In brief, what M. Heger's face revealed when studied as the index of his

natural qualities, was intellectual superiority, an imperious temper, a

good deal of impatience against stupidity, and very little patience with

his fellow-creatures generally; it revealed too a good deal of humour;

and a very little kind-heartedness, to be weighed against any amount of

irritability. It was a sort of face bound to interest one; but not, so

it seems to me, to conquer affection. For with all these qualities of

intellect, power, humour, and a little kind-heartedness, one quality was

totally lacking: there was no love in M. Heger's face, nor in his

character, as I recall it; and, oddly enough, looking back now to him as

one of the personages in my own past to whom I owe most, and whose mind

I most admire, I have to recognise that in my sentiment towards M. Heger

to-day even, made up as it is half of admiration and half of amusement,

there is not one particle of love.

I have said--in connection with my first impression, that 'undying hate'

was the sentiment that M. Heger had conceived for me--that really 'it

was not so bad as all that.' Still, what happened at this first

interview, if it did not determine any deep-rooted antipathy to me,

planted from this moment in M. Heger's breast, did indicate, to a

certain extent, what the character of our future relationships was to

be--_out of lesson-hours._ In these hours, our relationships of

Professor and pupil were ideal. Seldom did an occasional

misunderstanding trouble them. Certainly, in my own day, no other pupil

entered with so much sympathetic admiration into the spirit of M.

Heger's teaching as I did. He saw and felt this; and here I, too, was

for him, and _as a pupil_, sympathetic. But in our personal

relationships, there were certain things in me that were antipathetic to

M. Heger, and that rubbed him so much the wrong way, that he was

constantly (so it still seems to me) unjust to what were not faults, but

idiosyncrasies, that belonged to my nationality and my character. First

of all, there was my English accent: and here this singular remark has

to be made: I never spoke such purely British French to any one as to M.

Heger; and this was the result of my constant endeavour to be very

careful to avoid the accent he disliked, when speaking to him. The

second cause of offence in me was also due to my nationality, or rather

to my upbringing. Like all English children of my generation, I had been

brought up to esteem it undignified, and even a breach of good manners,

to cry in public: and although I was tender-hearted and emotional, I was

not in the least hysterical; and except under the stress of extreme

distress, it cost me very little self-control not to weep, as my Belgian

schoolfellows did, very often, at the smallest scolding; or even without

a scolding, and simply because they were bored--'_ennuyée_.' I remember

now my surprise, at first hearing the reply to my question to a sobbing

schoolfellow: '_Pourquoi pleures-tu?_ '_Parce que je m'ennuie._' 'Why?'

'_Mais je te le dis parce que je m'ennuie_.' Well, but M. Heger liked

his pupils to cry, when he said disagreeable things: or, in any case, he

became gentle, and melted, when they wept, and was amiable at once. But

when one did not weep, but appeared either unmoved, or indignant, he

became more and more disagreeable: and, at length, exasperated. A third

idiosyncrasy in me that he disliked was not national, but personal. It

was due to a sort of incipient Rousseau-ism,--that must have been

inborn, because I was never taught it, even in England. And yet there

it was, implanted in me as a sentiment, long before I recognised it as

an opinion or conviction, that I could express in words! This natural

sentiment, or principle, was the belief that '_I was born free: that my

soul was my own: and that there was no virtue, wisdom, nor happiness

possible for me outside of the laws of my own constitution_.'

Unformulated, but inherent in me, this fundamental belief in myself as a

law to myself, no doubt betrayed itself in a sort of independence of

mind and manner very aggravating to my elders and betters, and to those

put in authority over me. And especially aggravating to an authoritative

Professor, who was, in all domains, opposed to individualism, and the

doctrine of personal rights and liberty. Thus in literature M. Heger was

a classic; in religion he was a dogmatic Catholic; in politics he was an

anti-democrat, a lover of vigorous kings; and by constitution he was a

king in his own right: a masterful man, not only a law to himself, but a

lord, by virtue of his sense of superiority, to everyone else.

For these reasons, M. Heger and myself--on ideal terms as Professor

and pupil--were on bad terms outside of lesson-hours. We could not quite

dislike each other; but our relationships were stormy. There were,

however, intervals of calm.

I have said that with a good deal of admiration, gratitude, and some

amusement, there is no _love_ for M. Heger intermingled with my

remembrances of him.

There is, on the contrary, a good deal of love in the sentiment I retain

for Madame Heger,--although, as a matter of fact, in the days when I was

her pupil I never remember any strong or warm feeling of personal

affection for her; nor have I any distinct personal obligation to her,

as to one who, like M. Heger, rendered me direct services by her

instructions or counsels. Nor yet again had Madame Heger any strong

personal liking for me; nor did she show me any special kindness. But

her kindness was of an all-embracing character. And so was her liking

for, or rather love of, all the inhabitants of the little world she

governed: a world that extended beyond the boundaries of the actual

walls of the Pensionnat, in any stated year; a world, made up of all

the girls who, before that year, and afterwards, through several

generations, had been and ever would be, her 'dear pupils'; '_mes chères

élèves_';--terms that, uttered by her, were no mere formula, but

expressed a true sentiment, and a serious and, so it seems to me, a

beautiful and sweet idealism. This idealism in Madame Heger, this

constant love and care and watchfulness for the community of girls, who,

passing out of her hands, were to go out into the world by and by, to

fulfil there what Madame Heger saw to be the kind and sweet and

tranquil, and sometimes self-sacrificing and sorrowful, mission of

womanhood, enveloped the ideal school-mistress with a sort of unfailing

benevolence, that became a pervading influence in the Pensionnat,

singling out no particular pupils, and withdrawn from none of them.

Here, it seems to me, and not at all in the reasons imagined by

Charlotte in the case of Madame Beck, we have the secret of Madame

Heger's system of government. I really am not, at this distance of time,

able to say positively whether there was, or was not, a surveillance

that might be called a system of _espionage_ carried on, keeping the

head-mistress informed of the conversation and behaviour of this large

number of girls, amongst whom one or two black sheep might have sufficed

to contaminate the flock. I was not a faultless, nor a model girl by any

means: but I was a simple sort of young creature with nothing of the

black sheep in me; and I never remember in my own case having my desk

explored, nor my pockets turned inside out. But if even this had been

done, it would not have gravely affected me; because neither in my

pockets nor in my desk, would anything have been found of a mysterious

or interesting character. But I should think it very probable that, in

this very large school, a watchful surveillance _was_ kept up; and that

if any of these schoolgirls, most of them under sixteen, had attempted,

after their return from the monthly holiday, to bring back to school

illegal stores of sweets, or a naughty story book, and had concealed

such things in their school desks, well, I admit, I think it possible,

that the sweets or naughty book _might_ have been missing from the desk

next day. And also that, in the course of the afternoon, a not entirely

welcome invitation would have been received by the imprudent smuggler of

forbidden goods to pay Madame Heger a visit in the Salon? These things

took place occasionally I know: and naturally, amongst the girls public

sympathy was with the smuggler. But I am not sure, if one takes the

point of view of a Directress, if a large girls' school could be carried

on successfully, were it made a point of honour that there should be no

surveillance, and that pupils might use their lockers as cupboards for

sweets, or as hiding-places for light literature.

But, apart from the fact that Madame Heger was, no doubt, both watchful

and uncompromising in her surveillance, based upon a firm resolution

that nothing 'inconvenient' must be smuggled in, or hidden out of sight,

as a source of mischief in the school, there was in her no resemblance

to the odious Madame Beck; that is to say, no _moral_ resemblance. In

physical appearance, the author of _Villette_ did use Madame Heger

evidently as the model for the picture of an entirely different moral

person. '_Her complexion was fresh and sanguine, her eye blue and

serene. Her face offered contrasts--its features were by no means such

as are usually seen in conjunction with a complexion of such blended

freshness and repose; their outline was stern; her forehead was high,

but narrow; it expressed capacity and some benevolence, but no

expanse.... I know not what of harmony pervaded her whole person._'[1]

Taking this portrait from _Villette_, as it is given of Madame Beck, and

comparing it with my own recollections, and also with the photograph I

am fortunate enough to possess of Madame Heger at the age of sixty, it

seems to me that this _is_ a very accurate physical description of the

real Directress of the school in the Rue d'Isabelle; who morally was as

unlike the fictitious Madame Beck as truth is unlike falsehood. About

the physical resemblance, I may say that, if I had trusted to my own

impressions, I should have rejected the assertion that the 'outline

of her features was stern.' I never remember associating sternness

with Madame Heger; though her supreme quality of serenity imposed a sort

of respect that had a little touch of fear in it. Upon re-examining the

photograph attentively, however, I find that it is true that the outline

of the features _is_ stern; but I do not think that this impression was

conveyed by the younger face, remembered with softened colouring; and

lit up, as a characteristic expression, by a normal expression of

serenity and of kindliness. '_I know not what of harmony pervaded her

whole person_': that sentence of Charlotte's (used by her of the

unspeakable Madame Beck) exactly expresses the impression I still retain

of the very estimable and, by myself, affectionately remembered, Madame

Heger.

[Illustration: MADAME HEGER AT SIXTY. (She was thirty years younger when

Charlotte knew her) From a portrait given to the author by Madame

Heger's daughter (Author's _Copyright_)]

In the same way, as I have said, the apprehensions as to my future

companions in this foreign school, that would infallibly have been

awakened in me if I had read, before meeting them, the account given by

the author of _Villette_ of Belgian schoolgirls, as differing, not only

in nationality, but in human nature, from English schoolgirls, would

have been groundless. When I call up around me to-day the recollections

of my Bruxelles schoolfellows, amongst whom I was the only English girl

and the only Protestant, there does not come back to me any painful

remembrance that I ever felt myself an alien amongst them. On the

contrary, I remember privileges granted me as 'la petite Anglaise,' who

was further away than others from home, and must be treated with special

kindness. I see around me in this large company of girls, no 'perverted'

nor precociously formed young women, _whose 'eyes are full of an

insolent light, and their brows hard and unblushing as marble_.' In

brief, I see no '_swinish multitude_'--such as insular prejudice, and a

disturbed imagination, showed Charlotte; but I see very much the same

mixed crowd of youthful faces, fair and dark, pretty and plain, smiling

and serious, stupid and intelligent, coarse and fine, sympathetic and

unlikeable, that one would get in such a large collection of English

schoolgirls; but in all this crowd of my Belgian schoolfellows just what

my memory does _not_ show me anywhere, are the '_eyes full of an

insolent light, and the brow hard and unblushing as marble_,'[2]--that

are not characteristics of the schoolgirl in any nation or country I

have ever known; and I have been a traveller in my time, and enjoyed

opportunities of observing different national peculiarities, that never

fell in the way of Charlotte, who spent two years in Bruxelles; but

lived the rest of her life in Yorkshire.

As for the hundred (or more perhaps than a hundred) schoolgirls that

made up in my day the little world ruled by Madame Heger as the

administrator of a system based on the authority of _Douceur, Bonté_,

and _les Convenances_ (in the sense of what was seemly, and opposed to

violence and ugliness), amongst them were many girls whom I only knew by

name and sight; many of whom I knew slightly better, and whom I rather

liked than disliked; a few whom I disliked heartily (very few of

these)--and a few whom I loved dearly (very few again)--but amongst

these friends, chosen because their hearts were in tune with my own,

the difference of nationality and creed did not stand in the way of

mutual affection. In some cases, it is true, life, with its exacting

claims of duties and occupations and cares, rushed in to divide me

afterwards from these companions of my best years; when everything that

I am glad, and not sorry, to have been, and to have done, in a long

life, was prepared and made possible for me--but at least one of these

friendships formed with a Belgian schoolgirl in those days, I may

describe as a life-long friendship: because it remains an unaltered

sentiment that lives in me to-day, unquenched by the fact that, only a

few years ago--after half a century had passed since we met--my girl

friend that had been then, a white-haired woman now, died; in the same

year, as it strangely happened, that our old school (transformed into a

boys' college during the last twenty years of its existence), that had

stood in the Rue d'Isabelle until 1909, was swept away, with its

beautiful old walled garden and time-honoured pear-trees, that to the

end of their lives 'renewed their perfumed snowy blossom every spring.'

I am told a handsome building now replaces the long, plain straggling

façade of the historic school--but I have no wish to see it.

[1] _Villette_, chapter viii.

[2] See _Villette_, chapter viii.

CHAPTER IV

MY SECOND INTERVIEW WITH M. HEGER.

THE WASHING OF 'PEPPER.' THE

LESSON IN ARITHMETIC

I had been an inmate of the school in the Rue d'Isabelle a fortnight. In

this interval I had lived through a great deal. Thanks to attentive

self-doctoring and a strict _régime_, where no luxuries in the way of

private crying were allowed, I had pulled myself through the first acute

stage of the sort of sickness that attacks every 'new' girl, as the

result of being plunged into the cold atmosphere of a strange, and

especially of a foreign, school. Now I was out of danger of the peril

that had threatened me during about a week, the possible disaster of

some sudden access of violent weeping over my sense of desolation, in

the sight of these foreign teachers and pupils, that would have seemed

to me profoundly humiliating, on patriotic, as well as upon private

grounds. For, as the one English girl in this Belgian school, was not

the honour of my country, or, at any rate, of the girls of my country,

at stake? And then I realised, also, that politeness to the foreigner,

as well as duty to myself and my country, forbade any exhibition of

vehement home-sickness. Thus, might not these Belgian teachers and girls

reasonably take offence, and say, 'Why do you come to school in our

country if you don't like it? We didn't ask you to come here. Why don't

you go home?'

By these methods, then, of what it pleased me to regard as a sort of

philosophy of my own, I had lived through the worst, and if I was not

entirely cured of occasional inward sinkings of the heart and the

feeling of desolation, I felt I had mastered the temptation to make any

public display of them. And having reached this point by my own effort,

now help came to me in the shape of a friendly tribute and encouragement

from a girl who was a sort of philosopher, also by a rule of her own,

which she kindly explained to me, and which I entirely approved of.

This girl was fair and small, and had broad brows and clear green eyes

under them. Her name was Marie Hazard. She had not spoken to me before,

but on several occasions had shown me little kindnesses, and given me

nice smiles and nods of greeting. Finally she came up to me in the

garden and took my arm:--

'Do you know why I have a friendship for you?' she asked.

'No,' I answered. 'But have you _really_? I _am_ so glad.'

'Yes,' she proceeded to explain; 'I like you, because you are

reasonable, and don't sit down and cry, as, of course, you _could_ if

you liked. I have as much heart as another; but it irritates me, and

does not touch me one bit, to see some of the pupils here, the big ones

too, crying and crying, and _why? because they have come back to school,

and would rather be at home!_ Evidently that is the case with all of us.

And evidently, what is more, it's going to be the case for ten months.

But for some insignificant holidays at the New Year, from now until

August, thus it will be with us. We shall be all of us in this school,

and we would all of us prefer to be in our homes. But why cry, then? or

if one begins to cry, why leave off? Is one, then, to cry for ten

months? And what eyes will one have at the end? And what good is it?'

I laughed, not only because she seemed to me to put it humorously, but

because I was full of happiness that I had found a friend.

'Yes,' she said, 'you laugh, and that is well, too. It's the thing to

do. Now, if _you_ cried there might be an excuse; you are farther away

from your people than we are. But you ask yourself, What is the good?

And you say to yourself, No, I won't discourage the others. And that is

English. And that is why I like the English; they are at least

reasonable.'

This was balm to me. The sense of desolation had vanished. Here was the

proof that I had been a good witness, and served to uphold the good name

of England, and also that I had conquered a friend.

I think it was the same afternoon, because there were Catechism classes,

from which, as a Protestant, I was exempted, that I was sent out into

the garden, for the first time, at an hour when no other pupils were

there. Later on this privilege was very often accorded me, for the same

reason; so that, in my own day at any rate, no one else in the school

had the opportunity I had given me, and that I used, of taking

possession of the enchanted place and making it my very own. And this

was so because there was no knowledge in my mind at the time that Some

One had been beforehand with me here; and that although for my inner

self it became (and must always be for me exclusively) my own beautiful,

well-enclosed, flower-scented, turf-carpeted, Eden where the spirit of

my youth had its home before any worldly influences, or any knowledge of

evil, had come between it and the poetry of its aspirations and its

dreams, yet for every one _but_ myself, it is Charlotte Brontë's Garden

of Imagination, where _she_ used to '_stray down the pleasant alleys and

hear the bells of St. Jean Baptiste peal out with their sweet, soft,

exalted sound._[1]

And although no angel with a flaming sword--no, nor yet any Belgian

architects and masons, who have broken down the walls and uprooted the

old trees, and made the old historical garden in the Rue d'Isabelle a

place of stones--can drive me out of _my_ garden of memories where still

(and more often than before as the day darkens) I walk 'in the cool of

the evening' with the spirit of my youth; yet, for English readers, it

is not I, but Charlotte Brontë who must describe, what I could never

dare nor desire to paint after her, the famous _Allée défendue_ that

holds such a romantic place in her novel of Lucy Snowe, and that was

also the scene of my second meeting with M. Heger.

'In the garden there _was a large berceau_,' wrote the author of

_Villette_, '_above which spread the shade of an acacia; there was a

smaller, more sequestered bower, nestled in the vines which ran along a

high and grey wall and gathered their tendrils in a knot of beauty; and

hung their clusters in loving profusion about the favoured spot, where

jasmine and ivy met and married them ... this alley, which ran parallel

with the very high wall on that side of the garden, was forbidden to be

entered by the pupils; it was called indeed l'Allée défendue._'

In my day there was no prohibition of the _Allée défendue_, although the

name survived. It was only forbidden to play noisy or disturbing games

there; as it was to be reserved for studious pupils, or for the

mistresses who wished to read or converse there in quietude.

[Illustration: THE "ALLÉE DÉFENDUE"]

If I had a lesson to learn, it was to the _Allée défendue_ that I took

my book; and in this _allée_ I had already discovered and appropriated a

sheltered nook, at the furthest end of the _berceau_, where one was

nearly hidden oneself in the vine's curtain, but had a delightful view

of the garden. Before reaching this low bench, I had noticed, when

entering the _berceau_, that a ladder stood in the centre; and that, out

of view in so far as his head went, a man, in his shirt sleeves, was

clipping and thinning the vines. I took it for granted he was a

gardener, and paid no attention to him; but, in a quite happy frame of

mind, sat down to learn some poetry by heart. My impression is that it

was Lamartine's _Chûte des Feuilles_. Shutting my eyes, whilst repeating

the verses out aloud (a trick I had), I opened them, _to see M. Heger_.

He it was who had been thinning the vine; it was a favourite occupation

of his (had I read _Villette_ I should have known it).[2] Once again he

took me by surprise, and I was full of anxiety as to what might come of

it. Since I entered the school I had, indeed, caught distant views of

him, hurrying through the class-rooms to or from his lessons in the

First and Second divisions. But until my French had improved I was

placed in the Third division, where M. Heger only taught occasionally,

so that I had not yet received any lesson from him.

It was a relief to see that he looked amiable, and even friendly; if

only I didn't lose my head and say the wrong thing again! One thing I

kept steadily in view; nothing must induce me to forget my brother's

advice this time; there must be no attempt at fine phrases, this time

nothing that could possibly appear like showing off.... But all my

anxieties upon this occasion were dispelled by the purpose of my

Professor's disturbance of my studies. He invited me to assist him in

washing a very stout but very affectionate white dog, to whom I was told

I owed this service as he was a compatriot of mine, an English dog, with

an English name: a very inappropriate one, for he was sweet-tempered and

white, and the name was Pepper. For this operation of washing Pepper, I

was invited upstairs into M. Heger's library, which was, in this

beautifully clean and orderly house, a model of disorder; clouded as to

air, and soaked as to scent, with the smoke of living and the

accumulated ashes of dead cigars. But the shelves laden from floor to

ceiling with books made a delightful spectacle.

Upon the occasion of this first visit to his library, M. Heger made me

the present of a book that marked a new epoch in my life, because,

before I was fifteen, it put before me in a vivid and amusing way the

problem of personality, _Le Voyage autour de ma Chambre_ of Xavier de

Maistre, was my introduction to thoughts and speculations that led me to

a later interest in Oriental philosophy, and especially in Buddhism. I

must not forget another present in the form of one more of those

luminous little sentences that, as I have said, he used as Lanterns,

turning them to send light in different directions. I had confided to

him, not my own methods of philosophy--I did not dare incur the

risk--but my newly found friend's methods of helping herself to be

'reasonable.' M. Heger showed no enthusiasm, nor even approval: and I

found out that he had a strong dislike to my elected friend. Personally

he would have preferred and recommended _Religious_ methods of prayer,

and docile submission to spiritual direction, to any philosophy,

especially in the case of women. But he quoted to me and wrote down for

me, and exhorted me to learn by heart and repeat aloud (as I actually

did), a definition of the philosophy of life of an Eighteenth-century

Woman, as '_Une façon de tirer parti de sa raison pour son bonheur_.' I

discovered this sentence a great many years afterwards in a book of the

de Goncourts. But M. Heger first gave it to me in my girlhood.

Although it was, of course, as Professor of Literature that M. Heger

excelled, he was in other domains--in every domain he entered--an

original and an effective teacher. Let me give the history of a famous

Lesson in Arithmetic by M. Heger that took place, I am not quite sure

why, in the large central hall, or _Galerie_ as it was called, that

flanked the square, enclosing the court or playground of daily boarders,

whilst the _Galerie_ divided the court from the garden. For some special

reason, all the classes attended this particular lesson; where the

subject was the _Different effects upon value, of multiplication and

division in the several cases of fractions and integers_. Madame Heger

and the Mesdemoiselles Heger, and all the governesses were there. I had

been promoted into the first class (passing the second class over

altogether) before this, so that I was a regular pupil of M. Heger's in

literature, and certainly in this class, a favourite. But I was a

complete dunce at arithmetic, and it was a settled conviction in my mind

that my stupidity was written against me in the book of destiny; and I

admit that, as it did not seem of any use for me to try to do anything

in this field, I had given up trying, and when arithmetic lessons were

being given I employed my thoughts elsewhere. But a lesson from M. Heger

was another thing; even a lesson in arithmetic by him might be worth

while. So that I really did, with all the power of brain that was in me,

try to apply myself to the understanding of his lesson. But it was of no

use; after about five minutes, the usual arithmetic brain-symptoms

began; words ceased to mean anything at all intelligible. It was really

a sort of madness; and therefore in self-defence I left the thing alone

and looked out of the window, whilst the lesson lasted. It never entered

my head that _I_ was in any danger of being questioned: no one ever took

any notice of me at the arithmetic lessons. It was recognised that,

here, I was no good; and as I was good elsewhere, they left me alone.

Yes, but M. Heger wasn't going to leave me alone. Evidently he had taken

a great deal of trouble, and wanted the lesson to be a success. And it

had not succeeded. He was dissatisfied with all the answers he received.

He ran about on the _estrade_ getting angrier and angrier. And then at

last, to my horror, he called upon _me_; and what cut me to the soul, I

saw that there was a look of confidence in his face, as if to say 'Here

is some one who will have understood!'

... Well of course the thing was hopeless. I had a sort of mad notion

that a miracle might happen, and that Providence might interfere, and

that if by accident I repeated some words I had heard him say there

might be some sense in them--but, as Matthew Arnold said, miracles don't

happen. It was deplorable. I saw him turn to Madame Heger with a shrug

of the shoulders: and that he must have said of the whole English race

abominable things, and of this English girl in particular, may be taken

for granted; because Madame Heger hardly ever spoke a word when he was

angry. But now she said something soothing about the English nation, and

in my praise. Well, my case being settled, M. Heger began: and he did

not leave off until the whole Galerie was a house of mourning. In the

whole place, the only dry eyes were mine, and here I had to exercise no

self-control; for although at first I had been sorry for him, now I was

really so angry with him for attacking these harmless girls, and

attributing to them abominable heartlessness, although the place rang

with their sobs, that I don't think I should have minded a slight attack

of apoplexy--only I shouldn't have liked him to have died.

It was really a bewildering and almost maddening thing, because on both

sides it was so absurd. First of all, what had all these weeping girls

done to deserve the reproaches the Professor heaped upon them? 'They

said to themselves,' he told them: '"What does this old Papa-Heger

matter? Let him sit up at night, let him get up early, let him spend all

his days in thinking how he can serve _us_, make difficulties light,

and dark things clear to _us. We_ are not going to take any trouble on

our side, not we! why should we? Indeed, it amuses us to see him

_navré_--for us, it is a good farce."'

The wail rose up--'_Mais non, Monsieur, ce n'est pas vrai, cela ne nous

amuse pas; nous sommes tristes, nous pleurons, voyez._'

The Professor took no heed; he continued. 'They said to themselves "Ah!

the old man, _le pauvre vieux_, takes an interest in us, he loves us; it

pleases him to think when he is dead, and has disappeared, these little

pupils whom he has tried to render intelligent, and well instructed, and

adorned with gifts of the mind, will think of his lessons, and wish they

had been more attentive. Foolish old thing! not at all," they say, "as

if _we_ had any care for him or his lessons."'

The wail rose up--'_Ce n'est pas gentil ce que vous dites là, Monsieur:

nous avons beaucoup de respect pour vous, nous aimons vos leçons; oui,

nous travaillerons bien, vous allez voir, pardonnez-nous_.'

'Frankly, now, does that touch you?' I heard behind me. 'It is not

reasonable! I find it even stupid (_je le trouve même bête_).' Marie

Hazard, of course. I made a mistake when I said _my_ eyes were the only

dry ones. Here was my philosopher-friend, amongst the pupils in the

Galerie, and her eyes were quite as dry as mine.

But the story of the Lesson in Arithmetic does not finish here; and

nothing would be more ungrateful were I to hide the ending: by which I

was the person to benefit most. To my alarm, in the recreation hour next

day, M. Heger came up to me, still with a frowning brow and a strong

look of dislike, and told me he wished to prove to himself whether I was

negligent or incapable. Because if I was incapable, it was idle to waste

time on me--so much the worse for my poor mother, who deceived herself!

On the other hand, if I was negligent, it was high time I should correct

myself. This was what had to be seen. I followed him up to his library,

not joyously like the willing assistant in the washing of Pepper, but

like a trembling criminal led to execution. I felt he was going again

over 'fractions' and the 'integers.' I knew I shouldn't understand

them; and that he wouldn't understand that I was 'incapable,' that when

arithmetic began my brain was sure to go!

The funny and pleasant thing about M. Heger was that he was so fond of

teaching, and so truly in his element when he began it, that his temper

became sweet at once; and I loved his face when it got the look upon it

that came in lesson-hours: so that, whereas we were hating each other

when we crossed the threshold of the door, we liked each other very much

when we sat down to the table; and I had an excited feeling that he was

going to make me understand. _It took him rather less than a quarter of

an hour._

On the table before us he had a bag of macaroon biscuits, and half a

Brioche cake. He presented me with a macaroon. There you have one whole

macaroon (_intègre_): well, but let us be generous. Suppose I multiply

my gift, by eight: now you have eight whole macaroons and _are eight

times richer_, hein? But that's too many; _eight_ whole macaroons! I

divide them between you and me. As the result, you have half the eight.

But now for our _half-Brioche_; we have one piece only: and we are _two

people_, so we multiply the pieces. But _each is smaller_, the more

pieces, the smaller slice of cake; here are eight pieces; they are

really too small for anything, we will divide this collection of pieces

into two parts. Now does not this division make you better off, hein?

Then he folded his arms across his chest in a Napoleonic attitude, and

nodding his head at me, asked, '_Que c'est difficile,--n'est-ce pas_?'

Of course in this, and indeed in all his personal and special methods,

M. Heger followed Rousseau faithfully. But, then, where is the modern

educationalist since 1762 who does _not_ found himself upon Rousseau?

It was not, however, in rescuing one from the slough of despond, where

natural defects would have left one without his aid, that M. Heger

excelled--it was rather in calling out one's best faculties; in

stimulating one's natural gifts; in lifting one above satisfaction with

mediocrity; in fastening one's attention on models of perfection; in

inspiring one with a sense of reverence and love for them, that M.

Heger's peculiar talent lay.

I may attempt only to sum up a _few_ maxims of his, that have constantly

lived in my own mind: but I feel painfully my inability to convey the

impression they produced when given by this incomparable Professor;

whose power belonged to his personality; and was consequently a power

that cannot be reproduced, nor continued by any disciple. The Teacher of

genius is born and not made.

The first of these maxims was that, before entering upon the study of

any noble or high order of thoughts, one had to follow the methods

symbolised by the Eastern practice of leaving one's shoes outside of the

Mosque doors. There were any number of ways of 'putting off the shoes'

of vulgarity, suggested to one's choice by M. Heger: the reading of some

beautiful passage in a favourite book; the repetition of a familiar

verse: attention to some very beautiful object: the deliberate

recollection of some heroic action, _etc._ With different temperaments

different plans might be followed:--what was necessary was that one did

not enter the sacred place without some _deliberate_ renunciation of

vulgarity and earthliness: by _some_ mental act, or process, one must

have 'put off one's shoes.' There is here a strange circumstance that I

was too young to feel the true importance of at the time, but that I

have often wondered over since then. There can be no doubt of M. Heger's

rigid orthodoxy as a Catholic. Yet whilst the recitation of the Rosary

inaugurated the daily lessons, M, Heger had a special invocation[3] of

'the Spirits of _Wisdom_, _Truth_, _Justice_, _and Equanimity_,' that

was recited by some chosen pupil; who had to come out of her place in

class and stand near him; and who was not allowed by him to gabble. And

this was the invariable introduction to _his_ lesson. I can't feel it

was an orthodox proceeding: _There was not a Saint's name anywhere!_ But

I feel the infallible impression it produced upon me now. One effect, in

the sense of 'putting off one's shoes,' that it had for myself was that

the Professor of Literature appeared to me without any of the dislikable

qualities of the everyday M. Heger.

Another maxim of M. Heger's was certainly borrowed from Voltaire: That

one must give one's soul as many forms as possible. _Il faut donner à

son âme toutes les formes possibles_. Again, that every sort of

literature and literary style has its merits, _except the literature

that is not literary and the style that is bad:_ here again, one has, of

course, Voltaire's well-known phrases: _J'admets tous les genres, hors

le genre ennuyeux_.'

A third maxim was that one must never employ, nor tolerate the

employment of, a literary image as _an argument_. The purpose of a

literary image is to illuminate as a vision, and to interpret as a

parable. An image that does not serve both these purposes is a fault in

style.

_A fourth maxim_ is that one must never neglect the warning one's ear

gives one of a _fault_ in style; and never trust one's ear exclusively

about the merits of a literary style.

_A fifth rule_:--One must not fight with a difficult sentence; but take

it for a walk with one; or sleep with the thought of it present in one's

mind; and let the difficulty arrange itself whilst one looks on.

_A sixth rule_:--One must not read, before sitting down to write, a

great stylist with a marked manner of his own; unless this manner

happens to resemble one's own.

Now I shall be told that these rules and maxims, whether true or false,

are 'known to nearly every one,' and are of assistance to no one;

because people who can write do not obey rules: and people who can't

write are not taught to do so by rules. If this were literally true then

there would be no room in the world for a Professor of Literature. My

own opinion is that there are very few good writers who do not obey

rules; and that these rules are, if contracted in youth, of great use as

a discipline that saves original writers from the defect of their

quality of originality, in a proneness to mannerisms and whims.

In connection with the possible complaint that I am putting forward as

M. Heger's maxims, sentences that were not originally invented nor

uttered by him, my reply is that I do not affirm that he invented his

own maxims, but simply that he chose them from an enormous store he had

collected by study and fine taste and by a sound critical judgment, the

result of an extensive acquaintanceship with the best that has been said

and thought in the world by philosophers, poets, and literary artists

and connoisseurs. In his character of a Professor of literature I find

it hard to imagine that any gift of original thought, or personal power

of expressing his own thoughts, could have placed M. Heger's pupils

under the same obligations as did his knowledge of beautiful ideas,

beautifully expressed, gathered from north, south, east and west, in

classical, mediæval and modern times. To be given these precious and

luminous thoughts in one's youth, when they have a special power to

'rouse, incite and gladden one,' is a supreme boon:--and in my own case

my gratitude to M. Heger has never been in the least disturbed by the

discovery that he was not the inventor of the maxims that have

constantly been a light to my feet and a lantern to my path during the

half-century that has elapsed since I received them from him in the

historical Pensionnat, that stood for many years, after Monsieur Heger

himself had vanished out of life, but that stands no longer in the Rue

d'Isabelle.

[1] From Mlle. Louise Heger I have this note: '_Les cloches de St.

Jacques et non pas St. Jean Baptiste, église qui se trouve à l'autre

côté de la ville près du canal: quartier du Père Silas dans

"Villette."_'

[2] _Villette_, chapter xii.

[3] Esprit de Sagesse, conduisez-nous:

Esprit de Vérité, enseignez-nous:

Esprit de Charité, vivifiez-nous:

Esprit de Prudence, préservez-nous:

Esprit de Force, défendez-nous:

Esprit de Justice, éclairez-nous:

Esprit Consolateur, apaisez-nous.

Here is the invocation, sent me by Mlle. Heger; who has, with extreme

kindness, endeavoured to recover it for me.

CHAPTER V

THE STORY OF A CHAPEAU D'UNIFORME

In connection with the particular Belgian schoolgirls whom I knew, who

still, in 1860, learnt their lessons in the class-rooms where Charlotte

Brontë once taught, and who were still taught by M. Heger, and still

surrounded with the benign and serene influences of Madame Heger, let me

prove that these schoolgirls had not the characteristics of the

_Lesbassecouriennes_; and that Charlotte Brontë displayed insular

prejudice, as well as an imagination coloured by the distress of an

unhappy passion, when she said of them, '_The Continental female is

quite a different being to the insular female of the same age and

class._'[1]

Inasmuch as the story I have to tell is the story of a Bonnet, it will

be recognised as one that is calculated to display the qualities and

intimate and essential peculiarities of the 'Continental female' (under

sixteen) in a light, and under the stress and strain of passions and

interests, too serious to permit of any tampering with, or disguise of,

nature. One has to realise, also, that the question is not merely of a

bonnet, but of a Best Bonnet, a Sunday Bonnet. For, in the remote days

of which I am now writing modern young people should realise even

schoolgirls of ten or twelve wore bonnets on Sunday, and even upon

week-days, when they went beyond the borders of their garden: a hat was

thought indecorous on the head of any girl in her 'teens--a form of

undress rather than of dress. To wear a hat was like wearing a

pinafore--a confession that one had not forgotten the nursery. To save

one's best Sunday Bonnet, in the garden, one might go about in a hat,

and in the bosom of one's family wear a pinafore to save a new dress;

but in the same way that one did not go into the drawing-room with a

pinafore on, one did not, in those days, pay visits in a hat: and to go

to church in one would have been thought irreverent. So that a Sunday

Bonnet meant that childish ways were done with, and that one had

attained the age of reason. Like a barrister's wig it imposed

seriousness on the wearer, who had to live up to it. Madame Heger, when

establishing the rules for the uniform that was worn by all the pupils

of the school in the Rue d'Isabelle, paid great attention to the Sunday

Bonnet. Following the sense she lent to the law of her system of

government, the love of dress was not to be allowed amongst her pupils

to become an encouragement to vanity and rivalship, and hence one

uniform, for rich and poor alike, avoided any chance of vain, unkind,

and envious feelings; but at the same time the love of dress was not to

be discouraged altogether; because it was serviceable to taste, and the

care for appearance, without which a young person remains deficient in

femininity. Therefore although every boarder wore the same uniform, what

this uniform was to be was made quite an important question: and the

girls were invited to choose a committee to decide it, in consultation

with their head-mistress. And to this consultation Madame Heger brought

a large spirit of indulgence, especially where the Sunday Bonnet was

concerned. The Sunday Dress had to be black silk--about the _façon_

there might be discussion, but not about the colour or material. On the

other hand, about the Bonnet, everything was left an open question. It

might be fashionable: it might be becoming: and even serviceableness was

not made a too stringent obligation. Indeed in the first year of my

school career the Sunday Bonnet selected for the summer months was the

reverse of serviceable. It was white chip; it was decorated with pink

rosebuds, where blonde and tulle mingled with the rosebuds; it had broad

white ribands edged with black velvet--in short, a very charming Bonnet:

but sown with perils. Everything about it could get easily soiled; and

nothing about it would stand exposure to rain.

Madame Heger, recognising these material inconveniences, had

nevertheless seen that, on the educational side, there were compensating

advantages--the cultivation of neatness and order. She had not then

discouraged the white chip, rosebuds and the rest; at the same time,

she had stated the case for a yellow straw, with a plaid-ribbon that

would not easily soil.

'On the one hand,' she had said, 'you may, with merely simple

precautions, carry your Bonnet through the summer to the big holidays,

without anxiety. On the other hand, no doubt there will be anxiety: the

white chip is extremely pretty, but do not forget that it will require

almost incessant care. Never must this Bonnet be put on one side without

a clean white handkerchief to cover it. Not only so, one storm, if you

have no umbrella, will suffice; everything will need renewal. And I warn

you, my children, that if this misfortune arrive, it is not I, but

_you_, who will have to ask your good mammas for another Bonnet. _I_ ask

from your parents a _chapeau d'uniforme_, and one only, each term: no

more. So now decide as you please.'

_The decision had been for the white chip, arrive what may_. My own

point of view, whilst the subject was being discussed around me, was

that nothing could interest me less. Fancy troubling one's head about a

Bonnet! I did not say it, because I had no wish to make myself

unpopular, but the interest in the affair appeared to me puerile.

Happily these trifling matters had no importance for me; it did not

matter to me at all what sort of _chapeau d'uniforme_ they chose.

How wrong I was! It mattered to me more than to any one else in the

whole school, because no one wore their _chapeau d'uniforme_ so much,

and no one took the poor thing out so frequently into storm and rain.

All the other boarders attended early mass on Sunday mornings in a

convent chapel, within five minutes' walk of the school. The other

occasions when they wore the fragile white chip _chapeau_ were safe

occasions, when, if it rained, they took shelter in their own homes on

the monthly holidays, or were sent back to school in a _fiacre_. My case

was different. Every Sunday morning, in accordance with the arrangement

made by my mother, my brother called at the Rue d'Isabelle to take me to

the English Church, which in those days was a sort of hall, known as the

'_Temple Anglican_,' situated in a passage near the Bruxelles Museum.

The service was generally over by noon; but it was too late for me to

return to school in time for the déjeuner at mid-day, and this

authorised the custom of my taking lunch with my brother and enjoying a

short walk afterwards; so that I was taken back by him to the Rue

d'Isabelle before four o'clock. Now it will be easily understood that

this agreeable arrangement had temptations: and that _sometimes_, on

_very_ fine days, there would occur forgetfulness of the 'Temple

Anglican' altogether; and the whole of these four or five hours would be

spent in our favourite haunt, the Bois de la Cambre, where we would

picnic, on cakes and fruit, when there was pocket-money enough, or on

two halfpenny 'pistolets,' when, as often happened, ten centimes, that

ought to have gone into the plate at the Temple, was all we had. And

whether the lunch was of cakes, or of dry bread, it did not alter the

fact that we talked of home incessantly; and were supremely happy. Yes;

but no doubt our conduct was reprehensible, and did not deserve the

favour of Heaven. And my recollection is that almost invariably these

picnics in the Bois de la Cambre, to which an exceptionally fine day had

tempted us, ended in a downpour of rain. And how it rains at Brussels,

when it does rain! So now, think of the state of the white chip Bonnet,

and of the bunch of rosebuds, interwoven with blonde, and of the white

silk ribbon edged with black velvet, that I took back with me to the Rue

d'Isabelle.

And it is here where the beautiful nature of Belgian schoolgirls, or of

these particular Belgian schoolgirls who were my companions and

contemporaries, stands revealed. For upon one particular Sunday, having

hastily and silently fled to the dormitory upon my return, and being

discovered there, in dismayed contemplation of the lamentable saturated

mixture of mashed up tinted pulp and wires, that had once been rosebuds

and blonde, my depths of despondency moved these sympathetic young

hearts to compassion. As it was Sunday afternoon, one was allowed to

loiter over getting ready for dinner; a circle of consolers gathered

round me, and from it, forth stepped two rival aspirants to the honour

of sacrificing themselves on the altar of friendship. The first said:

'Now nothing is more simple: we shall wrap up this unhappy rag in my

handkerchief as you see;_--You shall have my chapeau d'uniforme_, and I

shall tell Maman everything--she interests herself in you; for when she

was young, she was at school in England. She will send me another

_chapeau d'uniforme_, and all is said.'

The other girl, whose name was Henriette--I forget her surname--said,

'My plan is easier: for here is an accident,--as though it were done on

purpose. Now what do you say: I have two _chapeaux d'uniforme_, if you

please! The first my mother sent me as a model to show Madame Heger, and

from this model she chose it. But now Madame had ordered mine with the

others: and when I told my mother, she said, 'Say nothing: an accident

may happen, the Bonnet will not support rain, you will have this one at

hand if a misfortune arrive. Well, and here is the misfortune: there's

no difficulty at all.'

Both of these girls had their homes in Brussels, and both of them I knew

had everything their own way with two fondly indulgent mammas. I had no

scruple in accepting their generous sacrifice, and I hugged them both,

and was really (I who despised tears) on the verge of crying. Between

the two, I hardly knew which offer to take, but it seemed to me that as

Henriette had two Bonnets, it was most reasonable to take hers. And we

all went down to dinner happily. And the 'Unhappy rag' '_cette

malheureuse loque_,' was buried in the _hangar_, the wood-house at the

bottom of the garden.

But under cloudless skies one is prone to forget the lessons of

misfortune. It took some time--but the Sunday came when, once again, it

seemed 'almost wrong' to waste summer hours in the Temple Anglican, when

one felt so good under the beautiful trees in the Bois de la Cambre. And

then there was pocket-money in hand, and a lunch of cakes, and not

halfpenny pistolets, could be obtained.

'I suppose you don't think it will rain?' I suggested.

'Rain!' My brother said with scorn. 'Look at that sky! How could it

rain?'

It managed to do it. True, it was only a brief shower: but the water

came down in sheets. In despair I took off the _chapeau d'uniforme_, and

my brother, who wore an Inverness cape, sheltered it under the flap. I

stood to hold the cape at a right angle, so that the precious object

might not be crushed, and we were watching it under this sheltering

wing, and my brother was assuring me it was all right when,--as I stood

there bareheaded and rain-beaten, beneath a tree by the side of the

broad path near the entrance to the wood--a short, stoutish man,

buttoned up to the chin in his greatcoat, and holding his umbrella

tightly, walked by us at a great pace, without (so at least it seemed)

looking at us at all. And that man was M. Heger. We gasped, and looked

at each other.

'He didn't see us,' said my brother cheerily. 'What a bit of luck!'

'You may be quite sure he did see us,' I answered. 'Well, I wonder what

will happen now?'

With this new anxiety on our hands, even the precious _chapeau

d'uniforme_ became a secondary consideration. But the shower having

passed, we examined it carefully. There was no disaster this time. The

rosebuds were still rosebuds and the blonde still blonde. It is true

that a splash had fallen on the white chip crown, but my brother was

always ready with comfort.

[Illustration: THE GALERIE AND GARDEN IN WINTER (The Allée Defendue is

on the left. The old pear-tree, whose lower branches still blossomed in

spring, is on the right)]

'When it's dry,' he told me, 'you'll easily get that off with a bit of

bread.'

This consoled me for the time being: but he was wrong as to the question

of facts. Bread had no effect upon that blot. It remained an island, or,

to speak more correctly, a coast-line, on the white chip, to the end of

that _chapeau d'uniforme_'s existence. But one dusted the stain over

with white powder before putting on one's Bonnet, and hoped no one

noticed it? So far as I know, no one did. But let it not be supposed

that I escaped moral punishment: I, who had once boasted in my pride

that nothing was less indifferent to me than my Sunday Bonnet, wore this

one uneasily to the end of the term, always conscious that the tell-tale

stain was there, and might suggest questions as to its origin.

Nor did I escape scot-free from M. Heger's hands, although he did behave

with a certain generosity, for he kept the secret. But he used his own

method of punishment.

Happy in the confidence given me by my brother's assurance that I should

easily get rid of the rain-blot, I went back to the Rue d'Isabelle, in

some anxiety about M. Heger, but _nearly_ persuaded that, after all,

perhaps, with his umbrella to think of and grasp, and the hurry he was

in, he _very likely_ hadn't seen us. But when the pupil's door was

opened in answer to my ring, and I was hoping to hurry through the

corridor to the staircase leading to the dormitories, I found M. Heger

waiting for me. He barred my path and looked down at me with his

penetrating, mocking eyes,--that, although I do not like to contradict

Charlotte, I still think had more green and steel, than violet-blue,

colour in them.

'A-ah,' he said with his long-drawn sigh, 'you are attentive at my

lessons, Mees; do you now listen with the same attention to the sermon

of the Minister at your Temple?'

Here was my opportunity; of course I ought to have said, '_No,

Monsieur, I don't listen to any one with so much attention as I do to

you: no one interests me so much_.' When I had got upstairs and had

taken off the _chapeau d'uniforme_, I realised that this was what any

rational being would have said. But it was too late then--all I did say

was, '_Je ne sais pas, Monsieur_' (a bad French accent too).

'A-ah,' he repeated, tightening his mouth, 'now I should like to see

whether you profit by the instructions of your Minister: Thus I shall be

glad if you will write me a _résumé_ in French of the sermon you heard

to-day at the Temple. It will be a good exercise for you in the French

language. And also I shall enjoy the happiness of knowing this wise

Minister's advice. It is understood, you will give me the _résumé_ of

this sermon to-morrow.'

'_Oui, Monsieur_.'

All through the evening recreation hours, and at night when I fought

against sleepiness in my bed, I worked over the composition of that

sermon. It is true that I did fall asleep in the middle of it myself;

but that does not prove it was a dull sermon, for I took it up again in

the morning with renewed zest. I gave up my whole recreation hour after

_déjeuner_ to writing it out. And I believed it to be as good a sermon

as was ever preached. And there was no vanity in this belief: because it

was not my own sermon, but one I had originally heard preached in my

childhood in an old village church, and the arguments in favour of being

good and simple had taken hold of my imagination, partly on account of

the associations with the place where I heard it. Well, but now, can my

readers deny that when I say M. Heger was a more irritating than lovable

man, I have sound reasons for my statement? _After ordering me to write

that sermon, and when I had stolen several hours from my sleep, and

given up two recreations to obey him, he never asked for it!_ And when I

told him I had written the sermon and that it was ready for him, he

merely looked down upon me with a strange twinkle in his eyes, and said,

'_A-ah, c'est bien. Vous l'avez donc bien retenu, ce fameux sermon? tant

mieux, tant mieux_.'

[1] _Villette_, chapter viii.

CHAPTER VI

MADAME HEGER'S SENTIMENT OF THE JUSTICE

OF RESIGNATION TO INJUSTICE

At the end of these reminiscences I have now to relate the incident that

stands out in my memory as, not only the most bitter experience I had

ever, up to this date, undergone of personal injustice in my brief life

of fifteen years, not only, what was of great moral importance to me, my

first lesson in the philosophy of refusing to torment oneself in order

to punish one's tormentors, but also the incident that revealed to me a

secret sorrow hidden away under Madame Heger's serenity; and that

convinces me, now, that the tragical romance of Charlotte Brontë was not

to her, as it must have been to M. Heger, misunderstood, and regarded as

an event of small importance; but that it 'entered into her life,' and

was to her a very serious trouble.

One day in June, I am not able to remember now upon what especial

occasion, nor in honour of what event, all the school was given an

entire holiday: and, for its better enjoyment, the girls were invited by

a former pupil in the Rue d'Isabelle, who had married and possessed a

fine château and a large garden within walking distance of Bruxelles, to

spend the whole day in her house and garden, where a mid-day collation

was prepared for them. I remember very little about the day's

enjoyments--the cruel impressions that followed the pleasant holiday

have effaced from my memory almost everything that preceded them. I

know, however, that all was sunshine and good humour: that my companions

whom I had trusted as friends were as friendly to me as ever; and that

with my two chosen companions, the philosopher Marie Hazard and the

other still dearer friend, who was a philosopher in a different sense,

as a profound Nature-worshipper,--where _I_ was supposed to be a

philosopher in a sense of my own as a worshipper of ideas--talked

'philosophy' wisely and well--in our own estimation, and ate red

gooseberries. As we talked other girls discovered these

gooseberry-bushes also, and came in flocks: so we three withdrew, and

sat down under some shady tree, and were very happy and at peace. Near

us, on a low cane chair, sat one of the under-mistresses, a Frenchwoman,

whom I liked extremely, and who also liked me: her name was Mlle.

Zélie--she was too young to have been one of the mistresses known to

Charlotte Brontë twenty years before. She may have been twenty-six: or

she may have been thirty.

As she sat there, doing embroidery, and watching all the time a swarm of

girls picking gooseberries,--we three, who had left off picking them,

were at rest upon the grass,--there came, suddenly, a servant in great

haste sent from the Rue d'Isabelle by Madame Heger, with a letter:

neither Monsieur nor Madame had arrived yet, they were to be there in

time for the collation in the afternoon. The letter was an urgent order

to Mlle. Zélie that the girls were not to _touch the fruit in the

kitchen garden_--this stipulation had been made by the generous hostess,

who had invited all this company to a feast of cakes and cream and good

things of every description, but who wanted her gooseberries and

currants for jam. Here of course was cause of great dismay: although the

bushes had not been entirely stripped, yet certainly thirty or forty

girls amongst the gooseberry-bushes alone had made their mark. We three

philosophers had trifled with one bush perhaps; but our share in the

depredation was comparatively slight. A bell was rung, and the message

read aloud. I am convinced from that moment onwards no one touched any

fruit:--still the mischief had been done; it was obvious to the naked

eye that the gooseberry-bushes had been attacked.

The person who seemed most distressed was poor Mlle. Zélie: she blamed

no one, but repeated constantly, 'Why then did not Madame warn me? Never

should I have permitted it, had I not supposed that it was understood

that these gooseberries, without value for that matter, were intended

to be eaten. It seemed to me, in the absence of instructions, so

natural.'

And a chorus of girls answered: 'We thought it too, Mademoiselle: never

would we have touched a gooseberry had we understood.'

There the matter remained. We were not particularly unhappy: as a matter

of fact all the gooseberries in the garden could have been purchased for

five francs in Bruxelles. No harm had been done the bushes: it was a

_mal entendu_--what would you have? The only person who seemed to take

it to heart was poor Mlle. Zélie.

'Quel malheur,' she kept repeating. 'Quel malheur! mais aussi, pourquoi

Madame ne m'a-t-elle rien dit?'

We continued, Marie Hazard and myself, sitting under our shady tree; our

third philosopher, the Nature-worshipper, always good at decoration, had

been called off to assist at laying out the tables, and arranging

flowers; groups of other girls were sitting in circles on the grass or

walking about arm in arm, when--suddenly arrived upon the scene M.

Heger. He came up with an amiable expression: but in a moment the look

changed to one black as night: he had seen the tell-tale signs of the

depredations inflicted on the gooseberry-bushes.

'Who is responsible for this?' he asked, '_c'est une bassesse!_ Mlle.

Zélie, what does this signify? Were you not told the fruit was to be

respected?'

Poor Mlle. Zélie stood there quivering with terror.

'Unhappily,' she said, 'Madame's letter arrived too late: without bad

intention, these young girls imagined themselves free to eat

gooseberries: from the moment it was known that it was forbidden, I am

sure there was no infraction of the rule: but alas! what was done, was

done. I regret it profoundly: and so I am sure do you, is it not so, my

children?' she asked, turning to Marie Hazard and myself:--there was a

clear and empty space around us--every other girl had somehow vanished.

'Yes, Mademoiselle, we are very sorry,' both of us answered at once.

M. Heger swooped round upon us in his wrath.

'And so,' he said, 'it is _you_, is it; you two who have so much pride,

both of you; who are so little sensitive to the counsels of your

teachers, you, who are so superior in your own esteem, who are the

guilty ones? It is you two, and you alone in the entire Pension, who

have been capable of this indignity? And see what ruin you have made!

Are you not ashamed--what gluttony!'

'Mais non, Monsieur, non,' pleaded Mademoiselle Zélie, 'these young

girls are not alone responsible; many others also took the fruit; you

must not blame them for everything.'

'Is that so, Mademoiselle Hazard? Is that so, Mees?'

'Il ne faut pas nous demander cela,' said I, with my usual bad accent in

agitated moments. 'C'est aux autres qu'il faut le demander.'

'Mais oui,' he said, 'and this is what I intend to do; Mlle. Zélie, do

me this pleasure: fetch me the _élèves_ who were here just now: call

them together. I must get to the bottom of this. Je dois approfondir

cela.'

Mlle. Zélie was some time about it: but in the end, she returned with a

good company of girls, forty or fifty at least; amongst them nearly all

of those who had been most busy amongst the gooseberry bushes. They

stood round us in a sort of circle; Marie Hazard, myself, and M. Heger.

M. Heger delivered a little speech: he explained, and enlarged upon, the

confidence that our kind hostess had placed in us; she had thrown open

her garden to us; she had prepared a feast for us; she had made only one

condition--respect my gooseberry-bushes. Was it possible, could one

suppose it possible, that any one could be found base enough, greedy

enough, to ignore her wishes?

'We were not told,' said Marie Hazard; 'This is not reasonable--one

would not have touched a gooseberry had one known. Is one a child of six

then, to love gooseberries to this extent?'

'Mlle. Hazard, it is not to _you_ I address myself,' said M. Heger. 'I

have no question to ask you. You admit, and indeed it is not possible

for you to deny, that you have committed this act of

gluttony--inexcusable in a child of six. It is to you all, my dear

pupils, outside of these two, who I know are guilty, that I ask it, and

with confidence--amongst you all, have any of you been guilty of this

indignity?'

Dead silence. Mlle. Zélie was fidgeting about, snapping her fingers

nervously. But she said nothing.

M. Heger again addressed the girls round him, and there was a note of

triumph in his voice:--

'Cela suffit,' he affirmed, 'I shall ask no more. If any of you are

guilty, you know it in your consciences: you know now what it remains

for you to do. For me, I believe, and I love to believe, that the only

pupil in this school capable of this unworthy conduct is a foreigner.'

'Pardon, Monsieur,' said a voice at my elbow, 'je suis Belge; et moi

aussi j'ai mangé des groseilles.'

M. Heger bowed towards her profoundly.

_Je fais une exception en votre faveur_, _Mademoiselle Hazard_,' he

said: and then he walked away.

I remained at first almost stupefied: the first shock rendered me unable

to distinguish between reality and fiction. I began to doubt my senses:

was I really, were Marie Hazard and myself, the only girls in the school

who had rifled the gooseberry-bushes? Did it mean that, if not

deliberately base, in some way there was a peculiar deficiency in

delicacy and honour in my constitution, rendering me capable of doing

base things without knowing it? Was it true that in this foreign country

I had disgraced my own? This was my first impression, confusion of mind;

because up to this date I had never known nor suffered from real

injustice. Here was an entirely new experience. And at first it baffled

me. I suppose I must have shown this desperation in my face: for M.

Heger was no sooner out of sight than attempts were made to console me:

but I was beyond consolation. Mlle. Zélie came first; she laid a

soothing hand on my shoulder.

'Do not afflict yourself, my child,' she said. 'This is a

misunderstanding: I shall explain everything to Madame Heger.'

Then several girls came bustling up, rather shamefacedly, assuring me

that it was nothing: '_Quelle affaire_,' they ejaculated. '_Et tout cela

à propos de quelques groseilles!_'

'It has nothing to do with the gooseberries,' I said; 'you are all

cowards, and I detest you; why couldn't you say you took them too?'

'What good would it have been, with M. Heger? We shall all go to Madame

and tell her everything. She will see how it is at once. _Voyons, Chou:

ne pleures pas_.'

'_Je ne pleure pas; vous mentez_:' and this was both impolite and

incorrect: I _was_ crying, but not ordinary tears, because they scalded

one.

What happens invariably with people who insist upon their own private

grievances too much, and too long, happened in my case that afternoon:

at first I had been an object of sympathy, but when I refused it, and

was ungracious, I became a bore. The case was stated to me in reasonable

terms:

'Say that we should have done differently and were cowardly. It was not

out of ill-will to you, but because we were afraid of M. Heger, with

whom one must not reason when he is in a bad humour, as every one knows.

You and Marie Hazard, for instance, who must always be in the right with

him, in what way does it serve you? Voyons: be frank; at least: _cela

vous réussit-il?_ Listen then: we will make it all plain with Madame

Heger. Mlle. Zélie will tell her we knew nothing when we ate those

gooseberries; we thought they were there for us--that it belonged to the

feast to eat this fruit: they were not so very good, these gooseberries

after all: it was a politeness on our part, not greediness. Every one

nearly ate gooseberries. When we were told it was a mistake, we ate no

more gooseberries, and were sorry. La petite Anglaise and Marie Hazard

did as the others did: and here is the whole history. Now all this is

known already to almost every one. It will be known to Madame Heger

before we go home to-night. What then do you want? Look at Marie Hazard:

she is in the same case as you are, and does not afflict herself.'

'Marie Hazard is at home here, and I am not at home. I am English; and I

am told by M. Heger before you all, that because I am English I am

capable of baseness.'

'And what does that do to you?' asked Marie Hazard, herself, turning

upon me with her cruel reasonableness. 'English or Belgian, one is not

capable of baseness, and one has not deserved any blame: that is what is

serious; the rest signifies nothing. One must not be a patriot to this

extent. It is not reasonable. If even you had been in the wrong about

those gooseberries, do you truly imagine to yourself that the honour of

England would have been affected by it?'

Just _because_ this was so reasonable and true, it stung me to the soul.

'_Ma chère et bonne amie_,' wrote Rousseau to Madame d'Epinay in the

days of their friendship, when explaining why he had burnt a letter to

her that seemed to him more reasonable than kind: '_Pythagore disait

qu'il ne faut jamais attiser le feu avec une épée. Cette sentence me

paraît être la plus importante et la plus sacrée des lois de l'amitié_.'

I knew nothing about the sayings of Pythagoras, nor the writings of

Rousseau in those days. But it did seem to me opposed to the sacred laws

of friendship, to remind me, in this moment, that it was absurd in me to

drag patriotism into this question.

'Leave me alone,' I said, turning my back upon them, 'you tire me, all

of you; none of you understand me.'

Although I sulked the whole afternoon, and was, as I deserved to be,

left to sulk, as 'insupportable,' I yet came round to the conviction

before we returned, that everything had been explained, and that even M.

Heger understood that an injustice had been done me; and that although,

of course, no apology could be looked for from such an obstinate man,

still _he knew he had been in the wrong_ and was secretly repentant. But

I was to be undeceived. After our return to the Rue d'Isabelle, the

lecture du soir in the refectory was given, as was the usual plan on

holidays, by M. Heger, seated at the head of the room, with Madame Heger

on his right hand, and a table before them, placed between the two long

lines of tables with benches stretching the length of the room against

the walls, and two ranges of chairs on the opposite side of the tables

facing the benches, where sat all the pupils. Having finished the

'reading,' M. Heger summed up in a few words the sentiments that 'he was

sure all there must feel of gratitude to their hostess, once an inmate

of this school; and who had contrived this little fête for her

successors. He asked their consent to a message of thanks that was to be

sent her; and he wound up his expression of confidence in the enjoyment

every one had derived from this holiday, by stating the satisfaction of

Madame Heger and himself at the good conduct of every one; and then came

this sentence:--There was only one regrettable exception to be made to

the perfect behaviour and sense of respect due to the lady who had

thrown open her house and garden to them, and this exception, he was, at

any rate, pleased to recognise, was not amongst those brought up in the

sentiments of religion and convenience cherished by almost all of them:

and hence though one had to deplore the fault, in the case of a

foreigner (_une étrangère_) one was more disposed to regard it with

indulgence.'

Marie Hazard rose from her seat:--but there really was no time for any

protest or objection. There was a shuffling of chairs, a movement of

benches. Monsieur and Madame Heger walked out of the Refectory by a

folding door behind them that opened into a passage leading to their own

part of the house; and the pupils filed out, under the surveillance of

the mistress in charge, by the opposite door towards the staircase

leading to the Oratory, for evening prayers. I alone remained sitting on

my bench, in my usual place in the Refectory, about half-way down the

right-hand line of tables. No one paid any attention to me, until the

room was nearly empty, and then the mistress at the door looked round,

and seeing me sitting there, said, 'Make haste, Mees; you will be late

for prayers: what _are_ you doing?'

I remained sitting there. She looked at me a moment; evidently didn't

like my looks; shrugged her shoulders, agitated her hands, said--

'One cannot wait for you any longer mademoiselle, _vous êtes notée_,'

and vanished.

I do not know now, and I hardly think I knew then, what I meant by the

resolution that was the only one firmly present to me, that no one,

nothing, should move me from the place where I was sitting in the

Refectory: that there I was going to remain all night, and for ever if

necessary, until this wrong was redressed, and until just excuses were

made to me. What had at first been a new and astonishing discovery to

me, that injustice could be done, and that people whom I respected and

even loved, could be unjust to me, had now become a well-established and

common fact, and I saw injustice everywhere and felt no use in living at

all, because I had become convinced that people would always be unjust

to me, _always_; it was the common rule of the world evidently. What was

I to do then? Resist, perish in resisting? Very possibly, but not

submit.

There I sat at fifteen years of age, on the bench, with my elbows

planted on the Refectory table, and my burning, throbbing head between

my hands, _in the frame of mind in which Anarchists are made._

But the influence was already approaching that was to transform anarchy

into the ideal socialism of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, where the bitter

bitter rage of rebelliousness against the wrong done oneself becomes the

generous sympathy with all injustice throughout the world: '_Ce premier

sentiment de l'injustice est resté si profondément gravé dans mon âme,

que toutes les idées qui s'y rapportent me rendent ma première émotion;

et ce sentiment, relatif à moi dans son origine, a pris une telle

consistance en lui-même, et s'est si bien détaché de tout intérêt

personnel, que mon coeur s'enflamme au spectacle ou au récit de toute

action injuste, quel qu'en soit l'objet, et en quelque lieu qu'elle se

commette, comme si l'effet en retomboit sur moi_.'

The lesson that the author of the _Confessions_ learnt at an even

earlier age than I did was taught me by a Victim of injustice who

continued throughout her life so courageously undisturbed by it in

kindness and consideration for others, that her sensibility to it became

a less powerful feeling in her than her compassion for the suffering

and passionate woman who had wronged her.

I cannot say how long I had sat in the Refectory, when I saw the folding

doors at the head of the room open, and quietly and composedly as usual,

Madame Heger entered and approached me. She sat down on the chair

opposite my bench on the opposite side of the table.

'My child,' she said, 'you are wrong to take so seriously the reproach

addressed to you by M. Heger as the result of a mistake. Mlle. Zélie has

explained to M. Heger and to me the accident. It was a pity, no doubt,

that this happened: but you have not any more blame than the others. All

is forgotten and forgiven. But you, my child, are wrong in this. Why do

you remain here, when prayers are already over, and without permission?

You know well it is forbidden.'

I broke out passionately complaining that I could not be expected to

obey rules when I was unjustly treated: I could bear anything else, but

I could not support injustice.

'Pas l'injustice,' I protested, 'j'obéirais a tout, je supporterais

tout: mais, pas l'injustice, non, madame, non, je ne saurais supporter

l'injustice.'

'Cependant, mon enfant, il faut savoir la supporter. Que faire?

_Seriez-vous la seule personne au monde qui ne connaîtrait pas

l'injustice?_'

I shook my head obstinately: I made a show of resistance: but I was

already under Madame Heger's influence. A tremendous change had taken

place in me. I was no longer an Anarchist. It had already come to me as

a conviction that there was nothing grand, but rather something mean, in

refusing to bear anything that my other fellow-creatures had to bear,

that better and nobler people than I had borne.

'It saddens me,' continued Madame Heger--'(_Cela m'attriste_) to see a

young girl like you, who soon must enter life, and who takes the habit

of saying, "I cannot support this, everything else you like, _but not

this_": or "I will renounce everything else, _but not that_." It does

not depend upon us, my child, what we must support, nor what we may,

because _les convenances_ or the interests of others demand it, have to

renounce. Amongst the many pupils I have known, there have been some

passionate like yourself and exalted, who have said like you to-day, I

cannot support injustice, who have seen injustice, where there was no

intention to be unjust; who have refused counsel with anger and

impatience, and who in their refusal to bow to necessary obligations

have been themselves unjust. And they have been unhappy in their lives;

most unhappy. _Dominated by some fixed idea, the slave of some desire

that cannot be accomplished,_ they have seen enemies in those who would

have been their friends. They have created for themselves a sad fate;

and I know one of them who died of it (_j'en connais une qui en est

morte_).'

Something in Madame Heger's voice surprised me, for her even tones

quavered and broke. I looked up suddenly, her face was ashen white and

her lips blue. I was struck to the heart. I knew not why, but in some

way I instinctively felt that, through my fault, she was in pain: I was

full of remorse. The table was between us, or I should have thrown

myself upon my knees before her. My emotion had the usual effect upon my

French accent. 'Forgive me, oh forgive me,' I wanted to say, 'I am

ashamed of myself.' I said, 'Pardong, O pardong, j'ai honte de moi.'

As it happened, nothing could have been better timed than my relapse

into English barbarism. In a moment Madame's unusual emotion was under

control: the soft colour returned to her cheek and lips, she shook her

head gently, and said in her ordinary voice--

'You _must_ take care of your accent, my child. One says "pardon," not

"pardong "; and one does not say "J'ai honte de moi," but one says "Je

suis honteuse," or "J'ai honte."

'But I see you are now in a good disposition,' she went on, 'and I am

pleased to see it. Thus then, go quietly to bed without disturbing your

companions, and I will send Clothilde to you with some flower-of-orange

water that will tranquillise this hot head. Good night, and be very wise

in the future: and all will be well.'

Ever since I have known the story of Charlotte Brontë I have had the

firm conviction of what was in Madame Heger's mind when she spoke to me

of one who had imagined enemies in friends, and who, complaining of

injustice, had been unjust. But since I have read Charlotte's Letters,

the unmistakable proof is that Madame Heger, so far as my memory serves

me after all these years, actually quoted the very words of one of these

letters, about one dominated by a fixed idea, and the slave of vain

desires.

So then we may decide finally, that Madame Heger was not Madame Beck.

And of M. Heger we may decide that he was not Paul Emanuel either; for

Paul Emanuel having learnt that he had committed an injustice, would

have called his whole school together, and in full class-room repaired

his involuntary fault. But the real M. Heger did nothing of the sort.

For a time there was a great coldness towards him in my heart. But in

the hours of his lessons he remained, as ever, the 'Professor' of

unrivalled merit.

Summing up what may be gathered from these reminiscences, I think the

facts that can be affirmed are these:--

No moral likeness, but a physical resemblance, between Madame Heger and

the portrait of Madame Beck. A strong and lifelike resemblance, between

Paul Emanuel and M. Heger, up to the point when the Professor Paul falls

in love with Lucy Snowe. After this event, a dwindling resemblance

between the Professor in _Villette_, and the real Professor in the Rue

d'Isabelle, who was never in love with Charlotte Brontë, and who was the

lawful and attached husband of the Directress of the Pensionnat.

But when Professor Paul Emanuel becomes the docile disciple of Père

Silas, when he is caught in the 'Jesuitical cobwebs of mother Church,'

then he ceases to resemble the real man in the very least. M. Heger's

role in life was not that of a disciple but of a Master of other people,

and a very arbitrary and domineering Master too, for whom the world was

his class-room. He was under the thumb of no priest, nor spiritual

director. As for Jesuitical 'cobwebs,' the notion of M. Heger caught in

any cobweb is absurd!

Every one knows what happens when a bumble-bee in its courses comes in

contact with a cobweb. It is a mere incident in the career of the

bumble-bee--but it is a disaster for the cobweb.