A NEW chapter in a novel is something like a new scene in a play;

and when I draw up the curtain this time, reader, you must fancy you

see a room in the George Inn at Millcote, with such large figured

papering on the walls as inn rooms have; such a carpet, such

furniture, such ornaments on the mantel-piece, such prints,

including a portrait of George the Third, and another of the Prince of

Wales, and a representation of the death of Wolfe. All this is visible

to you by the light of an oil lamp hanging from the ceiling, and by

that of an excellent fire, near which I sit in my cloak and bonnet; my

muff and umbrella lie on the table, and I am warming away the numbness

and chill contracted by sixteen hours' exposure to the rawness of an

October day: I left Lowton at four o'clock A.M., and the Millcote town

clock is now just striking eight.

Reader, though I look comfortably accommodated, I am not very

tranquil in my mind. I thought when the coach stopped here there would

be some one to meet me; I looked anxiously round as I descended the

wooden steps the 'boots' placed for my convenience, expecting to

hear my name pronounced, and to see some description of carriage

waiting to convey me to Thornfield. Nothing of the sort was visible;

and when I asked a waiter if any one had been to inquire after a

Miss Eyre, I was answered in the negative: so I had no resource but to

request to be shown into a private room: and here I am waiting,

while all sorts of doubts and fears are troubling my thoughts.

It is a very strange sensation to inexperienced youth to feel

itself quite alone in the world, cut adrift from every connection,

uncertain whether the port to which it is bound can be reached, and

prevented by many impediments from returning to that it has quitted.

The charm of adventure sweetens that sensation, the glow of pride

warms it; but then the throb of fear disturbs it; and fear with me

became predominant when half an hour elapsed and still I was alone.

I bethought myself to ring the bell.

'Is there a place in this neighbourhood called Thornfield?' I asked

of the waiter who answered the summons.

'Thornfield? I don't know, ma'am; I'll inquire at the bar.' He

vanished, but reappeared instantly-

'Is your name Eyre, Miss?'

'Yes.'

'Person here waiting for you.'

I jumped up, took my muff and umbrella, and hastened into the

inn-passage: a man was standing by the open door, and in the

lamp-lit street I dimly saw a one-horse conveyance.

'This will be your luggage, I suppose?' said the man rather

abruptly when he saw me, pointing to my trunk in the passage.

'Yes.' He hoisted it on to the vehicle, which was a sort of car,

and then I got in; before he shut me up, I asked him how far it was to

Thornfield.

'A matter of six miles.'

'How long shall we be before we get there?'

'Happen an hour and a half.'

He fastened the car door, climbed to his own seat outside, and we

set off. Our progress was leisurely, and gave me ample time to

reflect; I was content to be at length so near the end of my

journey; and as I leaned back in the comfortable though not elegant

conveyance, I meditated much at my ease.

'I suppose,' thought I, 'judging from the plainness of the

servant and carriage, Mrs. Fairfax is not a very dashing person: so

much the better; I never lived amongst fine people but once, and I was

very miserable with them. I wonder if she lives alone except this

little girl; if so, and if she is in any degree amiable, I shall

surely be able to get on with her; I will do my best; it is a pity

that doing one's best does not always answer. At Lowood, indeed, I

took that resolution, kept it, and succeeded in pleasing; but with

Mrs. Reed, I remember my best was always spurned with scorn. I pray

God Mrs. Fairfax may not turn out a second Mrs. Reed; but if she does,

I am not bound to stay with her! let the worst come to the worst, I

can advertise again. How far are we on our road now, I wonder?'

I let down the window and looked out; Millcote was behind us;

judging by the number of its lights, it seemed a place of considerable

magnitude, much larger than Lowton. We were now, as far as I could

see, on a sort of common; but there were houses scattered all over the

district; I felt we were in a different region to Lowood, more

populous, less picturesque; more stirring, less romantic.

The roads were heavy, the night misty; my conductor let his horse

walk all the way, and the hour and a half extended, I verily

believe, to two hours; at last he turned in his seat and said-

'You're noan so far fro' Thornfield now.'

Again I looked out: we were passing a church; I saw its low broad

tower against the sky, and its bell was tolling a quarter; I saw a

narrow galaxy of lights too, on a hillside, marking a village or

hamlet. About ten minutes after, the driver got down and opened a pair

of gates: we passed through, and they clashed to behind us. We now

slowly ascended a drive, and came upon the long front of a house:

candlelight gleamed from one curtained bow-window; all the rest were

dark. The car stopped at the front door; it was opened by a

maid-servant; I alighted and went in.

'Will you walk this way, ma'am?' said the girl; and I followed

her across a square hall with high doors all round: she ushered me

into a room whose double illumination of fire and candle at first

dazzled me, contrasting as it did with the darkness to which my eyes

had been for two hours inured; when I could see, however, a cosy and

agreeable picture presented itself to my view.

A snug small room; a round table by a cheerful fire; an arm-chair

high-backed and old-fashioned, wherein sat the neatest imaginable

little elderly lady, in widow's cap, black silk gown, and snowy muslin

apron; exactly like what I had fancied Mrs. Fairfax, only less stately

and milder looking. She was occupied in knitting; a large cat sat

demurely at her feet; nothing in short was wanting to complete the

beau-ideal of domestic comfort. A more reassuring introduction for a

new governess could scarcely be conceived; there was no grandeur to

overwhelm, no stateliness to embarrass; and then, as I entered, the

old lady got up and promptly and kindly came forward to meet me.

'How do you do, my dear? I am afraid you have had a tedious ride;

John drives so slowly; you must be cold, come to the fire.'

'Mrs. Fairfax, I suppose?' said I.

'Yes, you are right: do sit down.'

She conducted me to her own chair, and then began to remove my

shawl and untie my bonnet-strings; I begged she would not give herself

so much trouble.

'Oh, it is no trouble; I daresay your own hands are almost numbed

with cold. Leah, make a little hot negus and cut a sandwich or two:

here are the keys of the storeroom.'

And she produced from her pocket a most housewifely bunch of

keys, and delivered them to the servant.

'Now, then, draw nearer to the fire,' she continued. 'You've

brought your luggage with you, haven't you, my dear?'

'Yes, ma'am.'

'I'll see it carried into your room,' she said, and bustled out.

'She treats me like a visitor,' thought I. 'I little expected

such a reception; I anticipated only coldness and stiffness: this is

not like what I have heard of the treatment of governesses; but I must

not exult too soon.'

She returned; with her own hands cleared her knitting apparatus and

a book or two from the table, to make room for the tray which Leah now

brought, and then herself handed me the refreshments. I felt rather

confused at being the object of more attention than I had ever

before received, and, that too, shown by my employer and superior; but

as she did not herself seem to consider she was doing anything out

of her place, I thought it better to take her civilities quietly.

'Shall I have the pleasure of seeing Miss Fairfax to-night?' I

asked, when I had partaken of what she offered me.

'What did you say, my dear? I am a little deaf,' returned the

good lady, approaching her ear to my mouth.

I repeated the question more distinctly.

'Miss Fairfax? Oh, you mean Miss Varens! Varens is the name of your

future pupil.'

'Indeed! Then she is not your daughter?'

'No,- I have no family.'

I should have followed up my first inquiry, by asking in what way

Miss Varens was connected with her; but I recollected it was not

polite to ask too many questions: besides, I was sure to hear in time.

'I am so glad,' she continued, as she sat down opposite to me,

and took the cat on her knee; 'I am so glad you are come; it will be

quite pleasant living here now with a companion. To be sure it is

pleasant at any time; for Thornfield is a fine old hall, rather

neglected of late years perhaps, but still it is a respectable

place; yet you know in winter-time one feels dreary quite alone in the

best quarters. I say alone- Leah is a nice girl to be sure, and John

and his wife are very decent people; but then you see they are only

servants, and one can't converse with them on terms of equality: one

must keep them at due distance, for fear of losing one's authority.

I'm sure last winter (it was a very severe one, if you recollect,

and when it did not snow, it rained and blew), not a creature but

the butcher and postman came to the house, from November till

February; and I really got quite melancholy with sitting night after

night alone; I had Leah in to read to me sometimes; but I don't

think the poor girl liked the task much: she felt it confining. In

spring and summer one got on better: sunshine and long days make

such a difference; and then, just at the commencement of this

autumn, little Adela Varens came and her nurse: a child makes a

house alive all at once; and now you are here I shall be quite gay.'

My heart really warmed to the worthy lady as I heard her talk;

and I drew my chair a little nearer to her, and expressed my sincere

wish that she might find my company as agreeable as she anticipated.

'But I'll not keep you sitting up late to-night,' said she; 'it

is on the stroke of twelve now, and you have been travelling all

day: you must feel tired. If you have got your feet well warmed,

I'll show you your bedroom. I've had the room next to mine prepared

for you; it is only a small apartment, but I thought you would like it

better than one of the large front chambers: to be sure they have

finer furniture, but they are so dreary and solitary, I never sleep in

them myself.'

I thanked her for her considerate choice, and as I really felt

fatigued with my long journey, expressed my readiness to retire. She

took her candle, and I followed her from the room. First she went to

see if the hall-door was fastened; having taken the key from the lock,

she led the way upstairs. The steps and banisters were of oak; the

staircase window was high and latticed; both it and the long gallery

into which the bedroom doors opened looked as if they belonged to a

church rather than a house. A very chill and vault-like air pervaded

the stairs and gallery, suggesting cheerless ideas of space and

solitude; and I was glad, when finally ushered into my chamber, to

find it of small dimensions, and furnished in ordinary, modern style.

When Mrs. Fairfax had bidden me a kind good-night, and I had

fastened my door, gazed leisurely round, and in some measure effaced

the eerie impression made by that wide hall, that dark and spacious

staircase, and that long, cold gallery, by the livelier aspect of my

little room, I remembered that, after a day of bodilyfatigue and

mental anxiety, I was now at last in safe haven. The impulse of

gratitude swelled my heart, and I knelt down at the bedside, and

offered up thanks where thanks were due; not forgetting, ere I rose,

to implore aid on my further path, and the power of meriting the

kindness which seemed so frankly offered me before it was earned. My

couch had no thorns in it that night; my solitary room no fears. At

once weary and content, I slept soon and soundly: when I awoke it

was broad day.

The chamber looked such a bright little place to me as the sun

shone in between the gay blue chintz window curtains, showing

papered walls and a carpeted floor, so unlike the bare planks and

stained plaster of Lowood, that my spirits rose at the view. Externals

have a great effect on the young: I thought that a fairer era of

life was beginning for me- one that was to have its flowers and

pleasures, as well as its thorns and toils. My faculties, roused by

the change of scene, the new field offered to hope, seemed all

astir. I cannot preciselydefine what they expected, but it was

something pleasant: not perhaps that day or that month, but at an

indefinite future period.

I rose; I dressed myself with care: obliged to be plain- for I

had no article of attire that was not made with extreme simplicity-

I was still by nature solicitous to be neat. It was not my habit to be

disregardful of appearance or careless of the impression I made: on

the contrary, I ever wished to look as well as I could, and to

please as much as my want of beauty would permit. I sometimes

regretted that I was not handsomer; I sometimes wished to have rosy

cheeks, a straight nose, and small cherry mouth; I desired to be tall,

stately, and finely developed in figure; I felt it a misfortune that I

was so little, so pale, and had features so irregular and so marked.

And why had I these aspirations and these regrets? It would be

difficult to say: I could not then distinctly say it to myself; yet

I had a reason, and a logical, natural reason too. However, when I had

brushed my hair very smooth, and put on my black frock- which,

Quakerlike as it was, at least had the merit of fitting to a nicety-

and adjusted my clean white tucker, I thought I should do

respectably enough to appear before Mrs. Fairfax, and that my new

pupil would not at least recoil from me with antipathy. Having

opened my chamber window, and seen that I left all things straight and

neat on the toilet table, I ventured forth.

Traversing the long and matted gallery, I descended the slippery

steps of oak; then I gained the hall: I halted there a minute; I

looked at some pictures on the walls (one, I remember, represented a

grim man in a cuirass, and one a lady with powdered hair and a pearl

necklace), at a bronze lamp pendent from the ceiling, at a great clock

whose case was of oak curiously carved, and ebon black with time and

rubbing. Everything appeared very stately and imposing to me; but then

I was so little accustomed to grandeur. The hall-door, which was

half of glass, stood open; I stepped over the threshold. It was a fine

autumn morning; the early sun shone serenely on embrowned groves and

still green fields; advancing on to the lawn, I looked up and surveyed

the front of the mansion. It was three storeys high, of proportions

not vast, though considerable: a gentleman's manor-house, not a

nobleman's seat: battlements round the top gave it a picturesque look.

Its grey front stood out well from the background of a rookery,

whose cawing tenants were now on the wing: they flew over the lawn and

grounds to alight in a great meadow, from which these were separated

by a sunk fence, and where an array of mighty old thorn trees, strong,

knotty, and broad as oaks, at once explained the etymology of the

mansion's designation. Farther off were hills: not so lofty as those

round Lowood, nor so craggy, nor so like barriers of separation from

the living world; but yet quiet and lonely hills enough, and seeming

to embrace Thornfield with a seclusion I had not expected to find

existent so near the stirringlocality of Millcote. A little hamlet,

whose roofs were blent with trees, straggled up the side of one of

these hills; the church of the district stood nearer Thornfield: its

old tower-top looked over a knoll between the house and gates.

I was yet enjoying the calm prospect and pleasant fresh air, yet

listening with delight to the cawing of the rooks, yet surveying the

wide, hoary front of the hall, and thinking what a great place it

was for one lonely little dame like Mrs. Fairfax to inhabit, when that

lady appeared at the door.

'What! out already?' said she. 'I see you are an early riser.' I

went up to her, and was received with an affable kiss and shake of the

hand.

'How do you like Thornfield?' she asked. I told her I liked it very

much.

'Yes,' she said, 'it is a pretty place; but I fear it will be

getting out of order, unless Mr. Rochester should take it into his

head to come and reside here permanently; or, at least, visit it

rather oftener: great houses and fine grounds require the presence

of the proprietor.'

'Mr. Rochester!' I exclaimed. 'Who is he?'

'The owner of Thornfield,' she responded quietly. 'Did you not know

he was called Rochester?'

Of course I did not- I had never heard of him before; but the old

lady seemed to regard his existence as a universally understood

fact, with which everybody must be acquainted by instinct.

'I thought,' I continued, 'Thornfield belonged to you.'

'To me? Bless you, child; what an idea! To me! I am only the

housekeeper- the manager. To be sure I am distantly related to the

Rochesters by the mother's side, or at least my husband was; he was

a clergyman, incumbent of Hay- that little village yonder on the hill-

and that church near the gates was his. The present Mr. Rochester's

mother was a Fairfax, second cousin to my husband: but I never presume

on the connection- in fact, it is nothing to me; I consider myself

quite in the light of an ordinary housekeeper: my employer is always

civil, and I expect nothing more.'

'And the little girl- my pupil!'

'She is Mr. Rochester's ward; he commissioned me to find a

believe. Here she comes, with her "bonne," as she calls her nurse.'

The enigma then was explained: this affable and kind little widow

was no great dame; but a dependant like myself. I did not like her the

worse for that; on the contrary, I felt better pleased than ever.

The equality between her and me was real; not the mere result of

condescension on her part: so much the better- my position was all the

freer.

As I was meditating on this discovery, a little girl, followed by

her attendant, came running up the lawn. I looked at my pupil, who did

not at first appear to notice me: she was quite a child, perhaps seven

or eight years old, slightly built, with a pale, small-featured

face, and a redundancy of hair falling in curls to her waist.

'Good morning, Miss Adela,' said Mrs. Fairfax. 'Come and speak to

the lady who is to teach you, and to make you a clever woman some

day.' She approached.

'C'est la ma gouvernante!' said she, pointing to me, and addressing

her nurse; who answered-

'Mais oui, certainement.'

'Are they foreigners?' I inquired, amazed at hearing the French

language.

'The nurse is a foreigner, and Adela was born on the Continent;

and, I believe, never left it till within six months ago. When she

first came here she could speak no English; now she can make shift

to talk it a little: I don't understand her, she mixes it so with

French; but you will make out her meaning very well, I daresay.'

Fortunately I had had the advantage of being taught French by a

French lady; and as I had always made a point of conversing with

Madame Pierrot as often as I could, and had besides, during the last

seven years, learnt a portion of French by heart daily- applying

myself to take pains with my accent, and imitating as closely as

possible the pronunciation of my teacher, I had acquired a certain

degree of readiness and correctness in the language, and was not

likely to be much at a loss with Mademoiselle Adela. She came and

shook hands with me when she heard that I was her governess; and as

I led her in to breakfast, I addressed some phrases to her in her

own tongue: she replied briefly at first, but after we were seated

at the table, and she had examined me some ten minutes with her

large hazel eyes, she suddenly commenced chattering fluently.

'Ah!' cried she, in French, 'you speak my language as well as Mr.

Rochester does: I can talk to you as I can to him, and so can

Sophie. She will be glad: nobody here understands her: Madame

Fairfax is all English. Sophie is my nurse; she came with me over