Sense and Sensibility | Page 4

touch In the 'landscape in coloured silks' which Charlotte Palmer had worked at school (chap, xxvi.); and of old remedies for the lost art of swooning, in the 'lavender drops' of chapter xxix. The mention of a dance as a 'little hop' in chapter ix. reads like a premature instance of middle Victorian slang. But nothing is new-even in a novel--and 'hop,' in this sense, is at least as old as Joseph Andrews.
* * * * *

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Mr. Dashwood introduced him Frontispiece
His son's son, a child of four years old
"I cannot imagine how they will spend half of it"
So shy before company
They sang together
He cut off a long lock of her hair
"I have found you out in spite of all your tricks"
Apparently In violent affliction
Begging her to stop
Came to take a survey of the guest
"I declare they are quite charming"
Mischievous tricks
Drinking to her best affections
Amiably bashful
"I can answer for it," said Mrs. Jennings
At that moment she first perceived him
"How fond he was of it!"
Offered him one of Folly's puppies
A very smart beau
Introduced to Mrs. Jennings
Mrs. Jennings assured him directly that she should not stand upon ceremony
Mrs. Ferrars
Drawing him a little aside
In a whisper
"You have heard, I suppose"
Talking over the business
"She put in the feather last night"
Listening at the door
Both gained considerable amusement
"Of one thing I may assure you"
Showing her child to the housekeeper
The gardener's lamentations
Opened a window-shutter
"I entreat you to stay"
"I was formally dismissed"
"I have entered many a shop to avoid your sight"
"And see how the children go on"
"I suppose you know, ma'am, that Mr. Ferrars is married"
It was Edward
"Everything in such respectable condition"
* * * * *
CHAPTER I
The family of Dashwood had long been settled in Sussex. Their estate was large, and their residence was at Norland Park, in the centre of their property, where, for many generations, they had lived in so respectable a manner as to engage the general good opinion of their surrounding acquaintance. The late owner of this estate was a single man, who lived to a very advanced age, and who for many years of his life, had a constant companion and housekeeper in his sister. But her death, which happened ten years before his own, produced a great alteration in his home; for to supply her loss, he invited and received into his house the family of his nephew Mr. Henry Dashwood, the legal inheritor of the Norland estate, and the person to whom he intended to bequeath it. In the society of his nephew and niece, and their children, the old Gentleman's days were comfortably spent. His attachment to them all increased. The constant attention of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Dashwood to his wishes, which proceeded not merely from interest, but from goodness of heart, gave him every degree of solid comfort which his age could receive; and the cheerfulness of the children added a relish to his existence.
By a former marriage, Mr. Henry Dashwood had one son: by his present lady, three daughters. The son, a steady respectable young man, was amply provided for by the fortune of his mother, which had been large, and half of which devolved on him on his coming of age. By his own marriage, likewise, which happened soon afterwards, he added to his wealth. To him therefore the succession to the Norland estate was not so really important as to his sisters; for their fortune, independent of what might arise to them from their father's inheriting that property, could be but small. Their mother had nothing, and their father only seven thousand pounds in his own disposal; for the remaining moiety of his first wife's fortune was also secured to her child, and he had only a life-interest in it.
The old gentleman died: his will was read, and like almost every other will, gave as much disappointment as pleasure. He was neither so unjust, nor so ungrateful, as to leave his estate from his nephew; but he left it to him on such terms as destroyed half the value of the bequest. Mr. Dashwood had wished for it more for the sake of his wife and daughters than for himself or his son; but to his son, and his son's son, a child of four years old, it was secured, in such a way, as to leave to himself no power of providing for those who were most dear to him, and who most needed a provision by any charge on the estate, or by any sale of its valuable woods. The whole was tied up for the benefit of this child, who, in occasional visits with his father and mother at Norland, had so far gained on the affections of his uncle, by such attractions as are by no means unusual in children of two or three years old; an imperfect articulation, an