janey

fjdaoifhdiusaofhduoasfhudoipf huoid hfauosp hfiuosHale treated all his fellow-creatures alike- it never entered into his head to make and difference because of their rank. He placed a chair for Nicholas, stood up till he, at Mr. Hales request, took a seat; and called him, in variable, "Mr. Higgins," instead of the curt "Nicholas" or "Higgins," to which the "drunken infidel weaver" had been accustomed. But Nicholas was neither an habitual drunkard nor a thorough infidel. He …

…to describe him. Further on in the novel, as Thorton comes to accept his worker as equal human beings, his label for them switches from "hands" to "men." The identical thing happens in Jane Eyre. As Jane gains equal footing with Rochester, he demands that she calls him "Edward" rather than "sir." The manipulation of names reveals the shallow basis for social structure, thus confirming Brontë and Gaskell's ideas on the negativity of class prejudice.