This was wealth indeed! wealth to the heart! a mine of pure, genial affections.

Jane (or rather, St. John) makes a life-changing discovery.

The day after St. John had that discussion with her about Rosamond (and then he made an abrupt exit), there’s a bit of a snowstorm.

I heard a noise: the wind, I thought, shook the door. No; it was St. John Rivers, who, lifting the latch, came in and out of the frozen hurricane – the howling darkness – and stood before me: the cloak that covered his tall figure all white as a glacier. I was almost in consternation; so little had I expected any guest from the blocked-up vale that night,
“Any ill news? I demanded. “Has anything happened?”
“No. How very easily alarmed you are!” he answered, removing his cloak and hanging it up against the door, towards which he again coolly pushed the mat which his entrance had deranged.

I mean, if she wasn’t expecting you, it’s fair to assume that only an emergency would bring you out in the snow, no matter how near your houses are.

“But why are you come?” I could not forbear saying.
“Rather an inhospitable question to put to a visitor; but since you ask it, I answer simply to have a talk with you; I got tired of my mute books and empty rooms. Besides, since yesterday I have experienced the excitement of a person to whom a tale has been half-told, and who is impatient to hear the sequel.”

She then notices how pale and thin he is.

It struck me that his hand looked wasted like his face. A perhaps uncalled-for gush of pity came over my heart: I was moved to say: – “I wish Diana or Mary would come and live with you: it is too bad that you should be quite alone; and you are recklessly rash about your own health.”
“Not at all.” said he: “I care for myself when necessary; I am well now. What do you see amiss in me?”
This was said with a careless, abstracted indifference, which showed that my solicitude was, at least in his opinion, wholly superfluous. I was silenced.

She proceeds to attempt to engage him in conversation, but he’s clearly lost in his own thoughts, so she gives up after a while.

“Leave your book a moment, and come a little nearer the fire,” he said.
Wondering, and of my wonder finding no end, I complied.
“Half an hour ago,” he pursued, “I spoke of my impatience to hear the sequel of a tale: on reflection, I find the matter will be better managed by assuming the narrator’s part, and converting you into a listener. Before commencing it is but fair to warn you that the story will sound somewhat hackneyed in your ears: but stale details often regain a degree of freshness when they pass through new lips. For the rest, whether trite or novel, it is short.”

Thus he finally gets to the point of his visit.

“Twenty years ago a poor curate – never mind his name at this moment – fell in love with a rich man’s daughter; she fell in love with him, and married him, against the advice of all her friends; who consequently disowned her immediately after the wedding. Before two years passed the rash pair were both dead, and laid quietly side by side under one slab. […] They left a daughter, which, at its very birth, Charity received in her lap – cold as that of the snow-drift I almost stuck fast in to-night. Charity carried the friendless thing to the house of its rich maternal relations; it was reared by an aunt-in-law called (I come to names now) Mrs. Reed, of Gateshead – you start – did you hear a noise? I daresay it is only a rat scrambling along the rafters of the adjoining schoolroom: it was a barn before I had it repaired and altered, and barns are generally haunted by rats. – To proceed. Mrs. Reed kept the orphan ten years: whether it was happy or not with her I cannot say, never having been told; but at the end of that time she transferred it to a place you know – being none other than Lowood School, where you so long resided yourself. It seems her career there was very honourable: from a pupil she became a teacher, like yourself – really it strikes me there are parallel points in her history and yours – she left it to be a governess: there, again, your fates are analogous; she undertook the education of the ward of a certain Mr. Rochester.
“Mr. Rivers!” I interrupted.
“I can guess your feelings,” he said, “but restrain them for a while: I have nearly finished; hear me to the end. Of Mr. Rochester’s character I know nothing, but the one fact that he professed to offer honourable marriage to this young girl, and that at the very altar she discovered he had a wife yet alive, though a lunatic. What his subsequent conduct and proposals were is a matter of pure conjecture; but when an event transpired which rendered inquiry after the governess necessary, it was discovered she was gone – no one could tell when, where, or how. She left Thornfield Hall in the night; every research after her course had been in vain: the country had been scoured far and wide; no vestige of information could be gathered respecting her. Yet that she should be found is become a matter of serious urgency: advertisements have been put in all the papers; I myself have received a letter from one Mr. Briggs, a solicitor, communicating the details I have just imparted. Is it not an odd tale?”

and of course jane just asks after mr. rochester

St. John, knowing only what Mr. Briggs relayed to him, knows only that Mrs. Fairfax was the one who corresponded with Mr. Briggs.

I felt cold and dismayed: my worst fears then were probably true: and he in all probability left England, and rushed in reckless desperation to some former haunt on the Continent. And what opiate for his severe sufferings – what object for his strong passions – had he sought there? I dared not answer the question. Oh, my poor master – once almost my husband – whom I had often called “my dear Edward!”

Jane, honey, I think you’re reading a little much into it. Of course Mr. Rochester would be upset at your flight, but maybe THAT’S the reason Mrs. Fairfax would be answering letters regarding your whereabouts, because he was too distraught about it, and not because he’d run off to the Continent? I mean, if he HAD, that would seem to indicate he’s a lost cause who will never be able to love you like you deserve.

“He must have been a bad man,” observed Mr. Rivers.
“You don’t know him – don’t pronounce an opinion upon him,” I said, with warmth.
“Very well,” he answered, quietly: “and indeed my head is otherwise occupied than with him: I have my tale to finish. Since you won’t ask the governess’s name, I must tell it of my own accord – stay – I have it here – it is always more satisfactory to see important points written down, fairly committed to black and white.”

And of course, it’s the scrap of paper he took, on which she’d absent-mindedly written her proper name.

“Briggs wrote to me of a Jane Eyre,” he said; “the advertisements demanded a Jane Eyre: I knew a Jane Elliott. – I confess I had my suspicions, but it was only yesterday afternoon they were resolved into certainty. You own the name and renounce the alias?“
“Yes – yes – but where is Mr. Briggs? He perhaps knows more of Mr. Rochester than you do.”
“Briggs is in London; I should doubt his knowing anything at all about Mr. Rochester; it is not in Mr. Rochester he is interested. Meantime you forget essential points in pursuing trifles: you do not inquire why Mr. Briggs sought after you – what he wanted with you.”
“Well, what did he want?”
“Merely to tell you that your uncle, Mr. John Eyre of Madeira, is dead; that he has left you all his property, and that you are now rich – merely that – nothing more.”
“I! rich?”
“Yes, you, rich – quite an heiress.”

But it takes a little while for Jane to process all this.

[The] words Legacy, Bequest, go side by side with the words Death, Funeral. My uncle I had heard was dead – my only relative; ever since being made aware of his existence I had cherished the hope of one day seeing him: now, I never should. And then this money came only to me: not to me and a rejoicing family, but to my isolated self. It was a grand boon doubtless; and independence would be glorious – yes, I felt that – that thought swelled my heart.
“You unbend your forehead at last,” said Mr. Rivers: “I thought Medusa had looked at you, and that you were turning to stone – perhaps now you will ask how much you are worth?”
“How much am I worth?”
“Oh, a trifle! Nothing of course to speak of – twenty thousand pounds, I think they say – but what is that?”
“Twenty thousand pounds?”
Here was a new stunner – I had been calculating on four or five thousand. This news actually took my breath for a moment: Mr. St. John, whom I had never heard laugh before, laughed now.
“Well,” said he, “if you had committed a murder, and I had told you your crime was discovered, you could scarcely look more aghast.”

Just for reference, Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice was considered very wealthy on 10,000 pounds a year, so even it’s a lump sum, 20k would be a staggering amount, especially to someone who had previously had to earn her own living.

But despite all this, there’s something that’s not quite adding up for Jane.

“Stop one minute!” I cried.
“Well?”
“It puzzles me to know why Mr. Briggs wrote to you about me; or how he knew you, or could fancy that you, living in such an out-of-the-way place, had the power to aid in my discovery.”
“Oh! I am a clergyman,” he said; “and the clergy are often appealed to about odd matters.”
[…]
“No: that does not satisfy me!” I exclaimed: and, indeed, there was something in the hasty and unexplanatory reply which, instead of allaying, piqued my curiosity more than ever.

As always, he’s slow to get to the point, but Jane refuses to drop it.

“As you hope to ever be forgiven, Mr. Rivers, the high crime and misdemeanour of spoiling a sanded kitchen, tell me what I wish to know.”
“Well, then,” he said, “I yield; if not to your earnestness, to your perseverance: as stone is worn by continual dropping. Besides, you must know some day, – as well now as later. Your name is Jane Eyre?”
“Of course: that was settled before.”
“You are not, perhaps, aware that I am your namesake? – that I was christened St. John Eyre Rivers?”

Because naturally, their Uncle John was the same as HER Uncle John!

“My mother’s name was Eyre; she had two brothers; one a clergyman, who married Miss Jane Reed, of Gateshead; the other, John Eyre, Esq., merchant, late of Funchal, Madeira. Mr. Briggs, being Mr. Eyre’s solicitor, wrote us last August to inform us of our uncle’s death; and to say that he had left his property to his brother the clergyman’s orphan daughter; overlooking us, in consequence of a quarrel, never forgiven, between him and my father. He wrote again a few weeks since, to intimate that the heiress was lost; and asking if we knew anything of her. A name casually written on a slip of paper enabled me to find her out. You know the rest.” Again he was going, but I set my back against the door.
“Do let me speak,” I said; “Let me have one moment to draw breath and reflect.” I paused – he stood before me, hat in hand, looking composed enough. I resumed: “Your mother was my father’s sister?”
“Yes.”
“My aunt, consequently?”
He bowed.
“My uncle John was your uncle John? You, Diana, and Mary, are his sister’s children; as I am his brother’s child?”
“Undeniably.”
“You three, then, are my cousins; half our blood on each side flows from the same source?”
“We are cousins, yes.”

And after just hearing of the death of what she believed to be her last relative, this news is even more powerful for Jane.

I surveyed him. It seemed I had found a brother: one I could be proud of, – one I could love; and two sisters whose qualities were such that, when I knew them but as mere strangers, they had inspired me with genuine affection and admiration. The two girls on whom, kneeling down on the wet ground, and looking through the low, latticed window of Moor House kitchen, I had gazed with so bitter a mixture of interest and despair were my near kinswomen; and the young and stately gentlemen who had found me almost dying on his threshold was my blood relation. Glorious discovery to a lonely wretch! This was wealth indeed! wealth to the heart! a mine of pure, genial affections. This was a blessing, bright, vivid, and exhilarating; – not like the ponderous gift of gold: rich and welcome enough in its way, but sobering from its weight. I now clapped my hands in sudden joy – my pulse bounded, my veins thrilled.
“Oh, I am glad! – I am glad!” I exclaimed.
St. John smiled. “Did I not say you neglected essential points to pursue trifles?” he asked. “You were serious when I told you you had got a fortune; now, for a matter of no moment, you are excited.”
“What can you mean? It may be of no moment to you; you have sisters, and don’t care for a cousin; but I had nobody; and now three relations, – or two, if you don’t choose to be counted, – are born into my world full grown. I say again, I am glad!”
I walked fast through the room: I stopped, half suffocated with the thoughts that rose faster than I could receive, comprehend, settle them: – Thoughts of what might, could, would, and should be, and that ere long. I looked at the blank wall: it seemed a sky, thick with ascending stars, – every one lit me to a purpose or delight. Those who had saved my life, whom till this hour I had loved barrenly, could now benefit. They were under a yoke: I could free them: they were scattered, – I could reunite them – the independence, the affluence which was mine might be theirs too. Were we not four? Twenty thousand pounds shared equally would be five thousand each, enough and to spare: justice would be done, – mutual happiness secured. Now the wealth did not weigh on me: now it was not a mere bequest of coin, – it was a legacy of life, hope, enjoyment.

This is something else I relate to: I take much more joy in sharing with my loved ones than hoarding wealth for myself (even if it isn’t necessarily advisable).

Part of her intention is that they’d all be able to live together at Moor House…and maybe the five thousand pounds will convince St. John to settle down in England.

“And you,” I interrupted, “cannot imagine the craving I have for fraternal and sisterly love. I never had a home, I never had brothers or sisters; I must and will have them now: you are not reluctant to admit and own me, are you?”
“Jane: I will be your brother – my sisters will be your sisters – without stipulating for this sacrifice of your just rights.”
“Brother? Yes; at a distance of a thousand leagues! Sisters? Yes; slaving amongst strangers! I, wealthy – gorged with gold I never earned and do not merit! You, penniless! Famous equality and fraternisation! Close union! Intimate attachment!”
“But, Jane, your aspirations after family ties and domestic happiness may be realised otherwise than by the means you contemplate: you may marry.”
“Nonsense again! Marry! I don’t want to marry, and never shall marry.”

Because she’s convinced that no one could truly love her as Mr. Rochester had (because she’s so “plain”), so while I sympathize with her desire for the family she already has, girl, YOU CAN DO BETTER.

“Say again you will be my brother: when you uttered the words I was satisfied, happy; repeat them, if you can repeat them sincerely.”
“I think I can. I know I have always loved my own sisters; and I know on what my affection for them is grounded, – respect for their worth and admiration of their talents. You too have principle and mind: your tastes and habits resemble Diana’s and Mary’s; your presence is always agreeable to me; in your conversation I have already for some time found a salutary solace. I feel I can easily and naturally make room in my heart for you, as my third and youngest sister.”
“Thank you: that contents me for to-night. Now you had better go; for if you stay longer you will perhaps irritate me afresh by some mistrustful scruple.”

The Rivers siblings are clearly intended as foils to the Reeds she grew up with…but it carries with it a somewhat concerning eugenic flavor. The Rivers being “naturally” superior to the Reeds (and more like Jane), while Mrs. Reed had a “natural aversion” to her seems to indicate that Bronte believes that the Reed children would have turned out the same regardless of Mrs. Reed having a hand in raising them, ignoring the whole argument in regard to “nurture”. Interestingly, this seems to be one aspect Rowling took away from the novel, which I discussed elsewhere.

Anyhow, Jane ultimately gets her way, and Mary and Diana return home.

Until next time…