Chapter IV — Pride and Prejudice

The person you are trying to protect often hears the warning as an insult to their judgment, not a gift. Alone after the ball, Jane finally admits how much she admires Bingley: sensible, good-humoured, perfectly well bred. Elizabeth teases her for being surprised by the second dance, gives her leave to like him, and names the difference between them: Jane takes the good in everyone and says nothing of the bad; Elizabeth does not.

They split on the Bingley sisters. Jane insists Miss Bingley will be a charming neighbour; Elizabeth, remembering the assembly, finds them proud and conceited. The narrator fills in what the sisters cannot see from the conversation alone: fine ladies with twenty thousand pounds and northern trade in the family memory, spending above their means and thinking meanly of others; Bingley inheriting nearly a hundred thousand pounds and renting Netherfield on impulse; Darcy and Bingley bound in friendship despite opposite temperaments, Bingley liked wherever he appears, Darcy continually giving offence.

Afterward the two men compare notes on the same evening. Bingley found everyone pleasant and Miss Bennet angelic. Darcy saw no beauty, no fashion, no interest, and admitted Jane pretty only to add that she smiled too much. His sisters nevertheless called her a sweet girl, which authorized Bingley to think of her as he chose.