I thought his smile was such as a sultan might, in a blissful and fond moment, bestow on a slave his gold and gems had enriched: I crushed his hand, which was ever hunting mine, vigorously, and thrust it back to him red with the passionate pressure.
Chapter 24 · Narrator
Context
After shopping for dresses and jewels, Jane compares Rochester's smile to that of a sultan admiring a slave he has enriched, and she violently crushes and rejects his hand.
Analysis
The orientalist simile of the sultan and slave exoticizes what Jane fears is actually happening—Rochester using wealth to purchase her—by displacing it onto a fantasy of eastern despotism. Yet her physical response is immediate and forceful: the verb 'crushed' and the detail of his hand returning 'red with the passionate pressure' turn her resistance into a kind of violence, making visible the anger beneath her articulate objections to his gifts.
Essay Tip
Use this to argue that Jane's resistance to Rochester's generosity is inseparable from her fear of becoming property—the sultan/slave simile names what the language of romantic gift-giving obscures, and her violent physical rejection shows she experiences his shopping expedition as a form of purchase.