Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë Chapter 5 Page 37

After dinner, we immediately adjourned to the schoolroom: lessons recommenced, and were continued till five o’clock.

The only marked event of the afternoon was, that I saw the girl with whom I had conversed in the verandah dismissed in disgrace by Miss Scatcherd from a history class, and sent to stand in the middle of the large schoolroom. The punishment seemed to me in a high degree ignominious, especially for so great a girl — she looked thirteen or upwards. I expected she would show signs of great distress and shame; but to my surprise she neither wept nor blushed: composed, though grave, she stood, the central mark of all eyes. “How can she bear it so quietly — so firmly?” I asked of myself. “Were I in her place, it seems to me I should wish the earth to open and swallow me up.