Book: The Life of Charlotte Bronte

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"You say that you suspect I have formed a large circle of
acquaintance by this time. No: I cannot say that I have. I doubt
whether I possess either the wish or the power to do so. A few
friends I should like to have, and these few I should like to
know well; If such knowledge brought proportionate regard, I
could not help concentrating my feelings; dissipation, I think,
appears synonymous with dilution. However, I have, as yet,
scarcely been tried. During the month I spent in London in the
spring, I kept very quiet, having the fear of lionising before my
eyes. I only went out once to dinner; and once was present at an
evening party; and the only visits I have paid have been to Sir
James Kay Shuttleworth's and my publisher's. From this system I
should not like to depart; as far as I can see, Indiscriminate
visiting tends only to a waste of time and a vulgarising of
character. Besides, it would be wrong to leave Papa often; he is
now in his seventy-fifth year, the infirmities of age begin to
creep upon him; during the summer he has been much harassed by
chronic bronchitis, but I am thankful to say that he is now
somewhat better. I think my own health has derived benefit from
change and exercise.

"Somebody in D---- professes to have authority for saying, that
'when Miss Bronte was in London she neglected to attend Divine
service on the Sabbath, and in the week spent her time in going
about to balls, theatres, and operas.' On the other hand, the
London quidnuncs make my seclusion a matter of wonder, and devise
twenty romantic fictions to account for it. Formerly I used to
listen to report with interest, and a certain credulity; but I am
now grown deaf and sceptical: experience has taught me how
absolutely devoid of foundation her stories may be."

I must now quote from the first letter I had the privilege of
receiving from Miss Bronte. It is dated August the 27th.

"Papa and I have just had tea; he is sitting quietly in his room,
and I in mine; 'storms of rain' are sweeping over the garden and
churchyard: as to the moors, they are hidden in thick fog. Though
alone, I am not unhappy; I have a thousand things to be thankful
for, and, amongst the rest, that this morning I received a letter
from you, and that this evening I have the privilege of
answering it.

"I do not know the 'Life of Sydney Taylor;' whenever I have the
opportunity I will get it. The little French book you mention
shall also take its place on the list of books to be procured as
soon as possible. It treats a subject interesting to all women--
perhaps, more especially to single women; though, indeed,
mothers, like you, study it for the sake of their daughters. The
Westminster Review is not a periodical I see regularly, but some
time since I got hold of a number--for last January, I think--in
which there was an article entitled 'Woman's Mission' (the phrase
is hackneyed), containing a great deal that seemed to me just and
sensible. Men begin to regard the position of woman in another
light than they used to do; and a few men, whose sympathies are
fine and whose sense of justice is strong, think and speak of it
with a candour that commands my admiration. They say, however--
and, to an extent, truly--that the amelioration of our condition
depends on ourselves. Certainly there are evils which our own
efforts will best reach; but as certainly there are other evils--
deep-rooted in the foundation of the social system--which no
efforts of ours can touch: of which we cannot complain; of which
it is advisable not too often to think.

"I have read Tennyson's 'In Memoriam,' or rather part of it; I
closed the book when I had got about half way. It is beautiful;
it is mournful; it is monotonous. Many of the feelings expressed
bear, in their utterance, the stamp of truth; yet, if Arthur
Hallam had been som what nearer Alfred Tennyson, his brother
instead of his friend,--I should have distrusted this rhymed, and
measured, and printed monument of grief. What change the lapse of
years may work I do not know; but it seems to me that bitter
sorrow, while recent, does not flow out in verse.

"I promised to send you Wordsworth's 'Prelude,' and, accordingly,
despatch it by this post; the other little volume shall follow in
a day or two. I shall be glad to hear from you whenever you have
time to write to me, but you are never, on any account, to do
this except when inclination prompts and leisure permits. I
should never thank you for a letter which you had felt it a task
to write."

A short time after we had met at the Briery, she sent me the
volume of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell's poems; and thus alludes
to them in the note that accompanied the parcel:--

"The little book of rhymes was sent by way of fulfilling a
rashly-made promise; and the promise was made to prevent you from
throwing away four shillings in an injudicious purchase. I do not
like my own share of the work, nor care that it should be read:
Ellis Bell's I think good and vigorous, and Acton's have the
merit of truth and simplicity. Mine are chiefly juvenile
productions; the restless effervescence of a mind that would not
be still. In those days, the sea too often 'wrought and was
tempestuous,' and weed, sand, shingle--all turned up in the
tumult. This image is much too magniloquent for the subject, but
you will pardon it."

Another letter of some interest was addressed, about this time,
to a literary friend, on Sept. 5th:--

"The reappearance of the Athenaeum is very acceptable, not merely
for its own sake,--though I esteem the opportunity of its perusal
a privilege,--but because, as a weekly token of the remembrance
of friends, it cheers and gives pleasure. I only fear that its
regular transmission may become a task to you; in this case,
discontinue it at once.

"I did indeed enjoy my trip to Scotland, and yet I saw little of
the face of the country; nothing of its grandeur or finer scenic
features; but Edinburgh, Melrose, Abbotsford--these three in
themselves sufficed to stir feelings of such deep interest and
admiration, that neither at the time did I regret, nor have I
since regretted, the want of wider space over which to diffuse
the sense of enjoyment. There was room and variety enough to be
very happy, and 'enough,' the proverb says, 'is as good as a
feast.' The queen, indeed, was right to climb Arthur's Seat with
her husband and children. I shall not soon forget how I felt
when, having reached its summit, we all sat down and looked over
the city--towards the sea and Leith, and the Pentland Hills. No
doubt you are proud of being a native of Scotland,--proud of your
country, her capital, her children, and her literature. You
cannot be blamed.

"The article in the Palladium is one of those notices over which
an author rejoices trembling. He rejoices to find his work
finely, fully, fervently appreciated, and trembles under the
responsibility such appreciation seems to devolve upon him. I am
counselled to wait and watch--D. V. I will do so; yet it is
harder to wait with the hands bound, and the observant and
reflective faculties at their silent and unseen work, than to
labour mechanically.

"I need not say how I felt the remarks on 'Wuthering Heights;'
they woke the saddest yet most grateful feelings; they are true,
they are discriminating, they are full of late justice, but it is
very late--alas! in one sense, TOO late. Of this, however, and of
the pang of regret for a light prematurely extinguished, it is
not wise to speak much. Whoever the author of this article may
be, I remain his debtor.

"Yet, you see, even here, Shirley is disparaged in comparison
with "Jane Eyre"; and yet I took great pains with Shirley. I did
not hurry; I tried to do my best, and my own impression was that
it was not inferior to the former work; indeed, I had bestowed on
it more time, thought, and anxiety: but great part of it was
written under the shadow of impending calamity; and the last
volume, I cannot deny, was composed in the eager, restless
endeavour to combat mental sufferings that were scarcely
tolerable.

"You sent the tragedy of 'Galileo Galilei,' by Samuel Brown, in
one of the Cornhill parcels; it contained, I remember, passages
of very great beauty. Whenever you send any more books (but that
must not be till I return what I now have) I should be glad if
you would include amongst them the 'Life of Dr. Arnold.' Do you
know also the 'Life of Sydney Taylor?' I am not familiar even
with the name, but it has been recommended to me as a work
meriting perusal. Of course, when I name any book, it is always
understood that it should be quite convenient to send it."



CHAPTER VIII

It was thought desirable about this time, to republish "Wuthering
Heights" and "Agnes Grey", the works of the two sisters, and
Charlotte undertook the task of editing them.

She wrote to Mr. Williams, September 29th, 1850, "It is my
intention to write a few lines of remark on 'Wuthering Heights,'
which, however, I propose to place apart as a brief preface
before the tale. I am likewise compelling myself to read it over,
for the first time of opening the book since my sister's death.
Its power fills me with renewed admiration; but yet I am
oppressed: the reader is scarcely ever permitted a taste of
unalloyed pleasure; every beam of sunshine is poured down through
black bars of threatening cloud; every page is surcharged with a
sort of moral electricity; and the writer was unconscious of all
this--nothing could make her conscious of it.

"And this makes me reflect,--perhaps I am too incapable of
perceiving the faults and peculiarities of my own style.

"I should wish to revise the proofs, if it be not too great an
inconvenience to send them. It seems to me advisable to modify
the orthography of the old servant Joseph's speeches; for though,
as it stands, it exactly renders the Yorkshire dialect to a
Yorkshire ear, yet, I am sure Southerns must find it
unintelligible; and thus one of the most graphic characters in
the book is lost on them.

"I grieve to say that I possess no portrait of either of my
sisters."


To her own dear friend, as to one who had known and loved her
sisters, she writes still more fully respecting the painfulness
of her task.


"There is nothing wrong, and I am writing you a line as you
desire, merely to say that I AM busy just now. Mr. Smith wishes
to reprint some of Emily's and Annie's works, with a few little
additions from the papers they have left; and I have been closely
engaged in revising, transcribing, preparing a preface, notice,
etc. As the time for doing this is limited, I am obliged to be
industrious. I found the task at first exquisitely painful and
depressing; but regarding it in the light of a SACRED DUTY, I
went on, and now can bear it better. It is work, however, that I
cannot do in the evening, for if I did, I should have no sleep at
night. Papa, I am thankful to say, is in improved health, and so,
I think, am I; I trust you are the same.

"I have just received a kind letter from Miss Martineau. She has
got back to Ambleside, and had heard of my visit to the Lakes.
She expressed her regret, etc., at not being at home.

"I am both angry and surprised at myself for not being in better
spirits; for not growing accustomed, or at least resigned, to the
solitude and isolation of my lot. But my late occupation left a
result for some days, and indeed still, very painful. The reading
over of papers, the renewal of remembrances brought back the pang
of bereavement, and occasioned a depression of spirits well nigh
intolerable. For one or two nights, I scarcely knew how to get on
till morning; and when morning came, I was still haunted with a
sense of sickening distress. I tell you these things, because it
is absolutely necessary to me to have some relief. You will
forgive me, and not trouble yourself, or imagine that I am one
whit worse than I say. It is quite a mental ailment, and I
believe and hope is better now. I think so, because I can speak
about it, which I never can when grief is at its worst.

"I thought to find occupation and interest in writing, when alone
at home, but hitherto my efforts have been vain; the deficiency
of every stimulus is so complete. You will recommend me, I dare
say, to go from home; but that does no good, even could I again
leave Papa with an easy mind (thank God! he is better). I cannot
describe what a time of it I had after my return from London,
Scotland, etc. There was a reaction that sunk me to the earth;
the deadly silence, solitude, desolation, were awful; the craving
for companionship, the hopelessness of relief, were what I should
dread to feel again.

"Dear ----, when I think of you, it is with a compassion and
tenderness that scarcely cheer me. Mentally, I fear, you also are
too lonely and too little occupied. It seems our doom, for the
present at least. May God in His mercy help us to bear it!"


During her last visit to London, as mentioned in one of her
letters, she had made the acquaintance of her correspondent, Mr.
Lewes. That gentleman says:--

"Some months after" (the appearance of the review of "Shirley" in
the Edinburgh), "Currer Bell came to London, and I was invited to
meet her at your house. You may remember, she asked you not to
point me out to her, but allow her to discover me if she could.
She DID recognise me almost as soon as I came into the room. You
tried me in the same way; I was less sagacious. However, I sat by
her side a great part of the evening and was greatly interested
by her conversation. On parting we shook hands, and she said, 'We
are friends now, are we not?' 'Were we not always, then?' I
asked. 'No! not always,' she said, significantly; and that was
the only allusion she made to the offending article. I lent her
some of Balzac's and George Sand's novels to take with her into
the country; and the following letter was written when they were
returned:"--

"I am sure you will have thought me very dilatory in returning
the books you so kindly lent me. The fact is, having some other
books to send, I retained yours to enclose them in the same
parcel.

"Accept my thanks for some hours of pleasant reading. Balzac was
for me quite a new author; and in making big acquaintance,
through the medium of 'Modeste Mignon,' and 'Illusions perdues,'
you cannot doubt I have felt some interest. At first, I thought
he was going to be painfully minute, and fearfully tedious; one
grew impatient of his long parade of detail, his slow revelation
of unimportant circumstances, as he assembled his personages on
the stage; but by and bye I seemed to enter into the mystery of
his craft, and to discover, with delight, where his force lay: is
it not in the analysis of motive; and in a subtle perception of
the most obscure and secret workings of the mind? Still, admire
Balzac as we may, I think we do not like him; we rather feel
towards him as towards an ungenial acquaintance who is for ever
holding up in strong light our defects, and who rarely draws
forth our better qualities.

"Truly, I like George Sand better.

"Fantastic, fanatical, unpractical enthusiast as she often
is--far from truthful as are many of her views of life--misled,
as she is apt to be, by her feelings--George Sand has a better
nature than M. de Balzac; her brain is larger, her heart warmer
than his. The 'Lettres d'un Voyageur' are full of the writer's
self; and I never felt so strongly, as in the perusal of this
work, that most of her very faults spring from the excess of her
good qualities: it is this excess which has often hurried her
into difficulty, which has prepared for her enduring regret.

"But I believe her mind is of that order which disastrous
experience teaches, without weakening or too much disheartening;
and, in that case, the longer she lives the better she will grow.
A hopeful point in all her writings is the scarcity of false
French sentiment; I wish I could say its absence; but the weed
flourishes here and there, even in the 'Lettres.'"

I remember the good expression of disgust which Miss Bronte made
use of in speaking to me of some of Balzac's novels: "They leave
such a bad taste in my mouth."

The reader will notice that most of the letters from which I now
quote are devoted to critical and literary subjects. These were,
indeed, her principal interests at this time; the revision of her
sister's works, and writing a short memoir of them, was the
painful employment of every day during the dreary autumn of 1850.
Wearied out by the vividness of her sorrowful recollections, she
sought relief in long walks on the moors. A friend of hers, who
wrote to me on the appearance of the eloquent article in the
Daily News upon the "Death of Currer Bell," gives an anecdote
which may well come in here.

"They are mistaken in saying she was too weak to roam the hills
for the benefit of the air. I do not think any one, certainly not
any woman, in this locality, went so much on the moors as she
did, when the weather permitted. Indeed, she was so much in the
habit of doing so, that people, who live quite away on the edge
of the common, knew her perfectly well. I remember on one
occasion an old woman saw her at a little distance, and she
called out, 'How! Miss Bronte! Hey yah (have you) seen ought o'
my cofe (calf)?' Miss Bronte told her she could not say, for she
did not know it. 'Well!' she said, 'Yah know, it's getting up
like nah (now), between a cah (cow) and a cofe--what we call a
stirk, yah know, Miss Bronte; will yah turn it this way if yah
happen to see't, as yah're going back, Miss Bronte; nah DO, Miss
Bronte.'"


It must have been about this time that a visit was paid to her by
some neighbours, who were introduced to her by a mutual friend.
This visit has been described in a letter from which I am
permitted to give extracts, which will show the impression made
upon strangers by the character of the country round her home,
and other circumstances. "Though the weather was drizzly, we
resolved to make our long-planned excursion to Haworth; so we
packed ourselves into the buffalo-skin, and that into the gig,
and set off about eleven. The rain ceased, and the day was just
suited to the scenery,--wild and chill,--with great masses of
cloud glooming over the moors, and here and there a ray of
sunshine covertly stealing through, and resting with a dim
magical light upon some high bleak village; or darting down into
some deep glen, lighting up the tall chimney, or glistening on
the windows and wet roof of the mill which lies couching in the
bottom. The country got wilder and wilder as we approached
Haworth; for the last four miles we were ascending a huge moor,
at the very top of which lies the dreary black-looking village of
Haworth. The village-street itself is one of the steepest hills I
have ever seen, and the stones are so horribly jolting that I
should have got out and walked with W----, if possible, but,
having once begun the ascent, to stop was out of the question. At
the top was the inn where we put up, close by the church; and the
clergyman's house, we were told, was at the top of the
churchyard. So through that we went,--a dreary, dreary place,
literally PAVED with rain-blackened tombstones, and all on the
slope, for at Haworth there is on the highest height a higher
still, and Mr. Bronte's house stands considerably above the
church. There was the house before us, a small oblong stone
house, with not a tree to screen it from the cutting wind; but
how were we to get at it from the churchyard we could not see!
There was an old man in the churchyard, brooding like a Ghoul
over the graves, with a sort of grim hilarity on his face. I
thought he looked hardly human; however, he was human enough to
tell us the way; and presently we found ourselves in the little
bare parlour. Presently the door opened, and in came a
superannuated mastiff, followed by an old gentleman very like
Miss Bronte, who shook hands with us, and then went to call his
daughter. A long interval, during which we coaxed the old dog,
and looked at a picture of Miss Bronte, by Richmond, the solitary
ornament of the room, looking strangely out of place on the bare
walls, and at the books on the little shelves, most of them
evidently the gift of the authors since Miss Bronte's celebrity.
Presently she came in, and welcomed us very kindly, and took me
upstairs to take off my bonnet, and herself brought me water and
towels. The uncarpeted stone stairs and floors, the old drawers
propped on wood, were all scrupulously clean and neat. When we
went into the parlour again, we began talking very comfortably,
when the door opened and Mr. Bronte looked in; seeing his
daughter there, I suppose he thought it was all right, and he
retreated to his study on the opposite side of the passage;
presently emerging again to bring W---- a country newspaper. This
was his last appearance till we went. Miss Bronte spoke with the
greatest warmth of Miss Martineau, and of the good she had gained
from her. Well! we talked about various things; the character of
the people,--about her solitude, etc., till she left the room to
help about dinner, I suppose, for she did not return for an age.
The old dog had vanished; a fat curly-haired dog honoured us with
his company for some time, but finally manifested a wish to get
out, so we were left alone. At last she returned, followed by the
maid and dinner, which made us all more comfortable; and we had
some very pleasant conversation, in the midst of which time
passed quicker than we supposed, for at last W----found that it
was half-past three, and we had fourteen or fifteen miles before
us. So we hurried off, having obtained from her a promise to pay
us a visit in the spring; and the old gentleman having issued
once more from his study to say good-bye, we returned to the inn,
and made the best of our way homewards.

"Miss Bronte put me so in mind of her own 'Jane Eyre.' She looked
smaller than ever, and moved about so quietly, and noiselessly,
just like a little bird, as Rochester called her, barring that
all birds are joyous, and that joy can never have entered that
house since it was first built; and yet, perhaps, when that old
man married, and took home his bride, and children's voices and
feet were heard about the house, even that desolate crowded
grave-yard and biting blast could not quench cheerfulness and
hope. Now there is something touching in the sight of that little
creature entombed in such a place, and moving about herself like
a spirit, especially when you think that the slight still frame
encloses a force of strong fiery life, which nothing has been
able to freeze or extinguish."


In one of the preceding letters, Miss Bronte referred to am
article in the Palladium, which had rendered what she considered
the due meed of merit to "Wuthering Heights", her sister Emily's
tale. Her own works were praised, and praised with
discrimination, and she was grateful for this. But her warm heart
was filled to the brim with kindly feelings towards him who had
done justice to the dead. She anxiously sought out the name of
the writer; and having discovered that it was Mr. Sydney Dobell
he immediately became one of her

"Peculiar people whom Death had made dear."

She looked with interest upon everything he wrote; and before
long we shall find that they corresponded.

To W. S. WILLIAMS, ESQ.

"Oct. 25th.

"The box of books came last night, and, as usual, I have only
gratefully to admire the selection made: 'Jeffrey's Essays,' 'Dr.
Arnold's Life,' 'The Roman,' 'Alton Loche,' these were all wished
for and welcome.

"You say I keep no books; pardon me--I am ashamed of my own
rapaciousness I have kept 'Macaulay's History,' and Wordsworth's
'Prelude', and Taylor's 'Philip Van Artevelde.' I soothe my
conscience by saying that the two last,--being poetry--do not
count. This is a convenient doctrine for me I meditate acting
upon it with reference to the Roman, so I trust nobody in
Cornhill will dispute its validity or affirm that 'poetry' has a
value, except for trunk-makers.

"I have already had 'Macaulay's Essays,' 'Sidney Smith's Lectures
on Moral Philosophy,' and 'Knox on Race.' Pickering's work on the
same subject I have not seen; nor all the volumes of Leigh Hunt's
Autobiography. However, I am now abundantly supplied for a long
time to come. I liked Hazlitt's Essays much.

"The autumn, as you say, has been very fine. I and solitude and
memory have often profited by its sunshine on the moors.

"I had felt some disappointment at the non-arrival of the proof-
sheets of 'Wuthering Heights;' a feverish impatience to complete
the revision is apt to beset me. The work of looking over papers,
etc., could not be gone through with impunity, and with unaltered
spirits; associations too tender, regrets too bitter, sprang out
of it. Meantime, the Cornhill books now, as heretofore, are my
best medicine,--affording a solace which could not be yielded by
the very same books procured from a common library.

"Already I have read the greatest part of the 'Roman;' passages
in it possess a kindling virtue such as true poetry alone can
boast; there are images of genuine grandeur; there are lines that
at once stamp themselves on the memory. Can it be true that a new
planet has risen on the heaven, whence all stars seemed fast
fading? I believe it is; for this Sydney or Dobell speaks with a
voice of his own, unborrowed, unmimicked. You hear Tennyson,
indeed, sometimes, and Byron sometimes, in some passages of the
Roman; but then again you have a new note,--nowhere clearer than
in a certain brief lyric, sang in a meeting of minstrels, a sort
of dirge over a dead brother;--THAT not only charmed the ear and
brain, it soothed the heart."

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