“Well, Jane Eyre, and are you a good child?”
Impossible to reply to this in the affirmative: my little world
held a contrary opinion: I was silent. Mrs. Reed answered for me
by an expressive shake of the head, adding soon, “Perhaps the less
said on that subject the better, Mr. Brocklehurst.”
“Sorry indeed to hear it! she and I must have some talk;” and
bending from the perpendicular, he installed his person in the
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Jane Eyre 46
arm-chair opposite Mrs. Reed’s. “Come here,” he said.
I stepped across the rug; he placed me square and straight
before him. What a face he had, now that it was almost on a level
with mine! what a great nose! and what a mouth! and what large
prominent teeth!
“No sight so sad as that of a naughty child,” he began,
“especially a naughty little girl. Do you know where the wicked go
after death?”
“They go to hell,” was my ready and orthodox answer.
“And what is hell? Can you tell me that?”
“A pit full of fire.”
“And should you like to fall into that pit, and to be burning
there for ever?”
“No, sir.”
“What must you do to avoid it?”
I deliberated a moment; my answer, when it did come, was
objectionable: “I must keep in good health, and not die.”
“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.
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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.”
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
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Jane Eyre 48
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 "};
