While the driver and Hannah brought
in the boxes, they demanded St.
in the boxes, they demanded St.
Jane Eyre- An Autobiography by Charlotte Brontë
--I am glad!
" I exclaimed.
St. John smiled. "Did I not say you neglected essential points to pursue
trifles? " he asked. "You were serious when I told you you had got a
fortune; and now, for a matter of no moment, you are excited. "
"What can you mean? It may be of no moment to you; you have sisters and
don't care for a cousin; but I had nobody; and now three relations,--or
two, if you don't choose to be counted,--are born into my world
full-grown. I say again, I am glad! "
I walked fast through the room: I stopped, half suffocated with the
thoughts that rose faster than I could receive, comprehend, settle
them:--thoughts of what might, could, would, and should be, and that ere
long. I looked at the blank wall: it seemed a sky thick with ascending
stars,--every one lit me to a purpose or delight. Those who had saved my
life, whom, till this hour, I had loved barrenly, I could now benefit.
They were under a yoke,--I could free them: they were scattered,--I could
reunite them: the independence, the affluence which was mine, might be
theirs too. Were we not four? Twenty thousand pounds shared equally
would be five thousand each, justice--enough and to spare: justice would
be done,--mutual happiness secured. Now the wealth did not weigh on me:
now it was not a mere bequest of coin,--it was a legacy of life, hope,
enjoyment.
How I looked while these ideas were taking my spirit by storm, I cannot
tell; but I perceived soon that Mr. Rivers had placed a chair behind me,
and was gently attempting to make me sit down on it. He also advised me
to be composed; I scorned the insinuation of helplessness and
distraction, shook off his hand, and began to walk about again.
"Write to Diana and Mary to-morrow," I said, "and tell them to come home
directly. Diana said they would both consider themselves rich with a
thousand pounds, so with five thousand they will do very well. "
"Tell me where I can get you a glass of water," said St. John; "you must
really make an effort to tranquillise your feelings. "
"Nonsense! and what sort of an effect will the bequest have on you? Will
it keep you in England, induce you to marry Miss Oliver, and settle down
like an ordinary mortal? "
"You wander: your head becomes confused. I have been too abrupt in
communicating the news; it has excited you beyond your strength. "
"Mr. Rivers! you quite put me out of patience: I am rational enough; it
is you who misunderstand, or rather who affect to misunderstand. "
"Perhaps, if you explained yourself a little more fully, I should
comprehend better. "
"Explain! What is there to explain? You cannot fail to see that twenty
thousand pounds, the sum in question, divided equally between the nephew
and three nieces of our uncle, will give five thousand to each? What I
want is, that you should write to your sisters and tell them of the
fortune that has accrued to them. "
"To you, you mean. "
"I have intimated my view of the case: I am incapable of taking any
other. I am not brutally selfish, blindly unjust, or fiendishly
ungrateful. Besides, I am resolved I will have a home and connections. I
like Moor House, and I will live at Moor House; I like Diana and Mary,
and I will attach myself for life to Diana and Mary. It would please and
benefit me to have five thousand pounds; it would torment and oppress me
to have twenty thousand; which, moreover, could never be mine in justice,
though it might in law. I abandon to you, then, what is absolutely
superfluous to me. Let there be no opposition, and no discussion about
it; let us agree amongst each other, and decide the point at once. "
"This is acting on first impulses; you must take days to consider such a
matter, ere your word can be regarded as valid. "
"Oh! if all you doubt is my sincerity, I am easy: you see the justice of
the case? "
"I _do_ see a certain justice; but it is contrary to all custom. Besides,
the entire fortune is your right: my uncle gained it by his own efforts;
he was free to leave it to whom he would: he left it to you. After all,
justice permits you to keep it: you may, with a clear conscience,
consider it absolutely your own. "
"With me," said I, "it is fully as much a matter of feeling as of
conscience: I must indulge my feelings; I so seldom have had an
opportunity of doing so. Were you to argue, object, and annoy me for a
year, I could not forego the delicious pleasure of which I have caught a
glimpse--that of repaying, in part, a mighty obligation, and winning to
myself lifelong friends. "
"You think so now," rejoined St. John, "because you do not know what it
is to possess, nor consequently to enjoy wealth: you cannot form a notion
of the importance twenty thousand pounds would give you; of the place it
would enable you to take in society; of the prospects it would open to
you: you cannot--"
"And you," I interrupted, "cannot at all imagine the craving I have for
fraternal and sisterly love. I never had a home, I never had brothers or
sisters; I must and will have them now: you are not reluctant to admit me
and own me, are you? "
"Jane, I will be your brother--my sisters will be your sisters--without
stipulating for this sacrifice of your just rights. "
"Brother? Yes; at the distance of a thousand leagues! Sisters? Yes;
slaving amongst strangers! I, wealthy--gorged with gold I never earned
and do not merit! You, penniless! Famous equality and fraternisation!
Close union! Intimate attachment! "
"But, Jane, your aspirations after family ties and domestic happiness may
be realised otherwise than by the means you contemplate: you may marry. "
"Nonsense, again! Marry! I don't want to marry, and never shall marry. "
"That is saying too much: such hazardous affirmations are a proof of the
excitement under which you labour. "
"It is not saying too much: I know what I feel, and how averse are my
inclinations to the bare thought of marriage. No one would take me for
love; and I will not be regarded in the light of a mere money
speculation. And I do not want a stranger--unsympathising, alien,
different from me; I want my kindred: those with whom I have full fellow-
feeling. Say again you will be my brother: when you uttered the words I
was satisfied, happy; repeat them, if you can, repeat them sincerely. "
"I think I can. I know I have always loved my own sisters; and I know on
what my affection for them is grounded,--respect for their worth and
admiration of their talents. You too have principle and mind: your
tastes and habits resemble Diana's and Mary's; your presence is always
agreeable to me; in your conversation I have already for some time found
a salutary solace. I feel I can easily and naturally make room in my
heart for you, as my third and youngest sister. "
"Thank you: that contents me for to-night. Now you had better go; for if
you stay longer, you will perhaps irritate me afresh by some mistrustful
scruple. "
"And the school, Miss Eyre? It must now be shut up, I suppose? "
"No. I will retain my post of mistress till you get a substitute. "
He smiled approbation: we shook hands, and he took leave.
I need not narrate in detail the further struggles I had, and arguments I
used, to get matters regarding the legacy settled as I wished. My task
was a very hard one; but, as I was absolutely resolved--as my cousins saw
at length that my mind was really and immutably fixed on making a just
division of the property--as they must in their own hearts have felt the
equity of the intention; and must, besides, have been innately conscious
that in my place they would have done precisely what I wished to do--they
yielded at length so far as to consent to put the affair to arbitration.
The judges chosen were Mr. Oliver and an able lawyer: both coincided in
my opinion: I carried my point. The instruments of transfer were drawn
out: St. John, Diana, Mary, and I, each became possessed of a competency.
CHAPTER XXXIV
It was near Christmas by the time all was settled: the season of general
holiday approached. I now closed Morton school, taking care that the
parting should not be barren on my side. Good fortune opens the hand as
well as the heart wonderfully; and to give somewhat when we have largely
received, is but to afford a vent to the unusual ebullition of the
sensations. I had long felt with pleasure that many of my rustic
scholars liked me, and when we parted, that consciousness was confirmed:
they manifested their affection plainly and strongly. Deep was my
gratification to find I had really a place in their unsophisticated
hearts: I promised them that never a week should pass in future that I
did not visit them, and give them an hour's teaching in their school.
Mr. Rivers came up as, having seen the classes, now numbering sixty
girls, file out before me, and locked the door, I stood with the key in
my hand, exchanging a few words of special farewell with some half-dozen
of my best scholars: as decent, respectable, modest, and well-informed
young women as could be found in the ranks of the British peasantry. And
that is saying a great deal; for after all, the British peasantry are the
best taught, best mannered, most self-respecting of any in Europe: since
those days I have seen paysannes and Bauerinnen; and the best of them
seemed to me ignorant, coarse, and besotted, compared with my Morton
girls.
"Do you consider you have got your reward for a season of exertion? "
asked Mr. Rivers, when they were gone. "Does not the consciousness of
having done some real good in your day and generation give pleasure? "
"Doubtless. "
"And you have only toiled a few months! Would not a life devoted to the
task of regenerating your race be well spent? "
"Yes," I said; "but I could not go on for ever so: I want to enjoy my own
faculties as well as to cultivate those of other people. I must enjoy
them now; don't recall either my mind or body to the school; I am out of
it and disposed for full holiday. "
He looked grave. "What now? What sudden eagerness is this you evince?
What are you going to do? "
"To be active: as active as I can. And first I must beg you to set
Hannah at liberty, and get somebody else to wait on you. "
"Do you want her? "
"Yes, to go with me to Moor House. Diana and Mary will be at home in a
week, and I want to have everything in order against their arrival. "
"I understand. I thought you were for flying off on some excursion. It
is better so: Hannah shall go with you. "
"Tell her to be ready by to-morrow then; and here is the schoolroom key:
I will give you the key of my cottage in the morning. "
He took it. "You give it up very gleefully," said he; "I don't quite
understand your light-heartedness, because I cannot tell what employment
you propose to yourself as a substitute for the one you are
relinquishing. What aim, what purpose, what ambition in life have you
now? "
"My first aim will be to _clean down_ (do you comprehend the full force
of the expression? )--to _clean down_ Moor House from chamber to cellar;
my next to rub it up with bees-wax, oil, and an indefinite number of
cloths, till it glitters again; my third, to arrange every chair, table,
bed, carpet, with mathematical precision; afterwards I shall go near to
ruin you in coals and peat to keep up good fires in every room; and
lastly, the two days preceding that on which your sisters are expected
will be devoted by Hannah and me to such a beating of eggs, sorting of
currants, grating of spices, compounding of Christmas cakes, chopping up
of materials for mince-pies, and solemnising of other culinary rites, as
words can convey but an inadequate notion of to the uninitiated like you.
My purpose, in short, is to have all things in an absolutely perfect
state of readiness for Diana and Mary before next Thursday; and my
ambition is to give them a beau-ideal of a welcome when they come. "
St. John smiled slightly: still he was dissatisfied.
"It is all very well for the present," said he; "but seriously, I trust
that when the first flush of vivacity is over, you will look a little
higher than domestic endearments and household joys. "
"The best things the world has! " I interrupted.
"No, Jane, no: this world is not the scene of fruition; do not attempt to
make it so: nor of rest; do not turn slothful. "
"I mean, on the contrary, to be busy. "
"Jane, I excuse you for the present: two months' grace I allow you for
the full enjoyment of your new position, and for pleasing yourself with
this late-found charm of relationship; but _then_, I hope you will begin
to look beyond Moor House and Morton, and sisterly society, and the
selfish calm and sensual comfort of civilised affluence. I hope your
energies will then once more trouble you with their strength. "
I looked at him with surprise. "St. John," I said, "I think you are
almost wicked to talk so. I am disposed to be as content as a queen, and
you try to stir me up to restlessness! To what end? "
"To the end of turning to profit the talents which God has committed to
your keeping; and of which He will surely one day demand a strict
account. Jane, I shall watch you closely and anxiously--I warn you of
that. And try to restrain the disproportionate fervour with which you
throw yourself into commonplace home pleasures. Don't cling so
tenaciously to ties of the flesh; save your constancy and ardour for an
adequate cause; forbear to waste them on trite transient objects. Do you
hear, Jane? "
"Yes; just as if you were speaking Greek. I feel I have adequate cause
to be happy, and I _will_ be happy. Goodbye! "
Happy at Moor House I was, and hard I worked; and so did Hannah: she was
charmed to see how jovial I could be amidst the bustle of a house turned
topsy-turvy--how I could brush, and dust, and clean, and cook. And
really, after a day or two of confusion worse confounded, it was
delightful by degrees to invoke order from the chaos ourselves had made.
I had previously taken a journey to S--- to purchase some new furniture:
my cousins having given me _carte blanche_ to effect what alterations I
pleased, and a sum having been set aside for that purpose. The ordinary
sitting-room and bedrooms I left much as they were: for I knew Diana and
Mary would derive more pleasure from seeing again the old homely tables,
and chairs, and beds, than from the spectacle of the smartest
innovations. Still some novelty was necessary, to give to their return
the piquancy with which I wished it to be invested. Dark handsome new
carpets and curtains, an arrangement of some carefully selected antique
ornaments in porcelain and bronze, new coverings, and mirrors, and
dressing-cases, for the toilet tables, answered the end: they looked
fresh without being glaring. A spare parlour and bedroom I refurnished
entirely, with old mahogany and crimson upholstery: I laid canvas on the
passage, and carpets on the stairs. When all was finished, I thought
Moor House as complete a model of bright modest snugness within, as it
was, at this season, a specimen of wintry waste and desert dreariness
without.
The eventful Thursday at length came. They were expected about dark, and
ere dusk fires were lit upstairs and below; the kitchen was in perfect
trim; Hannah and I were dressed, and all was in readiness.
St. John arrived first. I had entreated him to keep quite clear of the
house till everything was arranged: and, indeed, the bare idea of the
commotion, at once sordid and trivial, going on within its walls sufficed
to scare him to estrangement. He found me in the kitchen, watching the
progress of certain cakes for tea, then baking. Approaching the hearth,
he asked, "If I was at last satisfied with housemaid's work? " I answered
by inviting him to accompany me on a general inspection of the result of
my labours. With some difficulty, I got him to make the tour of the
house. He just looked in at the doors I opened; and when he had wandered
upstairs and downstairs, he said I must have gone through a great deal of
fatigue and trouble to have effected such considerable changes in so
short a time: but not a syllable did he utter indicating pleasure in the
improved aspect of his abode.
This silence damped me. I thought perhaps the alterations had disturbed
some old associations he valued. I inquired whether this was the case:
no doubt in a somewhat crest-fallen tone.
"Not at all; he had, on the contrary, remarked that I had scrupulously
respected every association: he feared, indeed, I must have bestowed more
thought on the matter than it was worth. How many minutes, for instance,
had I devoted to studying the arrangement of this very room? --By-the-bye,
could I tell him where such a book was? "
I showed him the volume on the shelf: he took it down, and withdrawing to
his accustomed window recess, he began to read it.
Now, I did not like this, reader. St. John was a good man; but I began
to feel he had spoken truth of himself when he said he was hard and cold.
The humanities and amenities of life had no attraction for him--its
peaceful enjoyments no charm. Literally, he lived only to aspire--after
what was good and great, certainly; but still he would never rest, nor
approve of others resting round him. As I looked at his lofty forehead,
still and pale as a white stone--at his fine lineaments fixed in study--I
comprehended all at once that he would hardly make a good husband: that
it would be a trying thing to be his wife. I understood, as by
inspiration, the nature of his love for Miss Oliver; I agreed with him
that it was but a love of the senses. I comprehended how he should
despise himself for the feverish influence it exercised over him; how he
should wish to stifle and destroy it; how he should mistrust its ever
conducting permanently to his happiness or hers. I saw he was of the
material from which nature hews her heroes--Christian and Pagan--her
lawgivers, her statesmen, her conquerors: a steadfast bulwark for great
interests to rest upon; but, at the fireside, too often a cold cumbrous
column, gloomy and out of place.
"This parlour is not his sphere," I reflected: "the Himalayan ridge or
Caffre bush, even the plague-cursed Guinea Coast swamp would suit him
better. Well may he eschew the calm of domestic life; it is not his
element: there his faculties stagnate--they cannot develop or appear to
advantage. It is in scenes of strife and danger--where courage is
proved, and energy exercised, and fortitude tasked--that he will speak
and move, the leader and superior. A merry child would have the
advantage of him on this hearth. He is right to choose a missionary's
career--I see it now. "
"They are coming! they are coming! " cried Hannah, throwing open the
parlour door. At the same moment old Carlo barked joyfully. Out I ran.
It was now dark; but a rumbling of wheels was audible. Hannah soon had a
lantern lit. The vehicle had stopped at the wicket; the driver opened
the door: first one well-known form, then another, stepped out. In a
minute I had my face under their bonnets, in contact first with Mary's
soft cheek, then with Diana's flowing curls. They laughed--kissed
me--then Hannah: patted Carlo, who was half wild with delight; asked
eagerly if all was well; and being assured in the affirmative, hastened
into the house.
They were stiff with their long and jolting drive from Whitcross, and
chilled with the frosty night air; but their pleasant countenances
expanded to the cheerful firelight.
While the driver and Hannah brought
in the boxes, they demanded St. John. At this moment he advanced from
the parlour. They both threw their arms round his neck at once. He gave
each one quiet kiss, said in a low tone a few words of welcome, stood a
while to be talked to, and then, intimating that he supposed they would
soon rejoin him in the parlour, withdrew there as to a place of refuge.
I had lit their candles to go upstairs, but Diana had first to give
hospitable orders respecting the driver; this done, both followed me.
They were delighted with the renovation and decorations of their rooms;
with the new drapery, and fresh carpets, and rich tinted china vases:
they expressed their gratification ungrudgingly. I had the pleasure of
feeling that my arrangements met their wishes exactly, and that what I
had done added a vivid charm to their joyous return home.
Sweet was that evening. My cousins, full of exhilaration, were so
eloquent in narrative and comment, that their fluency covered St. John's
taciturnity: he was sincerely glad to see his sisters; but in their glow
of fervour and flow of joy he could not sympathise. The event of the
day--that is, the return of Diana and Mary--pleased him; but the
accompaniments of that event, the glad tumult, the garrulous glee of
reception irked him: I saw he wished the calmer morrow was come. In the
very meridian of the night's enjoyment, about an hour after tea, a rap
was heard at the door. Hannah entered with the intimation that "a poor
lad was come, at that unlikely time, to fetch Mr. Rivers to see his
mother, who was drawing away. "
"Where does she live, Hannah? "
"Clear up at Whitcross Brow, almost four miles off, and moor and moss all
the way. "
"Tell him I will go. "
"I'm sure, sir, you had better not. It's the worst road to travel after
dark that can be: there's no track at all over the bog. And then it is
such a bitter night--the keenest wind you ever felt. You had better send
word, sir, that you will be there in the morning. "
But he was already in the passage, putting on his cloak; and without one
objection, one murmur, he departed. It was then nine o'clock: he did not
return till midnight. Starved and tired enough he was: but he looked
happier than when he set out. He had performed an act of duty; made an
exertion; felt his own strength to do and deny, and was on better terms
with himself.
I am afraid the whole of the ensuing week tried his patience. It was
Christmas week: we took to no settled employment, but spent it in a sort
of merry domestic dissipation. The air of the moors, the freedom of
home, the dawn of prosperity, acted on Diana and Mary's spirits like some
life-giving elixir: they were gay from morning till noon, and from noon
till night. They could always talk; and their discourse, witty, pithy,
original, had such charms for me, that I preferred listening to, and
sharing in it, to doing anything else. St. John did not rebuke our
vivacity; but he escaped from it: he was seldom in the house; his parish
was large, the population scattered, and he found daily business in
visiting the sick and poor in its different districts.
One morning at breakfast, Diana, after looking a little pensive for some
minutes, asked him, "If his plans were yet unchanged. "
"Unchanged and unchangeable," was the reply. And he proceeded to inform
us that his departure from England was now definitively fixed for the
ensuing year.
"And Rosamond Oliver? " suggested Mary, the words seeming to escape her
lips involuntarily: for no sooner had she uttered them, than she made a
gesture as if wishing to recall them. St. John had a book in his hand--it
was his unsocial custom to read at meals--he closed it, and looked up.
"Rosamond Oliver," said he, "is about to be married to Mr. Granby, one of
the best connected and most estimable residents in S-, grandson and heir
to Sir Frederic Granby: I had the intelligence from her father
yesterday. "
His sisters looked at each other and at me; we all three looked at him:
he was serene as glass.
"The match must have been got up hastily," said Diana: "they cannot have
known each other long. "
"But two months: they met in October at the county ball at S-. But where
there are no obstacles to a union, as in the present case, where the
connection is in every point desirable, delays are unnecessary: they will
be married as soon as S--- Place, which Sir Frederic gives up to them,
can he refitted for their reception. "
The first time I found St. John alone after this communication, I felt
tempted to inquire if the event distressed him: but he seemed so little
to need sympathy, that, so far from venturing to offer him more, I
experienced some shame at the recollection of what I had already
hazarded. Besides, I was out of practice in talking to him: his reserve
was again frozen over, and my frankness was congealed beneath it. He had
not kept his promise of treating me like his sisters; he continually made
little chilling differences between us, which did not at all tend to the
development of cordiality: in short, now that I was acknowledged his
kinswoman, and lived under the same roof with him, I felt the distance
between us to be far greater than when he had known me only as the
village schoolmistress. When I remembered how far I had once been
admitted to his confidence, I could hardly comprehend his present
frigidity.
Such being the case, I felt not a little surprised when he raised his
head suddenly from the desk over which he was stooping, and said--
"You see, Jane, the battle is fought and the victory won. "
Startled at being thus addressed, I did not immediately reply: after a
moment's hesitation I answered--
"But are you sure you are not in the position of those conquerors whose
triumphs have cost them too dear? Would not such another ruin you? "
"I think not; and if I were, it does not much signify; I shall never be
called upon to contend for such another. The event of the conflict is
decisive: my way is now clear; I thank God for it! " So saying, he
returned to his papers and his silence.
As our mutual happiness (_i. e. _, Diana's, Mary's, and mine) settled into
a quieter character, and we resumed our usual habits and regular studies,
St. John stayed more at home: he sat with us in the same room, sometimes
for hours together. While Mary drew, Diana pursued a course of
encyclopaedic reading she had (to my awe and amazement) undertaken, and I
fagged away at German, he pondered a mystic lore of his own: that of some
Eastern tongue, the acquisition of which he thought necessary to his
plans.
Thus engaged, he appeared, sitting in his own recess, quiet and absorbed
enough; but that blue eye of his had a habit of leaving the outlandish-
looking grammar, and wandering over, and sometimes fixing upon us, his
fellow-students, with a curious intensity of observation: if caught, it
would be instantly withdrawn; yet ever and anon, it returned searchingly
to our table. I wondered what it meant: I wondered, too, at the punctual
satisfaction he never failed to exhibit on an occasion that seemed to me
of small moment, namely, my weekly visit to Morton school; and still more
was I puzzled when, if the day was unfavourable, if there was snow, or
rain, or high wind, and his sisters urged me not to go, he would
invariably make light of their solicitude, and encourage me to accomplish
the task without regard to the elements.
"Jane is not such a weakling as you would make her," he would say: "she
can bear a mountain blast, or a shower, or a few flakes of snow, as well
as any of us. Her constitution is both sound and elastic;--better
calculated to endure variations of climate than many more robust. "
And when I returned, sometimes a good deal tired, and not a little
weather-beaten, I never dared complain, because I saw that to murmur
would be to vex him: on all occasions fortitude pleased him; the reverse
was a special annoyance.
One afternoon, however, I got leave to stay at home, because I really had
a cold. His sisters were gone to Morton in my stead: I sat reading
Schiller; he, deciphering his crabbed Oriental scrolls. As I exchanged a
translation for an exercise, I happened to look his way: there I found
myself under the influence of the ever-watchful blue eye. How long it
had been searching me through and through, and over and over, I cannot
tell: so keen was it, and yet so cold, I felt for the moment
superstitious--as if I were sitting in the room with something uncanny.
"Jane, what are you doing? "
"Learning German. "
"I want you to give up German and learn Hindostanee. "
"You are not in earnest? "
"In such earnest that I must have it so: and I will tell you why. "
He then went on to explain that Hindostanee was the language he was
himself at present studying; that, as he advanced, he was apt to forget
the commencement; that it would assist him greatly to have a pupil with
whom he might again and again go over the elements, and so fix them
thoroughly in his mind; that his choice had hovered for some time between
me and his sisters; but that he had fixed on me because he saw I could
sit at a task the longest of the three. Would I do him this favour? I
should not, perhaps, have to make the sacrifice long, as it wanted now
barely three months to his departure.
St. John was not a man to be lightly refused: you felt that every
impression made on him, either for pain or pleasure, was deep-graved and
permanent. I consented. When Diana and Mary returned, the former found
her scholar transferred from her to her brother: she laughed, and both
she and Mary agreed that St. John should never have persuaded them to
such a step. He answered quietly--
"I know it. "
I found him a very patient, very forbearing, and yet an exacting master:
he expected me to do a great deal; and when I fulfilled his expectations,
he, in his own way, fully testified his approbation. By degrees, he
acquired a certain influence over me that took away my liberty of mind:
his praise and notice were more restraining than his indifference. I
could no longer talk or laugh freely when he was by, because a tiresomely
importunate instinct reminded me that vivacity (at least in me) was
distasteful to him. I was so fully aware that only serious moods and
occupations were acceptable, that in his presence every effort to sustain
or follow any other became vain: I fell under a freezing spell. When he
said "go," I went; "come," I came; "do this," I did it. But I did not
love my servitude: I wished, many a time, he had continued to neglect me.
One evening when, at bedtime, his sisters and I stood round him, bidding
him good-night, he kissed each of them, as was his custom; and, as was
equally his custom, he gave me his hand. Diana, who chanced to be in a
frolicsome humour (_she_ was not painfully controlled by his will; for
hers, in another way, was as strong), exclaimed--
"St. John! you used to call Jane your third sister, but you don't treat
her as such: you should kiss her too. "
She pushed me towards him. I thought Diana very provoking, and felt
uncomfortably confused; and while I was thus thinking and feeling, St.
John bent his head; his Greek face was brought to a level with mine, his
eyes questioned my eyes piercingly--he kissed me. There are no such
things as marble kisses or ice kisses, or I should say my ecclesiastical
cousin's salute belonged to one of these classes; but there may be
experiment kisses, and his was an experiment kiss. When given, he viewed
me to learn the result; it was not striking: I am sure I did not blush;
perhaps I might have turned a little pale, for I felt as if this kiss
were a seal affixed to my fetters. He never omitted the ceremony
afterwards, and the gravity and quiescence with which I underwent it,
seemed to invest it for him with a certain charm.
As for me, I daily wished more to please him; but to do so, I felt daily
more and more that I must disown half my nature, stifle half my
faculties, wrest my tastes from their original bent, force myself to the
adoption of pursuits for which I had no natural vocation. He wanted to
train me to an elevation I could never reach; it racked me hourly to
aspire to the standard he uplifted. The thing was as impossible as to
mould my irregular features to his correct and classic pattern, to give
to my changeable green eyes the sea-blue tint and solemn lustre of his
own.
Not his ascendancy alone, however, held me in thrall at present. Of late
it had been easy enough for me to look sad: a cankering evil sat at my
heart and drained my happiness at its source--the evil of suspense.
Perhaps you think I had forgotten Mr. Rochester, reader, amidst these
changes of place and fortune. Not for a moment. His idea was still with
me, because it was not a vapour sunshine could disperse, nor a
sand-traced effigy storms could wash away; it was a name graven on a
tablet, fated to last as long as the marble it inscribed. The craving to
know what had become of him followed me everywhere; when I was at Morton,
I re-entered my cottage every evening to think of that; and now at Moor
House, I sought my bedroom each night to brood over it.
In the course of my necessary correspondence with Mr. Briggs about the
will, I had inquired if he knew anything of Mr. Rochester's present
residence and state of health; but, as St. John had conjectured, he was
quite ignorant of all concerning him. I then wrote to Mrs. Fairfax,
entreating information on the subject. I had calculated with certainty
on this step answering my end: I felt sure it would elicit an early
answer. I was astonished when a fortnight passed without reply; but when
two months wore away, and day after day the post arrived and brought
nothing for me, I fell a prey to the keenest anxiety.
I wrote again: there was a chance of my first letter having missed.
Renewed hope followed renewed effort: it shone like the former for some
weeks, then, like it, it faded, flickered: not a line, not a word reached
me. When half a year wasted in vain expectancy, my hope died out, and
then I felt dark indeed.
A fine spring shone round me, which I could not enjoy. Summer
approached; Diana tried to cheer me: she said I looked ill, and wished to
accompany me to the sea-side. This St. John opposed; he said I did not
want dissipation, I wanted employment; my present life was too
purposeless, I required an aim; and, I suppose, by way of supplying
deficiencies, he prolonged still further my lessons in Hindostanee, and
grew more urgent in requiring their accomplishment: and I, like a fool,
never thought of resisting him--I could not resist him.
One day I had come to my studies in lower spirits than usual; the ebb was
occasioned by a poignantly felt disappointment. Hannah had told me in
the morning there was a letter for me, and when I went down to take it,
almost certain that the long-looked for tidings were vouchsafed me at
last, I found only an unimportant note from Mr. Briggs on business. The
bitter check had wrung from me some tears; and now, as I sat poring over
the crabbed characters and flourishing tropes of an Indian scribe, my
eyes filled again.
St. John called me to his side to read; in attempting to do this my voice
failed me: words were lost in sobs. He and I were the only occupants of
the parlour: Diana was practising her music in the drawing-room, Mary was
gardening--it was a very fine May day, clear, sunny, and breezy. My
companion expressed no surprise at this emotion, nor did he question me
as to its cause; he only said--
"We will wait a few minutes, Jane, till you are more composed. " And
while I smothered the paroxysm with all haste, he sat calm and patient,
leaning on his desk, and looking like a physician watching with the eye
of science an expected and fully understood crisis in a patient's malady.
Having stifled my sobs, wiped my eyes, and muttered something about not
being very well that morning, I resumed my task, and succeeded in
completing it. St. John put away my books and his, locked his desk, and
said--
"Now, Jane, you shall take a walk; and with me. "
"I will call Diana and Mary. "
"No; I want only one companion this morning, and that must be you. Put
on your things; go out by the kitchen-door: take the road towards the
head of Marsh Glen: I will join you in a moment. "
I know no medium: I never in my life have known any medium in my dealings
with positive, hard characters, antagonistic to my own, between absolute
submission and determined revolt. I have always faithfully observed the
one, up to the very moment of bursting, sometimes with volcanic
vehemence, into the other; and as neither present circumstances
warranted, nor my present mood inclined me to mutiny, I observed careful
obedience to St. John's directions; and in ten minutes I was treading the
wild track of the glen, side by side with him.
The breeze was from the west: it came over the hills, sweet with scents
of heath and rush; the sky was of stainless blue; the stream descending
the ravine, swelled with past spring rains, poured along plentiful and
clear, catching golden gleams from the sun, and sapphire tints from the
firmament. As we advanced and left the track, we trod a soft turf, mossy
fine and emerald green, minutely enamelled with a tiny white flower, and
spangled with a star-like yellow blossom: the hills, meantime, shut us
quite in; for the glen, towards its head, wound to their very core.
"Let us rest here," said St. John, as we reached the first stragglers of
a battalion of rocks, guarding a sort of pass, beyond which the beck
rushed down a waterfall; and where, still a little farther, the mountain
shook off turf and flower, had only heath for raiment and crag for
gem--where it exaggerated the wild to the savage, and exchanged the fresh
for the frowning--where it guarded the forlorn hope of solitude, and a
last refuge for silence.
I took a seat: St. John stood near me. He looked up the pass and down
the hollow; his glance wandered away with the stream, and returned to
traverse the unclouded heaven which coloured it: he removed his hat, let
the breeze stir his hair and kiss his brow. He seemed in communion with
the genius of the haunt: with his eye he bade farewell to something.
"And I shall see it again," he said aloud, "in dreams when I sleep by the
Ganges: and again in a more remote hour--when another slumber overcomes
me--on the shore of a darker stream! "
Strange words of a strange love! An austere patriot's passion for his
fatherland! He sat down; for half-an-hour we never spoke; neither he to
me nor I to him: that interval past, he recommenced--
"Jane, I go in six weeks; I have taken my berth in an East Indiaman which
sails on the 20th of June. "
"God will protect you; for you have undertaken His work," I answered.
"Yes," said he, "there is my glory and joy. I am the servant of an
infallible Master. I am not going out under human guidance, subject to
the defective laws and erring control of my feeble fellow-worms: my king,
my lawgiver, my captain, is the All-perfect. It seems strange to me that
all round me do not burn to enlist under the same banner,--to join in the
same enterprise. "
"All have not your powers, and it would be folly for the feeble to wish
to march with the strong. "
"I do not speak to the feeble, or think of them: I address only such as
are worthy of the work, and competent to accomplish it. "
"Those are few in number, and difficult to discover. "
"You say truly; but when found, it is right to stir them up--to urge and
exhort them to the effort--to show them what their gifts are, and why
they were given--to speak Heaven's message in their ear,--to offer them,
direct from God, a place in the ranks of His chosen. "
"If they are really qualified for the task, will not their own hearts be
the first to inform them of it? "
I felt as if an awful charm was framing round and gathering over me: I
trembled to hear some fatal word spoken which would at once declare and
rivet the spell.
"And what does _your_ heart say? " demanded St. John.
"My heart is mute,--my heart is mute," I answered, struck and thrilled.
"Then I must speak for it," continued the deep, relentless voice. "Jane,
come with me to India: come as my helpmeet and fellow-labourer. "
The glen and sky spun round: the hills heaved! It was as if I had heard
a summons from Heaven--as if a visionary messenger, like him of
Macedonia, had enounced, "Come over and help us! " But I was no
apostle,--I could not behold the herald,--I could not receive his call.
"Oh, St. John! " I cried, "have some mercy! "
I appealed to one who, in the discharge of what he believed his duty,
knew neither mercy nor remorse. He continued--
"God and nature intended you for a missionary's wife. It is not
personal, but mental endowments they have given you: you are formed for
labour, not for love. A missionary's wife you must--shall be. You shall
be mine: I claim you--not for my pleasure, but for my Sovereign's
service. "
"I am not fit for it: I have no vocation," I said.
He had calculated on these first objections: he was not irritated by
them. Indeed, as he leaned back against the crag behind him, folded his
arms on his chest, and fixed his countenance, I saw he was prepared for a
long and trying opposition, and had taken in a stock of patience to last
him to its close--resolved, however, that that close should be conquest
for him.
"Humility, Jane," said he, "is the groundwork of Christian virtues: you
say right that you are not fit for the work. Who is fit for it? Or who,
that ever was truly called, believed himself worthy of the summons? I,
for instance, am but dust and ashes. With St. Paul, I acknowledge myself
the chiefest of sinners; but I do not suffer this sense of my personal
vileness to daunt me. I know my Leader: that He is just as well as
mighty; and while He has chosen a feeble instrument to perform a great
task, He will, from the boundless stores of His providence, supply the
inadequacy of the means to the end. Think like me, Jane--trust like me.
It is the Rock of Ages I ask you to lean on: do not doubt but it will
bear the weight of your human weakness. "
"I do not understand a missionary life: I have never studied missionary
labours. "
"There I, humble as I am, can give you the aid you want: I can set you
your task from hour to hour; stand by you always; help you from moment to
moment. This I could do in the beginning: soon (for I know your powers)
you would be as strong and apt as myself, and would not require my help. "
"But my powers--where are they for this undertaking? I do not feel them.
Nothing speaks or stirs in me while you talk.
St. John smiled. "Did I not say you neglected essential points to pursue
trifles? " he asked. "You were serious when I told you you had got a
fortune; and now, for a matter of no moment, you are excited. "
"What can you mean? It may be of no moment to you; you have sisters and
don't care for a cousin; but I had nobody; and now three relations,--or
two, if you don't choose to be counted,--are born into my world
full-grown. I say again, I am glad! "
I walked fast through the room: I stopped, half suffocated with the
thoughts that rose faster than I could receive, comprehend, settle
them:--thoughts of what might, could, would, and should be, and that ere
long. I looked at the blank wall: it seemed a sky thick with ascending
stars,--every one lit me to a purpose or delight. Those who had saved my
life, whom, till this hour, I had loved barrenly, I could now benefit.
They were under a yoke,--I could free them: they were scattered,--I could
reunite them: the independence, the affluence which was mine, might be
theirs too. Were we not four? Twenty thousand pounds shared equally
would be five thousand each, justice--enough and to spare: justice would
be done,--mutual happiness secured. Now the wealth did not weigh on me:
now it was not a mere bequest of coin,--it was a legacy of life, hope,
enjoyment.
How I looked while these ideas were taking my spirit by storm, I cannot
tell; but I perceived soon that Mr. Rivers had placed a chair behind me,
and was gently attempting to make me sit down on it. He also advised me
to be composed; I scorned the insinuation of helplessness and
distraction, shook off his hand, and began to walk about again.
"Write to Diana and Mary to-morrow," I said, "and tell them to come home
directly. Diana said they would both consider themselves rich with a
thousand pounds, so with five thousand they will do very well. "
"Tell me where I can get you a glass of water," said St. John; "you must
really make an effort to tranquillise your feelings. "
"Nonsense! and what sort of an effect will the bequest have on you? Will
it keep you in England, induce you to marry Miss Oliver, and settle down
like an ordinary mortal? "
"You wander: your head becomes confused. I have been too abrupt in
communicating the news; it has excited you beyond your strength. "
"Mr. Rivers! you quite put me out of patience: I am rational enough; it
is you who misunderstand, or rather who affect to misunderstand. "
"Perhaps, if you explained yourself a little more fully, I should
comprehend better. "
"Explain! What is there to explain? You cannot fail to see that twenty
thousand pounds, the sum in question, divided equally between the nephew
and three nieces of our uncle, will give five thousand to each? What I
want is, that you should write to your sisters and tell them of the
fortune that has accrued to them. "
"To you, you mean. "
"I have intimated my view of the case: I am incapable of taking any
other. I am not brutally selfish, blindly unjust, or fiendishly
ungrateful. Besides, I am resolved I will have a home and connections. I
like Moor House, and I will live at Moor House; I like Diana and Mary,
and I will attach myself for life to Diana and Mary. It would please and
benefit me to have five thousand pounds; it would torment and oppress me
to have twenty thousand; which, moreover, could never be mine in justice,
though it might in law. I abandon to you, then, what is absolutely
superfluous to me. Let there be no opposition, and no discussion about
it; let us agree amongst each other, and decide the point at once. "
"This is acting on first impulses; you must take days to consider such a
matter, ere your word can be regarded as valid. "
"Oh! if all you doubt is my sincerity, I am easy: you see the justice of
the case? "
"I _do_ see a certain justice; but it is contrary to all custom. Besides,
the entire fortune is your right: my uncle gained it by his own efforts;
he was free to leave it to whom he would: he left it to you. After all,
justice permits you to keep it: you may, with a clear conscience,
consider it absolutely your own. "
"With me," said I, "it is fully as much a matter of feeling as of
conscience: I must indulge my feelings; I so seldom have had an
opportunity of doing so. Were you to argue, object, and annoy me for a
year, I could not forego the delicious pleasure of which I have caught a
glimpse--that of repaying, in part, a mighty obligation, and winning to
myself lifelong friends. "
"You think so now," rejoined St. John, "because you do not know what it
is to possess, nor consequently to enjoy wealth: you cannot form a notion
of the importance twenty thousand pounds would give you; of the place it
would enable you to take in society; of the prospects it would open to
you: you cannot--"
"And you," I interrupted, "cannot at all imagine the craving I have for
fraternal and sisterly love. I never had a home, I never had brothers or
sisters; I must and will have them now: you are not reluctant to admit me
and own me, are you? "
"Jane, I will be your brother--my sisters will be your sisters--without
stipulating for this sacrifice of your just rights. "
"Brother? Yes; at the distance of a thousand leagues! Sisters? Yes;
slaving amongst strangers! I, wealthy--gorged with gold I never earned
and do not merit! You, penniless! Famous equality and fraternisation!
Close union! Intimate attachment! "
"But, Jane, your aspirations after family ties and domestic happiness may
be realised otherwise than by the means you contemplate: you may marry. "
"Nonsense, again! Marry! I don't want to marry, and never shall marry. "
"That is saying too much: such hazardous affirmations are a proof of the
excitement under which you labour. "
"It is not saying too much: I know what I feel, and how averse are my
inclinations to the bare thought of marriage. No one would take me for
love; and I will not be regarded in the light of a mere money
speculation. And I do not want a stranger--unsympathising, alien,
different from me; I want my kindred: those with whom I have full fellow-
feeling. Say again you will be my brother: when you uttered the words I
was satisfied, happy; repeat them, if you can, repeat them sincerely. "
"I think I can. I know I have always loved my own sisters; and I know on
what my affection for them is grounded,--respect for their worth and
admiration of their talents. You too have principle and mind: your
tastes and habits resemble Diana's and Mary's; your presence is always
agreeable to me; in your conversation I have already for some time found
a salutary solace. I feel I can easily and naturally make room in my
heart for you, as my third and youngest sister. "
"Thank you: that contents me for to-night. Now you had better go; for if
you stay longer, you will perhaps irritate me afresh by some mistrustful
scruple. "
"And the school, Miss Eyre? It must now be shut up, I suppose? "
"No. I will retain my post of mistress till you get a substitute. "
He smiled approbation: we shook hands, and he took leave.
I need not narrate in detail the further struggles I had, and arguments I
used, to get matters regarding the legacy settled as I wished. My task
was a very hard one; but, as I was absolutely resolved--as my cousins saw
at length that my mind was really and immutably fixed on making a just
division of the property--as they must in their own hearts have felt the
equity of the intention; and must, besides, have been innately conscious
that in my place they would have done precisely what I wished to do--they
yielded at length so far as to consent to put the affair to arbitration.
The judges chosen were Mr. Oliver and an able lawyer: both coincided in
my opinion: I carried my point. The instruments of transfer were drawn
out: St. John, Diana, Mary, and I, each became possessed of a competency.
CHAPTER XXXIV
It was near Christmas by the time all was settled: the season of general
holiday approached. I now closed Morton school, taking care that the
parting should not be barren on my side. Good fortune opens the hand as
well as the heart wonderfully; and to give somewhat when we have largely
received, is but to afford a vent to the unusual ebullition of the
sensations. I had long felt with pleasure that many of my rustic
scholars liked me, and when we parted, that consciousness was confirmed:
they manifested their affection plainly and strongly. Deep was my
gratification to find I had really a place in their unsophisticated
hearts: I promised them that never a week should pass in future that I
did not visit them, and give them an hour's teaching in their school.
Mr. Rivers came up as, having seen the classes, now numbering sixty
girls, file out before me, and locked the door, I stood with the key in
my hand, exchanging a few words of special farewell with some half-dozen
of my best scholars: as decent, respectable, modest, and well-informed
young women as could be found in the ranks of the British peasantry. And
that is saying a great deal; for after all, the British peasantry are the
best taught, best mannered, most self-respecting of any in Europe: since
those days I have seen paysannes and Bauerinnen; and the best of them
seemed to me ignorant, coarse, and besotted, compared with my Morton
girls.
"Do you consider you have got your reward for a season of exertion? "
asked Mr. Rivers, when they were gone. "Does not the consciousness of
having done some real good in your day and generation give pleasure? "
"Doubtless. "
"And you have only toiled a few months! Would not a life devoted to the
task of regenerating your race be well spent? "
"Yes," I said; "but I could not go on for ever so: I want to enjoy my own
faculties as well as to cultivate those of other people. I must enjoy
them now; don't recall either my mind or body to the school; I am out of
it and disposed for full holiday. "
He looked grave. "What now? What sudden eagerness is this you evince?
What are you going to do? "
"To be active: as active as I can. And first I must beg you to set
Hannah at liberty, and get somebody else to wait on you. "
"Do you want her? "
"Yes, to go with me to Moor House. Diana and Mary will be at home in a
week, and I want to have everything in order against their arrival. "
"I understand. I thought you were for flying off on some excursion. It
is better so: Hannah shall go with you. "
"Tell her to be ready by to-morrow then; and here is the schoolroom key:
I will give you the key of my cottage in the morning. "
He took it. "You give it up very gleefully," said he; "I don't quite
understand your light-heartedness, because I cannot tell what employment
you propose to yourself as a substitute for the one you are
relinquishing. What aim, what purpose, what ambition in life have you
now? "
"My first aim will be to _clean down_ (do you comprehend the full force
of the expression? )--to _clean down_ Moor House from chamber to cellar;
my next to rub it up with bees-wax, oil, and an indefinite number of
cloths, till it glitters again; my third, to arrange every chair, table,
bed, carpet, with mathematical precision; afterwards I shall go near to
ruin you in coals and peat to keep up good fires in every room; and
lastly, the two days preceding that on which your sisters are expected
will be devoted by Hannah and me to such a beating of eggs, sorting of
currants, grating of spices, compounding of Christmas cakes, chopping up
of materials for mince-pies, and solemnising of other culinary rites, as
words can convey but an inadequate notion of to the uninitiated like you.
My purpose, in short, is to have all things in an absolutely perfect
state of readiness for Diana and Mary before next Thursday; and my
ambition is to give them a beau-ideal of a welcome when they come. "
St. John smiled slightly: still he was dissatisfied.
"It is all very well for the present," said he; "but seriously, I trust
that when the first flush of vivacity is over, you will look a little
higher than domestic endearments and household joys. "
"The best things the world has! " I interrupted.
"No, Jane, no: this world is not the scene of fruition; do not attempt to
make it so: nor of rest; do not turn slothful. "
"I mean, on the contrary, to be busy. "
"Jane, I excuse you for the present: two months' grace I allow you for
the full enjoyment of your new position, and for pleasing yourself with
this late-found charm of relationship; but _then_, I hope you will begin
to look beyond Moor House and Morton, and sisterly society, and the
selfish calm and sensual comfort of civilised affluence. I hope your
energies will then once more trouble you with their strength. "
I looked at him with surprise. "St. John," I said, "I think you are
almost wicked to talk so. I am disposed to be as content as a queen, and
you try to stir me up to restlessness! To what end? "
"To the end of turning to profit the talents which God has committed to
your keeping; and of which He will surely one day demand a strict
account. Jane, I shall watch you closely and anxiously--I warn you of
that. And try to restrain the disproportionate fervour with which you
throw yourself into commonplace home pleasures. Don't cling so
tenaciously to ties of the flesh; save your constancy and ardour for an
adequate cause; forbear to waste them on trite transient objects. Do you
hear, Jane? "
"Yes; just as if you were speaking Greek. I feel I have adequate cause
to be happy, and I _will_ be happy. Goodbye! "
Happy at Moor House I was, and hard I worked; and so did Hannah: she was
charmed to see how jovial I could be amidst the bustle of a house turned
topsy-turvy--how I could brush, and dust, and clean, and cook. And
really, after a day or two of confusion worse confounded, it was
delightful by degrees to invoke order from the chaos ourselves had made.
I had previously taken a journey to S--- to purchase some new furniture:
my cousins having given me _carte blanche_ to effect what alterations I
pleased, and a sum having been set aside for that purpose. The ordinary
sitting-room and bedrooms I left much as they were: for I knew Diana and
Mary would derive more pleasure from seeing again the old homely tables,
and chairs, and beds, than from the spectacle of the smartest
innovations. Still some novelty was necessary, to give to their return
the piquancy with which I wished it to be invested. Dark handsome new
carpets and curtains, an arrangement of some carefully selected antique
ornaments in porcelain and bronze, new coverings, and mirrors, and
dressing-cases, for the toilet tables, answered the end: they looked
fresh without being glaring. A spare parlour and bedroom I refurnished
entirely, with old mahogany and crimson upholstery: I laid canvas on the
passage, and carpets on the stairs. When all was finished, I thought
Moor House as complete a model of bright modest snugness within, as it
was, at this season, a specimen of wintry waste and desert dreariness
without.
The eventful Thursday at length came. They were expected about dark, and
ere dusk fires were lit upstairs and below; the kitchen was in perfect
trim; Hannah and I were dressed, and all was in readiness.
St. John arrived first. I had entreated him to keep quite clear of the
house till everything was arranged: and, indeed, the bare idea of the
commotion, at once sordid and trivial, going on within its walls sufficed
to scare him to estrangement. He found me in the kitchen, watching the
progress of certain cakes for tea, then baking. Approaching the hearth,
he asked, "If I was at last satisfied with housemaid's work? " I answered
by inviting him to accompany me on a general inspection of the result of
my labours. With some difficulty, I got him to make the tour of the
house. He just looked in at the doors I opened; and when he had wandered
upstairs and downstairs, he said I must have gone through a great deal of
fatigue and trouble to have effected such considerable changes in so
short a time: but not a syllable did he utter indicating pleasure in the
improved aspect of his abode.
This silence damped me. I thought perhaps the alterations had disturbed
some old associations he valued. I inquired whether this was the case:
no doubt in a somewhat crest-fallen tone.
"Not at all; he had, on the contrary, remarked that I had scrupulously
respected every association: he feared, indeed, I must have bestowed more
thought on the matter than it was worth. How many minutes, for instance,
had I devoted to studying the arrangement of this very room? --By-the-bye,
could I tell him where such a book was? "
I showed him the volume on the shelf: he took it down, and withdrawing to
his accustomed window recess, he began to read it.
Now, I did not like this, reader. St. John was a good man; but I began
to feel he had spoken truth of himself when he said he was hard and cold.
The humanities and amenities of life had no attraction for him--its
peaceful enjoyments no charm. Literally, he lived only to aspire--after
what was good and great, certainly; but still he would never rest, nor
approve of others resting round him. As I looked at his lofty forehead,
still and pale as a white stone--at his fine lineaments fixed in study--I
comprehended all at once that he would hardly make a good husband: that
it would be a trying thing to be his wife. I understood, as by
inspiration, the nature of his love for Miss Oliver; I agreed with him
that it was but a love of the senses. I comprehended how he should
despise himself for the feverish influence it exercised over him; how he
should wish to stifle and destroy it; how he should mistrust its ever
conducting permanently to his happiness or hers. I saw he was of the
material from which nature hews her heroes--Christian and Pagan--her
lawgivers, her statesmen, her conquerors: a steadfast bulwark for great
interests to rest upon; but, at the fireside, too often a cold cumbrous
column, gloomy and out of place.
"This parlour is not his sphere," I reflected: "the Himalayan ridge or
Caffre bush, even the plague-cursed Guinea Coast swamp would suit him
better. Well may he eschew the calm of domestic life; it is not his
element: there his faculties stagnate--they cannot develop or appear to
advantage. It is in scenes of strife and danger--where courage is
proved, and energy exercised, and fortitude tasked--that he will speak
and move, the leader and superior. A merry child would have the
advantage of him on this hearth. He is right to choose a missionary's
career--I see it now. "
"They are coming! they are coming! " cried Hannah, throwing open the
parlour door. At the same moment old Carlo barked joyfully. Out I ran.
It was now dark; but a rumbling of wheels was audible. Hannah soon had a
lantern lit. The vehicle had stopped at the wicket; the driver opened
the door: first one well-known form, then another, stepped out. In a
minute I had my face under their bonnets, in contact first with Mary's
soft cheek, then with Diana's flowing curls. They laughed--kissed
me--then Hannah: patted Carlo, who was half wild with delight; asked
eagerly if all was well; and being assured in the affirmative, hastened
into the house.
They were stiff with their long and jolting drive from Whitcross, and
chilled with the frosty night air; but their pleasant countenances
expanded to the cheerful firelight.
While the driver and Hannah brought
in the boxes, they demanded St. John. At this moment he advanced from
the parlour. They both threw their arms round his neck at once. He gave
each one quiet kiss, said in a low tone a few words of welcome, stood a
while to be talked to, and then, intimating that he supposed they would
soon rejoin him in the parlour, withdrew there as to a place of refuge.
I had lit their candles to go upstairs, but Diana had first to give
hospitable orders respecting the driver; this done, both followed me.
They were delighted with the renovation and decorations of their rooms;
with the new drapery, and fresh carpets, and rich tinted china vases:
they expressed their gratification ungrudgingly. I had the pleasure of
feeling that my arrangements met their wishes exactly, and that what I
had done added a vivid charm to their joyous return home.
Sweet was that evening. My cousins, full of exhilaration, were so
eloquent in narrative and comment, that their fluency covered St. John's
taciturnity: he was sincerely glad to see his sisters; but in their glow
of fervour and flow of joy he could not sympathise. The event of the
day--that is, the return of Diana and Mary--pleased him; but the
accompaniments of that event, the glad tumult, the garrulous glee of
reception irked him: I saw he wished the calmer morrow was come. In the
very meridian of the night's enjoyment, about an hour after tea, a rap
was heard at the door. Hannah entered with the intimation that "a poor
lad was come, at that unlikely time, to fetch Mr. Rivers to see his
mother, who was drawing away. "
"Where does she live, Hannah? "
"Clear up at Whitcross Brow, almost four miles off, and moor and moss all
the way. "
"Tell him I will go. "
"I'm sure, sir, you had better not. It's the worst road to travel after
dark that can be: there's no track at all over the bog. And then it is
such a bitter night--the keenest wind you ever felt. You had better send
word, sir, that you will be there in the morning. "
But he was already in the passage, putting on his cloak; and without one
objection, one murmur, he departed. It was then nine o'clock: he did not
return till midnight. Starved and tired enough he was: but he looked
happier than when he set out. He had performed an act of duty; made an
exertion; felt his own strength to do and deny, and was on better terms
with himself.
I am afraid the whole of the ensuing week tried his patience. It was
Christmas week: we took to no settled employment, but spent it in a sort
of merry domestic dissipation. The air of the moors, the freedom of
home, the dawn of prosperity, acted on Diana and Mary's spirits like some
life-giving elixir: they were gay from morning till noon, and from noon
till night. They could always talk; and their discourse, witty, pithy,
original, had such charms for me, that I preferred listening to, and
sharing in it, to doing anything else. St. John did not rebuke our
vivacity; but he escaped from it: he was seldom in the house; his parish
was large, the population scattered, and he found daily business in
visiting the sick and poor in its different districts.
One morning at breakfast, Diana, after looking a little pensive for some
minutes, asked him, "If his plans were yet unchanged. "
"Unchanged and unchangeable," was the reply. And he proceeded to inform
us that his departure from England was now definitively fixed for the
ensuing year.
"And Rosamond Oliver? " suggested Mary, the words seeming to escape her
lips involuntarily: for no sooner had she uttered them, than she made a
gesture as if wishing to recall them. St. John had a book in his hand--it
was his unsocial custom to read at meals--he closed it, and looked up.
"Rosamond Oliver," said he, "is about to be married to Mr. Granby, one of
the best connected and most estimable residents in S-, grandson and heir
to Sir Frederic Granby: I had the intelligence from her father
yesterday. "
His sisters looked at each other and at me; we all three looked at him:
he was serene as glass.
"The match must have been got up hastily," said Diana: "they cannot have
known each other long. "
"But two months: they met in October at the county ball at S-. But where
there are no obstacles to a union, as in the present case, where the
connection is in every point desirable, delays are unnecessary: they will
be married as soon as S--- Place, which Sir Frederic gives up to them,
can he refitted for their reception. "
The first time I found St. John alone after this communication, I felt
tempted to inquire if the event distressed him: but he seemed so little
to need sympathy, that, so far from venturing to offer him more, I
experienced some shame at the recollection of what I had already
hazarded. Besides, I was out of practice in talking to him: his reserve
was again frozen over, and my frankness was congealed beneath it. He had
not kept his promise of treating me like his sisters; he continually made
little chilling differences between us, which did not at all tend to the
development of cordiality: in short, now that I was acknowledged his
kinswoman, and lived under the same roof with him, I felt the distance
between us to be far greater than when he had known me only as the
village schoolmistress. When I remembered how far I had once been
admitted to his confidence, I could hardly comprehend his present
frigidity.
Such being the case, I felt not a little surprised when he raised his
head suddenly from the desk over which he was stooping, and said--
"You see, Jane, the battle is fought and the victory won. "
Startled at being thus addressed, I did not immediately reply: after a
moment's hesitation I answered--
"But are you sure you are not in the position of those conquerors whose
triumphs have cost them too dear? Would not such another ruin you? "
"I think not; and if I were, it does not much signify; I shall never be
called upon to contend for such another. The event of the conflict is
decisive: my way is now clear; I thank God for it! " So saying, he
returned to his papers and his silence.
As our mutual happiness (_i. e. _, Diana's, Mary's, and mine) settled into
a quieter character, and we resumed our usual habits and regular studies,
St. John stayed more at home: he sat with us in the same room, sometimes
for hours together. While Mary drew, Diana pursued a course of
encyclopaedic reading she had (to my awe and amazement) undertaken, and I
fagged away at German, he pondered a mystic lore of his own: that of some
Eastern tongue, the acquisition of which he thought necessary to his
plans.
Thus engaged, he appeared, sitting in his own recess, quiet and absorbed
enough; but that blue eye of his had a habit of leaving the outlandish-
looking grammar, and wandering over, and sometimes fixing upon us, his
fellow-students, with a curious intensity of observation: if caught, it
would be instantly withdrawn; yet ever and anon, it returned searchingly
to our table. I wondered what it meant: I wondered, too, at the punctual
satisfaction he never failed to exhibit on an occasion that seemed to me
of small moment, namely, my weekly visit to Morton school; and still more
was I puzzled when, if the day was unfavourable, if there was snow, or
rain, or high wind, and his sisters urged me not to go, he would
invariably make light of their solicitude, and encourage me to accomplish
the task without regard to the elements.
"Jane is not such a weakling as you would make her," he would say: "she
can bear a mountain blast, or a shower, or a few flakes of snow, as well
as any of us. Her constitution is both sound and elastic;--better
calculated to endure variations of climate than many more robust. "
And when I returned, sometimes a good deal tired, and not a little
weather-beaten, I never dared complain, because I saw that to murmur
would be to vex him: on all occasions fortitude pleased him; the reverse
was a special annoyance.
One afternoon, however, I got leave to stay at home, because I really had
a cold. His sisters were gone to Morton in my stead: I sat reading
Schiller; he, deciphering his crabbed Oriental scrolls. As I exchanged a
translation for an exercise, I happened to look his way: there I found
myself under the influence of the ever-watchful blue eye. How long it
had been searching me through and through, and over and over, I cannot
tell: so keen was it, and yet so cold, I felt for the moment
superstitious--as if I were sitting in the room with something uncanny.
"Jane, what are you doing? "
"Learning German. "
"I want you to give up German and learn Hindostanee. "
"You are not in earnest? "
"In such earnest that I must have it so: and I will tell you why. "
He then went on to explain that Hindostanee was the language he was
himself at present studying; that, as he advanced, he was apt to forget
the commencement; that it would assist him greatly to have a pupil with
whom he might again and again go over the elements, and so fix them
thoroughly in his mind; that his choice had hovered for some time between
me and his sisters; but that he had fixed on me because he saw I could
sit at a task the longest of the three. Would I do him this favour? I
should not, perhaps, have to make the sacrifice long, as it wanted now
barely three months to his departure.
St. John was not a man to be lightly refused: you felt that every
impression made on him, either for pain or pleasure, was deep-graved and
permanent. I consented. When Diana and Mary returned, the former found
her scholar transferred from her to her brother: she laughed, and both
she and Mary agreed that St. John should never have persuaded them to
such a step. He answered quietly--
"I know it. "
I found him a very patient, very forbearing, and yet an exacting master:
he expected me to do a great deal; and when I fulfilled his expectations,
he, in his own way, fully testified his approbation. By degrees, he
acquired a certain influence over me that took away my liberty of mind:
his praise and notice were more restraining than his indifference. I
could no longer talk or laugh freely when he was by, because a tiresomely
importunate instinct reminded me that vivacity (at least in me) was
distasteful to him. I was so fully aware that only serious moods and
occupations were acceptable, that in his presence every effort to sustain
or follow any other became vain: I fell under a freezing spell. When he
said "go," I went; "come," I came; "do this," I did it. But I did not
love my servitude: I wished, many a time, he had continued to neglect me.
One evening when, at bedtime, his sisters and I stood round him, bidding
him good-night, he kissed each of them, as was his custom; and, as was
equally his custom, he gave me his hand. Diana, who chanced to be in a
frolicsome humour (_she_ was not painfully controlled by his will; for
hers, in another way, was as strong), exclaimed--
"St. John! you used to call Jane your third sister, but you don't treat
her as such: you should kiss her too. "
She pushed me towards him. I thought Diana very provoking, and felt
uncomfortably confused; and while I was thus thinking and feeling, St.
John bent his head; his Greek face was brought to a level with mine, his
eyes questioned my eyes piercingly--he kissed me. There are no such
things as marble kisses or ice kisses, or I should say my ecclesiastical
cousin's salute belonged to one of these classes; but there may be
experiment kisses, and his was an experiment kiss. When given, he viewed
me to learn the result; it was not striking: I am sure I did not blush;
perhaps I might have turned a little pale, for I felt as if this kiss
were a seal affixed to my fetters. He never omitted the ceremony
afterwards, and the gravity and quiescence with which I underwent it,
seemed to invest it for him with a certain charm.
As for me, I daily wished more to please him; but to do so, I felt daily
more and more that I must disown half my nature, stifle half my
faculties, wrest my tastes from their original bent, force myself to the
adoption of pursuits for which I had no natural vocation. He wanted to
train me to an elevation I could never reach; it racked me hourly to
aspire to the standard he uplifted. The thing was as impossible as to
mould my irregular features to his correct and classic pattern, to give
to my changeable green eyes the sea-blue tint and solemn lustre of his
own.
Not his ascendancy alone, however, held me in thrall at present. Of late
it had been easy enough for me to look sad: a cankering evil sat at my
heart and drained my happiness at its source--the evil of suspense.
Perhaps you think I had forgotten Mr. Rochester, reader, amidst these
changes of place and fortune. Not for a moment. His idea was still with
me, because it was not a vapour sunshine could disperse, nor a
sand-traced effigy storms could wash away; it was a name graven on a
tablet, fated to last as long as the marble it inscribed. The craving to
know what had become of him followed me everywhere; when I was at Morton,
I re-entered my cottage every evening to think of that; and now at Moor
House, I sought my bedroom each night to brood over it.
In the course of my necessary correspondence with Mr. Briggs about the
will, I had inquired if he knew anything of Mr. Rochester's present
residence and state of health; but, as St. John had conjectured, he was
quite ignorant of all concerning him. I then wrote to Mrs. Fairfax,
entreating information on the subject. I had calculated with certainty
on this step answering my end: I felt sure it would elicit an early
answer. I was astonished when a fortnight passed without reply; but when
two months wore away, and day after day the post arrived and brought
nothing for me, I fell a prey to the keenest anxiety.
I wrote again: there was a chance of my first letter having missed.
Renewed hope followed renewed effort: it shone like the former for some
weeks, then, like it, it faded, flickered: not a line, not a word reached
me. When half a year wasted in vain expectancy, my hope died out, and
then I felt dark indeed.
A fine spring shone round me, which I could not enjoy. Summer
approached; Diana tried to cheer me: she said I looked ill, and wished to
accompany me to the sea-side. This St. John opposed; he said I did not
want dissipation, I wanted employment; my present life was too
purposeless, I required an aim; and, I suppose, by way of supplying
deficiencies, he prolonged still further my lessons in Hindostanee, and
grew more urgent in requiring their accomplishment: and I, like a fool,
never thought of resisting him--I could not resist him.
One day I had come to my studies in lower spirits than usual; the ebb was
occasioned by a poignantly felt disappointment. Hannah had told me in
the morning there was a letter for me, and when I went down to take it,
almost certain that the long-looked for tidings were vouchsafed me at
last, I found only an unimportant note from Mr. Briggs on business. The
bitter check had wrung from me some tears; and now, as I sat poring over
the crabbed characters and flourishing tropes of an Indian scribe, my
eyes filled again.
St. John called me to his side to read; in attempting to do this my voice
failed me: words were lost in sobs. He and I were the only occupants of
the parlour: Diana was practising her music in the drawing-room, Mary was
gardening--it was a very fine May day, clear, sunny, and breezy. My
companion expressed no surprise at this emotion, nor did he question me
as to its cause; he only said--
"We will wait a few minutes, Jane, till you are more composed. " And
while I smothered the paroxysm with all haste, he sat calm and patient,
leaning on his desk, and looking like a physician watching with the eye
of science an expected and fully understood crisis in a patient's malady.
Having stifled my sobs, wiped my eyes, and muttered something about not
being very well that morning, I resumed my task, and succeeded in
completing it. St. John put away my books and his, locked his desk, and
said--
"Now, Jane, you shall take a walk; and with me. "
"I will call Diana and Mary. "
"No; I want only one companion this morning, and that must be you. Put
on your things; go out by the kitchen-door: take the road towards the
head of Marsh Glen: I will join you in a moment. "
I know no medium: I never in my life have known any medium in my dealings
with positive, hard characters, antagonistic to my own, between absolute
submission and determined revolt. I have always faithfully observed the
one, up to the very moment of bursting, sometimes with volcanic
vehemence, into the other; and as neither present circumstances
warranted, nor my present mood inclined me to mutiny, I observed careful
obedience to St. John's directions; and in ten minutes I was treading the
wild track of the glen, side by side with him.
The breeze was from the west: it came over the hills, sweet with scents
of heath and rush; the sky was of stainless blue; the stream descending
the ravine, swelled with past spring rains, poured along plentiful and
clear, catching golden gleams from the sun, and sapphire tints from the
firmament. As we advanced and left the track, we trod a soft turf, mossy
fine and emerald green, minutely enamelled with a tiny white flower, and
spangled with a star-like yellow blossom: the hills, meantime, shut us
quite in; for the glen, towards its head, wound to their very core.
"Let us rest here," said St. John, as we reached the first stragglers of
a battalion of rocks, guarding a sort of pass, beyond which the beck
rushed down a waterfall; and where, still a little farther, the mountain
shook off turf and flower, had only heath for raiment and crag for
gem--where it exaggerated the wild to the savage, and exchanged the fresh
for the frowning--where it guarded the forlorn hope of solitude, and a
last refuge for silence.
I took a seat: St. John stood near me. He looked up the pass and down
the hollow; his glance wandered away with the stream, and returned to
traverse the unclouded heaven which coloured it: he removed his hat, let
the breeze stir his hair and kiss his brow. He seemed in communion with
the genius of the haunt: with his eye he bade farewell to something.
"And I shall see it again," he said aloud, "in dreams when I sleep by the
Ganges: and again in a more remote hour--when another slumber overcomes
me--on the shore of a darker stream! "
Strange words of a strange love! An austere patriot's passion for his
fatherland! He sat down; for half-an-hour we never spoke; neither he to
me nor I to him: that interval past, he recommenced--
"Jane, I go in six weeks; I have taken my berth in an East Indiaman which
sails on the 20th of June. "
"God will protect you; for you have undertaken His work," I answered.
"Yes," said he, "there is my glory and joy. I am the servant of an
infallible Master. I am not going out under human guidance, subject to
the defective laws and erring control of my feeble fellow-worms: my king,
my lawgiver, my captain, is the All-perfect. It seems strange to me that
all round me do not burn to enlist under the same banner,--to join in the
same enterprise. "
"All have not your powers, and it would be folly for the feeble to wish
to march with the strong. "
"I do not speak to the feeble, or think of them: I address only such as
are worthy of the work, and competent to accomplish it. "
"Those are few in number, and difficult to discover. "
"You say truly; but when found, it is right to stir them up--to urge and
exhort them to the effort--to show them what their gifts are, and why
they were given--to speak Heaven's message in their ear,--to offer them,
direct from God, a place in the ranks of His chosen. "
"If they are really qualified for the task, will not their own hearts be
the first to inform them of it? "
I felt as if an awful charm was framing round and gathering over me: I
trembled to hear some fatal word spoken which would at once declare and
rivet the spell.
"And what does _your_ heart say? " demanded St. John.
"My heart is mute,--my heart is mute," I answered, struck and thrilled.
"Then I must speak for it," continued the deep, relentless voice. "Jane,
come with me to India: come as my helpmeet and fellow-labourer. "
The glen and sky spun round: the hills heaved! It was as if I had heard
a summons from Heaven--as if a visionary messenger, like him of
Macedonia, had enounced, "Come over and help us! " But I was no
apostle,--I could not behold the herald,--I could not receive his call.
"Oh, St. John! " I cried, "have some mercy! "
I appealed to one who, in the discharge of what he believed his duty,
knew neither mercy nor remorse. He continued--
"God and nature intended you for a missionary's wife. It is not
personal, but mental endowments they have given you: you are formed for
labour, not for love. A missionary's wife you must--shall be. You shall
be mine: I claim you--not for my pleasure, but for my Sovereign's
service. "
"I am not fit for it: I have no vocation," I said.
He had calculated on these first objections: he was not irritated by
them. Indeed, as he leaned back against the crag behind him, folded his
arms on his chest, and fixed his countenance, I saw he was prepared for a
long and trying opposition, and had taken in a stock of patience to last
him to its close--resolved, however, that that close should be conquest
for him.
"Humility, Jane," said he, "is the groundwork of Christian virtues: you
say right that you are not fit for the work. Who is fit for it? Or who,
that ever was truly called, believed himself worthy of the summons? I,
for instance, am but dust and ashes. With St. Paul, I acknowledge myself
the chiefest of sinners; but I do not suffer this sense of my personal
vileness to daunt me. I know my Leader: that He is just as well as
mighty; and while He has chosen a feeble instrument to perform a great
task, He will, from the boundless stores of His providence, supply the
inadequacy of the means to the end. Think like me, Jane--trust like me.
It is the Rock of Ages I ask you to lean on: do not doubt but it will
bear the weight of your human weakness. "
"I do not understand a missionary life: I have never studied missionary
labours. "
"There I, humble as I am, can give you the aid you want: I can set you
your task from hour to hour; stand by you always; help you from moment to
moment. This I could do in the beginning: soon (for I know your powers)
you would be as strong and apt as myself, and would not require my help. "
"But my powers--where are they for this undertaking? I do not feel them.
Nothing speaks or stirs in me while you talk.
