Джейн Эйр / Jane Eyre

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Not being in a condition to remove his doubt, I only cast my eyes down on the two large feet planted on the rug, and sighed, wishing myself far enough away.

�I hope that sigh is from the heart, and that you repent of ever having been the occasion of discomfort to your excellent benefactress.’

�Benefactress! benefactress!’ said I inwardly; �they all call Mrs. Reed my benefactress; if so, a benefactress is a disagreeable thing.’

�Do you say your prayers night and morning?’ continued my interrogator.

�Yes, sir.’

�Do you read your Bible?’

�Sometimes.’

�With pleasure? Are you fond of it?’

�I like Revelations, and the book of Daniel, and Genesis and Samuel, and a little bit of Exodus, and some parts of Kings and Chronicles, and Job and Jonah.’

�And the Psalms? I hope you like them?’

�No, sir.’

�No? Oh, shocking! I have a little boy, younger than you, who knows six Psalms by heart; and when you ask him which he would rather have, a gingerbread-nut to eat or a verse of a Psalm to learn, he says, “Oh! the verse of a Psalm! angels sing Psalms,” says he; “I wish to be a little angel here below.

” He then gets two nuts in recompense for his infant piety.’

�Psalms are not interesting,’ I remarked.

�That proves you have a wicked heart; and you must pray to God to change it; to give you a new and clean one; to take away your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.’

I was about to propound a question, touching the manner in which that operation of changing my heart was to be performed, when Mrs.

Reed interposed, telling me to sit down; she then proceeded to carry on the conversation herself.

�Mr. Brocklehurst, I believe I intimated in the letter which I wrote to you three weeks ago, that this little girl has not quite the character and disposition I could wish; should you admit her into Lowood school, I should be glad if the superintendent and teachers were requested to keep a strict eye on her, and, above all, to guard against her worst fault, a tendency to deceit.

I mention this in your hearing, Jane, that you may not attempt to impose on Mr. Brocklehurst.’

Well might I dread, well might I dislike Mrs. Reed; for it was her nature to wound me cruelly; never was I happy in her presence. However carefully I obeyed, however strenuously I strove to please her, my efforts were still repulsed and repaid by such sentences as the above.