hester certainly seems to be. During her life at Thornfield Hall, Rochester continually likens Jane to many non-angelic things. In their first formal encounter, he accuses her of causing his horse to fall. Rochester says to her, “When you came on me in Hay Lane last night, I thought unaccountably of fairy tales, and had half a mind to demand whether you had bewitched my horse: I am not sure yet.” He, at first, cannot see her for the angel she will become, for this can only happen after she becomes financially independent.This freedom is brought about during Jane’s stay with the two other angel figures in the novel, Diana and Mary Rivers. These women turn out to be Jane’s long lost relatives. It is their brother whom discovers the family connection and Jane’s subsequent inheritance. It is significant that it is these good angels who take Jane in just as she is on the verge of death. These women are instrumental in Jane’s education of prudence and the pleasures of domesticity. Jane explains that she idolizes them and attempts to emulate their behaviour: “I liked to read what they liked to read: what they enjoyed, delighted me; what they approved I reverenced. They loved their sequestered home.” Although the Rivers sisters are not married, their brother serves as the domestic equal of a husband, and together they form a household. Through them, Jane is provided with a well-rounded version of angels of the house with which to model herself after.Eventually, she gains enough inheritance to make herself a gentlewoman. Therefore, she goes to Rochester on an equal social level. Jane exhibits a middle-class mentality that is consistent with the domestic goddess when she decides to take care of Adele at the end of the novel. Jane decides to remove Adele from the boarding school in order to educate her at home: “I meant to become her governess once more, but I soon found this...
