第76页
《简·爱(英文版)》章节:第76页,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
to talk it a little: I don't understand her, she mixes it so with
French; but you will make out her meaning very well, I daresay.'
Fortunately I had had the advantage of being taught French by a
French lady; and as I had always made a point of conversing with
Madame Pierrot as often as I could, and had besides, during the last
seven years, learnt a portion of French by heart daily- applying
myself to take pains with my accent, and imitating as closely as
possible the pronunciation of my teacher, I had acquired a certain
degree of readiness and correctness in the language, and was not
likely to be much at a loss with Mademoiselle Adela. She came and
shook hands with me when she heard that I was her governess; and as
I led her in to breakfast, I addressed some phrases to her in her
own tongue: she replied briefly at first, but after we were seated
at the table, and she had examined me some ten minutes with her
large hazel eyes, she suddenly commenced chattering fluently.
'Ah!' cried she, in French, 'you speak my language as well as Mr.
Rochester does: I can talk to you as I can to him, and so can
Sophie. She will be glad: nobody here understands her: Madame
Fairfax is all English. Sophie is my nurse; she came with me over
the sea in a great ship with a chimney that smoked- how it did smoke!-
and I was sick, and so was Sophie, and so was Mr. Rochester. Mr.
Rochester lay down on a sofa in a pretty room called the salon, and
Sophie and I had little beds in another place. I nearly fell out of
mine; it was like a shelf. And Mademoiselle- what is your name?'
'Eyre- Jane Eyre.'
'Aire? Bah! I cannot say it. Well, our ship stopped in the morning,
before it was quite daylight, at a great city- a huge city, with
very dark houses and all smoky; not at all like the pretty clean
town I came from; and Mr. Rochester carried me in his arms over a
plank to the land, and Sophie came after, and we all got into a coach,
which took us to a beautiful large house, larger than this and
finer, called an hotel. We stayed there nearly a week: I and Sophie
used to walk every day in a great green place full of trees, called
the Park; and there were many children there besides me, and a pond
with beautiful birds in it, that I fed with crumbs.'
'Can you understand her when she runs on so fast?' asked Mrs.
Fairfax.
I understood her very well, for I had been accustomed to the fluent
tongue of Madame Pierrot.
'I wish,' continued the good lady, 'you would ask her a question or
two about her parents: I wonder if she remembers them?'
'Adele,' I inquired, 'with whom did you live when you were in
that pretty clean town you spoke of?'
'I lived long ago with mama; but she is gone to the Holy Virgin.
Mama used to teach me to dance and sing, and to say verses. A great
many gentlemen and ladies came to see mama, and I used to dance before
them, or to sit on their knees and sing to them: I liked it. Shall I