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positively rainy, but darkened by a drizzling yellow fog; all under
foot was still soaking wet with the floods of yesterday. The
stronger among the girls ran about and engaged in active games, but
sundry pale and thin ones herded together for shelter and warmth in
the verandah; and amongst these, as the dense mist penetrated to their
shivering frames, I heard frequently the sound of a hollow cough.
As yet I had spoken to no one, nor did anybody seem to take
notice of me; I stood lonely enough: but to that feeling of
isolation I was accustomed; it did not oppress me much. I leant
against a pillar of the verandah, drew my grey mantle close about
me, and, trying to forget the cold which nipped me without, and the
unsatisfied hunger which gnawed me within, delivered myself up to
the employment of watching and thinking. My reflections were too
undefined and fragmentary to merit record: I hardly yet knew where I
was; Gateshead and my past life seemed floated away to an immeasurable
distance; the present was vague and strange, and of the future I could
form no conjecture. I looked round the convent-like garden, and then
up at the house- a large building, half of which seemed grey and
old, the other half quite new. The new part, containing the schoolroom
and dormitory, was lit by mullioned and latticed windows, which gave
it a church-like aspect; a stone tablet over the door bore this
inscription-
Brocklehurst, of Brocklehurst Hall, in this county.' 'Let your light
so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify
your Father which is in heaven.'- St. Matt. v. 16.
I read these words over and over again: I felt that an
explanation belonged to them, and was unable fully to penetrate
their import. I was still pondering the signification of
'Institution', and endeavouring to make out a connection between the
first words and the verse of Scripture, when the sound of a cough
close behind me made me turn my head. I saw a girl sitting on a
stone bench near; she was bent over a book, on the perusal of which
she seemed intent: from where I stood I could see the title- it was
Rasselas; a name that struck me as strange, and consequently
attractive. In turning a leaf she happened to look up, and I said to
her directly-
'Is your book interesting?' I had already formed the intention of
asking her to lend it to me some day.
'I like it,' she answered, after a pause of a second or two, during
which she examined me.
'What is it about?' I continued. I hardly know where I found the
hardihood thus to open a conversation with a stranger; the step was
contrary to my nature and habits: but I think her occupation touched a
chord of sympathy somewhere; for I too liked reading, though of a
frivolous and childish kind; I could not digest or comprehend the
serious or substantial.
'You may look at it,' replied the girl, offering me the book.
I did so; a brief examination convinced me that the contents were