“With respect to that other,more weighty accusation,of having injured Mr.Wickham, I can only refute it by laying before you the whole of his connection with my family. Of what he has particularly accused me I am ignorant;but of the truth of what I shall relate,I can summon more than one witness of undoubted veracity.
“I had not been long in Hertfordshire,before I saw,in common with others,that Bingley preferred your elder sister to any other young woman in the country.But it was not till the evening of the dance at Netherfield that I had any apprehension of his feeling a serious attachment. I had often seen him in love before.At that ball,while I had the honour of dancing with you,I was first made acquainted,by Sir William Lucas's accidental information, that Bingley's attentions to your sister had given rise to a general expectation of their marriage.He spoke of it as a cer