"My style of writing is very different from yours."

"Oh!" cried Miss Bingley, "Charles writes in the most careless way
imaginable. He leaves out half his words, and blots the rest."

"My ideas flow so rapidly that I have not time to express them--by which
means my letters sometimes convey no ideas at all to my correspondents."

"Your humility, Mr. Bingley," said Elizabeth, "must disarm reproof."

"Nothing is more deceitful," said Darcy, "than the appearance of
humility. It is often only carelessness of opinion, and sometimes an
indirect boast."

"And which of the two do you call _my_ little recent piece of modesty?"

"The indirect boast;--for you are really proud of your defects in
writing, because you consider them as proceeding from a rapidity of
thought and carelessness of execution, which if not estimable, you think
at least highly interesting. The power of doing any thing with
quickness is always much prized by the possessor, and often without any
attention to the imperfection of the performance. When you told Mrs.
Bennet this morning that if you ever resolved on quitting Netherfield
you should be gone in five minutes, you meant it to be a sort of
panegyric, of compliment to yourself--and yet what is there so very
laudable in a precipitance which must leave very necessary business
undone, and can be of no real advantage to yourself or any one else?"

"Nay," cried Bingley, "this is too much, to remember at night all the
foolish things that were said in the morning. And yet, upon my honour, I
believed what I said of myself to be true, and I believe it at this
moment. At least, therefore, I did not assume the character of needless
precipitance merely to shew off before the ladies."

"I dare say you believed it; but I am by no means convinced that you
would be gone with such celerity. Your conduct would be quite as
dependant on chance as that of any man I know; and if, as you were
mounting your horse, a friend were to say, 'Bingley, you had better stay
till next week,' you would probably do it, you would probably not
go--and, at another word, might stay a month."

"You have only proved by this," cried Elizabeth, "that Mr. Bingley did
not do justice to his own disposition. You have shewn him off now much
more than he did himself."

"I am exceedingly gratified," said Bingley, "by your converting what my
friend says into a compliment on the sweetness of my temper. But I am
afraid you are giving it a turn which that gentleman did by no means
intend; for he would certainly think the better of me, if under such a
circumstance I were to give a flat denial, and ride off as fast as I
could."

"Would Mr. Darcy then consider the rashness of your original intention
as atoned for by your obstinacy in adhering to it?"

"Upon my word I cannot exactly explain the matter, Darcy must speak for
himself."

"You expect me to account for opinions which you chuse to call mine, but
which I have never acknowledged. Allowing the case, however, to stand
according to your representation, you must remember, Miss Bennet, that
the friend who is supposed to desire his return to the house, and the
delay of his plan, has merely desired it, asked it without offering one
argument in favour of its propriety."

"To yield readily--easily--to the _persuasion_ of a friend is no merit
with you."

"To yield without conviction is no compliment to the understanding of
either."

"You appear to me, Mr. Darcy, to allow nothing for the influence of
friendship and affection. A regard for the requester would often make
one readily yield to a request, without waiting for arguments to reason
one into it. I am not particularly speaking of such a case as you have
supposed about Mr. Bingley. We may as well wait, perhaps, till the
circumstance occurs, before we discuss the discretion of his behaviour
thereupon. But in general and ordinary cases between friend and friend,
where one of them is desired by the other to change a resolution of no
very great moment, should you think ill of that person for complying
with the desire, without waiting to be argued into it?"

"Will it not be advisable, before we proceed on this subject, to arrange
with rather more precision the degree of importance which is to
appertain to this request, as well as the degree of intimacy subsisting
between the parties?"

"By all means," cried Bingley; "let us hear all the particulars, not
forgetting their comparative height and size; for that will have more
weight in the argument, Miss Bennet, than you may be aware of. I assure
you that if Darcy were not such a great tall fellow, in comparison with
myself, I should not pay him half so much deference. I declare I do not
know a more aweful object than Darcy, on particular occasions, and in
particular places; at his own house especially, and of a Sunday evening
when he has nothing to do."

Mr. Darcy smiled; but Elizabeth thought she could perceive that he was
rather offended; and therefore checked her laugh. Miss Bingley warmly
resented the indignity he had received, in an expostulation with her
brother for talking such nonsense.

"I see your design, Bingley," said his friend.--"You dislike an
argument, and want to silence this."

"Perhaps I do. Arguments are too much like disputes. If you and Miss
Bennet will defer yours till I am out of the room, I shall be very
thankful; and then you may say whatever you like of me."

"What you ask," said Elizabeth, "is no sacrifice on my side; and Mr.
Darcy had much better finish his letter."

Mr. Darcy took her advice, and did finish his letter.

When that business was over, he applied to Miss Bingley and Elizabeth
for the indulgence of some music. Miss Bingley moved with alacrity to
the piano-forte, and after a polite request that Elizabeth would lead
the way, which the other as politely and more earnestly negatived, she
seated herself.

Mrs. Hurst sang with her sister, and while they were thus employed
Elizabeth could not help observing as she turned over some music books
that lay on the instrument, how frequently Mr. Darcy's eyes were fixed
on her. She hardly knew how to suppose that she could be an object of
admiration to so great a man; and yet that he should look at her because
he disliked her, was still more strange. She could only imagine however
at last, that she drew his notice because there was a something about
her more wrong and reprehensible, according to his ideas of right, than
in any other person present. The supposition did not pain her. She liked
him too little to care for his approbation.

After playing some Italian songs, Miss Bingley varied the charm by a
lively Scotch air; and soon afterwards Mr. Darcy, drawing near
Elizabeth, said to her--

"Do not you feel a great inclination, Miss Bennet, to seize such an
opportunity of dancing a reel?"

She smiled, but made no answer. He repeated the question, with some
surprise at her silence.

"Oh!" said she, "I heard you before; but I could not immediately
determine what to say in reply. You wanted me, I know, to say 'Yes,'
that you might have the pleasure of despising my taste; but I always
delight in overthrowing those kind of schemes, and cheating a person of
their premeditated contempt. I have therefore made up my mind to tell
you, that I do not want to dance a reel at all--and now despise me if
you dare."

"Indeed I do not dare."

Elizabeth, having rather expected to affront him, was amazed at his
gallantry; but there was a mixture of sweetness and archness in her
manner which made it difficult for her to affront anybody; and Darcy had
never been so bewitched by any woman as he was by her. He really
believed, that were it not for the inferiority of her connections, he
should be in some danger.

Miss Bingley saw, or suspected enough to be jealous; and her great
anxiety for the recovery of her dear friend Jane, received some
assistance from her desire of getting rid of Elizabeth.

She often tried to provoke Darcy into disliking her guest, by talking of
their supposed marriage, and planning his happiness in such an alliance.

"I hope," said she, as they were walking together in the shrubbery the
next day, "you will give your mother-in-law a few hints, when this
desirable event takes place, as to the advantage of holding her tongue;
and if you can compass it, do cure the younger girls of running after
the officers.--And, if I may mention so delicate a subject, endeavour to
check that little something, bordering on conceit and impertinence,
which your lady possesses."

"Have you any thing else to propose for my domestic felicity?"

"Oh! yes.--Do let the portraits of your uncle and aunt Philips be
placed in the gallery at Pemberley. Put them next to your great uncle
the judge. They are in the same profession, you know; only in different
lines. As for your Elizabeth's picture, you must not attempt to have it
taken, for what painter could do justice to those beautiful eyes?"

"It would not be easy, indeed, to catch their expression, but their
colour and shape, and the eye-lashes, so remarkably fine, might be
copied."

At that moment they were met from another walk, by Mrs. Hurst and
Elizabeth herself.

"I did not know that you intended to walk," said Miss Bingley, in some
confusion, lest they had been overheard.

"You used us abominably ill," answered Mrs. Hurst, "in running away
without telling us that you were coming out."

Then taking the disengaged arm of Mr. Darcy, she left Elizabeth to walk
by herself. The path just admitted three. Mr. Darcy felt their rudeness
and immediately said,--

"This walk is not wide enough for our party. We had better go into the
avenue."

But Elizabeth, who had not the least inclination to remain with them,
laughingly answered,

"No, no; stay where you are.--You are charmingly group'd, and appear to
uncommon advantage. The picturesque would be spoilt by admitting a
fourth. Good bye."

She then ran gaily off, rejoicing as she rambled about, in the hope of
being at home again in a day or two. Jane was already so much recovered
as to intend leaving her room for a couple of hours that evening.

 Jane continues to get better. Much of the day is spent in the drawing-room with reading, letter-writing and music. While Miss Bingley is playing the piano, Darcy asks Elizabeth to dance, and she says no, thinking that he only wants to dance with her so he can "have the pleasure of despising taste. This makes Miss Bingley jealous, and the next day she teases Darcy more about his admiration for Elizabeth

