Quotation from: Villette

Written by: Charlotte Bronte

"Was I the mistress of these girls? Did I profess to teach them the
conduct befitting ladies?--and did I permit and, he doubted not,
encourage them to strangle their mother-tongue in their throats, to
mince and mash it between their teeth, as if they had some base cause
to be ashamed of the words they uttered? Was this modesty? He knew
better. It was a vile pseudo sentiment--the offspring or the
forerunner of evil. Rather than submit to this mopping and mowing,
this mincing and grimacing, this, grinding of a noble tongue, this
general affectation and sickening stubbornness of the pupils of the
first class, he would throw them up for a set of insupportable petites
maitresses, and confine himself to teaching the ABC to the babies of
the third division."