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SENSE AND SENSIBILITYby Jane Austensense 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. sense and sensability by jane austen 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
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