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伊丽莎白在做针线，一面留神地听着达西跟彬格莱小姐谈话。只听得彬格莱小姐恭维话说个不停，不是说他的字写得好，就是说他的字迹一行行很齐整，要不就是赞美他的信写得仔细，可是对方却完全是冷冰冰爱理不理。
The day passed much as the day before had done. Mrs. Hurst and Miss Bingley had spent some hours of the morning with the invalid, who continued, though slowly, to mend; and in the evening Elizabeth joined their party in the drawing-room. The loo-table, however, did not appear. Mr. Darcy was writing, and Miss Bingley, seated near him, was watching the progress of his letter and repeatedly calling off his attention by messages to his sister. Mr. Hurst and Mr. Bingley were at piquet, and Mrs. Hurst was observing their game.
Elizabeth took up some needlework, and was sufficiently amused in attending to what passed between Darcy and his companion. The perpetual commendations of the lady, either on his handwriting, or on the evenness of his lines, or on the length of his letter, with the perfect unconcern with which her praises were received, formed a curious dialogue, and was exactly in union with her opinion of each.
"How delighted Miss Darcy will be to receive such a letter!"
He made no answer.
"You write uncommonly fast. "
"You are mistaken. I write rather slowly. "
"How many letters you must have occasion to write in the course of a year! Letters of business, too! How odious I should think them!"
"It is fortunate, then, that they fall to my lot instead of yours. "
"Pray tell your sister that I long to see her. "
"I have already told her so once, by your desire. "
"I am afraid you do not like your pen. Let me mend it for you. I mend pens remarkably well. "
"Thank you--but I always mend my own. "
"How can you contrive to write so even?"
He was silent.
"Tell your sister I am delighted to hear of her improvement on the harp; and pray let her know that I am quite in raptures with her beautiful little design for a table, and I think it infinitely superior to Miss Grantley's. "
"Will you give me leave to defer your raptures till I write again? At present I have not room to do them justice. "
"Oh! it is of no consequence. I shall see her in January. But do you always write such charming long letters to her, Mr. Darcy?"
"They are generally long; but whether always charming it is not for me to determine. "
"It is a rule with me, that a person who can write a long letter with ease, cannot write ill. "
"That will not do for a compliment to Darcy, Caroline, " cried her brother, "because he does NOT write with ease. He studies too much for words of four syllables. Do not you, Darcy?"
"My style of writing is very different from yours. "
"Oh!" cried Miss Bingley, "Charles writes in the most careless way imaginable. He leaves out half his words, and blots the rest. "
"My ideas flow so rapidly that I have not time to express them--by which means my letters sometimes convey no ideas at all to my correspondents. "
