A splendid Midsummer shone over England: skies so pure, suns so radiant as were then seen in long succession, seldom favour even singly, our wave-girt land. It was as if a band of Italian days had come from the South, like a flock of glorious passenger birds, and lighted to rest them on the cliffs […]
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‘Thank you, Mr. Rochester, for your great kindness. I am strangely glad to get back again to you: and wherever you are is my home—my only home.’ I walked on so fast that even he could hardly have overtaken me had he tried. Little Adele was half wild with delight when she saw me. Mrs. […]
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‘I have been with my aunt, sir, who is dead.’ ‘A true Janian reply! Good angels be my guard! She comes from the other world—from the abode of people who are dead; and tells me so when she meets me alone here in the gloaming! If I dared, I’d touch you, to see if you […]
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It was not a bright or splendid summer evening, though fair and soft: the haymakers were at work all along the road; and the sky, though far from cloudless, was such as promised well for the future: its blue—where blue was visible—was mild and settled, and its cloud strata high and thin. The west, too, […]
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‘You are in the right,’ said she; and with these words we each went our separate way. As I shall not have occasion to refer either to her or her sister again, I may as well mention here, that Georgiana made an advantageous match with a wealthy worn-out man of fashion, and that Eliza actually […]
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I knew Mrs. Reed had not spoken for days: was she reviving? I went up to her. ‘It is I, Aunt Reed.’ ‘Who—I?’ was her answer. ‘Who are you?’ looking at me with surprise and a sort of alarm, but still not wildly. ‘You are quite a stranger to me—where is Bessie?’ ‘She is at […]
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Eliza still spoke little: she had evidently no time to talk. I never saw a busier person than she seemed to be; yet it was difficult to say what she did: or rather, to discover any result of her diligence. She had an alarm to call her up early. I know not how she occupied […]
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One morning I fell to sketching a face: what sort of a face it was to be, I did not care or know. I took a soft black pencil, gave it a broad point, and worked away. Soon I had traced on the paper a broad and prominent forehead and a square lower outline of […]
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How is Mrs. Reed?’ I asked soon, looking calmly at Georgiana, who thought fit to bridle at the direct address, as if it were an unexpected liberty. ‘Mrs. Reed? Ah! mama, you mean; she is extremely poorly: I doubt if you can see her to-night.’ ‘If,’ said I, ‘you would just step upstairs and tell […]
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‘How long will you stay?’ ‘As short a time as possible, sir.’ ‘Promise me only to stay a week—‘ ‘I had better not pass my word: I might be obliged to break it.’ ‘At all events you WILL come back: you will not be induced under any pretext to take up a permanent residence with […]
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