"I assure you I feel most amiably disposed towards them all, especially those who by dancing to-night have left me at liberty to converse with you. They are all charming chatterers, and delightful dancers, and equally exquisite, enlightened, eloquent and endearing."
"Your compliments are rather equivocal, Mr. Morgan, I do not know that I should like such problematic praises."
"You—you need not be afraid, I should never think of applying such terms to you—did I not begin with observing that you were not brought up in a country town."
"There are some people I have observed," said Emma thoughtfully, "who always hold the society in which they happen to move very cheap, because they have an unfortunate power of vision which enables them alone to see the weak, the ridiculous, the faulty side of things."
"Thank you—do not find fault with my compliments after that speech—I never made one more severe."
"I beg your pardon," replied she colouring deeply. "Perhaps it did sound a little harsh."
"Yes, I am deeply indebted to you for your good opinion—you probably suppose me incapable of appreciating the beautiful and excellent when I meet it, because I am alive to the follies, the littleness, and the absurdities of those amongst whom I am forced to mix—some day I trust you will judge me better."
He understood Emma's character completely—the idea that she had been harsh in her speech, and that he felt hurt by her injustice, was decidedly the most likely thing to produce kindness and conciliatory manners to make it up. He assumed an air and tone of injured innocence which quite touched her, for straightforward and artless herself, she never suspected he was only acting. She wanted him to speak again, but he was determined to leave it to her to make that effort, and he partly drew back and turned his chair slightly away, as if he had not courage again to address her. She renewed the conversation by enquiring whether he had long been resident in the town—the soft tone of her voice immediately drew him back to his former position, and he began to tell her that he had come to Croydon about fifteen years before, that like herself he had lived in his youth in the country, and the only towns he had previously been acquainted with were Oxford and London.
"Like yourself too," continued he, "I came here frank and open-hearted—ready to place the best construction on anything I saw or heard, and believing that the neighbourhood would do as much for me. Experience has taught me a very different lesson; but perhaps nothing but experience will do. With the consciousness of the amount it cost me to buy my knowledge with suffering, I sometimes idly think of saving others by my cautions from a similar expense of feeling, but it is vain—and I do not think I shall make the attempt again."
"And so," said Emma, after a short pause, "you think me ungrateful and self-willed, because I do not like to hear whole-sale depreciation of your fellow-townspeople."