"Nay, nay—a little too fast. No dependent situation is ever exactly a Paradise. I should be sorry you saw things in a false light, and should be disappointed."
"Oh, no, I do not wish to do that—I don't think—thank you for the great kindness and interest you are so kind as to show by this last remark—but I think I never in my life enjoyed one day of unmixed happiness since I was quite a little child; and I have got so entirely into the habit of thinking that every thing in the world goes so—that when I say Paradise, or quite happy, or so on, it is always in a certain sense—a comparative sense."
"I am glad to see you so reasonable—that is one sure way to be happy; but you will find your crosses at the Hazels. The general is not very sweet-tempered; and even dear mild Mrs. Melwyn is not perfect."
"Why, madam, what am I to expect? If I can not bear a few disagreeable things, what do I go there for? Not to be fed, and housed, and paid at other people's expense, just that I may please my own humors all the time. That would be rather an unfair bargain, I think. No: I own there are some things I could not and would not bear for any consideration; but there are a great many others that I can, and I shall, and I will—and do my best, too, to make happy, and be happy; and, in short, I don't feel the least afraid."
"No more you need—you right-spirited creature," said Mrs. Danvers, cordially.
Many were the difficulties, endless the objections raised by Myra against the proposed plan of going to Mrs. Fisher. Such people's objections and difficulties are indeed endless. In their weakness and their selfishness, they like to be objects of pity—they take a comfort in bothering and wearying people with their interminable complaints. Theirs is not the sacred outbreak of the overloaded heart—casting itself upon another heart for support and consolation under suffering that is too strong and too bitter to be endured alone. Sacred call for sympathy and consolation, and rarely made in vain! It is the wearying and futile attempt to cast the burden of sorrow and suffering upon others, instead of seeking their assistance in enduring it one's self. Vain and useless endeavor, and which often bears hard upon the sympathy even of the kindest and truest hearts!
Ineffectually did Lettice endeavor to represent matters under a cheerful aspect. Nothing was of any avail. Myra would persist in lamenting, and grieving, and tormenting herself and her sister; bewailing the cruel fate of both—would persist in recapitulating every objection which could be made to the plan, and every evil consequence which could possibly ensue. Not that she had the slightest intention in the world of refusing her share in it, if she would have suffered herself to say so. She rather liked the idea of going to that fashionable modiste, Mrs. Fisher: she had the "âme de dentelle" with which Napoleon reproached poor Josephine. There was something positively delightful to her imagination in the idea of dwelling among rich silks, Brussels laces, ribbons, and feathers; it was to her what woods, and birds, and trees were to her sister. She fancied herself elegantly dressed, walking about a show-room, filled with all sorts of beautiful things; herself, perhaps, the most beautiful thing in it, and the object of a sort of flattering interest, through the melancholy cloud "upon her fine features." Nay, her romantic imagination traveled still farther—gentlemen sometimes come up with ladies to show-rooms,—who could tell? Love at first sight was not altogether a dream. Such things had happened.... Myra had read plenty of old, rubbishy novels when she was a girl.
Such were the comfortable thoughts she kept to herself; but it was, as I said, one endless complaining externally.
Catherine insisted upon being allowed to advance the money for the necessary clothes, which, to satisfy the delicacy of the one and the pride of the other, she agreed should be repaid by installments as their salaries became due. The sale of their few possessions put a sovereign or so into the pocket of each, and thus the sisters parted; the lovely Myra to Mrs. Fisher's, and Lettice, by railway, to the Hazels.