‘How can you keep in good health? Children younger than you die daily. I buried a little child of five years old only a day or two since – a good little child, whose soul is now in heaven. It is to be feared the same could not be said of you, were you to be called hence.’
Not being in a condition to remove his doubt, I only cast my eyes down on the two large feet planted on the rug, and sighed, wishing myself far enough away.
‘I hope that sigh is from the heart, and that you repent of ever having been the occasion of discomfort to your excellent benefactress.’
‘Benefactress! benefactress!’ said I inwardly: ‘they all call Mrs Reed my benefactress; if so, a benefactress is a disagreeable thing.’
‘Do you say your prayers night and morning?’ continued my interrogator.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Do you read your Bible?’
‘Sometimes.’
‘With pleasure? Are you fond of it?’
‘I like Revelations, and the Book of Daniel, and Genesis, and Samuel, and a little bit of Exodus, and some parts of Kings and Chronicles, and Job and Jonah.’
‘And the Psalms? I hope you like them?’
‘No, sir.’
‘No? Oh, shocking! I have a little boy, younger than you, who knows six Psalms by heart: and when you ask him which he would rather have, a gingerbread-nut to eat, or a verse of a Psalm to learn, he says: “Oh! the verse of a Psalm! angels sing Psalms,” says he; “I wish to be a little angel here below.” He then gets two nuts in recompense for his infant piety.’
‘Psalms are not interesting,’ I remarked.
‘That proves you have a wicked heart; and you must pray to God to change it: to give you a new and clean one: to take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.’7
I was about to propound a question, touching the manner in which that operation of changing my heart was to be performed, when Mrs Reed interposed, telling me to sit down; she then proceeded to carry on the conversation herself.
‘Mr Brocklehurst, I believe I intimated in the letter which I wrote to you three weeks ago, that this little girl has not quite the character and disposition I could wish: should you admit her into Lowood school, I should be glad if the superintendent and teachers were requested to keep a strict eye on her, and, above all, to guard against her worst fault, a tendency to deceit. I mention this in your hearing, Jane, that you may not attempt to impose on Mr Brocklehurst.’
Well might I dread, well might I dislike Mrs Reed; for it was her nature to wound me cruelly: never was I happy in her presence. However carefully I obeyed, however strenuously I strove to please her, my efforts were still repulsed, and repaid by such sentences as the above. Now, uttered before a stranger, the accusation cut me to the heart: I dimly perceived that she was already obliterating hope from the new phase of existence which she destined me to enter. I felt, though I could not have expressed the feeling, that she was sowing aversion and unkindness along my future path: I saw myself transformed, under Mr Brocklehurst’s eye, into an artful, noxious child, and what could I do to remedy the injury?
‘Nothing, indeed,’ thought I, as I struggled to repress a sob, and hastily wiped away some tears, the impotent evidences of my anguish.
‘Deceit is, indeed, a sad fault in a child,’ said Mr Brocklehurst; ‘it is akin to falsehood, and all liars will have their portion in the lake burning with fire and brimstone; she shall, however, be watched, Mrs Reed. I will speak to Miss Temple and the teachers.’
‘I should wish her to be brought up in a manner suiting her prospects,’ continued my benefactress; ‘to be made useful, to be kept humble. As for the vacations, she will, with your permission, spend them always at Lowood.’
‘Your decisions are perfectly judicious, madam,’ returned Mr Brocklehurst. ‘Humility is a Christian grace, and one peculiarly appropriate to the pupils of Lowood; I, therefore, direct that special care shall be bestowed on its cultivation amongst them. I have studied how best to mortify in them the worldly sentiment of pride, and, only the other day, I had a pleasing proof of my success. My second daughter, Augusta, went with her mamma to visit the school, and on her return she exclaimed, “Oh, dear papa, how quiet and