from moment to moment. This I could do in the beginning: soon (for I
know your powers) you would be as strong and apt as myself, and
would not require my help.'
'But my powers- where are they for this undertaking? I do not
feel them. Nothing speaks or stirs in me while you talk. I am sensible
of no light kindling- no life quickening- no voice counselling or
cheering. Oh, I wish I could make you see how much my mind is at
this moment like a rayless dungeon, with one shrinking fear fettered
in its depths- the fear of being persuaded by you to attempt what I
cannot accomplish!'
'I have an answer for you- hear it. I have watched you ever since
we first met: I have made you my study for ten months. I have proved
you in that time by sundry tests: and what have I seen and elicited?
In the village school I found you could perform well, punctually,
uprightly, labour uncongenial to your habits and inclinations; I saw
you could perform it with capacity and tact: you could win while you
controlled. In the calm with which you learnt you had become
suddenly rich, I read a mind clear of the vice of Demas:- lucre had no
undue power over you. In the resolute readiness with which you cut
your wealth into four shares, keeping but one to yourself, and
relinquishing the three others to the claim of abstract justice, I
recognised a soul that revelled in the flame and excitement of
sacrifice. In the tractability with which, at my wish, you forsook a
study in which you were interested, and adopted another because it
interested me; in the untiring assiduity with which you have since
persevered in it- in the unflagging energy and unshaken temper with
which you have met its difficulties- I acknowledge the complement of
the qualities I seek. Jane, you are docile, diligent, disinterested,
faithful, constant, and courageous; very gentle, and very heroic:
cease to mistrust yourself- I can trust you unreservedly. As a
conductress of Indian schools, and a helper amongst Indian women, your
assistance will be to me invaluable.'
My iron shroud contracted round me; persuasion advanced with
slow, sure step. Shut my eyes as I would, these last words of his
succeeded in making the way, which had seemed blocked up,
comparatively clear. My work, which had appeared so vague, so
hopelessly diffuse, condensed itself as he proceeded, and assumed a
definite form under his shaping hand. He waited for an answer. I
demanded a quarter of an hour to think, before I again hazarded a
reply.
'Very willingly,' he rejoined; and rising, he strode a little
distance up the pass, threw himself down on a swell of heath, and
there lay still.
'I can do what he wants me to do: I am forced to see and
acknowledge that,' I meditated,- 'that is, if life be spared me. But I
feel mine is not the existence to be long protracted under an Indian
sun. What then? He does not care for that: when my time came to die,
he would resign me, in all serenity and sanctity, to the God who
gave me. The case is very plain before me. In leaving England, I
should leave a loved but empty land- Mr. Rochester is not there; and
if he were, what is, what can that ever be to me? My business is to
live without him now: nothing so absurd, so weak as to drag on from
day to day, as if I were waiting some impossible change in
circumstances, which might reunite me to him. Of course (as St. John
once said) I must seek another interest in life to replace the one
lost: is not the occupation he now offers me truly the most glorious
man can adopt or God assign? Is it not, by its noble cares and sublime
results, the one best calculated to fill the void left by uptorn
affections and demolished hopes? I believe I must say, Yes- and yet
I shudder. Alas! If I join St. John, I abandon half myself: if I go to
India, I go to premature death. And how will the interval between
leaving England for India, and India for the grave, be filled? Oh, I
know well! That, too, is very clear to my vision. By straining to
satisfy St. John till my sinews ache, I shall satisfy him- to the
finest central point and farthest outward circle of his
expectations. If I do go with him- if I do make the sacrifice he
urges, I will make it absolutely: I will throw all on the altar-
heart, vitals, the entire victim. He will never love me; but he
shall approve me; I will show him energies he has not yet seen,
resources he has never suspected. Yes, I can work as hard as he can,
and with as little grudging.
'Consent, then, to his demand is possible: but for one item- one
dreadful item. It is- that he asks me to be his wife, and has no
more of a husband's heart for me than that frowning giant of a rock,
down which the stream is foaming in yonder gorge. He prizes me as a
soldier would a good weapon, and that is all. Unmarried to him, this
would never grieve me; but can I let him complete his calculations-
coolly put into practice his plans- go through the wedding ceremony?
Can I receive from him the bridal ring, endure all the forms of love
(which I doubt not he would scrupulously observe) and know that the
spirit was quite absent? Can I bear the consciousness that every
endearment he bestows is a sacrifice made on principle? No: such a
martyrdom would be monstrous. I will never undergo it. As his
sister, I might accompany him- not as his wife: I will tell him so.'
I looked towards the knoll: there he lay, still as a prostrate
column; his face turned to me: his eye beaming watchful and keen. He
started to his feet and approached me.
'I am ready to go to India, if I may go free.'
'Your answer requires a commentary,' he said; 'it is not clear.'
'You have hitherto been my adopted brother- I, your adopted sister:
let us continue as such: you and I had better not marry.'
He shook his head. 'Adopted fraternity will not do in this case. If
you were my real sister it would be different: I should take you,
and seek no wife. But as it is, either our union must be consecrated
and sealed by marriage, or it cannot exist: practical obstacles oppose
themselves to any other plan. Do you not see it, Jane? Consider a
moment- your strong sense will guide you.'
I did consider; and still my sense, such as it was, directed me
only to the fact that we did not love each other as man and wife
should: and therefore it inferred we ought not to marry. I said so.
'St. John,' I returned, 'I regard you as a brother- you, me as a
sister: so let us continue.'
'We cannot- we cannot,' he answered, with short, sharp
determination: 'it would not do. You have said you will go with me
to India: remember- you have said that.'
'Conditionally.'
'Well- well. To the main point- the departure with me from England,
the co-operation with me in my future labours- you do not object.
You have already as good as put your hand to the plough: you are too
consistent to withdraw it. You have but one end to keep in view- how
the work you have undertaken can best be done. Simplify your
complicated interests, feelings, thoughts, wishes, aims; merge all
considerations in one purpose: that of fulfilling with effect- with
power- the mission of your great Master. To do so, you must have a
coadjutor: not a brother- that is a loose tie- but a husband. I,
too, do not want a sister: a sister might any day be taken from me.
I want a wife: the sole helpmeet I can influence efficiently in
life, and retain absolutely till death.'
I shuddered as he spoke: I felt his influence in my marrow- his
hold on my limbs.
'Seek one elsewhere than in me, St. John: seek one fitted to you.'
'One fitted to my purpose, you mean- fitted to my vocation. Again I
tell you it is not the insignificant private individual- the mere man,
with the man's selfish senses- I wish to mate: it is the missionary.'
'And I will give the missionary my energies- it is all he wants-
but not myself: that would be only adding the husk and shell to the
kernel. For them he has no use: I retain them.'
'You cannot- you ought not. Do you think God will be satisfied with
half an oblation? Will He accept a mutilated sacrifice? It is the
cause of God I advocate: it is under His standard I enlist you. I
cannot accept on His behalf a divided allegiance: it must be entire.'
'Oh! I will give my heart to God,' I said. 'You do not want it.'
I will not swear, reader, that there was not something of repressed
sarcasm both in the tone in which I uttered this sentence, and in
the feeling that accompanied it. I had silently feared St. John till
now, because I had not understood him. He had held me in awe,
because he had held me in doubt. How much of him was saint, how much
mortal, I could not heretofore tell: but revelations were being made
in this conference: the analysis of his nature was proceeding before
my eyes. I saw his fallibilities: I comprehended them. I understood
that, sitting there where I did, on the bank of heath, and with that
handsome form before me, I sat at the feet of a man, erring as I.
The veil fell from his hardness and despotism. Having felt in him
the presence of these qualities, I felt his imperfection and took
courage. I was with an equal- one with whom I might argue- one whom,
if I saw good, I might resist.
He was silent after I had uttered the last sentence, and I
presently risked an upward glance at his countenance. His eye, bent on
me, expressed at once stern surprise and keen inquiry. 'Is she
sarcastic, and sarcastic to me!' it seemed to say. 'What does this
signify?'
'Do not let us forget that this is a solemn matter,' he said ere
long; 'one of which we may neither think nor talk lightly without sin.
I trust, Jane, you are in earnest when you say you will give your
heart to God: it is all I want. Once wrench your heart from man, and
fix it on your Maker, the advancement of that Maker's spiritual
kingdom on earth will be your chief delight and endeavour; you will be
ready to do at once whatever furthers that end. You will see what
impetus would be given to your efforts and mine by our physical and
mental union in marriage: the only union that gives a character of
permanent conformity to the destinies and designs of human beings;
and, passing over all minor caprices- all trivial difficulties and
delicacies of feeling- all scruple about the degree, kind, strength or
tenderness of mere personal inclination- you will hasten to enter into
that union at once.'
'Shall I?' I said briefly; and I looked at his features,
beautiful in their harmony, but strangely formidable in their still
severity; at his brow, commanding but not open; at his eyes, bright
and deep and searching, but never soft; at his tall imposing figure;
and fancied myself in idea his wife. Oh! it would never do! As his
curate, his comrade, all would be right: I would cross oceans with him
in that capacity; toil under Eastern suns, in Asian deserts with him
in that office; admire and emulate his courage and devotion and
vigour; accommodate quietly to his masterhood; smile undisturbed at
his ineradicable ambition; discriminate the Christian from the man:
profoundly esteem the one, and freely forgive the other. I should
suffer often, no doubt, attached to him only in this capacity: my body
would be under rather a stringent yoke, but my heart and mind would be
free. I should still have my unblighted self to turn to: my natural
unenslaved feelings with which to communicate in moments of
loneliness. There would be recesses in my mind which would be only
mine, to which he never came, and sentiments growing there fresh and
sheltered which his austerity could never blight, nor his measured
warrior-march trample down: but as his wife- at his side always, and
always restrained, and always checked- forced to keep the fire of my
nature continually low, to compel it to burn inwardly and never
utter a cry, though the imprisoned flame consumed vital after vital-
this would be unendurable.
'St. John!' I exclaimed, when I had got so far in my meditation.
'Well?' he answered icily.
'I repeat I freely consent to go with you as your
fellow-missionary, but not as your wife; I cannot marry you and become
part of you.'
'A part of me you must become,' he answered steadily: 'otherwise
the whole bargain is void. How can I, a man not yet thirty, take out
with me to India a girl of nineteen, unless she be married to me?
How can we be for ever together- sometimes in solitudes, sometimes
amidst savage tribes- and unwed?'
'Very well,' I said shortly; 'under the circumstances, quite as
well as if I were either your real sister, or a man and a clergyman
like yourself.'
'It is known that you are not my sister; I cannot introduce you
as such: to attempt it would be to fasten injurious suspicions on us
both. And for the rest, though you have a man's vigorous brain, you
have a woman's heart and- it would not do.'
'It would do,' I affirmed with some disdain, 'perfectly well. I
have a woman's heart, but not where you are concerned; for you I
have only a comrade's constancy; a fellow-soldier's frankness,
fidelity, fraternity, if you like; a neophyte's respect and submission
to his hierophant: nothing more- don't fear.'
'It is what I want,' he said, speaking to himself; 'it is just what
I want. And there are obstacles in the way: they must be hewn down.
Jane, you would not repent marrying me- be certain of that; we must be
married. I repeat it: there is no other way; and undoubtedly enough of
