Chapter 30





CHAPTER XXX


The more I knew of the inmates of Moor House, the better I liked
them.  In a few days I had so far recovered my health that I could
sit up all day, and walk out sometimes.  I could join with Diana and
Mary in all their occupations; converse with them as much as they
wished, and aid them when and where they would allow me.  There was
a reviving pleasure in this intercourse, of a kind now tasted by me
for the first time-the pleasure arising from perfect congeniality of
tastes, sentiments, and principles.

I liked to read what they liked to read:  what they enjoyed,
delighted me; what they approved, I reverenced.  They loved their
sequestered home.  I, too, in the grey, small, antique structure,
with its low roof, its latticed casements, its mouldering walls, its
avenue of aged firs--all grown aslant under the stress of mountain
winds; its garden, dark with yew and holly--and where no flowers but
of the hardiest species would bloom--found a charm both potent and
permanent.  They clung to the purple moors behind and around their
dwelling--to the hollow vale into which the pebbly bridle-path
leading from their gate descended, and which wound between fern-
banks first, and then amongst a few of the wildest little pasture-
fields that ever bordered a wilderness of heath, or gave sustenance
to a flock of grey moorland sheep, with their little mossy-faced
lambs:- they clung to this scene, I say, with a perfect enthusiasm
of attachment.  I could comprehend the feeling, and share both its
strength and truth.  I saw the fascination of the locality.  I felt
the consecration of its loneliness:  my eye feasted on the outline
of swell and sweep--on the wild colouring communicated to ridge and
dell by moss, by heath-bell, by flower-sprinkled turf, by brilliant
bracken, and mellow granite crag.  These details were just to me
what they were to them--so many pure and sweet sources of pleasure.
The strong blast and the soft breeze; the rough and the halcyon day;
the hours of sunrise and sunset; the moonlight and the clouded
night, developed for me, in these regions, the same attraction as
for them--wound round my faculties the same spell that entranced
theirs.

Indoors we agreed equally well.  They were both more accomplished
and better read than I was; but with eagerness I followed in the
path of knowledge they had trodden before me.  I devoured the books
they lent me:  then it was full satisfaction to discuss with them in
the evening what I had perused during the day.  Thought fitted
thought; opinion met opinion:  we coincided, in short, perfectly.

If in our trio there was a superior and a leader, it was Diana.
Physically, she far excelled me:  she was handsome; she was
vigorous.  In her animal spirits there was an affluence of life and
certainty of flow, such as excited my wonder, while it baffled my
comprehension.  I could talk a while when the evening commenced, but
the first gush of vivacity and fluency gone, I was fain to sit on a
stool at Diana's feet, to rest my head on her knee, and listen
alternately to her and Mary, while they sounded thoroughly the topic
on which I had but touched.  Diana offered to teach me German.  I
liked to learn of her:  I saw the part of instructress pleased and
suited her; that of scholar pleased and suited me no less.  Our
natures dovetailed:  mutual affection--of the strongest kind--was
the result.  They discovered I could draw:  their pencils and
colour-boxes were immediately at my service.  My skill, greater in
this one point than theirs, surprised and charmed them.  Mary would
sit and watch me by the hour together:  then she would take lessons;
and a docile, intelligent, assiduous pupil she made.  Thus occupied,
and mutually entertained, days passed like hours, and weeks like
days.

As to Mr. St John, the intimacy which had arisen so naturally and
rapidly between me and his sisters did not extend to him.  One
reason of the distance yet observed between us was, that he was
comparatively seldom at home:  a large proportion of his time
appeared devoted to visiting the sick and poor among the scattered
population of his parish.

No weather seemed to hinder him in these pastoral excursions:  rain
or fair, he would, when his hours of morning study were over, take
his hat, and, followed by his father's old pointer, Carlo, go out on
his mission of love or duty--I scarcely know in which light he
regarded it.  Sometimes, when the day was very unfavourable, his
sisters would expostulate.  He would then say, with a peculiar
smile, more solemn than cheerful -

"And if I let a gust of wind or a sprinkling of rain turn me aside
from these easy tasks, what preparation would such sloth be for the
future I propose to myself?"

Diana and Mary's general answer to this question was a sigh, and
some minutes of apparently mournful meditation.

But besides his frequent absences, there was another barrier to
friendship with him:  he seemed of a reserved, an abstracted, and
even of a brooding nature.  Zealous in his ministerial labours,
blameless in his life and habits, he yet did not appear to enjoy
that mental serenity, that inward content, which should bet he
reward of every sincere Christian and practical philanthropist.
Often, of an evening, when he sat at the window, his desk and papers
before him, he would cease reading or writing, rest his chin on his
hand, and deliver himself up to I know not what course of thought;
but that it was perturbed and exciting might be seen in the frequent
flash and changeful dilation of his eye.

I think, moreover, that Nature was not to him that treasury of
delight it was to his sisters.  He expressed once, and but once in
my hearing, a strong sense of the rugged charm of the hills, and an
inborn affection for the dark roof and hoary walls he called his
home; but there was more of gloom than pleasure in the tone and
words in which the sentiment was manifested; and never did he seem
to roam the moors for the sake of their soothing silence--never seek
out or dwell upon the thousand peaceful delights they could yield.

Incommunicative as he was, some time elapsed before I had an
opportunity of gauging his mind.  I first got an idea of its calibre
when I heard him preach in his own church at Morton.  I wish I could
describe that sermon:  but it is past my power.  I cannot even
render faithfully the effect it produced on me.

It began calm--and indeed, as far as delivery and pitch of voice
went, it was calm to the end:  an earnestly felt, yet strictly
restrained zeal breathed soon in the distinct accents, and prompted
the nervous language.  This grew to force--compressed, condensed,
controlled.  The heart was thrilled, the mind astonished, by the
power of the preacher:  neither were softened.  Throughout there was
a strange bitterness; an absence of consolatory gentleness; stern
allusions to Calvinistic doctrines--election, predestination,
reprobation--were frequent; and each reference to these points
sounded like a sentence pronounced for doom.  When he had done,
instead of feeling better, calmer, more enlightened by his
discourse, I experienced an inexpressible sadness; for it seemed to
me--I know not whether equally so to others--that the eloquence to
which I had been listening had sprung from a depth where lay turbid
dregs of disappointment--where moved troubling impulses of insatiate
yearnings and disquieting aspirations.  I was sure St. John Rivers--
pure-lived, conscientious, zealous as he was--had not yet found that
peace of God which passeth all understanding:  he had no more found
it, I thought, than had I with my concealed and racking regrets for
my broken idol and lost elysium--regrets to which I have latterly
avoided referring, but which possessed me and tyrannised over me
ruthlessly.

Meantime a month was gone.  Diana and Mary were soon to leave Moor
House, and return to the far different life and scene which awaited
them, as governesses in a large, fashionable, south-of-England city,
where each held a situation in families by whose wealthy and haughty
members they were regarded only as humble dependants, and who
neither knew nor sought out their innate excellences, and
appreciated only their acquired accomplishments as they appreciated
the skill of their cook or the taste of their waiting-woman.  Mr.
St. John had said nothing to me yet about the employment he had
promised to obtain for me; yet it became urgent that I should have a
vocation of some kind.  One morning, being left alone with him a few
minutes in the parlour, I ventured to approach the window-recess--
which his table, chair, and desk consecrated as a kind of study--and
I was going to speak, though not very well knowing in what words to
frame my inquiry--for it is at all times difficult to break the ice
of reserve glassing over such natures as his--when he saved me the
trouble by being the first to commence a dialogue.

Looking up as I drew near--"You have a question to ask of me?" he
said.

"Yes; I wish to know whether you have heard of any service I can
offer myself to undertake?"

"I found or devised something for you three weeks ago; but as you
seemed both useful and happy here--as my sisters had evidently
become attached to you, and your society gave them unusual pleasure-
-I deemed it inexpedient to break in on your mutual comfort till
their approaching departure from Marsh End should render yours
necessary."

"And they will go in three days now?" I said.

"Yes; and when they go, I shall return to the parsonage at Morton:
Hannah will accompany me; and this old house will be shut up."

I waited a few moments, expecting he would go on with the subject
first broached:  but he seemed to have entered another train of
reflection:  his look denoted abstraction from me and my business.
I was obliged to recall him to a theme which was of necessity one of
close and anxious interest to me.

"What is the employment you had in view, Mr. Rivers?  I hope this
delay will not have increased the difficulty of securing it."

"Oh, no; since it is in employment which depends only on me to give,
and you to accept."

He again paused:  there seemed a reluctance to continue.  I grew
impatient:  a restless movement or two, and an eager and exacting
glance fastened on his face, conveyed the feeling to him as
effectually as words could have done, and with less trouble.

"You need be in no hurry to hear," he said:  "let me frankly tell
you, I have nothing eligible or profitable to suggest.  Before I
explain, recall, if you please, my notice, clearly given, that if I
helped you, it must be as the blind man would help the lame.  I am
poor; for I find that, when I have paid my father's debts, all the
patrimony remaining to me will be this crumbling grange, the row of
scathed firs behind, and the patch of moorish soil, with the yew-
trees and holly-bushes in front.  I am obscure:  Rivers is an old
name; but of the three sole descendants of the race, two earn the
dependant's crust among strangers, and the third considers himself
an alien from his native country--not only for life, but in death.
Yes, and deems, and is bound to deem, himself honoured by the lot,
and aspires but after the day when the cross of separation from
fleshly ties shall be laid on his shoulders, and when the Head of
that church-militant of whose humblest members he is one, shall give
the word, 'Rise, follow Me!'"

St. John said these words as he pronounced his sermons, with a
quiet, deep voice; with an unflushed cheek, and a coruscating
radiance of glance.  He resumed -

"And since I am myself poor and obscure, I can offer you but a
service of poverty and obscurity.  YOU may even think it degrading--
for I see now your habits have been what the world calls refined:
your tastes lean to the ideal, and your society has at least been
amongst the educated; but I consider that no service degrades which
can better our race.  I hold that the more arid and unreclaimed the
soil where the Christian labourer's task of tillage is appointed
him--the scantier the meed his toil brings--the higher the honour.
His, under such circumstances, is the destiny of the pioneer; and
the first pioneers of the Gospel were the Apostles--their captain
was Jesus, the Redeemer, Himself."

"Well?" I said, as he again paused--"proceed."

He looked at me before he proceeded:  indeed, he seemed leisurely to
read my face, as if its features and lines were characters on a
page.  The conclusions drawn from this scrutiny he partially
expressed in his succeeding observations.

"I believe you will accept the post I offer you," said he, "and hold
it for a while:  not permanently, though:  any more than I could
permanently keep the narrow and narrowing--the tranquil, hidden
office of English country incumbent; for in your nature is an alloy
as detrimental to repose as that in mine, though of a different
kind."

"Do explain," I urged, when he halted once more.

"I will; and you shall hear how poor the proposal is,--how trivial--
how cramping.  I shall not stay long at Morton, now that my father
is dead, and that I am my own master.  I shall leave the place
probably in the course of a twelve-month; but while I do stay, I
will exert myself to the utmost for its improvement.  Morton, when I
came to it two years ago, had no school:  the children of the poor
were excluded from every hope of progress.  I established one for
boys:  I mean now to open a second school for girls.  I have hired a
building for the purpose, with a cottage of two rooms attached to it
for the mistress's house.  Her salary will be thirty pounds a year:
her house is already furnished, very simply, but sufficiently, by
the kindness of a lady, Miss Oliver; the only daughter of the sole
rich man in my parish--Mr. Oliver, the proprietor of a needle-
factory and iron-foundry in the valley.  The same lady pays for the
education and clothing of an orphan from the workhouse, on condition
that she shall aid the mistress in such menial offices connected
with her own house and the school as her occupation of teaching will
prevent her having time to discharge in person.  Will you be this
mistress?"

He put the question rather hurriedly; he seemed half to expect an
indignant, or at least a disdainful rejection of the offer:  not
knowing all my thoughts and feelings, though guessing some, he could
not tell in what light the lot would appear to me.  In truth it was
humble--but then it was sheltered, and I wanted a safe asylum:  it
was plodding--but then, compared with that of a governess in a rich
house, it was independent; and the fear of servitude with strangers
entered my soul like iron:  it was not ignoble--not unworthy--not
mentally degrading, I made my decision.

"I thank you for the proposal, Mr. Rivers, and I accept it with all
my heart."

"But you comprehend me?" he said.  "It is a village school:  your
scholars will be only poor girls--cottagers' children--at the best,
farmers' daughters.  Knitting, sewing, reading, writing, ciphering,
will be all you will have to teach.  What will you do with your
accomplishments?  What, with the largest portion of your mind--
sentiments--tastes?"

"Save them till they are wanted.  They will keep."

"You know what you undertake, then?"

"I do."

He now smiled:  and not a bitter or a sad smile, but one well
pleased and deeply gratified.

"And when will you commence the exercise of your function?"

"I will go to my house to-morrow, and open the school, if you like,
next week."

"Very well:  so be it."

He rose and walked through the room.  Standing still, he again
looked at me.  He shook his head.

"What do you disapprove of, Mr. Rivers?" I asked.

"You will not stay at Morton long:  no, no!"

"Why?  What is your reason for saying so?"

"I read it in your eye; it is not of that description which promises
the maintenance of an even tenor in life."

"I am not ambitious."

He started at the word "ambitious."  He repeated, "No.  What made
you think of ambition?  Who is ambitious?  I know I am:  but how did
you find it out?"

"I was speaking of myself."

"Well, if you are not ambitious, you are--"  He paused.

"What?"

"I was going to say, impassioned:  but perhaps you would have
misunderstood the word, and been displeased.  I mean, that human
affections and sympathies have a most powerful hold on you.  I am
sure you cannot long be content to pass your leisure in solitude,
and to devote your working hours to a monotonous labour wholly void
of stimulus:  any more than I can be content," he added, with
emphasis, "to live here buried in morass, pent in with mountains--my
nature, that God gave me, contravened; my faculties, heaven-
bestowed, paralysed--made useless.  You hear now how I contradict
myself.  I, who preached contentment with a humble lot, and
justified the vocation even of hewers of wood and drawers of water
in God's service--I, His ordained minister, almost rave in my
restlessness.  Well, propensities and principles must be reconciled
by some means."

He left the room.  In this brief hour I had learnt more of him than
in the whole previous month:  yet still he puzzled me.

Diana and Mary Rivers became more sad and silent as the day
approached for leaving their brother and their home.  They both
tried to appear as usual; bat the sorrow they had to struggle
against was one that could not be entirely conquered or concealed.
Diana intimated that this would be a different parting from any they
had ever yet known.  It would probably, as far as St. John was
concerned, be a parting for years:  it might be a parting for life.

"He will sacrifice all to his long-framed resolves," she said:
"natural affection and feelings more potent still.  St. John looks
quiet, Jane; but he hides a fever in his vitals.  You would think
him gentle, yet in some things he is inexorable as death; and the
worst of it is, my conscience will hardly permit me to dissuade him
from his severe decision:  certainly, I cannot for a moment blame
him for it.  It is right, noble, Christian:  yet it breaks my
heart!"  And the tears gushed to her fine eyes.  Mary bent her head
low over her work.

"We are now without father:  we shall soon be without home and
brother," she murmured,

At that moment a little accident supervened, which seemed decreed by
fate purposely to prove the truth of the adage, that "misfortunes
never come singly," and to add to their distresses the vexing one of
the slip between the cup and the lip.  St. John passed the window
reading a letter.  He entered.

"Our uncle John is dead," said he.

Both the sisters seemed struck:  not shocked or appalled; the
tidings appeared in their eyes rather momentous than afflicting.

"Dead?" repeated Diana.

"Yes."

She riveted a searching gaze on her brother's face.  "And what
then?" she demanded, in a low voice.

"What then, Die?" he replied, maintaining a marble immobility of
feature.  "What then?  Why--nothing.  Read."

He threw the letter into her lap.  She glanced over it, and handed
it to Mary.  Mary perused it in silence, and returned it to her
brother.  All three looked at each other, and all three smiled--a
dreary, pensive smile enough.

"Amen!  We can yet live," said Diana at last.

"At any rate, it makes us no worse off than we were before,"
remarked Mary.

"Only it forces rather strongly on the mind the picture of what
MIGHT HAVE BEEN," said Mr. Rivers, "and contrasts it somewhat too
vividly with what IS."

He folded the letter, locked it in his desk, and again went out.

For some minutes no one spoke.  Diana then turned to me.

"Jane, you will wonder at us and our mysteries," she said, "and
think us hard-hearted beings not to be more moved at the death of so
near a relation as an uncle; but we have never seen him or known
him.  He was my mother's brother.  My father and he quarrelled long
ago.  It was by his advice that my father risked most of his
property in the speculation that ruined him.  Mutual recrimination
passed between them:  they parted in anger, and were never
reconciled.  My uncle engaged afterwards in more prosperous
undertakings:  it appears he realised a fortune of twenty thousand
pounds.  He was never married, and had no near kindred but ourselves
and one other person, not more closely related than we.  My father
always cherished the idea that he would atone for his error by
leaving his possessions to us; that letter informs us that he has
bequeathed every penny to the other relation, with the exception of
thirty guineas, to be divided between St. John, Diana, and Mary
Rivers, for the purchase of three mourning rings.  He had a right,
of course, to do as he pleased:  and yet a momentary damp is cast on
the spirits by the receipt of such news.  Mary and I would have
esteemed ourselves rich with a thousand pounds each; and to St. John
such a sum would have been valuable, for the good it would have
enabled him to do."

This explanation given, the subject was dropped, and no further
reference made to it by either Mr. Rivers or his sisters.  The next
day I left Marsh End for Morton.  The day after, Diana and Mary
quitted it for distant B-.  In a week, Mr. Rivers and Hannah
repaired to the parsonage:  and so the old grange was abandoned.




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