The recollection of about three days and nights succeeding this isvery dim in my mind. I can recall some sensations felt in thatinterval; but few thoughts framed, and no actions performed. I knewI was in a small room and in a narrow bed. To that bed I seemed tohave grown; I lay on it motionless as a stone; and to have torn mefrom it would have been almost to kill me. I took no note of thelapse of time--of the change from morning to noon, from noon toevening. I observed when any one entered or left the apartment: Icould even tell who they were; I could understand what was said whenthe speaker stood near to me; but I could not answer; to open mylips or move my limbs was equally impossible. Hannah, the servant,was my most frequent visitor. Her coming disturbed me. I had afeeling that she wished me away: that she did not understand me ormy circumstances; that she was prejudiced against me. Diana andMary appeared in the chamber once or twice a day. They wouldwhisper sentences of this sort at my bedside -

"It is very well we took her in."

"Yes; she would certainly have been found dead at the door in themorning had she been left out all night. I wonder what she has gonethrough?"

"Strange hardships, I imagine--poor, emaciated, pallid wanderer?"

"She is not an uneducated person, I should think, by her manner ofspeaking; her accent was quite pure; and the clothes she took off,though splashed and wet, were little worn and fine."

"She has a peculiar face; fleshless and haggard as it is, I ratherlike it; and when in good health and animated, I can fancy herphysiognomy would be agreeable."

Never once in their dialogues did I hear a syllable of regret at thehospitality they had extended to me, or of suspicion of, or aversionto, myself. I was comforted.

Mr. St. John came but once: he looked at me, and said my state oflethargy was the result of reaction from excessive and protractedfatigue. He pronounced it needless to send for a doctor: nature,he was sure, would manage best, left to herself. He said everynerve had been overstrained in some way, and the whole system mustsleep torpid a while. There was no disease. He imagined myrecovery would be rapid enough when once commenced. These opinionshe delivered in a few words, in a quiet, low voice; and added, aftera pause, in the tone of a man little accustomed to expansivecomment, "Rather an unusual physiognomy; certainly, not indicativeof vulgarity or degradation."

"Far otherwise," responded Diana. "To speak truth, St. John, myheart rather warms to the poor little soul. I wish we may be ableto benefit her permanently."

"That is hardly likely," was the reply. "You will find she is someyoung lady who has had a misunderstanding with her friends, and hasprobably injudiciously left them. We may, perhaps, succeed inrestoring her to them, if she is not obstinate: but I trace linesof force in her face which make me sceptical of her tractability."He stood considering me some minutes; then added, "She lookssensible, but not at all handsome."

"She is so ill, St. John."

"Ill or well, she would always be plain. The grace and harmony ofbeauty are quite wanting in those features."

On the third day I was better; on the fourth, I could speak, move,rise in bed, and turn. Hannah had brought me some gruel and drytoast, about, as I supposed, the dinner-hour. I had eaten withrelish: the food was good--void of the feverish flavour which hadhitherto poisoned what I had swallowed. When she left me, I feltcomparatively strong and revived: ere long satiety of repose anddesire for action stirred me. I wished to rise; but what could Iput on? Only my damp and bemired apparel; in which I had slept onthe ground and fallen in the marsh. I felt ashamed to appear beforemy benefactors so clad. I was spared the humiliation.

On a chair by the bedside were all my own things, clean and dry. Myblack silk frock hung against the wall. The traces of the bog wereremoved from it; the creases left by the wet smoothed out: it wasquite decent. My very shoes and stockings were purified andrendered presentable. There were the means of washing in the room,and a comb and brush to smooth my hair. After a weary process, andresting every five minutes, I succeeded in dressing myself. Myclothes hung loose on me; for I was much wasted, but I covereddeficiencies with a shawl, and once more, clean and respectablelooking--no speck of the dirt, no trace of the disorder I so hated,and which seemed so to degrade me, left--I crept down a stonestaircase with the aid of the banisters, to a narrow low passage,and found my way presently to the kitchen.

It was full of the fragrance of new bread and the warmth of agenerous fire. Hannah was baking. Prejudices, it is well known,are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has neverbeen loosened or fertilised by education: they grow there, firm asweeds among stones. Hannah had been cold and stiff, indeed, at thefirst: latterly she had begun to relent a little; and when she sawme come in tidy and well-dressed, she even smiled.

"What, you have got up!" she said. "You are better, then. You maysit you down in my chair on the hearthstone, if you will."

She pointed to the rocking-chair: I took it. She bustled about,examining me every now and then with the corner of her eye. Turningto me, as she took some loaves from the oven, she asked bluntly -

"Did you ever go a-begging afore you came here?"

I was indignant for a moment; but remembering that anger was out ofthe question, and that I had indeed appeared as a beggar to her, Ianswered quietly, but still not without a certain marked firmness -

"You are mistaken in supposing me a beggar. I am no beggar; anymore than yourself or your young ladies."

After a pause she said, "I dunnut understand that: you've like nohouse, nor no brass, I guess?"

"The want of house or brass (by which I suppose you mean money) doesnot make a beggar in your sense of the word."

"Are you book-learned?" she inquired presently.

"Yes, very."

"But you've never been to a boarding-school?"

"I was at a boarding-school eight years."

She opened her eyes wide. "Whatever cannot ye keep yourself for,then?"

"I have kept myself; and, I trust, shall keep myself again. Whatare you going to do with these gooseberries?" I inquired, as shebrought out a basket of the fruit.

"Mak' 'em into pies."

"Give them to me and I'll pick them."

"Nay; I dunnut want ye to do nought."

"But I must do something. Let me have them."

She consented; and she even brought me a clean towel to spread overmy dress, "lest," as she said, "I should mucky it."

"Ye've not been used to sarvant's wark, I see by your hands," sheremarked. "Happen ye've been a dressmaker?"

"No, you are wrong. And now, never mind what I have been: don'ttrouble your head further about me; but tell me the name of thehouse where we are."

"Some calls it Marsh End, and some calls it Moor House."

"And the gentleman who lives here is called Mr. St. John?"

"Nay; he doesn't live here: he is only staying a while. When he isat home, he is in his own parish at Morton."

"That village a few miles off?

"Aye."

"And what is he?"

"He is a parson."

I remembered the answer of the old housekeeper at the parsonage,when I had asked to see the clergyman. "This, then, was hisfather's residence?"

"Aye; old Mr. Rivers lived here, and his father, and grandfather,and gurt (great) grandfather afore him."

"The name, then, of that gentleman, is Mr. St. John Rivers?"

"Aye; St. John is like his kirstened name."

"And his sisters are called Diana and Mary Rivers?"

"Yes."

"Their father is dead?"

"Dead three weeks sin' of a stroke."

"They have no mother?"

"The mistress has been dead this mony a year."

"Have you lived with the family long?"

"I've lived here thirty year. I nursed them all three."

"That proves you must have been an honest and faithful servant. Iwill say so much for you, though you have had the incivility to callme a beggar."

She again regarded me with a surprised stare. "I believe," shesaid, "I was quite mista'en in my thoughts of you: but there is somony cheats goes about, you mun forgie me."

"And though," I continued, rather severely, "you wished to turn mefrom the door, on a night when you should not have shut out a dog."

"Well, it was hard: but what can a body do? I thought more o' th'childer nor of mysel: poor things! They've like nobody to tak'care on 'em but me. I'm like to look sharpish."

I maintained a grave silence for some minutes.

"You munnut think too hardly of me," she again remarked.

"But I do think hardly of you," I said; "and I'll tell you why--notso much because you refused to give me shelter, or regarded me as animpostor, as because you just now made it a species of reproach thatI had no 'brass' and no house. Some of the best people that everlived have been as destitute as I am; and if you are a Christian,you ought not to consider poverty a crime."

"No more I ought," said she: "Mr. St. John tells me so too; and Isee I wor wrang--but I've clear a different notion on you now towhat I had. You look a raight down dacent little crater."

"That will do--I forgive you now. Shake hands."

She put her floury and horny hand into mine; another and heartiersmile illumined her rough face, and from that moment we werefriends.

Hannah was evidently fond of talking. While I picked the fruit, andshe made the paste for the pies, she proceeded to give me sundrydetails about her deceased master and mistress, and "the childer,"as she called the young people.

Old Mr. Rivers, she said, was a plain man enough, but a gentleman,and of as ancient a family as could be found. Marsh End hadbelonged to the Rivers ever since it was a house: and it was, sheaffirmed, "aboon two hundred year old--for all it looked but asmall, humble place, naught to compare wi' Mr. Oliver's grand halldown i' Morton Vale. But she could remember Bill Oliver's father ajourneyman needlemaker; and th' Rivers wor gentry i' th' owd days o'th' Henrys, as onybody might see by looking into th' registers i'Morton Church vestry." Still, she allowed, "the owd maister waslike other folk--naught mich out o' t' common way: stark mad o'shooting, and farming, and sich like." The mistress was different.She was a great reader, and studied a deal; and the "bairns" hadtaken after her. There was nothing like them in these parts, norever had been; they had liked learning, all three, almost from thetime they could speak; and they had always been "of a mak' of theirown." Mr. St. John, when he grew up, would go to college and be aparson; and the girls, as soon as they left school, would seekplaces as governesses: for they had told her their father had someyears ago lost a great deal of money by a man he had trusted turningbankrupt; and as he was now not rich enough to give them fortunes,they must provide for themselves. They had lived very little athome for a long while, and were only come now to stay a few weeks onaccount of their father's death; but they did so like Marsh End andMorton, and all these moors and hills about. They had been inLondon, and many other grand towns; but they always said there wasno place like home; and then they were so agreeable with each other--never fell out nor "threaped." She did not know where there wassuch a family for being united.

Having finished my task of gooseberry picking, I asked where the twoladies and their brother were now.

"Gone over to Morton for a walk; but they would be back in half-an-hour to tea."

They returned within the time Hannah had allotted them: theyentered by the kitchen door. Mr. St. John, when he saw me, merelybowed and passed through; the two ladies stopped: Mary, in a fewwords, kindly and calmly expressed the pleasure she felt in seeingme well enough to be able to come down; Diana took my hand: sheshook her head at me.

"You should have waited for my leave to descend," she said. "Youstill look very pale--and so thin! Poor child!--poor girl!"

Diana had a voice toned, to my ear, like the cooing of a dove. Shepossessed eyes whose gaze I delighted to encounter. Her whole faceseemed to me fill of charm. Mary's countenance was equallyintelligent--her features equally pretty; but her expression wasmore reserved, and her manners, though gentle, more distant. Dianalooked and spoke with a certain authority: she had a will,evidently. It was my nature to feel pleasure in yielding to anauthority supported like hers, and to bend, where my conscience andself-respect permitted, to an active will.

"And what business have you here?" she continued. "It is not yourplace. Mary and I sit in the kitchen sometimes, because at home welike to be free, even to license--but you are a visitor, and must gointo the parlour."

"I am very well here."

"Not at all, with Hannah bustling about and covering you withflour."

"Besides, the fire is too hot for you," interposed Mary.

"To be sure," added her sister. "Come, you must be obedient." Andstill holding my hand she made me rise, and led me into the innerroom.

"Sit there," she said, placing me on the sofa, "while we take ourthings off and get the tea ready; it is another privilege weexercise in our little moorland home--to prepare our own meals whenwe are so inclined, or when Hannah is baking, brewing, washing, orironing."

She closed the door, leaving me solus with Mr. St. John, who satopposite, a book or newspaper in his hand. I examined first, theparlour, and then its occupant.

The parlour was rather a small room, very plainly furnished, yetcomfortable, because clean and neat. The old-fashioned chairs werevery bright, and the walnut-wood table was like a looking-glass. Afew strange, antique portraits of the men and women of other daysdecorated the stained walls; a cupboard with glass doors containedsome books and an ancient set of china. There was no superfluousornament in the room--not one modern piece of furniture, save abrace of workboxes and a lady's desk in rosewood, which stood on aside-table: everything--including the carpet and curtains--lookedat once well worn and well saved.

Mr. St. John--sitting as still as one of the dusty pictures on thewalls, keeping his eyes fixed on the page he perused, and his lipsmutely sealed--was easy enough to examine. Had he been a statueinstead of a man, he could not have been easier. He was young--perhaps from twenty-eight to thirty--tall, slender; his face rivetedthe eye; it was like a Greek face, very pure in outline: quite astraight, classic nose; quite an Athenian mouth and chin. It isseldom, indeed, an English face comes so near the antique models asdid his. He might well be a little shocked at the irregularity ofmy lineaments, his own being so harmonious. His eyes were large andblue, with brown lashes; his high forehead, colourless as ivory, waspartially streaked over by careless locks of fair hair.

This is a gentle delineation, is it not, reader? Yet he whom itdescribes scarcely impressed one with the idea of a gentle, ayielding, an impressible, or even of a placid nature. Quiescent ashe now sat, there was something about his nostril, his mouth, hisbrow, which, to my perceptions, indicated elements within eitherrestless, or hard, or eager. He did not speak to me one word, noreven direct to me one glance, till his sisters returned. Diana, asshe passed in and out, in the course of preparing tea, brought me alittle cake, baked on the top of the oven.

"Eat that now," she said: "you must be hungry. Hannah says youhave had nothing but some gruel since breakfast."

I did not refuse it, for my appetite was awakened and keen. Mr.Rivers now closed his book, approached the table, and, as he took aseat, fixed his blue pictorial-looking eyes full on me. There wasan unceremonious directness, a searching, decided steadfastness inhis gaze now, which told that intention, and not diffidence, hadhitherto kept it averted from the stranger.

"You are very hungry," he said.

"I am, sir." It is my way--it always was my way, by instinct--everto meet the brief with brevity, the direct with plainness.

"It is well for you that a low fever has forced you to abstain forthe last three days: there would have been danger in yielding tothe cravings of your appetite at first. Now you may eat, thoughstill not immoderately."

"I trust I shall not eat long at your expense, sir," was my veryclumsily-contrived, unpolished answer.

"No," he said coolly: "when you have indicated to us the residenceof your friends, we can write to them, and you may be restored tohome."

"That, I must plainly tell you, is out of my power to do; beingabsolutely without home and friends."

The three looked at me, but not distrustfully; I felt there was nosuspicion in their glances: there was more of curiosity. I speakparticularly of the young ladies. St. John's eyes, though clearenough in a literal sense, in a figurative one were difficult tofathom. He seemed to use them rather as instruments to search otherpeople's thoughts, than as agents to reveal his own: the whichcombination of keenness and reserve was considerably more calculatedto embarrass than to encourage.

"Do you mean to say," he asked, "that you are completely isolatedfrom every connection?"

"I do. Not a tie links me to any living thing: not a claim do Ipossess to admittance under any roof in England."

"A most singular position at your age!"

Here I saw his glance directed to my hands, which were folded on thetable before me. I wondered what he sought there: his words soonexplained the quest.

"You have never been married? You are a spinster?"

Diana laughed. "Why, she can't he above seventeen or eighteen yearsold, St. John," said she.

"I am near nineteen: but I am not married. No."

I felt a burning glow mount to my face; for bitter and agitatingrecollections were awakened by the allusion to marriage. They allsaw the embarrassment and the emotion. Diana and Mary relieved meby turning their eyes elsewhere than to my crimsoned visage; but thecolder and sterner brother continued to gaze, till the trouble hehad excited forced out tears as well as colour.

"Where did you last reside?" he now asked.

"You are too inquisitive, St. John," murmured Mary in a low voice;but he leaned over the table and required an answer by a second firmand piercing look.

"The name of the place where, and of the person with whom I lived,is my secret," I replied concisely.

"Which, if you like, you have, in my opinion, a right to keep, bothfrom St. John and every other questioner," remarked Diana.

"Yet if I know nothing about you or your history, I cannot helpyou," he said. "And you need help, do you not?"

"I need it, and I seek it so far, sir, that some true philanthropistwill put me in the way of getting work which I can do, and theremuneration for which will keep me, if but in the barestnecessaries of life."

"I know not whether I am a true philanthropist; yet I am willing toaid you to the utmost of my power in a purpose so honest. First,then, tell me what you have been accustomed to do, and what you CANdo."

I had now swallowed my tea. I was mightily refreshed by thebeverage; as much so as a giant with wine: it gave new tone to myunstrung nerves, and enabled me to address this penetrating youngjudge steadily.

"Mr. Rivers," I said, turning to him, and looking at him, as helooked at me, openly and without diffidence, "you and your sistershave done me a great service--the greatest man can do his fellow-being; you have rescued me, by your noble hospitality, from death.This benefit conferred gives you an unlimited claim on my gratitude,and a claim, to a certain extent, on my confidence. I will tell youas much of the history of the wanderer you have harboured, as I cantell without compromising my own peace of mind--my own security,moral and physical, and that of others.

"I am an orphan, the daughter of a clergyman. My parents diedbefore I could know them. I was brought up a dependant; educated ina charitable institution. I will even tell you the name of theestablishment, where I passed six years as a pupil, and two as ateacher--Lowood Orphan Asylum, -shire: you will have heard of it,Mr. Rivers?--the Rev. Robert Brocklehurst is the treasurer."

"I have heard of Mr. Brocklehurst, and I have seen the school."

"I left Lowood nearly a year since to become a private governess. Iobtained a good situation, and was happy. This place I was obligedto leave four days before I came here. The reason of my departure Icannot and ought not to explain: it would be useless, dangerous,and would sound incredible. No blame attached to me: I am as freefrom culpability as any one of you three. Miserable I am, and mustbe for a time; for the catastrophe which drove me from a house I hadfound a paradise was of a strange and direful nature. I observedbut two points in planning my departure--speed, secrecy: to securethese, I had to leave behind me everything I possessed except asmall parcel; which, in my hurry and trouble of mind, I forgot totake out of the coach that brought me to Whitcross. To thisneighbourhood, then, I came, quite destitute. I slept two nights inthe open air, and wandered about two days without crossing athreshold: but twice in that space of time did I taste food; and itwas when brought by hunger, exhaustion, and despair almost to thelast gasp, that you, Mr. Rivers, forbade me to perish of want atyour door, and took me under the shelter of your roof. I know allyour sisters have done for me since--for I have not been insensibleduring my seeming torpor--and I owe to their spontaneous, genuine,genial compassion as large a debt as to your evangelical charity."

"Don't make her talk any more now, St. John," said Diana, as Ipaused; "she is evidently not yet fit for excitement. Come to thesofa and sit down now, Miss Elliott."

I gave an involuntary half start at hearing the alias: I hadforgotten my new name. Mr. Rivers, whom nothing seemed to escape,noticed it at once.

"You said your name was Jane Elliott?" he observed.

"I did say so; and it is the name by which I think it expedient tobe called at present, but it is not my real name, and when I hearit, it sounds strange to me."

"Your real name you will not give?"

"No: I fear discovery above all things; and whatever disclosurewould lead to it, I avoid."

"You are quite right, I am sure," said Diana. "Now do, brother, lether be at peace a while."

But when St. John had mused a few moments he recommenced asimperturbably and with as much acumen as ever.

"You would not like to be long dependent on our hospitality--youwould wish, I see, to dispense as soon as may be with my sisters'compassion, and, above all, with my CHARITY (I am quite sensible ofthe distinction drawn, nor do I resent it--it is just): you desireto be independent of us?"

"I do: I have already said so. Show me how to work, or how to seekwork: that is all I now ask; then let me go, if it be but to themeanest cottage; but till then, allow me to stay here: I dreadanother essay of the horrors of homeless destitution."

"Indeed you SHALL stay here," said Diana, putting her white hand onmy head. "You SHALL," repeated Mary, in the tone of undemonstrativesincerity which seemed natural to her.

"My sisters, you see, have a pleasure in keeping you," said Mr. St.John, "as they would have a pleasure in keeping and cherishing ahalf-frozen bird, some wintry wind might have driven through theircasement. I feel more inclination to put you in the way of keepingyourself, and shall endeavour to do so; but observe, my sphere isnarrow. I am but the incumbent of a poor country parish: my aidmust be of the humblest sort. And if you are inclined to despisethe day of small things, seek some more efficient succour than suchas I can offer."

"She has already said that she is willing to do anything honest shecan do," answered Diana for me; "and you know, St. John, she has nochoice of helpers: she is forced to put up with such crusty peopleas you."

"I will be a dressmaker; I will be a plain-workwoman; I will be aservant, a nurse-girl, if I can be no better," I answered.

"Right," said Mr. St. John, quite coolly. "If such is your spirit,I promise to aid you, in my own time and way."

He now resumed the book with which he had been occupied before tea.I soon withdrew, for I had talked as much, and sat up as long, as mypresent strength would permit.