the sea in a great ship with a chimney that smoked- how it did smoke!-

and I was sick, and so was Sophie, and so was Mr. Rochester. Mr.

Rochester lay down on a sofa in a pretty room called the salon, and

Sophie and I had little beds in another place. I nearly fell out of

mine; it was like a shelf. And Mademoiselle- what is your name?'

'Eyre- Jane Eyre.'

'Aire? Bah! I cannot say it. Well, our ship stopped in the morning,

before it was quite daylight, at a great city- a huge city, with

very dark houses and all smoky; not at all like the pretty clean

town I came from; and Mr. Rochester carried me in his arms over a

plank to the land, and Sophie came after, and we all got into a coach,

which took us to a beautiful large house, larger than this and

finer, called an hotel. We stayed there nearly a week: I and Sophie

used to walk every day in a great green place full of trees, called

the Park; and there were many children there besides me, and a pond

with beautiful birds in it, that I fed with crumbs.'

'Can you understand her when she runs on so fast?' asked Mrs.

Fairfax.

I understood her very well, for I had been accustomed to the fluent

tongue of Madame Pierrot.

'I wish,' continued the good lady, 'you would ask her a question or

two about her parents: I wonder if she remembers them?'

'Adele,' I inquired, 'with whom did you live when you were in

that pretty clean town you spoke of?'

'I lived long ago with mama; but she is gone to the Holy Virgin.

Mama used to teach me to dance and sing, and to say verses. A great

many gentlemen and ladies came to see mama, and I used to dance before

them, or to sit on their knees and sing to them: I liked it. Shall I

let you hear me sing now?'

She had finished her breakfast, so I permitted her to give a

specimen of her accomplishments. Descending from her chair, she came

and placed herself on my knee; then, folding her little hands demurely

before her, shaking back her curls and lifting her eyes to the

ceiling, she commenced singing a song from some opera. It was the

strain of a forsaken lady, who, after bewailing the perfidy of her

lover, calls pride to her aid; desires her attendant to deck her in

her brightest jewels and richest robes, and resolves to meet the false

one that night at a ball, and prove to him, by the gaiety of her

demeanour, how little his desertion has affected her.

The subject seemed strangely chosen for an infant singer; but I

suppose the point of the exhibition lay in hearing the notes of love

and jealousy warbled with the lisp of childhood; and in very bad taste

that point was: at least I thought so.

Adele sang the canzonette tunefully enough, and with the naivete of

her age. This achieved, she jumped from my knee and said, 'Now,

Mademoiselle, I will repeat you some poetry.'

Assuming an attitude, she began 'La Ligue des Rats: fable de La

Fontaine.' She then declaimed the little piece with an attention to

punctuation and emphasis, a flexibility of voice and an

appropriateness of gesture, very unusual indeed at her age, and

which proved she had been carefully trained.

'Was it your mama who taught you that piece?' I asked.

'Yes, and she just used to say it in this way: "Qu'avez vous

donc? lui dit un de ces rats; parlez!" She made me lift my hand- so-

to remind me to raise my voice at the question. Now shall I dance

for you?'

'No, that will do: but after your mama went to the Holy Virgin,

as you say, with whom did you live then?'

'With Madame Frederic and her husband: she took care of me, but she

is nothing related to me. I think she is poor, for she had not so fine

a house as mama. I was not long there. Mr. Rochester asked me if I

would like to go and live with him in England, and I said yes; for I

knew Mr. Rochester before I knew Madame Frederic, and he was always

kind to me and gave me pretty dresses and toys: but you see he has not

kept his word, for he has brought me to England, and now he is gone

back again himself, and I never see him.'

After breakfast, Adele and I withdrew to the library, which room,

it appears, Mr. Rochester had directed should be used as the

schoolroom. Most of the books were locked up behind glass doors; but

there was one bookcase left open containing everything that could be

needed in the way of elementary works, and several volumes of light

literature, poetry, biography, travels, a few romances, etc. I suppose

he had considered that these were all the governess would require

for her private perusal; and, indeed, they contented me amply for

the present; compared with the scanty pickings I had now and then been

able to glean at Lowood, they seemed to offer an abundant harvest of

entertainment and information. In this room, too, there was a

cabinet piano, quite new and of superior tone; also an easel for

painting and a pair of globes.

I found my pupil sufficiently docile, though disinclined to

apply: she had not been used to regular occupation of any kind. I felt

it would be injudicious to confine her too much at first; so, when I

had talked to her a great deal, and got her to learn a little, and

when the morning had advanced to noon, I allowed her to return to

her nurse. I then proposed to occupy myself till dinner-time in

drawing some little sketches for her use.

As I was going upstairs to fetch my portfolio and pencils, Mrs.

Fairfax called to me: 'Your morning school-hours are over now, I

suppose,' said she. She was in a room the folding doors of which stood

open: I went in when she addressed me. It was a large, stately

apartment, with purple chairs and curtains, a Turkey carpet,

walnut-panelled walls, one vast window rich in stained glass, and a

lofty ceiling, nobly moulded. Mrs. Fairfax was dusting some vases of

fine purple spar, which stood on a sideboard.

'What a beautiful room!' I exclaimed, as I looked round; for I

had never before seen any half so imposing.

'Yes; this is the dining-room. I have just opened the window, to

let in a little air and sunshine; for everything gets so damp in

apartments that are seldom inhabited; the drawing-room yonder feels

like a vault.'

She pointed to a wide arch corresponding to the window, and hung

like it with a Tyrian-dyed curtain, now looped up. Mounting to it by

two broad steps, and looking through, I thought I caught a glimpse

of a fairy place, so bright to my novice-eyes appeared the view

beyond. Yet it was merely a very pretty drawing-room, and within it

a boudoir, both spread with white carpets, on which seemed laid

brilliant garlands of flowers; both ceiled with snowy mouldings of

white grapes and vine-leaves, beneath which glowed in rich contrast

crimson couches and ottomans; while the ornaments on the pale Parian

mantelpiece were of sparkling Bohemian glass, ruby red; and between

the windows large mirrors repeated the general blending of snow and

fire.

'In what order you keep these rooms, Mrs. Fairfax!' said I. 'No

dust, no canvas coverings: except that the air feels chilly, one would

think they were inhabited daily.'

'Why, Miss Eyre, though Mr. Rochester's visits here are rare,

they are always sudden and unexpected; and as I observed that it put

him out to find everything swathed up, and to have a bustle of

arrangement on his arrival, I thought it best to keep the rooms in

readiness.'

'Is Mr. Rochester an exacting, fastidious sort of man?'

'Not particularly so; but he has a gentleman's tastes and habits,

and he expects to have things managed in conformity to them.'

'Do you like him? Is he generally liked?'

'Oh, yes; the family have always been respected here. Almost all

the land in this neighbourhood, as far as you can see, has belonged to

the Rochesters time out of mind.'

'Well, but, leaving his land out of the question, do you like

him? Is he liked for himself?'

'I have no cause to do otherwise than like him; and I believe he is

considered a just and liberal landlord by his tenants: but he has

never lived much amongst them.'

'But has he no peculiarities? What, in short, is his character?'

'Oh! his character is unimpeachable, I suppose. He is rather

peculiar, perhaps: he has travelled a great deal, and seen a great

deal of the world, I should think. I daresay he is clever, but I never

had much conversation with him.'

'In what way is he peculiar?'

'I don't know- it is not easy to describe- nothing striking, but

you feel it when he speaks to you; you cannot be always sure whether

he is in jest or earnest, whether he is pleased or the contrary; you

don't thoroughly understand him, in short- at least, I don't: but it

is of no consequence, he is a very good master.'

This was all the account I got from Mrs. Fairfax of her employer

and mine. There are people who seem to have no notion of sketching a

character, or observing and describing salient points, either in

persons or things: the good lady evidently belonged to this class;

my queries puzzled, but did not draw her out. Mr. Rochester was Mr.

Rochester in her eyes; a gentleman, a landed proprietor- nothing more:

she inquired and searched no further, and evidently wondered at my

wish to gain a more definite notion of his identity.

When we left the dining-room she proposed to show me over the

rest of the house; and I followed her upstairs and downstairs,

admiring as I went; for all was well arranged and handsome. The

large front chambers I thought especially grand: and some of the

third-storey rooms, though dark and low, were interesting from their

air of antiquity. The furniture once appropriated to the lower

apartments had from time to time been removed here, as fashions

changed: and the imperfect light entering by their narrow casement

showed bed-steads of a hundred years old; chests in oak or walnut,

looking, with their strange carvings of palm branches and cherubs'

heads, like types of the Hebrew ark; rows of venerable chairs,

high-backed and narrow; stools still more antiquated, on whose

cushioned tops were yet apparent traces of half-effaced

embroideries, wrought by fingers that for two generations had been

coffin-dust. All these relics gave to the third storey of Thornfield

Hall the aspect of a home of the past: a shrine of memory. I liked the

hush, the gloom, the quaintness of these retreats in the day; but I by

no means coveted a night's repose on one of those wide and heavy beds:

shut in, some of them, with doors of oak; shaded, others, with wrought

old English hangings crusted with thick work, portraying effigies of

strange flowers, and stranger birds, and strangest human beings,-

all which would have looked strange, indeed, by the pallid gleam of

moonlight.

'Do the servants sleep in these rooms?' I asked.

'No; they occupy a range of smaller apartments to the back; no

one ever sleeps here: one would almost say that, if there were a ghost

at Thornfield Hall, this would be its haunt.'

'So I think: you have no ghost, then?'

'None that I ever heard of,' returned Mrs. Fairfax, smiling.

'Nor any traditions of one? no legends or ghost stories?'

'I believe not. And yet it is said the Rochesters have been

rather a violent than a quiet race in their time: perhaps, though,

that is the reason they rest tranquilly in their graves now.'

'Yes- "after life's fitful fever they sleep well,"' I muttered.

'Where are you going now, Mrs. Fairfax?' for she was moving away.

'On to the leads; will you come and see the view from thence?' I

followed still, up a very narrow staircase to the attics, and thence

by a ladder and through a trap-door to the roof of the hall. I was now

on a level with the crow colony, and could see into their nests.

Leaning over the battlements and looking far down, I surveyed the

grounds laid out like a map: the bright and velvet lawn closely

girdling the grey base of the mansion; the field, wide as a park,

dotted with its ancient timber; the wood, dun and sere, divided by a

path visibly overgrown, greener with moss than the trees were with

foliage; the church at the gates, the road, the tranquil hills, all

reposing in the autumn day's sun; the horizon bounded by a

propitious sky, azure, marbled with pearly white. No feature in the

scene was extraordinary, but all was pleasing. When I turned from it

and repassed the trap-door, I could scarcely see my way down the

ladder; the attic seemed black as a vault compared with that arch of

blue air to which I had been looking up, and to that sunlit scene of

grove, pasture, and green hill, of which the hall was the centre,

and over which I had been gazing with delight.

Mrs. Fairfax stayed behind a moment to fasten the trap-door; I,

by dint of groping, found the outlet from the attic, and proceeded

to descend the narrow garretstaircase. I lingered in the long passage

to which this led, separating the front and back rooms of the third

storey: narrow, low, and dim, with only one little window at the far

end, and looking, with its two rows of small black doors all shut,

like a corridor in some Bluebeard's castle.

While I paced softly on, the last sound I expected to hear in so

still a region, a laugh, struck my ear. It was a curious laugh;

distinct, formal, mirthless. I stopped: the sound ceased, only for

an instant; it began again, louder: for at first, though distinct,

it was very low. It passed off in a clamorous peal that seemed to wake

an echo in every lonely chamber; though it originated but in one,

and I could have pointed out the door whence the accents issued.

'Mrs. Fairfax!' I called out: for I now heard her descending the

great stairs. 'Did you hear that loud laugh? Who is it?'

'Some of the servants, very likely,' she answered: 'perhaps Grace

Poole.'

'Did you hear it?' I again inquired.

'Yes, plainly: I often hear her: she sews in one of these rooms.

Sometimes Leah is with her; they are frequently noisy together.'

The laugh was repeated in its low, syllabic tone, and terminated in

an odd murmur.

'Grace!' exclaimed Mrs. Fairfax.

I really did not expect any Grace to answer; for the laugh was as

tragic, as preternatural a laugh as any I ever heard; and, but that it

was high noon, and that no circumstance of ghostliness accompanied the

curious cachinnation; but that neither scene nor season favoured fear,

I should have been superstitiously afraid. However, the event showed

me I was a fool for entertaining a sense even of surprise.

The door nearest me opened, and a servant came out,- a woman of

between thirty and forty; a set, square-made figure, red-haired, and

with a hard, plain face: any apparition less romantic or less

ghostly could scarcely be conceived.

'Too much noise, Grace,' said Mrs. Fairfax. 'Remember

directions!' Grace curtseyed silently and went in.

'She is a person we have to sew and assist Leah in her

housemaid's work,' continued the widow; 'not altogether

unobjectionable in some points, but she does well enough. By the

bye, how have you got on with your new pupil this morning?'

The conversation, thus turned on Adele, continued till we reached

the light and cheerful region below. Adele came running to meet us

in the hall, exclaiming-

'Mesdames, vous etes servies!' adding, 'J'ai bien faim, moi!'

We found dinner ready, and waiting for us in Mrs. Fairfax's room.