The Bewitched Parsonage The Story Of The Brontes

jii
9?'

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

By the SAME AUTHOR

SELECTED POEMS

Reproduction of a sampler made by Charlotte Bronte. Courtesy,
The Bibliographical Society and Emery Walker.

The

Bewitched
Parsona^

fe

9k %of THE BRONTES

STANLEY

BBAITHWAITE

COWARD-MCCANN,INC. NEW YORK

Copyright, 1950, by WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE

All rights reserved. This book, or parts thereof, must
not be reproduced in any form without permission.

Published simultaneously in the Dominion of Canada
by LONGMANS, GREEN & COMPANY, Toronto

MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES , OF AMERICA

Van Rees Press, New York

To EDITH
THE YOUNGEST DAUGHTER

Preface

TO TELL again the story of the Brontes is to invite
the captious eye of the literary historian. That cannot be
avoided whatever the literary subject may be. The creative
artist in literature is grist to every critic's mill. But critics
have made appropriations which have excluded the interest
of the general reader. This has been the case, and in a larger
measure, I think, with the Brontes than with any other
authors, whose lives and works have had such a long and
familiar influence upon the reading public.

The tragic drama of the lives of the Bronte family has so
colored and tempered the qualities and spirit of the Bronte
novels that, in any appraisal of the writings, it is as difficult
as it is undesirable to separate them. The fault is not in the
eager willingness to interweave the realities of the Brontes'
personal history with their creative and imaginative work,
but with the injection, arbitrarily and conclusively, of critical
ideas into the meaning and character of both the facts of
personal history and the imaginative representations of the
authors.

The general reader who has read the Bronte novels and
who hasn't? seeking enlightenment about them and their
authors, is more often than not confused by this welter of
interpretations and explanations. He wants to know about
them, but is discouraged from learning when confronted
with the tangle of subtleties that must be unwound before
reaching an understanding of the Bronte genius.

vii

PREFACE

The story herewith told of the Bronte genius has attempted
to take a straight course. In its biographical and literary
phases, it is hoped that both the information and interpreta-
tion has the quality and interest of a narrative.

The lives of the Bronte sisters are stories as intriguing as
the stories that made their novels. With every one of the
three it was a tragic story. The novels reflected this tragedy.
That is why, I think, it has been important to treat the novels
with the fullness that has been attempted here. If they over-
balance the straight biographical material, they may well
serve to extend the revelations that the private lives of the
sisters in the Haworth Parsonage yielded with such reluc-
tance. When we stop to consider that essentially all the facts
of their lives that have any validity are contained in Char-
lotte's voluminous correspondence, the novels are as im-
portant biographically as they are artistically. And Charlotte
was not above tempering her letters with her imaginative
emotions while recording the domestic life of the family.

The story of the Brontes reiterates one overwhelming
truth, and this is that life is an enigma. With some individuals
it is easily solved and forgotten. With the four Bronte chil-
dren it leaves us bewildered as it has for a centuryand only
sure of the emotions that fired them and the spirit that
winged them.

W. S. B.
New Jork, 1950

V1U

Contents

Preface vii

i. Furor Scribendi 3

n. The Bruntys of Ahaderg 12

m. Patrick Brunty into Patrick Bronte 17

iv. Irish Youth and Cornish Maid 22

v. On the West Riding 29

vi. The Wooden Soldiers 33

vn. Charlotte of Angria 38

VIH. Emily of Gondal 46

ix. The Smoldering Interval 51

x, Charic 58

xi. Emily 94

xrr. Branwell 110

xiii. First Publication: Poems by Currer, Ellis, and

Acton Bell 119

xiv. The Professor 125

ix

CONTENTS

xv. Jane Eyre 131

xvi. Shirley 144

xvn. Villette 156

XVHI. Wuthering Heights 167

xix. Agnes Grey 192

xx. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall 202

xxi. "Where Did You Get This?" 210
(A Footnote in the History of Anonymous)

EPILOGUE 215

APPENDIX 221

REFERENCES 235

Illustrations

A Sampler Made by Charlotte Bronte Frontispiece

Facing page

The Rev. P. Bronte 18

The Bronte Sisters 19

Charlotte Bronte 88

Emily Bronte 89

Anne Bronte 112

Patrick Branwell Bronte 113

Haworth Parsonage from the Church 116

Haworth Parsonage 116

View of the Moors 117

View near the "Bronte Falls 117

Haworth Church 148

Roe Head School 149

M. Constantin Heger 180

Emily's Desk and Lamp 181

Emily's Sofa, on Which She Died 181

e Villette' School 212

Bronte Bridge 213

: ' ' ' ' '. . ' . xi

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Chapter i FUROR SCRIBENDI

T.
DE creative force in man is a fugitive

one. It rises from some mysterious origin and finds sanctuary
in the blood and brain of certain individuals. In the early
Greek civilization the creative faculty was thought to be a
gift of the gods, a fire that set the imagination aflame, en-
raged the emotions. It was born of religious faith, and was
redeemed in tragedy. The poet, sculptor, dramatist of Greece
practiced his art as an appeasement of the gods ? and was in
turn touched and transfigured in the light of inspiration.
Since neither psychology nor aesthetics was known, as we
know them today, there was no attempt to probe man's
conscious or subconscious, to plumb the depths of his symbol-
ism. Aristotle was a very wise man, but even Aristotle left
this rage, this process of creation, to the gods. He certainly
would not have attempted to explain the strange phenomenon
of the Brontes, where the lightning struck many times in the
same family! Not that we can explain it today, with modern
methods of scientific investigation at our disposal, and with
psychiatry itself by way of becoming an exact science.

For Freudian analysis has thus far failed to clarify the
enigma. Nor does the Mecanisme Cerebrde of M. Nicolas
Kostyleff, that genius can be measured by a mathematical
yardstick, help us in the least. John Livingston Lowes, in his
remarkable study of Coleridge's "Kubla Khan," tries bravely

,- ; -. ' ' 3

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

to capture the elusive answer to what it is that birthmarks
some men with genius, and by-passes most of us, He goes a
long way toward solving the riddle. And the poet, William
Blake, has interpreted it as the difference between the aver-
age man and the man endowed with the most intense sensi-
bilities. But this, too, hardly seems to be the complete answer.
Many an "average" man is possessed of acute sensibility, or
susceptibility, yet cannot express it through the medium of
art. In other words, he has not been star-crossed by that fever
of the blood which heightens imagery to the point where it
communicates reality by fusing it with insight to make a sym-
bol which is itself another reality. There are psychological
factors here which, for all the advances in the practice of
science, are still fundamentally unexplained. Heredity, ex-
perience, environment, all play a role i IK ir prop.)i lions being
difficult to gauge, due in great part to the quantitative and
qualitative variations in the individuals concerned. While
one tries to detect the pattern, it falls away in one ? s hands,
dissolves as one concentrates upon it, like a mist in the sun's
rays.

But most mysterious of all are the instances in which an
entire family is stricken with genius, a family that seems to
have drunk at the same Pierian spring. There is no more
extraordinary example of such a family in all literature than
that of the Brontes, who lived in the Haworth Parsonage, on
the West Riding of England's Yorkshire, during the early
nineteenth century. The parents, Patrick Bronte and Maria
Branwell, the one from Ireland, the other from Cornwall,
were ordinary people, but within them lay sparks that
were to be touched off by the union to give us an explosion,
so to speak, of furor scribendi in their progeny.

By inheritance, tradition, and childhood experience, the

FUROR SCRIBENDI

father had traveled down Ireland's folkways. He came from
the soil; he understood the uninhibited physical appetities
of the peasant; he was imbued with the spirit of the super-
natural; he knew the tragedy of poverty that is so often akin
to comedy, comedy that is close to tragedy. Although he
rose above his environment and attended one of England's
great universities, earning a bachelor's degree in the humani-
ties, his primitive instincts never bowed entirely before the
discipline and moderation of men of birth. He remained
illiterate in his marital relations, his belief in the unquestioned
authority of the male of the species. Even when he became a
vicar in the Anglican Church, his adopted faith, his intel-
lectual and emotional attitudes had undergone little change.
No faith, of whatever kind, appears to have softened his
crude ambitious nature. He was impervious to the physical
(and spiritual) needs of his wife and children. What had
sufficed for his own meager existence as a child could suffice
for them. He seems to have nourished, even with a kind of
pride, a scorn of refined living, of all beauty manifest in
color or texture or workmanship. What was good enough
for him, he implied, was good enough for his children. Such
a philosophy, if one can dignify it by such a name, could
only make a stark and desolate atmosphere, in the home or
in the heart, for the woman who bore him six children in
seven years and died of cancer before the youngest could
call her by the name of mother. And it naturally raised a
heavy inscrutable barrier between him and the four little
ones who were to make his name immortal.

Maria Branwell, on the other hand, was born of a re-
spectable middle-class family in Penzance, Cornwall. The
family apparently had pride and tradition, and some sub-
stance. If their manners perhaps showed a slight hauteur, as

5

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

in the person of "Aunt Elizabeth," Maria's sister, it was be-
cause the Branwells were accustomed to a position in society.
The Brontes had no position in Ireland. And, even though
Patrick was a university graduate when he wooed and won
Maria, her family undoubtedly felt that he was not her
equal. As the years passed and they saw her the victim of a
ruthless helpmate, an unrestrained marriage bed, and dire
poverty, they must have said, in thought if not in words,
that it was only to be expected. But even the opportunity to
upbraid Maria for her foolhardy love, her loyalty and devo-
tion to a man who gave so little in return, was short-lived.
Eight years of marriage and Maria Branwell Bronte was
buried in the little Haworth Church, where her two eldest
daughters, Elizabeth and Maria, were soon to join her. In-
deed, Patrick Bronte was to outlive not only his wife but
all his children.

The characters of both parents were deeply affected by
their religious upbringing. Maria Branwell was born and
raised a Methodist, Patrick Bronte a Presbyterian, yet both
were united in the Episcopal Church. However, religion
dealt variously with the temperaments of Patrick and Maria.
Whereas it made her a woman of strong conscience, God-
fearing and humble, simple and sincere and uncomplaining,
in him it produced a hard core of religious zeal and moral
judgment. He carried out the laws of the Church to the final
letter. God ordained that man should marry: he had married.
God ordained that man should create from the seed of his
loins: this lie had done in full measure. What more was neces-
sary? It was not required that he sit at his wife's deathbed, or
visit his (laugh Lcr Anne when she also lay dying in Scar-
borough by the Sea, or give his daughter Charlotte away in
marriage.
6

FUROR SCRIBENDI

Charlotte and Emily Bronte have both given us a some-
what harsh opinion of an unnatural father, often directly,
more often under various disguises, as in the first chapters of
Emily's Wuthering Heights. A poem of Emily's describes him
as

bland and kind,
But hard as hardest flint the soul that lurks behind,

and she tells us he was a man who "took for granted Original
Sin and his own supreme authority/' that he was a "hard,
just judge," just according to the code she knows, unjust ac-
cording to the code she feels. Edith Ellsworth Kinsley sums
him up as "a good man, but cold, hard and ambitious. His

nature had a deep and sunless source If he was displeased,

no happy reconciliation could be had with him no ruth met
ruth. ... It is reputed that he never spoke an unkind word to
his wife, but he did not speak many. He was patient; he
prided himself on Christian forbearance; he remarked that he
was not in the habit of cherishing vexation; but his eye was a
cold blue hem, and he spoke in a tone that mortified pride."
Roamer Wilson adds, "Emily's portrait [of her father] is per-
fectly fair." This, then, was the sort of man the gentle Maria
had chosen for her husband. It was soon obvious to both that
they were peculiarly unsuited to each other, and each turned
to his appointed task: Patrick to his study and his vocation,
Maria to her childbearing and to the management of a grow-
ing family in a home darkened by illness and privation.

It is of course probable that Patrick Bronte's nature suf-
fered a sea change as he saw his own hopes and ambition
gradually reduced to naught by the exigencies of living. He
himself had fostered literary "aspirations, and undoubtedly
the overcrowded household, the disturbance of the children,

7

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

interfered with his writing. Anyway, his literary pursuits
seemed to come to an abrupt close in 1818 when he published
his fourth and last book, The Maid of Killarney. How much
did the four children, born in the cramped rooms behind the
grocery store in Thornton, who were to startle the world with
their own literary genius, owe to the ambitious Irish peasant
with his frustrated desires, and his inheritance of strong
natural instincts battened down by overwhelming odds in a
land foreign to his soul? And how much again to the quiet-
hearted mother who also dreamed of other scenes than these,
scenes shifting against a curtain of wild sea foam on the
Cornish coast? Something of both, of course, went into the
forging of the destinies of these children. From the farthest
reaches of incompatibility and disparity a man and a woman
crossed paths, and where they crossed the elements of their
natures fused to a white-hot flame of creative power, not only
once but again and again.

A like power was discernible in every one of the six chil-
dren. Even Maria and Elizabeth showed signs of possessing
it, before they fell victim to the dread disease that carried
them away in childhood, and eventually claimed Emily and
Anne. These two little girls were the first sacrifices to the in-
sensibility of the parent to the malnutrition and physical
hardship, the damp, dark house and unsanitary conditions,
that continuously endangered the health of the entire family.
Their mode of living shattered the frail immaturity of all the
children. It would seem that spirit alone was what kept some
of them alive to fulfill their appointed destinies: Anne to
write Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wild-fell Hall, Charlotte
Jane Eyre and Villette, and Emily the crowning achievement,
Wuthering Heights.
8

FURO'R SCRIBENDI

Thus, to repeat, we have in the Bronte sisters a case of mul-
tiple genius that fits no known category of interpretation.
There were obviously biologic forces unleashed that have no
adequate explanation, either in medicine or in psychiatry. It
is possible that the reason so little attempt has been made to
discover the roots of the Bronte phenomenon is t that biog-
raphers are fearful lest they should be found to lie in the
science of pathology. There are clearly disturbing symptoms
in the "behavior patterns" of any one of the Bronte children
one cares to name. An exploration into their creative faculties
is no mere simple analysis of cause and effect. It must entail
a descent into the realm of the subconscious where, in some
mystical way, the creative impulses of four members of the
same family were united in a Gordian knot. And we must
needs take under observation the strange way in which the
cords of inspiration were cut at the point where any one of
them was crossed directly by the world at large. It was as if
the currents that flowed into creative channels, illuniinating
the inner mind and spirit, blacked out as surely as if a switch
had been thrown, when other faces, other places intervened.

As children, the three sisters and the brother played at
writing with all the seriousness of adults, and with a strange
secrecy. They poured into their compositions a mental and
emotional energy out of all proportion to their scanty physical
stamina. Even more amazing than the drive itself were the
character and passion, the naive sophistication, of the tales
and romances they created. The histories of the Anglian and
Gondal Empires are tumultuous chronicles of love and revo-
lution, diplomacy and conquest, cruelty and sacrifice. They
are dream fabrications fashioned to make possible an accept-
ance of the misery and loneliness of reality. Yet into these

9

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

tales is woven a web of thought, a mature conception that
seems primal in its origins, and which can almost be trans-
lated into a philosophy. The social and psychological impli-
cations of Charlotte s Jane Eyre or Shirley, of Emily's Wvth-
ering Heights, or of Anne's The<Tenant of Wildfell Hall have
their seed in the Anglian and Gondal child's play. Angria and
Gondal were outlets for forces that could not be contained.
Although these epics were born of childhood they cannot be
said to be juvenilia. They seem to explode from an inner com-
pulsion, atavistic in nature, whose chemistry is obscurely
buried in time. The Bronte children did not live the normal
life of childhood and youth. The brief periods they were away
from home, at Cowan Bridge School, or Roe Head, or the
Heger Pensionnat in Brussels, or as governesses in the homes
of Yorkshire families, served only to heighten their desire to
return to the nest on the moors. Indeed they were alien to
any other environment than that of the West Riding. They
were attached, as by an umbilical cord, to the earth, to some-
thing primeval in nature, and to each other.

Furor scribendi! It is what possessed Emily, Charlotte,
Anne, and Branwell Bronte. It is self-explanatory and yet
erplains nothing. It is a name for a seething brew of spiritual
and emotional daring and desire. The desire to write came
as a spontaneous overflow of the imaginationan extraordi-
nary awareness of light and color, space and motion, love and
hate. The intensity of concentration needed to transfer the
imagery to paper is another miracle beyond our comprehen-
sion. It could only have come from that "crepuscular twilight' 5
where Henry James traces the subtle motivations of character
for which he is famous. But though James located this dim
region where lie the springs of our beings, he was still unable
to explain the source beyond the source, the source below all
10

FUROR SCRIBENDI

sources, from which the Bronte children received their
strength. The wine of creation boiled up from subterranean
depths we know not of , or what or where or when, and could
not be stayed short of death. There was no respite till genius
had run its tide.

11

Chapter n THE BRUNTYS OF AHADERG

J[ATRICK BRONTE, tlie father of the Bronte
children, was born in the Parish of Ahaderg, County Down,
in Northern Ireland, on March 17, 1777. Since March 17 is
the day of Ireland's patron saint, Saint Patrick, he was nat-
urally named in the saint's honor.

The family name has been variously known as Prunty,
Brunty, and Bronte, Hugh Prunty, Patrick's father, probably
changed the name to Bronte, although it has been suggested
that Patrick made the change when he registered at St.
John's College, Cambridge.

Hugh Prunty (or Bronte) had ten children, Patrick being
the eldest They were one and all remarkable for their beauty
and strength, the girls being as Amazonian as their brothers
were Herculean. ] The stock was Irish peasant, going back
many generations in the region north of the river Boyne. The
story of the family, followed to its dim sources, is filled with
tales of character and romance. Augustine Birrell, in his study
of Charlotte, published in 1887, remarked that "nobody has
even been at pains to discover anything about Charlotte
Bronte's nine uncles and aunts." Six years later, in 1893, Wil-
liam Wright published The Brontes in Ireland, or Facts
Stranger Than Fiction. Here, for the first time, was something
about Charlotte's forebears, her father and mother, as well as
her uncles "and her cousins and her aunts/* And, although
12

THE BRUNTYS OF AHADERG

Dr. Wright's book aroused considerable controversy, many of
his facts proving to be fiction, he is the only biographer who
has taken the trouble to trace the Bronte ancestry in Ireland.
All other biographers, including Mrs. Gaskell, have given
their attention to the Brontes in England. Dr. Wright relates,
with partisan enthusiasm it must be admitted, the history of
the Irish Pruntys through the two generations preceding
Emily's, and there is an atmosphere of extravagance and
wildness in his memoir which is strongly articulated in her
Wuthering Heights. In other words, the children of Patrick
Bronte and Maria Branwell must have been told many tales,
remembered and half -remembered, of their Irish heritage.

For instance, the story of Heathcliff, in Wuthering Heights,
comes straight from the Prunty household in Ahaderg*
Prunty's father, the great-grandfather of Emily and Char-
lotte, was a prosperous farmer and cattle raiser who sold his
stock in the Liverpool markets. Returning from one of his
journeys he brought with him a waif, a foundling child,
whom he proceeded to make a member of the family. Be-
cause of the boy's swarthy complexion it was believed he
might have been born in Wales, and he was given the name of
Welsh. Like Heathcliff, Welsh, when he came of age, ac-
quired the property of his benefactor, and his foster-brother,
Hugh, became his ward. And although Welsh promised to
make Hugh his heir, and give him the education that was his
due, he sent him away from his home in Drogheda to live
with an uncle in Ahaderg, where he grew up in misery. The
bitterness and resentment Hugh Prunty must have felt as a
result of such injustice undoubtedly affected his character
adversely in some ways, but it may also have been respon-
sible for making him a man of strong will and ambitious

13

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

dreams. And in addition he was endowed with a striking
personality and delightful imagination.

Although the family was Protestant for generations, Hugh
Prunty married a Catholic. Alice McClory was the "prettiest
girl in the county," and Hugh did not let her religion stand in
the way of his desire to make her his wife. Her family is said
to have objected strenuously, and the story is that the two
young people were "the chief figures in a fierce religious
drama/' They met secretly at a spot known as the Courting
Bower until betrayed by a servant, whereupon they eloped
and were secretly married.

Alice McClory was not only a pretty girl but a very in-
telligent one, and she passed on her beauty and intelligence
to her nine sons and daughters. Their first four children were
boys, Patrick, William, Hugh, and James, and the following
five were girls, Jane, Mary, Rose, Sarah, and Alice.

Dr. Wright vividly describes the daughters; "the Bronte
girls were tall, red-cheeked, fair-haired, with dark eyelashes,
and very handsome. They were massive strong-minded
women; and, as they despised men in their own rank of life,
only one of them married/ 7 His book also contains a sketch,
written by his friend, Mr. McCracken, who had known the
Pruntys: "I have seen all the sisters of Patrick Bronte except
the one that was married. They were fine, stalwart, good-
looking women, with rather a masculine build and carriage.
They were not ordinary women. They were essentially
women of character, and I think men were perhaps a little
afraid of them."

The brothers, too, have been described, with typical Irish

hyperbole, by a neighbor: "I remember seeing them as they

marched in step across the field. Their style of marching and

their whole appearance arrested our attention. They were

14

THE BRUNTYS OF AHADERG

dressed alike in homespun and home-knitted garments that
fitted them closely, and showed off to perfection their large,
lithe, and muscular forms. They were all tall men, but with
their close-fitting apparel and erect bearing they appeared
to be men of gigantic stature. They bounded lightly over all
the fences that stood in their way, all springing from the
ground and alighting together; and they continued to march
in step without apparent effort until they reached the public
road, and then began in a businesslike way to settle condi-
tions in preparation for a serious contest. . . . We had never
seen men like the Irish Brontes, and we had never heard
language like theirs. The quaint conceptions, glowing
thoughts, and ferocious epithets, that struggled for utterance
at their unlettered lips, revealed the original quarry from
which the vicar's daughters chiselled the stones for their ar-
tistic castle-building, and closed the original fountain from
which they drew their pathos and passion. Similar fierce
originality and power are felt to be present in everything
produced by the English Brontes; but in their case the inten-
sity of energy is held in check by the Branwell temperament,
and kept under restraint by education and culture.' 7 The
physical attractions of these young men were generously
bestowed on Branwell, Patrick's only son. Branwell also in-
herited other, less fortunate, family characteristics. He was
given to the outbursts of hysteria, wild eloquence, pagan
revelry, that were so much a part of the Prunty nature.

It naturally would follow that this Irish ancestry, colorful
and exciting as it was, would have a strong influence on the
imagination and writing of Hugh's grandchildren in England,
who never saw him. It undoubtedly had an effect on their
literary genius. Emily particularly seems to have drawn on
this source for much of her material and many of her char-

15

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

acters. Hugh Prunty's tales of his boyhood and youth, of his
relations with the dark-complexioned Welsh, of the upheaval
that took place in his life when he was transplanted to Aha-
derg, of the countless superstitions passed from generation
to generation, all these came down to the Bronte children in
the English parsonage through their father's retelling. He
must have told them of the wars, too, of the Battle of the
Boyne, and the Battle of Ballynahinch, where his brother had
fought. The Bruntys (or Pruntys ) were Orangemen of Ulster,
Protestants, believing in a free Ireland. Violence, then, and
passionate protest, were in the Bronte blood.

According to Dr, Wright's record, one figure in particular
was the villain of the piece. This was Gallagher, an old
servant and retainer of the family, who came to give his
entire allegiance to Welsh as Welsh gradually usurped the
family estate. It was on Gallagher, more than on Welsh, that
Hugh Prunty poured, as Dr. Wright says, "the copious vials
of the Bronte satire, scorn and hatred." Gallagher becomes
a vicious figure of talebearing, religious hypocrisy, and unc-
tuous service to his master. Gallagher is recreated as Joseph in
Wuthering Heights. Without a knowledge of Gallagher, it
would be puzzling to know where Emily, secluded and in-
experienced as she was, could have conceived the idea of the
substance and temper of Joseph's character.

When Patrick Bronte left Ireland for Cambridge he never
returned to his native land. But he carried with him a fund
of tradition and story, handed down to him by a father who
possessed, "like the bards of old," a power of illuminating the
past, And he succeeded in impressing it upon his own chil-
dren, so that the English moors of Haworth and the Irish fells
of Ahaderg became inextricably woven into the fiction and
poetry of Emily, Charlotte, and Anne.
16

Chapter m PATRICK BRUNTY

INTO PATRICK BRONTE

A.

WE have said, the nature and charac-
ter of Patrick Bronte, whatever it may have become later as
father and husband, was indelibly underscored by the peas-
ant life from which he sprang. Yet his mind, unlike the minds
of his young brothers and sisters, must have been filled with
rebellious thoughts, with a desire to escape a provincial life
bounded by farming and by tradej As the family gathered
during the long autumn evenings around the furnace in the
cabin kitchen, where the oats were roasted for the com-
munity, Patrick listened to his fathers tales of derring-do, of
the giants of Irish history, of the deeds of the Pruntys in the
great wars, and wondered why he shouldn't be a warrior of
a different kind, Something whispered that knowledge, the
knowledge obtained from books, could be an open sesame to
another world. Even this way would be hard and long, since
there was no money to send him to school. But he would
earn the money himself. He apparently made up his mind
about it very young, and he never changed his course. It
meant that the farm boy, whose horizons had for generations
been bounded by the river Boyne and the Mourne Mountains.,
was destined to attend one oAe,top greatest English uni-
versities. He was to become a-mmisi@ in the English Church.
His rooms would be lined with the books he knew and loved.

17

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Three of his four children would make original and per-
manent marks on English literature.

To earn the money necessary to buy the learning he
needed, he went to work as a handloom weaver. By the time
he was sixteen he had become very skillful, and not only was
producing enough cloth for use at home but was selling it
lsewhere, And when the production of flax was first intro-
juced in Ulster he turned to the weaving of linens, and found
excellent market in the towns nearby, Banbridge and
wry. He carried his wares as far afield as Belfast in order
taunt the larger bookstalls, and to meet others who read
looks and talked about them.

At last an incident occurred that was definitely the turning
J)oint in Patrick's life. He was lying on the grass one afternoon
fat Emdale Fort, reading aloud to the sky from Milton's Para-
$se Lost, when the Reverend Andrew Harshaw, the village
minister and schoolteacher, came by. Harshaw was so im-
pressed by the boy's obvious love of poetry, by his finding
jaad reading Milton, that he sat down with him then and there
tod suggested that Patrick do some supervised studying at
fee parsonage. "During those first years of study," Dr. Wright
s, "young Bronte never allowed himself more than four
five hours of sleep at night. He used to sit in his Uncle
chimney corner reading Ovid and Virgil and Homer
Herodotus, and working out the problems of Euclid on
hearthstone with the blackened ends of his half -burnt
s/'J Before dawn Patrick would visit Mr. Harshaw in his
Bedroom at the rectory; from there he went to his loom for a
welvc-hour work day.

As soon as Mr. Harshaw considered Patrick's studies suffi-
ciently advanced he secured him a teaching position in the
GJascar Hill Presbyterian Church School. There was a great
18

The Rev. P. Bronte. Photograph by Walter Scott, Copyright, The
Bronte Society.

The Bronte Sisters by P. B. Bronte. Copyright, National Portrait
Gallery, London.

PATRICK BRUNTY INTO PATRICK BRONTE

deal of opposition to the appointment on the part of Presby-
terian parents, Patrick's mother being Catholic. But Mr.
Harshaw took matters firmly in hand and Patrick was given
the job.

He remained at the Glascar School for some time and was
very successful with the children, who came from the homes
of farmers and tradespeople. Dr. Wright reports that "several
little country boys who began their studies under Bronte suc-
ceeded in forcing their way to the universities; and some of
them became professional men of eminence." In the mean-
time, Patrick continued his own education with Mr. Harshaw;
and it was during the same period that he began to write
poetry, intending to give the children pleasure, and inspire
them to a love of writing as well as reading. Most of the
poems appearing in Cottage Poems, published in 1811, were
written then.

But all was not smooth sailing for Patrick at the Glascar
School. An unfortunate and unnecessary entanglement with
a young girl, ona of his pupils, was responsible for the loss of
his position there. The girl was the daughter of the most
substantial farmer in the neighborhood. She was red-haired
and attractive. One of her brothers caught Patrick kissing her
and reported it at home. "War was instantly declared against
the 'mongrel' and 'papish brat' who had dared to insult their
daughter." They produced the love poems Patrick had been
writing Helen as evidence of her consent to his advances.
Helen, in the meantime, took his side against her family,
which only helped to fan the flames of battle. Everyone con-
cerned in the matter seems to have made himself somewhat
ridiculous, but it was Patrick Bronte who stood to lose the
most. Helen's father, being an influential pillar of the Glascar
church, was able to pursuade the new minister to dismiss the

19

THE BliWITCIlLl) PARSONAGE

young teacher. This was serious enough, but the effect of
Patrick's folly went even further, for it weakened the friend-
ship and devotion of Mr. Harshaw, who was severe in his
censure. Yet Mr. Harshaw's interest in Patrick and his admi-
ration for the boys intellectual curiosity were so great that he
eventually helped him obtain another position in the parish
school at Drumballyroney. At the same time, realizing that
Patrick was not likely to reach the goal they had both set for
him a university educationthrough his own Presbyterian
connections, particularly after the Glascar episode, Mr. Har-
shaw recommended that Patrick enter the Episcopal Church.
This was extraordinary advice, considering the time and the
place, and indicates an amazingly broad viewpoint, a most
generous nature, on the part of the Reverend Andrew
Harshaw.

The Reverend Thomas Tighe, Episcopal vicar of the united
parishes of Drumballyroney and Drumgooland, found Mr.
Harshaw's protege "an enthusiastic and excellent teacher/'
He was so appreciative of the young man's exceptional ability
that he trusted him with the tutoring of his own children, and
he himself continued giving Patrick the instruction he still
needed for entering the university. So a great deal of credit
is also due the Reverend Tighe, though of course not in the
same degree as Mr. Harshaw, for discovering and forwarding
Patrick Bronte s talents and ambition. The inner drive that
makes some of us rise above our conditions, our environment,
is as much a mystery as any other genius we may possess.
Patrick Bronte had it in full measure. And although Mr. Har-
shaw and Mr. Tighe were intelligent enough to spot it, and
generous enough to cultivate it, yet Patrick would have gone
where he was going by one means or another. However, it is a
great pity that there are no records of the conversations, ex-
20

PATRICK BRUNTY INTO PATRICK BRONTE

change of ideas, that must have taken place between Patrick
and his two mentors. They would be interesting from every
standpoint, and might be very illuminating in explaining the
philosophy and attitude of the man Patrick became. For, after
he settled down at Haworth as vicar, the source of those qual-
ities which lent enchantment to his nature, force to his
dreams, seemed to wither away. When life bore down on him
with relentless tragedies he could summon no inner strength
to temper them with the gentleness of acceptance, the sweet-
ness of endurance. Then he seemed to shrink from all human
warmth and sympathy, and retreat into the lonely solace of
his faith, which only succeeded in making him a colder and
more forbidding man. There is nothing to indicate such a
retreat from life in the accounts, which are very full and
delightful, of his activities between his coming down from
Cambridge and his marriage to Maria BranwelL During this
period of gaiety and hope he seemed well on his way to ful-
filling the promise that inspired Mr. Harshaw and Mr. Tighe
to believe in his future, and stirred their hearts to give him
help and courage. However, in his earlier relations with Mr.
Harshaw and Mr. Tighe, there may have been indications of
certain dark wells in his nature that drew their waters from
the difficulties and sadness, perhaps largely unconscious at
the time, of leaving his home and his family, and the fields
and streams of his native land. It is quite possible that such a
finality could demand a heavy price in later years.

21

Chapter iv IRISH YOUTH

AND CORNISH MAID

J[ATRICK BRONTE received Ms degree of
bachelor of arts at St. John's, Cambridge, in the spring of 1806.)
He must have been duly proud. But Mr. Harshaw and Mr.
Tighe were undoubtedly just as proud, since their protege
had now justified the faith and encouragement, the many
moments of anxiety, the long hours of toil, that Patrick's ad-
vancement had meant to them. For^t St. John's the boy had
immediately won honors, and had continued to pay his entire
tuition and residence with scholarships and fellowships
throughout his years at the university. Four months after his
arrival he obtained one of the Hare Exhibitions, established
by Sir Ralph Hare, for "thirty of the poorest and best dis-
posed scholars." Less than a year later he was granted one of
the Duchess of Suffolk's Exhibitions, also established for
students of poor circumstances, and both these awards were
continued through 1806 and 1807. In 1805 he won the Good-
man Exhibition. Over and above these sums from the grants,
he earned his spending money tutoring his fellow students.)

There is a complete dearth of material of any kind regard-
ing Patrick Bronte's years at Cambridge. Perhaps the only
detail we have concerning his college life is extracurricular:
since Napoleon was threatening invasion, the undergraduates
had formed a volunteer training corps, and Patrick found
himself drilling in company with Henry John Temple (Lord
22

IRISH YOUTH AND CORNISH MAID

Palmerston-to-be) and the young Duke of Devonshire. But
there is no record that Patrick formed any close friendships
among his classmates, either then or later,
In October of 1806, a few months after taking his

Patrick Bronte entered Holy Orders. He was ordained in the
Episcopal Church, and straightway became curate in the
village of Weathersfield in a remote section of Essex County.
During his three years in Weathersfield it is apparent that he
was often involved in episodes similar to the unfortunate
incident that ended his career at the Glascar School. There
was not only Mary Bruder, whom he met in the home of her
aunt, Miss Mildred Davey, where he boarded during the first
months, but, as Mr. Clement Shorter remarks, "gossip had
much to say concerning the flirtations of its Irish curate/'
both in Weathersfield and later in Dewsbury. Patrick seems
to have actually fled before his reputation, from one curacy
to the other, and, in 1811, he escaped from Dewsbury to
Hartshead, on the West Riding of Yorkshire. It was indeed
becoming high time that young Mr. Bronte should meet a
young lady who would return his sentiments in kind and
marry him forthwith, interference by fathers, uncles, brothers
to the contrary. And, fortunately, the right opportunity sud-
denly materialized, in the summer of 1812, in the person of
Maria Branwell. The courtship was whirlwind, leading to
marriage by the consent of all concerned, even an uncle! )

Maria Branwell had come to Yorkshire from Penzance,
Cornwall, to visit her uncle, the Reverend John Fennel She
was an orphan, but her father had been a well-to-do mer-
chant, the family well descended and thoroughly respected
in Penzance. Mrs. Gaskell describes Maria Branwell as "ex-
tremely small in person; not pretty, but very elegant, and
always dressed with a quiet simplicity of taste, which ac-

23

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

corded well with her general character. ... Mr. Bronte was
soon captivated by the little, gentle creature, and declared
that this time it was for life!" And this time Patrick's love did
prosper, at least until he had attained his heart's desire.
Everything conspired to forward the association and rapidly
deepening affection of the lovers. Their engagement was
thoroughly approved and blessed by Mr. Fennel, who joined
his niece in writing her sisters in Penzance, announcing the
betrothal and praising Mr. Bronte without reserve. There
were picnics and parties and meetings on the moors-and
love letters.

But it is when we come to the love letters that the first
shadow seems to fall across this bright and hopeful romance.
For although it is abundantly clear that there was a consider-
able correspondence between Patrick and Maria during the
courtship, borne witness to by Maria's own letters and her
many references to his, there is not a single letter of Patrick
Bronte's to be found. During the four months of association
before the marriage Maria wrote nine letters which we have
intact. Mr. Bronte seems to have preserved these with con-
siderable care, and many years later he gave them to Char-
lotte. Since lie was sufficiently interested to make such an
effort, why did neither Patrick nor Maria treasure the letters
he wrote her? Did Mr. Bronte deliberately destroy them? Or
did she? Or were they merely mislaid?

The nine letters Maria Branwell wrote between August 26
and December 5 clearly indicate that they were in answer to
letters received. She was not the first to write, an etiquette
quite in accord with her character and up-bringing. ''My
dear Friend," she opens her first letter, "This address is suffi-
cient to convince you that I not only permit, but approve of
yours to me I do consider you as my friend/' In her second,
24

IRISH YOUTH AND CORNISH MAID

dated September 5, "My dear Friend" has become "My dear-
est Friend," and she continues, "I have just received your
affectionate and very welcome letter, and though I shall not
be able to send this until Monday, yet I cannot deny myself
the pleasure of writing a few lines this evening., no longer
considering it a task, but a pleasure, next to that of reading
yours/' The third, September 11, begins, "Having spent the
day yesterday at Miry Shay, a place near Bradford, I had not
got your letter till my return in the evening, and consequently
have only a short time this morning to write if I send it by
this post. You surely do not think you trouble me by writing?"
However, the last two letters before her marriage do strike
the first faint notes of warning that all is not well for the
future; although the first of these, which I quote in full, is an
expression of spirit and feeling prophetic of the woman who
would one day be the mother of Emily Bronte.

My dear Saucy Pat, Now don't you think you deserve
this epithet far more than I do that which you have given
me? I really know not what to make of the beginning of
your last, the winds, and rocks almost stunned me. I
thought you were giving me the account of some terrible
dream, or that you had had a presentment of the fate of
my poor box, having no idea that your lively imagination
could make so much of the slight reproof conveyed in my
last. What will you say when you get a real, downright
scolding? Since you show such a readiness to atone for
your offenses after receiving a mild rebuke, I am inclined
to hope you will seldom deserve a severe one. I accept
with pleasure your atonement, and send you a free and
full forgiveness. But I cannot allow that your affection is
more deeply rooted than mine. However, we will dispute
no more about this, but rather embrace every opportunity
to prove its sincerity and strength by acting in every

25

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

respect as friends and fellow-pilgrims travelling the same
road, actuated by the same motives, and having in view
the same end. I think if our lives are spared twenty years
hence I shall then pray for you with the same, if not
greater, fervour and delight that I do now. I am pleased
that you are so fully convinced of my candour, for to know
that you suspected me of a deficiency in this virtue would
grieve and mortify me beyond expression. I do not derive
any merit from the possession of it, for in me it is consti-
tutional. Yet I think where it is possessed it will rarely
exist alone, and when it is wanted there is reason to doubt
the existence of almost every other virtue. As to the other
qualities which your partiality attributes to me, although
I rejoice to know that I stand so high in your good opin-
ion, yet I blush to think in how small a degree I possess
them. But it shall be the pleasing study of my future life
to gain such an increase of grace and wisdom as shall en-
able me to act up to your highest expectations and prove
to you a helpmeet. I firmly believe the Almighty has set
us apart for each other; may we, by earnest, frequent
prayer, and every possible exertion, endeavour to fulfil
His will in all things! I do not, cannot, doubt your love,
and here I freely declare I love you above all the world
besides. I feel very, very grateful to the great Author of
all our mercies for His unspeakable love and condescen-
sion towards us, and desire "to show forth my gratitude
not only with my lips, but with my life and conversation."
I indulge a hope that our mutual prayers will be answered,
and that our intimacy will tend much to promote our
temporal and eternal interest.

I suppose you never expected to be much the richer for

me, but I am sorry to inform you that I am still poorer than

I thought myself. I mentioned having sent for my books,

clothes, etc. On Saturday evening about the time you

26

IRISH YOUTH AND CORNISH MAID

were writing the description of our imaginary shipwreck,
I was reading and feeling the effects of a real one, having
then received a letter from my sister giving me an account
of the vessel in which she had sent my box being stranded
on the coast of Devonshire, in consequence of which the
box was dashed to pieces with the violence of the sea, and
all my little property, with the exception of a very few
articles, swallowed up in the mighty deep. If this should
prove the prelude to something worse, I shall think little
of it, as it is the first disastrous circumstance which has
occurred since I left home, and having been so highly
favored it would be highly ungrateful in me were I to
suffer this to dwell much on my mind.

But in the final letter, written December 5, 1812, one can
hear the beginning of doubt, misgivings, anxiety, as if, too
late, Maria BranweU is asking herself whether she is alto-
gether wise in marrying a man she has known so short a time.

So you thought that perhaps I might expect to hear
from you. As the case was so doubtful, and you were in
such great haste, you might as well have deferred writing
a few days longer, for you seem to suppose it is a matter of
perfect indifference to me whether I hear from you or not.
I believe I once requested you to }udge of my feelings by
your ownam I to think that you are thus indifferent? I
feel very unwilling to entertain such an opinion, and am
grieved that you should suspect me of such a cold, heart-
less attachment. But I am too serious on the subject; I
only meant to rally you a little on the beginning of your
last, and to tell you that I fancied there was a coolness in
it which none of your former letters had contained."

Yes, she had truly fathomed the nature of the handsome,
passionate, determined Irish lad who had spoken her so fair

27

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

at first, but was perhaps already disinterested. Was his love
the love of a man who only woos to win, and having done so
turns to pastures new or to his own affairs? If she was dis-
turbed by such premonitions she was only too rightly
disturbed. In her attempted gaiety of speech and manner
there is deep pathos. She had been attracted by the flame as
others had been before her, both men and women, and had
flown headlong into it. A few short weeks of happiness, ro-
mance, dreams that was all she had. Nine years later, having
borne her husband six children in as many years, and as in
duty bound, it was all over, for her. Yet the very fact of her
motherhood has given her name meaning in its proudest
sense. We all pray that we may be used to advance mankind
through such creative potentialities as we may possess. Maria
Bronte stands unique among those who created as it is or-
dained that women shall create.

28

Chapter v ON THE WEST RIDING

T

JL.HE WEST RIDING is the most famous part
of England's largest county, Yorkshire County. Its moors
rise a thousand feet above the valleys. They run forty miles
east and west and a hundred and fifty north and south. In
every direction they seem to roll off and over the edge of
the world. A mood of desolation, like a waiting bird of prey,
hovers above them, and never lifts even in bright sunlight.
There are no woods patching its broad reaches; no blue
lakes break the surface monotone of gray-green land. There
are several rivers: the Aire, the Sheaf, and the Don. The big
cities on the outskirts of the Riding are York, Leeds, and
Sheffield. They are large industrial cities, using the rivers as
their source of water power.

Looking across the moors on a clear day, one can see low
mountains on the horizon's edge, but the moors themselves
never lift above smoothly rolling hills. Here and there an
outcrop of granite breaks at the crest of a hill; it was on such
cragged promontories that the natives built their villages.
These moorland towns are bare of orchards and gardens.
Their stone cottages and church towers rise above lichened
walls, gray and cold against the colder sky. So the total im-
pression of the moors, spread out over Yorkshire's West Rid-
ing, is one of loneliness and indifference, of barren pride, of
stubborn refusal to submit to fertility, in other words, o

29

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

nature gone underground. They only spring to life when the
storms break, when rain or snow sweeps across them in
blinding sheets, when the wind screams in the stone crevices
and the twisted gullies of the sunken rivers. Then the dwell-
ers on the moors, few and far between, are even more isolated
from one another. The winter winds and rains hold them to
their habitations, and nature takes over.

However, although the moors are regarded as an extensive
wasteland, they are not without a muted life of their own.
There are golden plover and red grouse in the brush; there
are peewits crying low over the heather; and larks and lin-
nets sing high above it all, The ground itself holds the moors'
delicate outlines with carpets of green moss in the uneven
stream beds, with heather clothing the roll of hills with a
skintight dress of purple pink.

The seasons on the moors, except for winter, are no more
than a promise of perfection. Spring is a "whisper down the
field," summer is an Indian giver, and autumn has waved
good-by from the road without corning in. Writing to Sydney
Dobell, Charlotte Bronte said, "I know nothing of such an
orchard country as you describe. I have never seen such a
region. Our hills only confess the coming of summer by grow-
ing green with young fern and moss, and secret little hollows.
Their bloom is reserved for autumn; then they burn with a
land of dark glow, differing, doubtless, from the blush of
garden blossoms." And when she invited Mrs. Gaskell'to
visit the parsonage she also warned her, telling her she must -
only come "in the spirit which might sustain you in case you
were setting out on a brief trip to the backwoods of America.
Leaving civilization you must come out to barbarism, loneli-
ness and liberty."

Yet by strange contrast the cities of this seemingly desolate
30

ON THE WEST RIDING

region, which Charlotte considered uncivilized, were among
the first to give civilization the implements and goods neces-
sary for our material progress. Perhaps such "progress" is not"
civilization! But be that as it may, long before the turn of
the eighteenth century the West Riding had become a pros-
perous manufacturing center. Lancaster and Manchester on
the western edge of the Riding produced enough cotton
goods for the export trade. To the east, Sheffield and Leeds
were making leather goods, glass, ironware, earthenware,
woolens, and cottons. Around Bradford, in the heart of the
moorland, lay the natural resources, coal, iron, stone, being
quarried in sufficient amount for foreign trade. All this in-
dustrial ferment was well under way by the year 1820, the
year Patrick Bronte moved his family into the parsonage in
the village of HawortL

Between York and Sheffield, in the northeast corner of the
Riding, are clustered twelve or fifteen villages. Their names
are poetry, and would be poetry whether Emily and Char-
lotte had rubbed them with Aladdin's lampdust or not.
Keighley, Stanbury, Hatherage, Withens, Thornton, Birstall,
Dewsbufy, Cowan Bridge, Rawdon, Stonegappewhat
names could come more quaintly to an English tongue?
Haworth was one of them. And Haworth was to be the
hearthstone where the wild hearts of three girls would make
a light across the moors, across the world, as far as the written
word has carried their names.

On coming down from Cambridge, Patrick Bronte became
curate at Hartshead, in Yorkshire County, and remained
there for four years after his marriage. During the following
four years he was vicar at Thornton, moving to Haworth in
1820 where he was to remain until his death in 1861. The
two elder children, Elizabeth and Maria, were born at Harts-

31

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

head, the four younger, Charlotte, Branwell, Emily, and
Anne, at Thornton.

The Bronte family already numbered eight when it moved
from Thornton to Haworth in May or June of 1820. It was
only a distance of six miles as the road winds, a distance they
covered, even in the days of oxcarts, in a matter of a few
hours. Yet somehow we have come to feel that those six miles
represent far more than mere lineal distance, that they rep-
resent two worlds. Perhaps this is because, though the Brontes
had been faced with the usual hardships of poverty and
illness that were a part of the life of any poorly paid English
vicar with a rapidly growing family, they had not met the
acute sorrows that were to come to them at Haworth. For
from the day they turned their six carts, filled with children
and household goods, into the driveway of the Haworth par-
sonage, and entered the bleak, damp, stone house, darkness
and death seemed to have entered with them. Yet it was out
of that same pyre of grief and misfortune that the genius of
the children was to rise like the phoenix flown, so that what
was begun one day in Emdale Fort, when Patrick Bronte
read Paradise Lost to the high heavens, came to its fruition
in a little English village, a long way and a hard way from
its Irish birthplace. Paradise had been lost and regained.

32

Chapter vi THE WOODEN SOLDIERS

VJLucH of t the secret of the Bronte's genius
lies in the writing they did as children, when they seriously
played at being authors/ These earliest stories and poems,
letters and notes, have been so scattered, even lost, that stu-
dents of the Brontes have been largely thwarted in their
desire to get to the root of the creative forces at work in the
Bronte home during the childhood of the three girls. Biogra*
phers who had the first access to the early manuscripts failed
to make the use of them that their subsequent value would
have inspired. Later the manuscripts were distributed among
collectors and libraries. For instance, Mr. Clement Shorter,
in behalf of Thomas J, Wise, an English bibliophile, pur-
chased from Charlotte s widower, Mr. Arthur Bell Nichols,
most of the Bronte papers and letters, including a package
of stories written by the children. These stories and records
Were known to Mrs, Gaskell when she wrote her life of Char-
lotte. A considerable portion of this package of stories even-
tually fell into the hands of Mr. Henry H. Bonnell of Phila-
delphia, and came to this country. When Mr. Shorter
disposed of his collection he gave a great deal of it to the
British Museum, and smaller amounts to other collectors and
to friends. In the same way, the collection bought by Mr.
Bonnell, who recently died, was also scattered, the largest

33

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE
portion being presented to the Bronte Museum at Haworth,
and certain manuscripts being sold.

Fannie E. Ratchford made the first thorough study of the
youthful writing of the four Bronte children. Her book, The
Brontes' Web of Childhood, is an illuminating piece of re-
search among the manuscripts, which include a considerable
number of tales, dramas, poems, and novelettes, For what
was at one time being called "ir-Mgni.fLunt juvenilia" has
since assumed the importance it deserves in an analysis of
the nature and environment of the Bronte genius. On this
very attitude of earlier biographers, Miss Ratchford charges:
"It would seem that neither Mrs. Gaskell nor Mr. Shorter was
equal to the forbidding and apparently interminable task of
reading in chronological order the hundreds of pages of mi-
croscopic hand printing which guarded the secret of Char-
lotte's childhood and early womanhood. Thus they missed a
record far more revealing of the mind and genius of their
subject than the letters which they made the basis for their
biographies, and a romance more interesting than the specu-
lations that have gathered around the contradictory revela-
tions of letters and manuscripts, and chose the more under-
standable one~the letters/' *

Miss Ratchford's assertion that something was missed in
the neglect of these youthful writings, which might throw
light on the later work, is all too true. For during those forma-
tive years the Bronte children all seem to have given free
rein to an imagination that escaped into a world of fancy.
In spirit they moved away from the sadness and loneliness,
the loss of a mother to the graveyard across the wall, of a
father to a library behind closed doors and a closed heart,

* Reprinted from Fannie Elizabeth Ratchford, The Brontes Web of Child-
hood. Copyright 1941 by Columbia University Press.

34

THE WOODEN SOLDIERS

and went into a fairy realm where they played at storytelling
as simply as other children play with dolls and kites. By this
very token, that they entered into another world of illusion
with so much naturalness and joy, with the excitement of
secrecy and in the manner of playing a game with each other,
it may be said that we are too prone to call their game an es-
cape. Psychiatry may have put the word in our mouths, and
psychiatry could be wrong.

' Miss Ratchf ord, for one, discounts this accepted interpreta-
tion of the Brontes' childhood. "In contrast," she writes, "to
the oft-repeated, tragic picture of the four little Brontes,
frail, neglected, and prematurely old, crouching in terror
before the ever-threatening monsters of disease and early
death, the juvenilia show us singularly happy beings, pos-
sessed of an Aladdin's lamp through whose magic power they
transcended time and distance, walked with kings, and
swayed the destiny of mighty empires/'

Yet "the tragic picture of the four little Brontes," so often
told, is a story of fact and not of fancy. Life, and death, were
too hard and too swift in their attack for children to take. A
mother, the only individual who could hold the home to its
spiritual shape, died when her eldest of six children was only
eight; a father failed to be of solace in their time of need,
much as he may have wanted to help. The house itself was a
cheerless, poverty-stricken, unhealthy place, where sunlight
and beauty never entered. It necessarily follows that these
"singularly happy beings,'* as Miss Ratchford calls them,
could not have been happy as children should be happy, run-
ning and playing and laughing in the love and security of
parental care and encouragement. Any child of eager sensi-
bilities, and these children were gifted with the greatest
sensibility, could scarcely avoid an inward turning to the

35

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

bright warmth of the imagination. Here they find a strength
that keeps their minds and hearts from breaking. It is a talent
in which children excel: a need for play finding a way to
play. It is the parents that go into sanitariums.

The play within a play, into which the Bronte children
"escaped/' seems to have been begun on a June day in 1826.
Mr. Bronte had been to Leeds on business, and when he re-
turned he brought a present of wooden soldiers for little
Branwell Branwell shouted to his sisters to come and see the
wonderful gift. Charlotte snatched a soldier from the box and
said, "Oh, look, this is the Duke of Wellington. This shall be
my Duke/' So of course Emily chose a soldier for herself, and
said it was to he called "Gravey." And Anne said hers would
be "Waiting Boy." After that Branwell picked his favorite
and named it "Buonaparte/' From that day on the characters
of the Duke, Gravey, Waiting Boy, and Buonaparte became
the pr>la->Mi^h of an ever developing drama, filled with
romantic enchantment and symbolic significance. "In these
wooden soldiers/' Miss Ratchford continues, "the children
had at hand dramatis personae for an ever-lengthening series
of games. And as the games progressed several conceptions
tended to run together, and soldiers, literary men, artists,
prophets, and rogues fused in a complex and representative
society/' A great deal of their game they secretly confided to
little slips of paper. Writing the "inventions" down, and pass-
ing them from one to another when no one was observing
them, seemed to add greatly to the creative excitement that
had begun to take fire in the four children.

They culled many of their characters from their father's

library. They invented towns and places. There was Dream

Island, the Glass Town, and the Guinea Coast of Africa. They

peopled the towns with heroes, famous names of the day.

36

THE WOODEN SOLDIERS

The soldiers from which it all sprang took part in every epi-
sode, were present at every crisis, and were collectively
called the "Young Men." Eventually the "Young Men" be-
came the chroniclers, as well as the participants, of many a
tale. As in The Arabian Nights, the authors became genii
whose omnipotence gave them power over life and death.

The Bronte children, before and even during adolescence,
made this writing into a game in which the materials were
wholly of the mind and the emotions. The language in which
they recorded and communicated the experiences of their
"Young Men" is shot through with the same beauty and flame
that ultimately was to crystallize into the superb romances
of Charlotte's Angria" and the Angrians, the epic naturalism
of Emily's Gondal and the Gondalians. No better practice
fields could be devised for the writing of such classics as
Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.]

37

Chapter vn CHARLOTTE OF ANGRIA

jf\j TWENTY-THREE," Miss Ratchford says,
"Charlotte Bronte emerged from the strangest authorship
that ever an author served." That apprenticeship was in the
Angrian romances. Beginning with the Young Mens Play, in-
spired by the wooden soldiers, through countless ramifica-
tions of characters, scene, plot, and conflict, including the
Angrian period, Charlotte had spent thirteen years living
one Me and writing another. Much of that time she had
written in collaboration with Branwell, but the Angrian sto-
ries are almost entirely of her own devising.

Although Branwell; did not possess the genius his family
long believed him to have, he fwas a very important part of
the make-believe that inspired all four children. He had a
boy's technical and inventive sense, and "wars and rumors
of wars" were meat and drink to him. jln all BranwelTs con-
tributions to the Young Mens Play there are battles and
campaigns, skillful maneuvers, plans of attack and retreat,
He also created the political issues, the motives and ambi-
tions, that drive men to war. But his interest did not go
beyond military problems, action in the field, heroic deeds
with the sword, slaughter and blood, defeat and victory.
He was wholly absorbed in active combat. "When he ran out
of nations to conquer, kingdoms to annex, he simply invented
new ones^j farther and farther afield. He hadn't named his

CHARLOTTE OF ANGRIA

wooden soldier "Buonaparte" for nothing. And it was Bran-
well, when the possibilities of any further development of
the Young Mens Play seemed to be exhausted once and for
all, who had Napoleon Invade the vast stretch of uncivilized
jungleland lying to the east and southeast of Glass Town/'
the Young Men's capital. He arranged that an army under
Arthur Wellesley, Marquis of Duoro, should meet and defeat
the French Emperor, For this service to his country, Welles-
ley was to compel his father-in-law, the Earl of Northanger-
land, to request that the Parliament of Glass Town grant him
the rich province of Angria, under the titles Duke of Zamora,
King of Angria, and Emperor Adrian.

(Angria, this new mythical empire, was located on the
South Pacific coast of Africa. The idea for its location came
from the Reverend J. Goldsmith's A Grammar of General
Geography, a book the children used constantly in plotting
their kingdoms.": Branwell drew the specifications for the
seven provinces of Angria, each with its own capital, lord
lieutenant, and hierarchy of potentates. The Duke of Zamora
and the Earl of Northangerland were to build Adrianapolis,
the capital of the largest province and the seat of government
for the kingdom. Branwell was the deus ex machim.

, But, according to Miss Ratchford, "Charlotte shows little
interest in the geography of the new country, its political
'i-.-nl'.-'jci 1 ! and its financial resources, concerning herself
solely with the spirit of the people." It might be said that she
began to part company with Branwell when she wrote the
"poem" she called "A National Ode for the Angrians." From
that day she became increasingly more concerned with the
spirit and destiny of a people, rather than with a nation's mil-
itary prowess^ The hero of her first Angrian stories was her
soldier boy, the Duke of Wellington; but as the Angrian Em-

39

11

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

pire grew and multiplied, she replaced Wellington with, his
son, Arthur Augustus Adrian Wellesley, Duke of Zamora and
Marquis of Duora. To give Wellesley a background befitting
his station in life she wrote a thirty-eight-thousand-word
prologue, as it were, which bears the title "High Life in Ver-
dopolis," dealing with its "lords and ladies and squires of
high degree." Miss Ratchford caUs this "a delightful orgy of
Byronisin/'

jit is obvious that Charlotte, as she approached young
womanhood, was beginning to be more interested in the call
of romance than in the call to arms. The Duke of Wellington,
who won in battle, finally yielded to the Duke of Zamora, who
won in love, Zamora is "irresistible to women." Mary Percy,
the Queen, Maria Queachi, and Marian Hume, are all sub-
ject to his spell 4 And in Charlotte's portrayal of the "ladies"
of Angria, the violence of their passions, the strength of their
devotion and allegiance to lord and master, one can easily
trace the descent of Jane Eyre and Villette.^eice are the first
intimations of a feminine psychology in which sacrifice and
revolt are made the underlying principles of a woman's be-
havior when she loves all too well, if not always wisely.

Charlotte's Angrian "serial story" revolves entirely around
the stormy emotional life of the Duke of Zamora. His adven-
tures become so complicated, so intricate and entangled, that
one doubts if there was any sequence intended. Charlotte
was obviously not writing, or attempting, the novel form as
yet. The events are episodic, the characters inconsistent. To
add to the confusion, the Duke is given a dual personality.
He is a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. On one hand he slays the
women, runs the gamut of the emotional scale from gaiety to
melancholy, indulges in all the sensuous pleasures of court
life, is involved in every amorous intrigue that Charlotte can

Af\

CHARLOTTE OF ANGRIA

imagine for him; on the other, he slays the enemy, is noble
and patriotic, honored by his subjects for saving his country
in its hour of need.

Even Charlotte would appear to have lost her way in the
maze of incident and counterincident, character and lack of
character, that takes her <c down the labyrinthine ways" of
her own mind. Now and then she pauses in the rush of anec-
dote to try to slraiii^.teii her characters out, as well as her-
self. One such attempt, "Corner Dishes, Being a Small Col-
lection of Mixed and Unsubstantial Trifles in Prose and
Verse," is a hundred thousand words tossed off to explain by
chapter and verse the true nature of Angria and its aristoc-
racy. The "upper crust" society of Adrianapolis and the pro-
vincial capitals, the Duke and his friends, are sketched with
the same strokes that an artist uses in workftig up to a mas-
terpiece, the difference being that Charlotte never takes the
entire responsibility for the sketches. There is always an alter
ego. Every character, every incident, is described by still
another character in the narrative itself. By such a method
the author kills two birds with one stone, giving us a picture
of the narrator as well as his subject. She brings her early
heroes and heroines to Angria, but often in name only. Once
they have become Angrians their personalities may suffer a
sea change. As, for instance, the Rogue, who was a villain
in the Glass Town cycle, cruel and treacherous, turns up in
Angria as Alexander Percy, Earl of Northangerland, father-
in-law of the Duke of Zamora, and a man of integrity and
honor as well as substance.

In the meantime, Charlotte's devotion to BranweH, her
love and admiration for him, was undergoing a severe strain,
Branwell was going astray. He was not only becoming a

41

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

familiar of Haworth's Black Bull Tavern, and drinking to
excess, but in other ways he was indulging in habits that
were to pave the way to his downfall. Charlotte was dis-
tressed and worried. No amount of expostulation or threaten-
ing seemed to move BranwelL In fact he became the more
perverse as his sisters remonstrated with him. And it may
easily have been a desire to influence him indirectly that gave
Charlotte the idea of caricaturing him in her stories. For Pat-
rick Benjamin Wiggins, met one day by Lord Charles Welles-
ley (Charlotte's favorite raconteur) as he makes his call on
the Queen, is quite obviously BranwelL " 'My readers/ de-
clares Lord Charles, will have recognized Patrick^ Benjamin
Wiggins, that quizzical little personage whose outre manners,
and almost insane devotion to all the celebrated characters
in Verdopolis, have of late absorbed so much of public atten-
tion. His form is that of a lad of sixteen, his face that of a man
of twenty-five, his hair is red, his features not bad, for he has
a Roman nose, small mouth, and well-turned chin; his figure
too, though diminutive, is perfectly symmetrical, and of this
he seems not unconscious. A pair of spectacles garnishes his
nose, and through these he is constantly gazing at Flanagan
(Zamora's boxing master), whose breadth of shoulder ap-
pears to attract his sincere admiration, as every now and then
he touched his own with the tip of his forefinger, and pushed
out his small contracted chest to make it appear broader/ J>
Miss Ratchf ord rather doubts that Charlotte is as yet fully
aware of the "ruinous tendencies of her brother's village asso-
ciations," since the portrait of him as Patrick Wiggins is done
"without condemnations, in good-natured, teasing satire/'

However, the following passage, taken from Lord Charles's
narration, would indicate that Charlotte was truly concerned
over her brother's wayward attitude.
A.9.

CHARLOTTE OF ANGRIA

Tm rather thirsty/* Branwell remarks to Lord Charles,
"and I think 111 call for a pot of porter or a tumbler of
brandy and water at the public yonder." What he has
there is tea and bread and butter, but he returns lying
and boasting: "I feel like a lion now, at any rate. Two
bottles of Sneachf s Glass Town ale, and a double quart
of porter,, with cheese, bread and cold beef, have I de-
voured since I left you, Lord Charles, and I am not a bit
touched, only light and smart and active. I'd defy all the
danders in Christendom now that I would! and a hun-
dred goslings to boot. What were you asking me, sir?"

"I have asked you where you were born, sir, and now
I ask what relations you have?"

"Why, in a way I may be said to have no relations. I
can't tell you who my father and mother were, no more
than that stone. I've some people who call themselves
akin to me in the shape of three girls. They are honored
by possessing me as a brother, but I deny that they are
my sisters."

"What are your sisters' names?"

"Charlotte Wiggins, Emily Jane Wiggins, and Anne
Wiggins."

"Are they as queer as you?"

"Oh, they are miserable, silly creatures, not worth talk-
ing about. Charlotte's eighteen years old, a broad, dumpy
thing, whose head does not come higher than my elbow.
Emily's sixteen, lean and scant, with a face the size of a
penny; and Anne's nothing, absolutely nothing."

"What! Is she an idiot?"

"Next door to it."

"Humph! You're a pretty set/'

This dialogue is extremely revealing in many ways. It
cnakes it clear that BranwelTs lack of physical stature may

43

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

have Bad a great deal to do with his becoming a wastrel, and
particularly with his fondness for drink. For the latter made
him feel aggressive, bold and pugnacious. It drowned out the
inferiority complex, the feeling that they were "nobody" as a
family, and he was "nobody" as a man. The conversation
discloses, on the other hand, an opposite trait in Charlotte:
the saving grace that allows her to poke fun at herself. That
nice balance of nature which makes it possible for us to laugh
at ourselves, and see ourselves as others see us, is particularly
necessary in a writer. Charlotte, Emily, and Anne all had it to
a degree that saved them. Branwell was without it, and he
paid the price.

The Angrian cycle draws to a close in 1839. The Duke of
Zamora is overthrown in the course of a revolution, and, sus-
pecting the queen of playing a part in the conspiracy that led
to the rebellion, he murders her. He is promptly exiled. But
the Angrians rally under Warner Howard Warner, scion of
an ancient Angrian clan, and defeat the usurpers, restoring
Zamora to the throne. Whereupon Charlotte introduces a
new narrator, Charles Townshend, a younger son of the Duke
of Wellington, and the Angrian cycle ends triumphantly with
two outstanding narratives, one entitled "Passing Events,"
and the other bearing no name, The last is a long poem writ-
ten in the stanza form of Byron's Don Juan. It is a glowing
account of the restoration of the kingdom and Zamora's re-
turn to the throne, with the late-murdered Queen Mary at
his side. Mary, Duchess of Zamora, Queen of Angria, has
been Charlotte's favorite heroine, and she could not leave her
in the grave! She restores her to life, to the throne, and to her
husband's love and protection.

(With the end of the Angrian War," as Miss Ratchf ord
says, "Charlotte's awakening was complete, and conditions
44

CHARLOTTE OF ANGRIA

set for the maturing of her genius; fancy had given way to
an intensity of imagination that carried with it a suggestion
of the supernatural; suffering had changed adolescent roman-
ticism to passion so strong as to give the stamp of conviction
to the most impossible situations; and mere fluency of expres-
sion had developed into a characteristic style."

45

Chapter vm EMILY OF GONDAL

nr

JLHE enigma of Emily Bronte's genius
lies in the Gondal writings, which in turn grew out of the
same play instinct that she shared in common with her
brother and sisters. The actual writing is as enigmatic as the
spirit that produced it. In comparison, Charlotte's progress
can be followed quite easily as she steadily improved in
craftsmanship, as she grew in literary stature, from childhood
through adolescence into young womanhood. The Young
Mens Play, the "Glass Town" adventures, and the Angrian
romances spell out her steps. But with Emily we are continu-
ally baffled by evasions and reservations until we are re-
warded with the perfected accomplishments of her poetry
and the novel.

Most of what we know about Emily as a person, during the
early years, has had to be gathered at second hand from
Charlotte, Anne, and Branwell. And all that we know about
her writing during the same period must be discovered from
a few slight compositions that were overlooked in the whole-
sale destruction of her manuscripts. Whether Emily herself
destroyed them, or Charlotte, as has been claimed, the result
is devastatingly the same. Nothing is left for us to study but
a letter, a birthday note, a scrap of diary, and five papers in
French which she wrote as a class assignment at the Heger
Pensionnat in Brussels.
46

EMILY OF GONDAL

Yet it stands to reason that the novel, Wuthering Heights,
and the volume of poems, did not spring full-fledged from
her brain as Minerva from the forehead of Jupiter. Emily in
all probability wrote as extensively as the other three chil-
dren. She must have contributed her share to the Young
Men's Flay and "Glass Town/' And it is perhaps doubly un-
fortunate that Emily's early contributions to the imaginative
structure they built should have been lost. The very purpose
of its destruction could have been the very reason we would
find it most valuable: that it revealed more truth than make-
believe, that it explained the Bronte family as Charlotte and
Branwell were either unable, or unwilling, to unveil it. /An
analysis of Emily's character, as we get glimpses of it in her
finished work, would indicate that she must have understood
the psychological implications in human relationships far
better than the others. Although younger than Charlotte and
Branwell, she may have been more touched in spirit by the
misunderstandings of her parents, her mother's unspoken
loneliness and untimely death, the loss of the two older sis-
ters, her father's retirement into "a shell of silence/' and she
may have been more aware than Charlotte of Branweffs dis-
integration and defection.! She may even have given Char-
lotte away, as well as herself, in the matter of their attach-
ment to M. Heger, "the Professor" of the school in Brussels.
So that if it was Charlotte who destroyed the evidence, one
can see how she might have been tempted. But the loss of
what Emily trusted to paper is a cruel one in terms of literary
history.

There are many indications that Emily did not see eye to
eye with the other three in the treatment of character and
plot in the Young Men's flay and "Glass Town." The puppets
with which Branwell and Charlotte stuffed their kingdoms

47

THE BE\V ITCHED PARSONAGE

to overflowing were victims of circumstances in a prescribed
world, a world of circumstances prescribed by Branwell and
Charlotte. Through it all Emily appears to have been more
inclined to ideas, and to the development of ideas into a
formalized, definite philosophy. While Branwell built cities,
she charted human values. Emily's nature would seem to be
rooted in the primal myth of creation, in its divine mystery.
She was already something of a mystic.

Emily and Charlotte began to go separate ways, in the
spiritual sense, once they were launched on their Angrian
and Gondal "epics/' As Charlotte and Branwell discovered
Angria, Emily and Anne immediately set up a kingdom of
their own, possibly in a spirit of rivalry. Gondal, an island
continent in the North Pacific (Angria was in the South
Pacific ) , was very similar in many of its physical characteris-
tics, its wars and conquests, to Angria as was quite natural
in view of the friendly competition between the Emily- Anne
Cli.irloiU-^vaMv.c:- 1 ! romances at that time. And there were
only minor differences in the geographic and economic pat-
terns of the two empires. Angria, as we have said, was estab-
lished as an independent state by a Glass Town act of Parlia-
ment, under the Duke of Zainora, and was made up of seven
provinces ruled by lord lieutenants of the realm. Gondal, on
the other hand, had nine kingdoms and provinces, the prov-
inces being ruled by viceroys. There are revolutions, counter-
revolutions; thrones fall and are restored; men rise to power
only to die the death, But beyond this the similarity ends.
For, although the Queen, Augusta Geraldine Almeda, is a
female counterpart of the Duke of Zamora, she possesses the
strange and divine mystery of the earth. The goddess motif
enters the picture! ! One has a feeling that Greek mythology
must have had a strong influence on Emily. f
48

EMILY OF GONDAL

had very little part in the construction of Gondal,
and still less in its destiny. Beyond place names, geographic
locations, and setting up the machinery of government (more
or less copying Branwell in the process), Anne left the shap-
ing of incident and character to Emily. As Emily reached
down into the subconscious, plumbing the dark mysteries
and bright enchantments that were beginning to seethe in
her, Anne was left far behind. As Emily's spirit soared above
mere plot and adventure into the creative imagination that
shapes life into art, Anne hung more and more on Emily's
words and wrote less and less herself. Anne remained Emily's
devoted and admiring apostle, urging Emily not to forget her
Gondal people, anxiously awaiting the next installment, i

Meanwhile, in the summer of 1836, Emily's writing took
still another turn. She began to write the Gondal story in
verse, in a series of poems filled with intense passion, in
which love and liberty are the burning symbols. iThere are
two strands of creative force woven into the action of the
Gondal poetry. One deals primarily with the life revolving
in and about the Palace of Instruction, an institution em-
bodying the social and civic virtues, the social ideals, of
Gondalian society; the other dealing with the stormy joys
and sorrows of the royal lovers, Julius Benzaida and Queen
Augusta Geraldine Almeda, and their enemies Lady Angelica
and Douglas. Bitter civil strife between two political fac-
tions, the Royalists and the Republicans, keeps the country in
constant turmoil. 'And against a brilliant tapestry of love and
war the character of Queen Almeda, Emily's chief protago-
nist, changes, declares Miss Ratchford, from that of a beau-
tiful and richly endowed queen, a generous, happy girl,
hardening through indulgence of an ardent nature, into a

49

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE
selfish, cruel woman ruthlessly feeding her vanity on the souls

of men."

The Gondal tale, unfolding as it does by lyric and ballad,
instead of by narrative verse, has no clear sequence of time
or event. It is therefore extremely difficult to follow. But actu-
ally it has ceased to be important, except to the research
worker who desires to trace the fountain sources of Emily s
inspiration, whether or not we can read the Gondal poetry
as a history of Gondal. Because many of the individual poems
are immortal, they are enough to make the name of Emily
Bronte immortal. "Remembrance," a dirge for a love long
dead; "The Wanderer from the Fold," a lament for a moral
derelict, probably written with Branwell in mind; "No Cow-
ard Soul Is Mine," an expression of her own indomitable
courage; "The Visionary" and "The Prisoner," in which the
mystic speaks from the soul; and many others proving Emily s
oneness with nature have a permanent place in our literature.
It is unnecessary for the reader to attempt to comprehend
the entire Gondal manuscript, which is wholly unintelligible
in the mass, filled as it is with murder and suicide, captivity
and betrayal, war and pestilence. Much of it is the dross
remaining as childhood and adolescence burn away, leaving
the bright prophetic sparks of pure art.

50

Chapter ix THE SMOLDERING INTERVAL

JLHE last of Charlotte's Angrian stories,
written in the year 1839, were "Henry Hastings" and "Caro-
line Hernon." Anne, in a letter dated 1841, says that she is at
work on "Solala Vernon's Life/' while all we know of Emily
at this time, without the evidence of a single extant manu-
script, is that she had ceased to write the Gondal epic in prose
and was secretly writing it in verse. Branwell, in the mean-
time, had quite definitely turned from literature to the art
that was to prove a dismal failure.

The three sisters had come through an apprenticeship in
writing that cannot be matched in literary annals, and with
no self-consciousness of what it could and would mean for
their future. Professional authorship as a career was scarcely
to be hoped for by women, least of all women of their status
in the English society of that day. However, it seems to have
crossed Charlotte's mind as early as 1836, as is witnessed by
her letter to Robert Southey in December of that year. And
in January, 1837, Branwell wrote to Wordsworth, sending
him excerpts from a story he expected to develop into a
long narrative. These letters were a pitiful reaching out for
attention and encouragement from the contemporary authors
whom they read and admired from a distance, men already
appreciated by a large public, But, whatever the Brontes
hoped the seven years from 1839 to 1846, when the Poems

51

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

were published, were a smoldering interval during which
the fire of their genius was banked down, though it never
ceased to burn. May Sinclair says that it was the impressions
they took in during those years that assured their immor-
tality.

They left Haworth several times during this period, going
as students to Brussels or as governesses to the manor houses
of Yorkshire, They were separated from each other, some-
thing that must have been acutely difficult to bear after the
close, even mystical, bonds forged between them during the
years of association in their childhood literary partnership.
Already they were individuals, uncommonly perceptive, un-
commonly sensitive, and it is not so strange that the experi-
ences of tie outside world were to be screened, through what
one might call a kind of clairvoyance, into an essence of cre-
ative insight And it is in her voluminous letters to Ellen Nus-
sey, and her briefer correspondence with Mary Taylor, that
Charlotte Bronte has left us an extensive record of the im-
pressions made on her by the places and persons of another
world than Haworth.

Emily and Anne were seeing the world, too, through other
eyes than Charlotte's. Their impressions were colored and
tempered by the deep imprint the moods and mystery of
the moors had long since made on their hearts. For the two
younger sisters felt a stronger kinship to the wild beauty of
Yorkshire s West Riding than Charlotte had ever felt. Even
when Charlotte wrote her "prose hymn" to the earth, in
Shi.'ky, it \vtis Emily speaking through her. It was Emily who
understood that only freedom of communion with nature can
establish a bond between the temporal and the eternal.
During her brief and infrequent absences from Haworth,
Emily became the more convinced that mankind is what
52

THE SMOLDERING INTERVAL

fails man; that man must turn inward to his own soul to be
sustained; that only nature can give him the faith to live;
that men cannot rely on each other to achieve a common goal
of happiness.

During the years 1839 to 1846, as we have said, the yeast
of experience was beginning to have its effect on the Bronte
genius, causing it to turn, as it were. There is a distinct
change in the tone of Charlotte's letters to Ellen Nussey.
Something creeps into them that is almost fey, a spirit of
wildness that might burst from its crysaHs at any moment.
One such letter bears quoting in full for its charming play
with words:

"The wind bloweth where it listeth. Thou hearest the
sound thereof, but cannot tell whence it cometh, nor
whither it goeth." That I believe, is Scripture, though in
what chapter or book, or whether it be correctly quoted,
I can't possibly say. However, it behooves me to write a
letter to a young woman of the name of E., with whom I
was once acquainted, "in life's morning march, when my
spirit was young." This young woman wished me to write
her some time since, though I have nothing to say I e'en
put it off, day by day, till at last, fearing that she will
"curse me by her gods/' I feel constrained to sit down and
tack a few lines together, which she may call a letter or
not as she pleases. Now if the young woman expects sense
in this production, she will find herself miserably disap-
pointed. I shall dress her a dish of salmagundi I shall
cook a hash compound a stew toss up an omelette
soufflee & la frangaise, and send it to her with my re-
spects. The wind, which is very high up in our hills of
Judea, though I suppose, down in the Philistine flats of B.
parish it is nothing to speak of, has produced the same ef-
fects on the contents of my knowledge-box that a quaigh

53

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

of usequebaugh does upon those of most other bipeds.
I see everything couleur de rose, and am strongly inclined
to dance a jig, if I knew how. I think I must partake of a
pig or an ass-both animals are strongly affected by a high
wind. From what quarter the wind blows I cannot tell,
for I never could in my life; but I should very much like
to know how the great brewing-tub of Bridlington Bay
works, and what sort of yeastly froth rises just now on the
waves.

Of the three sisters, Charlotte had the most worldly ex-
perience in "the years between/* In 1839 she had two pro-
posals of marriage. She passed through the crucial and criti-
cal interlude at the Heger Pensionnat in Brussels. She tasted
humiliation as a governess in the home of the Sidgwicks at
Stonegappe, and later with Mrs. White at Rawdon. All this,
coming so closely after the imaginative saturation in the
Angrian romances, which were still echoing in her spirit,
must have affected her powerfully, though perhaps less
severely than similar experiences were to affect Emily and
Anne. At least Charlotte (hear Charlotte tell it in her letters! )
was never as homesick, as overcome with nostalgia for Ha-
worth, as were the two younger girls. Ellen Nussey, and
even Mr. Williams, heard a great deal from Charlotte about
the unhappiness of Emily and Anne when away from home.
Their acute misery when cut off from the moors and the
winds of Yorkshire was as much a subject for Charlotte's
voluminous letter writing as were her own aches and pains,
though there is a surplus of the latter, also. Charlotte might
well be called a hypochondriac, and yet her obsession with
matters of health is most natural when one considers the
family's propensity to serious illness.

Emily was only away from Yorkshire during the eight
54

THE SMOLDERING INTERVAL

months' stay in Brussels, in 1842. Her school days at Cowan
Bridge and Roe Head were behind her then, as were the six
months she spent as a teacher in Halifax. In her preface to
the posthumous edition of Emily's works, Charlotte describes
the Brussels experience in its effect on Emily:

After the age of twenty, having meantime studied
alone with diligence and perseverance, she went with me
to an establishment on the continent. The same suffering
and conflict ensued, heightened by the strong recoil of
her upright heretic and English spirit from the gentle
Jesuitry of the foreign and Romish system. Once more
she seemed sinking, but this time she rallied through the
mere force of resolution: with inward remorse and shame
she looked back on her former failure, and resolved to
conquer, but victory cost her dear. She was never happy
till she carried her hard-won knowledge back to the re-
mote English village, the old parsonage-house, and deso-
late Yorkshire hills.

I have referred elsewhere to the five essays that Emily
wrote in French as a class assignment at the Pensionnat.
These have been lately translated for the first time, and pub-
lished by the University of Texas. They are, as Miss Ratch-
ford says in her foreword to the collection, "in a very real
sense autobiographical, sketching the fullest and clearest
self-portrait we have of Emily.' 7 In one of %em, "A Letter
from One Brother to Another," Emily reveals the agony of
her exile even more poignantly than Charlotte had done it
for her:

I have crossed the ocean; I have traveled in several
countries; I have been the poorest of the poor, ill among
strangers without being able to offer the works of my
hands in exchange for the bread that I was eating. Some-

55

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

time I have enjoyed luxuries and all the pleasures that
they can afford their possessor, but always alone, always
friendless, with no one to love me. I never thought of
being reconciled with you, however. I did not want to
enjoy again that concord of soul, that sweet and calm
happiness of our childhood. Or if that thought came to
me sometimes, I drove it out of my mind as unworthy
and dcra(]m<i weakness.

At last my soul and body being worn out with wander-
ing, my bark shaken with so many tempests, I longed to
gain a harbor. I resolved to end my days where they had
begun, and I longed to see again the native heath and the
home so long abandoned.*

I should like to repeat, and italicize, a sentence from this
letter which seems to me to express the deepest core of what
it was that made Emily so miserably unhappy away from
Haworth: '7 have been ...ill among strangers without being
able to ofer the works of my hands in exchange for the bread
that I was eating!' It was the household duties she missed
most urgently, the work that gave her a sense of usefulness
and fulfillment in the community, and in the parsonage itself.
Helping Tabby in the kitchen, kneading bread and peeling
potatoes, washing and ironing, sweeping and dusting the
beloved rooms, these were the acts that focused the hands
and the heart into an excuse for being. It is not strange then
that in faraway Brussels, as she dreamed of the "remote Eng-
lish village" and the "desolate Yorkshire hills," all the impres-
sions that swept upon her in the midst of a busy school life
in a foreign land should have distilled into the cry, "I long
to gain a harbor!" She had already mapped and charted a

* "A Letter from One Brother to Another" by Emily Bronte is reprinted
from Five Essays by Emihj Bronte with the permission of the Walter Marion
Manly III Publication Fund.

56

THE SMOLDERING INTERVAL

harbor on the coast of Eternity, and the craft that was to
carry her there was built, hull, sails, and compass, out of the
native heath and home without which she would have been
lost in the sea of life.

As for Anne, she was in some ways more responsive to the
faintest currents of emotion than her sisters. During her im-
pressionable years, she was for a long time governess at the
Robinson home in Thorp Green, where Branwell joined her
as tutor of the Robinson boys. It was here she felt the barbs
of cruel condescension and callous indifference that were
to be the motif of her first novel. "She waited in silence and
resignation," May Sinclair wrote, "and then told her own
story in Agnes Grey" She was also more hurt, more deeply
wounded, by BranwelTs failure to live up to all his sisters
had trusted him to be. It was Anne who took it upon her
conscience to blame herself, more perhaps than Rranwell, for
his maladjustment and breakdown. Hence we have The Ten-
ant of Wild-fell Hall; as if she owed the world an example in
order that others might steer a better course. Anne had
schooled herself to a fortitude only matched by Emily's. But
she had done it in travail, in the secret regions of her soul,
where she battled with, even against, her destiny. Anne had
fallen in love with the sea at first sight. It answered some-
thing fundamental in her character. It was therefore only
f ! i s ", , . she should die within the sound of its breakers.

57

Chapter x CHARLOTTE

V^HAHLOTTE BKONTE was born at Thornton,
in the Yorkshire West Riding, on April 21, 1816. When she
was four years old, Patrick Bronte became curate of Ha-
worth; and Haworth parsonage was to be Charlotte's home
for the rest of her life, until her death at thirty-nine. Maria
Bronte died very shortly after the family moved to Haworth,
and the six children were, to all intents and purposes, left
orphans. Mr. Bronte was not a natural father, any more than
he had been a natural husband. Disappointed in his dreams
of one day being a name in scholastic and literary pursuits,
or in the church itself, bound down by the burdens and re-
sponsibilities of multiple parenthood, while seeming to ex-
perience none of its joys, Patrick Bronte had become a dour,
God-fearing man who retired into his lonely study and his
own thoughts for what cold comfort life still afforded him.
His motherless children were shut out, silenced, and left to
grow up as best they could. The eldest, Maria, became the
"little mother" of the parsonage. She was sweet and good by
nature, and accepted the overwhelming responsibility of
caring for the five younger children in a way that would have
done credit to someone much older. She even taught the little
ones to read and write. Though Mr. Bronte made some at-
tempt to hear the children's lessons, die teaching and prep-
aration fell to Maria. It is reasonable to believe that the work
58

CHARLOTTE

and anxiety, the strain and undernourishment, of the years
following their mother s death paved the way for the tuber-
culosis that took the two oldest, Maria and Elizabeth, at the
ages of twelve and eleven, and Emily and Anne at thirty-one
and thirty.

Shortly after Mrs. Bronte's death, Tabitha Ackroyd, a
middle-aged woman from Haworth village, came into the
household to help with the menial tasks. This was the famous
Tabby, the Tabby who appears under various guises Nelly
Dean, Rachel, Mrs. Pryor-in the novels of Emily, Charlotte,
and Anne. Charlotte and her sisters truly loved Tabby. They
had a great respect for Aunt Elizabeth, Maria's sister, who
came eventually to live with them, but they did not love her
as they loved Tabby. Aunt Elizabeth was not their kind.
She could never understand how her nieces could prefer
books to pretty clothes, running on the moors to the society
of other children. She was painstaking in her attempts to
teach them sewing and embroidery and knitting. And in
these homely arts Charlotte was her most apt pupil, acquir-
ing a skill that stood her in great stead in later years when
she went out in service, as governess or companion.

Charlotte's childhood, until she went to school at Cowan
Bridge in 1824, in no way differed outwardly from that of
her sisters and brother. She listened, as they did, to Maria's
reading aloud of tie Leeds Intelligencer, and discussed pub-
lic affairs, and the important names of the day, with a gravity
beyond her years. N Though there were books in their father s
study which the children were allowed to read, and the
Leeds newspaper and Blacktoootfs Magazine came to the
parsonage regularly, there were no toys, no dolls or art ma-
terials-until the advent of the wooden soldiers-to waken
childish fancies or stir creative activities. Beauty, of color or

59

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

shape, was lacking in the dark house. What the children
found of these was on the moors. The wild countryside was
their true nursery. Their father completely discouraged as-
sociation with the village children, for what reason it is
difficult to say. Was it because, remembering his own peasant
childhood, he wanted to avoid contact with it? Did he feel
he had so risen above his class that he preferred his children
never to know its vulgarity, its ignorant prejudice and super-
stition?

In 1824, Charlotte and Emily followed Maria and Eliza-
beth in attendance at the Reverend Carus Wilson's School at
Cowan Bridge, founded for the daughters of poor clergymen.
The bad conditions of the school, sanitary and dietary,
brought the older girls down with fevers, which their frail
constitutions could not overcome, and soon after their with-
drawal in the spring of 1825, both Maria and Elizabeth died.
Charlotte remained at the school for less than a year, but it
left an indelible impression on the child of eight, as we know
from her description of Lowood School in Jane Eyre. It is
inteiostinjr that her school report is still extant: "She writes
indifferently. Ciphers a little and works neatly. Knows noth-
ing of 'T./ivi iv. geography, history, or accomplishments.
Altogether clever for her age, but knows nothing system-
atically."

After the tragic illness and death of Maria and Elizabeth,
which were largely due, as noted above, to the desperately
unhealthy and miserable conditions at Cowan Bridge, Mr.
Bronte withdrew Charlotte and Emily in June of 1825, and
for the next six years Charlotte studied at home under her
father and Aunt Elizabeth, At fif teen she again went away to
school, this time to Miss Wooler's School at Roe Head, which
lies between Leeds and Huddersfield, less than twenty miles
60

CHARLOTTE

from Haworti^, Mrs. Gaskell describes Charlotte at that time as
"a quiet, thoughtful girl, very small in figure ( 'stunted' was the
word she applied to herself), but her limbs and head were in
just proportion to her slight, fragile body." She had "soft,
thick brown hair, and peculiar eyes/ 7 Mrs. Gaskell goes on
to say, "which I find it difficult to describe. They were large
and well-shaped, their color a reddish brown, but if the iris
was closely examined it appeared to be composed of a va-
riety of tints. The usual expression was one of quiet, listening
intelligence, but now and then, on some just occasion for
vivid interest or wholesome indignation, a light would shine
out, as if some spiritual lamp had been kindled, which
glowed behind those expressive orbs. I never saw the like in
any human creature. As for the rest of her features, they
were plain, large and ill-set, but unless you began to cata-
logue them you were hardly aware of the fact, for the eyes
and power of the countenance over-balanced every physical
defect; the crooked mouth and the large nose were forgotten,
and the whole face arrested the attention Her hands and
feet were the smallest I ever saw. When one of the former
was placed in mine it was like the soft touch of a bird in the
middle of my palm. The delicate long fingers had a peculiar
fineness of sensation, which was one reason why all her
handiwork, of whatever kind writing, sewing, knittingwas
so clear and minute. She was remarkably neat in her whole
personal attire., dainty as to the fit of her shoes and gloves."
(At Miss Wooler's School, Charlotte made her first friends
outside the family' circle, two of them, Ellen Nussey and
Mary Taylor, becoming lifelong friends.jThe voluminous cor-
respondence resulting from these friendships, particularly
with Ellen Nussey, has been the one most important means
whereby we discover Charlotte as she thought and felt in the

61

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

obscure years of her childhood and adolescence. Miss Wooler
herself, though beginning as Charlottes teacher, was to
prove, in affection and devotion, more a mother than anyone
Charlotte had known since the loss of her own.

Charlotte spent the better part of a year and a half at Miss
Wooler's School, and her shortcomings, as recorded on the
Cowan Bridge report card, were quickly observed at Roe
Head. Both Ellen Nussey and Mary Taylor, in after years,
were to comment on her lack of rudimentary and systematic
knowledge, but they said she had a fund of general informa-
tion, a wide reading in literature, a familiarity with public
affairs, that were the envy of her fellow students. She also
won a reputation as a storyteller, revealing her Irish heritage
in a slight brogue remarked by Mary Taylor. As Mary wrote
Mrs. Gaskell:

We thought her very ignorant, for she had never learnt
grammar at all, and very little geography. ... But she
would confound us by knowing things that were out of
our range altogether. She was acquainted with most of
the short pieces of poetry that we had to learn by heart;
would tell us the authors, the poems they were taken
from, and sometimes repeat a page or two. She had a
habit of writing in italics (printing characters), and said
she had learnt It by writing in their magazine. They
brought out a "magazine" once a month, and wished it
to look as like print as possible. She told us a tale out of
it. No one wrote in it, and no one read it, but herself, her
brother, and two sisters. She promised to show me some
of these magazines, but retracted afterwards, and would
never be persuaded to do so. In our play hours she sate,
or stood still, with a book if possible. Some of us once
urged her to be on our side in a game at ball. She said she
had never played, and could not play. We made her try,
62

CHARLOTTE

but soon found that she could not see the ball, so we
put her out. She took all our proceedings with pliable in-
difference, and always seemed to need a previous resolu-
tion to say "no" to anything. She used to go and stand
under the trees in the playground, and say it was pleas-
anter. She endeavoured to explain this, pointing out the
shadows, the peeps of sky, etc. We understood but little
of it. She said that at Cowan Bridge she used to stand in
the burn, on a stone, to watch the water flow by. I told
her she should have gone fishing; she said she never
wanted to. She always showed physical feebleness in
everything. She ate no animal food at school. It was about
this time I told her she was very ugly. Some years after-
wards, I told her I thought I had been very impertinent.
She replied, "You did me a great deal of good, Polly, so
don't repent of it!"

Charlotte left Roe Head in June of 1832, and her corre-
spondence with Ellen Nussey began as soon as she had re-
turned to Haworth parsonage. Mrs. Gastell remarks on the
absence of hope which, she says, forms "such a strong charac-
teristic in Charlotte." In a letter dated July 21, 1832, Char-
lotte describes her daily life: "An account of one day is an
account of all. In the morning, from nine o'clock till half past
twelve, I instruct my sisters, and draw; then we walk till
dinner-time. After dinner I sew till tea-time, and after tea I
either write, read, or do a little fancy work, or draw, as I
please. Thus, in one delightful, though somewhat monoto-
nous course, my life is passed. I have been only out twice to
tea since I came home. We are expecting company this after-
noon, and on Tuesday next we shall have all the female
teachers of the Sunday School to tea." One cannot but be
struck by the omission of any reference to what she was writ-

63

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

ing, for we do know that the Joung Mens Play and the
Angrian romances, in which she had been engaged before
going to Roe Head, had been resumed as soon as she re-
turned, and were to be continued during the next three years
until her return to Miss Wooler's School as a teacher.

When Charlotte did return to Miss Wooler's School, this
time to teach, Emily accompanied her as a pupil. But Emily
only remained three months. She was desperately unhappy
and homesick during this brief interlude away from the par-
sonage, and was rapidly failing in health and spirit when
Charlotte fortunately intervened to have her called home.
Writing of the episode, though in retrospect, Charlotte
showed a concern and affection for her younger sister that is
most admirable and most touching/It does, in fact, reveal a
quality of Charlotte's character that is essential in an under-
standing of her whole nature, and therefore bears quoting:

My sister Emily loved the moors. Flowers brighter than
the rose bloomed in the blackest of the heath for her;
-out of a sullen hollow in a livid hill-side, her mind could
make an Eden. She found in the bleak solitude many and
dear delights; and not the least and best-loved was lib-
erty. Liberty was the breath of Emily s nostrils; without
it she perished. The change from her home to a school,-
and from her own very noiseless, very secluded, but un-
restricted and unartificial mode of life, to one of disci-
plinary routine (though under the kindest auspices), was
what she failed in enduring. Her nature proved here too
strong for her fortitude. Every morning, when she woke,
the vision of home and the moors rushed on her, and
darkened and saddened the day that lay before her. No-
body knew what ailed her but me. I knew only too well.
In this struggle her health was quickly broken: her white

64

CHARLOTTE

face, attenuated form, and failing strength, threatened
rapid decline. I felt in my heart she would die, if she did
not go home, and with this conviction obtained her recall.

It is clear that at nineteen Charlotte was already assuming
the family leadership. Someone certainly needed to step
into a breach that had never been satisfactorily filled since
the death of Mrs. Bronte. Charlotte felt that the need was
there, and tried her best to remedy the situation. It made
her overly anxious, and overly aggressive, for her age. For
instance, this first important step into taking family affairs
into her own hands produced a crisis that almost ended her
great friendship with Miss Wooler. After seeing that Emily
was taken home, she brought Anne to the school instead.
But Anne also became very ill there, and Charlotte thought
Miss Wooler took her illness far too lightly. If it had not been
for Miss Wooler's good sense, and mature emotional under-
standing of Charlotte's attitude, there would undoubtedly
have been an end of a fine relationship, the sort of rela-
tionship Charlotte herself needed in all its aspects. But even
though there was a reconciliation of sorts^ there was never
again the same warmth of trust that had previously existed.
Charlotte s championship of Anne, her anger over Miss
Woole/s apparent neglect of a serious matter, burned so
deeply that it was to be the cause, much later, of Charlotte's
refusal to take the school when Miss Wooler wished to retire.
Her letter to Ellen Nussey at the time of the misunderstand-
ing indicates how deeply she was affected:

You were right in your conjectures respecting the cause
of my sudden departure, Anne continued wretchedly ill,
neither the pain nor the difficulty of breathing left her,
and how could I feel otherwise than very miserable. I
looked on her case in a different light to what I could

65

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

wish or expect any uninterested person to view it in.
Miss Wooler thought me a fool, and by way of proving
her opinion treated me with marked coolness. We came
to a little eclaircissement one evening. I told her one or two
rather plain truths, which set her a-crying; and the next
day, unknown to me, she wrote papa, telling him that I
had reproached her bitterly, taken her severely to task,
etc. Papa sent for us the day after he had received her
letter. Meantime I had formed a firm resolution to quit
Miss Wooler and her concerns for ever; but just before I
went away, she took me to her room, and giving way to
her feelings, which in general she restrains far too rigidly,
gave me to understand that in spite of her cold, repulsive
manners, she had a considerable regard for me, and
would be very sorry to part with me. If any body likes me,
I cannot help liking them; and remembering that she had
in general been very kind to me, I gave in and said I
would come back if she wished me. So we are settled
again for the present, but I am not satisfied. I should have
respected her far more if she had turned me out of doors,
instead of crying for two days and two nights together.
I was in a regular passion; my "warm temper" quite got
the better of me, of which I don't boast, for it is a weak-
ness; nor am I ashamed of it, for I had reason to be angry.
Anne is now much better, though she still requires a
great deal of care. However, I am relieved from my worst
fears respecting her. I approve highly of the plan you
mention, except as it regards committing a verse of the
Psalms to memory. I do not see the direct advantage to
be derived from that. We have entered on a new year.
Will it be stained as darkly as the last with all our sins,
follies, secret vanities, and uncontrolled passions and
propensities? I trust not; but I feel in nothing better,
neither humbler nor purer. It will be three weeks next
66

CHARLOTTE

Monday to the termination of the holidays. Come to see
me, dear Ellen, as soon as you can; however bitterly I
sometimes feel towards other people, the recollection of
your mild, steady friendship consoles and softens me. I
am glad you are not such a passionate fool as myself.

Meanwhile, Emily had taken a teaching position at Law
Hill, near Halifax, where her general duties were so difficult
as to make her, in Charlotte's opinion, *a slave." Also the
anxiety over BranwelTs future was becoming critical, so that
when Charlotte left Miss Wooler's she made up her mind to
put the family exchequer on a substantial footing. How else,
except by what they earned, could Branwell achieve his des-
tiny? Charlotte's faith in BranwelTs genius was as yet unim-
paired. But for the daughters of a poor clergyman in the
early Victorian era the field of employment was definitely
limited. One could be a teacher or a governess, a governess
or a teacher. A governess was a combination of nursemaid,
seamstress, and teacher. But she had tried teaching, and
though many of the associations at Miss Wooler's had been
pleasant and beneficial, yet she was wearied in spirit by the
attempt to inculcate the young with knowledge, infuse them
with ambition. So she now decided to try the only other al-
ternative, that of being a governess in a family, although she
had an intense dislike for very young children where disci-
pline was a necessary part of the routine.

In April, 1839, she sent Anne off to Mirfield to be governess
in the home of Mrs. Blake of Blake Hill. Emily came back
from Law Hill to take care of things at home. And she her-
self went as governess to the Sidgwicks at Stonegappe, Her
experiences as a governess were for the most part shattering
to Charlotte's nature. From the parsonage doorstep she had
gone forth to school and employment a dreamer, her head

67

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

full of wishful thinking. When the dreams came in direct
contact and conflict with reality, she was filled with the aches
of doubt and frustration, and these in turn made a rebel of
her. She rebelled, first of all, against the attitude of employer
toward employee. She did not understand that such a tone of
social superiority was not directed against her personally,
that it was the conventional one of the period. She felt hu-
miliated, and she struck back. Her opinion of the Sidgwicks
is succinctly expressed in a letter to Emily:

I have striven hard to be pleased with my new situa-
tion. The country, the house, and the grounds are, as I
have said, divine. But, alack-a-day! there is such a thing
as seeing all beautiful around you and not having a free
moment or a free thought left to enjoy them in. The chil-
dren are constantly with me, and more riotous, perverse,
unmanageable cubs never grew. As for correcting them,
I soon quickly found that was entirely out of the ques-
tion: they are to do as they like. A complaint to Mrs. Sidg-
wick brings only black looks upon oneself, and unjust,
partial excuses to screen the children. I have tried that
plan once. It succeeded so notably that I shall try it no
more. I now begin to find that she does not intend to
know me, that she cares nothing in the world about me
except to contrive how the greatest possible quantity of
labour may be squeezed out of me, and to that end she
overwhelms me with oceans of needlework, yards of cam-
bric to hem, muslin night-caps to make, and, above all
things, dolls to dress. I do not think she likes me at all,
because I can't help being shy in such an entirely novel
scene, surrounded as I have hitherto been by strange and
constantly changing faces. I see now more clearly than I
have ever done before that a private governess has no
existence, is not considered as a living and rational being

68

CHARLOTTE

except as connected with the wearisome duties she has
to fulfil. While she is teaching the children, working for
them, it is all right. If she steals a moment for herself
she is a nuisance, Nevertheless, Mrs. Sidgwick is uni-
versally considered an amiable woman. Her manners are
fussily affable. She talks a great deal, but as it seems to
me not much to the purpose. Perhaps I may like her
better after a while. At present I have no call to her, Mr.
Sidgwick is, in my opinion, a hundred times better less
profession, less bustling condescension, but a far kinder
heart. It is very seldom that he speaks to me, but when he
does I always feel happier and more settled for some min-
utes after. He never asks me to wipe the children's smutty
noses or tie their shoes or fetch their pinafores or set
them a chair. One of the pleasantest afternoons I have
spent here indeed, the only one at all pleasantwas
when Mr. Sidgwick walked out with his children, and I
had orders to follow a little behind. As he strolled on
through his fields, with his magnificent Newfoundland
dog at his side, he looked very like what a frank, wealthy,
Conservative gentleman ought to be. He spoke freely and
unaffectedly to the people he met, and though he in-
dulged his children and allowed them to tease himself
far too much, he would not suffer them grossly to insult
others.

Vnd, a week later, she writes to Ellen Nussey:

I must not bother you too much with my sorrows, of
which, I fear you have heard an exaggerated account. If
you were near me, perhaps, I might be tempted to tell
you all, to grow egotistical, and pour out the long history
of a private governess's trials and crosses in her first situ-
ation. As it is, I will only ask you to imagine the miseries
of a reserved wretch like me thrown at once into the

69

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

midst of a large family, proud as peacocks and wealthy
as Jews, at a time when they were particularly gay, when
the house was filled with company-all strangers: people
whose faces I had never seen before. In this state I had a
charge given of a set of horrid children, whom I was ex-
pected constantly to amuse, as well as instruct. I soon
found that the constant demand on my stock of animal
spirits reduced them to the lowest state of exhaustion; at
times I felt-and, I suppose seemed-depressed. To my
astonishment, I was taken to task on the subject by Mrs.
Sidgwick, with a sternness of manner and a harshness
of language scarcely credible. Like a fool, I cried bitterly.
I could not help it; my spirits quite failed me at first. I
thought I had done my best, strained every nerve to
please her; and to be treated that way, merely because I
was shy and sometimes melancholy, was too bad. At
first I was for giving all up and going home. But after a
little reflection, I determined to summon what energy I
had, and to weather the storm. I said to myself, "I had
never y e t quitted a place without gaining a friend; adver-
sity Is a good school; the poor are born to labour, and the
dependent to endure/ 7 1 resolved to be patient, to com-
mand my feelings, and to take what came; the ordeal, I
reflected, would not last many weeks, and I trusted it
would do me good. I recollected the fable of the willow
and the oak; I bent quietly and now I trust the storm is
blowing over. Mrs. Sidgwick is generally considered an
agreeable woman; so she is, I doubt not, in general so-
ciety. Her health is sound, her animal spirits good, con-
sequently she is cheerful in company. But oh! does this
compensate for the absence of every fine feeling, of every
gentle and delicate sentiment? She behaves more civilly
to me now than she did at first, and the children are a
little more manageable; but she does not know my char-
70

CHARLOTTE

acter, and she does not wish to know it I have never had
five minutes conversation with her since I came, except
when she was scolding me. I have no wish to be pitied
except by yourself.

Charlotte had left the Sidgwicks, and little wonder, by the
midsummer of 1839, but the experience, as Mr. Shorter says,
"rankled for many a long day." 'It is not necessary to assume
any very serious inhumanity on the part of the Sidgwicks/*
he added. "Hers was hardly a temperament adapted for that
docile part; and one thinks of the author of Villette, possessed
of one of the most vigorous prose styles in our language, con-
demned to a perpetual manufacture of night-caps, with
something like a shudder." But it is quite possible that Char-
lotte would not have become the great novelist she became
unless she had cut her teeth on the rough edges of personal
friction. The shrewd analyses of character growing out of her
associations at Miss Wooler's, the Sidgwicks, the Whites
(where she went for a short term after her service at the
Sidgwicks), all contributed a quantity of grist to Charlotte's
creative mill Her relationship to others forced upon her a
keen sense of self, giving her an aptitude for self-analysis that
also added greatly to her genius. For instance, she wrote
EUen:

I have some qualities that make me very miserable,
some feelings that you can have no participation in-that
few, very few people in the world can at all understand.
I don't pride myself on these peculiarities. I strive to con-
ceal and suppress them as much as I can, but they burst
out sometimes, and then those who see the explosion
despise me, and I hate myself for days afterwards. . . .
You have been very kind to me of late, and have spared
me all those little sallies of ridicule, which, owing to my

71

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

miserable and wretched touchiness of character, used for-
merly to make me wince, as if I had been touched with a
hot-iron; things that nobody else cares for enter my mind
and rankle there like venom. I know these feelings are
absurd, and therefore I try to hide them, but they only
sting the deeper for concealment. .

f Rebellious and passionate, endowed with a blazing imagi-
aation and sensitive perceptions, Charlotte Bronte found it
difficult to curb her headstrong nature, which had a tendency
to become vindictive when too directly crossed.

It is always futile to speculate on what might have been
if so-and-so had happened instead of such-and-such. Yet one
cannot but suppose that Charlotte's life would have turned
out quite differently had she married at the first opportunity.
If she had married in 1839, she would have escaped much of
the travail that beset her during the following years, and yet
she would have had to sacrifice the very things that were to
be her salvation. For all her unstable emotional make-up,
Charlotte was calculating and wise when it came to her
deep-rooted ambitions. Somewhere at the outer fringes of
her consciousness she felt that one or another of the Brontes,
perhaps Emily or Branwell, even possibly herself, was fated
to make the name of Bronte a name to be conjured with.
While love was one thing she craved, with a pure and exalted
idea of its completeness, she did not intend to compromise
either her love or her future by becoming just another poor
curate's wife in order to have a roof over her head, or to
escape being a spinster.)

Charlotte's first proposal came from Ellen Nussey's

brother, Henry Nussey, the curate at Bonnington. Mr. Nus-

sey proposed by letter, as did her second suitor, Mr. Price,

a young Irish clergyman, not long from Dublin University,

72

CHARLOTTE

and who was also a curate of the neighborhood. This method
of communicating one's fondest hopes to the object of
one's affections seems to have been the custom of the day.
I suppose it was intended to give the young lady in question
an opportunity to marshal her thoughts and phrase accept-
ance or refusal in terms that would do both of them justice.
Certainly Charlotte took full advantage of the opening to
express herself with due consideration for Mr. Nussey, and
for his sentiments, at the same time making her own argu-
ment for the opposition quite effective. The letter she wrote
him bears quoting in full:

My dear sir, Before answering your letter I might
have spent a long time in consideration of its subject;
but as from the first moment of its reception and perusal
I determined on what course to pursue, it seemed to me
that delay was wholly unnecessary. You are aware that I
have many reasons to feel grateful to your family, that
I have peculiar reasons for affection towards one at least
of your sisters, and also that I highly esteem yourself-
do not therefore accuse me of wrong motives when I say
that my answer to your proposal must be a decided nega-
tive. In forming this decision, I trust I have listened to the
dictates of conscience more than to those of inclination.
I have no personal repugnance to the idea of a union with
you, but I feel convinced that mine is not the sort of dis-
position calculated to form the happiness of a man like
you. It has always been my habit to study the characters
of those amongst whom I chance to be thrown, and I
think I know yours and can imagine what description of
woman would suit you for a wife. The character should
not be too marked, ardent, and original, her temper
should be mild, her piety undoubted, her spirits even and
cheerful, and her personal attractions sufficient to please

73

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

your eyes and gratify your just pride. As for me, you do
not know me; I am not tlie serious, grave, cool-headed in-
dividual you suppose; you would think me romantic and
eccentric; you would say I was satirical and severe. How-
ever, I scorn deceit, and I will never, for the sake of
attaining the distinction of matrimony and escaping the
stigma of an old maid, take a worthy man whom I am
conscious I cannot render happy. Before I conclude, let
me thank you warmly for your other proposal regarding
the school near Bonnington. It is kind in you to take so
much interest about me; but the fact is, I could not at
present enter upon such a project because I have not the
capital necessary to insure success. It is a pleasure to me
to hear that you are so comfortably settled and that your
health is so much improved. I trust God will continue His
kindness towards you. Let me say also that I admire the
good-sense and absence of flattery and cant which your
letter displayed. Farewell. I shall always be glad to hear
from you as a friend.

And to Ellen, who wrote asking whether she had received
her brother's letter, she also wrote an explanation:

I have, about a week since. The contents, I confess, did
a little surprise me, but I kept them to myself, and unless
you had questioned me on the subject, I would never
have adverted to it. Now, my dear Ellen, there were in
this proposal some things which might have proved a
strong temptation, I thought if I were to marry Henry
Nussey, his sister could live with me, and how happy I
should be. But again I asked myself two questions: Do
I love him as much as a woman ought to love the man she
marries? Am I the person best qualified to make him
happy? Alas! Ellen, my conscience answered no to both
these questions. I felt that though I esteemed, though I
74

CHARLOTTE

had a kindly leaning towards him, because lie is an ami-
able and well-disposed man, yet I had not, and could not
have, that intense attachment which would make me will-
ing to die for him; and, if ever I marry, it must be in that
light of adoration that I will regard my husband. Ten to
one I shall never have the chance again; but nimporte.
Moreover, I was aware that Henry knew so little of me
he could hardly be conscious to whom he was writing.
Why, it would startle him to see me in my natural home
character; he would think I was a wild, romantic en-
thusiast indeed. I could not sit all day long making a
grave face before my husband. I would laugh, and sat-
irise, and say whatever came into my head first. And if
he were a clever man ? and loved me, the whole world
weighed in the balance against his smallest wish should
be light as air. Could I, knowing my mind to be such
as that, conscientiously say that I would take a grave,
quiet young man like Henry? No, it would have been de-
ceiving him, and deception of that sort is beneath me.

The second proposal, from Mr. Price, Charlotte took
lightly, as was only natural, since it came after a single call
at the parsonage in which the young curate had accom-
panied his vicar on a visit to Mr. Bronte. And telling Ellen
of the incident, she dismissed matrimony from her life once
and for all!

A few days after, I got a letter, the nature of which
puzzled me, it being in a hand I was not accustomed to
see. Evidently it was neither from you nor Mary, my only
correspondents. Having opened and read it it proved to
be a declaration of attachment and proposal of marriage
from the sapient young Irishman! I hope you are laugh-
ing heartily. This is not like one of my adventures, is it?
It more nearly resembles Martha's. I am certainly doomed

75

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

to be an old maid. Never mind, I made up my mind to
that fate ever since I was twelve years old. Well! I
thought, I have heard of love at first sight, but this beats
all. I leave you to guess what my answer would be, con-
vinced you will not do me the injustice of guessing wrong.

By 1841 there was little hope that Branwell would make a
way for himself, or be anyone that his sisters could turn to
for either moral or financial support. Charlotte insisted that
he seek employment, and he did attempt a clerkship in the
railway, a job which turned out to be a dismal failure. Poor
Charlotte was at her wit's end to devise a plan whereby she
and Emily and Anne could remain together and yet gain
sufficient livelihood to keep body and soul together. She
herself no longer wanted to work as a governess, and teach-
ing, at least tinder such conditions as she had previously en-
countered, was also to be avoided if possible. Anne's health
was no better, and Charlotte was constantly worried about
her, particularly while Anne was enduring such drudgery
and hardship at the Robinsons, where she had gone after
two years with the Blakes at Mirfield. At this point it oc-
curred to Charlotte that the three of them might open a
school of their own; and Miss Wooler, who remained in close
touch with Charlotte, and who had been considering retire-
ment for some time, now offered to step down in her favor.
Charlotte was coolly appreciative of the offer, in her de-
tached way, but was not ready to accept it, apparently hav-
ing other plans already formulated. "I am not going to
Dewsbury Moor," she wrote Ellen, "as far as I can see at
present. It was a decent proposal on Miss Wooler's part, and
cancels all or most of her little foibles, in my estimation; but
Dewsbury Moor is a poisoned place to me; besides I burn
to go somewhere else. I think, Nell, I see a chance of getting
76

CHARLOTTE

to Brussels." If she was going to conduct a school of her own,
one can only suppose she felt the need for further training in
French, and possibly German. If she could raise the money
necessary for taking over the school at Dewsbury Moor she
could certainly raise a sufficient amount to go abroad, even
take Emily along.

With the thought of going to Belgium we find Charlotte in
a mood of delighted anticipation quite alien to her usual
lack of hope. The idea had been suggested by Martha Tay-
lor, Mary's sister, who was herself at school in Brussels. But
now the question was, where to raise the money for the un-
dertaking. Aunt Elizabeth had been ready to help financially
in the acquisition of Miss Wooler's School Could she be
made to see that it was as important, possibly more impor-
tant, to invest money in furthering her niece's education?
She would have to be persuaded. Charlotte had her heart
set on going abroad. She wrote Aunt Elizabeth, and the
letter is a self-portrait of Charlotte as she was that day, Sep-
tember 29, 1841, when her hopes were at the crossroads of
their fulfillment. Mr. Clement Shorter published the letter
for the first time from the original, which was in possession
of Charlotte's widower, Arthur Bell Nichols; I reproduce it
here:

Dear Aunt, I have heard nothing of Miss Wooler yet
since I wrote to her intimating that I would accept the
offer. I cannot conjecture the reason of this long silence,
unless some unforeseen impediment has occurred in con-
cluding the bargain. Meantime, a plan has been suggested
and approved by Mr. and Mrs. White, and others, which
I wish now to impart to you. My friends recommend me,
if I desire to secure permanent success, to delay com-
mencing the school for six months longer, and by all

77

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

means to contrive, by hook or crook, to spend the inter-
vening time in some school on the continent. They say
schools in England are so numerous, competition so great,
that without some such step towards superiority we shall
probably have a very hard struggle, and may fail in the
end. They say, moreover, that the loan of one hundred
pounds, which you have been so kind as to offer us, will,
perhaps, not be all required now, as Miss Wooler will lend
us the furniture; and that, if the speculation is intended
to be a good and successful one, half the sum, at least,
ought to be laid out in the manner I have mentioned,
thereby insuring a more speedy repayment both of in-
terest and principal.

I would not go to France or to Paris. I would go to
Brussels, in Belgium, The cost of the journey there, at
the dearest rate of travelling, would be five pounds; liv-
ing there is little more than half as dear as it is in Eng-
land, and the Lc il lies for education are equal or superior
to any other place in Europe. In half a year, I could ac-
quire a thorough familiarity with French. I could improve
greatly in Italian, and even get a dash of German, L e.,
providing my health continued as good as it is now.
Martha Taylor is now staying in Brussels, 'at a first-rate
establishment there. I should not think of going to the
Chateau de Knockleberg, where she is resident, as the
terms are much too high; but if I wrote to her, she, with
the assistance of Mrs. Jenkins, the wife of the British
Consul, would be able to secure me a cheap and decent
residence and respectable protection. I should have the
opportunity of seeing her frequently, she would make me
acquainted with the city; and, with the assistance of her
cousins, I should probably in time be introduced to con-
nections far more improving, polished, and cultivated,
than any I have yet known.

78

CHARLOTTE

There are advantages which would turn to vast ac-
count, when we actually commenced a school and, if
Emily could share them with me, only for a single half-
year, we could take a footing in the world afterwards
which we can never do now. I say Emily instead of Anne;
for Anne might take her turn at some future period, if
our school answered. I feel certain, while I am writing,
that you will see the propriety of what I say; you always
like to use your money to the best advantage; you are not
fond of making shabby purchases; when you do confer a
favor, it is often done in style; and depend upon it fifty
pounds, or one hundred pounds, thus laid out, would be
well employed. Of course, I know no other friend in the
world to whom I could apply on this subject except
yourself. I feel an absolute conviction that, if this advan-
tage were allowed us, it would be the making of us for
life. Papa will perhaps think it a wild and ambitious
scheme; but who ever rose in the world without ambi-
tion? When he left Ireland to go to Cambridge Univer-
sity, he was as ambitious as I am now. I want us all to go
on. I know we have talents, and I want them to be turned
to account. I look to you, aunt, to help us. I think you will
not refuse. I know, if you consent, it shall not be my
fault if you ever repent your kindness. With love to all,
and the hope that you are well, Believe me, dear aunt,
your affectionate niece.

Aunt Elizabeth generously granted the loan, and in Feb-
ruary, 1842, Mr. Bronte accompanied Charlotte and Emily
to Brussels, entering them in the Pensionnat Heger, in the rue
dlsabelle. The pensionnat was in the charge of Madame
Heger, but her husband conducted the classes in literature,
and taught Latin at the Royal Athenee, a boy's school nearby.

The six months at the Heger Pensionnat were the happiest

79

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

months of Charlotte's life. Her spirit rose to its brightest; her
understanding of others developed to its fullest extent; she
made friends widely. Among her closest friends were num-
bered Mrs. Jenkins., wife of the British Consul, Dr. Wheel-
wright and his two daughters, and of course Martha Taylor,
who had inspired Charlotte to come to the pensionnat, being
a pupil there herself. Dr. Wheelwright was in Brussels for
his health, and his daughters were day students at the school.
One of them, Letitia Wheelwright, became a lasting friend.
Emily, unfortunately, held aloof from these outside pleasures
and associations; in fact, Charlotte's friends were shocked at
her lack of sociability. But Emily was homesick, besides
which, she had come abroad to study and would not be di-
verted Mr. Shorter says that both sisters went to Brussels to
learn, and that "they did learn, with energy. But it was their
first experience of foreign travel, and it came too late in life
for them to enter into it with that breadth of mind, and tol-
erance of the customs of other lands, lacking which the
Englishman abroad is always an offense."

Aunt Elizabeth died in October of 1842, and Charlotte and
Emily hurriedly returned to Haworth. They found that Aunt
Elizabeth's will, after distribution of all personal belongings,
divided an estate of fifteen hundred pounds among her four
nieces: Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Bronte, and Elizabeth
Jane Kingston, the daughter of another sister. With this leg-
acy, Charlotte and her sisters were to enjoy their first eco-
nomic freedom. And it meant that Charlotte, only a few
months later, returned as on wings to the Heger Pensionnat.

This second journey to Brussels has, as everyone knows, led

to the wildest controversy. Mr. Shorter has preferred to say

that it gave rise to "speculation, some of it not of the pleas-

antest kind/' though he agrees with May Sinclair that it is

80

CHARLOTTE

ridiculous to assume that Charlotte was in love with M.
Heger. Not even Charlotte's own words had been able to
convince Mr. Shorter and Miss Sinclair: "I returned to Brus-
sels after Aunt's death against my conscience, prompted by
what then seemed an irresistible impulse. I was punished for
my selfish folly by a total withdrawal, for more than two
years, of happiness and peace of mind." To what else could
this refer except to an attachment that drew her as a flame
draws a moth, and for which she payed with a burning heart.
We know that on returning to Haworth, in December of
1843, she entered a period of anguished sufferings, when
longing and pride battled within. There were nights of sleep-
lessness and torture, days of hope for the letters that never
came, long talks with Emily, her only confidante. Charlotte
was, as Esther Chadwick says, 'wrestling with the experi-
ence that caused her to leave Brussels for the last time." Yet,
even as she wrestled with her conscience, she continued to
write to M. Heger. M. Heger, meanwhile, carelessly disposed
of her letters * in the waste-paper basket, from which they
were surreptitiously rescued by Madame Heger and pre-
served in her jewel box. Had Charlotte not become a famous
novelist her letters to M. Heger, as those to Ellen Nussey or
Mary Taylor, would have been gone with the wind. But as
it was, M. Heger's son, Paul, into whose hands the letters
ultimately fell, preserved them as a national treasure, and
finally presented them to the British Museum. They were
published in the London Times of July 29, 1913.

No one at Haworth except Emily was aware that Char-
lotte had left at least a half of herself behind in Brussels,
that she had been torn from someone she loved. But, as
usual, she communicated her grief to Ellen:

* See Appendix.

81

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

I suffered much before I left Brussels. I think, however
long I live, I shall not forget what the parting with M.
Heger cost me. It grieved me so much to grieve him who

had been so true, kind, and disinterested a friend

I do not know whether you feel as I do, but there are
times now when it appears to me as if all my ideas and
feelings, except a few friendships and affections, are
changed from what they used to be: something in me ?
which used to be enthusiasm, is tamed down and broken.
I have fewer illusions; what I wish for now is active exer-
tiona stake in life. Haworth seems such a lonely, quiet
spot, buried away from the world. I no longer regard my-
self as young indeed, I shall soon be twenty-eight; and
it seems as if I ought to be working and braving the rough
realities of the world, as other people do. It is, however,
my duty to restrain this feeling at present, and I will
endeavor to do so.

The "active exertion" that was to win her "a stake in life"
was actually just around the corner. Fate, having played
havoc with her heart, was now to set her feet on the path of
fame. In 1845 the fever of creative energy that had used to
warm them as children was again to seize upon Charlotte,
Emily, and Anne. The result was an explosion of genius
unparalleled in literary annals. From Charlotte's pen came
The Professor, from Emily's Wuthering Heights, and from
Anne's Agnes Grey.

Charlotte's first novel, The Professor, was rejected by a
number of the publishers, but it paved the way for the pub-
lication of Jane Eyre, which followed in rapid succession. Yet
even with Jane Eyre in print it was some little time before
there was any personal triumph of success. In the first place,
the novel appeared under Charlotte's earlier pseudonym,
82

CHARLOTTE

Currer Bell, used for the poetry. Even Ellen Nussey and Mary
Taylor were unaware o their friend's authorship. Only Emily
and Anne knew the truth. Branwell was to die without ever
knowing. And it was not until the book was by way of being
what we would today call a best seller, critics to the contrary,
that Mr. Bronte was informed of his daughter's achievement.
The conversation between father and daughter is given by
Mrs. Gaskell in her biography:

When the demand for the work had assured success to
Jane Eyre, her sisters urged Charlotte to tell their father
of its publication. She accordingly went into his study one
afternoon, after his early dinner, carrying a copy of the
book, and two or three reviews, taking care to include an
adverse notice.

She informed me that something like the following
conversation took place between them. (I wrote down
her words the day after I heard them, and I am pretty
sure they are quite accurate. )

"Papa, I've written a book."

"Have you, my dear?"

"Yes; and I want you to read it."

"I am afraid it will try my eyes too much.**

"But it is not in manuscript; it is printed,"

"My dear! you've never thought of the expense it will
be! It will be almost sure to be a loss, for how can you
get a book sold? No one knows you or your name/*

"But papa, I don't think it will be a loss; no more will
you, if you will just let me read you a review or two, and
tell you more about it"

So she sat down and read some of the reviews to her
father; and then giving him a copy of Jane Eyre that she
intended for him, she left him to read it. When he came in

83

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

to tea, lie said, "Girls, do you know Charlotte has been
writing a book, and it is much better than likely?"

Charlotte began her third novel in the first flush of Jane
Eyres success, but it was while she was writing Shirley
that death again came on terrible wings and took three more
of the Bronte family! It seems truly incredible that any one
family could have been so singled out for both tragedy and
immortality, the two extremes of our scale of human values.
As fame flew in one window of the parsonage the souls of
Branwell, Emily, and Anne left by another. ;BranwelTs last
two years had been so fraught with illness, despair, delusions
and ravings, he had been so wasted and bitter, that death
was almost welcome. Charlotte had ceased to be interested
in what happened to him. She continued to pity him in a
way, but her disappointment in him, and her aggravation
over his follies and uselessness, far exceeded her sympathy
with his suffering. !

It was quite another matter when it came to the loss of
Emily and Anne. Here agony of soul descended upon Char-
lotte, and it was only by a miracle of fortitude and spiritual
strength that she rose to continue her appointed tasks ; \No
more than three months after Branwell's death, Emily was
prey to the tuberculosis that had in all probability been lying
dormant in every Bronte child since the sad days when Maria
and Elizabeth had been its victims.) And Emily had no more
than been laid in the crypt under the aisle of the church next
door when Anne began to fail. In a desperate effort to save
her, Charlotte took her to the sea at Scarborough. But it was
too late. Anne was also gone before the spring of 1849 had
passed. After her death Charlotte was close to collapse, and
in order to recuperate, went to stay with a friend, a Mrs. Hud-
84

CHARLOTTE

son, at Easton. And it was here, after a period of rest in
pleasant and happy surroundings, that she went back to her
writing, picking up Shirley where she had left off the year
before. But the return to Haworth was inevitable; again she
was swept down by the memories, by desuetude of spirit
and searing grief. Her heroism in the face of adversity re-
mained with her, for she wrote Ellen Nussey a letter of sur-
passing sadness, yet sustained with the will to survive:

I do not much like giving an account of myself. I like
better to go out of myself, and talk of something more
cheerful. My cold, wherever I got it, whether at Easton
or elsewhere, is not vanished yet. It began in my head,
then I had a sore throat, and then a sore chest, with a
cough, but only a trifling cough, which I still have at
times. The pain between my shoulders likewise amazed
me much. Say nothing about it, for I confess I am much
disposed to be nervous. This nervousness is a horrid phan-
tom. I dare communicate no ailment to Papa; his anxiety
harasses me inexpressibly.

My life is what I expected it to be. Sometimes when I
wake in the morning, and know that Solitude, Remem-
brance, and Longing are to be almost my sole compan-
ions all day through that at night I shall go to bed with
them, that they will long keep me sleepless that next
morning I shall wake to them again, sometimes, Nell, I
have a heavy heart of it. But crushed I am not, yet; nor
robbed of elasticity, nor of hope, nor quite of endeavour.
I have some strength to fight the battle of life. I am
aware, and can acknowledge, I have many comforts,
many mercies. Still I can get on. But I do hope and pray,,
that never may you, or any one I love, be placed as I am.
To sit in a lonely room the clock ticking loud through a
still house and have opened before the mind's eye the

85

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

record of the last year, with its shocks, sufferings, losses-
is a trial I write to you freely, because I believe you will
hear me with moderation that you will not take alarm
or think me in any way worse off than I am.

Shirley was finished in September, 1849, and Mr. James
Taylor, of the editorial department of Smith, Elder, visited
Haworth to pick up the manuscript. His visit was to be the
beginning of another romance for Charlotte, again one-sided,
which led to several urgent proposals on the part of the per-
sistent Scotchman. If Mr. Taylor had not been sent to Bom-
bay to open a branch office for his firm, it is quite possible
that Charlotte might have one day surrendered, for, after
nine months of remembrance, Charlotte could say of him,
"This little Taylor is deficient neither in spirit nor sense." That
was high recommendation from Charlotte!

The publication of Shirley and the interest stirred by Jane
Eyre made Charlotte somewhat of a literary celebrity. She
was invited to London and was given a little social whirl,
becoming acquainted with the artistic life of the great
metropolis. She went up to town at least four times during
the next months, and was always the house guest of Mr.
George Smith, the head of Smith, Elder, and his mother, at
their houses on Gloucester Terrace, Bishop's Place, and West-
bourne Place, Hyde Park. It was in their home that Charlotte
first met Thackeray, whom she so greatly admired, having
said that he possessed a ''Titan of a mind." And when she
discovered that Harriet Martineau, author of Deerbrook, was
the Smiths' nearby neighbor, she sent her a copy of Shir-
ley and was invited to tea in consequence., The incident was
the beginning of a short friendship between them which
went on the rocks after Miss Martineau criticized Shirley too
86

CHARLOTTE

severely. However, before the break, Charlotte was to visit
Miss Martineau at Ambleside in the Lake District, and
thereby have the opportunity of meeting Mrs. Thomas
Arnold, widow of the famous headmaster of Rugby, and
her son, Matthew Arnold. She was not well impressed by
either. "Mrs. Arnold's manner/' she wrote James Taylor, "on
introduction disappointed me sensibly, as lacking that gen-
uineness and simplicity one seemed to have a right to expect
in the chosen life-companion of Dr. Arnold. On my remark-
ing as much to Mrs. Gaskell and Sir J. K. Shuttleworth, I was
told for my consolation that it was a 'conventional manner/
but that it vanished on closer acquaintance; fortunately this
last assurance proved true. It is observable that Matthew
Arnold, the eldest son, and author of the volume of poems
to which you allude, inherits Ms mother's defect. Striking and
prepossessing in appearance, his manner displeases from its
seeming foppery. I own it caused me at first to regard him
with regretful surprise; the shade of Dr. Arnold seemed to
frown on his young representative/*

Charlotte made another visit to the Lake Country when
she went to stay a week with Sir James K. Shuttleworth and
his wife. The Shuttleworths lived at Gawthorpe Hall, a fine
mansion seven or eight miles across the moors from Haworth.
They had been much impressed by Charlotte's novels, and
had called at the parsonage to express their admiration. Their
interest so pleased Mr. Bronte, who was partial to the at-
tentions of society, that he urged Charlotte to accept their
invitations, though she was most reluctant to be under obli-
gation to them. Ilie result was that she went to their summer
home in Westmoreland, and it was on this occasion that she
met Mrs. GaskeE for the first time. As we know, the meeting

87

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

was to bear fruit to Charlotte's lasting advantage, since Mrs.
Gaskell proved to be one of the best-informed and most
painstaking biographers of the Bronte family.

Of Charlotte's visits to London, the most important took
place in 1850. She was entertained by Thackeray, attended
the opera, and sat for her portrait by George Richmond, R A.
George Smith arranged for the picture, and it is considered a
splendid likeness. The artist attributed his success largely to
an incident that took place during the sittings. When Char-
lotte arrived at the studio one afternoon he told her that had
she come a little earlier she would have met the aged Duke of
Wellington. Charlotte's face, he claimed, was so transformed
by the mere mention of Wellington, particularly in the ex-
pression of the eyes, that he was able to capture the mood
and quality that made the portrait so remarkable a likeness.

It was also concerning the 1850 interlude in London that
a controversy has arisen. Did Charlotte secretly leave Lon-
don at this time, and if she did, where did she go? With
whom (was it George Smith?) and to see whom (was it ML
Heger in Brussels? ) . She wrote a note to Letitia Wheelwright,
who lived in London, that she expected to be out of town a
few days, and would see her on her return. She wrote Ellen
Nussey saying she had "business to transact," but said
nothing about going out of London to transact it. And a
letter to her father, written at the same time, refers neither to
an absence from the Smiths, with whom she was staying, nor
to any business to be done elsewhere. Mrs. George Smith said
she was not aware that her son had gone to Brussels with
Charlotte at any time whatever. But, according to Miss
Chadwick, the business Charlotte had to tend to on the Con-
tinent derived from what appears to have been a plagiarism

CHARLOTTE

of Jane Eyre by M. Eugene Sue in his story entitled "Kitty
Bell, the Orphan." Miss Chadwick's opinion is that the story
was actually written by Charlotte, a preliminary sketch of
the early chapters of Jane Eyre, either when she was in
Brussels in 1843, or later. In which case the Hegers may have
had a copy in their possession, given them at the time, or sent
to them, by Charlotte herself. Possibly it fell into the hands
of Eugene Sue, who did little to alter it before presenting it
under his own name. Mr. George Smith might have consid-
ered it necessary for Charlotte to threaten suit against M.
Sue, hence the "power of attorney" for which Charlotte paid
Mr. Smith a known fee. There are much doubt and confu-
sion and conflicting evidence with regard to these missing
days in Charlotte's life, yet the balance of opinion would
lead one to feel that she did go to Paris or Brussels, or both,
and that, though she may not have seen M. Heger, yet re-
visiting the old scenes affected her so poignantly that Villette
literally poured itself from her reawakened heart.
( In 1851 Charlotte made three journeys from home. She
visited Mrs. Gaskell in Manchester, accompanied the Smiths
to Scotland, and was once more in London for some little
time. During the London visit she heard Thackeray lecture,
and was greatly impressed with his simple and easy manner
of delivery jshe saw Mme. Rachel act, and was "transfixed with
wonder," though repelled by "the tremendous force with
which she expresses the very worst passions in their strongest
essence." In a letter to her father dated June 26, 1851, she
gave an account of her days which is indicative of a certain
confidence existing between father and daughter. Also, in
the mere fact that it includes "Mr. Nichols" among the few to
whom she sent her best regards, it presaged the friendship
which was to lead to Charlotte's marriage.

89

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Dear Papa,- I have not yet been able to get away
from London, but if all be weU I shall go to-morrow,
stay two days with Mrs. Gaskell at Manchester, and re-
turn home on Monday 30th without fail During this week
or ten days I have seen many things, some of them very
interesting, and have also been in much better health
than I was during the first fortnight of my stay in Lon-
don. Sir James and Lady Shuttleworth have really been
very kind, and most scrupulously attentive. They desire
their regards to you, and send all manner of civil mes-
sages. The Marquis of Westminster and the Earl of Elle-
mere each sent me an order to see their private collection
of pictures, which I enjoyed very much. Mr. Rogers, the
patriarch-poet, now eighty-seven years old, invited me to
breakfast with him. His breakfasts, you must understand,
are celebrated throughout Europe for their peculiar re-
finement and taste. He never admits at that meal more
than four persons to his table: himself and three guests.
The morning I was there I met Lord Glenelg and Mrs.
Davenport, a relation of Lady Shuttleworth's, and a very
beautiful and fashionable woman. The visit was very in-
teresting; I was glad that I had paid it after it was over.
An attention that pleased and surprised me more than I
think than any other was the circumstance of Sir David
Brewster, who is one of the first scientific men of his day,
coming to take me over the Crystal Palace and pointing
out and explaining the most remarkable curiosities. You
will know, dear papa, that I do not mention these things
to boast of them, but merely because I think they will
give you pleasure. Nobody, I find, thinks the worse of
me for avoiding publicity and declining to go to large
parties, and everybody seems truly courteous and re-
spectful, a mode of behaviour which makes me grateful,
as it ought to do. Good-bye till Monday. Give my best

90

CHARLOTTE

regards to Mr. Nichols, Tabby, and Martha, and- Believe
me, your affectionate daughter.

The following year, 1852, seems to have been another sad
and trying one for Charlotte. Grief and loneliness swept back
upon her, possibly because she was not well, but also because
she was engaged in writing Vittette, a book that brought
back every poignant memory to stab her heart, particularly
those with Brussels. Also she felt obligated to make a pil-
grimage to Scarborough to see that the stone over Anne*s
grave was properly refaced and relettered. But she wrote
constantly throughout the summer and fall, and when
Villette was finished in November, she wrote George Smith,
"You will see that Villette touches on no matter of public
interest. I cannot write books handling topics of the day; it
is of no use trying. Nor can I write a book for its moral. Nor
can I make up a philanthropic scheme, though I honour phi-
lanthropy." This she said despite her stated theory that "a
work of fiction ought to be a work of creation; that the red
should be sparingly introduced in the pages dedicated to the
ideal."

Meanwhile, another curate had fallen in love with Char-
lotte, and this time she made up her mind to marry, love or
no love. Arthur Bell Nichols, Mr. Bronte's curate, had long
nursed his feelings for Charlotte in secret, but the day came
when he had to speak. Mr. Nichols was a good but unimag-
inative man, conscientious in his duties, and of great help to
Mr. Bronte. In spite of all this, Mr. Bronte never liked him.
And there is no question as to how Charlotte felt, She re-
spected him, seeing in this quiet, sturdy man a protection
and refuge from the tragic memories and solitary thoughts,
but she did not love him.

91

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

When Mr. Nichols went to Mr. Bronte with the request
for his daughter's hand in maniage, Mr. Bronte flew into a
violent temper and gave him to understand that he was most
unacceptable as a son-in-law. The poor man left the parson-
age utterly reduced, and standing by the gate bowed his
head and wept, with Charlotte of course observing from the
window. Mr. Nichols immediately resigned his curacy, and
again broke down before the assembled congregation when
giving Charlotte the sacrament for the last time before leav-
ing. By this time Charlotte pitied him with all her heart, and
pity must have played a large part in her determination to
marry him. After several scenes with her father, who con-
tinued to protest that Mr. Nichols was in no way her equal,
she finally persuaded him to relent. Mr. Nichols returned to
Haworth as curate and they were married June 29, 1854. But
the night before the wedding, when Charlotte went to her
father's study to bid him good night, he informed her that he
did not intend to be present at the ceremony next morning.
Charlotte was not only deeply hurt and humiliated, but there
was the vital question of who was to give her away, par-
ticularly at such short notice. She discussed the question with
Miss Wooler and Ellen Nussey, who had already arrived, and
after consulting the Bible they discovered that the service
could be performed by a woman. So it was Miss Wooler who
stood tip with Charlotte, and not her own father, rector of the
church where she was married.

Mr. Nichols took his bride to Ireland on their honeymoon.
They visited relatives and friends, and made tours of Kil-
larney, Klengariff, Tarbert, Tralae, Cork, and Charlotte was
truly enchanted with the Irish scenery.

Back at Haworth, Charlotte's husband took over many of
the parish duties, greatly relieving Mr. Bronte; and now, as
92

CHARLOTTE

wife and mistress of the parsonage, Charlotte found her
days full of pleasant activities. It is told that on one occa-
sion she played hostess to some five hundred of the parish-
ioners: scholars, teachers, churchringers, and singers. But
Charlotte's health, as we know, was not sturdy, and once
again we find death lurking on the moors, always eager to
find a fresh victim in the Bronte household.

Late in the fall of 1854, Charlotte took a long walk over the
moors, against her better judgment, but urged on by a sense
of duty, not wishing to appear unwilling or too frail to ac-
company her husband. But rain came on, and by the time she
reached home she was chilled to the bone and deeply ex-
hausted. It is quite possible that she was already with child,
which would have made the illness that followed more acute.
For shortly after we have Mrs. Gaskell reporting that she
"was attacked by new sensations of perpetual nausea, and an
ever-recurring faintness." She became so weak and ill that
she was unable to retain the smallest amount of food, and her
death, on March 31, 1855, was due, as Mr. Shorter has said,
"to an illness incidental to childbirth.1

Just before the end, in a moment of lucidity, she realized
that her husband was praying beside her, and looking on his
face worn with grief, she whispered, "Oh, I am not going to
die, am I? He will not separate us, we have been so happy/*

93

Chapter xi EMILY

"The earth that wakes one human "heart to feeling
Can centre both the worlds of Heaven and Hell"

E. BRONTE

E

I MILY," wrote Charles Morgan, "had two
lives. It was the essence of her genius that they were distinct.
One, the superficial, life, the life of the daughter at the par-
sonage, which she is commonly praised for having led with
dutiful heroism, was not in her eyes heroic. It was the activity
in the midst of which she learned how to feed upon the spirit
within her." *

The child who romped over the Haworth moors, whose
reticence and withdrawal kept her apart from schoolmates,
and whose domestic labors in the parsonage fell like a cur-
tain between the two worlds of her nature, turned out, by
virtue of a few poems and a strange puzzling novel, to have
been a pagan, a mystic, and a passionate woman. Biograph-
ical data, of a strictly circumstantial variety, is conspicu-
ously lacking in Emily s case. Yet of the Bronte sisters, it is
Emily with whom the critics and biographers have been
most concerned, particularly as regards her romantic attach-
ments, whatever those may have been. Here the controversy
over Emily becomes passionate. Was there a man, or men,
in Emily s life? And here we cannot but be reminded of
similar questions respecting another Emily, the Nun of Am-
herst Speculation about the men who influenced Emily
Bronte involves one to three. Virginia Moore says there was

* From The Great Victorians by H. J. Massingham

94

EMILY

a Louis Parensell, whom Emily met at Miss Patchefs School
at Law Hill. The name was found on the manuscript of one
of the poems written there, but the handwriting is supposed
to be Charlotte's. What that tends to prove, one wouldn't
know exactly. But Roamer Wilson, in order to confirm Mr.
Parensell, groups a number of poems written at Law Hill
under the title, Poems of Guilt. Then there is the rather subtle,
if tenuous, case that Miss Chadwick makes out for Emily's
affections being directed, together with her sister's, toward
M. Heger of Brussels. M. Heger was, according to Miss
Chadwick, "the first man to approach Emily Bronte's ideal/'
and she gives us a poem, written by Emily on May 17, 1842,
"which helps to prove she had had a vision of perfect love
in Brussels." Again may we say "yes, possibly." But the third
alternative is more farfetched than either of these. The third
is Branwell, Of course it can be fully admitted that there was
a particular bond of sympathy and imderstaMilinir between
brother and sister. And it is perfectly true that when Char-
lotte and Anne became thoroughly exasperated with Bran-
well's behavior, realizing that he had progressed too far
along the road to perdition ever to be reclaimed, Emily stood
by. It was Emily who sat waiting night after night until
Branwell returned from the tavern, often in a mood no
woman likes to reckon with. It was Emily who saved Bran-
well with her own hands from the burning bed he had inad-
vertently, in a drunken stupor, set afire. But neither is it in
the least necessary to accept Miss Kinsley s evidence, set
forth in her shrewd but too shrewd book, Pattern of Genius,
in which she attempts to prove the incestuous relationship by
using their own written words from novel and poem as wit-
ness against them. "It was an awful and inexplicable com-
munion/' Miss Kinsley claims, "never to be explained and

95

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

never to be wholly broken, a communion in the fourth
dimension which existed between them as long as they lived."
It is far better, I think, to accept Charles Morgan's sane and
sensible comment on the subject: *

Let us, then, examine the works without seeking to
prove in them either that Emily was in love with her
brother or with any other man, or that she was incapable
of bodily desire. It is unnecessary to proceed to either of
these extremes, for the poems do not require them, and,
though the closeness of Emily's later association with
Branwell is deeply relevant to the authorship of Wuther-
ing Heights, there is no just cause for assuming or sus-
pecting that her love for him, if she loved him, was ab-
normal, except in the sense in which all emotional states
were, by intensification and a disease of secrecy, made
abnormal within the walls of Haworth. It is true that
Charlotte's behavior to Branwell, her envenomed exclu-
sion of him from her life during the period in which
Wuthering Heights was being written, is not fully ac-
counted for either by his pleasures of the inn or by the
suggestion that, having been herself denied in her pas-
sion, she was made morally indignant and resentful by
her brother's disgrace at Thorpe Green. Charlotte had
many faults, but she was not a petty, spiteful spinster:
there must have been better reasons than these for the
long continuance of her hatred. It is true, also, that she
displayed an extraordinary eagerness to obliterate all
traces of her sister's private life, and that there is a hint
of baffled terror in her reticences when she writes of
Emily. On these and other indications it might be possible
to build up a theory that the relationship of Branwell and
Emily was one that displeased Charlotte, and that she

c From The Great Victorians by H. J. Massingfiam.

96

EMILY

wished to conceal the nature of it. But the evidence is all
conjectural and reacts against itself. We shall be wise to
put this theory out of mind, and to proceed, for lack of
available proof, on the assumption that it is altogether
unfounded.

Whatever the exact explanation of the passionate spirit
of Emily Bronte, biographers and commentators alike agree
that she burned with an insatiable hunger. But what did she
hunger for? Again it is common agreement that, whatever it
was, it was beyond the reach of mortal flesh. The poetry and
the novel blaze with the symbols of love and liberty, per-
sonal needs with universal significance. Charles Morgan
believes that during her adolescent years Emily Bronte
tasted the ecstasy of an exalted experience, and spent the
rest of her days attempting to recapture it. She sought to
possess the Absolute, and failing that would not be assuaged.
And it is out of the abstraction of Emily s ideal that Roma
Wilson has created her theory of a Demon Lover. Certainly
some such demon pursued Catherine and Heathcliff in
Wuthering Heights. In spite of Emily's outward calm, her
stoical endurance, and stubborn, reserved disposition, she
carried a tortured spirit within. Her real life existed only in
her poetry. She cared nothing for fame or appreciation. She
wrote to release the moods, the thoughts, that she could not
wholly contain in her fragile body. She was a mystic, as we
have said. Emily Bronte and William Blake were alike in one
respect they were unconcerned with individual salvation,
but sought to bring mankind into harmony with the will and
purpose of the Creator. To them human love and liberty
are the roots we throw down, ever more firmly, into the uni-
versal mind, into "a mutual immortality,'* as she expressed it
in the closing lines of "I See Around Me Tombstones Grey":

97

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

We all, in life's departing shine,
Our last dear longings blend with thine;
And straggle still and strive to trace
With clouded gaze, thy darling face.
We would not leave our native home
For any world beyond the Tomb.
No rather on thy kindly breast
Let us be laid in lasting rest;
Or waken but to share with thee
A mutual immortality.

For all source of knowledge, Emily drew upon her own
comprehending spirit. Miss Sinclair says, "There was in the
great genius of Emily Bronte a dark unconscious instinct of
primitive nature-worship. That was where she was so poised
and so complete, where she touches earth and heaven, and
is at once intoxicated with the splendor of the passion for
living. It is what holds her spirit in security and her heart

in peace And this woman, destitute, so far as can be

known, of all metaphysical knowledge, reared in the narrow-
est and least metaphysical of creeds, did yet contrive to ex-
press in one poem ... all the hunger and thirst after the
'Absolute that ever moved a human soul, all the bewilder-
ment and agony inflicted by the unintelligible spectacle of
existence, the intolerable triumph of evil over good, and did
conceive an image and a vision of the transcendent reality
that holds, as in a crystal, all the philosophies that are worthy
of the name." *

* Introduction by May Sinclair from The Tenant of Wild-field Hall and
Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte, Everyman's Library, E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc.,
N. Y. Introduction by May Sinclair from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte.
Everyman's Library, E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc., N. Y. By permission J. M.
Dent & Sons Ltd., London, and E. P. Dutton & Co. Inc., New York.

98

EMILY

"The Philosopher"

**Enough of Thought, Philosopher;
Too long hast thou been dreaming
Unenlightened, in this chamber drear
While summer's sun is beaming
Space-sweeping soul, what sad refrain
Concludes thy musings once again?

**O for the time when I shall sleep
Without identity.,

And never care how rain may steep
Or snow may cover me!

"No promised Heaven, these wild Desires
Could aU or half fulfil;

No threatened Hell, with quenchless fires,
Subdue this quenchless will!"

So said I, and still say the same;
Still to my Death will say-
Three Gods within this little frame
Are warring night and day.

Heaven could not hold them all, and yet
They all are held in me
And must be mine till I forget
My present entity.

O for the time when in my breast
Their struggles will be o'er;
O for the day when I shall rest,
And never suffer more;

99

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

"I saw a Spirit standing, Man,
Where thou dost stand an hour ago;
And round his feet, three rivers ran
Of equal depth and equal flow

"A golden stream, and one like blood,
And one like Sapphire, seemed to be,
But where they joined their triple flood
It tumbled in an inky sea.

"The Spirit bent his dazzling gaze
Down on that Ocean's gloomy night,
Then kindling all with sudden blaze,
The glad deep sparkled wide and bright-
White as the sun; far, far more fair
Than the divided sources were!'*

And even for that Spirit, Seer,
IVe watched and sought my lifetime long;
Sought Him in Heaven, Hell, Earth, Air,
AJI endless search and always wrong!

Had I but seen His glorious eye
Once light the clouds that 'wilder me,
I ne'er had raised this coward cry
To cease to think and cease to be

I ne'er had called oblivion blest,
Nor stretching eager hands to Death
Implored to change for lifeless rest
This sentient soul, this living breath.

O let me die, that power and will
Their cruel strife may close,
And vanquished Good, victorious 111
Be lost in one repose.
100

EMILY

This Absolute Emily yearned for, and sought with such
passionate desire, has been called, by some, her Demon
Lover, by others, her Angel Lover. Out of the search for sign
or image of her love springs the ecstasy between captive
flesh and liberated spirit:

"The Visionary"

What I love shall come like visitant of air,
Safe in secret power from lurking human snare;
Who loves me, no word of mine shall e'er betray,
Though for faith unstained my life must forfeit pay.

Burn, then, little lamp; glimmer straight and clear-
Hush! a rustling wing stirs, methinks, the air:
He for whom I wait, thus ever comes to me;
Strange Power! I trust thy might; trust thou my constancy.

The two stanzas above quoted have been taken, by editors,
as a separate poem, from the "sequel" to the Gondal epic, one
of Emily's longest and finest examples of sustained emotion.
The entire poem bears the title, as in the manner of so
many of the Gondal poems, Julian M. and A. G. Rochelle.
Miss Sinclair says that this poem is constantly reminding her
of "one of the most marvelous poems of Divine Love, 'En
Una Noche Escura,' by St. John of the Cross." In the follow-
ing stanzas the lady addresses Lord Julian:

"I cannot wonder now at aught the world will do,
And insult and contempt I lightly brook from you,
Since those, who vowed away their souls to win my love.
Around this living grave like utter strangers move!

101

THE BI-VWICHLD PARSONAGE

"Nor has one voice been raised to plead that I might die,
Not buried under earth but in the open sky;
By ball or speedy kaif e or headsman's sldlf ul blow
A quick and welcome pang instead of lingering woe!

''Yet, tell them, Julian, all, I am not doomed to wear
Year after year in gloom and desolate despair;
A messenger of Hope comes every night to me,
And offers, for short life, eternal liberty.

"He comes with western winds, with evening's wandering

airs,

With that clear dusk of heaven that brings the thickest stars;
Winds take a pensive tone, and stars a tender fire,
And visions rise and change which kill me with desire

"Desire for nothing known in my maturer years
When joy grew mad with awe at counting future tears;
When, if my spirit's sky was full of flashes warm,
I knew not whence they came, from sun or thunderstorm;

"But first a hush of peace, a soundless calm descends;
The struggle of distress and fierce impatience ends;
Mute music soothes my breast unuttered harmony
That I could never dream till earth was lost to me.

"Then dawns the Invisible, the Unseen its truth reveals;
My outward sense is gone, my inward essence feels
Its wings are almost free, its home, its harbour found;
Measuring the gulf it stoops and dares the final bound!

"Oh, dreadful is the check intense the agony
When the ear begins to hear and the eye begins to see;
When the pulse begins to throb, the brain to think again,
The soul to feel the flesh and the flesh to feel the chain!
102

EMILY

"Yet I would lose no sting, would wish no torture less;
The more that anguish racks the earlier it will bless;
And robed in fires of Hell, or bright with heavenly shine,
If it but herald Death, the vision is divine.'*

"The soul to feel the flesh and the flesh to feel the chain!"
It was this bondage, the struggle and agony it meant, that
kept Emily on a rack of torture. She pursued the vision with
reverent devotion until it bathed her soul in the reflected
radiance of truth* The very essence of that radiance is what
she poured into one of the most familiar of her poems, "No
Coward Soul Is Mine":

No coward soul is mine,

No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere:

I see Heaven's glories shine,

And Faith shines equal arming me from Fear.

O God within my breast

Almighty ever-present Deity

Life, that in me hast rest

As I Undying Life, have power in Thee

Vain are the thousand creeds

That move men's hearts: unutterably vain;

Worthless as withered weeds,

Or idlest froth amid the boundless main,

To waken doubt in me
Holding so fast by Thine infinity;
So surely anchored on
The steadfast rock of Immortality

103

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

With wide-embracing love

Thy spirit animates eternal years

Pervades and broods above,

Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates and rears.

Though Earth and moon were gone,
The suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou wert left alone
Every Existence would exist in Thee

There is not room for Death,

Nor atom that his might could render void:

Thou Thou art Being and Breath

And what Thou art may never be destroyed

Emily's love of nature, her sense of being one with the di-
urnal turn of the earth, of being a living part of the moor
and its mists and winds, sunsets and sunrises, moods of grie?
and joy, give her poetry universal significance. It also ex-
plains why Emily was torn asunder when she was away from
Haworth. It explains the fierce nostalgia that weakened even
her body when she was cut off from the sweet harmony of
life on the barren, heather-blue hills. Emily Bronte deprived
of her beloved countryside was as Samson shorn of his locks.
A poem that expresses the homesickness and longing that
swept over her in alien climes is one she wrote either at Miss
Patchet's School at Law Hill, in 1838, which is the date Mr.
Hatfield claims for it, or during the desolate months in Brus-
sels;

"A Little While, A Little While"

A little while, a little while,
The noisy crowd are barred away;
And I can sing and I can smile
A little while IVe
104

EMILY

Where wilt thou go, my harassed heart?
Full many a land invites thee now;
And places near and far apart
Have rest for thee, my -weary brow.

There is a spot 'mid barren hills
Where winter howls and driving rain,
But if the dreary tempest chills
There is a Hght that warms again.

The house is old, the trees are bare

TSbg- moonless bends the misty dome
But what on earth is half so dear,
So longed for as the hearth of home?

The mute bird sitting on the stone,
The dank moss dripping from the wall,
The garden-walk with weeds overgrown,
I love them how I love them all!

Shall I go there? or shall I seek
Another clime, another sky,
Where tongues familiar music speak
In accents dear to memory?

Yes, as I mused, the naked room,
The flickering firelight died away
And from the midst of cheerless gloom
I passed to bright, unclouded day

A little and a lone green lane
That opened on a common wide;
A distant, dreamy, dim blue chain
Of mountains circling every side;

105

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

A heaven so clear, an earth so calm,
So sweet, so soft, so hushed an air
And, deepening still the dream-like charm,
With moor-sheep feeding everywhere-
Uncounted hours have been spent by students and critics
alike in the attempt fully to recover, transcribe, arrange
chronologically, and adjudicate the poetry of Emily Bronte.
It was natural that all Emily's manuscripts, after her death,
should have fallen into the hands of Charlotte, and later into
those of Arthur Bell Nichols, Charlotte's widower. Mr.
Nichols made an attempt to transcribe them, which was pos-
sibly a serious mistake, since he has been found guilty of
many errors; and these might indicate others never checked
for lack of the original manuscripts concerned. Mr. Clement
Shorter, for instance, in editing the first collection of the
poems that bear any claim to being definitive, repeats many
of the errors for which Charlotte and Mr. Nichols are re-
sponsible. It is to Miss Fannie Ratchford that credit is due
for her patient and perceptive work, her collations and tran-
scriptions made directly from the texts of the scattered manu-
scripts, which laid the groundwork for the complete volume
of the poems, edited by Mr. C. W. Hatfield and published in
1941. This volume gives the world at last, after nearly a cen-
tury of groping research, Emily Bronte's full stature as a
poet. There has been altogether too much attempt to extract
biographical data from poetry that deserves to be treated as
literature. There has always been someone hunting the key
to Emily in her written words, since the facts of her life are
so few and far between. But it is an unremunerative task
the student has set himself, particularly since, in Emilys
case, her life was entirely in the spirit, and had so little direct
106

EMILY

relation to reality. Whereas, if the reader, whether scholar
or poet, would aHow himself to be led into the spirit with
her, to taste its joy and pain, a classification of the men in
Emily's life would seem a kind of sacrilege. Emily's reality
was not in this world. And, as Charles Morgan has so well
said, "to one who had known this reality all other failure was
less than the failure to recapture it, and over such a one the
world had no power* Death appeared to her, in one aspect,
as an end of the blissful torture she would not have lessened;
in another aspect, as a possible reversal of her failures an op-
portunity to be really in and with' the supreme familiar
spirit. She did not know whether to dread death as a cessa-
tion or to desire it as an opportunity. She did not know
whence her familiar spirit came, from heaven or from hell;
she did not know whether, in the Christian view, her blisses
were evil or good; she was not certain that, in going from
this world, she might take her ecstasy with her."

One cannot but wonder how much this doubt and desire
explains Emily's own death, which took place three months
after BranwelTs. From the day of his death she never set
foot outside the parsonage. In October (Branwell had died
in late September), she contracted a severe cold and devel-
oped a stubborn cough. Charlotte was deeply concerned, and
in writing to Ellen expressed her anxiety: *1 fear she has a
pain in the chest, and I sometimes catch a shortness in her
" -i < . t - : : : <; when she has moved at all quickly. She looks very,
very thin and pale. Her reserved nature occasions me great
unhappiness of mind. It is useless to question her-you get no
answers. It is still more useless to recommend remedies-
they are never adopted."

The agony persisted for two more months. Day after day
Emily insisted on going about her household tasks. She re-

107

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

fused to take medicine or see a doctor. Charlotte and Anne
stood by in helpless anguish. Once, in desperation, Charlotte
sent for a doctor, but when he came Emily refused to see him.
She would not allow her sisters to refer to her condition. She
grew steadily worse. She had often claimed she had no fear
of death. Was she trying to prove it? Was she inwardly
exultant that she would soon have the opportunity to taste
the ecstasy of her reunion with the spirit? As Emily said
when she was only twenty-two:

Riches I hold in light esteem
And love I laugh to scorn
And lust of Fame was but a dream
That vanished with the morn

And if I pray, the only prayer
That moves my lips for me
Is-"Leave the heart that now I bear
And give me liberty ."

Yes, as my swift days near their goal
*Tis all that I implore-
Through life and death, a chainless soul
With courage to endure! *

On Tuesday, the nineteenth of December, Emily came
downstairs and went about the usual household chores. By
noon she was so weak she was unable to speak above a whis-
per. She sat by the open grate trying to comb her hair, but
her hand was too feeble to hold the comb and it fell to the
hearthstone. Charlotte went out on the moor to find "a linger-

* Above poems reprinted from The Complete Poems of Emily Jane Bronte,
edited by C. W. Hatfield. Copyright 1941 by Columbia University Press.

108

EMILY

ing spray of heather" with which to cheer her sister, but
Emily was already beyond recognizing external objects. They
moved her to a couch. She opened her eyes then, and whis-
pered to Charlotte, "If you will send for a doctor, I will see
him now/ 7 But when she closed her eyes again it was for the
last time. There had died, that bleak December day, 1848,
in the lonely parsonage of Haworth, the spirit that had
bewitched it.

Emily's dog, Keeper, followed the coffin across the church-
yard, into the church, and up the aisle; and when she was
laid beneath the stone floor he returned to the parsonage, and
lay down across the threshold of her room, refusing to be
consoled.

109

Chapter xn BRAN WELL

I

IT is probable," writes Esther Alice Chad-
wick, "that no character in literature has been made to
suffer more for supposed misdeeds than Branwell Bronte.
Whatever was wrong in the Bronte household, or the Bronte
novels, has been generally attributed to Branwell, but he has
been more sinned against than sinning." Of the women who
have expressed themselves with regard to Branwell, Miss
Chadwick is the most charitable, for most of them have
treated him with considerable severity, fully sympathizing
with his three sisters. The men on the other hand, including
Francis Grundy and Francis Leyland, have been far more
tolerant. They no doubt understood him better, judging by
men's standards in a man's world.

We ask ourselves, was Branwell Bronte a genius without
the will to express it? Yet true genius does not lack the will,
labor being the essence of will. Branwell did not labor.
Therefore was the idea of his inherent genius a family illu-
sion, born in the hearts of bis adoring sisters and a doting
father, in whose eyes he could do no wrong, so that when he
disappointed them the consciousness of failure was a boom-
erang that destroyed him? "He was half poet/' says Edith
Kinsley, "when he was not a maniac; he might have been a
prophet had he not become a profligate. He had an electric
temper which emitted ominous sparks, which his father said
110

BEANWELL

was 'spirit,' and must not be curbed." An only son, spoiled
by a too-indulgent yet indifferent father, idolized by three
temperamental sisters, restrained from all association with
boys of his own age who might have succeeded in beating
his wayward nature to its knees, Branwell was more or less
doomed to go on the rocks. Given a chance, psychiatry would
only have predicted the worst!

Branwell was born at Thornton in 1817. When the family
moved to Haworth. he was three years old, and during the
succeeding years, his education was what he had received
at home; outside associations were frowned upon, and he
was regarded as a priceless jewel which would one day
shine for the honor and glory of the Bronte name. How
this was to be accomplished seems to have been left to
fate, since in all the records of the Bronte family there is
none to indicate that Branwell was to get even a university
degree. When one considers in what high esteem a degree
was held, and what travail Mr. Bronte endured to win the
honor himself, it is difficult to understand the omission in
BranweH's case. Aunt Elizabeth would assuredly have seen
the wisdom of giving her nephew such a start in life. Here
was an only son, and many dependents. Yet the ^career"
finally decided upon for Branwell was that of an artist; and
what career is less lucrative unless the artist has more than
his share of ambition, concentration, and genius. Branwell,
his family to the contrary, had none of these in marked de-
gree. All the children showed an inclination to drawing,
Branwell as well as his sisters. But it was for Branwell that
Mr. Bronte engaged a drawing teacher. And it was Branwell,
at the age of eighteen, who was sent up to London to study
at the Royal Academy.

Ill

THE BEVvITCJil-'.D PARSONAGE

The money advanced for the academy was quickly lost in
the gambling that had already become Branwells weakness,
and he was soon back in Havvorth without a penny to his
name. Mr, Bronte even refused to pay the debts his son had
incurred. However, since it was clearly impossible to allow
Branwell to become the ne'er-do-well of Haworth village,
as he was apparently quite willing to do, having joined a
convivial club, the "Lodge of the Three Graces/ 7 meeting at
the Black Bull Tavern, it was decided that he should set up
a studio in Bradford. There was the hope that through
friends he might receive portrait commissions. But it was
not to be. As Miss Kinsley says, "at the foot of his studio
stairs was a public house, The George, where a group of
artists consorted ... to chat, eat, and get rid of the evening
damp with a few cheerful drinks, Branwell, as before at The
Black Bull Tavern, now found himself secure of attention at
The George in the role of public entertainer. On the other
hand, his ideas and his work were indifferently regarded.
Therefore, he sought The George only as he had sought The
Bull, for specious consolation to his vanity."

The Bradford studio experiment having thus failed mis-
erably, Branwell next took a position as clerk in charge of
the Sowerby Bridge station of the Leeds and Manchester
Railway. After a year at Sowerby Bridge he was transferred
to the station at Luddenden Foot; but here an act of negli-
gence caused his dismissal Some years later, referring to this
period in a letter to Francis Grandy, he wrote, "My conduct
there, lost as I was to all that I like or had hoped for, was
marked by a malignant and yet cold debauchery, a determi-
nation to find how far mind could carry body, without both
being chucked into hell-it was a nightmare."

"Lost as I was to all that I like or had hoped for!" What a
112

Anne Bronte. Painted by her sister, Charlotte, June 17, 1834
This is the only known portrait of Anne in existence. Photograph
by Walter Scott Copyright, The Bronte Society.

Patrick Branwell Bronte, The only known portrait. Photograph
by Walter Scott. Copyright, The Bronte Society.

BRANWELL

death knell the words sound. One cannot but have a rending
sympathy for Branwell, whose life went so terribly askew,
and by no means entirely due to his own shortcomings. It
becomes obvious, as we follow Branwell down the rapid
decline of his youth, that he was cut out to be more scholar
than artist. Almost his only claim to literary ability, for in-
stance, over and above the famous Knave of Hearts epistle,
which immortalizes the name of the church sexton, John
Brown, rests in his translations of Horace. Before taking the
Job with the Leeds Railway, he had sent a few of these trans-
lations to Hartley Coleridge, with a letter from which I take
the following excerpt:

Since my childhood, I have been wont to devote the
hours I could spare from other and very different employ-
ments to efforts at literary composition, always keeping
the results to myself, nor have they in more than two or
three instances been seen by any other. But I am about
to enter active life, and prudence tells me not to waste
the time which must make my independence; yet, sir, I
like writing too well to fling aside the practice of It with-
out an effort to ascertain whether I could turn it to ac-
count, not in wholly iriu/ : Jr.".:- myself, but in aiding
my maintenance, for I do not sigh after fame, and am not
ignorant of the folly of the fate of those who, without
ability, would depend for their lives upon their pens; but
I seek to know, and venture, though with shame, to ask
from one whose word I must respect: whether, by peri-
odical or other writing, I could please myself with writ-
ing, and make it subservient to living.

Apparently Hartley Coleridge was sufficiently interested
to send for him, and Branwell spent a day with Coleridge
at Ambleside a few weeks later. How much praise or advice

113

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

he received on this occasion is not clear, but it was appar-
ently sufficient to encourage Branwell to pursue the subject:

I have, I fear most negligently, and amid other very
different employments-striven to Translate two books,
the first of which I have presumed to send you. And will
you, sir, stretch your past kindness by telling me whether
I should amend and pursue the work or let it rest in peace.

Great corrections I feel it wants, but till I feel that the
work might benefit me, I have no heart to make them;
yet if your judgment prove in any way favourable, I will
re-write the whole, without sparing labour to reach per-
fection.

I dared not have attempted Horace but that I saw the
utter worthlessness of all former translations, and thought
that a better one, by whomsoever executed, might meet
with some little encouragement. I long to clear up my
doubts by the judgment of one whose opinion I should
revere, andbut I suppose I am dreaming one to whom
I should be proud indeed to inscribe anything of mine
which any publisher would look at, unless, as is likely
enough, the work would disgrace the name as much as
the name would honour the work.

Obviously Hartley Coleridge let the matter drop. Per-
haps he was too busy to become involved in the hopes and
future of a young unknown. Perhaps he honestly did not see
that the work was in the least important. Whatever the
cause, the result was that Branwell passed beyond hope and
gave himself over to the demons of bitterness and waste. The
translations of Horace were discovered, about twenty-five
years ago, by the English poet, John Drinkwater, who edited
and privately printed them. In a foreword Mr. Drinkwater
states that the translations could hardly be improved: "There
114

BRANWELL

are passages of clear, lyrical beauty, and something of the
style that comes from spiritual understanding, apart from
merely formal knowledge of great models/ 7

In December, 1842, Branwell again tried work, this time
teaching. He went as tutor to the son of the Reverend Ed-
mund Robinson at Thorpe Green. Anne, as we have seen,
was governess in the same household. Once more fate dealt
Branwell a cruel blow. The Robinson household was not
the place for a young man of BranwelTs egotism and attitude
of mind. Mr. Robinson was ill and not expected to live; Mrs.
Robinson, young, vivacious, and extremely sophisticated, was
not averse to carrying on a flirtation to pass the time of day
with a brilliant young man, charming in manner, eloquent in
speech, and attractive to look upon. He appealed to her fancy
and her vanity. She was looking for amusement, but Branwell
fell madly in love. She encouraged him without reciproca-
tion, or at least without sincerity.

Mr. Robinson could hardly be said to have savored the
situation, which was all too apparent to both himself and
Anne, and proceeded to dismiss Branweil in peremptory
fashion. So again Branwell returned to Haworth under a
cloud, and took up his familiar routine; drinking at The
Black Bull Tavern, and lolling about the parsonage where
he was the cause of the greatest consternation and dismay.
But until Mr. Robinson s dealt he appeared to believe that
Mrs. Robinson, once a widow, would call him back. If Mrs.
Robinson ever had the idea in mind, she quickly dismissed it
when, soon after her husband s demise, she was courted by
Lord Scott, and went up to London to marry that gentleman.
Charlotte and Anne tried as long as possible to keep the
news of Mrs. Robinsons "betrayal" from reaching Branwell,
loiowing what it would do to him under the circumstances.

115

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

And Charlotte, though fiercely critical of Branwell for his
folly and stupidity in the whole matter, was equally incensed
at die treatment Mrs. Robinson had accorded her brother,
*1 suppose the affair was conducted as such affairs usually
are," she wrote. "Branwell offered .Mrs. Robinson his youth
and his talents, such as they were, in exchange for her posi-
tion and money. Love did not enter into the account. She
was older than he and, Anne says, not beautiful. The lady ?
having no chance at the moment of making a better bargain,
was inclined to come to terms with Branwell. Then Lord
Scott, a flourishing and handsome nobleman, stepped in with
a higher bid."

It was the outcome of this affair that lit the fuse of
BranwelTs mental illness. He had no further regard for any-
thing except his own personal indulgence. Drugs rapidly be-
came a habit and, added to the drinking, reduced him to a
condition bordering on insanity. He resorted to every petty
trick, every ignoble excuse, to obtain opium. He wheedled
the money for the purpose from his father who, rather than
face the violence of BranwdTs moods, gave the money while
praving for BranwelFs soul He became involved in debts
that brought the bailiff to the house, and fearing the indig-
nity of their brother's arrest the sisters paid the amount
owing, keeping the disgrace from Mr. Bronte.

But such self-destruction was bound to have an end. IB
the summer of 1848, Branwell had his first attacks of delirium
tremeBS, described by Mrs. Gaskell as "most frightful ia
character.*' The young man's constitution was completely
broken, and the last phase was inevitable. Mr. Bronte con-
tinually urged the consolation and redemption of prayer, but
his son would hear none of It. With wild bravado lie insisted
he would die on his feet, cursing his fate. However, to Mr.
116

BRAKWELL

Bronte's great comfort, they prayed together at the end.
Branwell died on the twenty-fourth of September, 1848.
Charlotte's letter to Mr. Williams, written a week after his
death, is fitting epitaph to her brothers brief and blighted
life. When all is said and done, there was no one like Char-
lotte for looking things straight in the eye, and summing
them up wdth a radiant perception of the truth, regardless
of the emotional implications.

We have hurried our dead out of our sight. A lull begins
to succeed the gloomy tumult of last week. It is not per-
mitted us to grieve for him who is gone as others grieve
for those they lose. The removal of our only brother must
necessarily be regarded by us rather in the light of mercy
than a chastisement. Branwell was his father's and his
sisters' pride and hope in boyhood, but since manhood the
case has been otherwise. It has been our lot to see him
take a wrong bent; to hope, expect, wait his return to the
right path; to know the sickness of hope deferred, the
dismay of prayer baffled; to experience despair at last
and now to behold the sudden early obscure close of what
might have been a noble career,

I do not weep from a sense of bereavement there is no
prop withdrawn, no consolation torn away, no dear com-
panion lost but for the wreck of talent, the ruin of prom-
ise, the untimely dreary extinction of what might have
been a burning and a shining light. My brother was a year
my junior. I had aspirations and ambitions for him once,
long ago-they have perished mournfully. Nothing re-
mains of him but a memory of errors and sufferings. There
is such a bitterness of pity for his life and death, such a
yeaniing for the emptiness of his whole existence as I
cannot describe. I trust time will aUay these feelings.

My poor father naturally thought more of his only son

117

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE
than of his daughters, and, much and long as he had suf-
fered on his account, he cried out for his loss like David
for that of Absalom-my son! my son!-and refused at first
to be comforted. And then when I ought to have been
able to collect my strength and be at hand to support
him, I fell ill with an illness whose approaches I had telt
for some time previously, and of which the crisis was
hastened by the awe and trouble of the death-scene-the
first I had ever witnessed. The past has seemed to me a
strange week. Thank God, for my father's sake, 1 am
better now, though still feeble. I wish indeed I had more
general strength-the want of it is sadly in my way. I
cannot do what I would do for want of sustained animal
spirits and efficient vigour.

My unhappy brother never knew what his sisters had
done in literature-he was not aware that they had ever
published a line. We could not tell him of our efforts for
fear of causing him too deep a pang of remorse for his
own time, and talents misapplied. Now he will never
know. I cannot dwell longer on the subject at present-it
is too painfuL

118

Chapter xm FIEST PUBLICATION:

POEMS BY CURRER, ELLIS,
AND ACTON BELL

L

IN THE preface to a new edition of Wuth-
ering Heists and Agnes Grey, published in 1850, Charlotte
writes:

One day, in the autumn of 1845, 1 accidentally lighted

on a MS. of verse in my sister Emily's handwriting, Of
course, I was not surprised, knowing that she did and
could write verse, I looked it over, and something more
than surprise seized me a deep conviction that these

were not common effusions, nor at all like the poetry
women write. I thought them condensed and terse, vig-
orous and genuine. To my ear they had also a peculiar
music, wild, melancholy, and elevating. My sister Emily
was not a person of demonstrative character, nor one on
the recesses of whose mind and feelings even those near-
est and dearest to her could, with impunity, intrude un-
licensed. It took hours to reconcile her to the discovery I
had made, and days to persuade her that such poems
merited publication/*

Perhaps Charlotte did come across the poems accidentally.
Or perhaps she suspected their existence and went looking
for them. Emily's apparent anger might indicate the latter.
However, it would have been like Emily to be displeased at
this invasion of her privacy, even supposing Charlotte had

119

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

found the poems by chance. And Charlotte, knowing her
sister's feelings about personal matters, particularly writing,
should have returned the poems to their hiding place and
said nothing to Emily about them. Instead, Charlotte seems
to have been struck with an idea as soon as she realized the
unusual quality of the poems themselves. Why not publish
them! All three sisters had "early cherished the dream/' as
Charlotte says, <s of one day being authors." Perhaps one (or
two or three) of them would become famous. How wonder-
ful that would be. And now here was some writing that
Charlotte, at least, felt convinced, after a single reading,
was worthy of meeting the public eye.

As Charlotte said, it was not so easy to convince Emily.
How she succeeded in breaking down Emily's objections,
what arguments she used, she doesn't say. But she had no
more than persuaded Emily that she must try publication
than Anne "quietly produced," some poems of her own, and :
Charlotte confessed, she had been writing poetry, too. What
a coincidence! All three sisters, it seems, had been indulging
in verse writing, more or less in secret. Now it was out in the
open, and enough for a book done in collaboration. Publica-
tion seemed the only logical answer.

It was Charlotte who took the initiative in making the
necessary arrangements, preparing the material in proper
form, and sending it to a publisher. They all agreed that
"authoresses are liable to be looked upon with prejudice,"
and so decided to conceal themselves by "assuming Christian
names positively masculine." Such a subterfuge would also
relieve them of the embarrassment of publicity, which was
something that young ladies of the day felt it a duty to es-
chew. The names chosen were Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell,
120

FIRST PUBLICATION

pseudonyms for Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Bronte respec-
tively.

The next step was to find a publisher who would bring
the book out, if not at his own risk, at least at the authors'.
Charlotte wrote Messrs, Chambers of Edinburgh. Failing to
receive any answer whatsoever, she next approached Messrs,
Aylott and Jones of Paternoster Row, London. Aylott and
Jones eventually agreed to bring out the book at a cost of 31
pounds 10 shillings. One might wonder where the sisters
obtained such a sum of money, which, though not large, was
still a great deal for a family of small means to invest.
It came from the modest legacy left them by Aunt Elizabeth,
the same Aunt Elizabeth who had, before her death, loaned
them the money which enabled Charlotte and Emily to attend
school in Brussels. They had used the legacy to buy railroad
shares, and these provided enough to pay the costs of publi-
cation.

During the proofreading and printing, which took consid-
erable time, a rather voluminous correspondence developed
between Charlotte and the publishers, and these letters can
be found in Mr. Clement Shelter's Charlotte Bronte and
Her Circle. Charlotte had taken pains to inform herself on
typography and format, and had no hesitation in making sug-
gestions. She estimated that the book would run to 200 or
250 pages, and she wished it to be an octavo volume resem-
bling Moxon's latest edition of Wordsworth. When told that
the manuscript would not require such a large volume, Char-
lotte writes, "The MS. will certainly form a thinner volume
than I had anticipated, I cannot name another model which
I would like it precisely to resemble; yet 3 I think, a duo-
decimo form, and a somewhat reduced, though still clear
type, would be preferable. I only stipulate for clear type.

121

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

not too small, and good paper." She always signed herself
C. Bronte, and, since there was no meeting between author
and publisher, the Messrs. Aylott and Jones must have been
somewhat mystified as to the identity of Currer, Ellis, and

Acton Bell. Charlotte's only explanation had been, "You will
perceive that the poems are the work of three persons, rela-
tivestheir separate pieces are distinguished by their re-
spective signatures." One imagines that the publishers may
have decided that he signatory was a wealthy patron of
letters who thought he had discovered genius.

Toward the end of May, 1846, Poems by Currer, Ellis and
Acton Bell was published, having "stolen into life" as Mrs.
Gaskell describes it. It may be said to have stolen out also.
For almost a year later Charlotte, still keeping in character
as Currer Bell, confessed in a letter to Thomas de Quincy that
only two copies of the book had been sold outright. With the
letter went a presentation copy, possibly in the hope that Mr.
de Quincy might be moved to speak favorably of the booK
in the press, or by return post. She wrote:

Sir-, My relatives, Ellis and Acton Bell, and myself,
heedless of the repeated warnings of various respectful
publishers, have committed the rash act of printing a
volume of poems.

The consequences predicted have, of course, overtaken
us. Our book is bound to be a drug; no man needs it or
heeds it, In the space of a year our publisher has disposed
but of two copies, and by what painful efforts he suc-
ceeded in getting rid of these two, himself only knows.

Before transferring the edition to the trankmakers, we
have decided on distributing as presents a few copies of
what we cannot sell; and we beg to offer you one in
acknowledgement of the pleasure and profit we have

122

FIRST PUBLICATION

often and long derived from your works. I am, yours very
respectfully, Currer Bell.

But, although there was the heartbreaking fact that only
two people in England had been brave enough to buy a
book of poetry by three unknown writers, there were certain
compensations for this rash act of publishing. Reviews ap-
pearing in the Critic and Athenaeum were sufficiently favor-
able to tempt the Messrs. Bell into spending an additional ten
pounds for advertising. The advertisements were to include
a quotation from the Critic: "They in whose hearts are
chords strung by nature to sympathise with the beautiful and
true, will recognize in these compositions the presence of
more genius than it was supposed this utilitarian age had de-
voted to the loftier exercises of the intellect* And three
months later Charlotte wrote an appreciative letter to
the editor of the Dublin University Magazine thanking him
for the generous review the magazine had given the book.

Sir, I thank you in my own name and that of my
brothers, Ellis and Acton, for the indulgent notice that ap-
peared in your last number of our Brst humble efforts in
literature; but I thank you far more for the essay on mod-
ern poetry which preceded that notice-an essay in which
seems to me to be condensed the very spirit of truth and
beauty. If all or half of your other readers shall have de-
rived from its perusal the delight it afforded myself and
my brothers, your labors have produced a rich result

After such criticism an author may indeed be smitten
at first by a sense of his own insignificance, as it were, but
on a second and third perusal he finds a power and beauty
therein which stirs him to a desire to do more and better
things, It fulfills the right end of criticism. Without abso-
lutely crushing, it corrects and rouses. I again thank you

123

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

heartily, and beg to subscribe myself > Your constant and
grateful reader, Currer Bell

There is a sincere humility in such a letter, and no bitter-
ness at all. There is not even an appeal for pity, or any
note of self-pity. Actually, the sisters felt none. The publi-
cation of their book had fulfilled the dream they had cher-
ished of one day being authors. To them the fact that a book
of theirs was in print made them authors. They did not go
beyond that, even to doubt the publishers' enterprise in hav-
ing done no better in sales promotion. They doubted the
value of the writing instead. In the same preface to the 1850
edition of Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey referred to
above. Charlotte says, "The book was printed; and all o| it
that merits to be known are the poems of Ellis Bell The fixed
conviction I held, and hold, of the worth of these poems has
not, indeed, received the confirmation of much favorable
criticism; but I must retain it not withstanding,"

Charlotte was right, as usual. Posterity would one day
prove how right she was. But both sisters were sensible
enough to take a first failure with calm good nature, without
prejudice, and with malice toward none. They had scarcely
thought of consigning the unsold copies of Poems by Currer,
Ellis and Acton Bell to the trankmaker than they were hard
at work on their first novels. Charlotte on The Professor,
Emily on Wuthering Heights, and Anne on Agnes Grey.

124

Chapter xiv THE PROFESSOR

T

JL lie Professor was the first of the four
novels writen by Charlotte Bronte, though It was not pub-
lished until two years after her death. It is regarded as the
least representative of her genius. And yet its qualities are,
one feels, entirely within the scale of her intention. She tells
the story, not so much with an eye to values, as with an earnest
concern for characteristics. The setting and the circum-
stances, these are what compelled her. How were the charac-
ters moved by environment and incident, she asked herself.
The effect is a tapestry done in dull shades, but the lines,
though thin, are clear and unwavering. She made no attempt
to get under the skin of her characters. The Professor is a
story of exteriors. Here and there she came close to dipping
below surfaces to passionate abandon. But something held
her in check, a certain fear of letting go. Therefore the novel
is more intellectual than it is psychological or emotional.
Which is, of course, what has caused Rebecca West to say,
"Color is lent to the suspicion that Charlotte Bronte is not an
artist but a sub-artist, that she does not analyze experience,
but weaves fantasies to hang between man and his painful
experience by the frequent use of the sub-artisfs chosen
weapon, sentimental writing. Charlotte Bronte was a su-
preme artist; and yet she was very nearly not an artist at
alL" And one wonders why it is that sentimentality, as it

125

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

seeps through the pages of The Professor, and flattens, as
must be admitted, many pages of Jane Eyre and Shirley, has
so damaged Charlotte Bronte s reputation, when, with many
another great author, it is a forgiven indulgence.

There is a great difference of opinion with regard to The
Professor. Is it a work of art, worthy of the woman who was
to write Jane Eyre and Vilktte? I think so. I think it gives
more than a hint of the later power, and I think the manner
of writing was well intended. Charlotte was not "giving a
loose to her soul" until she had perfected the mold into which
to pour it. She was still a prey to her habitual caution; she
dared not let out the rein. May Sinclair claims that it was only
after Charlotte had seen the manuscript of Emily's Wither-
ing Heights that she threw caution to the winds and gave her
imagination full sway. The result was Jane Eyre.

My opinion is that The Professor deserves more praise, a
wider audience, than it has received, in spite of the senti-
mentality which we grant is there in too large a measure.
The characters of Frances Henri and William Crimsworth are
drawn with very deft and subtle touches and, though she
has not penetrated to any passionate depths, she has re-
deemed them from bathos. They are not types, but personali-
ties. And The Professor contains superb passages of descrip-
tion, as fine as Charlotte ever wrote.

Charlotte herself did not think ill of her first novel. Neither
did she ask "indulgence for it on the plea of a first attempt,
for that," she declared, "it certainly was not, as the pen that
wrote it had been previously worn in practice of some years. 1 *
She was naturally referring to the practice in writing she had
had during the voluminous chapters of the Young Men's
Phy and the Angrian romances. Such early and vigorous
discipline at least justifies her in affirming: "I had got over
126

THE PROFESSOR

any such taste as I might have had for ornamented and
decorated composition, and come to prefer what was plain
and homely/ 7 This was the choice that explains the charac-
ters of The Professor, a choice that made her argue with
Emily and Anne that a heroine need not be beautiful to be
both worthy and interesting, and that the aspiration and for-
titude of the spirit are more important than fascination and
charm of feature. Yes, Charlotte knew what she was doing
in her art as she knew what she was doing in life! If The
Professor has a major fault it is that her calculation shows
through the material, as it doesn't in her later work.

The Professor grew out of Charlotte Bronte's experiences
in Brussels, as did Villette, the greater of the two books,
which dealt with a heroine tossed on the seas of passion and
suffering. But Frances Henri was the forerunner of Lucy
Stowe, as William Crimsworth was, to a certain degree, of
M. Paul Emanuel. The Professor is a novel of two parts, the
scene of the first being laid in England, and that of the sec-
ond in Brussels. The plot is also somewhat divided. In Eng-
land the story revolves about the lives of two brothers, un-
like each other in every way. Edward, the elder, operates a
mill in which William, the younger, works. But the occupa-
tion and environment are completely at variance with
William's tastes and interests, so that a strong antagonism
develops between the brothers. Eventually there is a final
break, and William departs for Brussels, where he becomes a
teacher in M. Pelefs school for boys. And in Brussels he
meets Frances Henri, and falls in love. The remainder of the
book is the story of their romance against the foreign back-
ground that had so deeply affected Charlotte.

We are not led to expect passion from the contained spirit,
the calin intelligence, of Frances Henri. And she does not

127

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

waken it in William Crimsworth. Yet there is a kind of idyllic
appeal in the love affair of these two, which springs from
what Charlotte describes as the "delicious solidarity" of the
young lady, and the decorous reserve of her lover. And the
scene in which William, having come into a small compe-
tence, indicates his wish to marry Frances, is expressive of
Charlotte's own philosophy of matrimony:

"Think of marrying you to be kept by you, Monsieur!
I could not do it; and how dull my days would be! You
would be away teaching in close, noisy schoolrooms, from
morning till evening, and I should be lingering at home,
unemployed and solitary. I should get depressed and
sullen, and you would tire of ine."

"Frances, you could yet read and study two things you
like so well"

"Monsieur, I could not, I like a contemplative life, but
I like an active better; I must act in some way, and act
with you, I have taken notice, Monsieur, that people who
act only in each others' company for amusement, never
really like each other so well, or esteem each other so
highly, as those who work together, and perhaps suffer
together!"

"You speak God's truth [Crimsworth replies], and you
shall have your own way, for it is the best way/'

The Professor has no plot in the conventional sense. It
might more properly be said to be a series of vignettes. The

dialogue makes them that: an arrangement of tableaus or
scenes. They are meant to illustrate the relationship between
the lovers rather than to interpret their feelings. One receives
a certain delight from the deft flourishes of the pen, whether
in conversation or in description, but the strokes are at their
best in the descriptive passages. These last give us Charlotte's
128

THE PROFESSOR

poetic spirit in its true colors. Her own poetry was mediocre,
for she was unable, as Emily, to fit matter to form with her
sister's genius; but given the unhampered freedom of prose,
her poetic imagination took flight. Her word painting is ex-
quisite. Such descriptive passages as the one we quote lift
the story into literature, in spite of the qualities it lacks as a
novel:

Already the pavement was drying; a balmy and fresh
breeze stirred the air, purified by lightning: I left the
west behind me, where a spread sky like opal, azure
inmingled with crimson; the enlarged sun, glorious in
Tynan dyes, dipped his brim already; stepping, as I was,
eastward, I faced a vast bank of clouds, but also I had
before me the arch of an even rainbow; a perfect rain-
bow-high, wide, vivid. I looked long; my eye drank in the
scene, and I suppose my brain must have absorbed it; for
that night, after tying awake in pleasant fever a long
time, watching the silent sheet-lightning, which still
played among the retreating clouds, and flashed silvery
over the stars, I at last fell asleep; and then in a dream
was reproduced the setting sun, the bank of clouds, the
mighty rainbow. I stood, methought, on a terrace; I
leaned over a parapeted wall; there was space below me,
depth I could not fathom, but hearing an endless splash
of waves, I believed it to be the sea; sea spread to the
horizon; sea of changeful green and intense blue; all was
soft in the distance; all vapour-veiled. A spark of gold
glistened on the line between water and air, floated up,
appeared, enlarged and changed; the object hung mid-
way between heaven and earth, under the arch of the
rainbow; the soft but dark clouds diffused behind. It hov-
ered as on wings; pearly, fleecy, ir!canii:ig air streamed
like raiment round it; light, tinted with carnation, col-

129

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

cured what seemed face and limbs; a large star shoiie
with still lustre on an angel's forehead.

Yet no publisher would take The Professor. It went the
heartbreaking rounds from office to office. This journey of
the manuscript best illustrates a certain naivete in Charlotte
that she never outgrew, with all her shrewd arrangement of
life. She never took the trouble to change the wrapping on
the bundle of sheets in which they were returned from the
latest publisher! She would merely erase as best she could,
and send it forth again. Such a purity of intention, whereby
there is no attempt to conceal one's failures in order to fur-
ther one's success, is a tribute to the character and integrity
of a great nature. Emily and Anne possessed the same virtue
to an even higher degree. It is a quality the world could well
emulate in these days of propaganda.

When the manuscript reached Smith, Elder, Mr. Williams
of the firm's editorial stal also rejected it, not for lack of
merit, he said, but because it was too short for the average
three-volume novel. It was a period when the longer the
better, the reader demanding his money's worth in number
of pages and volumes. This rejection, however, established a
correspondence between Charlotte and Mr. Williams that led
to his becoming her friend and literary mentor, and to the
publication of Jane Eyre by the firm of Smith, Elder.

"To come to Jane Eyre after The Professor, declares May
Sinclair, <e is to pass into another world of feeling and vision."
But the two worlds are linked by the symbol of the rue d'lsa-
belle, that was like a river of dreams flowing through Char-
lotte's heart bearing strange crafts of human experience.

130

Chapter xv JANE "EYRE

I

March, 1847, shortly before her thirty-
first birthday, Charlotte Bronte wrote her friend Ellen Nus-
sey, "I shall be thirty-one next birthday. My youth is gone
like a dream; and very little use have I even made of it
What have I done these last thirty years? Precious little."
Yet, only a few months later, she was to realize in full what
those years had meant. For in the first week of October, 1847,
an unknown novelist by the name of Currer Bell gave the
world a story called Jane Eyre.

When, as we previously noted, Mr. Williams of Smith,
Elder turned down The Professor, he was cordially regretful,
and expressed the hope that Currer Bell would grant him
the pleasure of examining any future work, particularly if it
was of greater length. Charlotte, nothing daunted by what
might have appeared merely a kind way of giving her the
brush-off, as we say today, took him at Ms word, and wrote
immediately to say she had a three-volume novel in the mak-
ing which she hoped to finish within a month. When the
completed Jane Eyre reached Mr. Williams, Be is said to have
given it his entire attention, to the exclusion of all else, until
he finished it. "He was so powerfully struck by the character
of the tale," Mrs. Gaskell writes, **that he reported his im-
pression in very strong terms to Mr, Smith, who appears to
have been much amused by the admiration excited. "You

131

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

seem to have been so enchanted, that I do not know how to
believe you/ he laughingly said. But when a second reader
(the Mr. Taylor who later proposed to Charlotte), a clear-
headed Scotchman not given to enthusiasm, had taken the
MS. home in the evening, and become so deeply interested in
it as to sit up half the night to finish it, Mr. Smith's curiosity
was sufficiently excited to prompt him to read it for himself;
and great as were the praises which had been bestowed upon
it, he found that they had not exceeded the truth." So Mr.
Smith of Smith, Elder promptly published it, and thereby
was responsible for turning a page in the history of the novel,
and, more than that, in the history of womankind.

Nothing like this novel had ever come from the hand of a
woman, in English, or any other, literature. Her predeces-
sors, Fanny Burney, Ann Radcliffe, Maria Edgeworth, Jane
Porter, and Jane Austen, her contemporaries Mrs. Oliphant,
Mrs. Gaskell, and George Eliot, had enriched English fiction
to be sure, but not with the electrifying dramatic effect pro-
duced by Jane Eyre. Charlotte Bronte shot her bolt at the
very heart o Victorian complacency and opened up a seeth-
ing subconscious of feminine revolt against convention, of
suppressed humiliations and resentments, that women had
been nourishing in their breasts far too long. And it was not
merely the individual that it probed, exposing, like a sur-
geon's knife, the quivering nerves of the passionate anatomy
of woman's nature, but the institutions that had imprisoned
her for their own security and survival.

One of the extraordinary things about the reception of
Jane Eyre was that it fascinated, at the same tune that it re-
pelled, the mind and sense of its generation. As popukr en-
tertainment its reception was tremendous, overriding all
critical censure and disapproval. It swept the emotions of
132

JANE EYRE

its readers before it in a flood of sensations that had previ-
ously been kept in the dark, in more ways than one, if felt
at all. Its realism challenged the professional critics. The
public had not had its feelings so ruthlessly stirred since
Byron gave them romantic passion in his narrative verse,
Previously, when anyone wished to lay bare the soul of man,
he resorted to the safer smokescreen of poetry. But lately the
novel had begun to realize its power to investigate the inner
conflicts, the capacities for joy and grief, love and hate, that
human flesh is heir to. Charlotte Bronte, largely because she
was blissfully unaware of the depths below her, went over-
board. The result was furiously controversial, in and out of
the press.

Of course the critics, being male, or women who, like Miss
Rigby, prided themselves on going one step further in re-
pudiating their own sex, felt it their bounden duty to be
shocked at the moral and social aspects involved. That Jane
Eyre, not only a woman, but a woman of low degree, should
attempt to probe the human frailties of men and women,
the qualities of character that are elected by the relationship
between the sexes, and particularly the passion that is as
much a right of women as men this was too much for the
male ego to accept without protest. God forbid that women
should be encouraged to follow in Jane's footsteps, or that
such a fantastic emotional outburst should be mistaken for
real life. The possibility must be nipped in the bud. Not
that the pleasure of nipping it in the bud wasn't given fresh
impetus by the necessity for reading the book. Naturally
one has to read what one censors-even in Boston!

One of die earliest and most venomous attacks appeared
in The Quarterly Review. John T. Lockhart, editor of the
C ,/,' "-" I--- had sent a review copy of Jane Eyre to Miss Bigby

133

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

(who later became Lady Eastlake), together with Thacke-
ray's Vanity Fair and a treatise on schools entitled Govern-
esses. The letter he wrote, enclosing them, is most interesting
in view of what had happened previously, and of the events
that were to occur:

About three years ago I received a small volume of
Foems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell, and a queer little
note by Currer Bell who said the book had been pub-
lished a year, and just two copies sold, so they were to
bum the rest, but distributed a few copies, mine being
one. I find what seems rather a fair review of that tiny
tome in the Spectator of this week; pray look at it.

I think the poems of Currer much better than those of
Acton and Ellis, and believe his novel is vastly better
than those which they have more recently put forth.

I know nothing of the writers, but the common rumor
is that they are brothers of the weaving order in some
Lancashire town. At first it was generally said Currer was
a lady, and Mayf air circumstantialised by making her the
chere amie of Mr. Thackeray. But your skill in "dress"
settles the question of sex. I think, however, some woman
must have assisted in the school scenes of Jane Eyre,
which have a striking air of truthfulness to me an igno-
ramus, 1 allow, on such points.

I should say you might well glance at the novels by
Acton and Ellis Bell Withering Heights is one of them.-
If you have any friend about Manchester, it would, I sup-
pose, be easy to learn accurately as to the position of these
men.

Whether Miss Rigby actually wrote the review which re-
sulted from this assignment is somewhat questionable. There
is a possibility, vouched for by Mr. Andrew Lang, that a cer-
tain Mr. Broeklebanfc, "a black-marble clcrgvman," either
134

JANE EYRE

wrote the article or collaborated with Miss Rigby. And it

would seem highly probable that Mr. Lang was right. The
hand of the clergy appears to be discernible in the harsh

tones of the denunciation. After all, the attitude would have
the approval of such an eminent authority of the cloth as
Charles Kingsley, whose word for Jane Eyre was "coarse."

We have said [writes Miss Rigby (or Mr. BrocHe-
bank)] that this was a picture of a natural heart. This, to
our view, is the great and crying mischief of the book.
Jane Eyre is throughout the personification of an unre-
generate and undisciplined spirit the more dangerous to
exhibit from that prestige of principle and self-control
which is liable to dazzle the eye too much for it to observe
the insufficient and unsound foundation on which it rests.
It is true that Jane does right, and exerts great moral
strength, but it is the strength of a mere heathen mind,
which is a law unto itself. No Christian grace is percep-
tible upon her. She has inherited in the fullest measure
the worst sin of our fallen nature, the sin of pride. Jane
Eyre is proud,~aad therefore she is ungrateful too. It
pleased God to make her an orphan, friendless and penni-
less, and yet she thanks nobody, least of all the friends,
companions, and instructors of her helpless youth, for the
food and raiment, the care and education, vouchsafed to
her till she was capable in mind and fit to provide for
herself. Altogether the autobiography of Jane Eyre is
pre-eminently an anti-Christian composition. There is
throughout it a murmuring against the comforts of the
rich and the privations of the poor, which, so far as each
individual is concerned, is a murmuring against God's
appointment. There is a proud and perpetual asserting
of the rights of man for which we find no authority in
God's Word or His Providence. There is that pervading

135

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

tone of ungodly discontent which is at once the most
prominent and the most subtle evil which the law and the
pulpit, which all civilized society, in fact, at the present
day has to contend with.

The Quarterly also was of two minds as to the sex of the
author of Jane Eyre. Was Currer Bell man or woman? "No
woman," the reviewer states emphatically, "trusses game,
garnishes dessert dishes with the same hands, or talks of doing
so in the same breath. Above all, no woman attires another in
such fancy dresses as Jane's ladies assume. Miss Ingram com-
ing down irresistible in a morning robe of sky-blue crepe, a
gauze azure scarf twisted in her hair! No lady, we under-
stand, when suddenly aroused in the night, would think of
hurrying on "a frock/ They have garments more convenient
for such occasions, and more becoming, too!" Obviously be-
lieving that the author is not only a man, but a dangerous and
fanatic radical as well, the reviewer continues: "We do not
hesitate to say that the tone of mind and thought which has
overthrown authority, and violated every code, human and
divine, abroad, and fostered chartism and rebellion at home,
is the same which has also written Jane Eyre!' And 'Tie" goes
on to make what Miss May Sinclair calls "an infamous and
immoral utterance": "If we ascribe the book to a woman at
all, we have no alternative but to ascribe it to one who has,
for some sufficient reason, long forfeited the society of her
own sex."

What was this story that stirred such passions in the hearts
of its readers? Where did it spring from, whether from the
heart of man or woman, out of what travail and faith? Actu-
ally the fictional character of Jane Eyre is a tangled web of
autobiographical counterpoint. Jane Eyre's recital of her life,
138

JANE EYRE

and of her love for the master of Thornfield, was drawn di-

rectlv from the reaKties of Charlotte Bronte's life. The atmos-

*>

phere was one she had known and absorbed; the situations

were those she had observed intimately, suffered, and not
accepted; the characters had many of them been ripening
through the long apprenticeship of the Angrian cycle. Char-
lotte's sources and resources were so rich and varied it is not
surprising she sometimes became embarrassed in the use of
them when attempting the novel form. She had always freely
piled incident on incident, character on character, in hap-
hazard abandonment to imaginative impulses. Now incident
and character must be harnessed tandem to a vehicle she had
never ridden. So that while her creative genius easily trans-
formed the illusions of Angria to the realities of Thomfield,
it still could fail to keep the course of action in proper focus
and perspective. From the exteriors and intellectual refine-
ments of The Professor, she leaped with a sudden and direct
force into the interiors and passions of Jane Eyre; and, dazed
by the transition, she had difficulty to keep her narrative in
balance, her values defined. Her fortitude, however, sus-
tained her, and she persisted until the essence of passion, and
it was a profoundly spiritual passion, yielded its strong magic
to flavor the crises in the love of Jane and Rochester. As May
Sinclair says in her introduction to the 1905 edition of Jane
Eyre, published by J. M. Dent, London:

Passion was Charlotte Bronte^ secret. She gave a new
meaning to the word. She was the Erst novelist .to handle
the thing, the real thing. Jjaae Austen 1 was not alone in
her ignorance of it. None of the older novelists had
treated it adequately. For Scott it was simply a high,
vague, romantic feeling that hung round his characters
like a dress. Kichardson got somewhere near it in Clarissa

137

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Harlowe without knowing it. His vision was impaired by
tht damp fog of sentiment in which he loved to live. To
Fielding passion meant animal passion, and as such he
rightly held it unimportant.

For Thackeray, too, it is a sharp fever of the senses, to
be treated with the brevity its episodic and accidental
character deserves.

None of these novelists understood by passion what
Charlotte Bronte understood. And the comfortable, senti-
mental, thoroughly prosaic Early Victorians who de-
voured Jane Eyre did not understand it either and were
shocked.

! .;" / ^ as the orphan child with the Reeds at Gates-
head, where her spirit was wounded by the frightful experi-
ence of the Red Room, to the finding of the blind and broken
Rochester, and the atonement of her marriage to him, Jane
Eyre tells her story in a series of poignant crises. As a child
of ten, she confesses, "I was a discord at Gateshead." This is
the motif of an autobiography. Jane was out of step with life,
she was a discord in the harmony of love and convention,
off-key in her adjustment to society, so-called. Yet all these
discordant notes were to be resolved in what Miss Sinclair
calls a "truth beyond reality/*

I think one is first made aware of the symbolic significance
of certain episodes, that weave an oft-repeated melody
throughout the whole, at the first meeting of Jane and Roch-
ester. Eight years after Jane leaves the infamous school at
Lowood, and goes out into the world to make a living, we
find her at Thornfield as governess to Adele Varens, the half-
French half -English ward of Rochester. Rochester has been
absent from Thornfield at the time Mrs. Fairfax, the house-
hold manager, engaged her. When he returns, he meets with
138

JANE EYRE

an accident on the icy path approaching the house, spraining
an ankle. Jane goes to his assistance, and though he is a
strong, heavy man, leaning on her frail body he is safely

helped indoors. Here, from the first, we have the interplay,
the juxtaposition, of the forces that make the novel so power-
ful and stimulating: the superior power of the spirit, particu-
larly when it is aflame with love, over the instability of
matter. Charlotte clearly conceived this idea as being the
guiding thread that held together and unified the novel, not
as incidents in a consciously "invented" plot, but as abstrac-
tions released from the secret frustrations of the heart

There are four such crises in Jane Eyre, rising like snow-
capped peaks lit by the rays of a setting sun. By way of these,
the soul of Jane, as in Pilgrims Progress, reaches successive
heights of self-sacrifice and redemption, gains a discipline
over the turbulent spirit, attains ultimate happiness and rest.
The first of these, already referred to, was the terror she expe-
rienced as a child in the Red Room at Gateshead; the second
was the severe trial her love for Rochester suffered at his
hands at Thornfield; the third, the telepathic exchange be-
tween them that impelled their meeting, the spirit of each
yearning for revelation; and, finally, Jane's triumph over
temptation when it became clear she could not marry Roch-
ester. Charlotte Bronte, in her handling of these episodes,
seems to be exercising her most rigid Calvinisttc convictions
to catechize the waywardness of the human heart. Yet when
she discovers that man's seeming desire to break the laws of
nature is really only his need to break die laws of man,
she grants her characters mercy and salvation. The "values"
of Gateshead were conventions, she discovers, not the kws
that should underlie the obligations of both domestic and
Christian life. Although the intolerable conditions at Lowood

1S9

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

were a sin against Christian principles, the worst that could
be said of them was that they were mistaken, yet they had
foundation in the creed in which Charlotte believed: it is
God's will to chasten with trial and pain those whom He most
loves.

As I have said, there is so much in Jane Eyre that is subject
to symbolic interpretation. And it is all encompassed by the
great house at Thornfield, whose destruction by fire is itself
an emblem. The whole drama of Jane's love is played out in
this house. Through its rooms wander the brutal spirit of
Rochester's cruel deception; the delicate charm and inno-
cence of Adele, the illegitimate child; the tipsy ogre; Grace
Poole; Bertha, the mad wife, confined to her chamber of
horrors; and the gentle, graceful Mrs. Fairfax. The child
Adele is perhaps the most symbolic of all Charlotte Bronte's
characters. Adele is the symbol of that purity which sin may
beget but cannot harm, when the sin is an accident of man's
nature caught in the grip of natural law that force which is
an expression of God's will to create. As the symbol of the
expiation of such "sin," Charlotte's Adele is the first in fiction,
to be followed closely by Pearl in The Scarlet Letter. But
Charlotte's portrait is perhaps even more vivid, and certainly
as beautiful, as Hawthorne's.

Furthermore there are whole conversations that are, in
themselves, an interpretation, a symbolic representation, of
an idea. Take, for instance, the conversation that follows
Jane's discovery of Rochester's philandering with Blanche
Ingram:

"I grieve to leave Thornfield [says Jane], I love Thorn-
field: I love it because I have lived in it a full and de-
lightful life, momentarily, at least. I have not been
trampled on. I have not been petrified. I have not been

140

JANE EYRE

buried with inferior minds, and excluded from every
glimpse of communion with what is bright and energetic
and high. I have talked, face to face, with what I rev-
erence; with what I delight in with an original, a vigor-
ous, an expanded mind. I have known you, Mr. Rochester;
and it strikes me with terror and anguish to feel I abso-
lutely must be torn from you for ever. I see the necessity
of departure; and it is like looking on the necessity of
death."

"Where do you see the necessity?" he asked, suddenly.

"Where? You, sir, have placed it before me."

"In what shape?"'

"In the shape of Miss Ingram; a noble and beautifttl
woman, your bride/*

"My bride! What bride? I have no bridel*

"But you will have/*

"Yes;-I will!" He set his teeth,

"Then I must go: you have said it yourself."

"No; you must stay! I swear it and the oath shall be
kept."

"I tell you I must go!" I retorted, roused to something
like passion. "Do you titnnk I caa stay to become nothing
to you? Do you think I am an automaton? a machine
without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of
bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water
dashed from my cup? Do you think, because I am poor,
obscure, plain, little, I am soulless and heartless? You
think wrong! I have as much soul as you, and full as
much heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty,
and much wealth, I should have made it as hard for you
to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not
talking to you now through the medium of custom, con-
ventionalities, or even of mortal flesh : it is my spirit that
addresses your spirit; just as if both had passed tihrough

141

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

the grave and we stood at God's feet equal, as we are!"
"As we are!" repeated Mr. Rochester.

The critics have been immensely disturbed by this pas-
sage, objecting to its psychology and its histrionics. Char-
lotte herself was interested in neither. She knew nothing of
the former, and cared nothing for the latter. Her concern
was entirely with the moralities of love and passion, those
emotions that compel man to reach the most exalted place
life can hold or to sink to its most despicable depths; and her
principle of morality was not found in any system devised by
man, as Miss Sinclair said, but came from a divine source
which embraces the whole of creation. In this dialogue she
gave vent to that pride which was considered the unpardon
able sin of the orphaned and the helpless. It was Charlotte's
mission to tumble the mighty from their seats, and exalt the
lowly and meek. The meek shall have pride, she says, if it is
purified with the emotions that are the common heritage of
all menand women. She also was moved by an immense
sympathy for the suffering of the human soul, heart, and
mind. Whereas Becky Sharpe, of Vanity Fair, has lost much
of her original glamour, having been made an object of dis-
like and satire by her creator, Jane Eyre has emerged steadily
brighter, due to the pity and understanding that Charlotte's
conscience, incapable of ethical infidelity, poured upon her.
To quote again from Miss Sinclair;

What, after all, was the passion that Charlotte tinder-
stood? It is not any blind, unspiritual instinct. Her Jane's
upward gaze is "the very sublime of faith, truth and devo-
tion." She has not only shown in Jane the power of pas-
sion. She was the first to vindicate its essential purity; the
first woman to divine that a woman's passion, when com-

142

JANE EYRE

plete, is two-fold, she being destined supremely for
maternity. In Charlotte Bronte's hands passion becomes a
thing of strange innocences and tendernesses and terrors,
rejoicing in service and the sacrifice of self. A thing su-
perbly unaware of animal instinct; a profound and tragic
thing' that bears at its heart the prescience of suffering

and of death.

Because of this quality in her, little Jane, in spite ot
her quaint and somewhat alienating precision, and her
tendency to refer to herself as a "dependent," remains to
this day young and splendid and modern to her finger-
tips.

143

Chapter xvi SHIRLEY

c,

CHARLOTTE BRONTE'S novels are all stud-
ies of women against the Victorian background of England, a
background not so much of a period as of a convention.
But whereas Jane Eyre and Lucy Snowe are presented sub-
jectively, autobiographically, Shirley Keeldar is an objective
portrayal. Charlotte holds Shirley off, as it were, for scrutiny,
and for that reason Shirley is spared the brush strokes of
sentimentality that sometimes dull the canvas of Jane Eyre.
Also the atmosphere of place, the Yorkshire scene, exerts a
more vital influence on the whole picture of Shirley. Indeed,
scene is greatly responsible for Shirley's attractive per-
sonality, for the fascination she has for everyone who comes
to know her. And I agree with the critics who say that the
fj M: '; reason for Shirley's character being what it is,
her steadfast soul and its oneness with steadfast nature, is
that Emily was the model Charlotte used. I do not agree
that the character of Shirley is a failure because it is only a
partly realized delineation of Emily, as some have said, for
it seems to me that what there is of Emily in Shirley is a
phantom spirit that emerges in those rare moments when the
girl is transported by the supreme beauty in nature. Charlotte
herself says that she thought of Emily as she wrote of Shirley.
But the question remains, did she tave Emily in mind from
the * i : : '. or did Emily find her way into the book as
144

SHIRLEY

she progressed? The latter seems more likely, since the writ-
ing was begun before Emily's death. It would seem that, later
in the book, memories of her sister were what gave the char-
acter of Shirley its poignant qualities, its spiritual signifi-
cance. As Miss Ratchford says, Shirley Keeldar is what Emily
"might have been had she known health and prosperity/ 7

It was during the writing of Shirley that Charlotte passed
through "The Valley of the Shadow of Death/* to use the
title of her twenty-fourth chapter, taken in turn from Pil-
grim's Progress. She had the novel about half completed
when Emily became mortally ill, and her death was followed
swiftly by Anne's. Charlotte had laid the manuscript aside
during this tragic period of illness and death. She had taken
Anne to Scarborough in the hope that the sea air would be
a healing influence. But the tuberculosis, that scourge of the
Bronte family, again took its toll, and Charlotte returned to
the empty parsonage at Haworth bowed with grief and lone-
liness. "I felt that the house was all silent,* 7 she wrote Ellen
Nussey, "the rooms were all empty. I remembered where the
three were laidin what dark narrow dwellingsnevermore
to reappear on earth The agony that was to be under-
gone, and was not to be avoided, came on, I underwent it,
and passed a dreary evening and night, and a mournful mor-
row/* It is difficult to conceive such tragedy visited upon
one so young, so solitary, and so isolated.

What this "agony to be undergone" did to Charlotte was
to force her to reconceive her novel, and make of the second
part a memorial to her sister Emily. There is no doubt that
she set herself resolutely to finish Shirley, as a means of sur-
cease from sorrow and pain. Beginning with the twenty-
fourth chapter, "The Valley of the Shadow of Death," she
writes of Caroline Hektoae's illness, the tender nursing of

145

THE Bi:\\nci;i-:i) PARSONAGE

Mrs, Pryor, and the revelation of their relationship as mother
and daughter. And it is at this point in the book that May
Sinclair says, "Charlotte's level strength deserts her. Ever
after, she falls and soars, and falls, and soars again/' A mind
divided., or rather a heart divided, between life and the grave
-what could one expect! Yet it is in the second part of the
book that Emily emerges as an element-like wind or rain or
sunlight-in the character of Shirley herself. And it is the
second part, with all its faltering and inequality, its soaring
and falling, that is the most stimulating and uplifting, often
the most intense, due to the character of Shirley Keeldar.

Furthermore, any fluctuation in the artistic qualities of
Shirley does not rob it of the idea, the concept, that Char-
lotte Bronte had for the novel. She was concerned with the
heralding of a new industrial era, the coming in of the "in-
dustrial age/' in which the use of machinery was already
beginning to have its effect on labor. While the new inven-
tions, and their effect on the working man, served as Char-
lotte's protagonist in the industrial drama fust commencing,
she also introduced the political crisis, brought about by the
Napoleonic war, which had caused the government to pro-
hibit the products of British mills from being sold to neutral
countries. And in Shirley we have Robert Moore caught on
the horns of the economic dilemma thus precipitated.

Robert Moore was fighting to maintain his business sol-
vency against political restrictions with the use of labor-
saving devices; his rigid, unsympathetic attitude toward the
workers, antagonistic to begin with because of his foreign
extraction, made the conflict a class war as well as an eco-
nomic. Into this struggle Shirley Keeldar stepped, supporting
Moore's industrial investment with money of her own, at the
same time reconciling her conscience by assisting the dissi-
146

SHIRLEY

dent working class with practical charity and human sympa-
thy.

As can be seen, Shirley Keeldar is Charlotte's new concept
of womanhood. She is drawn, not so much as a rebel against
the strictures society had imposed upon her sex, as a proph-
ecy of woman's coming equality with man in his participa-
tion in the world of affairs. The development of Shirley's
character is masterfully accomplished through action and
scene, a composite of the two. We get it through the wooing
of Sir Philip Nunnely; the angry discussions between Shirley
and her uncle when she refuses to marry Sir Philip; the diary
of Louis Moore, who loves Shirley on paper until the end of
the book; the walks with Caroline Helstone on the heath
when Shirley talks of all earthly beauties; the conversation
between the two women as they watch the workers* riot in
the night:

"They come on!" cried Shirley. "How steadily they
march in! There is discipline in their ranks-I will not say
there is courage; hundreds against tens are no proof of
that quality; but (she dropped her voice) there is suffer-
ing and desperation amongst themthese goads will
urge them forward."

"Forwards against Robert-and they hate him. Shirley,
is there much danger they will win the day?"

"We shall see. Moore and Helstone are of earth's first
blood no bunglers no cravens"

A crash-smash-shiver-stopped their whispers. A si-
multaneously-hurled volley of stones had saluted the
broad front of the mill, and with all its windows; and now
every pane of every lattice lay shattered and pounded
fragments. A yell followed this demonstration a rioters*
yeE-a north-of-England-a Yorkshire a West Riding a

147

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

West Riding-clothing-district-of-Yorkshire rioters' yell.
You never heard that sound, perhaps, reader? So much
the better for your ears perhaps for your heart; since, if
it rends the air in hate to yourself, or to the men or prin-
ciples you approve, the interests to which you wish well,
Wrath wakens to the cry of Hate: the Lion shakes his
marie, and rises to the howl of the Hyena: Caste stands
up, ireful, against Caste; and the indignant, wronged
spirit of the Middle Rank bears down in zeal and scorn
on the famished and furious mass of the Operative Class.
It is difficult to be tolerant difficult to be justin such
moments.

Caroline rose; Shirley put her arm round her; they
stood as still as the straight stems of two trees. That yell
was a long one, and when it ceased, the night was yet full
of the swaying and murmuring of a crowd.

"What next?" was the question of the listeners. Nothing
came yet. The mill remained mute as a mausoleum.

<c He cannot be alone!" whispered Caroline.

"I would stake all I have, that he is as little alone as
he is alarmed/' responded Shirley.

This final declaration of Shirley's under the stress of the
violence which the two girls were witnessing, is the key to
the spirit of Shirley Keeldar, reflecting that of Emily Bronte,
drawing its strength from mystical powers. For Shirley and
Caroline were speaking of a man they both loved, Caroline
with a tender devotion but with an uncomprehending inno-
cence, Shirley with a mystic power of plumbing the human
soul; Caroline in deadly fear for Robert's life, Shirley with
courage for his soul. When she said tibat Robert Moore,
menaced as he was by the angry mob, was as little alone as
he was alarmed, she was stating the case for God. The magic
148

SHIRLEY

of Shirley's personality had come to burn with a steady flame
under her complex and unpredictable behavior.

In Shirley, Charlotte Bronte leaves the parsonage and the
classroom and goes out into the world of business, into the
affairs of men. Many men play important roles in Shirley's
life, in her public life as well as her private life. She is sur-
rounded by men; and she holds her own among them, from
the standpoint both of intellect and of integrity. It seems to
me to be one of the mysterious aspects of Charlotte's genius
that at so young an age, and living the secluded and penuri-
ous life of a minister's daughter, she could give us the men
she has drawn in Shirley. All of them are recognizably iesh
and blood, no mere figments of a girl's imagination. Her men
are sturdy and strong, with all the virtues and faults of human
beings. They do not stand on pedestals. She skillfully satirizes
the insipid weakness of the curates, Messrs. Malone, Sweet-
ing, and Donne; and yet the rector, Mathew Helstone, is a
cleric of determined political principles, a Tory, a skeptic
where women are concerned (and particularly where his
niece Shirley is concerned), who fearlessly and manfully de-
fends the law against the rioters. Robert Moore, Hiram Yorke,
Joe Scott, Mr. Sykes, even the hypocritical dissenters, Moses
Barraclough and Michael Hartley, are all realities. In Hiram
Yorke, Charlotte has been said to have created her most
powerful male character. A native of Yorkshire, with cultural
refinements acquired from foreign travel and wide associa-
tions, with an uncompromising yet understanding attitude
toward human frailty, Hiram Yorke is done with a power and
unerring penetration that makes him memorable in the roster
of Charlotte s creations. Hiram's racy Yorkshire dialect, ex-
pressing such wise insight, is done with a true ear for the
tang of originality of expression. The wisdom may be harsh,

149

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

but it is lit by such a spirit of sweet intelligence and faith as
to soften the sting. Although his part in the story is com-
paratively minor, he gives the impression of a major force,
outweighing the rigid financial obsessions of Robert Moore,
or the ineffectual, though noble, aspirations of his brother,
Louis Moore, And, speaking of Louis Moore, it must have
been in a moment of impulse that Charlotte chose him, of
them all, to become Shirley's husband. Perhaps because, hav-
ing made the problems of society, rather than romance, her
"leading men," she was not so deeply concerned with Shirley's
affairs of the heart as she had been with Jane's and Lucy's.
She could thus give Shirley away to any one of several men,
provided they were worthy aspirants.

Shirley's relation to Caroline is extremely interesting, in
view of the relationship of Emily, Anne, and Charlotte. Caro-
line might well have been Anne, as Shirley was Emily.
Shirley sees with patient and loving understanding, with
compassionate sympathy, the gnawing hunger of love for
Robert Moore that is eating Caroline's heart away. She her-
self feels irresistibly drawn into the flame of Robert Moore s
dynamic personality, his vigor and drive, yet she doesn't
allow the faintest intimation of her own feelings to shadow
her friendship for Caroline. Caroline sinks under the burden
of her unrequited love, and becomes very ill Shirley sends
her own governess-companion, the mysterious Mrs. Pryor, to
nurse Caroline; it is then that Caroline discovers that Mrs.
Pryor is her mother. For all the danger invited by such a
reunion for one of Charlottes lapses into sentimentality,
this is one of the tenderest and most moving scenes in any
of the novels.

What makes Shirley endearing, and a triumph of Char-
lotte s imagination, is that she is a symbol of the unity
150

SHIRLEY

between the human spirit and the profound realities of na-
ture. Shirley, like Emily, knew how to break through the
facade of man's creation to worship at the altars of those
truths. In Shirley, Charlotte Bronte used to greatest advan-
tage her familiarity with the Yorkshire background. The first
part of The Professor, and certain parts of Jane Eyre, find
her painting the scene she knew by heart, but in neither of
these novels does she weave such a pattern of natural and
psychological details, giving the temper and substance of a
place and its people, as she does in Shirley. In Shirley her
love of the Haworth country is transfigured by the spirit of
Emily and takes on a new significance. In one incomparable
passage, which May Sinclair has called a "great prose hymn,"
Shirley utters a paean of adoration of Earth that is Incom-
parable in its ecstatic fervor;

"How pleasant and calm it is!" said Caroline,
"And how hot it will be in the church!" responded Shir-
ley: "and what a dreary long speech Dr. Boultby will
make! and how the curates will hammer over their pre-
pared orations! For my part, I would rather not enter.**
"But uncle will be angry, if he observes our absence."
"I will bear the brunt of his wrath: he will not devour
me. I shall be sorry to miss his pungent speech. I know
it will be all sense for the Church, and all Causticity for
Schism: hell not forget the battle of Royd-lane. I shall
be sorry also to deprive you of Mr. Hall's sincere friendly
homily, with its racy Yorkshireisms; but here I must stay.
The gray church and grayer tombs look divine with this
crimson gleam on them. Nature is now at her evening
prayers: she is kneeling before those red hills. I see her
prostrate on the great steps of her altar, praying for a
fair night for mariners at sea, for travellers in the deserts,

151

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

for lambs on moors, and unfledged birds in woods. Caro-
line, I see her! and I will tell you what she is like: she is
like what Eve was when she and Adam stood alone on
earth/'

"And that is not Milton s Eve, Shirley."

"Milton's Eve! Milton's Eve! I repeat. No, by the pure
Mother of God, she is not! Gary, we are alone: we may
speak what we think. Milton was great; but was he good?
His brain was right: how was his heart? He saw heaven:
he looked down on hell. He saw Satan, and Sin his daugh-
ter, and Death their horrible off-spring. Angels serried
before him their battalions: the long lines of adamantine
shields flashed back on his blind eyeballs the unutterable
splendour of heaven. Devils gathered their legions in
his sight: their dim, discrowned, and tarnished armies
passed rank and file before him. Milton tried to see the
first woman; but } Gary, he saw her not!"

"You are bold to say so, Shirley."

"Not more bold than faithful It was his cook that he
saw; or it was Mrs. Gill, as I have seen her, making cus-
tards, in the heat of summer, in the cool dairy, with rose-
trees and nasturtiums about the latticed window, pre-
paring a cold collation for the rectors, preserves, and
'dulcent creams'puzzled

What choice to choose for delicacy best;
What order so contrived as not to mix
Tastes, not well-joined, inelegant; but bring
Taste after taste, upheld with kindliest change."

**A11 very well too, Shirley.''

"I would beg to remind him that the first men of the
earth were Titans, and that Eve was their mother: from
her sprang Saturn, Hyperion, Oceanus: she bore Prome-
theus"

152

SHIRLEY

"Pagan that you are; what does that signify?"
"I say, there were giants on the earth in those days:
giants that strove to scale heaven. The first woman's
breast that heaved with life on this world yielded the dar-
ing which could contend with Omnipotence: the strength
which could bear a thousand years of bondage, -the
vitality which could feed that vulture death through
uncounted ages, the unexhausted life and uncorrupted
excellence, sisters to immortality, which, after niilleniums
of crimes, struggles, and woes, could conceive and bring
forth a Messiah, The First woman was heaven-bom: vast
was the heart whence gushed the well-spring of the blood
of nations; and grand the undegenerate head where
rested the consort-crown of creation."

"She coveted an apple, and was cheated by a snake;
but you have got such a hash of Scripture and mythology
into your head that there is no making any sense of you.
You have not yet told me what you saw kneeling on those

"I saw I now see a woman-Titan: her robe of blue
air spreads to the outskirts of the heath, where yonder
flock is grazing; a veil white as an avalanche sweeps from
her head to her feet, and arabesques of lightning flame
on its borders. Under her breast I see her zone, purple like
that horizon: through its blush shines the star of evening.
Her steady eyes I cannot picture; they are clear they are
as deep as lakes they are lifted and full of worship they
tremble with the softness of love and the lustre of prayer.
Her forehead has the expanse of a cloud, and is paler than
the early moon, risen long before the dark gathers: she re-
clines her bosom on the ridge of Stilbro* Moor; her mighty
hands are foined beneath it. So kneeling, face to face she
speaks with God. That Eve is Jehovah's daughter, as
Adam was his son.**

153

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

"She is very vague and visionary! Come, Shirley, we
ought to go into church."

"Caroline, I will not: I will stay out here with my
mother Eve, in these days called Nature. I love her-
undying, mighty being! Heaven may have faded from
her brow when she fell in paradise; but all that is glorious
on earth shines there still She is taking me to her bosom,
and showing me her heart. Hush, Caroline! you will see
her and feel as I do, if we are both silent."

It is therefore little wonder that Shirley Keeldar, with her
freed spirit that went straight to God and asked no "middle
man," should have stirred the wonder and admiration of the
Yorkshire folk, from the hardheaded business executive,
Robert Moore, to the simple laborer, William Farren, touch-
ing their lives with a beauty they knew not of. The insight
that Shirley possessed, and that Caroline called visionary,
was supported by a creed, call it pagan if you will. It had
the power to magnetize men to action, though it needed no
doctrinal exhortation to work its effect. It was accomplished
by a smile, a word, a service rendered, starlighted with some
divine fire of the senses.

"I have spent the afternoon and evening at Fieldhead,"
Louis Moore writes in his diary. "Some hours ago she passed
me, coming down the oak-staircase-window, looking at the
frost-bright constellations. How closely she glided against
the bannisters! How shyly shone her large eyes upon me!
How evanescent, fugitive, fitful, she looked slim and swift as
a Northern Streamer! I followed her into the drawing-room.
Mrs. Pryor and Caroline Helstone were both there. She
summoned me to bear her company for awhile. In her eve-
ning dress; with her long hair flowing full and wavy; with
her noiseless step, her pale cheek, her eye full of night and
154

SHIRLEY

lightening, she looked, I thought, spirit-Hke-a thing made of
an element-the child of a breeze and a flame-the daughter
of ray and raindrop a thing never to be overtaken, arrested,
fixed . . . Once I only saw her beauty, now I feel it"

That was the secret of Shirley's power over all who knew
her. They saw her great external beauty, her charm of man-
ner, but as these became more and more familiar, they began
to feel her innate qualities, and suddenly found themselves
in labyrinths of emotion from which they had no desire to
extricate themselves. Clearly it was the spirit of Emily
Bronte, immortalized by her sister Charlotte Bronle, that
had led them into her inner sanctum.

155

Chapter xvn VILLETTE

G

CRITICAL opinion seems to be agreed
that Villette Is Charlotte Bronte s masterpiece. She poured
into this novel, her fourth and last to be completed before her
own untimely death at the age of thirty-nine, all the poetry
and music of love as her passionately poetic nature conceived
love to be. (She began a fifth novel, entitled Emma, that was
destined to remain a fragment.) Her heroine, Lucy Snowe,
is among the finest creations in English literature, and she is
made so out of the depths of Charlotte's own heart. A glow-
ing ardor holds the story to a high pitch of emotional excite-
ment. Villetfe does not "soar and fall, soar, and fall again,"
as does Shirley in its later pages. It rises quickly to a level
that is sustained throughout. No psychological or political
implications confuse the issue, as in Jane Eyre and Shirley,
and, whereas many of the incidents could have weighted the
book with tragedy, it is rescued by the saving grace of a
delicate and exquisite comedy, which gives the story a certain
wistful pathos. The extraordinarily adept mingling of comedy
ami pathos is a constant source of delight to the reader. "It is
this utter purity," Miss Sinclair says, "this transparent sim-
plicity., that makes Villette great." One is tempted, in speak*
ing of Villette, to use a cliche, and say that it was indeed
written in the white heat of inspiration.

The action of Villette occurs within a very narrow range.
156

VILLETTE

It all takes place at a girls' school In Villette (Brussels)-,
with a few excursions in and out of the city. There is no
question, nor was one obviously intended, that the school is
the school Charlotte attended in Brussels in 1842 and 1843,
when she and Emily were sent abroad for a few brief months
of study. How much further the similarity goes has become a
matter of almost legendary conjecture. As in the case of Emily
Dickinson, and her journey to Philadelphia, there has been
endless controversy as regards what happened when Char-
lotte first went forth into the world. Is the story of Villette,
in other words, the result of Charlotte's frustrated love for
M. Heger of the Heger Pensionnat? Did she really fall in
love with her teacher, or was she in love with love, or did
she merely feel the first stirrings of infatuation for someone
of the opposite sex whom she admired as her intellectual
superior? Whatever the emotion, was it reciprocated, or
frustrated, or quickly sublimated? Several things lend cre-
dence to the theory that Charlotte was deeply stirred, and
that she did not conceal the fact from M. Heger. For one
thing, her letters to him, after her return to England, indicate
an urgent desire to receive letters in return ultfr/jgh the de-
sire would appear to be for a correspondence between two
minds that thought in unison rather than two hearts that
beat as one. For another, Mrs. Gaskell was refused an audi-
ence by Madame Heger when she went to Brussels seeking
information. But then this could have been because Madame
Heger considered such a visit impertinent and uncalled for.
Or perhaps, as Miss Sinclair says, "Madame did not under-
stand these Platonic relations between English students and
their French professors.** Yet how Platonic was it? Charlotte
herself did not want Villette translated into French. Back-
ward and forward the argument swings, yes aad no, no and

157

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

yes. How important such a controversy becomes in the con-
sideration of Vittette as a work of art seems to me unimpor-
tant, even to the literary interpreter, and even though Char-
lotte may have "given herself hopelessly away." But what if
she did give herself away? The love, if it was there, died a
natural death from lack of response and propinquity. Why
should we, a hundred years later, take its name constantly
in vain? If what Charlotte felt for M. Heger awakened her
romantic imagination, and gave her the key to unlock the
souls of Jane and Shirley and Lucy, we should be only too
thankful to M. Heger, and let Charlotte's predicament rest
in peace. If, as I say, Villette is somewhat the fruit of experi-
ence (as why shouldn't it be, and how could it help being),
it is better to let the romantic background of that experience,
whether Platonic or otherwise, pass into history, and only
consider the use Charlotte Bronte made of it. Far better to
be grateful for the miracle wrought, somehow, somewhere,
in Charlotte's soul that gave her the power to reveal love in
the heart of Lucy Snowe.

We find Lucy Snowe, an orphan, living at the home of her
godmother, Mrs. Bretton, in the ancient English village of
Bretton. In the same household is the delightful child, Polly
Home, daughter of the austere but mysterious Scotchman
who turns up later, in Villette, as the fabulous Comte de
Bassompierre, Charlotte has never lost her childhood habit
of coincidental reincarnations! The Comte is one of them.
And Mrs. Bretton's son, Graham, is another, since he also
materializes later in the book as Dr. John. Lucy, with no
security in view, leaves the Bretton home to make her way in
the world, rather than be beholden. She goes up to London,
where, seized by an impulse, she boards a ship for Brussels,
or rather Villette. On board she becomes acquainted with a
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VILLETTE

young girl, Ginevra Fanshawe, who is returning as a pupil
to Madame Beck's pensionnat in Belgium. Learning that
Lucy is seeking employment, Ginevra introduces her to
Madame Beck ? and she becomes first governess and then
teacher at the school.

The years pass, until at last, suddenly, Lucy Is swept into
the wild, unpredictable currents of life in Villette. It all
began that day she was taken desperately ill in the street
and was found by Dr. John. Dr. John (the erstwhile Graham
Bretton), now a doctor in Villette, takes her home to be
nursed by his mother, who has, of course, followed her
adored and adoring son to the Continent. From this moment
Lucy becomes dramatically, and aB but fatally, involved in
conflicting streams of adventure, one of which has its source
in the harassed and uncertain life in the Beck pensionnat;
another in the affectionate and lively intercourse of the Bret-
ton menage, where the English of the foreign colony make
themselves at home; and still a third in the lavish and fantas-
tic apartments of the Gomte de Bassompierre at the Hotel
Crecy. Lucy is tossed about on these currents, and is con-
stantly brought to the brink of disaster in her attempt to get
a footing OB the shifting sands of social instability in a foreign
country. It is to Dr, John that she goes, as to a confessional,
with every tale of woe, until she is finally so overwhelmed by
hopelessness and yearning that she enters the very church
she had been reared to condemn. Yet even this refuge fails
her, as everything fails her, until M. Paul Emamiel, the little
professor at the pensionnat, comes to her rescue with the love
that passeth uziderstandfrg.

The relationship of Lucy Snowe to these two men* Dr,
John and M. Paul Emanuel, is the only attempt at plot to be
found in Villette, and even that is mere skeleton. Critics

159

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

have accused Charlotte of too easily transferring Lucy's love
from Dr. John to M. Paul Emanuel. Yet, in my opinion, what
Lucy felt for Dr. John was scarcely love at all. It was the
warm affection of a young woman for an understanding
masculine friend, growing out of their early associations in
England, when they are thrown together, as on an island, in
an alien atmosphere of suspicion and criticism. Though he
Is an admirable man in some ways, Dr. John's temperament
is too placid to have stirred Lucy to any degree of passion.
And whatever Lucy s feelings may have been toward him,
Dr. John had neither the will nor the power to respond in
kind. As strong a man as he appears to be outwardly, with
certain appealing masculine virtues, Lucy seemed to feel
that she could not depend on him in the final analysis. And
her instinct did not in the end betray her, for she saw Dr.
John quietly slipping into the harbor of Paulina de Bassom-
pierre's love with no consciousness whatever that he was de-
serting her. On the other hand, M. Paul Emanuel, full of
paradoxes as his temperament was, harbored under his
tyrannical egotism a tender and kindly nature that was ca-
pable of winning Lucy's deepest admiration and respect. And
it is on such a final bedrock of integrity that love is anchored.
Mr. Augustine Birrell makes an admirable comparison be-
tween lie two men who so deeply affected the pattern of
events in which Lucy Snowe found herself emotionally
tangled: "Though M. Paul may have had an actual counter-
feit, the original was a long way back in Miss Bronte's life
experience. It is a memory picture hence in its mellowness,
its idealization, it approaches a true creation. When we com-
pare it with Dr. John, whose counterfeit was close at hand,
we perceive the advantages of distance. M. Paul rises mys-
teriously from the depths of his author's mind, and brings
160

VILLETTE

with him tokens of what had so long been his romantic rest-
ing-place, whereas the doctor, apart from Lucy Snowe's
rhapsodies about him, does but bob up and down the surface
like a painted cork/*

Possibly the most intriguing chapter in Villette, certainly
one that has roused most comment, is "The Long Vacation."
It describes a distraught Lucy, sick at heart, wandering the
streets, seeking what she could not find nor had any hope of
finding, finally to be overtaken by the unaccountable impulse
to seek the confessional of the church. Lucy exclaims:

That vacation! Shall I ever forget it? I think not.
Madame Beck went, the first day of the holidays, to join
her children at the sea-side; ail the three teachers had
parents or friends with whom they took refuge; every pro-
fessor quitted the city; some went to Paris, some to Boue-
Marine; M. Paul set forth on a pilgrimage to Rome; the
house was left quite empty, but for me, a servant, and a
poor deformed and imbecile pupil, a sort of cretin, whom
her stepmother in a distant province would not allow to
return home.

My heart almost died within me; miserable longings
strained its chords. How long were the September days!
How silent, how lifeless! How vast and void seemed the
desolate premises! How gloomy the forsaken garden-
grey now with the dust of a town-summer departed.
Looking forward at the commencement of those eight
weeks, I hardly knew how I was to live to the end. My
spirits had been gradually sinking; now that the prop of
employment was withdrawn, they went down fast. Even
to look forward was not to hope: the dumb future spoke
no comfort, offered no promise, gave no inducement to
bear present evil in reliance on future good. A sorrowful
indifference to existence often pressed on me a despair-

161

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

ing resignation to reach betimes the end of all things
earthly. Alas! When I had full leisure to look on life as
life must be looked on by such as me, I found it but a
hopeless desert; tawny sands, with no green field, no
palm-tree, no well in view, The hopes which are dear to
youth, which bear it up and lead it on, I knew not and
dared not know. If they knocked at my heart sometimes,
an inhospitable bar to admission must be inwardly
drawn. When they turned away thus rejected, tears sad
enough sometimes flowed; but it could not be helped: I
dared not give such guests lodging. So mortally did I
fear the sin and weaknes of presumption.

It is then that Lucy seeks the priest, and tells him of her
desolation.

I said I was perishing for a word of advice or an accent
of comfort. I had been living for some weeks quite alone;
I had been ill; I had a pressure of affliction on my mind
of which it would hardly any longer endure the weight.

"Was it a sin, a crime?" he inquired, somewhat startled.

I assured him on this point, and, as well as I could, I
showed him the mere outline of my experience.

He looked thoughtful, surprised, puzzled. "You take me
unawares," he said. "I have not had such a case as yours
before: ordinarily we know our routine, and are pre-
pared; but this makes a great break in the common course
of confession. I am hardly furnished with counsel fitting
the circumstances/'

Lucy has assured the priest that her problem involves

neither sin nor crime, which would appear to rule out the

possibility that she could be speaking for Charlotte, since

Charlotte would certainly consider her love for M. Heger a

162

VILLETTE

sin, M. Heger being a married man. Whereas if she is speak-
ing for herself, and referring to her feeling for Dr. John as a
sin of "weakness and presumption/' it would be natural for
the priest, used to instructing those who covet their neigh-
bors" wives, to say that her request for counsel made a great
break in the common course of confession. He can do little
for her, and Lucy goes forth again into streets swept with
storm and chilled with the night. Fatigue and cold and
misery bring her to the point of collapse, when by good for-
tune Dr. John finds her and carries her to his home.

As Lucy recovers consciousness she finds herself in a
strange room, but it is filled with furnishings that are some-
how familiar. Everything is bewildering, real and yet not
real, present and yet illusory. Her predicament is symbolic of
Charlotte Bronte's deepest philosophy of life. To Charlotte
love in the heart of a woman is as Lucy in that room in Dr.
Bretton's house; "Of all these things," says Lucy, "I could
have told the peculiarities, numbered the flaws and cracks,
like any clairvoyant. But where was I? Not only in what spot
of the world, but in what year of our Lord? For all these
objects were of past days, and of a distant country. Ten
years ago I bade them good bye; since my fourteenth year
they and I have never met. I gasped audibly, 'where am I?' "

She is drugged to sleep by a potion, and on waking finds
Mrs. Bretton at her bedside. There is recognition, and re-
union, in the course of which Lucy admits that she has
known from the first that Dr. John was the Graham Bretton
of those long-ago days in the English village. How pathetic
is Lucy's " . " r T- ". . * - 1 . -^beyond friendship she seems
never to have hoped-in that she could be so grateful for the
acknowledged reunion with the Brettons* mother aad son.

163

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

When I had said my prayers [she says], and when I was
undressed and laid down, I felt that I still had friends.
Friends, not professing vehement attachment, not offer-
ing the tender solace of well-matched and congenial rela-
tionships; on whom, therefore, but moderate demand of
affection was to be made, of whom but moderate ex-
pectation formed. "Do not let me think of them too often,
too much, too fondly," I implored: "let me not run athirst,
and apply passionately to its welcome waters; let me not
imagine in them a sweeter taste than earth's fountains
know. Oh! would to God I may be enabled to feel enough
sustained by an occasional, amicable intercourse, rare,
brief, unengrossing and tranquil; quite tranquil!"

Still repeating this word, I turned to my pillow; and
stitt repeating it, I steeped that pillow with tears.

But this was the turning point in Lucy Snowe's life. She
had reached such depths of unhappiness that the only way
out was up. Her purgation had been complete, and her
spirit emerged indestructible. She could say, "A new creed
became mine a belief in happiness." This creed stood her
in good stead many times thereafter. It is put to test again
and again, before Lucy finds serenity in the haven of M. Paul
Emanuel's loving care. It had to bear with Paulina de Bas-
sompierre when Paulina confides in her the secret love she
has bestowed on Dr. John; with Paulina's father in an at-
tempt to reconcile him to what he considers his daughter's
misplacement of her affections; with Pere Salas, who misrep-
resents M. Paul Emanuel's "past" in order to turn her against
him; with the hoax perpetrated by Ginevra Fanshawe and
the Comte de Hamal; with, above all else, the long and diffi-
cult task of penetrating the shell of petty egotism covering
the passionate charity of M. Paul Emanuel's soul.
164

VILLETTE

M. Paul, In his turn, is the touchstone that transforms
Lucy Snowe from the plain little English girl, adrift in a
world of uncertainty, doubt, and despair., into the fine-tem-
pered, sane woman, who conies to be mistress of the house in
Faubourg Clotilde: "External de demoiselles, Numero 7,
Faubourg Clotilde. Directrice, Mademoiselle Lucy Snowe."
M. Paul will perhaps always remain an enigma to the stu-
dents and critics of Charlotte Bronte. If Charlotte did draw
on reality for the materials that go into M, Paul's character,
she gave them a significance beyond that of reality. It takes
a close and sympathetic scrutiny, a study of the finest lines
Charlotte ever drew, to understand M. Paul, The under-
standing must come as slowly as it came to Lucy herself. For,
!;cgi:.: ::.:; with the chapter, "Monsieur's Fete," we follow the
unfolding of M. Paul's love, concealed as it has been under
the eccentricities that have heretofore been deceptive, even
annoying. On the day of the fete Lucy saw him being hon-
ored by his friends and by the school, and she felt a first im-
pulse of true affection for him. She warns the reader,
however, "Do not be in any hurry with kindly conclusions, or
to suppose, with an over-hasty charity, that from that day M.
Paul became a changed character easy to live with, and no
longer apt to flash danger and discomfort around him. No; he
was naturally a little man of unreasonable moods. When
overwrought, which he often was, he became acutely irrit-
able; and, besides, his veins were dark with a livid beladonna
tincture, the essence of jealousy. I do not mean merely the
tender jealousy of the heart, but that sterner, narrower senti-
ment whose seat is in the mind.**

How could it happen that such opposing dispositions as
those of Lucy and M. Paul could have been eventually re-
solved into a single force, a single purpose? Charlotte

165

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Bronte's genius has accomplished the feat of bringing i1
about. From that "narrower sentiment whose seat is in the
head/' a fire of passion rises up and spreads until it envelops
Lucy and Paul in a single pinnacle of flame. In the trans-
formation of Lucy and M. Paul from friends into lovers.
Charlotte has revealed the mystery of the power of a
woman's heart to transfigure and fuse the nature of man. She
had gone a long way toward such a clarification in both Jane
Eyre and Shirley y but in Villette she has achieved a revelatior
of the synthesis of the actual and the imaginary, the visible
and the invisible, the present and the beyond, in human love
as it is known on earth.

166

Chapter xvra WUTHERING HEIGHTS

E

BRONTE Is the most Inscrutable
Bgure in English literature. Of the three Bronte sisters she
is the most difficult to analyze, her genius the most extraordi-
nary and mysterious. Charlotte may have been complex and
neurotic, but she is understandable, her nature is compara-
tively transparent. Her experiences as a girl and as a woman
are clearly revealed in her novels. Her letters are autobio-
graphical Even Anne, shy and simple though she was, speaks
as though in the first person in her fiction. Agnes Grey is
Anne Bronte. But when we come to Emily we have no per-
sonal record. Charlotte supplied., and possibly destroyed,
all we wiH ever know about Emily in the biographical sense.
Yet the Bronte genius is most powerful, most intense, in the
poetry and prose of Emily. The secret by which she became
possessed of such power and intensity is still a secret. No one,
not even her sister, has been able to push aside the veil that
shrouds her creative impulses, to offer an explanation for the
dazzling manifestation of the tragic vision with which Emily
penetrated the human spirit. Explaining it with the one word
"genius" only brings us back to where we started, to the
question, "What is genius?" Why and when does it strike,
whom does it choose?

Whence, for instance, comes the story of Withering
Heights? Perhaps Miss Hinkley, in her study of the novel,

167

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

has given us as good an answer as any: "Emily Bronte got
her ideas from the wide, primitive, half-savage little squires
around Haworth. She got them from hearing, at Miss Patch-
ett's, the story of a man who obtained a property by marry-
ing successively a mother and daughter. She got them from
tales of her Irish grandfather, who was brought up by a
harsh uncle. She got them from such a book or such a maga-
zine The genius lies in the combination."

Yes, the genius surely lies in the combination. But the com-
bination of what? Here is such a fusion of imagination and
reality, of extravagance and truth, that many a metaphor,
simile, symbol has been devised to interpret that strange
wild story named Wuthering Heights. Again it is Charlotte,
the loyal and admiring sister, so brilliant in her own right,
who makes a great symbol of the story. "It was/' she says,
"hewn in a wild workshop, with simple tools, out of homely
materials. The statuary found a granite block on a solitary
moor; gazing thereon he saw how from the crag might be
elicited a head, savage, swart, sinister; a form moulded with
at least one element of grar.t!(Mi:---]>(wcr. He wrought with
a rude chisel, and from no model but the vision of his medi-
tations. With time and labor the crag took human shape; and
there it stands colossal, dark and frowning, half -statue, half-
rock; in the former sense, terrible and goblin-like; in the
latter, almost beautiful, for its coloring is pf mellow grey, and
moorland moss clothes it; and heath, with its blooming bells
and balmy fragrance, grows faithfully close to the giant's

foot."

The secret of Wuthering Heights lies very simply in the

power to bring nature and man into passionate focus. As

Virginia Woolf says, when Emily wrote of thunder she made

it roar, of the wind, she made it blow. The moors gave her

168

WUXHERING HEIGHTS

the thunder and the wind until the earth with all its mysteries
became a revelation. Humanity gave her its pitiful sadness,
its frustrations and anguish. Relating the two she plumbed
the very depths of love and passion.

Professor Wilbur Cross declares that Wuthering Heights is
unquestionably a novel of vengeance, Many critics share
this opinion. On the other hand there are those who consider
it a tale of retribution. Both points of view are essentially
true. Vengeance and retribution, as Emily uses them, are
symptoms of a passion that has escaped the discipline and
control necessary to society. The acts of vengeance, and the
inevitability of retribution, are the results of disobeying nat-
ural laws; and the inverted loves of Heathcliff and Catherine
are just such a disobedience. While on earth these two were
compelled to pay the penalties of vengeance, accept the pun-
ishment of retribution, redemption, in their union after
death, is the ultimate answer. Emily has left us in no doubt
about that meeting in eternity, for Cathy is made to say, "I
am Heathcliff. He's always in my mind; not as a pleasure,
any more than 1 am always a pleasure to myself, but as my
own being. So don't talk of our separation again; it is im-
practicable." And Heathcliff, parting from her as she dies,
cries out in a paroxysm of unrestrained yearning, "Oh, God,
it is unutterable. I cannot live without my life. I cannot live
without my soul."

The structure of the novel may be poor. One hardly no-
tices, since the total impression is one of unsurpassed unity
of purpose. There is no letdown after the pace is set. The
faltering opening chapters suddenly run together into a
single stream of forces unleashed by uncontrolled emotion;
the pounding and crashing of the diabolical engine which is
HeathclifFs soul, tearing and rending every relationship in

169

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

its path in pursuit of the pure soul of Catherine Earnshaw.
By all standards of morality Heathcliff is a man of revolting
greed, of bestial habits, inhuman cruelty. Yet his one supreme
aspiration, enraged though it is by being thwarted, has all
the constancy and force of a spiritual ideal. Heathcliff is an
anomaly, as much so as the fair flower blooming from the bed
of offal.

It has been stated that Emily has drawn no portraits in
Wuthering Heights, that all her characters are abstractions.
Granted that most of them are, or at least that Heathcliff and
Catherine Eamshaw are the symbols of vengeance and ret-
ribution, yet it cannot be denied that several of them bear a
striking resemblance to people she knew, or are a composite
of people she knew, heard about, or read about. It was a
facet of her genius that she could fuse the characteristics of
various persons into a single idea. She recreated them in the
terms of her own vision. She transformed realities into sym-
bols. She worked with a magic that makes identification of
tfie originals largely a matter for the academicians, the
scholars.

It is supposed, for instance, that Mr. Joshua Taylor, father
of Charlotte's school friends, Mary and Martha Taylor, was
Emily's model for HeathcHff-as he certainly was Charlotte's
for Mr. Rochester, Hiram Yorke, and Yorke fiunsden. Inde-
pendent of mind, harsh in manner, a, rebel against accepted
institutions, Mr, Taylor half-frightened, half-shocked those
who came in contact with him. It was said that an early dis-
appointment in love had made him a dour man and a hard
one, and this lent ascertain glamour to his stem behavior.
However, I personally consider that* Emily owed less to
Joshua Taylor, in her delineation of HeatibcBff, than to
Welsh, her grandfather's harsh uncle who exiled him from

ifo

WUTHERIXG HEIGHTS

his home in Ahaderg. Heatfacliff, Ike Welsh, was a strange
dark-skinned waif brought into a home where he wreaked
emotional havoc from start to finish. Like Welsh, Heathclii
grew up to be a cruel, conniving man, obtaining control of
his benefactors property. Between Welsh and Mr. Taylor,
Emily had ample material with which to make Heathcliff a
character goaded to his doom by violent obsessions and an
incorrigible obstinacy.

In Catherine Eamshaw it is quite possible, as has been
often suggested, that Emily was thinking of Charlotte's
schoolmate in Brussels, Charlotte's Ginevra Fanshawe. But
again it seems to me that Catherine, certainly in her passion-
ate defiance, more nearly resembles Emily's own Augusta
Geraldine Almeda of the Gondal epic. I also feel that in the
scenes where Catherine is most vital, in sensibility and in
spirit, it is Emily herself who is speaking.

The fact that, in this novel, there is a "narrator" is a clear
indication that Emily is still under the spell of her childhood
and adolescent writing. It was an old Bronte custom, so to
speak, to have the story told by one who takes little or no
part in the action concerned. In Withering Height the 'cus-
tom is continued in the persons of Lockwood and Nelly
Dean. It has been suggested 'that Lockwood bears a re-
semblance to BranweH, but this I cannot see. Lockwood is a
mere artifice; no more. The moving story of Catherine Earn-
shaw's life, the malevolent influence of HeathcMffs power,
has no real effect on Lockwood. They merely produce in him
a half-cynical, contemptuous interest that sees him through
a tedious period of convalescence in the country. He bestows
neither color nor empliasts on the tale. From Nelly Dean, the
old housekeeper, who was herself a part o a! that hap-
pened, we get the moods, the suffering, the crises, through

171

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

which the lovers passed. And In spite of her impatient and
censorious attitude toward Catherine, her bitter hatred of
the savage Heathcliff, she draws us irresistibly to her by
voice and gesture as she talks. Emily must have realized,
after the first chapters, that Lockwood was not man enough
to be the narrator and so turned the task over to Nelly Dean,
reducing Lockwood to a bed of illness!

This might also explain the weakness of the opening pages
indeed, it is a far more logical explanation than the one
put forward by several critics, that Branwell himself wrote
the first four chapters. There are said to have been witnesses
who testified that Branwell read these chapters at a tavern,
from sheets he pulled from his coat pocket, as his contribu-
tion to a literary evening with his boon companions. A
nephew of Francis Leyland (author of a book extolling
BranwelTs superior capabilities and gifts), being present at
this occasion, claims to have recognized the chapters when
Wuthering Heights was published. And several Bronte au-
thorities have gone so far as to claim that seventeen chapters
of the book were the work of Branwell. Such a contention
is not only absurd but easily refuted by the evidence of style
and development obtaining after the fourth chapter. It there-
fore seems to me obvious that Emily's creative inspiration
took fire as soon as she took the narration out of the hands of
the dull Mr. Lockwood and put it in the hands of the colorful
Nelly Dean.

In Nelly Dean she had discovered the perfect instrument
for her purpose for Nelly is obviously Tabby. And there was
no single individual in Emily's life, with the possible excep-
tion of Anne, whom she knew and loved so well as Tabby,
the faithful old servant of the parsonage. Nelly Dean (or
Tabby) is a shrewd matron of Yorkshire heritage, above her
172

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

station in intelligence, opinionated, gruff but loving to those
she loves, downright prejudiced against those she doesn't
She is Catherine's confidante, and being in a continual fer-
ment of opposition to the girl's capricious outpourings of her
passion for Heathcliff, her mind and spirit and tired old body
become a battleground for the conflicts of Wuthering
Heights. Any excess of feeling was histrionics to Nelly Dean:
"Catherine paused and hid her face in the folds of my gown;
but I jerked it forcefully away. I was out of patience with
her folly/' This very attitude is what makes Nelly Dean the
hub of the wheel about which revolve the dark spokes of
tragedy and pain that make the story of W tethering Heights
so poignant

Another character in Wuthering Heights whose origin is
clearly indicated is that of Heathcliffs sanctimonious, hypo-
critical servant, Joseph. Obviously Joseph began in Emily's
memories of her father's description of Gallagher; the des-
picable Gallagher, w^hose cunning malignity had terrorized
the miserable boyhood of her grandfather in Ireland; the
Gallagher who stood by while Welsh beat Hugh Pranty
unmercifully for the misdemeanors that Gallagher had him-
self perpetrated; the Gallagher who quoted the Bible to
prove that such punishment was ordained by the Blessed
Saints, The Joseph of Wuthering Heights, mouthing the
scriptures, is just as diabolically callous to the suffering of
the boy Heathcliff at the hands of the Eamshaws, and of
Hareton at the hands of Heathcliff. No doubt Yorkshire had
its share of such ranters as Joseph, as offensive to an orthodox
churchman as to Emily. However, it was not so much the
pretensions to church dogma that Emily attacks with such
contemptuous scorn. Her desire seems to have been to expose
the hypocrite claiming virtues that are nonexistent in the

173

THE BEW ETCHED PARSONAGE

soul of the pretender. The local dissenters of the period, if
we take the character of Moses Barraclough in Charlotte's
Shirley as an example, had some justification in their repug-
nance for the easy living and self-righteous preaching of the
clergy, but Joseph is the personification of an evil spirit, quot-
ing tie text of Christianity while practicing the arts of the
Devil incarnate.

The house Wuthering Heights stood on the summit of
Haworth Hill, and was once a house of fine proportions, built
by a Hareton Earnshaw in the sixteenth century. All its early
grandeur has been erased by time and weather, the rise and
fall of many generations, and at the opening of Emily's story
has become no more than an ill-conditioned farmhouse, re-
duced by the poverty and shif tlessness of Hindley Earnshaw.
It is in such condition that Lockwood finds it when he calls
on Heathcliff, having come down from London and rented
Thrushcross Grange, former home of the Lintons, now Heath-
cliff's, for a few months' rest And the temper of the story is
immediately set by the night of horror and mystery which
Lockwood, caught by a blizzard, is forced to spend in Heath-
cliffs home, occupying "the unused chamber/' the "haunted"
chamber, where Catherine Earnshaw's ghost terrifies him
to such a point that he rouses Heathcliff with his cries for
help.

Heathcliff stood near the entrance, in his shirt and
trousers: with a candle dripping over his fingers, and his
face as white as the wall behind him. The first creak of
the oak startled him like an electric shock! the light
leaped from his hold to a distance of some feet, and his
agitation was so extreme, that he could hardly pick it up.

"It is only your guest, sir," I called out, desirous to
spare him the humiliation of exposing his cowardice fur-

174

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

ther. "I had the misfortune to scream in my sleep, owing
to a frightful nightmare. Tin sorry I disturbed you/'

"Oh, God confound you, Mr. Lockwood! I wish you

were at the 7J commenced my host, setting the candle

on a chair 5 because he found it impossible to hold it
steady. "And who showed you tip into this room?'* he
continued, crushing his nails into his palms, and grinding
his teeth to subdue the maxillary convulsions. "Who was
it? I've a good mind to turn them out of the house this
moment!"

"It was your servant, Zillah^ I replied, flinging myself
on to the floor, and rapidly resuming my garments. "I
should not care if you did, Mr. Heathcliff; she richly de-
serves it, I suppose that she wanted to get another proof
that the place was haunted, at my expense, WeB, it is
swarming with ghosts and goblins! You have reason in
shutting it up, I assure you. No one will thank you for
a doze in such a den!"

"What do you mean?" asked Heathcliff "and what are
you doing? Lie down and finish out the night, since you
are here; but, for Heaven's sake! don't repeat that horrid
noise; nothing could excuse it, unless you were having
your throat cut! 5 *

"If the little fiend had got in at the window, she prob-
ably would have strangled me!" I returned. Tra not going
to endure the persecutions of your hospitable ancestors
again. Was not the Reverend Jabes Branderham akin to
you on the mothers side? And that minx, Catherine
Linton, or Earnshaw, or however she was called she
must have been a changeling wicked little soul! She told
me she had been walking the earth those twenty years:
a just punishment for her mortal transgressions, Tve no
doubt!"

Scarcely were these words uttered, when I recollected

175

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

the association of HcathcIirTs with Catherine's name in
the book, which had completely slipped from my mem-
ory, till thus awakened. I blushed at my inconsideration;
but, without showing further consciousness of the of-
fence, I hastened to add-'The truth is, sir, I passed the
first part of the night in ?> -Here I stopped afresh-I was
about to say "perusing those old volumes/' then it would
have revealed my knowledge of their written, as well as
their printed contents; so, correcting myself, I went on,
"in spelling over the name scratched on that window-
ledge. A rionoroncus occupation, calculated to set me
asleep, like counting, or*

"What can you mean talking in this way to me?" thun-
dered Heathcliff with savage vehemence, "How how
dare you, under my roof? God! he's mad to speak so!"
And he struck his forehead with rage.

I did not know whether to resent this language or pur-
sue my explanation; but he seemed so powerfully af-
fected that I took pity and proceeded with my dreams;
affirming I had never heard the appellation of "Catherine
Linton * before, but reading it often over produced an
impression which personified itself when I had no longer
mv imagination under control. Heathcliff gradually fell
back into the shelter of the bed, as I spoke; finally sitting
down almost concealed behind it. I guessed, however, by
his irregular and intercepted breathing, that he struggled
to vanquish an excess of violent emotion. Not liking to
show him that I had heard the conflict, I continued my toi-
lette rather noisily, looked at my watch, and soliloquised
on the length of tie night: "Not three o'clock yet! I could
have taken oath it had been six. Time stagnates here: we
must surely have retired to rest at eight!"

"Always at nine in winter, and rise at four," said my
host, suppressing a groan: and, as I fancied by the motion
176

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

of his arm's shadow, dashing a tear from his eyes. "Mr.
Lockwood," he added, "you may go into my room: you'll
only be In the way, coming downstairs so early; and your
childish outcry has sent sleep to the devil for me,"

"And for me, too/* I replied. Til walk in the yard till
daylight, and then 111 be off; and you need not dread a
repetition of my intrusion. Fra now quite cured of seeking
pleasure in society, be it country or town. A sensible man
ought to find sufficient company in himself . ?>

"Delightful company!*' muttered Heathcliff. "Take the
candle, and go where you please. I shall join you directly.
Keep out of the yard, though, the dogs are unchained;
and the house June mounts sentinel there, and nay, you
can only ramble about the steps and passages. But, away
with you! Ill come in two minutes!'*

I obeyed, so far as to quit the chamber; when, ignorant
where the narrow lobbies led, I stood still, and was wit-
ness, involuntarily, to a piece of superstition on the part
of my landlord, which belied, oddly, his apparent sense.
He got on to the bed, and wrenched open the lattice,
bursting, as he pulled at it, into an uncontrollable passion
of tears. "Come in! come in!" he sobbed. "Cathy, do
come. Oh do once more!" The spectre showed a spectre's
ordinary caprice: it gave no sign of being; but the snow
and wind whirled wildly through, even reaching my sta-
tion, and blowing out the light.

There was such an anguish in the gush of grief that
accompanied this raving, that my compassion made me
overlook its folly, and I drew off, half angry to have lis-
tened at all, and vexed at having related my ridiculous
i,LgMr,iarc. since it produced that agony; though why,
was beyond my comprehension. I descended cautiously
to the lower regions, and landed in the back kitchen,
where a gleam of fire, raked compactly together, enabled

177

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

me to rekindle my candle. Nothing was stirring except a
brindled, grey cat, which crept from the ashes, and sa-
luted me with a querulous mew.

Lockwood's curiosity is naturally aroused, to say the least!
He cannot rest until he learns the story behind the reappear-
ance of Catherine Earnshaw, or is it Catherine Linton? And
the story of Wuthering Heights now begins, at the point
where Heathcliff, a Tittle dark thing, harbored by a good
man to his bane/* is brought home by the master and set
down in the kitchen at Wuthering Heights. The squire soon
displays an affection for this odd creature far exceeding
Ms love for his own children. His son, Hindley, comes to hate
the newcomer with a passionate and jealous fury, and Heath-
cliff passes a wretched childhood persecuted by his foster
brother. Although Mrs. Earnshaw is often a witness to her
son's cruelty, she never interferes in behalf of her husband's
strange prot6ge. Thus wife is set against husband, father
against son.

But Heathcliff finds solace in the friendship of little Cath-
erine, Hindley's younger sister. Catherine is & lively tempera-
mental child, .with aji affectionate ^nature. Her Heart is
touched by the unhappy, brooding boy, and she attaches
herself to him as his only comforter, and companion-in-arms
against the whole wide world. * The greatest punishment we
could invent for her/ " Nelly Dean tells Mr. Lockwood, " was
to keep her separate from Heathcliff. . . . Certainly she had
ways with her such as I never saw a child take up before;
and she put all of us past our patience fifty times and of tener
in a day; till the hour she came downstairs till the hour she
went to bed, we hadn't a minute's security that she wouldn't
be in mischief. Her spirits were always at high-water mark,
178

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

her tongue always goir.g-sir^ing. laughing, and plaguing
everyone who would not do the same. A wild, wicked slip
she was; but she had the bonniest eye, the sweetest smile,
and the lightest foot in the parish. And after all I believe she
meant no harm; for, when once she made you cry in good
earnest, it seldom happened that she wouldn't keep you
company, and oblige you to be quiet that you might com-
fort her. In play she liked exceedingly to act the little
mistress, using her hands freely and commanding her com-
panions.' " N

Here, in their childhood together, their sharing of confi-
dences, their combined forces against trouble, the trouble
shared, love had its roots. They loved before they knew what
love meant, what it would mean to them. So that tragedy
struck before they were ready to guard against it. For it was
when Catherine fell in love, or thought she had fallen in love,
with Edgar Linton, that the fuse was lit for all the agony
that was bound to follow. Already, Heathcliff and Catherine,
had they but realized it, were inextricably and inexorably
united. Catherine's marriage to Linton actually tore their
souls asunder as surely as if they had been one soul Cath-
erine found that out too late.

Accident had thrown Catherine into the path of the Linton
family at Thrushcross Grange, the ne mansion across the
moors where "the gentfe-folk* lived. Coming to know the
Lintons, being flattered and loved by them, was her undoing.
When she returned to Wuthering Heights, after several
weeks in the Linton home, she was already a young lady
seeing everything about her, including Heathcliff, in a new
light

Ca% [said Nelly Eton, telling Lockwood of this
iomeconujigl, catching a glimpse of her friend (Heatfa-

179

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

cliff) in his concealment, flew to embrace him; she be-
stowed seven or eight lasses on his cheek within the sec-
ond, and then stopped, and drawing back burst into a
laugh, exclaiming, "why, how very black and cross you
look! and how how funny and grim! But that's because
I'm used to Edgar and Isabella Linton. Well, Heathcliff,
have you forgotten me?" But the boy made no responsive
move to Catherine's effusive greeting and was admon-
ished by Hindley to shake hands, condescendingly as-
suring him that "once in a way, that is permitted!"

"I shall not," replied Heathcliff. "I shall not stand to be
laughed at. I shall not bear it." After saying this he tried
to escape, but Cathy, seizing him, explained, "I did not
mean to laugh at you," she said, "I could not hinder my-
self. Heathcliff, shake hands at least. What are you sulky
for? It is only that you looked odd. If you wash your face
and brush your hair, it will be all right; but you are so
dirty"

From this moment such fair currents as there had been in
the lives of these two were lost in wild waters, in a stormy
sea. What happiness Heathcliff had known as Cathy's play-
mate died with her laughter, while his love for her, instead
of being weakened, went on to float on a tide of evil and
vengeance. Everything that happened, from this day on,
nourished his desire to destroy himself if by so doing he
could destroy Catherine.

Since the death of the squire, some time previously,
Hindley had increased his maltreatment of Heathcliff. But
now Hindley's wife, to whom he was deeply attached, died
following the birth of a son, and Hindley took out his grief
in excessive drinking, gambling, and debauchery, eventually
becoming an easy prey to HeathclifFs plans for vengeance on
180

M. Constantin Heger. Photograph by Walter Scott. Copyright,
The Bronte Society

Emily's desk and lamp, with a letter from the publishers addressed
to Currer Bell. Photograph by Walter Scott. Copyright, The
Bronte Society.

Emily's sofa, on which she died. Photograph by Walter Scott.
Copyright, The Bronte Society.

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

the entire family. He sank to a condition of degradation that
put him at the mercy of one who had been, so shortly before,
the victim of his own hatred. At about the same time Edgar
Linton began his courtship of Catherine, inspiring in her a
new ambition for the refinements of wealth, making her cap-
tious and petulant where Heathcliff was concerned, particu-
larly since she had begun to be aware of HeathcliiFs passion
for her, and to realize that she was bound to Heathcliff by a
bond no will or fate could break. She confessed to Nelly, "I've
no more business to marry Edgar Linton than I have to be in
heaven; and if the wicked man in there [meaning Hindley]
had not brought Heathcliff so low, I shouldn't have thought
of it. It would degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he
shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he's
handsome, Nelly, but because he's more myself than I am.
Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the
same; and Linton's is as different as a moonbeam from light-
ning, or frost from fire/' Heathcliff, sitting noiselessly on a
bench out of view, heard her say it, and stole away, but not
so quietly but that Catherine was suspicious. " *Oh,' she whis-
pered, lie couldn't overhear me at the door! Give me Hareton
[Hindley's baby son], while you get supper, and when it is
ready ask me to sup with you. I want to cheat my uncomfort-
able conscience, and be convinced that Heathcliff has no
notion of these things. He has not, has he? He does not know
what being in love is?' "

So Cathy married Edgar Linton and Heathcliff disap-
peared from Wuthering Heights, only to return in three
years* time to make a tragic shambles of all their lives. "He
had grown," said Nelly Dean, "into a tall, athletic, well-
formed man; beside whom my master seemed quite slender
and youth-like. His upright carriage suggested the idea of

181

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

his having been in the army. His countenance was much
older in expression and decision of feature than Mr. Linton's;
it looked intelligent, and retained no marks of former degra-
dation. A half-civilized ferocity lurked yet in the depressed
brows and eyes full of black fire, but it was subdued; and his
manner was quite dignified; quite divested of roughness,
though too stern for grace. My master's surprise equalled or
exceeded mine: he remained for a minute at a loss how to ad-
dress the ploughboy, as he had called him."

With the reappearance of Heatheliff, Emily ignites a flame
of passion that consumes everything in its course. The disso-
lute Hindley falls an easy prey to his hands. What Hindley
had been to him as a boy, tormentor and brutalizer, he is
now to Hindley s son, Hareton. He seizes the property of
Wuthering Heights through mortgage foreclosures. And all
the while his love for Cathy, and hers for him, is mounting
to a new crescendo of burning frenzy. He cannot forgive her
for marrying Edgar Linton, lie could curse her forever. Yet
he is more fiendishly delighted at seeing her despair and
suffering than tortured with grief at his own loss. His satis-
factions are sadistic. He takes delight in degrading Hareton
Earnshaw with treatment more inhuman than had ever been
applied to himself. But the destinies that overtake these
people-the disillusioned, brow-beaten Isabella Linton, with
her sordid death in London; Hindley Earnshaw, and his ruin
and degraded end; Edgar Linton, and his aching, helpless en-
durance of his shattered loveare no more tragic than the
destiny that is in store for Catherine and Heathcliff. Never
had two people whose passion for each other transcended
every human obstacle been so cruel to one another. Never
had two people, so exultant in the ecstasy of love, been so
walled around with the darkest miseries of mortal flesh. The
182

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

climax to the unutterable beauty and despairing sorrow of
this love is given in a chapter in which angels and demons
compete to be heard above the howl of winds on the York-
shire moors. As Catherine, expecting a child, lies desperately
ill, Heathcliff writes, by way of Nelly, asking permission to
see her; and on a Sunday morning, in early spring, as the
Gimmerton chapel bells are calling the people to worship,
the crisis of Emily Bronte's powerful novel is enacted. Let
Nelly Dean tell it in her own words:

There was a startled and a troubled gleam of recollec-
tion, and a struggle to arrange her ideas. She lifted the
letter, and seemed to peruse it; and when she came to the
signature she sighed; yet still I found she had not gath-
ered its import, for, upon my desiring to hear her reply,
she merely pointed to the name, and gazed at me with
mournful and questioning eagerness.

"Well, he wishes to see you,** said I, guessing her need
of an interpreter, "He's in the garden by this time, and
impatient to know what answer I shall bring. 5 '

As I spoke, I observed a large dog lying on the grass
beneath raise its ears as if about to bark, and then smooth-
ing them back, announce, by a way of the tail, that some
one approached whom it did not consider a stranger. Mrs.
Linton bent forward, and listened breathlessly. The min-
ute after a step traversed the hall; the open house was
too tempting for Heathcliff to resist walking in: most
likely he supposed that I was inclined to shirk my prom-
ise and so resolved to trust to his own audacity. With
straining eagerness Catherine gazed towards the entrance
of her chamber. He did not hit the right room directly,
she motioned me to admit him, but he found it out ere I
could reach the door, and in a stride or two was at her
side, and had her in his arms.

183

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

He neither spoke nor loosed his hold for some five min-
utes, during which period he bestowed more kisses than
ever he gave in his life before, I dare say; but then my
mistress had kissed him first, and I plainly saw that he
could hardly bear, for downright agony, to look into her
face! The same conviction had stricken him as me, from
the instant he beheld her, that there was no prospect of
recovery there she was fated, sure to die.

"Oh, Cathy! Oh, my life! how can I bear it?" was the
first sentence he uttered, in a tone that did not seek to
disguise his despair. And he stared at her so earnestly that
I thought the very intensity of his gaze would bring tears
into his eyes; but they burned with anguish: they did
not melt.

"What now?" said Catherine, leaning back, and return-
ing his look with a suddenly clouded brow: her humour
was a mere vane for constantly varying caprices. "You
and Edgar have broken my heart, Heathcliff! And you
both come to bewail the deed to me, as if you were the
people to be pitied! I shall not pity you, not L You have
killed me-and thriven on it, I think. How strong you
are! How many years do you mean to live after I am
gone?"

Heathcliff had knelt on one knee to embrace her; he
attempted to rise, but she seized his hair, and kept him
down.

"I wish I could hold you," she continued bitterly, "till
we were both dead! I shouldn't care what you suffered. I
care nothing for your sufferings. Why shouldn't you suf-
fer? I do! Will you forget me? Will you be happy when
I am in the earth? Will you say twenty years hence,
'That's the grave of Catherine Earnshaw. I loved her
long ago, and was wretched to lose her; but it is past. IVe
loved many others since; my children are dearer to me

184

WITHERING HEIGHTS

than she was; and at death, I shall not rejoice that I am
going to her; I shall be sorry that I must leave them!'
Will you say so, HeathclifF?"

"Don't torture me till I am as mad as you yourself,"
cried he, wrenching his head free, and ,. " :V-- ; his teeth.

The two, to a cool spectator, made a strange and fearful
picture* Well might Catherine deem that heaven would
be a land of exile to her, unless with her mortal body she
cast away her moral character also. Her present counte-
nance had a wild vindictiveness in its white cheek, and a
bloodless lip and scintillating eye; and she retained in
her close fingers a portion of the locks she had been grasp-
ing. As to her companion, while raising himself on one
hand, he had taken her arm with the other; and so inade-
quate was his stock of gentleness to the requirements of
her condition, that on his letting go I saw four distinct
impressions left blue in the colorless skin.

"Are you possessed with a devil," he pursued savagely,
"to talk to me in that manner when you are dying? Do
you reflect that all those words will be branded on my
memory, and eating deeper eternally after you have left
me? You know you lie to say I have killed you : and, Cath-
erine, you know that I could as soon forget you as my
existence! Is it not sufficient for your infernal selfishness,
that while you are at peace I shall writhe in the torments
of hell?"

"I shall not be at peace," moaned Catherine, recalled
to a sense of physical weakness by the violent, unequal
il io1?1iM-'j[ of her heart, which beat visibly and audibly
under this excess of agitation. She said nothing further
till the paroxysm was over; then she continued more
kindly

"I'm not wishing you greater torment than I have,
Heathcliff. I only wish us never to be parted: and should

185

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

a word of mine distress you hereafter, think I feel the
same distress underground, and for my own sake, forgive
me! Come here and kneel down again! You never harmed
me in your life. Nay, if you nurse anger, that will be worse
to remember than my harsh words! Won't you come here
again? Do!"

Heathcliff went to the back of her chair, and leant over,
but not so far as to let her see Ms face, which was livid
with emotion. She bent round to look at him: he would
not permit it: turning abruptly, he walked to the fire-
place, where he stood, silent, with his back towards us.
Mrs. Lintons glance followed him suspiciously: every
moment woke a new sentiment in her. After a pause and
a prolonged gaze, she resumed; addressing me in accents
of indignant disappointment,

"Oh, you see, Nelly, he would not relent a moment to
keep me out of the grave. That is how I'm loved! Well,
never mind. That is not my Heathcliff. I shall love mine
yet; and take him with me; he's in my soul. And," she
added musingly, "the thing that irks me most is this
shattered prison, after all. I'm tired of being enclosed
here. I'm wearying to escape into that glorious world,
and to be always there: not seeing it dimly through tears,
and yearning for it through the walls of an aching heart;
but really with it, and in it. Nelly you think you are better
and more fortunate than I; in full health and strength:
you are sorry for me very soon that will be altered. I
shall be sorry for you. I shall be incomparably beyond
and above you all. I wonder he won't be near me!" She
went on to herself. "I thought he wished it. Heathcliff,
dear! you should not be sullen now. Do come to me,
Heathcliff."

In her eagerness she rose and supported herself on the
arm of the chair. At that earnest appeal he turned to her,

186

WITHERING HEIGHTS

looking absolutely desperate. His eyes, wide and wet, at
last flashed fiercely on her; his breast heaved convulsively.
An instant they held asunder, and then how they met I
hardly saw } but Catherine made a spring, and he caught
her, and they were locked in an embrace from which I
thought my mistress would never be released alive: in
fact, to my eyes, she seemed directly insensible. He flung
himself into the nearest seat, and on my approaching
hurriedly to ascertain if she had fainted, he gnashed at
me, and foamed like a mad dog, and gathered her to him
with greedy jealousy. I did not feel as if I was in the com-
pany of a creature of my own species: it appeared that
he would not understand, though I spoke to him; so I
stood off and held my tongue in great perplexity.

A movement of Catherine's relieved me a little pres-
ently: she put her hand to clasp his neck, and bring her
cheek to his as he held her; while he, in return, covering
her with frantic caresses, said wildly

"You teach me now how cruel youVe been cruel and
false* Why did you despise me? Why did you betray
your own heart, Cathy? I have not one word of comfort.
You deserve this. You have killed yourself. Yes, you may
Mss me, and cry; and wring out my kisses and tears:
they'll blight youthey'll damn you. You loved me then
what right had you to leave me? What right answer me
for the poor fancy you felt for Linton? Because misery
and degradation, and death, and nothing that God or
Satan ( :~^ " .1 ( I \ - ; M"! have parted us, you, of your own
will, did it. I have not broken your heart you have
broken it; and in breaking it, you have broken mine. So
much the worse for me, that I am strong. Do I want to
live? What kind of living will it be when you oh, God!
would you like to live with your soul in the grave?"

"Let me alone. Let me alone," sobbed Catherine. "If I

187

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

have done wrong, I'm dying for it. It is enough! You left
me too: but I won't upbraid you! I forgive you. Forgive
me!"

"It is hard to forgive, and to look at those eyes, and feel
those wasted hands/' he answered. "Kiss me again; and
don't let me see your eyes! I forgive what you have done
to me* I love my murderer but yours! How can I?"

They were silenttheir faces hid against each other,
and washed by each other's tears. At least, I suppose the
weeping was on both sides; as it seemed Heathcliff could
weep on a great occasion like this.

I grew very uncomfortable., meanwhile; for the after-
noon wore fast away, the man whom I had sent off re-
turned from his errand, and I could distinguish, by the
shine of the western sun up the valley, a concourse
thickening outside Gimmerton chapel porch.

"Service is over/' I announced, "My master will be here
in half-an-hour!"

Heathcliff groaned a curse, and strained Catherine
closer; she never moved.

Ere long I perceived a group of the servants passing up
the road towards the kitchen wing. Mr. Linton was not
far behind; he opened the gate himself and sauntered
slowly up, probably enjoying the lovely afternoon that
breathed as soft as summer.

"Now he is here/ 7 I exclaimed. "For Heaven's sake,
hurry down! Youll not meet anyone on the front stairs.
Do be quick; and stay among the trees till he is fairly in."

"I must go, Cathy/' said Heathcliff, seeking to extricate
himself from his companion's arms. "But if I live, 111 see
you again before you are asleep. I won't stray five yards
from your window/'

"You must not go!" she answered, holding him as firmly
as her strength allowed. "You shall not, I tell you."

188

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

"For one hour," he pleaded earnestly.

"Not for one minute/' she replied.

"I must Linton will be up immediately," persisted the
alarmed intruder.

He would have risen, and unfixed her fingers by the
actshe clung fast, grasping: there was mad resolution
in her face.

"No!" she shrieked. "Oh, don't, don't go. It is the last
time! Edgar will not hurt us. Heathcliff, I shall die! I shall
die!"

"Damn the fool! There he is," cried Heathcliff, sinking
back into his seat "Hush, my darling! Hush, hush, Cath-
erine! Ill stay. If he shot me so, I'd expire with a blessing
on my lips."

And there they were fast again. I heard my master
mounting the stairs the cold sweat ran from my fore-
head: I was horrified.

"Are you going to listen to her ravings?" I said passion-
ately. "She does not know what she says. Will you ruin
her, because she has not wit to help herself? Get up! You
could be free instantly. That is the most diabolical deed
that ever you did. We are all done for master, mistress,
and servant/'

That night Cathy's seven months child was born, and
death quietly sealed her earthly anguish of body and soul.
All night under the trees he waited for Nelly's promised word
which he anticipated when it came:

"She's dead!" he said; Tve not waited for you to learn
that. Put your handkerchief away don't snivel before me.
Damn you all! she wants none of your tears!"

"Yes, she's dead!" I answered. ". . . her sense never re-
turned; she recognized nobody from the time you left
her she lies with a sweet smile on her face; and her

189

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

latest ideas wandered back to pleasant early days. Her
life closed in a gentle dream may she wake as kindly in
the other world."

"May she wake in torment!" cried Heathcliff, with
frightful vehemence, stamping his foot, and groaning in
a sudden paroxysm of ungovernable passion. "Why, she's
a liar to the end! Where is she? Not there not in heaven
not perished where? Oh, you said you cared nothing
for my sufferings! And I pray one prayer I repeat it till
my tongue stiffens Catherine Earnshaw, may you not
rest as long as I am living! You said I killed you haunt
me, then! The murdered do haunt their murderers, I be-
lieve. I know that ghosts have wandered on earth. Be
with me always take any form drive me mad! Only do
not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you. Oh,
God! it is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I
cannot live without my soul!"

Yet Heathcliff lives. He cannot die, much as he wishes to
die. No, he lives on for many years at Wuthering Heights,
doing unspeakable harm to all those closely associated with
him, carrying vengeance into the next generation. Realiz-
ing that poor, silly Isabella Linton has fallen in love with him,
and that she will be her brother's heir, he elopes with her.
She leaves him soon enough, taking her child, Linton, with
her, and dies a miserable death in London. Linton is brought
back to the moors by his uncle Edgar, and turned over to
his father. He is a pathetic boy, ill and neurotic. Heathcliff is
determined that he shall marry Catherine's daughter, young
Cathy, so that he may feel a consummation denied to him
and the girl's mother. But Linton dies of grief and frustra-
tion and illness before Heathcliff has his wish. And Cathy
marries Hareton, Hindley's son, giving him something of the
190

WUTHERING HEIGHTS

happiness he had never known; for Hareton, too had taken
the brunt of Heathcliffs inverted hate. Until, at long last, all
too long, Heathcliff himself dies, and the tale ends with two
ghosts on the moors instead of one.

He solicited the society of no one more. At dusk, he
went into his chamber. Through the whole night, and far
into the morning, we heard him groaning and murmur-
ing to himself. Hareton was anxious to enter; but I bade
him fetch Dr. Kenneth, and he should go in and see him.
When he came, and I requested admittance and tried to
open the door, I found it locked; and Heathcliff bid us be
damned. He was better, and would be left alone; so the
doctor went away.

The following evening was very wet: indeed it poured
down till day-dawn; and, as I took my morning walk
round the house, I observed the master's window swing-
ing open, and the rain driving straight in. He cannot be
in bed, I thought: those showers would drench him
through. He must either be up or out. But 111 make no
more ado, 111 go boldly and look.

Having succeeded in obtaining entrance with another
key, I ran to unclose the panels, for the chamber was va-
cant; quickly pushing them aside, I peeped in. Mr. Heath-
cliff was there laid on his back. His eyes met mine so
keen and fierce, I started; and then h6 seemed to smile. I
could not think him dead: but his face and throat were
washed with rain; the bedclothes dripped, and he was
perfectly still. The lattice, flapping to and fro, had grazed
one hand that rested on the sill; no blood trickled from
the broken skin, and when I put my fingers to it, I could
doubt no more: he was dead and starkl

191

Chapter xix AGNES GREY

Hi

LISTORY would appear to have granted
Anne Bronte a place in literature only because she was the
sister of Charlotte and Emily Bronte, She has never been
really allowed to stand on her own. It is explained that if it
had not been for Charlotte's loyal defense of Anne, the world
would have accorded her very little notice. Even Miss Sin-
clair,, who makes an honest effort to give Anne her due,
introducing a new edition of Agnes Grey and The Tenant
of Wildfell Hall, writes that "if we respect the pieties of
tradition, it is right and fitting that the novels of Anne Bronte
should follow Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre. The Brontes
created that tradition; they clung together; they refuse to be
separated. Charlotte may be said to have thrust the words
of her younger sister upon the public that had acclaimed her
own with such violent enthusiasm and accepted Emily's
somewhat reluctantly at her hands. And even now, in the
second decade of the twentieth century, it is as if she still kept
her hold on the frail Anne."

I dare say this hypothesis cannot be denied, but it actually
has little bearing on the essential character of Anne's writing.
Certainly Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall show
nothing of the genius and intensity ofVillette or Wuthering
Heights, but how many novels are comparable in that re-
spect? And where does one find, even in Emily or Charlotte,
192

AGNES GREY

or any other contemporary novelist, such an attitude toward
the social problems of the day, and of mankind on the whole,
as are to be found in Anne's two novels? We cannot grant
that Anne had genius, as her sisters had it, but we can
assuredly say that she had great talent And for the good of
society talent, though not as powerful as genius, can some-
times be more useful. Anne's writing is often dull, to the point
of boredom; as pointing a moral is sometimes extremely dull,
while at the same time effective in bringing about necessary
reforms in the social system and in human behavior. The
moralities were what interested Anne. While her sisters kept
them in the realm of abstractions, powerful only in the soul,
repudiated by the flesh, inspiring yet confounding, Anne per-
sonified them, and in doing so produced types rather than
characters. Her people are coat racks on which she hangs out
her spiritual wares. Whereas in Charlotte and Emily the emo-
tions are strong and ungovernable, in Anne they are muted; a
gentle sensibility takes the place of desire; a strong undeviat-
ing will is in control.

Yet, with all her limitations, Anne's novels deserve better
than they have received. As Miss Sinclair goes on to say,
"Anne attacks her problem with a freedom and audacity
before which her sisters' boldest enterprises seem cowardly
and restrained There is nothing like these fragile re-
pressed and tremulous women when a deed of daring is to be
done. Anne does it with a naivete, a demure insouciance,
unknown to women of robust humour and the habit of un-
fettered speech. She is apparently unaware that she is doing
it; that her behaviour is the least unusual, not to say revolu-
tionary," And Charlotte, in a letter to Mr. \\ : '!i:i:iis, tells him
that 'Agnes Grey is the mirror of the mind of the writer." The
same may be said of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall Anne, be-

193

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

"They can talk the best about the things in which she
is most interested/* I replied.

"Well! that is a strange confession, however, to come
from her governess! Who is to form a young lady's tastes,
I wonder, if the governess doesn't do it? I have known
governesses who have so completely identified themselves
with the reputation of their young ladies for elegance and
propriety in mind and manners that they would blush to
speak a word against them; and to hear the slightest
blame imputed to their pupils was worse than to be cen-
sured in their own personsand I really think it very
natural, for my part."

"Do you, ma'am?"

"Yes, of course: the young lady's proficiency and ele-
gance is of more consequence to the governess than her
own, as well as to the world. If she wishes to prosper in
her vocation she must devote all her energies to her busi-
ness: all her ideas and all her ambition will tend to the
iiccTOnVslimc'iEs of that one object When we wish to
decide^upon the merits of a governess, we naturally look
at the young ladies she professes to have educated, and
judge accordingly. The judicious governess knows this:
she knows that, while she lives in obscurity herself, her
pupils' virtues and defects will be open to every eye; and
that, unless she loses sight of herself in their cultivation,
she need not hope for success. You see, Miss Grey, it is
just the same as any other trade or profession: they that
wish to prosper must devote themselves body and soul to
their calling; and if they begin to yield to indolence or
self-indulgence they are speedily distanced by wiser com-
petitors: there is little to choose between a person that
ruins her pupils by neglect, and one that corrupts them
by example. You will excuse my dropping these little
hints; you know it all for your own good. Many ladies

196

AGNES GREY

would speak to you much more strongly; and many would
not trouble themselves to speak at all, but quietly look
out for a substitute. That, of course, would be the easiest
plan: But I know the advantages of a place like this to a
person in your situation; and I have no desire to part with
you, as I am sure you will do very well if you will only
think of these things and try to exert yourself a little more;
then, I am convinced, you would soon acquire that deli-
cate tact which alone is wanting to give you a proper
influence over the mind of your pupil."

I was about to give the lady some idea of the fallacy of
her expectations; but she sailed away as soon as she had
concluded her speech. Having said what she wished, it
was no part of her plan to await my answer: it was my
business to hear, and not to speak.

It can be seen that the gentle and fragile Anne Bronte,
in spite of her quiet and unassuming appearance, could shoot
a pretty straight arrow, and an arrow with a barb of scorn.
The Murrays of this world should have been moved to sit
up and take notice. And when the Agnes Greys became the
Mrs. Westons of England, there could only have been a
sweeter and more wholesome respect for the individual,
whether servant or wife.

Anne had, as we know, worked as a governess herself. Both
Anne and Charlotte had "gone into service/' and both knew,
at first hand, the arduous duties, the discriminatory insolence,
the contemptuous complaints, heaped on women who were
forced, by penury, to seek employment. The two girls had
borne these humiliations with the greatest patience and gen-
tleness. Yet Anne could scarcely be expected to forego the
human need to give a vicarious vent to suppressed emotions
when it was Agnes Grey who suffered! Nor was it less than

197

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

natural that she should also permit Agnes Grey to fulfill many
of the dreams and aspirations she herself was never to see
fulfilled. It is probable that Anne had felt a romantic attach-
ment to the curate of Haworth, Mr. Weightman, whose death
she mourned in a tender poem:

Yes, thou art gone! and never more
Thy sunny smile shall gladden me;

But I may pass the old church door,
And pace the floor that covers thee,

May stand upon the cold, damp stone

Ajid think that, frozen, lies below
The lightest heart that I have known,

The kindest I shall ever know.

Yet, though I cannot see thee more,

'Tis still a comfort to have seen;
And though thy transient life is o'er,

TTis sweet to think that thou hast been;

To think a soul so near divine,

Within a form so angel fair,
United to a heart like thine

Has gladdened once our humble sphere.

If so, she was impelled to bring Agnes Grey and the curate,
Edward Weston, to a happy ending, to the love and marriage
she was denied in life.

Agnes Grey is indeed a comedy of manners. There are
engaging conversations, piquant situations, delightfully sa-
tirical incidents, throughout the book. There is the Bloomfield
family, father and mother, and their ill-mannered children.
Having been summarily dismissed by Mrs. Bloomfield, Agnes
finds re-employment at Horton Lodge, the home of the
198

AGNES GREY

Hurrays. There are four Murray offspring, Rosalie, Matilda,
John, and Charles. Their behavior and disposition are pre-
sented with a keen sense of detail. The girls, Rosalie and
Matilda, are courted by men who are drawn with equal skill-
Mr. Hatfield, the rector; and the baronets, Sir Thomas Ashby
and Sir Harry Meltham. Miss Matilda is the most refractory
member of the Murray establishment. She is a "veritable
hoyden," cut somewhat after the pattern of Charlotte's
Ginevra Fanshawe, and is a wicked trial to parent and gov-
erness alike. Agnes has to confess that, "as a moral agent,
Matilda was reckless, head-strong, violent, and unamenable
to reason. One proof of the deplorable state of her mind was
that from her father's example she had learned to swear like
a trooper." And therefore it is not surprising to detect a fear
creeping into Anne's heart that she may have exposed her
heroine to the dangerous influences of the people for whom
she worked:

As I could not make my companions better, I feared
exceedingly lliat ihey \\oulcl make me worse would grad-
ually bring my feelings, habits, capacities, to the level of
their own; without, however, imparting to me their light-
heartedness and cheerful vivacity.

Already I seemed to feel my intellect deteriorating, my
heart petrifying, my soul contracting; and I trembled lest
my very moral perceptions should become deadened, my
distinctions of right and wrong confounded, and all my
better faculties be sunk, at last, beneath the baneful in-
fluence of such a mode of life. The gross vapours of earth
were gathering around me, and closing in upon my in-
ward heaven; and thus it was that Mr. Weston rose at
length upon me, appearing like the morning-star in my
horizon, to save me from the fear of utter darkness; and

199

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

I rejoiced that I had now a subject for contemplation that
was above me, not beneath. I was glad to see that all the
world was not made up of Bloomfields, Murrays, Hat-
fields, Ashbys, etc.; and that human excellence was not a
mere dream of the imagination. When we hear a little
good and no harm of a person, it is easy and pleasant
to imagine more: in short, it is needless to analyse all my
thoughts; but Sunday was now a day of peculiar delight
to me (I was now almost broken in to the back corner in
the carriage), for I liked to hear him and I liked to see
him, too; though I knew he was not handsome, or even
what is called agreeable, in outward aspect: but, cer-
tainly, he was not ugly.

Anne Bronte drenches her quiet story in atmosphere, an
attractive quality which came to be more and more a part
of Victorian fiction, particularly among the minor novelists.
She caught the moods and shades of the moors until they
laid a dreamlike mantle over the people who passed along
their winding roads, who entered the lowly cottages on the
heath or the fine houses on the crests of the dark hills.
Whether it is Mr. Weston, the curate, or Nancy Brown, the
cripple, all are touched with the same magic that comes up
from the bosom of the earth at sunset and sunrise, summer
and winter, as nature turns on the wheel of time. The effect
is indefinable, yet real, and is the element that can be traced
in all the Brontes, whether Emily, Charlotte, or Anne, as the
irresistible power of the moors, of the Haworth witchery, to
effect its mysterious consummation.

Anne's intentions may have been, as Miss Sinclair says,

beyond her capacity to realize in full. But the inability to

shape a novel to a novelist's last, or to fill the shape with the

elixir of genius, is often made a matter of less importance by

200

AGNES GREY

the author's appealing sincerity, her crystal-clear motives, her
gentle wit, so that the reader is led beyond the failures of
style and conception and completes the image for himself.
For, in a considerable measure, Anne Bronte attempted in
Agnes Grey the very thing that Ethel Sidgewick and E. M.
Delafield have achieved with such subtle and disciplined
artistry nearly a hundred years later.

201

Chapter xx THE TENANT OF WILDFELL
HALL

T

JL HERE is nothing in English literature
that quite resembles Anne Bronte's The Tenant of Wildfell
Hall. It is truly a curious piece of fiction, seemingly without
roots or precedent. The title suggests mystery, even horror.
Before the reader has turned a page, he has already conjured
up an ancestral curse, flight from justice, secret passages,
dungeons, perhaps a ghost in the tower room! Actually there
is a fugitive spirit in Wildfell Hall, for Helen Huntington has
fled there to escape her husband. But Helen Huntington
herself is far from being exotic or romantic. She is a creature
obsessed with stern principles, intellectual prudery, moral
preachings. If ever a novel was written for a purpose, to set
forth certain precepts of man's behavior, it is The Tenant of
Wildfell Hall. Anne intended that Helen should merely be
the mouthpiece for lessons of piety, for chastising the wicked.
As Mrs. Humphrey Ward has said, "Anne wrote The Tenant
under the bitter mandate of conscience,"

It has been asked so often, whence came the fountain of
passion and power that gave the world Wuthering Heights?
Few have asked what brought The Tenant from the pen of
Anne Bronte. How could Anne, so gentle and good, so young
and inexperienced, write convincingly of the sordid side of
life? Charlotte felt moved to try to explain the paradox, but
we are even baffled by her explanation. Anne's own preface
202

THE TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL

to the second edition of the novel is also an attempt to an-
swer her critics, and justify herself for writing a tale of such
unrelieved corruption. "I would not be understood to sup-
pose," she writes, "that the proceedings of the unhappy scape-
grace, with his few profligate companions I have introduced,
are a specimen of the common practices of society the case
is an extreme one, as I trusted none would fail to perceive;
but I know that such characters do exist, and if I have warned
one rash youth from following in their steps, or prevented one
thoughtless girl from falling into the very natural error of
my heroine, the book has not been written in vain."

Anne wished to tell the truth, and hoped, as she says, that
it would "convey its own moral to those who are able to
receive it." It takes courage to tell such truths; it took courage
to write The Tenant of Wildfell Hall Anne did not possess
the imaginative powers, the artistry of execution, of her
sisters, but she shared one important quality with them that
made them kin; an intellectual and emotional daring. She
dared as completely in her representation of sin as they in
theirs of passion and desire. The genius of all the Brontes was,
in great part, a certain lack of inhibitions that made them
fearless in the best sense of the word. Their acquaintance
with the world, its conventions and restrictions, was so slight,
so distant, that it had not yet taught them "diplomacy." Like
children, they still saw no reason why what they knew to be
the truth should not be told.

"As the story of Agnes Grey? Anne writes, "was accused
of extravagant over-coloring in those very parts that were
carefully copied from life, with a most scrupulous avoidance
of all exaggeration, so, in the present work, I find myself cen-
sured for depicting con amore with 'a morbid love of the
coarse and the brutal,' those scenes which, I venture to say,

203

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

have not been more painful for the most fastidious of my
critics to read than they were for me to describe. I may have
gone too far; in which case I shall be careful not to trouble
myself or my readers in the same way again; but when we
have to do with vice, and vicious characters, I maintain that
it is better to depict them as they really are than as they
would wish to appear. To represent a bad thing in its least
offensive light is, doubtless, the most agreeable course for a
writer of fiction to pursue; but is it the most honest, or the
safest?"

So we must take Anne very much at her word when she
says that in both Agnes Grey and The Tenant she "carefully
copied from life." She undoubtedly did. As I have intimated
before, the dissolute Arthur Huntington has been universally
accepted as a portrait of Branwell It was surely the pain and
anxiety caused by BranwelTs defection, the gradual degrada-
tion of a brother who had been so loved and admired by his
three sisters, that drove Anne to writing a horror story of
moral degeneration, in the hope that it might, as she says,
warn "one rash youth" from following in Branwell's footsteps.
Naturally, since Branwell never married, Anne could not have
depended upon him for the scenes of marital life she has
drawn with such an unerring eye and ear for the inflections
of domestic disharmony. Yet it is probable that in this also
her sources lay in actual experience. There is reason to sup-
pose, for instance, that she was fully aware of the unhappi-

ness and discord in the family of Mr. C , a clergunan in

the nearby parish, whose conduct was so reprehensible that
his wife was constantly seeking solace from Mr. Bronte. It is
no more than natural that many of the case histories of Mr.
Bronte's parishioners should have been known intimately to
his daughters. Their curiosity alone would have seen to that
204

THE TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL

While even though Patrick Bronte had become a rigid and
lonely man, aloof from the normal exchange of confidences
that should have been a part of such a household of mother-
less children, yet he must have now and then sought his
daughters' advice and counsel in the course of his daily round
of parish duties.

In the meanwhile, although the critics might continue to
cavil as to the point at which Anne Bronte had "gone too
far/' The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was selling extremely well.
Even Mr. Clement Shorter remarks that it was a great sur-
prise to him that the book went into a second printing within
the year. One hopes that this was a comfort to Anne, since,
between the critics' attack and Charlotte's statement that
the book was "an entire mistake/' Anne had very little en-
couragement of any kind. What a satisfaction it would have
been if she could have looked forward a half-century and
known that a sound literary judgment was going to admit
that The Tenant of Wildfell Hall had been much underrated.
It would also have gladdened her to know that she was
eventually to be praised for creative skill as well as moral
courage, and that Miss Sinclair would one day write, "There
are scenes, there are situations, in Anne's amazing novel
which for sheer audacity stand alone in mid-Victorian litera-
ture, and would hold their own in the literature of revolt that
followed/' This courage is a fever of the spirit, a wild fire
springing from the soul itself, that burns through any lack
of craftsmanship in all the Bronte novels. The sisters shared
it in common. It seemed to be both hereditary and contagious.
It is what gives the scenes and situations of The Tenant, that
Miss Sinclair found so amazing, much of the same pungent
flavor that is to be found in Wuthering Heights or Shirky.

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall bears other resemblances to

205

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Wuthering Heights, particularly in the manner of narration.
As in Wuthering Heights, where the plot is unfolded by
Nelly Dean's retelling of the story of Heathcliff and Cath-
erine, so, in The Tenant, the narration follows the course of a
diary explaining the mysterious tenant of Wildfell Hall,
Helen Huntington.

It is a sordid story that the diary tells. A young girl, Helen
Lawrence, brought up by an uncle and aunt, falls madly in
love with a profligate young man, Arthur ITunliiigtou. Noth-
ing can persuade her that he is as dissipated and evil as he
is, or as hopeless of reform:

"*A few unprincipled mothers/" her aunt expostulates,
" may be anxious to catch a young man of fortune without
reference to his character; and thoughtless girls may be glad
to win the smiles of so handsome a gentleman, without seem-
ing to penetrate beyond the surface; but you, I trusted, were
better informed than to see with their eyes, and judge with
their perverted judgment/

"'Nor do I, aunt/" Helen Lawrence replies, ***but if I
hate the sins, I love the sinner, and would do much for his
salvation, even supposing your suspicions to be mainly true,
which I do not and will not believe.' "

Helen becomes sadly disillusioned in the course of mar-
riage. It is difficult to find, in the whole range of English
fiction, a wife who suffered such torment at the hands of a
husband so utterly reprobate. But neither can one have too
much sympathy for Helen, who is portrayed as a cold, un-
emotional, intellectual snob. Her moral self-sufficiency tends
to have the same irritating effect on the reader as on her
husband. She endures her husband's abuse, the ribaldry of
his drunken companions, his vile habits, with a complacency
that only aggravates the condition. There is a child born of
206

THE TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL

the union, the boy Arthur, and it is for Ms sake, to preserve
him from corruption, that she finally runs away and goes into
seclusion in Wildfell Hall. As Helen writes the story in her
diary, there is a steady mounting crescendo of resentment
and revolt against oppression, against what a woman has to
put up with in a society that demands that she stay married,
mistake or no mistake, and bear whatever trials her lord and
master imposes upon her. A climax is finally reached when
she shuts the door in her husband's face and flees the house.
And yet, when Arthur Huntington is about to die, a wretch-
edly broken man, a coward in the face of death, Helen
returns to ease his last hours with the assurance of God's
mercy and forgiveness.

"How could I bear to think/' she writes in her diary, "that
that poor trembling soul was hurried away to lasting tor-
ment? It would drive me mad. But, thank God, I have hope-
not only from the vague dependence on the possibility that
penitence and pardon might have reached him at last, but
from the blessed confidence that, through whatever purging
fires the erring spirit may be doomed to pass whatever fate
awaits it still it is not lost, and God, who hateth nothing
that he hath made, will bless it in the end."

Here again, in these words, we have another example of
the courage and revolt of Anne Bronte, the gentle Anne.
To express any doubt of the inevitability of eternal damna-
tion was heresy to the Victorian orthodoxy. And here is the
daughter of Haworth parsonage saying that God does not
hate, and that it would be madness to assume that he could
condemn a soul to lasting torment. Just as Emily did not
believe that any creed was a guarantee of salvation, so Anne
rejected that most appalling religious dogma, belief in dam-
nation. The true Bronte ferment of rebellion was at work in

207

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

Anne, and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was no less a dis-
turbing threat to the security of Victorian tradition than
were the more brilliant Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.

It is only natural, Anne's philosophy being what it was,
that both Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall should
end "happily ever after." In the one, the little governess,
Agnes Grey, and the good rector, Edward Weston, are united
in wedlock; and, in the other, Helen Huntington, after her
husband's death, finds happiness with Gilbert Markham.
Though much of the passion that splashes the pages of the
novels of her sisters is lacking in Anne's, yet they are tinted
with an emotional excitement of their own. They are not in
the least dull, and they are not sentimental. There was a hard
core of purpose in Anne around which the threads of her
moral ideals were smoothly wound, and as she unwound
them they never became knotted or tangled in her hands. Or,
to use Anne's own metaphor and symbol, "since the priceless
treasure too frequently hides at the bottom of a well, it needs
some courage to dive for it, especially as he who does so will
be likely to incur more scorn and obliquy for the mud and
water into which he has ventured to plunge than thanks for
the jewel he procures/ 3 Anne plunged, and procured the
jewel again and again from the depths beneath her own
limpid-clear nature. It is therefore only fust that she should
be given a small niche of her own in the Hall of Fame, not
always remain tucked in beside Charlotte or Emily.

The poetic genius among the three Bronte sisters was
Emily. The world has recognized this fact for the best part of
a century, and that recognition has granted her a foremost
place in the glorious line of English poets. All that can be
claimed for Charlotte in her experience with the muse is that
she never rose above the level of a competent versifier. Poetry
208

THE TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL

was not her forte. But of Anne something can be said for her
talent. She had a genuine, if fragile gift, in which sentiment
and piety combined to produce a pleasing song. Her gentle
note of reverence and devotion was imbued with a singular
flame that sprung from her sincerity. This slender, but per-
suasive gift of song has, paradoxically, carried her name to
more human hearts than the more powerful genius of her two
sisters: two of her poems are included in church hymnals and
sung by the faithful throughout the English-speaking world.
How familiar to many who had never read or heard of Agnes
Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, are the two verses that
begin, "O God, if this indeed be all," and "I hope that with
the brave and strong." It was quite in keeping with Anne's
gentle nature that her fame and immortality should triumph
in the quiet sanctuary of peace and meditation*

209

Chapter xxi "WHERE DID YOU
GET THIS?"

(A Footnote in the History of Anonymous}

L HAVE retained, from the chapter on Char-
lotte Bronte s life, a particular incident that seems to me so
interesting and dramatic that it deserves a small niche of its
own in this biography. It concerns the day when Charlotte
and Emily and Anne decided to reveal their true identity to
publisher and public, and no longer camouflage themselves
under the names of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell. No living
soul except Mr. Bronte knew the secret of this anonymity.
But the popularity of Jane Eyre, the critical furore over
Wuthering Heights, had roused the literary world and the
general reader to eager conjecture as to who the authors might
be. Were the Bells men or women? Where did they live?
What walk of society did they frequent? Were they one and
the same person? Were they well-known figures in the lit-
erary world, masquerading under assumed names? Jane Eyre,
in its handling of social problems, its insight into feminine
psychology, and Wuthering Heights, with its stoical phi-
losophy, its violent human passions, would seem to indicate
experienced writers, wise in the ways of mankind and skilled
in craftsmanship. Indeed, speculation was running high,
wide, and handsome, when Charlotte decided it was time to
make themselves known in their true colors. After all, she
210

"WHERE DID YOU GET THIS?"

had only taken the path of concealment because she felt
women were handicapped, by the very reason of their sex,
in the practice of any art. She had also known that Jane Eyre
and Wuthering Heights were strong meat for anyone's dish ?
reader or critic, and that if it were known in advance that
the authors were "ladies" there would be an uproar of
shocked protest. So Charlotte, whose instincts were always
so unerring in practical affairs, took the precaution of putting
men's names to work that would have done any man credit.

A letter from the publishers, Smith, Elder, received on
July 5, 1848, brought matters to a head. It arrived by post,
protesting a rumor that had reached their ears concerning the
acquisition of the American rights to the next work by the
author of Jane Eyre. Another London firm appeared to be
selling these rights to an American publisher, and the whole
transaction was contrary to the arrangements agreed upon
between the author of Jane Eyre and Smith, Elder. According
to the letter, the affair hinted of double dealing on the part
of Currer BelL That was enough for Charlotte! She was stung
to the quick by a suspicion of this nature, so completely un-
founded. There was nothing to do but act immediately, and
in the open. Smith, Elder must not be allowed to doubt the
integrity of the Bells or the Brontes, The authors themselves
must journey to London straightway and set the matter right!

It was decided that Charlotte and Anne would go, leaving
Emily in charge at home. In fact, Emily was not in favor of
the idea at all. The other two packed their satchels that
day, and sent them by oxcart to the station at Keighly, sev-
eral miles distant, where they would pick them up later as
they took the night train for Leeds and London. Such a
journey was quite an undertaking for two young women who
had traveled so little. Charlotte and Emily had stopped off

211

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

for a few hours in London, going and coming from Brussels.
But for Anne it was a first visit there, and, sadly enough,
would prove to be her last. The walk to Keighly, a distance
of four miles from Haworth, was taken in the cool of the
evening. A thunderstorm broke upon the sisters before they
reached Keighly. It is significant that this should happen. The
rage of the elements was in harmony with their own spirits,
and they were neither afraid nor sought shelter from the

storm.

The uncomfortable night ride in the coach from Leeds to
London must have been a strange one, filled with thoughts of
the past, anxiety for the morrow. Their spirits, as well as their
bodies, could only have arrived somewhat the worse for
the cramping night journey. They came into the city early
Saturday morning, July 6, and went directly to the Chapter
Coffee House, in Paternoster Row, where Charlotte had
settled that they should stay. Mr. Bronte had taken Charlotte
and Emily there for an overnight stay when he accompanied
them to Brussels. The Chapter Coffee House had a past,
having been a famous ^alliorintj place for critics and writers
during its heyday in the early eighteenth century. Chatterton
had written of it to his mother when he wanted to delude her
about his well-being in London since it was the consort of
famous men of letters. Now it was no more than a shabby,
run-down inn, in the care of a slatternly couple, and
patronized only by men. It was not the place for Charlotte
and Anne to sleep, but they knew of no other. They were
made as comfortable as possible in a long, low room with
high windows, on the second story, where book-trade meet-
ings had once been held. After freshening up from the night's
journey, they breakfasted, and lingered a moment to decide
what to do next in getting to Smith, Elder's in CornhilL
212

"WHERE DID YOU GET THIS?"

From Paternoster Row, the narrow street running north of
St. Paul's Churchyard, famed for its memories of the great
bookshops and publishing houses, but now crowded with
warehouses, it was only a short walk to Cornhill, where the
offices of Smith, Elder were located. Charlotte and Anne
emerged from the dim, dingy doorway of the Chapter Coffee
House into the business bustle and ferment of Paternoster
Row. They decided to economize by not taking a convey-
ance, though it might have been safer to rely on a driver for
directions, and made the dome of St. Paul's a guiding star in
the confusion and complexity of the innumerable crooked
streets and alleys. But St. Paul's was not always in sight.
Surely, they must have asked a stranger the way. And how
little he knew that he was directing Apollo's anointed. Two
young country women, attired in plain black homemade
gowns, one of them possessed of strange, compelling, reddish-
brown eyes, the other of a pale fragile face touched with the
loveliness of a white flower, had asked their way to Cornhill
that was all he knew.

Perhaps a little breathless with haste and uncertainty, but
no doubt grateful that they had come thus far with no un-
toward experience, the two sisters arrived at the offices of
their publishers. With what timidity did Charlotte ask to see
Mr. George Smith, and with what puzzled amusement did
the receptionist convey the request to his employer? Two
simple maidens, he thought, but how extraordinarily f roward
in asking to see the head of the firm! Or was it naivet6? Yet
there must have been something in Charlotte's eyes, in her
upright carriage and clear voice, that commanded instant
respect, for the attendant announced her to Mr. George
Smith without more ado. And so they came into the greal
publisher's presence. He must have gazed at them in wonder.

213

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

ment at the old-fashioned severity of toilet, at the dresses
and bonnets that had certainly never been purchased at
any Bond Street shop. Charlotte and Anne, as they stood
quietly under his slightly austere scrutiny, were alien to any-
thing he was accustomed to meet in the literary world. There
was absolutely nothing about these two frail daughters of a
Yorkshire clergyman, so out of their physical element in a
London publisher s office, that would convey an inkling to
Mr. George Smith of the creative fire he was playing with-
unless perhaps it was a certain dignity and simple lack of
pretension. He stood there, innocently unperceiving, on the
brink of a startling discovery for which he was totally un-
prepared. Then Charlotte, with no word of explanation,
handed him a letter. The dye was cast. George Smith glanced
at the letter, and back at the open faces before him, for he
recognized it as a letter he had written. And one quick, half-
accusing, half-puzzled question slipped from George Smith's
tongue: "Where did you get this?"
And Charlotte must have answered, "Why, you sent it to

me!"

Mr. Smith's unspoken response to that one may well have
been, "And who the devil are you?" but he undoubtedly
restrained the impulse and replied with courteous doubt, "I
did? And are you acting in behalf of Mr, Bell?"

When Charlotte made it clear who she was, and also the
silent sister beside her, as well as the absent sister whom they
could not persuade to leave the Haworth moors, and who to-
gether made the trinity of Bells, George Smith's ears must
have vibrated with Olympian laughter! There was the letter
in his hand, convincing evidence of the truth Charlotte had
uttered. And George Smith rose magnificently to the oc-
casion!
214

Epilogue

THIS HAS not been (it was not meant to be) a book
to fan the flames of controversy that still, and possibly wiU
ever, burn like grass fire across the Haworth moors, in the
attempt to "hole" some weary problem of truth or falsehood.
True, there are several questions that haunt the biographers
and critics of the fate-driven family of Brontes, as has been
thoroughly illustrated by the many attempts to clarify their
lives, but it has not been my purpose to re-examine the evi-
dence pro and con.

The controversies I refer to include, among others, the
question as to whether M. Heger encouraged Charlotte's in-
fatuation, and even the question we ask ourselves: to what
depths of passion did Charlotte herself descend? It would
certainly appear, after reading the six letters that remain
from those she wrote to M. Heger (possibly they were all
she wrote), that she was sure she had been indelibly
wounded, that her agony was mortal! Yet she did recover,
as we know. And she not only survived this despair of the
heart, but she was the one who eventually married. Further-
more, Charlotte was so fortunate as to live to see, as so few
have ever done, literary fame reach heights undreamed of
by any one of the sisters. Her four novels, even before her
death, had achieved the reputation of being unique, even
"classical." She was certainly one of the most important
women of the mid-nineteenth century. That, in itself, must

215

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

have been the greatest source of satisfaction and joy to a
woman of Charlotte's nature, for she was, in so many ways,
much more worldly and practical than Anne or Emily. Nor
were the critics of her day mistaken. Her reputation has suf-
fered little, if any, decline since her death. It might even be
defended that she is constantly more assured of a place
among the immortals. No one has left us, for instance, such a
vivid portrayal of a moment in history: that industrialization
of England, beginning as it did in the northern cities, and
affecting as it did the country and the country people from
Liverpool to Glasgow, and inaugurating a new era. And no
one, until recent times, unless perhaps Arnold Bennett, has
given us heroines of such living flesh and blood. Indeed, the
women, the "little governesses/' of Charlotte and Anne, are
more realistic, withal so chaotic and romantic, than the
women of such novelists as Dickens, Thackeray, Eliot, Mere-
dith, Galsworthy. They are extraordinarily "modern" women.
They have brains. They do things. They behave, to a startling
degree, as if the single standard had already been invoked by
the female sex.

I have not gone deeply into another question, also one of
controversy, which throws doubt on the extent to which
BranweE was involved with Mrs. Robinson. BranwelTs own
lurid accounts of his devotion and the lady's betrayals have
many of the earmarks of pathological .untruth, and it is quite
possible that Mrs. Robinson has been much maligned.

Nor have I been too greatly concerned with a matter that
is perhaps even more violent in its breech of opinion, the
delineation of the character of Mr. Bronte. We have, on the
one hand, those who paint this gentleman of the cloth with
severest censure; who see him as cruel and cold, a man with
no slightest flicker of human feeling, lacking the simplest
216

EPILOGUE

understanding of Ms pathetic wife, Maria, and of his eight re-
markable children; who starved them spiritually and physi-
cally; and who was to see them all die without visible
suffering or remorse. While, again, we have some few bi-
ographers who, while admitting Patrick Bronte's severity and
rigid religious discipline, yet believe that he could well
have done worse by the glowing coals of genius he had inad-
vertently kindled; who point at the intellectual play of minds
that early went on between father and daughters, at the re-
markable library to which the children had access at all
times (they were reading indiscriminately; the Bible, Shake-
speare, Bunyan, Addison, Johnson, Sheridan, Cowper, Scott,
Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Blackwoods Magazine, and
important London and provincial newspapers), and at the
freedom allowed for the wing spread of imagination across
the moors of Haworth; and who excuse the physical miseries,
and the psychological blunders, as the ignorance of a man
of Patrick Brontes own upbringing, together with the re-
ligious bigotry of his day. Perhaps Patrick Bronte actually
falls somewhere between these two extremes of portraiture.
Certainly he was not loved by Emily and Charlotte as they
grew older and were able to judge him. He spoiled and mis-
understood his son, wrecking his life. And yet one cannot find
it possible to be utterly harsh with Patrick Bronte. After all,
he once lay in the sun and read Paradise Lost. Somewhere he,
too, lost his Paradise. But he did something more for his
children than merely conceive them. He gave them liberty,
though it was, in the last analysis, "the liberty to die" that
Emily Dickinson once asked for herself. A strange and awe-
some paradox!

Lastly, I have not attempted to dissect Emily, a task that
has often led down confused and, it seems to me, futile paths

217

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

of failure. Emily was Emily, one of the most extraordinary
and mysterious beings who ever lived; mysterious, and yet
simplicity itself, as God is simple:

The soul can split the slcy in two
And let the face of God shine through.*

Emily Bronte is the proof positive that what we call nec-
essary experience pales to insignificance when placed in
contrast to inner knowledge. She was a spirit that emerged
independent of the material event. Perhaps no better descrip-
tion of her has been given than Maurice Maeterlinck's in
Wisdom and Destiny:

Not a single event ever paused as it passed by her
threshold; yet did every event she could claim take place
in her heart, with incomparable force and beauty, with
matchless precision and detail. We say that nothing ever
happened; but did not all things really happen to her
much more directly and tangibly than with most of us,
seeing that everything that took place about her, every-
thing that she saw or heard, was transformed, within her
thoughts and feelings, into indulgent love, admiration,
adoration of life

Of her happiness, none can doubt. Not in the soul of
the best of all those whose happiness has lasted longest,
been the most active, diversified, perfect, could more im-
perishable harvest be found than in the soul Emily
Bronte lays bare. If to her came nothing of all that passes
in love, sorrow, passion, and anguish, still did she possess
all that abides when emotion has faded away.

Emily's soul was forever innocent, forever completely
knowing. Its beauty was beyond our words to touch. "And all

* "Renascence," by Edna St. Vincent MiHay.

218

EPILOGUE

through" as May Sinclair has said, "an intangible presence,
something mysterious, but omnipotently alive; something
that excited these three sisters; something that atoned, but
not only consoled for suffering and solitude and bereave-
ment, but that drew its strength from these things; something
that moved in their books like a soul; that they called
'genius/ "

Genius! It is the word that brings us back full circle to the
spell of mystery and enchantment that caused me to write
again (may my readers forgive me) the story of the "be-
witched parsonage" of Haworth; back to the inexplicable
flame, the wild chemistry of Celt and Cornish bloods, and,
above all, the furor scribendi that seized these frail children
and stretched them for a few shining seconds between the
nodes of earth and sky.

219

APPENDIX

THE HEGER LETTERS *

LETTER I

I am well aware that it is not my turn to write to you, but
as Mrs. Wheelwright is going to Brussels and is kind enough
to take charge of a letterit appears to me that I ought not
to neglect so favourable an opportunity of writing to you.

I am very pleased that the school-year Is nearly over and
that the holidays are approaching I am pleased on your ac-
count, Monsieur for I am told that you are working too
hard and that your health has suffered somewhat in conse-
quence. For that reason I refrain from uttering a single
complaint for your long silence I would rather remain six
months without receiving news from you than add one grain
to the weight, already too heavy, which overwhelms you. I
know well that it is now the period of compositions, that it
will soon be that of examinations and later on of prizes and
during all that time you are condemned to breathe the sti-
fling atmosphere of the class-roomto spend yourself to
explain, to question, to talk aE day, and then in the evening
you have all those wretched compositions to read, to correct,
almost to re-write Ah, Monsieur! I once wrote you a letter
that was less than reasonable; because sorrow was at my

* These letters were printed for the first time in the London Times, July
29, 1913. The caption above them reads: CHARLOTTE BRONTE'S "TRAGEDY.**

THE LOST IJEHTERS. DR. HEGER*S GIFT TO THE BRITISH NATION. TEXT AND
TRANSLATIONS BY MARION EL SPIELMAN.

221

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

heart; but I shall do so no more.-I shall try to be selfish no
longer; and even while I look upon your letters as one of the
greatest felicities known to me I shall await the receipt of
them in patience until it pleases you and suits you to send
me any. Meanwhile I may well send you a little letter from
time to time: you have authorized me to do so,

I greatly fear that I shall forget French, for I am firmly
convinced that I shall see you again some day-I know not
how or when-but it must be for I wish it so much, and then I
should not wish to remain dumb before you it would be
too sad to see you and not be able to speak to you. To avoid
such a misfortune I learn every day by heart a half a page of
French from a book written in a familiar style: and I take
pleasure in learning this lesson, Monsieur; as I pronounce the
French words it seems to me as if I were chatting with you.

I have just been offered a situation as first governess in a
large school in Manchester, with a salary of 100 (i.e. 2,500
francs) per annum. I cannot accept it, for in accepting it I
would have to leave my father, and that I cannot do. Never-
theless I have a plan (when one lives retired the brain goes
on working; there is the desire of occupation, the wish to
embark on an active career). Our vicarage is rather a large
house with a few alterations there will be room for five or
six boarders. If I could find this number of children of good
family I should devote myself to their education. Emily does
not care much for teaching but she would look after the
housekeeping and although something of a recluse, she is
too good hearted not to do all she could for the well-being
of the children. Moreover she is very generous, and as for
order, economy, strictness and diligent work all of them
things very essential in a school I willingly take that upon
myself.
222

APPENDIX: THE HEGER LETTERS

That, Monsieur, is my plan, which I have already explained
to my father and which he approves. It only remains to find
the pupils rather a difficult thing for we live rather far
from towns and one does not greatly care about crossing the
hills which form as it were a barrier around us. But the task
that is without difficulty is almost without merit; there is
great interest in triumphing over obstacles. I do not say I
shall succeed the effort alone will do me good. There is
nothing I fear so much as idleness, the want of occupation,
inactivity, the lethargy of the faculties: when the body is
idle, the spirit suffers painfully.

I should not know this lethargy if I could write. Formerly
I passed whole days and weeks and months in writing, not
wholly without result, for Shelley and Coleridge two of our
best authors, to whom I sent certain manuscripts were good
enough to express their approval; but now my sight is too
weak to write. Were I to write much I should become blind.
This weakness of sight is a terrible hindrance to me. Other-
wise do you know what I should do, Monsieur? I should
write a book and I should dedicate it to my literature-master
to the only master I ever had to you Monsieur. I have
often told you in French how much I respect you how much
I am indebted to your goodness, to your advice; I should like
to say it once in English. But that cannot be it is not to be
thought of. The career of letters is closed to me only that of
teaching is open. It does not offer the same attractions; never
mind, I shall enter it and if I do not go far it will not be from
want of industry. You too, Monsieur you wished to be a
barrister destiny or Providence made you a professor; you
are happy in spite of it

Please convey to Madame the assurance of my esteem* I
fear that Marie, Louise and Claire have already forgotten

223

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

me. Prospere and Victorine never knew me well; I remember
well all five of them, especially Louise. She had so much
character so much naivete in her little face.
Goodby, Monsieur.
Your grateful pupil
C. Bronte

July 24.

I have not begged you to write to me soon as I fear to
importune you but you are too kind to forget that I wish it
all the same yes, I wish it greatly. Enough; after all, do as
you wish, Monsieur. If, then, I received a letter and if I
thought that you had written it out of pity I should feel
deeply wounded.

It seems that Mrs. Wheelwright is going to Paris before
going to Brussels but she will post my letter at Boulogne.
Once more goodbye, Monsieur; it hurts to say goodbye even
in a letter. Oh, it is certain that I shall see you again one day-
it must be so for as soon as I shall have earned enough
money to go to Brussels I shall go there and I shall see you
again if only for a moment

LETTER II

[Addressed, on the back:
Monsieur Heger
No. 32 Rue dlsabefle

Bruxelles]
Monsieur,

I am in high glee this morning and that has rarely hap-
pened to me these last two years. It is because a gentleman of
my acquaintance is going to Brussels and has offered to take
charge of a letter for you which letter he will deliver to you
224

APPENDIX; THE HEGER LETTERS

himself, or else, his sister, so that I shall be certain that you
have received it.

I am not going to write a long letter; in the first place, I
have not the time it must leave at once; and then, I am
afraid of worrying you, I would only ask of you if you heard
from me at the beginning of May and again in the month of
Au<mst? For six months I have been awaiting a letter from
Monsieur six months' waiting is very long, you know! How-
ever, I do not complain and I shall be richly rewarded for a
little sorrow if you will now write a letter and give it to this
gentleman or to his sister who will hand it to me without
fail.

I shall be satisfied with the letter however brief it be-only
do not forget to tell me of your health, Monsieur, and how
Madame and the children are, and the governesses and the
pupils.

My father and my sister send you their respects. My
father's infirmity increases little by little. Nevertheless he is
not yet entirely blind. My sisters are well, but my poor
brother is still ill.

Farewell, Monsieur; I am depending on soon having youi
news. The idea delights me for the remembrance of your
kindnesses will never fade from my memory, and as long as
that remembrance endures the respect with which it has in-
spired me will endure likewise.

Your very devoted pupil
C. Bronte

I have just had bound all the books you gave me when I was
at Brussels. I take delight in contemplating them; they make
quite a little library. To begin with, there are the complete
works of Bernardin de St. Pierre-the Pensees de Pascal-a

225

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

book of poetry, two German books-and (worth all the rest)
two discourses of Monsieur le Professor Heger, delivered at
the distribution of prizes of the Athenee Royal
Octb. 24th 1844

LETTER III

[Addressed, on the back:
Monsieur Hegfcf
No. 32 Rue dlsabelle
Bruxelles
Belgique]

Mr. Taylor has returned. I asked him if he had a letter for me.
"No; nothing." "Patience," said I- c< his sister will be here
soon." Miss Taylor has returned. "I have nothing for you
from Monsieur Heger," says she; "Neither letter nor mes-
sage/'

Having realized the meaning of these words, I said to my-
self what I should say to another similarly placed: "You must
be resigned, and above all do not grieve at a misfortune
which you have not deserved." I strove to restrain my tears,
to utter no complaint.

But when one does not complain, when one seeks to"
dominate oneself with a tyrant's grip, the faculties start into
rebellion and one pays for external calm with an internal
struggle that is almost unbearable.

Day and night I find neither rest nor peace. If I sleep I
am disturbed by tormenting dreams in which I see you al-
ways severe, always grave, always incensed against me.

Forgive me then, Monsieur, if I adopt the course of writing
to you again. I cannot endure life if I made no effort to ease
its sufferings.
226

APPENDIX: THE HEGER LETTERS

I know that you will be irritated when you read this letter.
You will say once more that I am hysterical (or neurotic)
that I have black thoughts, &e. So be it, Monsieur; I do not
seek to justify myself; I submit to every sort of reproach. All
I know is, that I cannot, that I will not, resign myself to lose
wholly the friendship of my master. I would rather suffer the
greatest physical pain than always have my heart lacerated
by smarting regrets. If my master withdraws his friendship
from me entirely I shall be altogether without hope; if he
gives me a lil lie just a little I shall be satisfiedhappy; I
shall have a reason for living, for working,

Monsieur, the poor have not need of much to sustain them
they ask only for the crumbs that fall from the rich man's
table. Nor do I, either, need much affection from those I
love. I should not know what to do with a friendship entire
and complete I am not used to it. But you showed me of
yore a little interest, when I was your pupil in Brussels, and I
hold on to the maintenance of that little interest I hold on to
it as I would Bold on to life.

You will tell me perhaps "I take not the slightest interest
in you, Mademoiselle Charlotte. You are no longer an in-
timate of my House: I have forgotten you."

Well, Monsieur, tell me so frankly. It will be a shock to me.
It matters not. It could be less dreadful than uncertainty.

I shall not reread this letter. I send it as I have written it
Nevertheless, I have a hidden consciousness that some
people, cold and common-sense, in reading it would say
"She is talking nonsense." I would avenge myself on such
persons in no other way than by wishing them one single day
of the torment which I have suffered for eight months. We
should then see if they would not talk nonsense too.

One suffers in silence so long as one has the strength so to

227

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

do, and when that strength gives out one speaks without too
carefully measuring one's words.
I wish Monsieur happiness and prosperity.

C.B.
Jany 8th Haworth. Bradford. Yorkshire.

LETTER IV
Monsieur,

The six months of silence have run their course. It is now
the 18th of Now.; my last letter was dated (I think) the
18th of May. I may therefore write to you without failing in
my promise.

The summer and autumn seemed very long to me; truth
to tell, it has needed painful efforts on my part to bear hith-
erto the self-denial which I have imposed upon myself. You,
Monsieur, you cannot conceive what it means; but suppose
for a moment that one of your children was separated from
you 160 leagues away, and that you had to remain six months
without writing to him, without receiving news of him, with-
out hearing him spoke of, without aught of his health, then
you would understand easily all the harshness of such an
obligation. I tell you frankly that I have tried meanwhile to
forget you, for the remembrance of a person whom one thinks
never to see again, and whom, nevertheless, one greatly
esteems, frets too much the mind; and when one has suffered
that kind of anxiety for a year or two, one is ready to do any-
thing to find peace once more. I have done everything; I
have sought occupations; I have denied myself absolutely
the pleasure of speaking about youeven to Emily, but I
have been able neither to conquer my regrets nor my impa-
tience. That, indeed, is humiliating-to be unable to control
228

APPENDIX: THE HEGER LETTERS

one's own thoughts, to be the slave of a regret, of a memory,
the slave of a fixed and dominant idea which lords it over
the mind. Why cannot I have just as much friendship for
you, as you for me neither more, nor less? Then should I be
so tranquil, so free I could keep silence then for ten years
without an effort.

My father is well but his sight is almost gone. He can
neither read nor write. Yet the doctors advise waiting a few
months before attempting an operation. The winter will be a
long night for him. He rarely complains; I admire his pa-
tience. If Providence wills the same calamity for me, may He
at least vouchsafe me as much patience with which to bear it!
It seems to me, Monsieur, that there is nothing more galling
in great physical misfortunes than to be compelled to make
all those about us share in our sufferings. The ills of the soul
one can hide, but those which attack the body and destroy
the faculties cannot be concealed. My father allows me now
to read to him and write for him; he shows me too, more con-
fidence than he has ever shown before, and that is a great
consolation.

Monsieur, I have a favour to ask of you: when you reply
to this letter, speak to me a little of yourself, not of me; for I
know that if you speak of me it will be to scold me, and this
time I would see your kindly side. Speak to me therefore of
your children. Never was your brow severe when Louise and
Claire and Prosper were by your side. Tell me also something
of the School, of the pupils, of the Governesses. Are Mes-
demoiselles Blanche, Sophie and Justine still at Brussels?
Tell me where you travelled during the holidays did you go
to the Rhine? Did you visit Cologne or Coblentz? Tell me, in
short, mon maitre, what you will, but tell me something. To
write to an ex-assistant-governess (No! I refuse to remember

229

THE BEWITCHED PARSONAGE

my employment as assistant-governess I repudiate it) any-
how, to write to an old pupil cannot be a very interesting oc-
cupation for you, I know; but for me it is life. Your last letter
was stay and prop to me nourishment to me, for half a
year. Now I need another and you will give it me; not be-
cause you bear me friendship you cannot have suchbut
because you are compassionate of soul and you would con-
demn no one to prolong suffering to save yourself a few mo-
ments' trouble, To forbid me to write to you, to refuse to
answer me would be to tear from me my only joy on earth, to
deprive me of my last privilege-a privilege I shall never
consent willingly to surrender. Believe me, mon maitre, in
writing to me it is a good deed that you will do. So long as I
believe you are pleased with me, so long as I have hope of re-
ceiving news from you, I can be at rest and not too sad. But
when a prolonged and gloomy silence seems to threaten me
with the estrangement of my master-when day by day 1
await a letter and when day by day disappointment comes to
fling me back into overwhelming sorrow,-and the sweet
delight of seeing your handwriting and reading your counsel
escapes me as a vision that is vain, then fever claims me I
lose appetite and sleep I pine away.

May I write to you again next May? I would rather wait a
year, but it is impossible it is too long.

C. Bronte

I must say a word to you in English I wish I could write to
you more cheerful letters, for when I read this over, I find it
to be somewhat gloomy but forgive me my dear master, do
not be irritated at my sadness according to the words of the
Bible: "Out of the fulness of the heart, the mouth speaketh,"
and truly I find it difficult to be cheerful so long as I think I
shall never see you more. You will perceive by the defects in
230

APPENDIX: EXTRACTS FROM REVIEWS

this letter that I am forgetting the French language I read
all the French books I can get, and learn daily a portion
by heart but I have never heard French spoken but once
since I left Brussels and then it sounded like music in my
ears every word was most precious to me because it re-
minded me of you I love French for your sake with all my
heart and soul.

Farewell my dear master may God protect you with spe-
cial care and crown you with peculiar blessings.

C. B.

Novr. 18th Haworth. Bradford. Yorkshire.
NOTE: It is on the edge of this letter that Professor Heger
made some commonplace notes in pencil one of
them the name and address of a shoemaker.
The Heger letters are reprinted through the courtesy of
Hodder & Stoughton, Ltd., and the Bibliographical Society.

EXTRACTS FROM REVIEWS

Athenaeum, no. 975, July 4, 1846, p. 682.
Poems by C. E. and A. Bell

The second book on our list furnishes another example of a
family in whom appears to run an instinct of song. It is
shared, however, by the three brothers as we suppose them
to be in very unequal proportions; requiring in the case of
Acton Bell the indulgences of affection ... to make it music,
and rising, in that of Ellis into an inspiration, which may
yet find an audience in the outer world. A fine quaint spirit
has the latter, which may have things to speak that men will
be glad to hear, and an evident power of wing that may
reach heights not here attempted. [Extracts follow from "The

231

THE BEWITCHEF PARSONAGE

Philosopher," "Song," and a poem beginning "Hope was but
a timid friend."] The Muse of Currer Bell walks half way
between the level of Acton's and the elevation attained by
Ellis. It is rarely that the whole of one of his poems is up
to the scale registered by parts. A bit here and there from
the 'Monologue of the Teacher'. . . may give the tone and
manner of his singing. [Extract follows,]

Frasers Magazine, Vol. 36, July-December, 1847, pp. 690-694.

Review of Jane Eyre
Extract:

. . . we wept over Jane Eyre. This, indeed, is a book after
our own heart; and, if its merits have not forced it into
notice by the time this paper comes before our readers, let
us, in all earnestness, bid them lose not a day in sending for
it. The writer is evidently a woman, and, unless we are
deceived, new in the world of literature. But, man, or woman,
young or old, be that as it may, no such book has gladdened
our eyes for a long while. Almost all that we require in a
novelist she has: perception of character, and power of
delineating it; picturesqueness; passion; and knowledge of

life The book closed, the enchantment continues. . .

Reality deep, significant reality is the great characteristic
of the book. It fe an autobiography ? ~not, perhaps, in the
naked facts and circumstances, but in the actual suffering

and experience There are some defects in it There

is, indeed, too much melodrama and improbability, which
smack of the circulating library we allude particularly to
the mad wife and all that relates to her, and to the wander-
ings of Jane when she quits Thornfield. . . . Jane herself is

a creation A creature of flesh and blood, with very fleshly

232

APPENDIX: EXTRACTS FROM REVIEWS

infirmities, and very mortal excellencies; a woman, not a

pattern Mr. Rochester is also well drawn, and from the

life; but it is the portrait of a man drawn by a woman, and
is not comparable to the portrait of Jane.

Extract from The Times, December 7, 1849,
Shirley-by the Author of Jane Eyre

. . . Struck, however, as we could not but be by the raciness
and ability of the work [i.e., Jane Eyre], by the independent
sway of a thoroughly original and unworn pen, by the
masculine current of noble thoughts ... we perused the last
words of the story with the conviction that the second effort

of the author would not surpass the first Currer Bell,

whomsoever that name may represent, during two-thirds of
her performance [i.e., the first two volumes of Jane Eyre]
obeyed the impulses and necessities of her mind, and her
genius enabled her to command success; for the remaining

third she was the mere bond slave of the booksellers

Eager to extend renown, she starts from the point where she '
left off ... and presents us with ... a novel made up of third
volumes [le., Shirley], a book to be read on the strength of

the book that was formerly devoured Shirley is very

clever as a matter of course. It could not be otherwise. The
story of Shirley may be told in a couple of pages, yet a more
artificial and unnatural history cannot be conceived; and
what is true of the plot is even more applicable to the
dramatis personae. The characters, from Shirley Keeldar
down to the smallest boy in the narrative, are manufactured
for the occasion. . . . Shirley is at once the* most high-flown
and the stalest of fictions.

233

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238

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