{{prxprp168.jpg}} || 168 PRIDE AND PREJUDICE ||

'His misfortunes!' repeated Darcy contemptuously -- 'yes, his

misfortunes have been great indeed.'

'And of your infliction,' cried Elizabeth with energy. 'You

have reduced him to his present state of poverty -- comparative

poverty. You have withheld the advantages which you must

know to have been designed for him. -- You have deprived the

best years of his life, of that independence which was no less his

due than his desert. You have done all this! and yet you can

treat the mention of his misfortunes with contempt and ridicule.'

'And this,' cried Darcy, as he walked with quick steps across

the room, 'is your opinion of me! This is the estimation in

which you hold me! I thank you for explaining it so fully.

My faults, according to this calculation, are heavy indeed! But

perhaps,' added he, stopping in his walk, and turning towards

her, 'these offences might have been overlooked, had not your

pride been hurt by my honest confession of the scruples that had

long prevented my forming any serious design. These bitter

accusations might have been suppressed, had I, with greater

policy, concealed my struggles, and flattered you into the belief

of my being impelled by unqualified, unalloyed inclination; by

reason, by reflection, by every thing. But disguise of every sort

is my abhorrence. Nor am I ashamed of the feelings I related.

They were natural and just. Could you expect me to rejoice

in the inferiority of your connections? To congratulate myself on

the hope of relations, whose condition in life is so decidedly

beneath my own?'

Elizabeth felt herself growing more angry every moment; yet

she tried to the utmost to speak with composure when she said,

'You are mistaken, Mr. Darcy, if you suppose that the mode of

your declaration affected me in any other way, than as it spared me

the concern which I might have felt in refusing you, had you

behaved in a more gentleman^like manner.'

She saw him start at this, but he said nothing, and she

continued,

'You could not have made me the offer of your hand in any

possible way that would have tempted me to accept it.'

Again his astonishment was obvious; and he looked at her

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