finished_summaries/shmoop/Sense and Sensibility/section_7_part_0.txt
Sense and Sensibility.chapter 8
chapter 8
{"name": "Chapter 8", "url": "https://web.archive.org/web/20210421140324/https://www.shmoop.com/study-guides/literature/sense-and-sensibility/summary/chapter-8", "summary": "Mrs. Jennings is a chatty old gossip with a heart of gold. Having found husbands for her two daughters, she now embarks upon the mission of marrying off all the other eligible young ladies of her acquaintance. Next up: Elinor and Marianne. Mrs. Jennings is certain that Colonel Brandon is head over heels in love with Marianne. She immediately decides that they should get married. She then delights in poking fun at both sides of this pair - much to everyone's embarrassment. Marianne finds Mrs. Jennings' jokes both funny and offensive, given Colonel Brandon's advanced age. Mrs. Dashwood finds it necessary to remind her ageist daughter that the guy isn't exactly at death's door. Marianne counters that he's old enough to be her father - shouldn't his \"age and infirmity\" protect him from mockery? Here, Elinor also steps in to defend the Colonel, who, it must be said, is far from \"infirm,\" even if he has rheumatism. Marianne, rather heartlessly, admits that Colonel Brandon isn't about to die , but claims that a man of 35 shouldn't be thinking about marriage at his age. Elinor cautiously agrees that perhaps a man his age shouldn't marry a young girl, but that he should be allowed to marry an older lady of 27 or so. Marianne concedes that this would be OK - after all, a woman who's unmarried at 27 is practically dead to the world, so it would be a marriage of convenience, in which the couple could provide company for each other in their declining years. We have to wonder what Marianne would think of marriage in our modern world - after all, it's not unusual for men and women to get married after 30 nowadays! Elinor tries futilely to convince her sister that 30 isn't the end of life as we know it, then gives up and heads out. Once her sister's gone, Marianne brings up Edward Ferrars - he hasn't come to visit them at Barton Cottage yet. What could possibly be preventing him? Marianne can't understand her sister's apparent lack of emotion with regards to her erstwhile suitor. Doesn't Elinor feel anything at all?", "analysis": ""}


Mrs. Jennings was a widow with an ample jointure.  She had only two
daughters, both of whom she had lived to see respectably married, and
she had now therefore nothing to do but to marry all the rest of the
world.  In the promotion of this object she was zealously active, as
far as her ability reached; and missed no opportunity of projecting
weddings among all the young people of her acquaintance.  She was
remarkably quick in the discovery of attachments, and had enjoyed the
advantage of raising the blushes and the vanity of many a young lady by
insinuations of her power over such a young man; and this kind of
discernment enabled her soon after her arrival at Barton decisively to
pronounce that Colonel Brandon was very much in love with Marianne
Dashwood.  She rather suspected it to be so, on the very first evening
of their being together, from his listening so attentively while she
sang to them; and when the visit was returned by the Middletons' dining
at the cottage, the fact was ascertained by his listening to her again.
It must be so.  She was perfectly convinced of it.  It would be an
excellent match, for HE was rich, and SHE was handsome.  Mrs. Jennings
had been anxious to see Colonel Brandon well married, ever since her
connection with Sir John first brought him to her knowledge; and she
was always anxious to get a good husband for every pretty girl.

The immediate advantage to herself was by no means inconsiderable, for
it supplied her with endless jokes against them both.  At the park she
laughed at the colonel, and in the cottage at Marianne.  To the former
her raillery was probably, as far as it regarded only himself,
perfectly indifferent; but to the latter it was at first
incomprehensible; and when its object was understood, she hardly knew
whether most to laugh at its absurdity, or censure its impertinence,
for she considered it as an unfeeling reflection on the colonel's
advanced years, and on his forlorn condition as an old bachelor.

Mrs. Dashwood, who could not think a man five years younger than
herself, so exceedingly ancient as he appeared to the youthful fancy of
her daughter, ventured to clear Mrs. Jennings from the probability of
wishing to throw ridicule on his age.

"But at least, Mama, you cannot deny the absurdity of the accusation,
though you may not think it intentionally ill-natured.  Colonel Brandon
is certainly younger than Mrs. Jennings, but he is old enough to be MY
father; and if he were ever animated enough to be in love, must have
long outlived every sensation of the kind.  It is too ridiculous!  When
is a man to be safe from such wit, if age and infirmity will not
protect him?"

"Infirmity!" said Elinor, "do you call Colonel Brandon infirm?  I can
easily suppose that his age may appear much greater to you than to my
mother; but you can hardly deceive yourself as to his having the use of
his limbs!"

"Did not you hear him complain of the rheumatism?  and is not that the
commonest infirmity of declining life?"

"My dearest child," said her mother, laughing, "at this rate you must
be in continual terror of MY decay; and it must seem to you a miracle
that my life has been extended to the advanced age of forty."

"Mama, you are not doing me justice.  I know very well that Colonel
Brandon is not old enough to make his friends yet apprehensive of
losing him in the course of nature.  He may live twenty years longer.
But thirty-five has nothing to do with matrimony."

"Perhaps," said Elinor, "thirty-five and seventeen had better not have
any thing to do with matrimony together.  But if there should by any
chance happen to be a woman who is single at seven and twenty, I should
not think Colonel Brandon's being thirty-five any objection to his
marrying HER."

"A woman of seven and twenty," said Marianne, after pausing a moment,
"can never hope to feel or inspire affection again, and if her home be
uncomfortable, or her fortune small, I can suppose that she might bring
herself to submit to the offices of a nurse, for the sake of the
provision and security of a wife.  In his marrying such a woman
therefore there would be nothing unsuitable.  It would be a compact of
convenience, and the world would be satisfied.  In my eyes it would be
no marriage at all, but that would be nothing.  To me it would seem
only a commercial exchange, in which each wished to be benefited at the
expense of the other."

"It would be impossible, I know," replied Elinor, "to convince you that
a woman of seven and twenty could feel for a man of thirty-five
anything near enough to love, to make him a desirable companion to her.
But I must object to your dooming Colonel Brandon and his wife to the
constant confinement of a sick chamber, merely because he chanced to
complain yesterday (a very cold damp day) of a slight rheumatic feel in
one of his shoulders."

"But he talked of flannel waistcoats," said Marianne; "and with me a
flannel waistcoat is invariably connected with aches, cramps,
rheumatisms, and every species of ailment that can afflict the old and
the feeble."

"Had he been only in a violent fever, you would not have despised him
half so much.  Confess, Marianne, is not there something interesting to
you in the flushed cheek, hollow eye, and quick pulse of a fever?"

Soon after this, upon Elinor's leaving the room, "Mama," said
Marianne, "I have an alarm on the subject of illness which I cannot
conceal from you.  I am sure Edward Ferrars is not well.  We have now
been here almost a fortnight, and yet he does not come.  Nothing but
real indisposition could occasion this extraordinary delay.  What else
can detain him at Norland?"

"Had you any idea of his coming so soon?" said Mrs. Dashwood.  "I had
none.  On the contrary, if I have felt any anxiety at all on the
subject, it has been in recollecting that he sometimes showed a want of
pleasure and readiness in accepting my invitation, when I talked of his
coming to Barton.  Does Elinor expect him already?"

"I have never mentioned it to her, but of course she must."

"I rather think you are mistaken, for when I was talking to her
yesterday of getting a new grate for the spare bedchamber, she observed
that there was no immediate hurry for it, as it was not likely that the
room would be wanted for some time."

"How strange this is! what can be the meaning of it!  But the whole of
their behaviour to each other has been unaccountable! How cold, how
composed were their last adieus! How languid their conversation the
last evening of their being together! In Edward's farewell there was no
distinction between Elinor and me: it was the good wishes of an
affectionate brother to both.  Twice did I leave them purposely
together in the course of the last morning, and each time did he most
unaccountably follow me out of the room.  And Elinor, in quitting
Norland and Edward, cried not as I did.  Even now her self-command is
invariable.  When is she dejected or melancholy? When does she try to
avoid society, or appear restless and dissatisfied in it?"



Chapter 8
Mrs. Jennings is a chatty old gossip with a heart of gold. Having found husbands for her two daughters, she now embarks upon the mission of marrying off all the other eligible young ladies of her acquaintance. Next up: Elinor and Marianne. Mrs. Jennings is certain that Colonel Brandon is head over heels in love with Marianne. She immediately decides that they should get married. She then delights in poking fun at both sides of this pair - much to everyone's embarrassment. Marianne finds Mrs. Jennings' jokes both funny and offensive, given Colonel Brandon's advanced age. Mrs. Dashwood finds it necessary to remind her ageist daughter that the guy isn't exactly at death's door. Marianne counters that he's old enough to be her father - shouldn't his "age and infirmity" protect him from mockery? Here, Elinor also steps in to defend the Colonel, who, it must be said, is far from "infirm," even if he has rheumatism. Marianne, rather heartlessly, admits that Colonel Brandon isn't about to die , but claims that a man of 35 shouldn't be thinking about marriage at his age. Elinor cautiously agrees that perhaps a man his age shouldn't marry a young girl, but that he should be allowed to marry an older lady of 27 or so. Marianne concedes that this would be OK - after all, a woman who's unmarried at 27 is practically dead to the world, so it would be a marriage of convenience, in which the couple could provide company for each other in their declining years. We have to wonder what Marianne would think of marriage in our modern world - after all, it's not unusual for men and women to get married after 30 nowadays! Elinor tries futilely to convince her sister that 30 isn't the end of life as we know it, then gives up and heads out. Once her sister's gone, Marianne brings up Edward Ferrars - he hasn't come to visit them at Barton Cottage yet. What could possibly be preventing him? Marianne can't understand her sister's apparent lack of emotion with regards to her erstwhile suitor. Doesn't Elinor feel anything at all?