"Discipline Prevailed: in five minutes the confusing throng was resolved into order, and comparative silence quelled the Babel clamour of tongues" (46).
When Jane is at Lowood, she is in a room filled with girls talking and chattering. As Mr. Brocklehurst walks in, the chaos is immediately toned down and the girls are behaving as they are supposed to. When Jane describes this occurance as a quelling of the "Babel clamour of tongues" she is referring to the story of Babel. In this story, a group of people try to build a tower to heaven, even though God commands them not to. In order to stop the progress of the tower, God makes the men suddenly speak different languages and sends them to different places in the world. Since the men can no longer communicate, the chaos among them is stopped. This is an effective reference for Jane to use to illustrate the power that Mr. Brocklehurst has over the girls. As soon as he walks in, the whole room silences, just as the City of Babel silenced at God's actions.
this helped a lot thank you to who wrote this :)
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