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Chapter XVI

As no objection was made the young people's engage-

ment with their aunt, and all Mr. Collins's scruples

of leaving Mr. and Mrs. Bennet for a single eve-

ning during his visit were most steadily resisted, the coach

conveyed him and his five cousins at a suitable hour to Mery-

ton; and the girls had the pleasure of hearing, as they

entered the drawing-room, that Mr. Wickham had accepted

their uncle's invitation, and was then in the house.

When this information was given, and they had all taken

their seats, Mr. Collins was at leisure to look around him

and admire, and he was so much struck with the size and

furniture of the apartment, that he declared he might almost

have supposed himself in the small summer breakfast par-

lour at Rosings; a comparison that did not at first convey

much gratification; but when Mrs. Philips understood from

him what Rosings was, and who was its proprietor, when

she had listened to the description of only one of Lady Cath-

erine's drawing-rooms, and found that the chimney-piece

alone had cost eight hundred pounds, she felt all the force

of the compliment, and would hardly have resented a com-

parison with the housekeeper's room.

In describing to her all the grandeur of Lady Catherine

and her mansion, with occasional digressions in praise of

his own humble abode, and the improvements it was receiv-

ing, he was happily employed until the gentlemen joined

them; and he found in Mrs. Philips a very attentive listener,

whose opinion of his consequence increased with what she

heard, and who was resolving to retail it all among her

neighbours as soon as she could. To the girls, who could

not listen to their cousin, and who had nothing to do but

to wish for an instrument, and examine their own indif-

ferent imitations of china on the mantelpiece, the interval of

waiting appeared very long. It was over at last, however.

The gentlemen did approach: and when Mr. Wickham

walked into the room, Elizabeth felt that she had neither

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