Gender and Space in Rural Britain, 1840-1920

116 Gender and Space in Rural Britain, 1840–1920

Millions are condemned to a stiller doom than mine, and millions are in silent revolt

against their lot. Nobody knows how many rebellions besides political rebellions

ferment in the masses of life which people earth. Women are supposed to be very

calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties,

and a fi eld for their eff orts as much as their brothers do; they suff er from too rigid a

restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suff er.^55

Jane links her experience to the masses of repressed, to human beings in general,
and to political rebellion – but in the end, she identifi es women as being par-
ticularly victimized by ‘too rigid a restraint’. Th e older Jane is aware that these
limitations on young women are not limited to herself, perhaps referring to her
later experiences with Diana and Mary Rivers and the other women that she
encountered. But is she also writing of herself? Is the ‘stiller doom’ referring
only to her experience at Th ornfi eld as a young governess, or does the switch to
present tense suggest an unacknowledged restlessness breaking through the nar-
rative? Jane’s happy ending is about as happy as it could realistically be, but our
sense of dissatisfaction may refl ect the awareness that there can be no entirely
happy ending for a young woman who – like millions of others – must compro-
mise at least one of her basic propensities (in her case, a sense of sublimity) in
order to satisfy others (love, or a need for security). Th at she can even attain one
of these makes Jane lucky – but the simple act of acknowledging the luckiness of
such a half-victory makes for an uneasy ending.
Th ere is a one last moment of the sublime before the novel’s close, and it is
not Jane’s. She concludes what is supposed to be her own autobiography with a
sublime image of St John, zealous and uncompromising :

his glorious sun hastens to its setting. Th e last letter I received from him drew from

my eyes human tears, and yet fi lled my heart with Divine joy: he anticipated his sure

reward, his incorruptible crown ... No fear of death will darken St. John’s last hour: his

mind will be unclouded; his heart will be undaunted; his hope will be sure; his faith

steadfast. His own words are a pledge of this: – ‘My Master’, he says, ‘has forewarned

me. Daily he announces more distinctly, – “Surely I come quickly!” and hourly I more

eagerly respond, – ‘Amen; even so come, Lord Jesus!’^56

Th ere is a trace of wistfulness in Jane’s description that ‘No fear of death will
darken St. John’s last hour’, and in the ‘divine joy’ she takes in his letter. Th e
sublime has broken through the text for a fi nal time – but now, the only place
that this sublimity can resonate is through St John’s story, not Jane’s. It is with
his conclusion that Jane ends her own narrative. Only by proxy, and by ending
her narrative with his, can she access the sublimity that she once took so much
pleasure in deriving from nature.