In Mansfield Park, Edmund asks Fanny what she thinks about Mary Crawford's sarcastic remarks about her uncle at dinner the night before: “I thought you would be struck, (says Edmund]. It was very wrong; very indecorous." “And very ungrateful, I think.” [says Fanny] “Ungrateful is a strong word. I do not know that her uncle has any claim to her gratitude; his wife certainly had; and it is the warmth of her respect for her aunt’s memory which misleads her here." |
“The nicest—by which I suppose you mean the neatest. That must depend upon the binding.” “Henry,” said Miss Tilney, “you are very impertinent. Miss Morland, he is treating you exactly as he does his sister. He is forever finding fault with me, for some incorrectness of language, and now he is taking the same liberty with you. The word ‘nicest,’ as you used it, did not suit him; and you had better change it as soon as you can, or we shall be overpowered with Johnson and Blair all the rest of the way.” “I am sure,” cried Catherine, “I did not mean to say anything wrong; but it is a nice book, and why should not I call it so?” |