This is S.
D.
Hudson Magic.
Jane Eyre.
Chapter 7 continued.
Miss Temple passed her handkerchief over her lips,
As if to smooth away the involuntary smile that curled them.
She gave the order,
However,
And when the first class could take in what was required of them,
They obeyed.
Leaning a little back on my bench,
I could see the looks and grimaces with which they commented on this manoeuvre.
It was a pity Mr Brocklehurst could not see them too.
He would perhaps have felt that,
Whatever he might do with the outside of the cup and platter,
The inside was further beyond his interference than he imagined.
He scrutinised the reverse of these living medals some five minutes,
Then pronounced sentence.
These words fell like the knell of doom.
All those top knots must be cut off.
Miss Temple seemed to remonstrate.
Madam,
He pursued,
I have a master to serve whose kingdom is not of this world.
My mission is to mortify in these girls the lusts of the flesh,
To teach them to clothe themselves with shamefacedness and sobriety,
Not with braided hair and costly apparel.
And each of the young persons before us has a string of hair twisted in plaits which vanity itself might have woven.
These,
I repeat,
Must be cut off.
Think of the time wasted,
Of.
.
.
Mr Brocklehurst was here interrupted.
Three other visitors,
Ladies,
Now entered the room.
They ought to have come a little sooner to have heard his lecture on dress,
For they were splendidly attired in velvet,
Silk and furs.
The two younger of the trio,
Fine girls of sixteen and seventeen,
Had grey beaver hats,
Then in fashion,
Shaded with ostrich plumes,
And from under the brim of this graceful headdress fell a profusion of light tresses elaborately curled.
The elder lady was enveloped in a costly velvet shawl,
Trimmed with ermine,
And she wore a false front of French curls.
These ladies were deferentially received by Miss Temple,
As Mrs and the Mrs Brocklehurst,
And conducted to seats of honour at the top of the room.
It seemed they had come in the carriage with their reverend relative,
And had been conducting a rummaging scrutiny of the rooms upstairs,
While he transacted business with the housekeeper,
Questioned the lawn dress,
And lectured the superintendent.
They now proceeded to address remarks and reproves to Miss Smith,
Who was charged with the care of the linen and the inspection of the dormitories.
But I had no time to listen to what they said.
Other matters called off and enchained my attention.
Hitherto,
Whilst gathering up the discourse of Mr Brocklehurst and Miss Temple,
I had not at the same time neglected precautions to secure my personal safety,
Which I thought would be effective if I could only elude observation.
To this end I sat well back on the form,
And while seeming to be busy with my sum,
Had held my slate in such a manner as to conceal my face.
I might have escaped notice had not my treacherous slate somehow happened to slip from my hand,
And falling with an obtrusive crash directly drawn every eye upon me.
I knew it was all over now,
And as I stooped to pick up the two fragments of slate,
I rallied my forces for the worst.
It came.
A careless girl,
Said Mr Brocklehurst,
And immediately after.
It is the new pupil I perceive,
And before I could draw breath,
I must not forget I have a word to say regarding her.
Then aloud,
How loud it seemed to me.
Let the child who broke her slate come forward.
Of my own accord I could not have stirred.
I was paralysed.
But the two great girls who sat either side of me set me on my legs and pushed me towards the dread judge,
And then Miss Temple gently assisted me to his very feet,
And I caught her whispered counsel.
Don't be afraid,
Jane.
I saw it was an accident.
You shall not be punished.
The kind whisper went to my heart like a dagger.
Another minute and she will despise me for a hypocrite,
Thought I,
And an impulse of fury against Reed,
Brocklehurst and co.
Bounded in my pulses at the conviction.
I was no Helen Burns.
Fetch that stool,
Said Mr Brocklehurst,
Pointing to a very high one from which a monitor had just risen.
It was broad.
Place the child upon it.
And I was placed there by whom I don't know.
I was in no condition to note particulars.
I was only aware that they had hoisted me up to the height of Mr Brocklehurst's nose,
That he was within a yard of me,
And that a spread of shot orange and purple sink polices and a cloud of silvery plumage extended and waved below me.
Mr Brocklehurst hemmed.
Ladies,
Said he,
Turning to his family.
Miss Temple,
Teachers and children,
You all see this girl?
Of course they did,
For I felt their eyes directed like burning glasses against my scorched skin.
You see she is yet young.
You observe she possesses the ordinary form of childhood.
God has graciously given her the shape that he has given to all of us.
No single deformity points her out as a marked character.
Who would think that the evil one had already found a servant,
An agent in her?
Yet such,
I grieve to say,
Is the case.
A pause in which I began to steady the palsy of my nerves and to feel that Rubicon was past and that the trial no longer needed to be shirked must be firmly sustained.
My dear children,
Pursued the black marble clergyman with pathos,
This is a sad and melancholy occasion.
For it becomes my duty to warn you that this girl,
Who might be one of God's own lambs,
Is a little cast away.
Not a member of the true flock,
But evidently an interloper and an alien.
You must be on your guard against her.
You must shun her example.
If necessary,
Avoid her company.
Exclude her from your sports and shut her out of your converse.
Teachers,
You must watch her.
Keep your eyes on her movements.
Weigh well her words.
Scrutinize her actions.
Punish her body to save her soul.
If indeed such salvation be possible.
For,
My tongue falters when I tell it,
This girl,
This child,
The native of Christian land,
Worse than many a little heathen who says its prayers to Brahma and kneels before Juggernaut,
This girl is a liar.
Now came a pause of ten minutes,
During which I,
By this time in perfect possession of my wits,
Observed all the female Brockelhursts produce their pocket handkerchiefs and apply them to their optics,
While the elderly lady swayed herself to and fro,
And the two younger ones whispered,
How shocking!
Mr.
Brockelhurst resumed.
This I learned from her benefactress,
From the pious and charitable lady who adopted her in her orphaned state,
Reared her as her own daughter,
And whose kindness,
Whose generosity the unhappy girl repaid by an ingratitude so bad,
So dreadful,
That at last her excellent patroness was obliged to separate her from her own young ones,
Fearful lest her vicious example should contaminate their purity.
She has sent her here to be healed,
Even as the Jews of old sent their disease to the troubled pool of Bethesda,
And teachers,
Superintendent,
I beg of you not to allow the waters to stagnate round her.
With this sublime conclusion,
Mr.
Brockelhurst adjusted the top button of his suit too,
Muttered something to his family,
Who rose,
Bowed to Miss Temple,
And then all the great people sailed in state from the row.
Turning at the door,
My judge said,
Let her stand half an hour longer on that stool,
And let no one speak to her during the remainder of the day.
There was I then mounted aloft.
I,
Who had said I could not bear the shame of standing on my natural feet in the middle of the room,
Was now exposed to general view on a pedestal of infamy.
What my sensations were no language can describe,
But just as they all rose,
Stifling my breath and constricting my throat,
A girl came up and passed me.
In passing she lifted her eyes.
What strange light inspired them.
What an extraordinary sensation that ray sent through me.
How the new feeling bore me up.
It was as if a martyr,
A hero,
Had passed a slave or victim,
And imparted strength in the transit.
I mastered the rising hysteria,
Lifted up my head,
And took a firm stand on the stool.
Helen Burns asked some slight question about her work of Miss Smith,
Was chidin for the triviality of the inquiry,
Returned to her place,
And smiled at me as she again went by.
What a smile.
I remember it now,
And I know that it was the effluence of fine intellect,
Of true courage.
It lit up her marked liniments,
Her lin face,
Her sunken grey eye,
Like a reflection from the aspect of an angel.
Yet at that moment,
Helen Burns wore on her arm the untidy badge.
Scarcely an hour ago I had heard her condemned by Miss Scatchard to a dinner of bread and water on the morrow,
Because she had blotted an exercise in copying it out.
Such is the imperfect nature of man.
Such spots are there on the disk of the clearest planet,
And eyes like Miss Scatchard's can only see those minute defects,
And are blind to the full brightness of the orb.
