CHAPTER I 12 succeeded .
" Wicked and cruel boy !" I said . " You are like a murderer -- you are like a slave-driver -- you are like the Roman emperors !"
I had read Goldsmith ' s History of Rome , and had formed my opinion of Nero , Caligula , & c . Also I had drawn parallels in silence , which I never thought thus to have declared aloud .
" What ! what !" he cried . " Did she say that to me ? Did you hear her , Eliza and Georgiana ? Won ' t I tell mama ? but first -- "
He ran headlong at me : I felt him grasp my hair and my shoulder : he had closed with a desperate thing . I really saw in him a tyrant , a murderer . I felt a drop or two of blood from my head trickle down my neck , and was sensible of somewhat pungent suffering : these sensations for the time predominated over fear , and I received him in frantic sort . I don ' t very well know what I did with my hands , but he called me " Rat ! Rat !" and bellowed out aloud . Aid was near him : Eliza and Georgiana had run for Mrs . Reed , who was gone upstairs : she now came upon the scene , followed by Bessie and her maid Abbot . We were parted : I heard the words -
" Dear ! dear ! What a fury to fly at Master John !" " Did ever anybody see such a picture of passion !" Then Mrs . Reed subjoined -
" Take her away to the red-room , and lock her in there ." Four hands were immediately laid upon me , and I was borne upstairs .