英文读书笔记格式

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a singular notion dawned upon me. i doubted not—never doubted – that if mr. reed had been alive he would have treated me kindly; and now as i sat looking at the white bed and overshadowed walls – occasionally also turning a fascinated eye towards the dimly gleaming mirror—i began to recall what i had heard of dead men troubled in their graves by the violation of their last wishes revising the earth to punish the perjured and avenge the oppressed; and i thought mr. reed’s spirit harassed by the wrong of his sister’s child might quit its abode—whether in the church vault or in the unknown world of the departed – and rise before me in this chamber. i wiped my tears and hushed my sobs fearful lest any sign of violent grief might waken a preternatural voice to comfort me or elicit from the gloom some haloed face bending over me with strange pity. this idea consolatory in theory i felt would be terrible if realized: with all my might i endeavored to stifle it—i endeavored to be firm. shaking my hair from my eyes i lifted my head and tried to look boldly around the dark room; at this moment a light gleamed on the wall. was it i asked myself a ray from the moon penetrating some aperture in the blind? no; moonlight was still and this stirred; while i gazed it glided up to the ceiling and quivered over my head. i can now conjecture readily that this streak of light was in all likelihood a gleam from a lantern carried by some one acrothe lawn; but then prepared as my mind was for horror shaken as my nerves were by agitation i thought the swift-darting beam was a herald of some coming vision from another world. my heart beat thick my head grew hot; a sound filled my ears which i deemed the rushing of wings; something seemed near me; i was oppressed suffocated: endurance broke down; i rushed to the door and shook the lock in desperate effort. steps came running along the outer passage; the key turned bessie and abbot entered.

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the next thing i remember is waking up with a feeling as if i had had a frightful nightmare and seeing before me a terrible red glare crossed with thick black bars. i heard voices too speaking with a hollow sound and as if muffled by a rush of wind or water agitation uncertainty and an all-predominating sense of terror confused my faculties. ere long i became aware that some one was handling me; lifting me up and supporting me in a sitting posture and that more tenderly than i had ever been raised or upheld before. i rested my head against a pillow or an arm and felt easy.

in five minutes more the cloud of bewilderment dissolved: i knew quite well that i was in my own bed and that the red glare was the nursery fire. it was night: a candle burnt on the table: bessie stood at the bed-foot with a basin in her hand and a gentleman sat in a chair near my pillow leaning over me.

i felt an inexpressible relief a soothing conviction of protection and security when i knew that there was a stranger in the room and inpidual not belonging to gateshead and not related to mrs. reed. turning from bessie (though her presence was far leobnoxious to me than that of abbot for instance would have been) i scrutinized the face of the gentlemen: i knew him; it was mr. lloyd an apothecary sometimes called in by mrs. reed when the servant were ailing: for herself and the children she employed a physician.

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bessie had been down into the kitchen and she brought up with her a tart on a certain brightly painted china plate whose bird of paradise nestling in a wreath of convolvuli and rosebuds had been wont to stir in me a most enthusiastic sense of admiration and which plate i had often petitioned to be allowed to take in my hand in order to examine it more closely but had always hitherto been deemed unworthy such a privilege. this precious vessel was now placed on my knee and i was cordially invited to eat the circlet of delicate pastry upon it. vain favour! coming like most other favours long deferred and often wished for too late! i could not ear the tart: and the plumage of the bird the tints of the flowers seemed strangely faded! i put both plate and tart away. bessie asked if i would have a book: the word book acted as a transient stimulus and i begged her to fetch gulliver’s travels from the library. this book i had again and again perused with delight. i considered a narrative of facts and discovered in it a vein of interest deeper than what i found in fairy tales: for as to the elves having sought them in vain among foxglove leaves and bells under mushrooms and beneath the ground-ivy mantling old wallnooks i had at length make up my mind to the sad truth that they were all gone out of england to some savage country where the woods were wilder and thicker and the population more scant; whereas lilliputt and brobdingnag being in my creed solid parts of the earth’s surf-ace i doubted not that i might one day by taking a long voyage see with my own eyes the little fields houses and trees the diminutive people the tiny cows sheep and birds of the one realm; and the cornfields forest-high the mighty mastiffs the monster cats the tower-like men and women of the other. yet when this cherished volume was now placed in my hands—when i turned over its leaves and sought in its marvelous pictures the charm i had till now never failed to find—all was eerie and dreary ; the faints were gaunt goblins the pigmies malevolent and fearful imps gulliver a most desolate wanderer in most dread and dangerous regions. i closed the book which i dared no longer peruse and put it on the table beside the untasted tart.