Nodiver d.o.o. · Pride & Prejudice · page 397 of 640

Pride & Prejudice – page 397

Pride and Prejudice

After the first fortnight or three weeks of her

absence, health, good humour, and cheerfulness began

to reappear at Longbourn. Everything wore a happier

aspect. The families who had been in town for the

winter came back again, and summer finery and

summer engagements arose. Mrs. Bennet was restored

to her usual querulous serenity; and, by the middle of

June, Kitty was so much recovered as to be able to enter

Meryton without tears; an event of such happy promise

as to make Elizabeth hope that by the following

Christmas she might be so tolerably reasonable as not

to mention an officer above once a day, unless, by some

cruel and malicious arrangement at the War Office,

another regiment should be quartered in Meryton.

The time fixed for the beginning of their northern

tour was now fast approaching, and a fortnight

only was wanting of it, when a letter arrived from

Mrs. Gardiner, which at once delayed its commence-

ment and curtailed its extent. Mr. Gardiner would be

prevented by business from setting out till a fortnight

later in July, and must be in London again within a

month, and as that left too short a period for them

to go so far, and see so much as they had proposed,

or at least to see it with the leisure and comfort they

had built on, they were obliged to give up the Lakes,

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