第38页
'Why,' thought I, 'does she not explain that she could neither
clean her nails nor wash her face, as the water was frozen?'
My attention was now called off by Miss Smith desiring me to hold a
skein of thread: while she was winding it, she talked to me from
time to time, asking whether I had ever been at school before, whether
I could mark, stitch, knit, etc.; till she dismissed me, I could not
pursue my observations on Miss Scatcherd's movements. When I
returned to my seat, that lady was just delivering an order of which I
did not catch the import; but Burns immediately left the class, and
going into the small inner room where the books were kept, returned in
half a minute, carrying in her hand a bundle of twigs tied together at
one end. This ominous tool she presented to Miss Scatcherd with a
respectful curtsey; then she quietly, and without being told, unloosed
her pinafore, and the teacher instantly and sharply inflicted on her
neck a dozen strokes with the bunch of twigs. Not a tear rose to
Burns's eye; and, while I paused from my sewing, because my fingers
quivered at this spectacle with a sentiment of unavailing and impotent
anger, not a feature of her pensive face altered its ordinary
expression.
'Hardened girl!' exclaimed Miss Scatcherd; 'nothing can correct you
of your slatternly habits: carry the rod away.'
Burns obeyed: I looked at her narrowly as she emerged from the
book-closet; she was just putting back her handkerchief into her
pocket, and the trace of a tear glistened on her thin cheek.
The play-hour in the evening I thought the pleasantest fraction
of the day at Lowood: the bit of bread, the draught of coffee
swallowed at five o'clock had revived vitality, if it had not
satisfied hunger: the long restraint of the day was slackened; the
schoolroom felt warmer than in the morning- its fires being allowed to
burn a little more brightly, to supply, in some measure, the place
of candles, not yet introduced: the ruddy gloaming, the licensed
uproar, the confusion of many voices gave one a welcome sense of
liberty.
On the evening of the day on which I had seen Miss Scatcherd flog
her pupil, Burns, I wandered as usual among the forms and tables and
laughing groups without a companion, yet not feeling lonely: when I
passed the windows, I now and then lifted a blind, and looked out;
it snowed fast, a drift was already forming against the lower panes;
putting my ear close to the window, I could distinguish from the
gleeful tumult within, the disconsolate moan of the wind outside.
Probably, if I had lately left a good home and kind parents, this
would have been the hour when I should most keenly have regretted
the separation; that wind would then have saddened my heart, this
obscure chaos would have disturbed my peace! as it was, I derived from
both a strange excitement, and reckless and feverish, I wished the
wind to howl more wildly, the gloom to deepen to darkness, and the