Too often, alas! it is so.

Fraternal love, sometimes almost everything, is at others worse than nothing.

But with William and Fanny Price it was still a sentiment in all its prime and freshness, wounded by no opposition of interest, cooled by no separate attachment, and feeling the influence of time and absence only in its increase.
An affection so amiable was advancing each in the opinion of all who had hearts to value anything good.

Henry Crawford was as much struck with it as any.

He honoured the warm-hearted, blunt fondness of the young sailor, which led him to say, with his hands stretched towards Fanny's head, "Do you know, I begin to like that queer fashion already, though when I first heard of such things being done in England, I could not believe it; and when Mrs.Brown, and the other women at the Commissioner's at Gibraltar, appeared in the same trim, I thought they were mad; but Fanny can reconcile me to anything"; and saw, with lively admiration, the glow of Fanny's cheek, the brightness of her eye, the deep interest, the absorbed attention, while her brother was describing any of the imminent hazards, or terrific scenes, which such a period at sea must supply.
It was a picture which Henry Crawford had moral taste enough to value.
Fanny's attractions increased--increased twofold; for the sensibility which beautified her complexion and illumined her countenance was an attraction in itself.