a keen discernment, which was not without a scorching quality.
If Miss Brooke ever attained perfect meekness, it would not be
for lack of inward fire.

"Perhaps," she said, rather haughtily. "I cannot tell to what level
I may sink."

Celia blushed, and was unhappy: she saw that she had offended
her sister, and dared not say even anything pretty about the gift
of the ornaments which she put back into the box and carried away.
Dorothea too was unhappy, as she went on with her plan-drawing,
questioning the purity of her own feeling and speech in the scene
which had ended with that little explosion.

Celia's consciousness told her that she had not been at all in the
wrong: it was quite natural and justifiable that she should have
asked that question, and she repeated to herself that Dorothea was
inconsistent: either she should have taken her full share of the jewels,
or, after what she had said, she should have renounced them altogether.

"I am sure--at least, I trust," thought Celia, "that the wearing
of a necklace will not interfere with my prayers. And I do not see
that I should be bound by Dorothea's opinions now we are going
into society, though of course she herself ought to be bound by them.
But Dorothea is not always consistent."

Thus Celia, mutely bending over her tapestry, until she heard
her sister calling her.

"Here, Kitty, come and look at my plan; I shall think I am