Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt against their lot.

We finally meet Jane’s employer…but first, she settles into her new role.

Adèle proves to be a little spoiled, but as there’s no one around to interfere with Jane’s instruction, she swiftly takes her in hand. Mrs. Fairfax is a pleasant enough companion, but she’s not exactly stimulating company, either.

Anybody may blame me who likes when I add further that now and then, when I took a walk by myself in the grounds, when I went down to the gates and looked through them along the road, or when Adèle played with her nurse, and Mrs. Fairfax made jellies in the storeroom, I climbed the three staircases, raised the trap-door of the attic, and having reached the leads, looked out afar over sequestered field and hill, and along dim sky-line – that I longed for a power of vision which might overpass that limit; which might reach the busy world, towns, regions full of life I had heard of but never seen: that then I desired more of a practical experience than I possessed; more of intercourse with my kind, of acquaintance with variety of character, than was here within my reach. I valued what was good in Mrs. Fairfax, and what was good in Adele; but I believed in the existence of other and more vivid kinds of goodness, and what I believed I wished to behold.
Who blames me? Many, no doubt; and I shall be called discontented. I could not help it: the restlessness was in my nature; it agitated me to pain sometimes. Then my sole relief was to walk along the corridor of the third story, backwards and forwards, safe in the silence and solitude of the spot to allow the mind’s eye to dwell on whatever bright visions rose before it – and, certainly, they were many and glowing; to let my heart be heaved by the exultant movement, which, while it swelled it in trouble, expanded it with life; and, best of all, to open my inward ear to a tale that was never ended – a tale my imagination created, and narrated continuously; quickened with all of incident, life, fire, feeling, that I desired and had not in my actual existence.
It is in vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it. Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt against their lot. Nobody knows how many rebellions besides political rebellions ferment in the masses of life which people earth. Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties and a field for their efforts just as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex.

Jane is seemingly just experiencing the restlessness of youth; she wanted freedom, or at least variety, but her life at Thornfield has thus far been much the same as her life at Lowood.

Several months pass in much the same way, and then one day Jane goes into town to mail a letter for Mrs. Fairfax.

From my seat I could look down on Thornfield: the grey and battlemented hall was the principle object in the vale below me; its woods and dark rookery rose against the west. I lingered till the sun went down amongst the trees, and sank crimson and clear behind them. I then turned eastward.
On the hilltop above me sat the rising moon; pale yet as a cloud, but brightening momently: she looked over Hay, which, half lost in trees, sent up a blue smoke from its few chimneys; it was yet a mile distant, but in the absolute hush I could hear plainly its thin murmurs of life. My ear too felt the flow of currents; in what dales and depths I could not tell: but there were many hills beyond Hay, and doubtless many becks threading their passes. That evening calm betrayed alike the tinkle of the nearest streams, and the sough of the most remote.

Bronte might not be the best at painting a scene, but I feel like when that scene is the British countryside, this is sufficient.

And then the quiet is interrupted by something approaching…

The din was on the causeway; a horse was coming; the windings of the lane yet hid it, but it approached. I was just leaving the stile; yet, as the path was narrow, I sat still to let it go by. In those days I was young, and all sorts of fancies bright and dark tenanted my mind: the memories of nursery stories were there amongst other rubbish; and when they recurred, maturing youth added to them a vigour and vividness beyond what childhood could give. As this horse approached, and as I watched for it to appear through the dusk, I remembered certain of Bessie’s tales, wherein figured a North-of-England spirit called a “Gytrash,” which, in the form of horse, mule, or large dog, haunted solitary ways, and sometimes came upon belated travellers, as this horse was now coming upon me.
It was very near, but not yet in sight, when, in addition to the tramp, tramp, I heard a rush under the hedge, and close down by the hazel stems glided a great dog, whose black and white colour made him a distinct object against the trees. It was exactly one mask of Bessie’s Gytrash, – a lion-like creature with long hair and a huge head: it passed me, however, quietly enough; not staying to look up, with strange pretercanine eyes, in my face, as I half expected it would. The horse followed, – a tall steed, and on its back a rider. The man, the human being, broke the spell at once. Nothing ever rode a Gytrash: it was always alone; and goblins, to my notions, though they might tenant the dumb carcasses of beasts, could scarce covet shelter in the common-place human form. No Gytrash was this, – only a traveller taking the short cut to Millcote. He passed, and I went on: a few steps, and I turned: a sliding sound and an exclamation of “What the deuce is to do now?” and a clattering tumble, arrested my attention. Man and horse were down; they had slipped on the sheet of ice which glazed the causeway. The dog came bounding back, and seeing his master in a predicament, and hearing the horse groan, barked till the evening hills echoed the sound, which was deep in proportion to his magnitude. He snuffed around the prostrate group, and then ran up to me; it was all he could do, – there was no other help at hand to summon. I obeyed him and walked to the traveller, by this time struggling himself free of his steed. His efforts were so vigorous I thought he could not be much hurt; but I asked him the question: – “Are you injured, sir?”

Because icy roads were a hazard to horses before they were a hazard to cars!

Funny enough, this is the first known reference to the Gytrash in a published work, although it’s presumably based on popular folklore of the day, as references were made to similar creatures like Church Grims (spectral black dogs) all around Great Britain. The Gytrash only seems to be unique in that it can manifest in the form of a horse or cow.

I was in the mood for being useful, or at least officious, I think, for I now drew near him again.
“If you are hurt, and want help, sir, I can fetch some one either from Thornfield or from Hay.”
“Thank you; I shall do: I have no broken bones – only a sprain;” and again he stood up and tried his foot, but the result extorted an involuntary “Ugh!”
Something of daylight still lingered, and the moon was waxing bright: I could see him plainly. His figure was enveloped in a riding cloak, fur collared, and steel clasped; its details were not apparent, but I traced the general points of middle height, and considerable breadth of chest. He had a dark face, with stern features and a heavy brow; his eyes and gathered eyebrows looked ireful and thwarted just now; he was past youth, but had not reached middle age; perhaps he might be thirty-five. I felt no fear of him, and but little shyness. Had he been a handsome, heroic-looking young gentleman, I should not have dared to stand thus questioning him against his will, and offering my services unasked. I had hardly ever seen a handsome youth; never in my life spoken to one. I had theoretical reverence and homage for beauty, elegance, gallantry, fascination; but had I met those qualities incarnate in masculine shape, I should have known instinctively that they neither had nor could have sympathy with anything in me, and should have shunned them as one would fire, lightning, or anything else that is bright but antipathetic.
If even this stranger had smiled and been good-humoured to me when I addressed him; if he had put off my offer of assistance gaily and with thanks, I should have gone on my way and not felt any vocation to renew inquiries: but the frown, the roughness of the traveller, set me at my ease: I retained my station when he waved to me to go, and announced: -“I cannot think of leaving you, sir, at so late an hour, in this solitary lane, till I see you are fit to mount your horse.”

Perhaps it’s because she’s so used to receiving flat-out abuse in exchange for kindness, or that she simply feels more at ease with other people who are “unattractive” (in the sense that his personality combined with his rough exterior doesn’t make him immediately appealing). Whatever the case, Jane is very bold for once, and that makes the traveler finally notice her.

He looked at me when I said this: he had hardly turned his eyes in my direction before.
“I should think you ought to be at home yourself,” said he, “if you have a home in this neighbourhood: where do you come from?”
“From just below; and I am not afraid of being out late when it is moonlight: I will run over to Hay for you with pleasure, if you wish it; indeed, I am going there to post a letter.”
“You live just below – do you mean at that house with the battlements?” pointing to Thornfield Hall, on which the moon cast a hoary gleam, bringing it out distinct and pale from the woods, that, by contrast with the western sky, now seemed a mass of shadow.
“Yes, sir.”
“Whose house is it?”
“Mr. Rochester’s.”
“Do you know Mr. Rochester?”
“No, I have never seen him.”
“He is not resident, then?”
“No.”
“Can you tell me where he is?”
“I cannot.”
“You are not a servant at the hall, of course. You are-” He stopped, ran his eye over my dress, which, as usual, was quite simple: a black merino cloak, a black beaver bonnet: neither of them half fine enough for a lady’s-maid. He seemed puzzled to decide what I was: I helped him.
“I am the governess.”
“Ah, the governess!” he repeated; “deuce take me, if I had not forgotten! The governess!”

He seems strangely well-aware of the situation at Thornfield for a complete stranger…

Anyhow, he first asks Jane to bring him his horse, but that seems to be more than she’s capable of (as handling a strange horse that’s been spooked by a fall would be tricky for anyone, let alone someone who has little experience with horses in general).

“I see,” he said, “the mountain will never be brought to Mahomet, so all you can do is aid Mahomet to go to the mountain; I must beg you to come here.”
I came. “Excuse me,” he continued: “necessity compels me to make you useful.” He laid a heavy hand on my shoulder, and leaning on me with some stress, limped to his horse. Having once caught the bridle, he mastered it directly, and sprang to his saddle; grimacing grimly as he made the effort, for it wrenched his sprain.
“Now,” said he, releasing his under lip after a hard bite, “just hand me my whip; it lies there under the hedge.”
I sought it and found it.
“Thank you: now make haste with the letter to Hay, and return as fast as you can.”
A touch of a spurred heel made his horse first start and rear, and then bound away; the dog rushed in his traces: all three vanished,

Like heath that, in the wilderness,
The wild wind whirls away

Jane finishes her errand without further delay, and half-expects that the traveler might have been a dream, and at any rate, she doesn’t think it had any impact on her daily life.

I did not like re-entering Thornfield. To pass its threshold was to return to stagnation; to cross the silent hall, to ascend the darksome staircase, to seek my own lonely little room, and then to meet tranquil Mrs. Fairfax, and spend the long winter evening with her, and her only, was to quell wholly the faint excitement wakened by my walk, – to slip again over my faculties the viewless fetters of an uniform and too still existence; of an existence whose very privileges of security and ease I was becoming incapable of appreciating. What good it would have done me at that time to have been tossed in the storms of an uncertain struggling life, and to have been taught by rough and bitter experience to long for the calm in which I now repined! Yes, just as much good as it would do a man tired of sitting in a “too easy chair” to take a long walk; and just as natural was the wish to stir, under my circumstances, as it would be under his.

She’s still a young adult, so she’s itching for excitement – but of course, it turns out the traveler had something to do with Thornfield after all.

I hastened to Mrs. Fairfax’s room: there was a fire there too, but no candle, and no Mrs. Fairfax. Instead, all alone, sitting upright on the rug, and gazing with gravity at the blaze, I beheld a great black and white long-haired dog, just like the Gytrash of the lane. It was so like it that I went forward and said – “Pilot,” and the thing got up and came to me and snuffed me. I caressed him, and he wagged his great tail: but he looked an eerie creature to be alone with, and I could not tell whence he had come. I rang the bell, for I wanted a candle; and I wanted, too, to get an account of this visitant.

There’s seems to be an important visitor downstairs…also, in pre-industrial times, “pilot” simply referred to a navigator, not someone who flies an airplane.

“What dog is this?”
“He came with master.”
“With whom?”
“With master – Mr. Rochester – he is just arrived.”
“Indeed! and is Mrs. Fairfax with him?”
“Yes, and Miss Adela; they are in the dining-room, and John has gone for a surgeon: for master has had an accident; his horse fell and his ankle is sprained.”

So clearly, it was Mr. Rochester she met on the road, and her life is certainly going to have more excitement going forward.

Until next time…