Pride and Prejudice

Chapter 10

Jane Austen · Mountaineers 10th–12th

Teaching Companion Print Adapt for your student

Copywork

Allowing the case, however, to stand according to your representation, you must remember, Miss Bennet, that the friend who is supposed to desire his return to the house, and the delay of his plan, has merely desired it, asked it without offering one argument in favour of its propriety.” “To yield readily--easily--to the persuasion of a friend is no merit with you.” “To yield without conviction is no compliment to the understanding of either.” “You appear to me, Mr. Darcy, to allow nothing for the influence of friendship and affection.

Elizabeth, having rather expected to affront him, was amazed at his gallantry; but there was a mixture of sweetness and archness in her manner which made it difficult for her to affront anybody, and Darcy had never been so bewitched by any woman as he was by her. He really believed that, were it not for the inferiority of her connections, he should be in some danger.

Read both passages aloud. In the first, Elizabeth says Darcy leaves no room for affection. What does the second passage say to that?

For the educator Two passages, six sentences: the heart of the drawing-room debate, and the narrator’s sentence after the reel that tells the reader what Elizabeth cannot see. The first passage opens on Darcy’s long sentence, which begins with a concession (“Allowing the case, however,”), names the person he is answering, and saves its point for the very end: the friend asked “without offering one argument in favour of its propriety.” Then the debate turns on one verb. Elizabeth makes an infinitive her subject (“To yield readily--easily--”), correcting herself between the dashes as she speaks, and stresses _persuasion_. Darcy keeps her opening words and changes what follows (“To yield without conviction”), so his answer is her sentence turned, and his “no compliment” answers her “no merit”. Elizabeth replies with a hedge (“You appear to me”) and a charge (“to allow nothing for”), ending on the pair “friendship and affection”. The second passage is one long sentence and one short one. The long sentence sets a participle phrase right after its subject (“having rather expected to affront him”), turns on a semicolon and “but”, repeats “affront”, and then, at “and Darcy”, crosses from her mind to his without a break, ending on “by her”. The short sentence holds its verdict back behind a conditional set off by commas (“were it not for”) and closes on an understatement, “some danger”. For mechanics, notice the edition’s double hyphens for dashes and the underscores that mark the italic _persuasion_. The first sentence closes a speech that began before it, so it has a closing mark and no opening one; the fourth opens a speech that runs on past the passage, so it has an opening mark and no closing one. For the talk prompt, listen for a student who hears the second passage refute Elizabeth, since Darcy is plainly moved, and one who hears it bear her out, since his feeling gives way at once to a reason about her connections.

Discussion

Narration Tell the chapter back in order, from Miss Bingley watching Darcy write to Elizabeth running off in the shrubbery.

Darcy brushes off Miss Bingley’s praise. By his own rule about humility, what is he doing? Character
Bingley says Darcy would think better of him for “a flat denial” and a fast ride away. How well does Bingley know his friend? Inference
Elizabeth has already said the request is a small one, made between friends. Why does Darcy still want “more precision”? Character
Elizabeth turns down the reel and dares Darcy to despise her, and he says, “Indeed I do not dare.” Is that a joke, a compliment, or the plain truth? Tone
“You are charmingly grouped,” Elizabeth tells the three of them, and runs off. Which of the three is she aiming at? Tone

Make a Connection Think of a time, in a book or in life, when praise pushed someone away instead of winning them over. Why might praise do that?

Vocabulary

precipitance: and yet what is there so very laudable in a precipitance which must leave very necessary business undone, and can be of no real advantage to yourself or anyone else? Rash haste; acting before thinking (from Latin praeceps, headlong, the root of precipice and precipitate). Darcy calls Bingley’s boast of leaving in five minutes “a precipitance which must leave very necessary business undone”. The word turns Bingley’s quickness from a charm into a fall.
celerity: I daresay you believed it; but I am by no means convinced that you would be gone with such celerity. Swiftness; speed in moving or acting (from Latin celer, swift, the root of accelerate). Darcy doubts that Bingley “would be gone with such celerity.” Where precipitance blames haste, celerity only measures it: Darcy’s doubt is whether the speed would be real at all.
propriety: Allowing the case, however, to stand according to your representation, you must remember, Miss Bennet, that the friend who is supposed to desire his return to the house, and the delay of his plan, has merely desired it, asked it without offering one argument in favour of its propriety. Rightness or fitness for the case; being proper (from Latin proprius, one’s own, the root of proper and property). Darcy says the imagined friend asked Bingley to stay “without offering one argument in favour of its propriety”: he gave no reason why staying would be the right thing. That missing reason is what the whole debate turns on.
expostulation: Miss Bingley warmly resented the indignity he had received, in an expostulation with her brother for talking such nonsense. An earnest protest that tries to talk someone out of what they are doing (from Latin expostulare, to demand, to complain). Miss Bingley answers her brother’s joke about Darcy’s height with an expostulation “for talking such nonsense.” She protests on Darcy’s behalf, though Darcy himself only smiled.
alacrity: Miss Bingley moved with alacrity to the pianoforte, and after a polite request that Elizabeth would lead the way, which the other as politely and more earnestly negatived, she seated herself. Quick and cheerful readiness (from Latin alacer, lively, eager). When Darcy asks for music, “Miss Bingley moved with alacrity to the pianoforte”. The word catches her eagerness to oblige him, the same eagerness that ran through her praises at the writing-table.
approbation: She liked him too little to care for his approbation. Approval, especially considered or formal approval (from Latin approbare, to approve, the root of approve and probation). Elizabeth does not care for Darcy’s approbation. The word is weightier than liking, and it fits what she thinks he is doing when he looks at her: judging her by “his ideas of right”.
archness: Elizabeth, having rather expected to affront him, was amazed at his gallantry; but there was a mixture of sweetness and archness in her manner which made it difficult for her to affront anybody, and Darcy had never been so bewitched by any woman as he was by her. Playful slyness; a teasing, knowing manner (from arch in its old sense of roguish or cunning, as in an arch look, not the curve of a bridge). The narrator sets it beside “sweetness”: the mixture is what keeps Elizabeth from affronting anybody. Sweetness takes the sting out, and archness lets him see she is teasing.

Critical thinking

Bingley asks them to stop, because “Arguments are too much like disputes.” Were Darcy and Elizabeth quarrelling, or only arguing?
Elizabeth can hardly believe Darcy looks at her out of admiration, and dislike seems “still more strange.” Then she decides he finds something “wrong and reprehensible” in her. Why can she believe that, when she could not believe the dislike?
Darcy says that giving way to a friend without being convinced is no compliment to either of them, and Elizabeth says friendship should count for something. Which of them describes the better friend?