While her hand was trembling under these letters, her eye running from
one to the other, and her heart swelling with emotion, Crawford thus
continued, with unfeigned eagerness, to express his interest in the
event-"I will not talk of my own happiness," said he, "great as it is, for I
think only of yours. Compared with you, who has a right to be happy?
I have almost grudged myself my own prior knowledge of what you ought
to have known before all the world. I have not lost a moment, however.
The post was late this morning, but there has not been since a moment's
delay. How impatient, how anxious, how wild I have been on the
subject, I will not attempt to describe; how severely mortified, how
cruelly disappointed, in not having it finished while I was in London!
I was kept there from day to day in the hope of it, for nothing less
dear to me than such an object would have detained me half the time
from Mansfield. But though my uncle entered into my wishes with all
the warmth I could desire, and exerted himself immediately, there were
difficulties from the absence of one friend, and the engagements of
another, which at last I could no longer bear to stay the end of, and
knowing in what good hands I left the cause, I came away on Monday,
trusting that many posts would not pass before I should be followed by
such very letters as these. My uncle, who is the very best man in the
world, has exerted himself, as I knew he would, after seeing your
brother. He was delighted with him. I would not allow myself
yesterday to say how delighted, or to repeat half that the Admiral said
in his praise. I deferred it all till his praise should be proved the
praise of a friend, as this day does prove it. Now I may say that
even I could not require William Price to excite a greater interest, or
be followed by warmer wishes and higher commendation, than were most
voluntarily bestowed by my uncle after the evening they had passed
together."