The Brontes

THE BRONTES 4!
outline of the Anglian cycle, or series of stories,
dramas, poems and essays which poured from
Charlotte between 1829 (when it seems that the
demon for scribbling first seized her) and 1840,
and to which Branwell contributed, but not, so
far as has been discovered, either Emily or Anne.
Already, by the end of August 1830, twenty-two
volumes had been written (these are the list repro-
duced by Mrs. Gaskell, drawn up by Charlotte
with pedantic precision and entitled " A Cata-
logue of my books with the period of their com-
pletion up to August soth., 18305") as well as a
long volume by Branwell called The History of the
Young Men, and six or more numbers of The Young
Men's Backwood Magazine, written, some by
Charlotte, some by Branwell. Most of these
books are tiny in size, so made to be in scale with
the toy soldiers, their supposed authors, not as
has so often been said because the Bronte children
were short of paper. The magazines, for instance,
are not more than one and a half inches by one
and a quarter inches, in size ; other books are
three and half inches by four inches, while some
are octavo volumes. The texts are written in a
minute hand-printing, impossible to read without
a magnifying-glass. There are elaborate title
pages, prefaces and colophons containing signa-
ture and date. The leaves are usually sewed
together inside a cover of blue or brown wrap-
ping-paper. Some of the stories have been pub-
lished in recent years, the latest publication being
of The Spell, a novel purporting to have been
written by Lord Charles Albert Florian Wellesley