Note (return) — Chapter XII · FANNY WYNDHAM

Miss Wyndham, and her cousin, Lady Selina Grey, the only unmarried daughter left on the earl’s hands, were together. Lady Selina was not in her première jeunesse [22], and, in manner, face, and disposition, was something like her father: she was not, therefore, very charming; but his faults were softened down in her; and what was pretence in him, was, to a certain degree, real in her. She had a most exaggerated conception of her own station and dignity, and of what was due to her, and expected from her. Because her rank enabled her to walk out of a room before other women, she fancied herself better than them, and entitled to be thought better. She was plain, red-haired, and in no ways attractive; but she had refused the offer of a respectable country gentleman, because he was only a country gentleman, and then flattered herself that she owned the continuance of her maiden condition to her high station, which made her a fit match only for the most exalted magnates of the land. But she was true, industrious, and charitable; she worked hard to bring her acquirements to that pitch which she considered necessary to render her fit for her position; she truly loved her family, and tried hard to love her neighbours, in which she might have succeeded but for the immeasurable height from which she looked down on them. She listened, complacently, to all those serious cautions against pride, which her religion taught her, and considered that she was obeying its warnings, when she spoke condescendingly to those around her. She thought that condescension was humility, and that her self-exaltation was not pride, but a proper feeling of her own and her family’s dignity.