Note 55 — Chapter IX
Reading edition
The preceding paragraphs about Elinor and Woodville are the result of considerable revision for the better of F of F—A and S-R fr. Mary scored out a paragraph describing Elinor, thus getting rid of several clichés (“fortune had smiled on her,” “a favourite of fortune,” “turning tears of misery to those of joy”); she omitted a clause which offered a weak motivation of Elinor’s father’s will (the possibility of her marrying, while hardly more than a child, one of her guardian’s sons); she curtailed the extravagance of a rhapsody on the perfect happiness which Woodville and Elinor would have enjoyed.