spirits
of Sir John, and gave exercise to the good-breeding of his wife.

Mrs. Jennings, Lady Middleton's mother, who formed one of the party on
the first occasion of the Dashwoods dining at Barton Park, was a
good-humoured, fat, elderly woman, who talked a good deal, and seemed
very happy, and rather vulgar. She was full of jokes and laughter, and
before dinner was over had said many witty things on the subject of
lovers and husbands, hoped they had not left their hearts behind them in
Sussex, and pretended to see them blush whether they did or not. In
fact, this lady was a born match-maker; and she at once proceeded, by
hints here and raillery there, to promote a match between Marianne, aged
seventeen, and Colonel Brandon, a grave but sensible bachelor on the
wrong side of thirty-five. Marianne, however, scorned and laughed at the
idea, being reasonable enough to allow that a man of five-and-thirty
might well have outlived all acuteness of feeling and every exquisite
power of enjoyment; and having met with an accident which led to her
being carried home by a handsome and vivacious young gentleman called
Willoughby, who had a seat called Combe Magna in Somersetshire, she
rapidly developed a liking for his society, and as quickly discovered
that in regard to music, to dancing, and to books, their tastes were
strikingly alike.

"Well, Marianne," said Elinor, after his first visit, "for one morning I
think you have done pretty well. You have already ascertained Mr.
Willoughby's opinion in almost every matter of importance. You know what
to think of Cowper and Scott; you are aware of his estimating their
beauties as he ought; and you have received every assurance of his
admiring Pope no more than is proper. But how is your acquaintance to be
long supported under such extraordinary dispatch of every subject for
discourse? You will soon have exhausted each favourite topic. Another
meeting will suffice to explain his sentiments on picturesque beauty and
second marriages, and then you can have nothing further to ask."

To this Marianne replied, "Is this fair? Is this just? Are my ideas so
scanty? But I see what you mean. I have been too much at my ease--too
happy, too frank. I have erred against every commonplace notion of
decorum. I have been open and sincere where I ought to have been
reserved, spiritless, dull and deceitful. Had I talked only of the
weather and the roads, and had I spoken only once in ten minutes, this