Jane Eyre: An Autobiography
“To Miss Temple? Oh, no! I wish it did: she has to answer to Mr.
Brocklehurst for all she does. Mr. Brocklehurst buys all our food and
all our clothes.”
“Does he live here?”
“No—two miles off, at a large hall.”
“Is he a good man?”
“He is a clergyman, and is said to do a great deal of good.”
“Did you say that tall lady was called Miss Temple?”
“Yes.”
“And what are the other teachers called?”
“The one with red cheeks is called Miss Smith; she attends to the work,
and cuts out—for we make our own clothes, our frocks, and pelisses, and
everything; the little one with black hair is Miss Scatcherd; she
teaches history and grammar, and hears the second class repetitions;
and the one who wears a shawl, and has a pocket-handkerchief tied to
her side with a yellow ribband, is Madame Pierrot: she comes from
Lisle, in France, and teaches French.”
“Do you like the teachers?”
“Well enough.”
“Do you like the little black one, and the Madame ——?—I cannot
pronounce her name as you do.”
“Miss Scatcherd is hasty—you must take care not to offend her; Madame
Pierrot is not a bad sort of person.”
“But Miss Temple is the best—isn’t she?”
“Miss Temple is very good and very clever; she is above the rest,
because she knows far more than they do.”
“Have you been long here?”
“Two years.”
“Are you an orphan?”
“My mother is dead.”
“Are you happy here?”
“You ask rather too many questions. I have given you answers enough for
the present: now I want to read.”
But at that moment the summons sounded for dinner; all re-entered the
house. The odour which now filled the refectory was scarcely more
appetising than that which had regaled our nostrils at breakfast: the
dinner was served in two huge tin-plated vessels, whence rose a strong
steam redolent of rancid fat. I found the mess to consist of
indifferent potatoes and strange shreds of rusty meat, mixed and cooked
together. Of this preparation a tolerably abundant plateful was
apportioned to each pupil. I ate what I could, and wondered within
myself whether every day’s fare would be like this.
After dinner, we immediately adjourned to the schoolroom: lessons
recommenced, and were continued till five o’clock.
The only marked event of the afternoon was, that I saw the girl with
whom I had conversed in the verandah dismissed in disgrace by Miss
Scatcherd from a history class, and sent to stand in the middle of the
large schoolroom. The punishment seemed to me in a high degree
ignominious, especially for so great a girl—she looked thirteen or
upwards. I expected she would show signs of great distress and shame;
but to my surprise she neither wept nor blushed: composed, though
grave, she stood, the central mark of all eyes. “How can she bear it so
quietly—so firmly?” I asked of myself. “Were I in her place, it seems
to me I should wish the earth to open and swallow me up. She looks as
if she were thinking of something beyond her punishment—beyond her
situation: of something not round her nor before her. I have heard of
day-dreams—is she in a day-dream now? Her eyes are fixed on the floor,
but I am sure they do not see it—her sight seems turned in, gone down
into her heart: she is looking at what she can remember, I believe; not
at what is really present. I wonder what sort of a girl she is—whether
good or naughty.”
Soon after five P.M. we had another meal, consisting of a small mug of
coffee, and half-a-slice of brown bread. I devoured my bread and drank
my coffee with relish; but I should have been glad of as much more—I
was still hungry. Half-an-hour’s recreation succeeded, then study; then
the glass of water and the piece of oat-cake, prayers, and bed. Such
was my first day at Lowood.
CHAPTER VI
The next day commenced as before, getting up and dressing by rushlight;
but this morning we were obliged to dispense with the ceremony of
washing; the water in the pitchers was frozen. A change had taken place
in the weather the preceding evening, and a keen north-east wind,
whistling through the crevices of our bedroom windows all night long,
had made us shiver in our beds, and turned the contents of the ewers to
ice.
Before the long hour and a half of prayers and Bible-reading was over,
I felt ready to perish with cold. Breakfast-time came at last, and this
morning the porridge was not burnt; the quality was eatable, the
quantity small. How small my portion seemed! I wished it had been
doubled.
In the course of the day I was enrolled a member of the fourth class,
and regular tasks and occupations were assigned me: hitherto, I had
only been a spectator of the proceedings at Lowood; I was now to become
an actor therein. At first, being little accustomed to learn by heart,
the lessons appeared to me both long and difficult; the frequent change
from task to task, too, bewildered me; and I was glad when, about three
o’clock in the afternoon, Miss Smith put into my hands a border of
muslin two yards long, together with needle, thimble, &c., and sent me
to sit in a quiet corner of the schoolroom, with directions to hem the
same. At that hour most of the others were sewing likewise; but one
class still stood round Miss Scatcherd’s chair reading, and as all was
quiet, the subject of their lessons could be heard, together with the
manner in which each girl acquitted herself, and the animadversions or
commendations of Miss Scatcherd on the performance. It was English
history: among the readers I observed my acquaintance of the verandah:
at the commencement of the lesson, her place had been at the top of the
class, but for some error of pronunciation, or some inattention to
stops, she was suddenly sent to the very bottom. Even in that obscure
position, Miss Scatcherd continued to make her an object of constant
notice: she was continually addressing to her such phrases as the
following:—
“Burns” (such it seems was her name: the girls here were all called by
their surnames, as boys are elsewhere), “Burns, you are standing on the
side of your shoe; turn your toes out immediately.” “Burns, you poke
your chin most unpleasantly; draw it in.” “Burns, I insist on your
holding your head up; I will not have you before me in that attitude,”
&c. &c.
A chapter having been read through twice, the books were closed and the
girls examined. The lesson had comprised part of the reign of Charles
I., and there were sundry questions about tonnage and poundage and
ship-money, which most of them appeared unable to answer; still, every
little difficulty was solved instantly when it reached Burns: her
memory seemed to have retained the substance of the whole lesson, and
she was ready with answers on every point. I kept expecting that Miss
Scatcherd would praise her attention; but, instead of that, she
suddenly cried out—
“You dirty, disagreeable girl! you have never cleaned your nails this
morning!”
Burns made no answer: I wondered at her silence.
“Why,” thought I, “does she not explain that she could neither clean
her nails nor wash her face, as the water was frozen?”
My attention was now called off by Miss Smith desiring me to hold a
skein of thread: while she was winding it, she talked to me from time
to time, asking whether I had ever been at school before, whether I
could mark, stitch, knit, &c.; till she dismissed me, I could not
pursue my observations on Miss Scatcherd’s movements. When I returned
to my seat, that lady was just delivering an order of which I did not
catch the import; but Burns immediately left the class, and going into
the small inner room where the books were kept, returned in half a
minute, carrying in her hand a bundle of twigs tied together at one
end. This ominous tool she presented to Miss Scatcherd with a
respectful curtesy; then she quietly, and without being told, unloosed
her pinafore, and the teacher instantly and sharply inflicted on her
neck a dozen strokes with the bunch of twigs. Not a tear rose to Burns’
eye; and, while I paused from my sewing, because my fingers quivered at
this spectacle with a sentiment of unavailing and impotent anger, not a
feature of her pensive face altered its ordinary expression.
“Hardened girl!” exclaimed Miss Scatcherd; “nothing can correct you of
your slatternly habits: carry the rod away.”
Burns obeyed: I looked at her narrowly as she emerged from the
book-closet; she was just putting back her handkerchief into her
pocket, and the trace of a tear glistened on her thin cheek.
The play-hour in the evening I thought the pleasantest fraction of the
day at Lowood: the bit of bread, the draught of coffee swallowed at
five o’clock had revived vitality, if it had not satisfied hunger: the
long restraint of the day was slackened; the schoolroom felt warmer
than in the morning—its fires being allowed to burn a little more
brightly, to supply, in some measure, the place of candles, not yet
introduced: the ruddy gloaming, the licensed uproar, the confusion of
many voices gave one a welcome sense of liberty.
On the evening of the day on which I had seen Miss Scatcherd flog her
pupil, Burns, I wandered as usual among the forms and tables and
laughing groups without a companion, yet not feeling lonely: when I
passed the windows, I now and then lifted a blind, and looked out; it
snowed fast, a drift was already forming against the lower panes;
putting my ear close to the window, I could distinguish from the
gleeful tumult within, the disconsolate moan of the wind outside.
Probably, if I had lately left a good home and kind parents, this would
have been the hour when I should most keenly have regretted the
separation; that wind would then have saddened my heart; this obscure
chaos would have disturbed my peace! as it was, I derived from both a
strange excitement, and reckless and feverish, I wished the wind to
howl more wildly, the gloom to deepen to darkness, and the confusion to
rise to clamour.
Jumping over forms, and creeping under tables, I made my way to one of
the fire-places; there, kneeling by the high wire fender, I found
Burns, absorbed, silent, abstracted from all round her by the
companionship of a book, which she read by the dim glare of the embers.
“Is it still ‘Rasselas’?” I asked, coming behind her.
“Yes,” she said, “and I have just finished it.”
And in five minutes more she shut it up. I was glad of this.
“Now,” thought I, “I can perhaps get her to talk.” I sat down by her on
the floor.
“What is your name besides Burns?”
“Helen.”
“Do you come a long way from here?”
“I come from a place farther north, quite on the borders of Scotland.”
“Will you ever go back?”
“I hope so; but nobody can be sure of the future.”
“You must wish to leave Lowood?”
“No! why should I? I was sent to Lowood to get an education; and it
would be of no use going away until I have attained that object.”
“But that teacher, Miss Scatcherd, is so cruel to you?”
“Cruel? Not at all! She is severe: she dislikes my faults.”
“And if I were in your place I should dislike her; I should resist her.
If she struck me with that rod, I should get it from her hand; I should
break it under her nose.”
“Probably you would do nothing of the sort: but if you did, Mr.
Brocklehurst would expel you from the school; that would be a great
grief to your relations. It is far better to endure patiently a smart
which nobody feels but yourself, than to commit a hasty action whose
evil consequences will extend to all connected with you; and besides,
the Bible bids us return good for evil.”
“But then it seems disgraceful to be flogged, and to be sent to stand
in the middle of a room full of people; and you are such a great girl:
I am far younger than you, and I could not bear it.”
“Yet it would be your duty to bear it, if you could not avoid it: it is