band of a very silly woman; but she knew that this kind of blunder was too common for any sensible man to be lastingly hurt by it."
Fortified by such philosophy, convinced that the natural order of things, though mysterious and unpleasant, does not entail unhappiness, Miss Austen deliberately marries Henry Tilney to Catherine Morland; marries them after an engagement long enough to have opened the bridegroom's eyes, were it not for the seventy merciful miles which lie between Northanger Abbey and the rectory of Fullerton. With an acute and delicate cynicism, so gently spoken that we hardly feel its sting, she proves to us, in a succession of conversations, that "a good-looking girl with an affectionate heart and a very ignorant mind cannot fail of attracting a clever young man, unless circumstances are particularly untoward." When Catherine delivers her priceless views upon the unprofitable labour of historians, we know that Mr. Tilney's fate is sealed.
"You are fond of history!—and so are Mr. Allen and my father; and I have two brothers who do not dislike it. So many instances within
