Chapter I

Some time in the afternoon I raised my head, and looking round and seeing the western sun gilding the sign of its decline on the wall, I asked, ‘What am I to do?’ But the answer my mind gave—‘Leave Thornfield at once’—was so prompt, so...

Chapter III

Merry days were these at Thornfield Hall; and busy days too: how different from the first three months of stillness, monotony, and solitude I had passed beneath its roof! All sad feelings seemed now driven from the house, all gloomy associations forgotten: there was...

Chapter X

Hitherto I have recorded in detail the events of my insignificant existence: to the first ten years of my life, I have given almost as many chapters. But this is not to be a regular autobiography: I am only bound to invoke memory where...

Chapter VII

My first quarter at Lowood seemed an age; and not the golden age either: it comprised an irksome struggle with difficulties in habituating myself to new rules and unwonted tasks. The fear of failure in these points harassed me worse than the physical hardships...

Chapter VII

When Mr. St. John went, it was beginning to snow: the whirling storm continued all night. The next day a keen wind brought fresh and blinding falls: by twilight the valley was drifted up and almost impassable. I had closed my shutter, laid a...

Chapter IV

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...

Chapter III

The recollection of about three days and nights succeeding this is very dim in my mind. I can recall some sensations felt in that interval; but few thoughts framed, and no actions performed. I knew I was in a small room, and in a...

Chapter II

Two days are passed. It is a summer evening; the coachman has set me down at a place called Whitcross;* he could take me no farther for the sum I had given, and I was not possessed of another shilling in the...

Chapter XI

Sophie came at seven to dress me; she was very long indeed in accomplishing her task: so long that Mr. Rochester, grown, I suppose, impatient of my delay, sent up to ask why I did not come. She was just fastening my veil (the...

Chapter VI

Presentiments are strange things! and so are sympathies; and so are signs: and the three combined make one mystery to which humanity has not yet found the key. I never laughed at presentiments in my life; because I have had strange ones of my...