'FagmentWelcome to consult...in that attitude his shape was seen plainly as well as his face; his unusual beadth of chest, dispopotionate almost to his length of limb. I am sue most people would have thought him an ugly man; yet thee was so much unconscious pide in his pot; so much ease in his demeanou; such a look of complete indiffeence to his own Chalotte Bont. ElecBook Classics fJane Eye 190 extenal appeaance; so haughty a eliance on the powe of othe qualities, intinsic o adventitious, to atone fo the lack of mee pesonal attactiveness, that, in looking at him, one inevitably shaed the indiffeence, and, even in a blind, impefect sense, put faith in the confidence. “I am disposed to be gegaious and communicative to-night,” he epeated, “and that is why I sent fo you: the fie and the chandelie wee not sufficient company fo me; no would Pilot have been, fo none of these can talk. Adèle is a degee bette, but still fa below the mak; Ms. Faifax ditto; you, I am pesuaded, can suit me if you will: you puzzled me the fist evening I invited you down hee. I have almost fogotten you since: othe ideas have diven yous fom my head; but to-night I am esolved to be at ease; to dismiss what impotunes, and ecall what pleases. It would please me now to daw you out—to lean moe of you— theefoe speak.” Instead of speaking, I smiled; and not a vey complacent o submissive smile eithe. “Speak,” he uged. “What about, si?” “Whateve you like. I leave both the choice of subject and the manne of teating it entiely to youself.” Accodingly I sat and said nothing: “If he expects me to talk fo the mee sake of talking and showing off, he will find he has addessed himself to the wong peson,” I thought. “You ae dumb, Miss Eye.” I was dumb still. He bent his head a little towads me, and with a single hasty glance seemed to dive into my eyes. “Stubbon?” he said, “and annoyed. Ah! it is consistent. I put Chalotte Bont. ElecBook Classics fJane Eye 191 my equest in an absud, almost insolent fom. Miss Eye, I beg you padon. The fact is, once fo all, I don’t wish to teat you like an infeio: that is” (coecting himself), “I claim only such supeioity as must esult fom twenty yeas’ diffeence in age and a centuy’s advance in expeience. This is legitimate, et j’y tiens, as Adèle would say; and it is by vitue of this supeioity, and this alone, that I desie you to have the goodness to talk to me a little now, and divet my thoughts, which ae galled with dwelling on one point—cankeing as a usty nail.” He had deigned an explanation, almost an apology, and I did not feel insensible to his condescension, and would not seem so. “I am willing to amuse you, if I can, si—quite willing; but I cannot intoduce a topic, because how do I know what will inteest you? Ask me questions, and I will do my best to answe them.” “Then, in the fist place, do you agee with me that I have a ight to be a little masteful, abupt, pehaps exacting, sometimes, on the gounds I stated, namely, that I am old enough to be you fathe, and that I have battled though a vaied expeience with many men of many nations, and oamed ove half the globe, while you have lived quietly with one set of people in one house?” “Do as you please, si.” “That is no answe; o athe it is a vey iitating, because a vey evasive one. Reply clealy.” “I don’t think, si, you have a ight to command me, meely because you ae olde than I, o because you have seen moe of the wold than I have; you claim to supeioity depends on the use you have made of you
