第282页
《简·爱(英文版)》章节:第282页,宠文网网友提供全文无弹窗免费在线阅读。!
you have your back towards me now.'
It was true. Though Mr. Rivers had started at the first of those
musical accents, as if a thunderbolt had split a cloud over his
head, he stood yet, at the close of the sentence, in the same attitude
in which the speaker had surprised him- his arm resting on the gate,
his face directed towards the west. He turned at last, with measured
deliberation. A vision, as it seemed to me, had risen at his side.
There appeared, within three feet of him, a form clad in pure
white-a youthful, graceful form: full, yet fine in contour; and
when, after bending to caress Carlo, it lifted up its head, and
threw back a long veil, there bloomed under his glance a face of
perfect beauty. Perfect beauty is a strong expression; but I do not
retrace or qualify it: as sweet features as ever the temperate clime
of Albion moulded; as pure hues of rose and lily as ever her humid
gales and vapoury skies generated and screened, justified, in this
instance, the term. No charm was wanting, no defect was perceptible;
the young girl had regular and delicate lineaments; eyes shaped and
coloured as we see them in lovely pictures, large, and dark, and full;
the long and shadowy eyelash which encircles a fine eye with so soft a
fascination; the pencilled brow which gives such clearness; the
white smooth forehead, which adds such repose to the livelier beauties
of tint and ray; the cheek oval, fresh, and smooth; the lips, fresh
too, ruddy, healthy, sweetly formed; the even and gleaming teeth
without flaw; the small dimpled chin; the ornament of rich,
plenteous tresses- all advantages, in short, which, combined,
realise the ideal of beauty, were fully hers. I wondered, as I
looked at this fair creature: I admired her with my whole heart.
Nature had surely formed her in a partial mood; and, forgetting her
usual stinted step-mother dole of gifts, had endowed this, her
darling, with a grand-dame's bounty.
What did St. John Rivers think of this earthly angel? I naturally
asked myself that question as I saw him turn to her and look at her;
and, as naturally, I sought the answer to the inquiry in his
countenance. He had already withdrawn his eye from the Peri, and was
looking at a humble tuft of daisies which grew by the wicket.
'A lovely evening, but late for you to be out alone,' he said, as
he crushed the snowy heads of the closed flowers with his foot.
town some twenty miles distant) 'this afternoon. Papa told me you
had opened your school, and that the new mistress was come; and so I
put on my bonnet after tea, and ran up the valley to see her: this
is she?' pointing to me.
'It is,' said St. John.
'Do you think you shall like Morton?' she asked of me, with a
direct and naive simplicity of tone and manner, pleasing, if
child-like.
'I hope I shall. I have many inducements to do so.'
'Did you find your scholars as attentive as you expected?'