Hello.
Welcome to Sleep Stories with Steph,
Your go-to romantic podcast that guarantees you a calm and entertaining transition into a great night's sleep.
Come with me as we immerse ourselves in a romantic journey to a time long since forgotten.
But before we begin,
Let's take a moment to focus on where we are now.
Take a deep breath in through your nose and let it out with a long sigh.
That's it.
Now close your eyes and feel yourself sink deeper into the support beneath you.
It is time to relax and fully let go.
There is nothing you need to be doing now and nowhere you need to go.
Happy listening.
This is S.
D.
Hudson Magic.
Jane Eyre Chapter 30 continued.
A month was gone.
Diana and Mary were gone.
Diana and Mary were soon to leave Morehouse and return to the far different life and scene which awaited them as governesses in a large fashionable south of England city where each held a situation.
One day,
Being left alone with St.
John for a few minutes in the parlour,
I ventured to approach the window recess,
Which is table,
Chair and desk consecrated as a kind of study.
I was going to speak though not very well knowing in what words to frame my inquiry when he saved me the trouble by beginning the first to commence a dialogue.
You have a question to ask of me,
He said.
Yes,
I wish to know whether you've heard of any service I can offer myself to undertake,
Said I.
I found or devised something for you three weeks ago,
He said,
But as you seem both useful and happy here,
I deemed it inexpedient to break in on your mutual comfort until my sister's approaching departure from Marsh End should render yours necessary.
And they will go in three days now,
I said.
Yes,
And when they go,
I shall return to the parsonage of Moreton.
Hannah will accompany me and this old house will be shut up.
I waited a few moments expecting St.
John would go on with a subject-first broach,
But he seemed to have entered another train of reflection.
I was obliged to recall him to a theme which was of necessity,
One of close and anxious interest to me.
What is the employment you had in view,
Mr.
Rivers?
I hope this delay will not have increased the difficulty of securing it.
Oh no,
It's an employment which depends only on me to give and you to accept.
He again paused.
There seemed a reluctance to continue.
I grew impatient,
A restless movement or two,
And an eager and exacting glance fastened on his face conveyed the feeling to him as effectually as words could have done and with less trouble.
You need be in no hurry to hear.
He said,
Let me frankly tell you I have nothing eligible or profitable to suggest.
Before I explain,
Recall if you please my notice,
Given that if I helped you it must be as the blind man would help the lame.
Now I'm poor,
For I find that when I've paid my father's debts,
All the patrimony remaining to me will be this crumbling grange,
The row of scathed firs behind and the patch of moorish soil with the yew trees and holly bushes in front.
I'm obscure.
Rivers is an old name,
But of the three sole descendants of the race,
Two earn the dependents' crust among strangers and the third considers himself an alien from his native country.
Now rise and follow me,
He said.
He said these words as he pronounced his sermons with a quiet deep voice and unflushed cheek and a coruscating radiance of glance.
Since I am myself poor and obscure,
He resumed,
I can offer you but a service of poverty and obscurity.
You may even think it degrading,
For I see now your habits have been what the world calls refined.
Your tastes lean to the ideal and your society has been at least among the educated,
But I consider that no service degrades what can better our race.
I hold the more arid and unreclaimed the soil where the Christian labourer's task of tillage is appointed,
The scantier the mead his toll brings,
The higher the honour.
I believe you will accept the post I offer you,
He continued,
And hold it for a while,
Not permanently though,
Any more than I could permanently keep the narrow and narrowing,
The tranquil hidden office of an English country incumbent,
For in your nature is an alloy as detrimental to repose as that is in mine,
Although of a different kind.
To explain,
I urged when he halted once more.
I will,
And you shall hear how poor the proposal is.
I shall not stay long at Morton now that my father is dead and I am my own master.
I shall leave the place probably in the course of a twelve-month,
But while I do stay I will exert myself to the utmost for its improvement.
Morton,
When I came to it two years ago,
Had no school.
The children of the poor were excluded from every hope of progress.
I established one for boys and I mean now to open a second one for girls.
I have hired a building for the purpose with a cottage of two rooms attached to it for the mistress's house.
Her salary will be thirty pounds a year.
Her house is already furnished,
Very simply but sufficiently by the kindness of a Lady Miss Oliver,
The only daughter of the sole rich man in my parish.
The same lady pays for the education and clothing of an orphan from the workhouse,
On condition she shall aid the mistress in such menial offices connected with her own house and the school.
Will you be this mistress?
He put the question rather hurriedly.
He seemed half to expect an indignant or at least a disdainful rejection.
In truth it was humble,
But it was sheltered,
And I wanted a safe asylum.
It was plodding,
But then,
Compared with that of a governess in a rich house,
It was independent,
And the fear of servitude with strangers entered my soul like iron.
It was not innoble,
Not unworthy,
Not mentally degrading.
So I made my decision.
I thank you for the proposal,
Miss Rivers,
And I accept it with all my heart.
But you comprehend me,
He said.
It is a village school.
Your scholars will be only poor girls,
Cottagers' children,
And the best farmers' daughters.
Knitting,
Sewing,
Reading,
Writing,
Ciphering will be all you will have to teach.
What will you do with your accomplishments,
With the largest portion of your mind?
Save them until they are wanted,
Said I.
They will keep.
You know what you undertake then?
I do.
St.
John now smiled,
And not a bitter or sad smile,
But one well-pleased and deeply gratified.
And when will you commence the exercise of your function?
I will go to my house tomorrow and open the school if you like next week.
Very well,
So be it.
He rose and walked through the room.
Standing still,
He again looked at me and shook his head.
What do you disapprove of,
Miss Rivers?
I asked.
You will not stay at Morton long?
No.
Why?
What is your reason for saying so?
I read it in your eye.
It is not that description which promises the maintenance of an even tenor in life.
I am not ambitious.
He started at the word ambitious and repeated,
What made you think of ambition?
Who is ambitious?
I know I am,
But how did you find it out?
I was speaking of myself.
Well,
If you are not ambitious,
You are what?
I was going to say impassioned,
But perhaps you would have misunderstood the word and been displeased.
I am sure you cannot be content to pass your leisure in solitude and devote your working hours to a monotonous labour wholly void of stimulus any more than I can be content.
Well,
Propensities and principles must be reconciled by some means.
He left the room.
In this brief hour I had learnt more of him than in the whole previous month,
Yet still St John puzzled me.
Diana and Mary Rivers became more sad and silent as the day approached for leaving their brother and their home.
They both tried to appear as usual,
But the sorrow they had to struggle against was one that could not be entirely conquered or concealed.
Diana intimated this would be a different parting from any other they had known.
It would probably,
As far as St John was concerned,
Be a parting for years.
It might be a parting for life.
He will sacrifice to all his long-framed resolves,
She said,
Natural affection of feelings more potent still.
St John looks quiet,
Jane,
But he hides a fever in his vitals.
You would think him gentle,
Yet in some things he is inexorable as death,
And the worst of it is my conscience will hardly permit me to dissuade him from his severe decision.
I cannot blame him for it.
It's right,
Noble and Christian,
Yet it breaks my heart.
The tears gushed to her fine eyes and Mary bent her head low over her work.
We are now without father and we shall soon be without home and brother,
She murmured.
Then,
To add to their distress,
St John passed the window reading a letter.
Our Uncle John is dead,
Said he.
Both sisters seemed struck,
Not shocked or appalled.
The tidings appeared in their eyes rather momentous than afflicting.
Dead?
Repeated Diana.
Yes.
What then?
She demanded in a low voice.
He threw the letter into her lap and she glanced over it and handed it to Mary.
All three looked at each other and all three smiled.
Amen!
We can yet live,
Said Diana at last.
At any rate,
It makes us no worse off than we were before,
Remarked Mary.
Only,
It forces rather strongly on the mind the picture of what might have been,
Said Mr Rivers,
And contrasts it somewhat too vividly with what is.
For some minutes no one spoke,
Then Diana turned to me.
Jane,
You will wonder at us and our mysteries,
And think us hard-hearted beings not to be more moot at the death of so near a relation,
But we'd never seen or known him.
He was my mother's brother,
My father,
And he quarrelled long ago.
It was by his advice my father risked most of his property in the speculation that ruined him.
My uncle engaged afterwards in more prosperous undertakings and it appears he realised a fortune of twenty thousand pounds.
He was never married and had no near relations but ours and one other person,
Not more closely related than we are.
He had a right,
Of course,
To do as he pleased,
And yet a momentary damp is cast on the spirits by the receipt of such news.
Mary and I would have esteemed ourselves rich with a thousand pounds each,
And to St John such a sum would have been valuable for the good it would have been able to do.
But the letter informs us he's bequeathed every penny to the other relation,
With the exception of thirty guineas to be divided between St John,
Diana and myself.
This explanation given,
The subject was dropped,
And no further reference made to it,
By either Mr Rivers or his sisters.
The next day I left Marchend for Moreton.
The day after,
Diana and Mary quitted it for distance.
And in a week,
Mr Rivers and Hannah repaired to the parsonage.
And so the old Grange was abandoned.
