Nodiver d.o.o. · Pride & Prejudice · page 368 of 640

Pride & Prejudice – page 368

JANE AUSTEN

maid soon, I declare. She is almost three-and-twenty!

Lord, how ashamed I should be of not being married

before three-and-twenty! My aunt Phillips wants you

so to get husbands, you can’t think. She says Lizzy

had better have taken Mr. Collins; but I do not think

there would have been any fun in it. Lord! how I

should like to be married before any of you; and then

I would chaperon you about to all the balls. Dear me!

we had such a good piece of fun the other day at

Colonel Forster’s. Kitty and me were to spend the day

there, and Mrs. Forster promised to have a little dance

in the evening; (by the bye, Mrs. Forster and me are

such friends!) and so she asked the two Harringtons

to come, but Harriet was ill, and so Pen was forced to

come by herself; and then, what do you think we did?

We dressed up Chamberlayne in woman’s clothes on

purpose to pass for a lady, only think what fun! Not a

soul knew of it, but Colonel and Mrs. Forster, and Kitty

and me, except my aunt, for we were forced to borrow

one of her gowns; and you cannot imagine how well

he looked! When Denny, and Wickham, and Pratt, and

two or three more of the men came in, they did not

know him in the least. Lord! how I laughed! and so did

Mrs. Forster. I thought I should have died. And that

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