There was no possibility
of taking a walk that day. We had
been wandering, indeed, in the
leafless shrubbery an hour in
the morning; but since dinner
(Mrs. Reed, when there was no
company, dined early) the cold
winter wind had brought with
it clouds so sombre, and a rain
so penetrating, that further
out-door exercise was now out
of the question.
I was glad of it: I never liked
long walks, especially on chilly
afternoons: dreadful to me was
the coming home in the raw twilight,
with nipped fingers and toes,
and a heart saddened by the chidings
of Bessie, the nurse, and humbled
by the consciousness of my physical
inferiority to Eliza, John, and
Georgiana Reed.
The said Eliza,
John, and Georgiana were now
clustered round their
mama in the drawing-room: she
lay reclined on a sofa by the
fireside, and with her darlings
about her (for the time neither
quarrelling nor crying) looked
perfectly happy. Me, she had
dispensed from joining the group;
saying, "She regretted to be
under the necessity of keeping
me at a distance; but that until
she heard from Bessie, and could
discover by her own observation,
that I was endeavouring in good
earnest to acquire a more sociable
and childlike disposition, a
more attractive and sprightly
manner-- something lighter, franker,
more natural, as it were--she
really must exclude me from privileges
intended only for contented,
happy, little children."
"What does Bessie say I have
done?" I asked.
"Jane, I don't
like cavillers or questioners;
besides, there
is something truly forbidding
in a child taking up her elders
in that manner. Be seated somewhere;
and until you can speak pleasantly,
remain silent."
A breakfast-room adjoined the
drawing-room, I slipped in there.
It contained a bookcase: I soon
possessed myself of a volume,
taking care that it should be
one stored with pictures. I mounted
into the window-seat: gathering
up my feet, I sat cross-legged,
like a Turk; and, having drawn
the red moreen curtain nearly
close, I was shrined in double
retirement.
Folds of scarlet drapery shut
in my view to the right hand;
to the left were the clear panes
of glass, protecting, but not
separating me from the drear
November day. At intervals, while
turning over the leaves of my
book, I studied the aspect of
that winter afternoon. Afar,
it offered a pale blank of mist
and cloud; near a scene of wet
lawn and storm-beat shrub, with
ceaseless rain sweeping away
wildly before a long and lamentable
blast.
I returned
to my book--Bewick's History
of British Birds: the
letterpress thereof I cared little
for, generally speaking; and
yet there were certain introductory
pages that, child as I was, I
could not pass quite as a blank.
They were those which treat of
the haunts of sea-fowl; of "the
solitary rocks and promontories" by
them only inhabited; of the coast
of Norway, studded with isles
from its southern extremity,
the Lindeness, or Naze, to the
North Cape -
"Where the
Northern Ocean, in vast whirls,
Boils round the
naked, melancholy isles Of farthest
Thule; and the Atlantic surge
Pours in among the stormy Hebrides."
Nor could I
pass unnoticed the suggestion
of the bleak shores
of Lapland, Siberia, Spitzbergen,
Nova Zembla, Iceland, Greenland,
with "the vast sweep of the Arctic
Zone, and those forlorn regions
of dreary space,--that reservoir
of frost and snow, where firm
fields of ice, the accumulation
of centuries of winters, glazed
in Alpine heights above heights,
surround the pole, and concentre
the multiplied rigours of extreme
cold." Of these death-white realms
I formed an idea of my own: shadowy,
like all the half-comprehended
notions that float dim through
children's brains, but strangely
impressive. The words in these
introductory pages connected
themselves with the succeeding
vignettes, and gave significance
to the rock standing up alone
in a sea of billow and spray;
to the broken boat stranded on
a desolate coast; to the cold
and ghastly moon glancing through
bars of cloud at a wreck just
sinking.
I cannot tell what sentiment
haunted the quite solitary churchyard,
with its inscribed headstone;
its gate, its two trees, its
low horizon, girdled by a broken
wall, and its newly-risen crescent,
attesting the hour of eventide.
The two ships becalmed on a
torpid sea, I believed to be
marine phantoms.
The fiend pinning down the
thief's pack behind him, I passed
over quickly: it was an object
of terror.
So was the black horned thing
seated aloof on a rock, surveying
a distant crowd surrounding a
gallows.
Each picture told a story;
mysterious often to my undeveloped
understanding and imperfect feelings,
yet ever profoundly interesting:
as interesting as the tales Bessie
sometimes narrated on winter
evenings, when she chanced to
be in good humour; and when,
having brought her ironing-table
to the nursery hearth, she allowed
us to sit about it, and while
she got up Mrs. Reed's lace frills,
and crimped her nightcap borders,
fed our eager attention with
passages of love and adventure
taken from old fairy tales and
other ballads; or (as at a later
period I discovered) from the
pages of Pamela, and Henry, Earl
of Moreland.
With Bewick on my knee, I was
then happy: happy at least in
my way. I feared nothing but
interruption, and that came too
soon. The breakfast-room door
opened.
"Boh! Madam Mope!" cried
the voice of John Reed; then
he paused:
he found the room apparently
empty.
"Where the dickens is she!" he
continued. "Lizzy! Georgy! (calling
to his sisters) Joan is not here:
tell mama she is run out into
the rain--bad animal!"
"It is well I drew the curtain," thought
I; and I wished fervently he
might not discover my hiding-place:
nor would John Reed have found
it out himself; he was not quick
either of vision or conception;
but Eliza just put her head in
at the door, and said at once
-
"She is in
the window-seat, to be sure,
Jack."
And I came out immediately,
for I trembled at the idea of
being dragged forth by the said
Jack.
"What do you want?" I
asked, with awkward diffidence.
"Say, 'What do you want, Master
Reed?'" was the answer. "I want
you to come here;" and seating
himself in an arm-chair, he intimated
by a gesture that I was to approach
and stand before him.
John Reed was
a schoolboy of fourteen years
old; four years
older than I, for I was but ten:
large and stout for his age,
with a dingy and unwholesome
skin; thick lineaments in a spacious
visage, heavy limbs and large
extremities. He gorged himself
habitually at table, which made
him bilious, and gave him a dim
and bleared eye and flabby cheeks.
He ought now to have been at
school; but his mama had taken
him home for a month or two, "on
account of his delicate health." Mr.
Miles, the master, affirmed that
he would do very well if he had
fewer cakes and sweetmeats sent
him from home; but the mother's
heart turned from an opinion
so harsh, and inclined rather
to the more refined idea that
John's sallowness was owing to
over-application and, perhaps,
to pining after home.
John had not much affection
for his mother and sisters, and
an antipathy to me. He bullied
and punished me; not two or three
times in the week, nor once or
twice in the day, but continually:
every nerve I had feared him,
and every morsel of flesh in
my bones shrank when he came
near. There were moments when
I was bewildered by the terror
he inspired, because I had no
appeal whatever against either
his menaces or his inflictions;
the servants did not like to
offend their young master by
taking my part against him, and
Mrs. Reed was blind and deaf
on the subject: she never saw
him strike or heard him abuse
me, though he did both now and
then in her very presence, more
frequently, however, behind her
back.
Habitually obedient to John,
I came up to his chair: he spent
some three minutes in thrusting
out his tongue at me as far as
he could without damaging the
roots: I knew he would soon strike,
and while dreading the blow,
I mused on the disgusting and
ugly appearance of him who would
presently deal it. I wonder if
he read that notion in my face;
for, all at once, without speaking,
he struck suddenly and strongly.
I tottered, and on regaining
my equilibrium retired back a
step or two from his chair.
"That is for your impudence
in answering mama awhile since," said
he, "and for your sneaking way
of getting behind curtains, and
for the look you had in your
eyes two minutes since, you rat!"
Accustomed to John Reed's abuse,
I never had an idea of replying
to it; my care was how to endure
the blow which would certainly
follow the insult.
"What were you doing behind
the curtain?" he asked.
"I was reading."
"Show the book."
I returned to the window and
fetched it thence.
"You have no
business to take our books;
you are a dependent,
mama says; you have no money;
your father left you none; you
ought to beg, and not to live
here with gentlemen's children
like us, and eat the same meals
we do, and wear clothes at our
mama's expense. Now, I'll teach
you to rummage my bookshelves:
for they ARE mine; all the house
belongs to me, or will do in
a few years. Go and stand by
the door, out of the way of the
mirror and the windows."
I did so, not at first aware
what was his intention; but when
I saw him lift and poise the
book and stand in act to hurl
it, I instinctively started aside
with a cry of alarm: not soon
enough, however; the volume was
flung, it hit me, and I fell,
striking my head against the
door and cutting it. The cut
bled, the pain was sharp: my
terror had passed its climax;
other feelings succeeded.
"Wicked and cruel boy!" I said. "You
are like a murderer--you are
like a slave-driver--you are
like the Roman emperors!"
I had read
Goldsmith's History of Rome,
and had formed my opinion
of Nero, Caligula, &c. Also I
had drawn parallels in silence,
which I never thought thus to
have declared aloud.
"What! what!" he cried. "Did
she say that to me? Did you hear
her, Eliza and Georgiana? Won't
I tell mama? but first--"
He ran headlong
at me: I felt him grasp my
hair and my shoulder:
he had closed with a desperate
thing. I really saw in him a
tyrant, a murderer. I felt a
drop or two of blood from my
head trickle down my neck, and
was sensible of somewhat pungent
suffering: these sensations for
the time predominated over fear,
and I received him in frantic
sort. I don't very well know
what I did with my hands, but
he called me "Rat! Rat!" and
bellowed out aloud. Aid was near
him: Eliza and Georgiana had
run for Mrs. Reed, who was gone
upstairs: she now came upon the
scene, followed by Bessie and
her maid Abbot. We were parted:
I heard the words -
"Dear! dear!
What a fury to fly at Master
John!"
"Did ever anybody
see such a picture of passion!"
Then Mrs. Reed subjoined -
"Take her away to the red-room,
and lock her in there." Four
hands were immediately laid upon
me, and I was borne upstairs.
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