Chapter Thirty-nine

Originally published 2/11/2007.

As promised, another exciting week collaborating with the lovely Susan. In this chapter, Lizzy and Jane finally go home, and meet up with the superlatively silly Lydia and Kitty; plenty of food for negative contemplation here.

It was the second week in May, in which the three young ladies set out together from Gracechurch Street for the town of ----, in Hertfordshire; and, as they drew near the appointed inn where Mr. Bennet's carriage was to meet them, they quickly perceived, in token of the coachman's punctuality, both Kitty and Lydia looking out of a dining-room upstairs. These two girls had been above an hour in the place, happily employed in visiting an opposite milliner,...

That is, someone who makes hats. We don't know how long Kitty and Lydia were with the milliner, but it was probably much more than the situation deserved.

...watching the sentinel on guard,...

A little too closely.

...and dressing a salad and cucumber.

An occupation which should definitely consume a considerable portion of your day.

After welcoming their sisters, they triumphantly displayed a table set out with such cold meat as an inn larder usually affords, exclaiming, "Is not this nice? Is not this an agreeable surprise?"

Please praise us!

"And we mean to treat you all," added Lydia, "but you must lend us the money, for we have just spent ours at the shop out there." Then, showing her purchases-- "Look here, I have bought this bonnet. I do not think it is very pretty; but I thought I might as well buy it as not...

Excellent monetary practices here. That last sentence is about as nonsensical as it is possible to utter.

...I shall pull it to pieces as soon as I get home, and see if I can not make it up any better."

And when her sisters abused it as ugly, she added, with perfect unconcern, "Oh! but there were two or three much uglier in the shop;...

Therefore, I should have bought it. Certainly there can be no better argument for buying anything.

...and when I have bought some prettier-coloured satin to trim it with fresh, I think it will be very tolerable. Besides, it will not much signify what one wears this summer, after the ----shire have left Meryton, and they are going in a fortnight."

There could be no greater catastrophe.

"Are they indeed!" cried Elizabeth, with the greatest satisfaction.

We know something of why she's so happy with this news: Wickham's exposure has taught her something about the shallowness of "running after officers." She wants her sisters removed from military people, perhaps to curb the tendencies Darcy showed her.

"They are going to be encamped near Brighton; and I do so want papa to take us all there for the summer! It would be such a delicious scheme; and I dare say would hardly cost anything at all. Mamma would like to go too of all things! Only think what a miserable summer else we shall have!"

"Yes," thought Elizabeth, "that would be a delightful scheme indeed, and completely do for us at once. Good Heaven! Brighton, and a whole campful of soldiers, to us, who have been overset already by one poor regiment of militia, and the monthly balls of Meryton!"

Lizzy might, perhaps, have equalled my sarcasm so far.

"Now I have got some news for you," said Lydia, as they sat down at table. "What do you think? It is excellent news-- capital news-- and about a certain person we all like!"

Jane and Elizabeth looked at each other, and the waiter was told he need not stay. Lydia laughed, and said:

"Aye, that is just like your formality and discretion. You thought the waiter must not hear, as if he cared!...

Her reasons for thinking that Lizzy dismissed the waiter are probably far from accurate. My guess is that Lizzy wants the waiter to leave in order to avoid having him hear the ridiculous piece of news Lizzy suspects Lydia to be about to impart. She thinks Lydia is about to engage in gossip, and wants the waiter to have no part in it.

...I dare say he often hears worse things said than I am going to say...

Lydia apparently likes to argue via the following path: what I'm going to do is just great because there are three or four other things much worse.

...But he is an ugly fellow! I am glad he is gone. I never saw such a long chin in my life...

This is surely irrelevant at least.

...Well, but now for my news; it is about dear Wickham; too good for the waiter, is it not?...

Meaning, this juicy bit of gossip is something so special, only Lizzy and Jane should hear it. Whereas, of course, Lydia shouldn't really tell anybody. This is my initial take on the matter. The talented Susan has an alternative: that Lydia is being sarcastic now, in reference to her earlier comment on the advisability of sending away the waiter. The reader can judge.

...There is no danger of Wickham's marrying Mary King. There's for you!...

This could mean "So there," or something equivalent.

...She is gone down to her uncle at Liverpool: gone to stay. Wickham is safe."

"And Mary King is safe!" added Elizabeth; "safe from a connection imprudent as to fortune."

It's probably prudent of Lizzy not to go into any particulars concerning all the other reasons this event is good for Mary King. After all, most of those reasons have to do with Georgiana, a subject to which Lizzy has sworn secrecy (via Darcy's comment in his letter, "Having said thus much, I feel no doubt of your secrecy.")

"She is a great fool for going away, if she liked him."

Lydia here.

"But I hope there is no strong attachment on either side," said Jane.

Typical Jane: doesn't want anyone to get hurt.

"I am sure there is not on his. I will answer for it, he never cared three straws about her-- who could about such a nasty little freckled thing?"

Lydia here, with a comment that pretty much takes the cake of shallowness. For Lydia, beauty is only skin deep, and not even all of that.

Elizabeth was shocked to think that, however incapable of such coarseness of expression herself, the coarseness of the sentiment was little other than her own breast had harboured and fancied liberal!

Lizzy is saying here that she was shocked to discover that, while she probably wouldn't have said anything so shallow, she definitely thought it, and not only thought it, but regarded that thought as magnanimous.

As soon as all had ate,...

Grammar seems to have changed since this book was originally published; certain it is, that my Everyman's Library edition has the word "ate" instead of "eaten".

...and the elder ones paid,...

As Lydia promised they would.

...the carriage was ordered; and after some contrivance, the whole party, with all their boxes, work-bags, and parcels, and the unwelcome addition of Kitty's and Lydia's purchases, were seated in it.

"How nicely we are all crammed in," cried Lydia. "I am glad I bought my bonnet, if it is only for the fun of having another bandbox!...

Thus showing a breath-taking disregard for the comfort of others.

...Well, now let us be quite comfortable and snug, and talk and laugh all the way home. And in the first place, let us hear what has happened to you all since you went away. Have you seen any pleasant men?...

Obviously this is the most important thing.

...Have you had any flirting?...

Asked as if such was a good thing, naturally.

...I was in great hopes that one of you would have got a husband before you came back. Jane will be quite an old maid soon, I declare. She is almost 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;...

All of Lydia's blabbing from my last comment to here must be irksome to Lizzy and Jane. Surely both of them do want husbands, but they want them in a better way than "just any husband will do." For Mrs. Philips to mention Mr. Collins in this way so soon after he is "happily" married to Charlotte is unfeeling to Charlotte, as if she wished the marriage had never happened.

...but I do not think there would have been any fun in it...

Fun being the first consideration in marriage.

...Lord! how I should like to be married before any of you!...

Ironic, seeing as how she does get married before any of them.

...and then I would chaperon you about to all the balls...

I can't think of anyone more qualified.

...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!)...

What does this say about Mrs. Forster?

...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!...

I seem to recall Bible verses about cross-dressing, disapproving of it. It was illegal in Old Testament Israel.

...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!...

Taking the Lord's name in vain.

...how I laughed! and so did Mrs. Forster. I thought I should have died. And that made the men suspect something, and then they soon found out what was the matter."

With such kinds of histories of their parties and good jokes, did Lydia, assisted by Kitty's hints and additions, endeavour to amuse her companions all the way to Longbourn. Elizabeth listened as little as she could,...

So we can see how much success Lydia and Kitty had in their amusement project.

...but there was no escaping the frequent mention of Wickham's name.

Their reception at home was most kind. Mrs. Bennet rejoiced to see Jane in undiminished beauty;...

Never mind why Jane was gone in the first place: to get her mind off Bingley, and hopefully to improve her health. As with Kitty and Lydia, Mrs. Bennet appears to care only for appearances.

...and more than once during dinner did Mr. Bennet say voluntarily to Elizabeth:

"I am glad you are come back, Lizzy."

Not demonstrative, but for Mr. Bennet it is praise indeed.

Their party in the dining-room was large, for almost all the Lucases came to meet Maria and hear the news; and various were the subjects that occupied them: Lady Lucas was inquiring of Maria, after the welfare and poultry of her eldest daughter; Mrs. Bennet was doubly engaged, on one hand collecting an account of the present fashions from Jane, who sat some way below her, and, on the other, retailing them all to the younger Lucases; and Lydia, in a voice rather louder than any other person's, was enumerating the various pleasures of the morning to anybody who would hear her.

Are we surprised? So full of herself.

"Oh! Mary," said she, "I wish you had gone with us, for we had such fun! As we went along, Kitty and I drew up the blinds, and pretended there was nobody in the coach;...

So Lydia is 15 going on 3.

...and I should have gone so all the way, if Kitty had not been sick; and when we got to the George, I do think we behaved very handsomely, for we treated the other three with the nicest cold luncheon in the world,...

Which they probably have not paid for yet.

...and if you would have gone, we would have treated you too. And then when we came away it was such fun! I thought we never should have got into the coach. I was ready to die of laughter...

She seems to be ready to die of laughter quite often. At the risk of sounding Darwinian, perhaps she should and cleanse the gene pool.

...And then we were so merry all the way home! we talked and laughed so loud, that anybody might have heard us ten miles off!"

To their very great edification.

To this Mary very gravely replied, "Far be it from me, my dear sister, to depreciate such pleasures! They would doubtless be congenial with the generality of female minds. But I confess they would have no charms for me-- I should infinitely prefer a book."

Hoity-toity. Pats self on back. She and Collins really would have made a "good" pair. They would have deserved each other.

But of this answer Lydia heard not a word. She seldom listened to anybody for more than half a minute, and never attended to Mary at all.

As pompous as Mary was, it would definitely have been kinder to listen sometimes.

In the afternoon Lydia was urgent with the rest of the girls to walk to Meryton, and to see how everybody went on; but Elizabeth steadily opposed the scheme. It should not be said that the Miss Bennets could not be at home half a day before they were in pursuit of the officers. There was another reason too for her opposition. She dreaded seeing Mr. Wickham again, and was resolved to avoid it as long as possible. The comfort to her of the regiment's approaching removal was indeed beyond expression. In a fortnight they were to go-- and once gone, she hoped there could be nothing more to plague her on his account.

She had not been many hours at home before she found that the Brighton scheme, of which Lydia had given them a hint at the inn, was under frequent discussion between her parents. Elizabeth saw directly that her father had not the smallest intention of yielding;...

Austen doesn't quite explain, but the context definitely indicates that Mr. Bennet is, currently, against the family going to Brighton.

...but his answers were at the same time so vague and equivocal, that her mother, though often disheartened, had never yet despaired of succeeding at last.


So we see here the importance of being a strong leader when it is required, as it surely is here. The Brighton scheme, however much even Mr. Bennet justifies it in the future, was not a good scheme.

Stay tuned next week for a boring Susan-less post. :-)]