Sense and Sensibility

CHAPTER 1

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 earnest de­sire of hav­ing his own way, many cun­ning tricks, and a great deal of noise, as to out­weigh all the val­ue of all the at­ten­tion which, for years, he had re­ceived from his niece and her daugh­ters. He meant not to be un­kind, how­ev­er, and, as a mark of his af­fec­tion for the three girls, he left them a thou­sand pounds a-​piece.

Mr. Dash­wood’s dis­ap­point­ment was, at first, se­vere; but his tem­per was cheer­ful and san­guine; and he might rea­son­ably hope to live many years, and by liv­ing eco­nom­ical­ly, lay by a con­sid­er­able sum from the pro­duce of an es­tate al­ready large, and ca­pa­ble of al­most im­me­di­ate im­prove­ment. But the for­tune, which had been so tardy in com­ing, was his on­ly one twelve­month. He sur­vived his un­cle no longer; and ten thou­sand pounds, in­clud­ing the late lega­cies, was all that re­mained for his wid­ow and daugh­ters.

His son was sent for as soon as his dan­ger was known, and to him Mr. Dash­wood rec­om­mend­ed, with all the strength and ur­gen­cy which ill­ness could com­mand, the in­ter­est of his moth­er-​in-​law and sis­ters.

Mr. John Dash­wood had not the strong feel­ings of the rest of the fam­ily; but he was af­fect­ed by a rec­om­men­da­tion of such a na­ture at such a time, and he promised to do ev­ery thing in his pow­er to make them com­fort­able. His fa­ther was ren­dered easy by such an as­sur­ance, and Mr. John Dash­wood had then leisure to con­sid­er how much there might pru­dent­ly be in his pow­er to do for them.

He was not an ill-​dis­posed young man, un­less to be rather cold heart­ed and rather self­ish is to be ill-​dis­posed: but he was, in gen­er­al, well re­spect­ed; for he con­duct­ed him­self with pro­pri­ety in the dis­charge of his or­di­nary du­ties. Had he mar­ried a more ami­able wom­an, he might have been made still more re­spectable than he was:–he might even have been made ami­able him­self; for he was very young when he mar­ried, and very fond of his wife. But Mrs. John Dash­wood was a strong car­ica­ture of him­self;– more nar­row-​mind­ed and self­ish.

When he gave his promise to his fa­ther, he med­itat­ed with­in him­self to in­crease the for­tunes of his sis­ters by the present of a thou­sand pounds a-​piece. He then re­al­ly thought him­self equal to it. The prospect of four thou­sand a-​year, in ad­di­tion to his present in­come, be­sides the re­main­ing half of his own moth­er’s for­tune, warmed his heart, and made him feel ca­pa­ble of gen­eros­ity.– “Yes, he would give them three thou­sand pounds: it would be lib­er­al and hand­some! It would be enough to make them com­plete­ly easy. Three thou­sand pounds! he could spare so con­sid­er­able a sum with lit­tle in­con­ve­nience.”– He thought of it all day long, and for many days suc­ces­sive­ly, and he did not re­pent.

No soon­er was his fa­ther’s fu­ner­al over, than Mrs. John Dash­wood, with­out send­ing any no­tice of her in­ten­tion to her moth­er-​in-​law, ar­rived with her child and their at­ten­dants. No one could dis­pute her right to come; the house was her hus­band’s from the mo­ment of his fa­ther’s de­cease; but the in­del­ica­cy of her con­duct was so much the greater, and to a wom­an in Mrs. Dash­wood’s sit­ua­tion, with on­ly com­mon feel­ings, must have been high­ly un­pleas­ing;– but in HER mind there was a sense of hon­or so keen, a gen­eros­ity so ro­man­tic, that any of­fence of the kind, by whom­so­ev­er giv­en or re­ceived, was to her a source of im­move­able dis­gust. Mrs. John Dash­wood had nev­er been a favourite with any of her hus­band’s fam­ily; but she had had no op­por­tu­ni­ty, till the present, of shew­ing them with how lit­tle at­ten­tion to the com­fort of oth­er peo­ple she could act when oc­ca­sion re­quired it.

So acute­ly did Mrs. Dash­wood feel this un­gra­cious be­haviour, and so earnest­ly did she de­spise her daugh­ter-​in-​law for it, that, on the ar­rival of the lat­ter, she would have quit­ted the house for ev­er, had not the en­treaty of her el­dest girl in­duced her first to re­flect on the pro­pri­ety of go­ing, and her own ten­der love for all her three chil­dren de­ter­mined her af­ter­wards to stay, and for their sakes avoid a breach with their broth­er.

Eli­nor, this el­dest daugh­ter, whose ad­vice was so ef­fec­tu­al, pos­sessed a strength of un­der­stand­ing, and cool­ness of judg­ment, which qual­ified her, though on­ly nine­teen, to be the coun­sel­lor of her moth­er, and en­abled her fre­quent­ly to coun­ter­act, to the ad­van­tage of them all, that ea­ger­ness of mind in Mrs. Dash­wood which must gen­er­al­ly have led to im­pru­dence. She had an ex­cel­lent heart;–her dis­po­si­tion was af­fec­tion­ate, and her feel­ings were strong; but she knew how to gov­ern them: it was a knowl­edge which her moth­er had yet to learn; and which one of her sis­ters had re­solved nev­er to be taught.

Mar­ianne’s abil­ities were, in many re­spects, quite equal to Eli­nor’s. She was sen­si­ble and clever; but ea­ger in ev­ery­thing: her sor­rows, her joys, could have no mod­er­ation. She was gen­er­ous, ami­able, in­ter­est­ing: she was ev­ery­thing but pru­dent. The re­sem­blance be­tween her and her moth­er was strik­ing­ly great.

Eli­nor saw, with con­cern, the ex­cess of her sis­ter’s sen­si­bil­ity; but by Mrs. Dash­wood it was val­ued and cher­ished. They en­cour­aged each oth­er now in the vi­olence of their af­flic­tion. The agony of grief which over­pow­ered them at first, was vol­un­tar­ily re­newed, was sought for, was cre­at­ed again and again. They gave them­selves up whol­ly to their sor­row, seek­ing in­crease of wretched­ness in ev­ery re­flec­tion that could af­ford it, and re­solved against ev­er ad­mit­ting con­so­la­tion in fu­ture. Eli­nor, too, was deeply af­flict­ed; but still she could strug­gle, she could ex­ert her­self. She could con­sult with her broth­er, could re­ceive her sis­ter-​in-​law on her ar­rival, and treat her with prop­er at­ten­tion; and could strive to rouse her moth­er to sim­ilar ex­er­tion, and en­cour­age her to sim­ilar for­bear­ance.

Mar­garet, the oth­er sis­ter, was a good-​hu­mored, well-​dis­posed girl; but as she had al­ready im­bibed a good deal of Mar­ianne’s ro­mance, with­out hav­ing much of her sense, she did not, at thir­teen, bid fair to equal her sis­ters at a more ad­vanced pe­ri­od of life.