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blameless distrust. How humiliating is this discovery! Yet,

how just a humiliation! Had I been in love, I could not

have been more wretchedly blind. But vanity, not love, has

been my folly. Pleased with the preference of one, and

offended by the neglect of the other, on the very beginning of

our acquaintance I have courted prepossession and ignorance,

and driven reason away where either was concerned. Till

this moment, I never knew myself.'

From herself to Jane, from Jane to Bingley, her thoughts

were in a line which soon brought to her recollection that Mr.

Darcy's explanation _there_ had appeared very insufficient; and

she read it again. Widely different was the effect of a second

perusal. How could she deny that credit to his assertions, in

one instance, which she had been obliged to give in the other?

He declared himself to have been totally unsuspicious of her

sister's attachment; and she could not help remembering

what Charlotte's opinion had always been. Neither could she

deny the justice of his description of Jane. She felt that

Jane's feelings, though fervent, were little displayed, and that

there was a constant complacency in her air and manner, not

often united with great sensibility.

When she came to that part of the letter in which her

family were mentioned, in terms of such mortifying, yet

merited, reproach, her sense of shame was severe. The

justice of the charge struck her too forcibly for denial; and

the circumstances to which he particularly alluded, as having

passed at the Netherfield ball, and as confirming all his first

disapprobation, could not have made a stronger impression

on his mind than on hers.

The compliment to herself and her sister was not unfelt.

It soothed, but it could not console her for the contempt

which had been thus self-attracted by the rest of her family;

and as she considered that Jane's disappointment had, in

fact, been the work of her nearest relations, and reflected

how materially the credit of both must be hurt by such

impropriety of conduct, she felt depressed beyond anything

she had ever known before.

After wandering along the lane for two hours, giving way

to every variety of thought, reconsidering events, determin-

ing probabilities, and reconciling herself, as well as she could,

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