I had forgotten to draw my curtain, which I usually did, and also tolet down my window-blind. The consequence was, that when the moon,which was full and bright (for the night was fine), came in hercourse to that space in the sky opposite my casement, and looked inat me through the unveiled panes, her glorious gaze roused me.Awaking in the dead of night, I opened my eyes on her disk--silver-white and crystal clear. It was beautiful, but too solemn; I halfrose, and stretched my arm to draw the curtain.

Good God! What a cry!

The night--its silence--its rest, was rent in twain by a savage, asharp, a shrilly sound that ran from end to end of Thornfield Hall.

My pulse stopped: my heart stood still; my stretched arm wasparalysed. The cry died, and was not renewed. Indeed, whateverbeing uttered that fearful shriek could not soon repeat it: not thewidest-winged condor on the Andes could, twice in succession, sendout such a yell from the cloud shrouding his eyrie. The thingdelivering such utterance must rest ere it could repeat the effort.

It came out of the third storey; for it passed overhead. Andoverhead--yes, in the room just above my chamber-ceiling--I nowheard a struggle: a deadly one it seemed from the noise; and ahalf-smothered voice shouted -

"Help! help! help!" three times rapidly.

"Will no one come?" it cried; and then, while the staggering andstamping went on wildly, I distinguished through plank and plaster:-

"Rochester! Rochester! for God's sake, come!"

A chamber-door opened: some one ran, or rushed, along the gallery.Another step stamped on the flooring above and something fell; andthere was silence.

I had put on some clothes, though horror shook all my limbs; Iissued from my apartment. The sleepers were all aroused:ejaculations, terrified murmurs sounded in every room; door afterdoor unclosed; one looked out and another looked out; the galleryfilled. Gentlemen and ladies alike had quitted their beds; and "Oh!what is it?"--"Who is hurt?"--"What has happened?"--"Fetch alight!"--"Is it fire?"--"Are there robbers?"--"Where shall we run?"was demanded confusedly on all hands. But for the moonlight theywould have been in complete darkness. They ran to and fro; theycrowded together: some sobbed, some stumbled: the confusion wasinextricable.

"Where the devil is Rochester?" cried Colonel Dent. "I cannot findhim in his bed."

"Here! here!" was shouted in return. "Be composed, all of you: I'mcoming."

And the door at the end of the gallery opened, and Mr. Rochesteradvanced with a candle: he had just descended from the upperstorey. One of the ladies ran to him directly; she seized his arm:it was Miss Ingram.

"What awful event has taken place?" said she. "Speak! let us knowthe worst at once!"

"But don't pull me down or strangle me," he replied: for the MissesEshton were clinging about him now; and the two dowagers, in vastwhite wrappers, were bearing down on him like ships in full sail.

"All's right!--all's right!" he cried. "It's a mere rehearsal ofMuch Ado about Nothing. Ladies, keep off, or I shall waxdangerous."

And dangerous he looked: his black eyes darted sparks. Calminghimself by an effort, he added -

"A servant has had the nightmare; that is all. She's an excitable,nervous person: she construed her dream into an apparition, orsomething of that sort, no doubt; and has taken a fit with fright.Now, then, I must see you all back into your rooms; for, till thehouse is settled, she cannot be looked after. Gentlemen, have thegoodness to set the ladies the example. Miss Ingram, I am sure youwill not fail in evincing superiority to idle terrors. Amy andLouisa, return to your nests like a pair of doves, as you are.Mesdames" (to the dowagers), "you will take cold to a deadcertainty, if you stay in this chill gallery any longer."

And so, by dint of alternate coaxing and commanding, he contrived toget them all once more enclosed in their separate dormitories. Idid not wait to be ordered back to mine, but retreated unnoticed, asunnoticed I had left it.

Not, however, to go to bed: on the contrary, I began and dressedmyself carefully. The sounds I had heard after the scream, and thewords that had been uttered, had probably been heard only by me; forthey had proceeded from the room above mine: but they assured methat it was not a servant's dream which had thus struck horrorthrough the house; and that the explanation Mr. Rochester had givenwas merely an invention framed to pacify his guests. I dressed,then, to be ready for emergencies. When dressed, I sat a long timeby the window looking out over the silent grounds and silveredfields and waiting for I knew not what. It seemed to me that someevent must follow the strange cry, struggle, and call.

No: stillness returned: each murmur and movement ceased gradually,and in about an hour Thornfield Hall was again as hushed as adesert. It seemed that sleep and night had resumed their empire.Meantime the moon declined: she was about to set. Not liking tosit in the cold and darkness, I thought I would lie down on my bed,dressed as I was. I left the window, and moved with little noiseacross the carpet; as I stooped to take off my shoes, a cautioushand tapped low at the door.

"Am I wanted?" I asked.

"Are you up?" asked the voice I expected to hear, viz., my master's.

"Yes, sir."

"And dressed?"

"Yes."

"Come out, then, quietly."

I obeyed. Mr. Rochester stood in the gallery holding a light.

"I want you," he said: "come this way: take your time, and make nonoise."

My slippers were thin: I could walk the matted floor as softly as acat. He glided up the gallery and up the stairs, and stopped in thedark, low corridor of the fateful third storey: I had followed andstood at his side.

"Have you a sponge in your room?" he asked in a whisper.

"Yes, sir."

"Have you any salts--volatile salts? Yes."

"Go back and fetch both."

I returned, sought the sponge on the washstand, the salts in mydrawer, and once more retraced my steps. He still waited; he held akey in his hand: approaching one of the small, black doors, he putit in the lock; he paused, and addressed me again.

"You don't turn sick at the sight of blood?"

"I think I shall not: I have never been tried yet."

I felt a thrill while I answered him; but no coldness, and nofaintness.

"Just give me your hand," he said: "it will not do to risk afainting fit."

I put my fingers into his. "Warm and steady," was his remark: heturned the key and opened the door.

I saw a room I remembered to have seen before, the day Mrs. Fairfaxshowed me over the house: it was hung with tapestry; but thetapestry was now looped up in one part, and there was a doorapparent, which had then been concealed. This door was open; alight shone out of the room within: I heard thence a snarling,snatching sound, almost like a dog quarrelling. Mr. Rochester,putting down his candle, said to me, "Wait a minute," and he wentforward to the inner apartment. A shout of laughter greeted hisentrance; noisy at first, and terminating in Grace Poole's owngoblin ha! ha! SHE then was there. He made some sort ofarrangement without speaking, though I heard a low voice addresshim: he came out and closed the door behind him.

"Here, Jane!" he said; and I walked round to the other side of alarge bed, which with its drawn curtains concealed a considerableportion of the chamber. An easy-chair was near the bed-head: a mansat in it, dressed with the exception of his coat; he was still; hishead leant back; his eyes were closed. Mr. Rochester held thecandle over him; I recognised in his pale and seemingly lifelessface--the stranger, Mason: I saw too that his linen on one side,and one arm, was almost soaked in blood.

"Hold the candle," said Mr. Rochester, and I took it: he fetched abasin of water from the washstand: "Hold that," said he. I obeyed.He took the sponge, dipped it in, and moistened the corpse-likeface; he asked for my smelling-bottle, and applied it to thenostrils. Mr. Mason shortly unclosed his eyes; he groaned. Mr.Rochester opened the shirt of the wounded man, whose arm andshoulder were bandaged: he sponged away blood, trickling fast down.

"Is there immediate danger?" murmured Mr. Mason.

"Pooh! No--a mere scratch. Don't be so overcome, man: bear up!I'll fetch a surgeon for you now, myself: you'll be able to beremoved by morning, I hope. Jane," he continued.

"Sir?"

"I shall have to leave you in this room with this gentleman, for anhour, or perhaps two hours: you will sponge the blood as I do whenit returns: if he feels faint, you will put the glass of water onthat stand to his lips, and your salts to his nose. You will notspeak to him on any pretext--and--Richard, it will be at the perilof your life if you speak to her: open your lips--agitate yourself--and I'll not answer for the consequences."

Again the poor man groaned; he looked as if he dared not move; fear,either of death or of something else, appeared almost to paralysehim. Mr. Rochester put the now bloody sponge into my hand, and Iproceeded to use it as he had done. He watched me a second, thensaying, "Remember!--No conversation," he left the room. Iexperienced a strange feeling as the key grated in the lock, and thesound of his retreating step ceased to be heard.

Here then I was in the third storey, fastened into one of its mysticcells; night around me; a pale and bloody spectacle under my eyesand hands; a murderess hardly separated from me by a single door:yes--that was appalling--the rest I could bear; but I shuddered atthe thought of Grace Poole bursting out upon me.

I must keep to my post, however. I must watch this ghastlycountenance--these blue, still lips forbidden to unclose--these eyesnow shut, now opening, now wandering through the room, now fixing onme, and ever glazed with the dulness of horror. I must dip my handagain and again in the basin of blood and water, and wipe away thetrickling gore. I must see the light of the unsnuffed candle waneon my employment; the shadows darken on the wrought, antiquetapestry round me, and grow black under the hangings of the vast oldbed, and quiver strangely over the doors of a great cabinetopposite--whose front, divided into twelve panels, bore, in grimdesign, the heads of the twelve apostles, each enclosed in itsseparate panel as in a frame; while above them at the top rose anebon crucifix and a dying Christ.

According as the shifting obscurity and flickering gleam hoveredhere or glanced there, it was now the bearded physician, Luke, thatbent his brow; now St. John's long hair that waved; and anon thedevilish face of Judas, that grew out of the panel, and seemedgathering life and threatening a revelation of the arch-traitor--ofSatan himself--in his subordinate's form.

Amidst all this, I had to listen as well as watch: to listen forthe movements of the wild beast or the fiend in yonder side den.But since Mr. Rochester's visit it seemed spellbound: all the nightI heard but three sounds at three long intervals,--a step creak, amomentary renewal of the snarling, canine noise, and a deep humangroan.

Then my own thoughts worried me. What crime was this that livedincarnate in this sequestered mansion, and could neither be expellednor subdued by the owner?--what mystery, that broke out now in fireand now in blood, at the deadest hours of night? What creature wasit, that, masked in an ordinary woman's face and shape, uttered thevoice, now of a mocking demon, and anon of a carrion-seeking bird ofprey?

And this man I bent over--this commonplace, quiet stranger--how hadhe become involved in the web of horror? and why had the Fury flownat him? What made him seek this quarter of the house at an untimelyseason, when he should have been asleep in bed? I had heard Mr.Rochester assign him an apartment below--what brought him here! Andwhy, now, was he so tame under the violence or treachery done him?Why did he so quietly submit to the concealment Mr. Rochesterenforced? Why DID Mr. Rochester enforce this concealment? Hisguest had been outraged, his own life on a former occasion had beenhideously plotted against; and both attempts he smothered in secrecyand sank in oblivion! Lastly, I saw Mr. Mason was submissive to Mr.Rochester; that the impetuous will of the latter held complete swayover the inertness of the former: the few words which had passedbetween them assured me of this. It was evident that in theirformer intercourse, the passive disposition of the one had beenhabitually influenced by the active energy of the other: whencethen had arisen Mr. Rochester's dismay when he heard of Mr. Mason'sarrival? Why had the mere name of this unresisting individual--whomhis word now sufficed to control like a child--fallen on him, a fewhours since, as a thunderbolt might fall on an oak?

Oh! I could not forget his look and his paleness when he whispered:"Jane, I have got a blow--I have got a blow, Jane." I could notforget how the arm had trembled which he rested on my shoulder: andit was no light matter which could thus bow the resolute spirit andthrill the vigorous frame of Fairfax Rochester.

"When will he come? When will he come?" I cried inwardly, as thenight lingered and lingered--as my bleeding patient drooped, moaned,sickened: and neither day nor aid arrived. I had, again and again,held the water to Mason's white lips; again and again offered himthe stimulating salts: my efforts seemed ineffectual: eitherbodily or mental suffering, or loss of blood, or all three combined,were fast prostrating his strength. He moaned so, and looked soweak, wild, and lost, I feared he was dying; ant I might not evenspeak to him.

The candle, wasted at last, went out; as it expired, I perceivedstreaks of grey light edging the window curtains: dawn was thenapproaching. Presently I heard Pilot bark far below, out of hisdistant kennel in the courtyard: hope revived. Nor was itunwarranted: in five minutes more the grating key, the yieldinglock, warned me my watch was relieved. It could not have lastedmore than two hours: many a week has seemed shorter.

Mr. Rochester entered, and with him the surgeon he had been tofetch.

"Now, Carter, be on the alert," he said to this last: "I give youbut half-an-hour for dressing the wound, fastening the bandages,getting the patient downstairs and all."

"But is he fit to move, sir?"

"No doubt of it; it is nothing serious; he is nervous, his spiritsmust be kept up. Come, set to work."

Mr. Rochester drew back the thick curtain, drew up the hollandblind, let in all the daylight he could; and I was surprised andcheered to see how far dawn was advanced: what rosy streaks werebeginning to brighten the east. Then he approached Mason, whom thesurgeon was already handling.

"Now, my good fellow, how are you?" he asked.

"She's done for me, I fear," was the faint reply.

"Not a whit!--courage! This day fortnight you'll hardly be a pinthe worse of it: you've lost a little blood; that's all Carter,assure him there's no danger."

"I can do that conscientiously," said Carter, who had now undone thebandages; "only I wish I could have got here sooner: he would nothave bled so much--but how is this? The flesh on the shoulder istorn as well as cut. This wound was not done with a knife: therehave been teeth here!"

"She bit me," he murmured. "She worried me like a tigress, whenRochester got the knife from her."

"You should not have yielded: you should have grappled with her atonce," said Mr. Rochester.

"But under such circumstances, what could one do?" returned Mason."Oh, it was frightful!" he added, shuddering. "And I did not expectit: she looked so quiet at first."

"I warned you," was his friend's answer; "I said--be on your guardwhen you go near her. Besides, you might have waited till to-morrow, and had me with you: it was mere folly to attempt theinterview to-night, and alone."

"I thought I could have done some good."

"You thought! you thought! Yes, it makes me impatient to hear you:but, however, you have suffered, and are likely to suffer enough fornot taking my advice; so I'll say no more. Carter--hurry!--hurry!The sun will soon rise, and I must have him off."

"Directly, sir; the shoulder is just bandaged. I must look to thisother wound in the arm: she has had her teeth here too, I think."

"She sucked the blood: she said she'd drain my heart," said Mason.

I saw Mr. Rochester shudder: a singularly marked expression ofdisgust, horror, hatred, warped his countenance almost todistortion; but he only said -

"Come, be silent, Richard, and never mind her gibberish: don'trepeat it."

"I wish I could forget it," was the answer.

"You will when you are out of the country: when you get back toSpanish Town, you may think of her as dead and buried--or rather,you need not think of her at all."

"Impossible to forget this night!"

"It is not impossible: have some energy, man. You thought you wereas dead as a herring two hours since, and you are all alive andtalking now. There!--Carter has done with you or nearly so; I'llmake you decent in a trice. Jane" (he turned to me for the firsttime since his re-entrance), "take this key: go down into mybedroom, and walk straight forward into my dressing-room: open thetop drawer of the wardrobe and take out a clean shirt and neck-handkerchief: bring them here; and be nimble."

I went; sought the repository he had mentioned, found the articlesnamed, and returned with them.

"Now," said he, "go to the other side of the bed while I order histoilet; but don't leave the room: you may be wanted again."

I retired as directed.

"Was anybody stirring below when you went down, Jane?" inquired Mr.Rochester presently.

"No, sir; all was very still."

"We shall get you off cannily, Dick: and it will be better, bothfor your sake, and for that of the poor creature in yonder. I havestriven long to avoid exposure, and I should not like it to come atlast. Here, Carter, help him on with his waist-coat. Where did youleave your furred cloak? You can't travel a mile without that, Iknow, in this damned cold climate. In your room?--Jane, run down toMr. Mason's room,--the one next mine,--and fetch a cloak you willsee there."

Again I ran, and again returned, bearing an immense mantle lined andedged with fur.

"Now, I've another errand for you," said my untiring master; "youmust away to my room again. What a mercy you are shod with velvet,Jane!--a clod-hopping messenger would never do at this juncture.You must open the middle drawer of my toilet-table and take out alittle phial and a little glass you will find there,--quick!"

I flew thither and back, bringing the desired vessels.

"That's well! Now, doctor, I shall take the liberty ofadministering a dose myself, on my own responsibility. I got thiscordial at Rome, of an Italian charlatan--a fellow you would havekicked, Carter. It is not a thing to be used indiscriminately, butit is good upon occasion: as now, for instance. Jane, a littlewater."

He held out the tiny glass, and I half filled it from the water-bottle on the washstand.

"That will do;--now wet the lip of the phial."

I did so; he measured twelve drops of a crimson liquid, andpresented it to Mason.

"Drink, Richard: it will give you the heart you lack, for an houror so."

"But will it hurt me?--is it inflammatory?"

"Drink! drink! drink!"

Mr. Mason obeyed, because it was evidently useless to resist. Hewas dressed now: he still looked pale, but he was no longer goryand sullied. Mr. Rochester let him sit three minutes after he hadswallowed the liquid; he then took his arm -

"Now I am sure you can get on your feet," he said--"try."

The patient rose.

"Carter, take him under the other shoulder. Be of good cheer,Richard; step out--that's it!"

"I do feel better," remarked Mr. Mason.

"I am sure you do. Now, Jane, trip on before us away to thebackstairs; unbolt the side-passage door, and tell the driver of thepost-chaise you will see in the yard--or just outside, for I toldhim not to drive his rattling wheels over the pavement--to be ready;we are coming: and, Jane, if any one is about, come to the foot ofthe stairs and hem."

It was by this time half-past five, and the sun was on the point ofrising; but I found the kitchen still dark and silent. The side-passage door was fastened; I opened it with as little noise aspossible: all the yard was quiet; but the gates stood wide open,and there was a post-chaise, with horses ready harnessed, and driverseated on the box, stationed outside. I approached him, and saidthe gentlemen were coming; he nodded: then I looked carefully roundand listened. The stillness of early morning slumbered everywhere;the curtains were yet drawn over the servants' chamber windows;little birds were just twittering in the blossom-blanched orchardtrees, whose boughs drooped like white garlands over the wallenclosing one side of the yard; the carriage horses stamped fromtime to time in their closed stables: all else was still.

The gentlemen now appeared. Mason, supported by Mr. Rochester andthe surgeon, seemed to walk with tolerable ease: they assisted himinto the chaise; Carter followed.

"Take care of him," said Mr. Rochester to the latter, "and keep himat your house till he is quite well: I shall ride over in a day ortwo to see how he gets on. Richard, how is it with you?"

"The fresh air revives me, Fairfax."

"Leave the window open on his side, Carter; there is no wind--good-bye, Dick."

"Fairfax--"

"Well what is it?"

"Let her be taken care of; let her be treated as tenderly as may be:let her--" he stopped and burst into tears.

"I do my best; and have done it, and will do it," was the answer:he shut up the chaise door, and the vehicle drove away.

"Yet would to God there was an end of all this!" added Mr.Rochester, as he closed and barred the heavy yard-gates.

This done, he moved with slow step and abstracted air towards a doorin the wall bordering the orchard. I, supposing he had done withme, prepared to return to the house; again, however, I heard himcall "Jane!" He had opened feel portal and stood at it, waiting forme.

"Come where there is some freshness, for a few moments," he said;"that house is a mere dungeon: don't you feel it so?"

"It seems to me a splendid mansion, sir."

"The glamour of inexperience is over your eyes," he answered; "andyou see it through a charmed medium: you cannot discern that thegilding is slime and the silk draperies cobwebs; that the marble issordid slate, and the polished woods mere refuse chips and scalybark. Now HERE" (he pointed to the leafy enclosure we had entered)"all is real, sweet, and pure."

He strayed down a walk edged with box, with apple trees, pear trees,and cherry trees on one side, and a border on the other full of allsorts of old-fashioned flowers, stocks, sweet-williams, primroses,pansies, mingled with southernwood, sweet-briar, and variousfragrant herbs. They were fresh now as a succession of Aprilshowers and gleams, followed by a lovely spring morning, could makethem: the sun was just entering the dappled east, and his lightillumined the wreathed and dewy orchard trees and shone down thequiet walks under them.

"Jane, will you have a flower?"

He gathered a half-blown rose, the first on the bush, and offered itto me.

"Thank you, sir."

"Do you like this sunrise, Jane? That sky with its high and lightclouds which are sure to melt away as the day waxes warm--thisplacid and balmly atmosphere?"

"I do, very much."

"You have passed a strange night, Jane."

"Yes, sir."

"And it has made you look pale--were you afraid when I left youalone with Mason?"

"I was afraid of some one coming out of the inner room."

"But I had fastened the door--I had the key in my pocket: I shouldhave been a careless shepherd if I had left a lamb--my pet lamb--sonear a wolf's den, unguarded: you were safe."

"Will Grace Poole live here still, sir?"

"Oh yes! don't trouble your head about her--put the thing out ofyour thoughts."

"Yet it seems to me your life is hardly secure while she stays."

"Never fear--I will take care of myself."

"Is the danger you apprehended last night gone by now, sir?"

"I cannot vouch for that till Mason is out of England: nor eventhen. To live, for me, Jane, is to stand on a crater-crust whichmay crack and spue fire any day."

"But Mr. Mason seems a man easily led. Your influence, sir, isevidently potent with him: he will never set you at defiance orwilfully injure you."

"Oh, no! Mason will not defy me; nor, knowing it, will he hurt me--but, unintentionally, he might in a moment, by one careless word,deprive me, if not of life, yet for ever of happiness."

"Tell him to be cautious, sir: let him know what you fear, and showhim how to avert the danger."

He laughed sardonically, hastily took my hand, and as hastily threwit from him.

"If I could do that, simpleton, where would the danger be?Annihilated in a moment. Ever since I have known Mason, I have onlyhad to say to him 'Do that,' and the thing has been done. But Icannot give him orders in this case: I cannot say 'Beware ofharming me, Richard;' for it is imperative that I should keep himignorant that harm to me is possible. Now you look puzzled; and Iwill puzzle you further. You are my little friend, are you not?"

"I like to serve you, sir, and to obey you in all that is right."

"Precisely: I see you do. I see genuine contentment in your gaitand mien, your eye and face, when you are helping me and pleasingme--working for me, and with me, in, as you characteristically say,'ALL THAT IS RIGHT:' for if I bid you do what you thought wrong,there would be no light-footed running, no neat-handed alacrity, nolively glance and animated complexion. My friend would then turn tome, quiet and pale, and would say, 'No, sir; that is impossible: Icannot do it, because it is wrong;' and would become immutable as afixed star. Well, you too have power over me, and may injure me:yet I dare not show you where I am vulnerable, lest, faithful andfriendly as you are, you should transfix me at once."

"If you have no more to fear from Mr. Mason than you have from me,sir, you are very safe."

"God grant it may be so! Here, Jane, is an arbour; sit down."

The arbour was an arch in the wall, lined with ivy; it contained arustic seat. Mr. Rochester took it, leaving room, however, for me:but I stood before him.

"Sit," he said; "the bench is long enough for two. You don'thesitate to take a place at my side, do you? Is that wrong, Jane?"

I answered him by assuming it: to refuse would, I felt, have beenunwise.

"Now, my little friend, while the sun drinks the dew--while all theflowers in this old garden awake and expand, and the birds fetchtheir young ones' breakfast out of the Thornfield, and the earlybees do their first spell of work--I'll put a case to you, which youmust endeavour to suppose your own: but first, look at me, and tellme you are at ease, and not fearing that I err in detaining you, orthat you err in staying."

"No, sir; I am content."

"Well then, Jane, call to aid your fancy:- suppose you were nolonger a girl well reared and disciplined, but a wild boy indulgedfrom childhood upwards; imagine yourself in a remote foreign land;conceive that you there commit a capital error, no matter of whatnature or from what motives, but one whose consequences must followyou through life and taint all your existence. Mind, I don't say aCRIME; I am not speaking of shedding of blood or any other guiltyact, which might make the perpetrator amenable to the law: my wordis ERROR. The results of what you have done become in time to youutterly insupportable; you take measures to obtain relief: unusualmeasures, but neither unlawful nor culpable. Still you aremiserable; for hope has quitted you on the very confines of life:your sun at noon darkens in an eclipse, which you feel will notleave it till the time of setting. Bitter and base associationshave become the sole food of your memory: you wander here andthere, seeking rest in exile: happiness in pleasure--I mean inheartless, sensual pleasure--such as dulls intellect and blightsfeeling. Heart-weary and soul-withered, you come home after yearsof voluntary banishment: you make a new acquaintance--how or whereno matter: you find in this stranger much of the good and brightqualities which you have sought for twenty years, and never beforeencountered; and they are all fresh, healthy, without soil andwithout taint. Such society revives, regenerates: you feel betterdays come back--higher wishes, purer feelings; you desire torecommence your life, and to spend what remains to you of days in away more worthy of an immortal being. To attain this end, are youjustified in overleaping an obstacle of custom--a mere conventionalimpediment which neither your conscience sanctifies nor yourjudgment approves?"

He paused for an answer: and what was I to say? Oh, for some goodspirit to suggest a judicious and satisfactory response! Vainaspiration! The west wind whispered in the ivy round me; but nogentle Ariel borrowed its breath as a medium of speech: the birdssang in the tree-tops; but their song, however sweet, wasinarticulate.

Again Mr. Rochester propounded his query:

"Is the wandering and sinful, but now rest-seeking and repentant,man justified in daring the world's opinion, in order to attach tohim for ever this gentle, gracious, genial stranger, therebysecuring his own peace of mind and regeneration of life?"

"Sir," I answered, "a wanderer's repose or a sinner's reformationshould never depend on a fellow-creature. Men and women die;philosophers falter in wisdom, and Christians in goodness: if anyone you know has suffered and erred, let him look higher than hisequals for strength to amend and solace to heal."

"But the instrument--the instrument! God, who does the work,ordains the instrument. I have myself--I tell it you withoutparable--been a worldly, dissipated, restless man; and I believe Ihave found the instrument for my cure in--"

He paused: the birds went on carolling, the leaves lightlyrustling. I almost wondered they did not check their songs andwhispers to catch the suspended revelation; but they would have hadto wait many minutes--so long was the silence protracted. At last Ilooked up at the tardy speaker: he was looking eagerly at me.

"Little friend," said he, in quite a changed tone--while his facechanged too, losing all its softness and gravity, and becoming harshand sarcastic--"you have noticed my tender penchant for Miss Ingram:don't you think if I married her she would regenerate me with avengeance?"

He got up instantly, went quite to the other end of the walk, andwhen he came back he was humming a tune.

"Jane, Jane," said he, stopping before me, "you are quite pale withyour vigils: don't you curse me for disturbing your rest?"

"Curse you? No, sir."

"Shake hands in confirmation of the word. What cold fingers! Theywere warmer last night when I touched them at the door of themysterious chamber. Jane, when will you watch with me again?"

"Whenever I can be useful, sir."

"For instance, the night before I am married! I am sure I shall notbe able to sleep. Will you promise to sit up with me to bear mecompany? To you I can talk of my lovely one: for now you have seenher and know her."

"Yes, sir."

"She's a rare one, is she not, Jane?"

"Yes, sir."

"A strapper--a real strapper, Jane: big, brown, and buxom; withhair just such as the ladies of Carthage must have had. Bless me!there's Dent and Lynn in the stables! Go in by the shrubbery,through that wicket."

As I went one way, he went another, and I heard him in the yard,saying cheerfully -

"Mason got the start of you all this morning; he was gone beforesunrise: I rose at four to see him off."