antiquity, moderate size, and no architectural pretensions, deep

buried in a wood. I had heard of it before. Mr. Rochester often

spoke of it, and sometimes went there. His father had purchased the

estate for the sake of the game covers. He would have let the house,

but could find no tenant, in consequence of its ineligible and

insalubrious site. Ferndean then remained uninhabited and unfurnished,

with the exception of some two or three rooms fitted up for the

accommodation of the squire when he went there in the season to shoot.

To this house I came just ere dark on an evening marked by the

characteristics of sad sky, cold gale, and continued small penetrating

rain. The last mile I performed on foot, having dismissed the chaise

and driver with the double remuneration I had promised. Even when

within a very short distance of the manor-house, you could see nothing

of it, so thick and dark grew the timber of the gloomy wood about

it. Iron gates between granite pillars showed me where to enter, and

passing through them, I found myself at once in the twilight of

close-ranked trees. There was a grass-grown track descending the

forest aisle between hoar and knotty shafts and under branched arches.

I followed it, expecting soon to reach the dwelling; but it

stretched on and on, it wound far and farther: no sign of habitation

or grounds was visible.

I thought I had taken a wrong direction and lost my way. The

darkness of natural as well as of sylvan dusk gathered over me. I

looked round in search of another road. There was none: all was

interwoven stem, columnar trunk, dense summer foliage- no opening

anywhere.

I proceeded: at last my way opened, the trees thinned a little;

presently I beheld a railing, then the house- scarce, by this dim

light, distinguishable from the trees, so dank and green were its

decaying walls. Entering a portal, fastened only by a latch, I stood

amidst a space of enclosed ground, from which the wood swept away in a

semicircle. There were no flowers, no garden-beds; only a broad

gravel-walk girdling a grass-plat, and this set in the heavy frame

of the forest. The house presented two pointed gables in its front;

the windows were latticed and narrow: the front door was narrow too,

one step led up to it. The whole looked, as the host of the

Rochester Arms had said, 'quite a desolate spot.' It was as still as a

church on a week-day: the pattering rain on the forest leaves was

the only sound audible in its vicinage.

'Can there be life here?' I asked.

Yes, life of some kind there was; for I heard a movement- that

narrow front-door was unclosing, and some shape was about to issue

from the grange.

It opened slowly: a figure came out into the twilight and stood

on the step; a man without a hat: he stretched forth his hand as if to

feel whether it rained. Dusk as it was, I had recognised him- it was

my master, Edward Fairfax Rochester, and no other.

I stayed my step, almost my breath, and stood to watch him- to

examine him, myself unseen, and alas! to him invisible. It was a

sudden meeting, and one in which rapture was kept well in check by

pain. I had no difficulty in restraining my voice from exclamation, my

step from hasty advance.

His form was of the same strong and stalwart contour as ever: his

port was still erect, his hair was still raven black; nor were his

features altered or sunk: not in one year's space, by any sorrow,

could his athletic strength be quelled or his vigorous prime blighted.

But in his countenance I saw a change: that looked desperate and

brooding- that reminded me of some wronged and fettered wild beast

or bird, dangerous to approach in his sullen woe. The caged eagle,

whose gold-ringed eyes cruelty has extinguished, might look as

looked that sightless Samson.

And, reader, do you think I feared him in his blind ferocity?- if

you do, you little know me. A soft hope blent with my sorrow that soon

I should dare to drop a kiss on that brow of rock, and on those lips

so sternly sealed beneath it: but not yet. I would not accost him yet.

He descended the one step, and advanced slowly and gropingly

towards the grass-plat. Where was his daringstride now? Then he

paused, as if he knew not which way to turn. He lifted his hand and

opened his eyelids; gazed blank, and with a straining effort, on the

sky, and toward the amphitheatre of trees: one saw that all to him was

void darkness. He stretched his right hand (the left arm, the

mutilated one, he kept hidden in his bosom); he seemed to wish by

touch to gain an idea of what lay around him: he met but vacancy

still; for the trees were some yards off where he stood. He

relinquished the endeavour, folded his arms, and stood quiet and

mute in the rain, now falling fast on his uncovered head. At this

moment John approached him from some quarter.

'Will you take my arm, sir?' he said; 'there is a heavy shower

coming on: had you not better go in?'

'Let me alone,' was the answer.

John withdrew without having observed me. Mr. Rochester now tried

to walk about: vainly,- all was too uncertain. He groped his way

back to the house, and, re-entering it, closed the door.

I now drew near and knocked: John's wife opened for me. 'Mary,' I

said, 'how are you?'

She started as if she had seen a ghost: I calmed her. To her

hurried 'Is it really you, miss, come at this late hour to this lonely

place?' I answered by taking her hand; and then I followed her into

the kitchen, where John now sat by a good fire. I explained to them,

in a few words, that I had heard all which had happened since I left

Thornfield, and that I was come to see Mr. Rochester. I asked John

to go down to the turnpike-house, where I had dismissed the chaise,

and bring my trunk, which I had left there: and then, while I

removed my bonnet and shawl, I questioned Mary as to whether I could

be accommodated at the Manor House for the night; and finding that

arrangements to that effect, though difficult, would not be

impossible, I informed her I should stay. just at this moment the

parlour-bell rang.

'When you go in,' said I, 'tell your master that a person wishes to

speak to him, but do not give my name.'

'I don't think he will see you,' she answered; 'he refuses

everybody.'

When she returned, I inquired what he had said.

'You are to send in your name and your business,' she replied.

She then proceeded to fill a glass with water, and place it on a tray,

together with candles.

'Is that what he rang for?' I asked.

'Yes: he always has candles brought in at dark, though he is

blind.'

'Give the tray to me; I will carry it in.'

I took it from her hand: she pointed me out the parlour door. The

tray shook as I held it; the water spilt from the glass; my heart

struck my ribs loud and fast. Mary opened the door for me, and shut it

behind me.

This parlour looked gloomy: a neglected handful of fire burnt low

in the grate; and, leaning over it, with his head supported against

the high, old-fashioned mantelpiece, appeared the blind tenant of

the room. His old dog, Pilot, lay on one side, removed out of the way,

and coiled up as if afraid of being inadvertently trodden upon.

Pilot pricked up his ears when I came in: then he jumped up with a

yelp and a whine, and bounded towards me: he almost knocked the tray

from my hands. I set it on the table; then patted him, and said

softly, 'Lie down!' Mr. Rochester turned mechanically to see what

the commotion was: but as he saw nothing, he returned and sighed.

'Give me the water, Mary,' he said.

I approached him with the now only half-filled glass; Pilot

followed me, still excited.

'What is the matter?' he inquired.

'Down, Pilot!' I again said. He checked the water on its way to his

lips, and seemed to listen: he drank, and put the glass down. 'This is

you, Mary, is it not?'

'Mary is in the kitchen,' I answered.

He put out his hand with a quick gesture, but not seeing where I

stood, he did not touch me. 'Who is this? Who is this?' he demanded,

trying, as it seemed, to see with those sightless eyes- unavailing and

distressing attempt! 'Answer me- speak again!' he ordered, imperiously

and aloud.

'Will you have a little more water, sir? I spilt half of what was

in the glass,' I said.

'Who is it? What is it? Who speaks?'

'Pilot knows me, and John and Mary know I am here. I came only this

evening,' I answered.

'Great God!- what delusion has come over me? What sweet madness has

seized me?'

'No delusion- no madness: your mind, sir, is too strong for

delusion, your health too sound for frenzy.'

'And where is the speaker? Is it only a voice? Oh! I cannot see,

but I must feel, or my heart will stop and my brain burst. Whatever-

whoever you are- be perceptible to the touch or I cannot live!'

He groped; I arrested his wandering hand, and prisoned it in both

mine.

'Her very fingers!' he cried; 'her small, slight fingers! If so

there must be more of her.'

The muscular hand broke from my custody; my arm was seized, my

shoulder- neck- waist- I was entwined and gathered to him.

'Is it Jane? What is it? This is her shape- this is her size-'

'And this her voice,' I added. 'She is all here: her heart, too.

God bless you, sir! I am glad to be so near you again.'

'Jane Eyre!- Jane Eyre,' was all he said.

'My dear master,' I answered, 'I am Jane Eyre: I have found you

out- I am come back to you.'

'In truth?- in the flesh? My living Jane?'

'You touch me, sir,- you hold me, and fast enough: I am not cold

like a corpse, nor vacant like air, am I?'

'My living darling! These are certainly her limbs, and these her

features; but I cannot be so blest, after all my misery. It is a

dream; such dreams as I have had at night when I have clasped her once

more to my heart, as I do now; and kissed her, as thus- and felt

that she loved me, and trusted that she would not leave me.'

'Which I never will, sir, from this day.'

'Never will, says the vision? But I always woke and found it an

empty mockery; and I was desolate and abandoned- my life dark, lonely,

hopeless- my soul athirst and forbidden to drink- my heart famished

and never to be fed. Gentle, soft dream, nestling in my arms now,

you will fly, too, as your sisters have all fled before you: but

kiss me before you go- embrace me, Jane.'

'There, sir- and there!'

I pressed my lips to his once brilliant and now rayless eyes- I

swept his hair from his brow, and kissed that too. He suddenly

seemed to arouse himself: the conviction of the reality of all this

seized him.

'It is you- is it, Jane? You are come back to me then?'

'I am.'

'And you do not lie dead in some ditch under some stream? And you

are not a pining outcast amongst strangers?'

'No, sir! I am an independent woman now.'

'Independent! What do you mean, Jane?'

'My uncle in Madeira is dead, and he left me five thousand pounds.'

'Ah! this is practical- this is real!' he cried: 'I should never

dream that. Besides, there is that peculiar voice of hers, so

animating and piquant, as well as soft: it cheers my withered heart;

it puts life into it.- What, Janet! Are you an independent woman? A

rich woman?'

'Quite rich, sir. If you won't let me live with you, I can build

a house of my own close up to your door, and you may come and sit in

my parlour when you want company of an evening.'

'But as you are rich, Jane, you have now, no doubt, friends who

will look after you, and not suffer you to devote yourself to a

blind lameter like me?'

'I told you I am independent, sir, as well as rich: I am my own

mistress.'

'And you will stay with me?'

'Certainly- unless you object. I will be your neighbour, your

nurse, your housekeeper. I find you lonely: I will be your

companion- to read to you, to walk with you, to sit with you, to

wait on you, to be eyes and hands to you. Cease to look so melancholy,

my dear master; you shall not be left desolate, so long as I live.'

He replied not: he seemed serious- abstracted; he sighed; he

half-opened his lips as if to speak: he closed them again. I felt a

little embarrassed. Perhaps I had too rashly overleaped

conventionalities; and he, like St. John, saw impropriety in my

inconsiderateness. I had indeed made my proposal from the idea that he

wished and would ask me to be his wife: an expectation, not the less

certain because unexpressed, had buoyed me up, that he would claim

me at once as his own. But no hint to that effect escaping him and his

countenance becoming more overcast, I suddenly remembered that I might

have been all wrong, and was perhaps playing the fool unwittingly; and

I began gently to withdraw myself from his arms- but he eagerly

snatched me closer.

'No- no- Jane; you must not go. No- I have touched you, heard

you, felt the comfort of your presence- the sweetness of your

consolation: I cannot give up these joys. I have little left in

myself- I must have you. The world may laugh- may call me absurd,

selfish- but it does not signify. My very soul demands you: it will be

satisfied, or it will take deadly vengeance on its frame.'

'Well, sir, I will stay with you: I have said so.'

'Yes- but you understand one thing by staying with me; and I

understand another. You, perhaps, could make up your mind to be

about my hand and chair- to wait on me as a kind little nurse (for you

have an affectionate heart and a generous spirit, which prompt you

to make sacrifices for those you pity), and that ought to suffice

for me no doubt. I suppose I should now entertain none but fatherly

feelings for you: do you think so? Come- tell me.'

'I will think what you like, sir: I am content to be only your

nurse, if you think it better.'

'But you cannot always be my nurse, Janet: you are young- you

must marry one day.'

'I don't care about being married.'

'You should care, Janet: if I were what I once was, I would try

to make you care- but- a sightless block!'

He relapsed again into gloom. I, on the contrary, became more

cheerful, and took fresh courage: these last words gave me an

insight as to where the difficulty lay; and as it was no difficulty

with me, I felt quite relieved from my previous embarrassment. I

resumed a livelier vein of conversation.

'It is time some one undertook to rehumanise you,' said I,

parting his thick and long uncut locks; 'for I see you are being

metamorphosed into a lion, or something of that sort. You have a "faux

air" of Nebuchadnezzar in the fields about you, that is certain:

your hair reminds me of eagles' feathers; whether your nails are grown

like birds' claws or not, I have not yet noticed.'

'On this arm, I have neither hand nor nails,' he said, drawing

the mutilated limb from his breast, and showing it to me. 'It is a

mere stump- a ghastly sight! Don't you think so, Jane?'

'It is a pity to see it; and a pity to see your eyes- and the

scar of fire on your forehead: and the worst of it is, one is in

danger of loving you too well for all this; and making too much of

you.'

'I thought you would be revolted, Jane, when you saw my arm, and my

cicatrised visage.'

'Did you? Don't tell me so- lest I should say something disparaging

to your judgment. Now, let me leave you an instant, to make a better

fire, and have the hearth swept up. Can you tell when there is a

good fire?'

'Yes; with the right eye I see a glow- a ruddy haze.'

'And you see the candles?'

'Very dimly- each is a luminous cloud.'

'Can you see me?'

'No, my fairy: but I am only too thankful to hear and feel you.'

'When do you take supper?'

'I never take supper.'

'But you shall have some to-night. I am hungry: so are you, I

daresay, only you forget.'

Summoning Mary, I soon had the room in more cheerful order: I

prepared him, likewise, a comfortable repast. My spirits were excited,

and with pleasure and ease I talked to him during supper, and for a

long time after. There was no harassing restraint, no repressing of

glee and vivacity with him; for with him I was at perfect ease,

because I knew I suited him; all I said or did seemed either to

console or revive him. Delightful consciousness! It brought to life

and light my whole nature: in his presence I thoroughly lived; and

he lived in mine. Blind as he was, smiles played over his face, joy

dawned on his forehead: his lineaments softened and warmed.

After supper, he began to ask me many questions, of where I had

been, what I had been doing, how I had found him out; but I gave him

only very partial replies: it was too late to enter into particulars

that night. Besides, I wished to touch no deep-thrilling chord- to

open no fresh well of emotion in his heart: my sole present aim was to

cheer him. Cheered, as I have said, he was: and yet but by fits. If

a moment's silence broke the conversation, he would turn restless,

touch me, then say, 'Jane.'

'You are altogether a human being, Janet? You are certain of that?'

'I conscientiously believe so, Mr. Rochester.'

'Yet how, on this dark and doleful evening, could you so suddenly

rise on my lone hearth? I stretched my hand to take a glass of water

from a hireling, and it was given me by you: I asked a question,

expecting John's wife to answer me, and your voice spoke at my ear.'

'Because I had come in, in Mary's stead, with the tray.'

'And there is enchantment in the very hour I am now spending with

you. Who can tell what a dark, dreary, hopeless life I have dragged on

for months past? Doing nothing, expecting nothing; merging night in

day; feeling but the sensation of cold when I let the fire go out,

of hunger when I forgot to eat: and then a ceaseless sorrow, and, at

times, a very delirium of desire to behold my Jane again. Yes: for her

restoration I longed, far more than for that of my lost sight. How can

it be that Jane is with me, and says she loves me? Will she not depart

as suddenly as she came? To-morrow, I fear I shall find her no more.'

A commonplace, practical reply, out of the train of his own

disturbed ideas, was, I was sure, the best and most reassuring for him

in this frame of mind. I passed my finger over his eyebrows, and

remarked that they were scorched, and that I would apply something

which would make them grow as broad and black as ever.

'Where is the use of doing me good in any way, beneficent spirit,

when, at some fatal moment, you will again desert me- passing like a

shadow, whither and how to me unknown, and for me remaining afterwards

undiscoverable?'

'Have you a pocket-comb about you, sir?'

'What for, Jane?'

'Just to comb out this shaggy black mane. I find you rather

alarming, when I examine you close at hand: you talk of my being a

fairy, but I am sure, you are more like a brownie.'

'Am I hideous, Jane?'

'Very, sir: you always were, you know.'

'Humph! The wickedness has not been taken out of you, wherever

you have sojourned.'

'Yet I have been with good people; far better than you: a hundred

times better people; possessed of ideas and views you never

entertained in your life: quite more refined and exalted.'

'Who the deuce have you been with?'

'If you twist in that way you will make me pull the hair out of

your head; and then I think you will cease to entertain doubts of my

substantiality.'

'Who have you been with, Jane?'

'You shall not get it out of me to-night, sir; you must wait till

to-morrow; to leave my tale half told, will, you know, be a sort of

security that I shall appear at your breakfast table to finish it.

By the bye, I must mind not to rise on your hearth with only a glass

of water then: I must bring an egg at the least, to say nothing of

fried ham.'

'You mocking changeling- fairy-born and human-bred! You make me

feel as I have not felt these twelve months. If Saul could have had

you for his David, the evil spirit would have been exorcised without

the aid of the harp.'

'There, sir, you are redd up and made decent. Now I'll leave you: I

have been travelling these last three days, and I believe I am

tired. Good night.'

'Just one word, Jane: were there only ladies in the house where you

have been?'

I laughed and made my escape, still laughing as I ran upstairs.

'A good idea!' I thought with glee. 'I see I have the means of

fretting him out of his melancholy for some time to come.'

Very early the next morning I heard him up and astir, wandering

from one room to another. As soon as Mary came down I heard the

question: 'Is Miss Eyre here?' Then: 'Which room did you put her into?

Was it dry? Is she up? Go and ask if she wants anything; and when

she will come down.'

I came down as soon as I thought there was a prospect of breakfast.

Entering the room very softly, I had a view of him before he

discovered my presence. It was mournful, indeed, to witness the

subjugation of that vigorous spirit to a corporeal infirmity. He sat

in his chair- still, but not at rest: expectant evidently; the lines

of now habitualsadness marking his strong features. His countenance

reminded one of a lamp quenched, waiting to be re-lit- and alas! it

was not himself that could now kindle the lustre of animated

expression: he was dependent on another for that office! I had meant

to be gay and careless, but the powerlessness of the strong man

touched my heart to the quick: still I accosted him with what vivacity

I could.

'It is a bright, sunny morning, sir,' I said. 'The rain is over and

gone, and there is a tender shining after it: you shall have a walk

soon.'

I had wakened the glow: his features beamed.

'Oh, you are indeed there, my skylark! Come to me. You are not

gone: not vanished? I heard one of your kind an hour ago, singing high

over the wood: but its song had no music for me, any more than the

rising sun had rays. All the melody on earth is concentrated in my

Jane's tongue to my ear (I am glad it is not naturally a silent

one): all the sunshine I can feel is in her presence.'

The water stood in my eyes to hear this avowal of his dependence;

just as if a royal eagle, chained to a perch, should be forced to

entreat a sparrow to become its purveyor. But I would not be

lachrymose: I dashed off the salt drops, and busied myself with

preparing breakfast.

Most of the morning was spent in the open air. I led him out of the

wet and wild wood into some cheerful fields: I described to him how

brilliantly green they were; how the flowers and hedges looked

refreshed; how sparklingly blue was the sky. I sought a seat for him

in a hidden and lovely spot, a dry stump of a tree; nor did I refuse

to let him, when seated, place me on his knee. Why should I, when both

he and I were happier near than apart? Pilot lay beside us: all was

quiet. He broke out suddenly while clasping me in his arms-

'Cruel, cruel deserter! Oh, Jane, what did I feel when I discovered

you had fled from Thornfield, and when I could nowhere find you;

and, after examining your apartment, ascertained that you had taken no

money, nor anything which could serve as an equivalent! A pearl

necklace I had given you lay untouched in its little casket; your

trunks were left corded and locked as they had been prepared for the

bridal tour. What could my darling do, I asked, left destitute and

penniless? And what did she do? Let me hear now.'

Thus urged, I began the narrative of my experience for the last

year. I softened considerably what related to the three days of

wandering and starvation, because to have told him all would have been

to inflict unnecessary pain: the little I did say lacerated his

faithful heart deeper than I wished.

I should not have left him thus, he said, without any means of

making my way: I should have told him my intention. I should have

confided in him: he would never have forced me to be his mistress.

Violent as he had seemed in his despair, he, in truth, loved me far

too well and too tenderly to constitute himself my tyrant: he would

have given me half his fortune, without demanding so much as a kiss in

return, rather than I should have flung myself friendless on the

wide world. I had endured, he was certain, more than I had confessed

to him.

'Well, whatever my sufferings had been, they were very short,' I