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quite a gentleman, and I believe he was your father's brother."

"What foreign country was he going to, Bessie?"

"An island thousands of miles off, where they make wine
-- the butler did tell me -- "

"Madeira?" I suggested.

"Yes, that is it -- that is the very word."

"So he went?"

"Yes; he did not stay many minutes in the house: Missis was very
high with him; she called him afterwards a 'sneaking tradesman.'
My Robert believes he was a wine-merchant."

"Very likely," I returned; "or perhaps clerk or agent to a
wine-merchant."

Bessie and I conversed about old times an hour longer, and then
she was obliged to leave me: I saw her again for a few minutes
the next morning at Lowton, while I was waiting for the coach. We
parted finally at the door of the Brocklehurst Arms there: each
went her separate way; she set off for the brow of Lowood Fell
to meet the conveyance which was to take her back to Gateshead, I
mounted the vehicle which was to bear me to new duties and a new
life in the unknown environs of Millcote.



CHAPTER XI


A new chapter in a novel is something like a new scene in a play;
and when I draw up the curtain this time, reader, you must fancy you
see a room in the George Inn at Millcote, with such large figured
papering on the walls as inn rooms have; such a carpet, such
furniture, such ornaments on the mantelpiece, such prints, including
a portrait of George the Third, and another of the Prince of Wales,
and a representation of the death of Wolfe. All this is visible
to you by the light of an oil lamp hanging from the ceiling, and
by that of an excellent fire, near which I sit in my cloak and
bonnet; my muff and umbrella lie on the table, and I am warming
away the numbness and chill contracted by sixteen hours' exposure
to the rawness of an October day: I left Lowton at four o'clock
a.m., and the Millcote town clock is now just striking eight.

Reader, though I look comfortably accommodated, I am not very tranquil
in my mind. I thought when the coach stopped here there would be
some one to meet me; I looked anxiously round as I descended the
wooden steps the "boots" placed for my convenience, expecting to
hear my name pronounced, and to see some description of carriage
waiting to convey me to Thornfield. Nothing of the sort was
visible; and when I asked a waiter if any one had been to inquire
after a Miss Eyre, I was answered in the negative: so I had no
resource but to request to be shown into a private room: and here
I am waiting, while all sorts of doubts and fears are troubling my
thoughts.

It is a very strange sensation to inexperienced youth to feel
itself quite alone in the world, cut adrift from every connection,
uncertain whether the port to which it is bound can be reached,
and prevented by many impediments from returning to that it has
quitted. The charm of adventure sweetens that sensation, the glow

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