Volume I: Chapter XVI

by Jane Austen

　　The hair was curled, and the maid sent away, and Emma sat down to thinkand be miserable.--It was a wretched business indeed!--Such an overthrowof every thing she had been wishing for!--Such a development of everything most unwelcomethat was the worstof all. Every part of it brought pain and humiliation, of some sortor other; but, compared with the evil to Harriet, all was light;and she would gladly have submitted to feel yet more mistaken--more in error--more disgraced by mis-judgment, than she actually was,could the effects of her blunders have been confined to herself.

　　"If I had not persuaded Harriet into liking the man, I could haveborne any thing. He might have doubled his presumption to me--but poor Harriet!"

　　How she could have been so deceived!--He protested that hehad never thought seriously of Harriet--never! She looked backas well as she could; but it was all confusion. She had takenup the idea, she supposed, and made every thing bend to it.His manners, however, must have been unmarked, wavering, dubious,or she could not have been so misled.

　　The pictureand the charadehow clearly they had seemed to point at Harriet. To be sure,the charade, with its "ready wit"--but then the "soft eyes"--in fact it suited neither; it was a jumble without taste or truth.Who could have seen through such thick-headed nonsense?

　　Certainly she had often, especially of late, thought his mannersto herself unnecessarily gallant; but it had passed as his way,as a mere error of judgment, of knowledge, of taste, as one proofamong others that he had not always lived in the best society,that with all the gentleness of his address, true elegancewas sometimes wanting; but, till this very day, she had never,for an instant, suspected it to mean any thing but grateful respectto her as Harriet's friend.

　　To Mr. John Knightley was she indebted for her first idea onthe subject, for the first start of its possibility. There wasno denying that those brothers had penetration. She rememberedwhat Mr. Knightley had once said to her about Mr. Elton, the cautionhe had given, the conviction he had professed that Mr. Elton wouldnever marry indiscreetly; and blushed to think how much truera knowledge of his character had been there shewn than any shehad reached herself. It was dreadfully mortifying; but Mr. Eltonwas proving himself, in many respects, the very reverse of what shehad meant and believed him; proud, assuming, conceited; very fullof his own claims, and little concerned about the feelings of others.

　　Contrary to the usual course of things, Mr. Elton's wantingto pay his addresses to her had sunk him in her opinion.His professions and his proposals did him no service. She thoughtnothing of his attachment, and was insulted by his hopes.He wanted to marry well, and having the arrogance to raise hiseyes to her, pretended to be in love; but she was perfectly easyas to his not suffering any disappointment that need be cared for.There had been no real affection either in his language or manners.Sighs and fine words had been given in abundance; but she couldhardly devise any set of expressions, or fancy any tone of voice,less allied with real love. She need not trouble herself to pity him.He only wanted to aggrandise and enrich himself; and if Miss Woodhouseof Hartfield, the heiress of thirty thousand pounds, were not quiteso easily obtained as he had fancied, he would soon try for MissSomebody else with twenty, or with ten.

　　But--that he should talk of encouragement, should consider her asaware of his views, accepting his attentions, meaning (in short),to marry him!--should suppose himself her equal in connexionor mind!--look down upon her friend, so well understanding thegradations of rank below him, and be so blind to what rose above,as to fancy himself shewing no presumption in addressing her!--It was most provoking.

　　Perhaps it was not fair to expect him to feel how very much hewas her inferior in talent, and all the elegancies of mind.The very want of such equality might prevent his perception of it;but he must know that in fortune and consequence she was greatlyhis superior. He must know that the Woodhouses had been settledfor several generations at Hartfield, the younger branchof a very ancient family--and that the Eltons were nobody.The landed property of Hartfield certainly was inconsiderable,being but a sort of notch in the Donwell Abbey estate, to which allthe rest of Highbury belonged; but their fortune, from other sources,was such as to make them scarcely secondary to Donwell Abbey itself,in every other kind of consequence; and the Woodhouses had longheld a high place in the consideration of the neighbourhood whichMr. Elton had first entered not two years ago, to make his wayas he could, without any alliances but in trade, or any thingto recommend him to notice but his situation and his civility.--But he had fancied her in love with him; that evidently musthave been his dependence; and after raving a little about theseeming incongruity of gentle manners and a conceited head,Emma was obliged in common honesty to stop and admit that her ownbehaviour to him had been so complaisant and obliging, so full ofcourtesy and attention, as (supposing her real motive unperceived)might warrant a man of ordinary observation and delicacy,like Mr. Elton, in fancying himself a very decided favourite. If shehad so misinterpreted his feelings, she had little right to wonderthat he, with self-interest to blind him, should have mistaken hers.

　　The first error and the worst lay at her door. It was foolish,it was wrong, to take so active a part in bringing any twopeople together. It was adventuring too far, assuming too much,making light of what ought to be serious, a trick of what oughtto be simple. She was quite concerned and ashamed, and resolvedto do such things no more.

　　"Here have I," said she, "actually talked poor Harriet into beingvery much attached to this man. She might never have thought of himbut for me; and certainly never would have thought of him with hope,if I had not assured her of his attachment, for she is as modestand humble as I used to think him. Oh! that I had been satisfied withpersuading her not to accept young Martin. There I was quite right.That was well done of me; but there I should have stopped, and leftthe rest to time and chance. I was introducing her into good company,and giving her the opportunity of pleasing some one worth having;I ought not to have attempted more. But now, poor girl, her peaceis cut up for some time. I have been but half a friend to her;and if she were not to feel this disappointment so very much, I amsure I have not an idea of any body else who would be at all desirablefor her;--William Coxe--Oh! no, I could not endure William Coxe--a pert young lawyer."

　　She stopt to blush and laugh at her own relapse, and then resumeda more serious, more dispiriting cogitation upon what had been,and might be, and must be. The distressing explanation she hadto make to Harriet, and all that poor Harriet would be suffering,with the awkwardness of future meetings, the difficulties ofcontinuing or discontinuing the acquaintance, of subduing feelings,concealing resentment, and avoiding eclat, were enough to occupyher in most unmirthful reflections some time longer, and she wentto bed at last with nothing settled but the conviction of her havingblundered most dreadfully.

　　To youth and natural cheerfulness like Emma's, though undertemporary gloom at night, the return of day will hardly failto bring return of spirits. The youth and cheerfulness of morningare in happy analogy, and of powerful operation; and if thedistress be not poignant enough to keep the eyes unclosed, theywill be sure to open to sensations of softened pain and brighter hope.

　　Emma got up on the morrow more disposed for comfort than she hadgone to bed, more ready to see alleviations of the evil before her,and to depend on getting tolerably out of it.

　　It was a great consolation that Mr. Elton should not be reallyin love with her, or so particularly amiable as to make it shockingto disappoint him--that Harriet's nature should not be of thatsuperior sort in which the feelings are most acute and retentive--and that there could be no necessity for any body's knowingwhat had passed except the three principals, and especiallyfor her father's being given a moment's uneasiness about it.

　　These were very cheering thoughts; and the sight of a great dealof snow on the ground did her further service, for any thing waswelcome that might justify their all three being quite asunderat present.

　　The weather was most favourable for her; though Christmas Day,she could not go to church. Mr. Woodhouse would have been miserablehad his daughter attempted it, and she was therefore safe fromeither exciting or receiving unpleasant and most unsuitable ideas.The ground covered with snow, and the atmosphere in that unsettledstate between frost and thaw, which is of all others the mostunfriendly for exercise, every morning beginning in rain or snow,and every evening setting in to freeze, she was for many days a mosthonourable prisoner. No intercourse with Harriet possible but by note;no church for her on Sunday any more than on Christmas Day; and noneed to find excuses for Mr. Elton's absenting himself.

　　It was weather which might fairly confine every body at home;and though she hoped and believed him to be really taking comfortin some society or other, it was very pleasant to have her fatherso well satisfied with his being all alone in his own house,too wise to stir out; and to hear him say to Mr. Knightley, whom noweather could keep entirely from them,--

　　"Ah! Mr. Knightley, why do not you stay at home like poor Mr. Elton?"

　　These days of confinement would have been, but for her privateperplexities, remarkably comfortable, as such seclusion exactlysuited her brother, whose feelings must always be of great importanceto his companions; and he had, besides, so thoroughly cleared offhis ill-humour at Randalls, that his amiableness never failed himduring the rest of his stay at Hartfield. He was always agreeableand obliging, and speaking pleasantly of every body. But with allthe hopes of cheerfulness, and all the present comfort of delay,there was still such an evil hanging over her in the hour of explanationwith Harriet, as made it impossible for Emma to be ever perfectly at ease.