 how unhappy I make you!«
    »I only wish,« replied her sister, »there were any thing I could do, which
might be of comfort to you.«
    This, as every thing else would have been, was too much for Marianne, who
could only exclaim, in the anguish of her heart, »Oh! Elinor, I am miserable
indeed,« before her voice was entirely lost in sobs.
    Elinor could no longer witness this torrent of unresisted grief in silence.
    »Exert yourself, dear Marianne,« she cried, »if you would not kill yourself
and all who love you. Think of your mother; think of her misery while you
suffer; for her sake you must exert yourself.«
    »I cannot, I cannot,« cried Marianne; »leave me, leave me, if I distress
you; leave me, hate me, forget me! but do not torture me so. Oh! how easy for
those who have no sorrow of their own to talk of exertion! Happy, happy Elinor,
you cannot have an idea of what I suffer.«
    »Do you call me happy, Marianne? Ah! if you knew! - And can you believe me
to be so, while I see you so wretched!«
    »Forgive me, forgive me,« throwing her arms round her sister's neck; »I know
you feel for me; I know what a heart you have; but yet you are - you must be
happy; Edward loves you - what, oh! what can do away such happiness as that?«
    »Many, many circumstances,« said Elinor, solemnly.
    »No, no, no,« cried Marianne wildly, »he loves you, and only you. You can
have no grief.«
    »I can have no pleasure while I see you in this state.«
    »And you will never see me otherwise. Mine is a misery which nothing can do
away.«
    »You must not talk so, Marianne. Have you no comforts? no friends? Is your
loss such as leaves no opening for consolation? Much as you suffer now, think of
what you would have suffered if the discovery of his character had been delayed
to a later period - if your engagement had been carried on for months and
months, as it might have been, before he chose to put an end to it. Every
additional day of unhappy confidence, on your side, would have made the blow
more dreadful.«
    »Engagement!« cried Marianne, »there has been no
