Jane Austen Quote of the Week 174

I have chosen a quote from Mansfield Park simply for the beautiful imagery and great construction of sentences by Jane Austen.

"Miss Crawford's attractions did not lessen. The harp arrived, and rather added to her beauty, wit, and good-humour; for she played with the greatest obligingness, with an expression and taste which were peculiarly becoming, and there was something clever to be said at the close of every air. Edmund was at the Parsonage every day, to be indulged with his favourite instrument: one morning secured an invitation for the next; for the lady could not be unwilling to have a listener, and every thing was soon in a fair train.

A young woman, pretty, lively, with a harp as elegant as herself, and both placed near a window, cut down to the ground, and opening on a little lawn, surrounded by shrubs in the rich foliage of summer, was enough to catch any man's heart. The season, the scene, the air, were all favourable to tenderness and sentiment."

This is taken from chapter 7 and the carefully chosen wording describes Edmund's lust for Miss Crawford- in my opinion there is almost an erotic tone to the description.

Pic: Austen prose