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from the cruel want of reflection in Elinor, which exposed her to an examination that, though she felt herself bound to evade, it must seem inexcuseable not to satisfy.
Mrs. Maple and the two gentlemen were at the breakfast-table. Harleigh would not even try to command himself to sit still, when he found that Ellis was forced to stand: and even Ireton, though he did not move, kept not his place from any intentional disrespect; for he would have thought himself completely old-fashioned, had he put himself out of his way, though for a person of the highest distinction.
"How comes it, Mistress Ellis," said Mrs. Maple, "that you had a message for me last night, from my niece, and that you never delivered it?"
Ellis, confounded, tried vainly to offer some apology.
Mrs. Maple rose still more peremptorily in her demands, mingling the haughtiest menaces with the most im-
