“Poor Miss Jane is to be pitied, too, Abbot.”
“Yes,” reponded Abbot, “if she were a nice, pretty child, one might compassionate her forlornness; but one really cannot care for such a little toad as that.
“Not a great deal, to be sure,” agreed Bessie: “at any rate, a beauty like Miss Georgiana would be more moving in the same condition.”
“Yes, I doat on Miss Georgiana!” cried the fervent Abbot. “Little darling! – with her long curls and her blue eyes, and such a sweet colour as she has; just as if she were painted!”
– Charlotte Bronte
Jane Eyre, Chapter 3. While Jane is locked in the frightful red room for punishment, Mrs. Reed’s servants Bessie and Abbot discuss her physical appearance and lack of beauty. To them plain Jane is an ugly girl who is not pretty like her cousin Georgiana and so doesn’t deserve any compassion. They find it hard to have sympathy for the unfortunate Jane because she doesn’t have cute curls and pretty blue eyes like her cousin.