"Why not, Mr. Rochester?"

     "The picture you have just drawn is suggestive of a rather too overwhelming contrast. Your words have delineated very prettily a graceful Apollo: he is present to your imagination,--tall, fair, blue-eyed, and with a Grecian profile. Your eyes dwell on a Vulcan,--a real blacksmith, brown, broad-shouldered: and blind and lame into the bargain."

     "I never thought of it, before; but you certainly are rather like Vulcan, sir."

     "Well, you can leave me, ma'am: but before you go" (and he retained me by a firmer grasp than ever), "you will be pleased just to answer me a question or two." He paused.

     "What questions, Mr. Rochester?"

     Then followed this cross-examination.

     "St. John made you schoolmistress of Morton before he knew you were his cousin?"

     "Yes."

     "You would often see him? He would visit the school sometimes?"