Delphi Complete Works of the Brontes

by Bronte Sisters

  Charlotte Brontë took Mr. Williams’s advice. She wrote Jane Eyre, and despatched it quickly to Smith & Elder’s house in Cornhill. It was read by Mr. Williams, and read afterwards by Mr. George Smith; and it was published with the success that we know. Charlotte awoke to find herself famous. She became a regular correspondent with Mr. Williams, and not less than a hundred letters were sent to him, most of them treating of interesting literary matters.

  One of Mr. Williams’s daughters, I may add, married Mr. Lowes Dickenson the portrait painter; his youngest child, a baby when Miss Brontë was alive, is famous in the musical world as Miss Anna Williams. The family has an abundance of literary and artistic association, but the father we know as the friend and correspondent of Charlotte Brontë. He still lives also in the memory of a large circle as a kindly and attractive — a singularly good and upright man.

  Comment upon the following letters is in well-nigh every case superfluous.

  TO W. S. WILLIAMS

  ‘February 25th 1848.

  ‘My dear Sir, — I thank you for your note; its contents moved me much, though not to unmingled feelings of exultation. Louis Philippe (unhappy and sordid old man!) and M. Guizot doubtless merit the sharp lesson they are now being taught, because they have both proved themselves men of dishonest hearts. And every struggle any nation makes in the cause of Freedom and Truth has something noble in it — something that makes me wish it success; but I cannot believe that France — or at least Paris — will ever be the battle-ground of true Liberty, or the scene of its real triumphs. I fear she does not know “how genuine glory is put on.” Is that strength to be found in her which will not bend “but in magnanimous meekness”? Have not her “unceasing changes” as yet always brought “perpetual emptiness”? Has Paris the materials within her for thorough reform? Mean, dishonest Guizot being discarded, will any better successor be found for him than brilliant, unprincipled Thiers?

  ‘But I damp your enthusiasm, which I would not wish to do, for true enthusiasm is a fine feeling whose flash I admire wherever I see it.

  ‘The little note inclosed in yours is from a French lady, who asks my consent to the translation of Jane Eyre into the French language. I thought it better to consult you before I replied. I suppose she is competent to produce a decent translation, though one or two errors of orthography in her note rather afflict the eye; but I know that it is not unusual for what are considered well-educated French women to fail in the point of writing their mother tongue correctly. But whether competent or not, I presume she has a right to translate the book with or without my consent. She gives her address: Mdlle B — - W. Cumming, Esq., 23 North Bank, Regent’s Park.

  ‘Shall I reply to her note in the affirmative?

  ‘Waiting your opinion and answer, — I remain, dear sir, yours faithfully,

  ‘C. Bell.’

  TO W. S. WILLIAMS

  ‘February 28th, 1848.

  ‘Dear Sir, — I have done as you advised me respecting Mdlle B — -, thanked her for her courtesy, and explained that I do not wish my consent to be regarded in the light of a formal sanction of the translation.

  ‘From the papers of Saturday I had learnt the abdication of Louis Philippe, the flight of the royal family, and the proclamation of a republic in France. Rapid movements these, and some of them difficult of comprehension to a remote spectator. What sort of spell has withered Louis Philippe’s strength? Why, after having so long infatuatedly clung to Guizot, did he at once ignobly relinquish him? Was it panic that made him so suddenly quit his throne and abandon his adherents without a struggle to retain one or aid the other?

  ‘Perhaps it might have been partly fear, but I daresay it was still more long-gathering weariness of the dangers and toils of royalty. Few will pity the old monarch in his flight, yet I own he seems to me an object of pity. His sister’s death shook him; years are heavy on him; the sword of Damocles has long been hanging over his head. One cannot forget that monarchs and ministers are only human, and have only human energies to sustain them; and often they are sore beset. Party spirit has no mercy; indignant Freedom seldom shows forbearance in her hour of revolt. I wish you could see the aged gentleman trudging down Cornhill with his umbrella and carpet-bag, in good earnest; he would be safe in England: John Bull might laugh at him but he would do him no harm.

  ‘How strange it appears to see literary and scientific names figuring in the list of members of a Provisional Government! How would it sound if Carlyle and Sir John Herschel and Tennyson and Mr. Thackeray and Douglas Jerrold were selected to manufacture a new constitution for England? Whether do such men sway the public mind most effectually from their quiet studies or from a council-chamber?

  ‘And Thiers is set aside for a time; but won’t they be glad of him by-and-by? Can they set aside entirely anything so clever, so subtle, so accomplished, so aspiring — in a word, so thoroughly French, as he is? Is he not the man to bide his time — to watch while unskilful theorists try their hand at administration and fail; and then to step out and show them how it should be done?

  ‘One would have thought political disturbance the natural element of a mind like Thiers’; but I know nothing of him except from his writings, and I always think he writes as if the shade of Bonaparte were walking to and fro in the room behind him and dictating every line he pens, sometimes approaching and bending over his shoulder, pour voir de ses yeux that such an action or event is represented or misrepresented (as the case may be) exactly as he wishes it. Thiers seems to have contemplated Napoleon’s character till he has imbibed some of its nature. Surely he must be an ambitious man, and, if so, surely he will at this juncture struggle to rise.

  ‘You should not apologise for what you call your “crudities.” You know I like to hear your opinions and views on whatever subject it interests you to discuss.

  ‘From the little inscription outside your note I conclude you sent me the Examiner. I thank you therefore for your kind intention and am sorry some unscrupulous person at the Post Office frustrated it, as no paper has reached my hands. I suppose one ought to be thankful that letters are respected, as newspapers are by no means sure of safe conveyance. — I remain, dear sir, yours sincerely,

  ‘C. Bell.’

  TO W. S. WILLIAMS

  ‘May 12th, 1848.

  ‘My dear Sir, — I take a large sheet of paper, because I foresee that I am about to write another long letter, and for the same reason as before, viz., that yours interested me.

  ‘I have received the Morning Chronicle, and was both surprised and pleased to see the passage you speak of in one of its leading articles. An allusion of that sort seems to say more than a regular notice. I do trust I may have the power so to write in future as not to disappoint those who have been kind enough to think and speak well of Jane Eyre; at any rate, I will take pains. But still, whenever I hear my one book praised, the pleasure I feel is chastened by a mixture of doubt and fear; and, in truth, I hardly wish it to be otherwise: it is much too early for me to feel safe, or to take as my due the commendation bestowed.

  ‘Some remarks in your last letter on teaching commanded my attention. I suppose you never were engaged in tuition yourself; but if you had been, you could not have more exactly hit on the great qualification — I had almost said the one great qualification — necessary to the task: the faculty, not merely of acquiring but of imparting knowledge — the power of influencing young minds — that natural fondness for, that innate sympathy with, children, which, you say, Mrs. Williams is so happy as to possess. He or she who possesses this faculty, this sympathy — though perhaps not otherwise highly accomplished — need never fear failure in the career of instruction. Children will be docile with them, will improve under them; parents will consequently repose in them confidence. Their task will be comparatively light, their path comparatively smooth. If the faculty be absent, the life of a teacher will be a struggle from beginning to end. No matter how amiable the disposition, how strong the sense of duty, how active the
desire to please; no matter how brilliant and varied the accomplishments; if the governess has not the power to win her young charge, the secret to instil gently and surely her own knowledge into the growing mind intrusted to her, she will have a wearing, wasting existence of it. To educate a child, as I daresay Mrs. Williams has educated her children, probably with as much pleasure to herself as profit to them, will indeed be impossible to the teacher who lacks this qualification. But, I conceive, should circumstances — as in the case of your daughters — compel a young girl notwithstanding to adopt a governess’s profession, she may contrive to instruct and even to instruct well. That is, though she cannot form the child’s mind, mould its character, influence its disposition, and guide its conduct as she would wish, she may give lessons — even good, clear, clever lessons in the various branches of knowledge. She may earn and doubly earn her scanty salary as a daily governess. As a school-teacher she may succeed; but as a resident governess she will never (except under peculiar and exceptional circumstances) be happy. Her deficiency will harass her not so much in school-time as in play-hours; the moments that would be rest and recreation to the governess who understood and could adapt herself to children, will be almost torture to her who has not that power. Many a time, when her charge turns unruly on her hands, when the responsibility which she would wish to discharge faithfully and perfectly, becomes unmanageable to her, she will wish herself a housemaid or kitchen girl, rather than a baited, trampled, desolate, distracted governess.

  ‘The Governesses’ Institution may be an excellent thing in some points of view, but it is both absurd and cruel to attempt to raise still higher the standard of acquirements. Already governesses are not half nor a quarter paid for what they teach, nor in most instances is half or a quarter of their attainments required by their pupils. The young teacher’s chief anxiety, when she sets out in life, always is to know a great deal; her chief fear that she should not know enough. Brief experience will, in most instances, show her that this anxiety has been misdirected. She will rarely be found too ignorant for her pupils; the demand on her knowledge will not often be larger than she can answer. But on her patience — on her self-control, the requirement will be enormous; on her animal spirits (and woe be to her if these fail!) the pressure will be immense.

  ‘I have seen an ignorant nursery-maid who could scarcely read or write, by dint of an excellent, serviceable, sanguine, phlegmatic temperament, which made her at once cheerful and unmoveable; of a robust constitution and steady, unimpassionable nerves, which kept her firm under shocks and unharassed under annoyances — manage with comparative ease a large family of spoilt children, while their governess lived amongst them a life of inexpressible misery: tyrannised over, finding her efforts to please and teach utterly vain, chagrined, distressed, worried — so badgered, so trodden on, that she ceased almost at last to know herself, and wondered in what despicable, trembling frame her oppressed mind was prisoned, and could not realise the idea of ever more being treated with respect and regarded with affection — till she finally resigned her situation and went away quite broken in spirit and reduced to the verge of decline in health.

  ‘Those who would urge on governesses more acquirements, do not know the origin of their chief sufferings. It is more physical and mental strength, denser moral impassibility that they require, rather than additional skill in arts or sciences. As to the forcing system, whether applied to teachers or taught, I hold it to be a cruel system.

  ‘It is true the world demands a brilliant list of accomplishments. For £20 per annum, it expects in one woman the attainments of several professors — but the demand is insensate, and I think should rather be resisted than complied with. If I might plead with you in behalf of your daughters, I should say, “Do not let them waste their young lives in trying to attain manifold accomplishments. Let them try rather to possess thoroughly, fully, one or two talents; then let them endeavour to lay in a stock of health, strength, cheerfulness. Let them labour to attain self-control, endurance, fortitude, firmness; if possible, let them learn from their mother something of the precious art she possesses — these things, together with sound principles, will be their best supports, their best aids through a governess’s life.

  ‘As for that one who, you say, has a nervous horror of exhibition, I need not beg you to be gentle with her; I am sure you will not be harsh, but she must be firm with herself, or she will repent it in after life. She should begin by degrees to endeavour to overcome her diffidence. Were she destined to enjoy an independent, easy existence, she might respect her natural disposition to seek retirement, and even cherish it as a shade-loving virtue; but since that is not her lot, since she is fated to make her way in the crowd, and to depend on herself, she should say: I will try and learn the art of self-possession, not that I may display my accomplishments, but that I may have the satisfaction of feeling that I am my own mistress, and can move and speak undaunted by the fear of man. While, however, I pen this piece of advice, I confess that it is much easier to give than to follow. What the sensations of the nervous are under the gaze of publicity none but the nervous know; and how powerless reason and resolution are to control them would sound incredible except to the actual sufferers.

  ‘The rumours you mention respecting the authorship of Jane Eyre amused me inexpressibly. The gossips are, on this subject, just where I should wish them to be, i.e., as far from the truth as possible; and as they have not a grain of fact to found their fictions upon, they fabricate pure inventions. Judge Erle must, I think, have made up his story expressly for a hoax; the other fib is amazing — so circumstantial! called on the author, forsooth! Where did he live, I wonder? In what purlieu of Cockayne? Here I must stop, lest if I run on further I should fill another sheet. — Believe me, yours sincerely,

  ‘Currer Bell.

  ‘P.S. — I must, after all, add a morsel of paper, for I find, on glancing over yours, that I have forgotten to answer a question you ask respecting my next work. I have not therein so far treated of governesses, as I do not wish it to resemble its predecessor. I often wish to say something about the “condition of women” question, but it is one respecting which so much “cant” has been talked, that one feels a sort of repugnance to approach it. It is true enough that the present market for female labour is quite overstocked, but where or how could another be opened? Many say that the professions now filled only by men should be open to women also; but are not their present occupants and candidates more than numerous enough to answer every demand? Is there any room for female lawyers, female doctors, female engravers, for more female artists, more authoresses? One can see where the evil lies, but who can point out the remedy? When a woman has a little family to rear and educate and a household to conduct, her hands are full, her vocation is evident; when her destiny isolates her, I suppose she must do what she can, live as she can, complain as little, bear as much, work as well as possible. This is not high theory, but I believe it is sound practice, good to put into execution while philosophers and legislators ponder over the better ordering of the social system. At the same time, I conceive that when patience has done its utmost and industry its best, whether in the case of women or operatives, and when both are baffled, and pain and want triumph, the sufferer is free, is entitled, at last to send up to Heaven any piercing cry for relief, if by that cry he can hope to obtain succour.’

  TO W. S. WILLIAMS

  ‘June 2, 1848.

  ‘My dear Sir, — I snatch a moment to write a hasty line to you, for it makes me uneasy to think that your last kind letter should have remained so long unanswered. A succession of little engagements, much more importunate than important, have quite engrossed my time lately, to the exclusion of more momentous and interesting occupations. Interruption is a sad bore, and I believe there is hardly a spot on earth, certainly not in England, quite secure from its intrusion. The fact is, you cannot live in this world entirely for one aim; you must take along with some single serious purpose a hundred little minor d
uties, cares, distractions; in short, you must take life as it is, and make the best of it. Summer is decidedly a bad season for application, especially in the country; for the sunshine seems to set all your acquaintances astir, and, once bent on amusement, they will come to the ends of the earth in search thereof. I was obliged to you for your suggestion about writing a letter to the Morning Chronicle, but I did not follow it up. I think I would rather not venture on such a step at present. Opinions I would not hesitate to express to you — because you are indulgent — are not mature or cool enough for the public; Currer Bell is not Carlyle, and must not imitate him.

  ‘Whenever you can write to me without encroaching too much on your valuable time, remember I shall always be glad to hear from you. Your last letter interested me fully as much as its two predecessors; what you said about your family pleased me; I think details of character always have a charm even when they relate to people we have never seen, nor expect to see. With eight children you must have a busy life; but, from the manner in which you allude to your two eldest daughters, it is evident that they at least are a source of satisfaction to their parents; I hope this will be the case with the whole number, and then you will never feel as if you had too many. A dozen children with sense and good conduct may be less burdensome than one who lacks these qualities. It seems a long time since I heard from you. I shall be glad to hear from you again. — Believe me, yours sincerely,

  ‘C. Bell.’

  TO W. S. WILLIAMS

  ‘Haworth, June 15th, 1848.

  ‘My dear Sir, — Thank you for your two last letters. In reading the first I quite realised your May holiday; I enjoyed it with you. I saw the pretty south-of-England village, so different from our northern congregations of smoke-dark houses clustered round their soot-vomiting mills. I saw in your description, fertile, flowery Essex — a contrast indeed to the rough and rude, the mute and sombre yet well-beloved moors over-spreading this corner of Yorkshire. I saw the white schoolhouse, the venerable school-master — I even thought I saw you and your daughters; and in your second letter I see you all distinctly, for, in describing your children, you unconsciously describe yourself.