ut in the
saloon.' Lady Elliott was delighted with the thought. We measured the
dining-room, and found it would hold exactly eighteen couple, and the
affair was arranged precisely after my plan. So that, in fact, you
see, if people do but know how to set about it, every comfort may be as
well enjoyed in a cottage as in the most spacious dwelling."

Elinor agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the
compliment of rational opposition.

As John Dashwood had no more pleasure in music than his eldest sister,
his mind was equally at liberty to fix on any thing else; and a thought
struck him during the evening, which he communicated to his wife, for
her approbation, when they got home. The consideration of Mrs.
Dennison's mistake, in supposing his sisters their guests, had
suggested the propriety of their being really invited to become such,
while Mrs. Jennings's engagements kept her from home. The expense would
be nothing, the inconvenience not more; and it was altogether an
attention which the delicacy of his conscience pointed out to be
requisite to its complete enfranchisement from his promise to his
father. Fanny was startled at the proposal.

"I do not see how it can be done," said she, "without affronting Lady
Middleton, for they spend every day with her; otherwise I should be
exceedingly glad to do it. You know I am always ready to pay them any
attention in my power, as my taking them out this evening shews. But
they are Lady Middleton's visitors. How can I ask them away from her?"

Her husband, but with great humility, did not see the force of her
objection. "They had already spent a week in this manner in Conduit
Street, and Lady Middleton could not be displeased at their giving the
same number of days to such near relations."

Fanny paused a moment, and then, with fresh vigor, said,

"My love I would ask them with all my heart, if it was in my power.
But I had just settled within myself to ask the Miss Steeles to spend a
few days with us. They are very well behaved, good kind of girls; and
I think the attention is due to them, as their uncle did so very well
by Edward. We can ask your sisters some other year, you know; but the
Miss Steeles may not be in town any more. I am sure you will like
them; indeed, you DO like them, you know, very much already, and so
does my mother; and they are such favourites with Harry!"

Mr. Dashwood was convinced. He saw the necessity of inviting the Mis