"I wish," said Margaret, striking out a novel thought,
"that somebody would give us all a large fortune apiece!"

"Oh that they would!" cried Marianne, her eyes
sparkling with animation, and her cheeks glowing
with the delight of such imaginary happiness.

"We are all unanimous in that wish, I suppose,"
said Elinor, "in spite of the insufficiency of wealth."

"Oh dear!" cried Margaret, "how happy I should be!
I wonder what I should do with it!"

Marianne looked as if she had no doubt on that point.

"I should be puzzled to spend so large a fortune myself,"
said Mrs. Dashwood, "if my children were all to be rich
my help."

"You must begin your improvements on this house,"
observed Elinor, "and your difficulties will soon vanish."

"What magnificent orders would travel from this family
to London," said Edward, "in such an event! What a happy
day for booksellers, music-sellers, and print-shops! You,
Miss Dashwood, would give a general commission for every
new print of merit to be sent you--and as for Marianne,
I know her greatness of soul, there would not be music enough
in London to content her. And books!--Thomson, Cowper,
Scott--she would buy them all over and over again: she
would buy up every copy, I believe, to prevent their
falling into unworthy hands; and she would have every
book that tells her how to admire an old twisted tree.
Should not you, Marianne? Forgive me, if I am very saucy.
But I was willing to shew you that I had not forgot our
old disputes."

"I love to be reminded of the past, Edward--whether it
be melancholy or gay, I love to recall it--and you
will never offend me by talking of former times.
You are very right in supposing how my money would be
spent--some of it, at least--my loose cash would certainly
be employed in improving my collection of music and books."

"And the bulk of your fortune would be laid out
in annuities on the authors or their heirs."

"No, Edward, I should have something else to do
with it."

"Perhaps, then, you would bestow it as a reward on that
person who wrote the ablest defence of your favourite maxim,
that no one can ever be in love more than once in their
life--your opinion on that point is unchanged, I presume?"

"Undoubtedly. At my time of life opinions are tolerably fixed.
It is not likely that I should now see or hear any thing to
change them."

"Marianne is as steadfast as ever, you see," said Elinor,
"she is not at all altered."

"She is only grown a little more grave than she was."

"Nay, Edward," said Marianne, "you need not reproach me.
You are not very gay yourself."

"Why should you think so!" replied he, with a sigh.
"But gaiety never was a part of MY character."

"Nor do I think it a part of Marianne's," said Elinor;
"I should hardly call her a lively girl--she is very earnest,
very eager in all she does--sometimes talks a great deal
and always with animation--but she is not often really merry."

"I believe you are right," he replied, "and yet I
have always set her down as a lively girl."

"I have frequently detected myself in such kind of mistakes,"
said Elinor, "in a total misapprehension of character in some
point or other: fancying people so much more gay or grave,
or ingenious or stupid than they really are, and I can
hardly tell why or in what the deception originated.
Sometimes one is guided by what they say of themselves,
and very frequently by what other people say of them,
without giving oneself time to deliberate and judge."

"But I thought it was right, Elinor," said Marianne,
"to be guided wholly by the opinion of other people.
I thought our judgments were given us merely to be subservient
to those of neighbours. This has always been your doctrine,
I am sure."

"No, Marianne, never. My doctrine has never aimed
at the subjection of the understanding. All I have
ever attempted to influence has been the behaviour.
You must not confound my meaning. I am guilty, I confess,
of having often wished you to treat our acquaintance
in general with greater attention; but when have I advised


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