Chapter: Sophie came at seven to dress me: she was very long indeed in
accomplishing her task; so long that Mr. Rochester, grown, I suppose,
impatient of my delay, sent up to ask why I did not come.  She was just
fastening my veil (the plain square of blond after all) to my hair with a
brooch; I hurried from under her hands as soon as I could.

"Stop!" she cried in French.  "Look at yourself in the mirror: you have
not taken one peep."

So I turned at the door: I saw a robed and veiled figure, so unlike my
usual self that it seemed almost the image of a stranger.  "Jane!" called
a voice, and I hastened down.  I was received at the foot of the stairs
by Mr. Rochester.

"Lingerer!" he said, "my brain is on fire with impatience, and you tarry
so long!"

He took me into the dining-room, surveyed me keenly all over, pronounced
me "fair as a lily, and not only the pride of his life, but the desire of
his eyes," and then telling me he would give me but ten minutes to eat
some breakfast, he rang the bell.  One of his lately hired servants, a
footman, answered it.

"Is John getting the carriage ready?"

"Yes, sir."

"Is the luggage brought down?"

"They are bringing it down, sir."

"Go you to the church: see if Mr. Wood (the clergyman) and the clerk are
there: return and tell me."

The church, as the reader knows, was but just beyond the gates; the
footman soon returned.

"Mr. Wood is in the vestry, sir, putting on his surplice."

"And the carriage?"

"The horses are harnessing."

"We shall not want it to go to church; but it must be ready the moment we
return: all the boxes and luggage arranged and strapped on, and the
coachman in his seat."

"Yes, sir."

"Jane, are you ready?"

I rose.  There were no groomsmen, no bridesmaids, no relatives to wait
for or marshal: none but Mr. Rochester and I.  Mrs. Fairfax stood in the
hall as we passed.   I would fain have spoken to her, but my hand was
held by a grasp of iron: I was hurried along by a stride I could hardly
follow; and to look at Mr. Rochester's face was to feel that not a second
of delay would be tolerated for any purpose.  I wonder what other
bridegroom ever looked as he did--so bent up to a purpose, so grimly
resolute: or who, under such steadfast brows, ever revealed such flaming
and flashing eyes.

I know not whether the day was fair or foul; in descending the drive, I
gazed neither on sky nor earth: my heart was with my eyes; and both
seemed migrated into Mr. Rochester's frame.  I wanted to see the
invisible thing on which, as we went along, he appeared to fasten a
glance fierce and fell.  I wanted to feel the thoughts whose force he
seemed breasting and resisting.

At the churchyard wicket he stopped: he discovered I was quite out of
breath.  "Am I cruel in my love?" he said.  "Delay an instant: lean on
me, Jane."

And now I can recall the picture of the grey old house of God rising calm
before me, of a rook wheeling round the steeple, of a ruddy morning sky
beyond.  I remember something, too, of the green grave-mounds; and I have
not forgotten, either, two figures of strangers straying amongst the low
hillocks and reading the mementoes graven on the few mossy head-stones.  I
noticed them, because, as they saw us, they passed round to the back of
the church; and I doubted not they were going to enter by the side-aisle
door and witness the ceremony.  By Mr. Rochester they were not observed;
he was earnestly looking at my face from which the blood had, I daresay,
momentarily fled: for I felt my forehead dewy, and my cheeks and lips
cold.  When I rallied, which I soon did, he walked gently with me up the
path to the porch.

We entered the quiet and humble temple; the priest waited in his white
surplice at the lowly altar, the clerk beside him.  All was still: two
shadows only moved in a remote corner.  My conjecture had been correct:
the strangers had slipped in before us, and they now stood by the vault
of the Rochesters, their backs towards us, viewing through the rails the
old time-stained marble tomb, where a kneeling angel guarded the remains
of Damer de Rochester, slain at Marston Moor in the time of the civil
wars, and of Elizabeth, his wife.

Our place was taken at the communion rails.  Hearing a cautious step
behind me, I glanced over my shoulder: one of the strangers--a gentleman,
evidently--was advancing up the chancel.  The service began.  The
explanation of the intent of matrimony was gone through; and then the
clergyman came a step further forward, and, bending slightly towards Mr.
Rochester, went on.

"I require and charge you both (as ye will answer at the dreadful day of
judgment, when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed), that if
either of you know any impediment why ye may not lawfully be joined
together in matrimony, ye do now confess it; for be ye well assured that
so many as are coupled together otherwise than God's Word doth allow, are
not joined together by God, neither is their matrimony lawful."

He paused, as the custom is.  When is the pause after that sentence ever
broken by reply?  Not, perhaps, once in a hundred years.  And the
clergyman, who had not lifted his eyes from his book, and had held his
breath but for a moment, was proceeding: his hand was already stretched
towards Mr. Rochester, as his lips unclosed to ask, "Wilt thou have this
woman for thy wedded wife?"--when a distinct and near voice said--

"The marriage cannot go on: I declare the existence of an impediment."

The clergyman looked up at the speaker and stood mute; the clerk did the
same; Mr. Rochester moved slightly, as if an earthquake had rolled under
his feet: taking a firmer footing, and not turning his head or eyes, he
said, "Proceed."

Profound silence fell when he had uttered that word, with deep but low
intonation.  Presently Mr. Wood said--

"I cannot proceed without some investigation into what has been asserted,
and evidence of its truth or falsehood."

"The ceremony is quite broken off," subjoined the voice behind us.  "I am
in a condition to prove my allegation: an insuperable impediment to this
marriage exists."

Mr. Rochester heard, but heeded not: he stood stubborn and rigid, making
no movement but to possess himself of my hand.  What a hot and strong
grasp he had! and how like quarried marble was his pale, firm, massive
front at this moment!  How his eye shone, still watchful, and yet wild
beneath!

Mr. Wood seemed at a loss.  "What is the nature of the impediment?" he
asked.  "Perhaps it may be got over--explained away?"

"Hardly," was the answer.  "I have called it insuperable, and I speak
advisedly."

The speaker came forward and leaned on the rails.  He continued, uttering
each word distinctly, calmly, steadily, but not loudly--

"It simply consists in the existence of a previous marriage.  Mr.
Rochester has a wife now living."

My nerves vibrated to those low-spoken words as they had never vibrated
to thunder--my blood felt their subtle violence as it had never felt
frost or fire; but I was collected, and in no danger of swooning.  I
looked at Mr. Rochester: I made him look at me.  His whole face was
colourless rock: his eye was both spark and flint.  He disavowed nothing:
he seemed as if he would defy all things.  Without speaking, without
smiling, without seeming to recognise in me a human being, he only twined
my waist with his arm and riveted me to his side.

"Who are you?" he asked of the intruder.

"My name is Briggs, a solicitor of --- Street, London."

"And you would thrust on me a wife?"

"I would remind you of your lady's existence, sir, which the law
recognises, if you do not."

"Favour me with an account of her--with her name, her parentage, her
place of abode."

"Certainly."  Mr. Briggs calmly took a paper from his pocket, and read
out in a sort of official, nasal voice:--

"'I affirm and can prove that on the 20th of October A.D. --- (a date of
fifteen years back), Edward Fairfax Rochester, of Thornfield Hall, in the
county of ---, and of Ferndean Manor, in ---shire, England, was married
to my sister, Bertha Antoinetta Mason, daughter of Jonas Mason, merchant,
and of Antoinetta his wife, a Creole, at --- church, Spanish Town,
Jamaica.  The record of the marriage will be found in the register of
that church--a copy of it is now in my possession.  Signed, Richard
Mason.'"

"That--if a genuine document--may prove I have been married, but it does
not prove that the woman mentioned therein as my wife is still living."

"She was living three months ago," returned the lawyer.

"How do you know?"

"I have a witness to the fact, whose testimony even you, sir, will
scarcely controvert."

"Produce him--or go to hell."

"I will produce him first--he is on the spot.  Mr. Mason, have the
goodness to step forward."

Mr. Rochester, on hearing the name, set his teeth; he experienced, too, a
sort of strong convulsive quiver; near to him as I was, I felt the
spasmodic movement of fury or despair run through his frame.  The second
stranger, who had hitherto lingered in the background, now drew near; a
pale face looked over the solicitor's shoulder--yes, it was Mason
himself.  Mr. Rochester turned and glared at him.  His eye, as I have
often said, was a black eye: it had now a tawny, nay, a bloody light in
its gloom; and his face flushed--olive cheek and hueless forehead
received a glow as from spreading, ascending heart-fire: and he stirred,
lifted his strong arm--he could have struck Mason, dashed him on the
church-floor, shocked by ruthless blow the breath from his body--but
Mason shrank away, and cried faintly, "Good God!"  Contempt fell cool on
Mr. Rochester--his passion died as if a blight had shrivelled it up: he
only asked--"What have _you_ to say?"

An inaudible reply escaped Mason's white lips.

"The devil is in it if you cannot answer distinctly.  I again demand,
what have you to say?"

"Sir--sir," interrupted the clergyman, "do not forget you are in a sacred
place."  Then addressing Mason, he inquired gently, "Are you aware, sir,
whether or not this gentleman's wife is still living?"

"Courage," urged the lawyer,--"speak out."

"She is now living at Thornfield Hall," said Mason, in more articulate
tones: "I saw her there last April.  I am her brother."

"At Thornfield Hall!" ejaculated the clergyman.  "Impossible!  I am an
old resident in this neighbourhood, sir, and I never heard of a Mrs.
Rochester at Thornfield Hall."

I saw a grim smile contort Mr. Rochester's lips, and he muttered--

"No, by God!  I took care that none should hear of it--or of her under
that name."  He mused--for ten minutes he held counsel with himself: he
formed his resolve, and announced it--

"Enough! all shall bolt out at once, like the bullet from the barrel.
Wood, close your book and take off your surplice; John Green (to the
clerk), leave the church: there will be no wedding to-day."  The man
obeyed.

Mr. Rochester continued, hardily and recklessly: "Bigamy is an ugly
word!--I meant, however, to be a bigamist; but fate has out-manoeuvred
me, or Providence has checked me,--perhaps the last.  I am little better
than a devil at this moment; and, as my pastor there would tell me,
deserve no doubt the sternest judgments of God, even to the quenchless
fire and deathless worm.  Gentlemen, my plan is broken up:--what this
lawyer and his client say is true: I have been married, and the woman to
whom I was married lives!  You say you never heard of a Mrs. Rochester at
the house up yonder, Wood; but I daresay you have many a time inclined
your ear to gossip about the mysterious lunatic kept there under watch
and ward.  Some have whispered to you that she is my bastard half-sister:
some, my cast-off mistress.  I now inform you that she is my wife, whom I
married fifteen years ago,--Bertha Mason by name; sister of this resolute
personage, who is now, with his quivering limbs and white cheeks, showing
you what a stout heart men may bear.  Cheer up, Dick!--never fear me!--I'd
almost as soon strike a woman as you.  Bertha Mason is mad; and she came
of a mad family; idiots and maniacs through three generations!  Her
mother, the Creole, was both a madwoman and a drunkard!--as I found out
after I had wed the daughter: for they were silent on family secrets
before.  Bertha, like a dutiful child, copied her parent in both points.
I had a charming partner--pure, wise, modest: you can fancy I was a happy
man.  I went through rich scenes!  Oh! my experience has been heavenly,
if you only knew it!  But I owe you no further explanation.  Briggs,
Wood, Mason, I invite you all to come up to the house and visit Mrs.
Poole's patient, and _my wife_!  You shall see what sort of a being I was
cheated into espousing, and judge whether or not I had a right to break
the compact, and seek sympathy with something at least human.  This
girl," he continued, looking at me, "knew no more than you, Wood, of the
disgusting secret: she thought all was fair and legal and never dreamt
she was going to be entrapped into a feigned union with a defrauded
wretch, already bound to a bad, mad, and embruted partner!  Come all of
you--follow!"

Still holding me fast, he left the church: the three gentlemen came
after.  At the front door of the hall we found the carriage.

"Take it back to the coach-house, John," said Mr. Rochester coolly; "it
will not be wanted to-day."

At our entrance, Mrs. Fairfax, Adele, Sophie, Leah, advanced to meet and
greet us.

"To the right-about--every soul!" cried the master; "away with your
congratulations!  Who wants them?  Not I!--they are fifteen years too
late!"

He passed on and ascended the stairs, still holding my hand, and still
beckoning the gentlemen to follow him, which they did.  We mounted the
first staircase, passed up the gallery, proceeded to the third storey:
the low, black door, opened by Mr. Rochester's master-key, admitted us to
the tapestried room, with its great bed and its pictorial cabinet.

"You know this place, Mason," said our guide; "she bit and stabbed you
here."

He lifted the hangings from the wall, uncovering the second door: this,
too, he opened.  In a room without a window, there burnt a fire guarded
by a high and strong fender, and a lamp suspended from the ceiling by a
chain.  Grace Poole bent over the fire, apparently cooking something in a
saucepan.  In the deep shade, at the farther end of the room, a figure
ran backwards and forwards.  What it was, whether beast or human being,
one could not, at first sight, tell: it grovelled, seemingly, on all
fours; it snatched and growled like some strange wild animal: but it was
covered with clothing, and a quantity of dark, grizzled hair, wild as a
mane, hid its head and face.

"Good-morrow, Mrs. Poole!" said Mr. Rochester.  "How are you? and how is
your charge to-day?"

"We're tolerable, sir, I thank you," replied Grace, lifting the boiling
mess carefully on to the hob: "rather snappish, but not 'rageous."

A fierce cry seemed to give the lie to her favourable report: the clothed
hyena rose up, and stood tall on its hind-feet.

"Ah! sir, she sees you!" exclaimed Grace: "you'd better not stay."

"Only a few moments, Grace: you must allow me a few moments."

"Take care then, sir!--for God's sake, take care!"

The maniac bellowed: she parted her shaggy locks from her visage, and
gazed wildly at her visitors.  I recognised well that purple face,--those
bloated features.  Mrs. Poole advanced.

"Keep out of the way," said Mr. Rochester, thrusting her aside: "she has
no knife now, I suppose, and I'm on my guard."

"One never knows what she has, sir: she is so cunning: it is not in
mortal discretion to fathom her craft."

"We had better leave her," whispered Mason.

"Go to the devil!" was his brother-in-law's recommendation.

"'Ware!" cried Grace.  The three gentlemen retreated simultaneously.  Mr.
Rochester flung me behind him: the lunatic sprang and grappled his throat
viciously, and laid her teeth to his cheek: they struggled.  She was a
big woman, in stature almost equalling her husband, and corpulent
besides: she showed virile force in the contest--more than once she
almost throttled him, athletic as he was.  He could have settled her with
a well-planted blow; but he would not strike: he would only wrestle.  At
last he mastered her arms; Grace Poole gave him a cord, and he pinioned
them behind her: with more rope, which was at hand, he bound her to a
chair.  The operation was performed amidst the fiercest yells and the
most convulsive plunges.  Mr. Rochester then turned to the spectators: he
looked at them with a smile both acrid and desolate.

"That is _my wife_," said he.  "Such is the sole conjugal embrace I am
ever to know--such are the endearments which are to solace my leisure
hours!  And _this_ is what I wished to have" (laying his hand on my
shoulder): "this young girl, who stands so grave and quiet at the mouth
of hell, looking collectedly at the gambols of a demon, I wanted her just
as a change after that fierce ragout.  Wood and Briggs, look at the
difference!  Compare these clear eyes with the red balls yonder--this
face with that mask--this form with that bulk; then judge me, priest of
the gospel and man of the law, and remember with what judgment ye judge
ye shall be judged!  Off with you now.  I must shut up my prize."

We all withdrew.  Mr. Rochester stayed a moment behind us, to give some
further order to Grace Poole.  The solicitor addressed me as he descended
the stair.

"You, madam," said he, "are cleared from all blame: your uncle will be
glad to hear it--if, indeed, he should be still living--when Mr. Mason
returns to Madeira."

"My uncle!  What of him?  Do you know him?"

"Mr. Mason does.  Mr. Eyre has been the Funchal correspondent of his
house for some years.  When your uncle received your letter intimating
the contemplated union between yourself and Mr. Rochester, Mr. Mason, who
was staying at Madeira to recruit his health, on his way back to Jamaica,
happened to be with him.  Mr. Eyre mentioned the intelligence; for he
knew that my client here was acquainted with a gentleman of the name of
Rochester.  Mr. Mason, astonished and distressed as you may suppose,
revealed the real state of matters.  Your uncle, I am sorry to say, is
now on a sick bed; from which, considering the nature of his
disease--decline--and the stage it has reached, it is unlikely he will
ever rise.  He could not then hasten to England himself, to extricate you
from the snare into which you had fallen, but he implored Mr. Mason to
lose no time in taking steps to prevent the false marriage.  He referred
him to me for assistance.  I used all despatch, and am thankful I was not
too late: as you, doubtless, must be also.  Were I not morally certain
that your uncle will be dead ere you reach Madeira, I would advise you to
accompany Mr. Mason back; but as it is, I think you had better remain in
England till you can hear further, either from or of Mr. Eyre.  Have we
anything else to stay for?" he inquired of Mr. Mason.

"No, no--let us be gone," was the anxious reply; and without waiting to
take leave of Mr. Rochester, they made their exit at the hall door.  The
clergyman stayed to exchange a few sentences, either of admonition or
reproof, with his haughty parishioner; this duty done, he too departed.

I heard him go as I stood at the half-open door of my own room, to which
I had now withdrawn.  The house cleared, I shut myself in, fastened the
bolt that none might intrude, and proceeded--not to weep, not to mourn, I
was yet too calm for that, but--mechanically to take off the wedding
dress, and replace it by the stuff gown I had worn yesterday, as I
thought, for the last time.  I then sat down: I felt weak and tired.  I
leaned my arms on a table, and my head dropped on them.  And now I
thought: till now I had only heard, seen, moved--followed up and down
where I was led or dragged--watched event rush on event, disclosure open
beyond disclosure: but _now_, _I thought_.

The morning had been a quiet morning enough--all except the brief scene
with the lunatic: the transaction in the church had not been noisy; there
was no explosion of passion, no loud altercation, no dispute, no defiance
or challenge, no tears, no sobs: a few words had been spoken, a calmly
pronounced objection to the marriage made; some stern, short questions
put by Mr. Rochester; answers, explanations given, evidence adduced; an
open admission of the truth had been uttered by my master; then the
living proof had been seen; the intruders were gone, and all was over.

I was in my own room as usual--just myself, without obvious change:
nothing had smitten me, or scathed me, or maimed me.  And yet where was
the Jane Eyre of yesterday?--where was her life?--where were her
prospects?

Jane Eyre, who had been an ardent, expectant woman--almost a bride, was a
cold, solitary girl again: her life was pale; her prospects were
desolate.  A Christmas frost had come at midsummer; a white December
storm had whirled over June; ice glazed the ripe apples, drifts crushed
the blowing roses; on hayfield and cornfield lay a frozen shroud: lanes
which last night blushed full of flowers, to-day were pathless with
untrodden snow; and the woods, which twelve hours since waved leafy and
flagrant as groves between the tropics, now spread, waste, wild, and
white as pine-forests in wintry Norway.  My hopes were all dead--struck
with a subtle doom, such as, in one night, fell on all the first-born in
the land of Egypt.  I looked on my cherished wishes, yesterday so
blooming and glowing; they lay stark, chill, livid corpses that could
never revive.  I looked at my love: that feeling which was my
master's--which he had created; it shivered in my heart, like a suffering
child in a cold cradle; sickness and anguish had seized it; it could not
seek Mr. Rochester's arms--it could not derive warmth from his breast.
Oh, never more could it turn to him; for faith was blighted--confidence
destroyed!  Mr. Rochester was not to me what he had been; for he was not
what I had thought him.  I would not ascribe vice to him; I would not say
he had betrayed me; but the attribute of stainless truth was gone from
his idea, and from his presence I must go: _that_ I perceived well.
When--how--whither, I could not yet discern; but he himself, I doubted
not, would hurry me from Thornfield.  Real affection, it seemed, he could
not have for me; it had been only fitful passion: that was balked; he
would want me no more.  I should fear even to cross his path now: my view
must be hateful to him.  Oh, how blind had been my eyes!  How weak my
conduct!

My eyes were covered and closed: eddying darkness seemed to swim round
me, and reflection came in as black and confused a flow.  Self-abandoned,
relaxed, and effortless, I seemed to have laid me down in the dried-up
bed of a great river; I heard a flood loosened in remote mountains, and
felt the torrent come: to rise I had no will, to flee I had no strength.
I lay faint, longing to be dead.  One idea only still throbbed life-like
within me--a remembrance of God: it begot an unuttered prayer: these
words went wandering up and down in my rayless mind, as something that
should be whispered, but no energy was found to express them--

"Be not far from me, for trouble is near: there is none to help."

It was near: and as I had lifted no petition to Heaven to avert it--as I
had neither joined my hands, nor bent my knees, nor moved my lips--it
came: in full heavy swing the torrent poured over me.  The whole
consciousness of my life lorn, my love lost, my hope quenched, my faith
death-struck, swayed full and mighty above me in one sullen mass.  That
bitter hour cannot be described: in truth, "the waters came into my soul;
I sank in deep mire: I felt no standing; I came into deep waters; the
floods overflowed me."

 Sophie helps Jane dress for the wedding, and Rochester and Jane walk to the church. Jane notes a pair of strangers reading the headstones in the churchyard cemetery. When Jane and Rochester enter the church, the two strangers are also present. When the priest asks if anyone objects to the ceremony, one of the strangers answers: "The marriage cannot go on: I declare the existence of an impediment." Rochester attempts to proceed with the ceremony, but the stranger explains that Rochester is already married--his wife is a Creole woman whom Rochester wed fifteen years earlier in Jamaica. The speaker explains that he is a solicitor from London, and he introduces himself as Mr. Briggs. He produces a signed letter from Richard Mason affirming that Rochester is married to Mason's sister, Bertha. Mr. Mason himself then steps forward to corroborate the story. After a moment of inarticulate fury, Rochester admits that his wife is alive and that in marrying Jane he would have been knowingly taking a second wife. No one in the community knows of his wife because she is mad, and Rochester keeps her locked away under the care of Grace Poole. But, he promises them all, Jane is completely ignorant of Bertha's existence. He orders the crowd to come to Thornfield to see her, so that they may understand what impelled him to his present course of action. At Thornfield, the group climbs to the third story. Rochester points out the room where Bertha bit and stabbed her brother, and then he lifts a tapestry to uncover a second door. Inside the hidden room is Bertha Mason, under the care of Grace Poole. Jane writes: In the deep shade, at the farther end of the room, a figure ran backwards and forwards. What it was, whether beast or human being, one could not, at first sight tell: it grovelled, seemingly, on all fours; it snatched and growled like some strange wild animal: but it was covered with clothing, and a quantity of dark, grizzled hair, wild as a mane, hid its head and face. Bertha attempts to strangle Rochester, who reminds his audience, "this is the sole conjugal embrace I am ever to know." Jane leaves the room with Mason and Briggs, who tells her that he learned of her intent to marry Jane via a letter from Jane's uncle, John Eyre, to Mason. It turns out that the two men are acquaintances, and Mason had stopped in Madeira on his way back to Jamaica when John received Jane's letter. Approaching death, John asked Mason to hurry to England to save his niece. After the wedding crowd disperses, Jane locks herself in her room and plunges into an inexpressible grief. She thinks about the almost calm manner in which the morning's events unfolded and how it seems disproportionate to the immense effect those events will have on her life. She prays to God to be with her.

