The life of Charlotte Brontë

by Elizabeth Gaskell

  In consequence of this long-protracted state of languor, headache, and sickness, to which the slightest exposure to cold added sensations of hoarseness and soreness at the chest, she determined to take the evil in time, as much for her father’s sake as for her own, and to go up to London and consult some physician there. It was not her first intention to visit anywhere; but the friendly urgency of her publishers prevailed, and it was decided that she was to become the guest of Mr. Smith. Before she went, she wrote two characteristic letters about “Shirley,” from which I shall take a few extracts.

  “‘Shirley’ makes her way. The reviews shower in fast.... The best critique which has yet appeared is in the ‘Revue des deux Mondes,’ a sort of European Cosmopolitan periodical, whose head-quarters are at Paris.aw Comparatively few reviewers, even in their praise, evince a just comprehension of the author’s meaning. Eugene Forsarde, the reviewer in question, follows Currer Bell through every winding, discerns every point, discriminates every shade, proves himself master of the subject, and lord of the aim. With that man I would shake hands, if I saw him, I would say, ‘You know me, Monsieur; I shall deem it an honour to know you.’ I could not say so much of the mass of the London critics. Perhaps I could not say so much to five hundred men and women in all the millions of Great Britain. That matters little. My own conscience I satisfy first; and having done that, if I further content and delight a Forsarde, a Fonblanque, and a Thackeray, my ambition has had its ration; it is fed; it lies down for the present satisfied; my faculties have wrought a day’s task, and earned a day’s wages. I am no teacher; to look on me in that light is to mistake me. To teach is not my vocation. What I am, it is useless to say. Those whom it concerns feel and find it out. To all others I wish only to be an obscure, steady-going, private character. To you, dear E—, I wish to be a sincere friend. Give me your faithful regard; I willingly dispense with admiration.”

  “Nov. 26th.

  “It is like you to pronounce the reviews not good enough, and belongs to that part of your character which will not permit you to bestow unqualified approbation on any dress, decoration, &c., belonging to you. Know that the reviews are superb; and were I dissatisfied with them, I should be a conceited ape. Nothing higher is ever said, from perfectly disinterested motives, of any living authors. If all be well, I go to London this week; Wednesday, I think. The dressmaker has done my small matters pretty well, but I wish you could have looked them over, and given a dictum. I insisted on the dresses being made quite plainly.”

  At the end of November she went up to the “big Babylon,”ax and was immediately plunged into what appeared to her a whirl; for changes, and scenes, and stimulus which would have been a trifle to others, were much to her. As was always the case with strangers, she was a little afraid at first of the family into which she was now received, fancying that the ladies looked on her with a mixture of respect and alarm; but in a few days, if this state of feeling ever existed, her simple, shy, quiet manners, her dainty personal and household ways, had quite done away with it, and she says that she thinks they begin to like her, and that she likes them much, for “kindness is a potent heartwinner.” She had stipulated that she should not be expected to see many people. The recluse life she had led was the cause of a nervous shrinking from meeting any fresh face, which lasted all her life long. Still, she longed to have an idea of the personal appearance and manners of some of those whose writings or letters had interested her. Mr. Thackeray was accordingly invited to meet her, but it so happened that she had been out for the greater part of the morning, and, in consequence, missed the luncheon hour at her friend’s house. This brought on a severe and depressing headache in one accustomed to the early, regular hours of a Yorkshire Parsonage; besides, the excitement of meeting, hearing, and sitting next a man to whom she looked up with such admiration as she did to the author of “Vanity Fair,” was of itself overpowering to her frail nerves. She writes about this dinner as follows:—

  “Dec. 10th, 1849.

  “As to being happy, I am under scenes and circumstances of excitement; but I suffer acute pain sometimes,—mental pain, I mean. At the moment Mr. Thackeray presented himself, I was thoroughly faint from inanition, having eaten nothing since a very slight breakfast, and it was then seven o’clock in the evening. Excitement and exhaustion made savage work of me that evening. What he thought of me I cannot tell.”

  She told me how difficult she found it, this first time of meeting Mr. Thackeray, to decide whether he was speaking in jest or in earnest, and that she had (she believed) completely misunderstood an inquiry of his, made on the gentlemen’s coming into the drawing-room. He asked her “if she had perceived the secret of their cigars;” to which she replied literally, discovering in a minute afterwards, by the smile on several faces, that he was alluding to a passage in “Jane Eyre.” Her hosts took pleasure in showing her the sights of London. On one of the days which had been set apart for some of these pleasant excursions, a severe review of “Shirley” was published in the “Times.”ay She had heard that her book would be noticed by it, and guessed that there was some particular reason for the care with which her hosts mislaid it on that particular morning. She told them that she was aware why she might not see the paper. Mrs. Smith at once admitted that her conjecture was right, and said that they had wished her to go to the day’s engagement before reading it. But she quietly persisted in her request to be allowed to have the paper. Mrs. Smith took her work, and tried not to observe the countenance, which the other tried to hide between the large sheets; but she could not help becoming aware of tears stealing down the face and dropping on the lap. The first remark Miss Brontë made was to express her fear lest so severe a notice should check the sale of the book, and injuriously affect her publishers. Wounded as she was, her first thought was for others. Later on (I think that very afternoon) Mr. Thackeray called; she suspected (she said) that he came to see how she bore the attack on “Shirley;” but she had recovered her composure, and conversed very quietly with him: he only learnt from the answer to his direct inquiry that she had read the “Times” article. She acquiesced in the recognition of herself as the authoress of “Jane Eyre,” because she perceived that there were some advantages to be derived from dropping her pseudonym. One result was an acquaintance with Miss Martineau.6 She had sent her the novel just published, with a curious note, in which Currer Bell offered a copy of “Shirley” to Miss Martineau as an acknowledgment of the gratification he had received from her works. From “Deerbrook” he had derived a new and keen pleasure, and experienced a genuine benefit. In his mind “Deerbrook,” &c.

  Miss Martineau, in acknowledging this note and the copy of “Shirley,” dated her letter from a friend’s house in the neighbourhood of Mr. Smith’s residence; and when a week or two afterwards, Miss Brontë found how near she was to her correspondent, she wrote, in the name of Currer Bell, to propose a visit to her. Six o’clock, on a certain Sunday afternoon (Dec. 10th),az was the time appointed. Miss Martineau’s friends had invited the unknown Currer Bell to their early tea; they were ignorant whether the name was that of a man or a woman; and had had various conjectures as to sex, age, and appearance. Miss Martineau had, indeed, expressed her private opinion pretty distinctly by beginning her reply, to the professedly masculine note referred to above, with “Dear Madam;” but she had addressed it to “Currer Bell, Esq.” At every ring the eyes of the party turned towards the door. Some stranger (a gentleman, I think) came in; for an instant they fancied he was Currer Bell, and indeed an Esq.; he stayed some time—went away. Another ring; “Miss Brontë” was announced; and in came a young-looking lady, almost child-like in stature,7 “in a deep mourning dress, neat as a Quaker’s, with her beautiful hair smooth and brown, her fine eyes blazing with meaning, and her sensible face indicating a habit of self-control.” She came,—hesitated one moment at finding four or five people assembled,—then went straight to Miss Martineau with intuitive recognition, and, with the free-masonry of good feeling and ge
ntle breeding, she soon became as one of the family seated round the tea-table; and before she left, she told them, in a simple, touching manner, of her sorrow and isolation, and a foundation was laid for her intimacy with Miss Martineau.

  After some discussion on the subject, and a stipulation that she should not be specially introduced to any one, some gentlemen were invited by Mr. Smith to meet her at dinner the evening before she left town. Her natural place would have been at the bottom of the table by her host; and the places of those who were to be her neighbours were arranged accordingly; but, on entering the dining-room, she quickly passed up so as to sit next to the lady of the house, anxious to shelter herself near some one of her own sex. This slight action arose out of the same womanly seeking after protection on every occasion, when there was no moral duty involved in asserting her independence, that made her about this time write as follows: “Mrs.—ba watches me very narrowly when surrounded by strangers. She never takes her eye from me. I like the surveillance; it seems to keep guard over me.”

  Respecting this particular dinner-party she thus wrote to the Brussels schoolfellowbb of former days, whose friendship had been renewed during her present visit to London:—

  “The evening after I left you passed better than I expected. Thanks to my substantial lunch and cheering cup of coffee, I was able to wait the eight o’clock dinner with complete resignation, and to endure its length quite courageously, nor was I too much exhausted to converse; and of this I was glad, for otherwise I know my kind host and hostess would have been much disappointed. There were only seven gentlemen at dinner besides Mr. Smith, but of these five were critics—men more dreaded in the world of letters than you can conceive. I did not know how much their presence and conversation had excited me till they were gone, and the reaction commenced. When I had retired for the night, I wished to sleep—the effort to do so was vain. I could not close my eyes. Night passed, morning came, and I rose without having known a moment’s slumber. So utterly worn out was I when I got to Derby, that I was again obliged to stay there all night.”

  “Dec. 17th.

  “Here I am at Haworth once more. I feel as if I had come out of an exciting whirl. Not that the hurry and stimulus would have seemed much to one accustomed to society and change, but to me they were very marked. My strength and spirits too often proved quite insufficient to the demand on their exertions. I used to bear up as long as I possibly could, for, when I flagged, I could see Mr. Smith became disturbed; he always thought that something had been said or done to annoy me—which never once happened, for I met with perfect good breeding even from antagonists—men who had done their best or worst to write me down. I explained to him, over and over again, that my occasional silence was only failure of the power to talk, never of the will.....

  “Thackeray is a Titan of mind. His presence and powers impress one deeply in an intellectual sense; I do not see him or know him as a man. All the others are subordinate. I have esteem for some, and, I trust, courtesy for all. I do not, of course, know what they thought of me, but I believe most of them expected me to come out in a more marked, eccentric, striking light. I believe they desired more to admire and more to blame. I felt sufficiently at my ease with all but Thackeray; with him I was fearfully stupid.”

  She returned to her quiet home, and her noiseless daily duties. Her father had quite enough of the spirit of hero-worship in him to make him take a vivid pleasure in the accounts of what she had heard and whom she had seen. It was on the occasion of one of her visits to London that he had desired her to obtain a sight of Prince Albert’s armoury, if possible. I am not aware whether she managed to do this; but she went to one or two of the great national armouries in order that she might describe the stern steel harness and glittering swords to her father, whose imagination was forcibly struck by the idea of such things; and often afterwards, when his spirits flagged and the languor of old age for a time got the better of his indomitable nature, she would again strike on the measure wild, and speak about the armies of strange weapons she had seen in London, till he resumed his interest in the old subject, and was his own keen, warlike, intelligent self again.

  CHAPTER V.

  Her life at Haworth was so unvaried that the postman’s call was the event of her day. Yet she dreaded the great temptation of centring all her thoughts upon this one time, and losing her interest in the smaller hopes and employments of the remaining hours. Thus she conscientiously denied herself the pleasure of writing letters too frequently, because the answers (when she received them) took the flavour out of the rest of her life; or the disappointment, when the replies did not arrive, lessened her energy for her home duties.

  The winter of this year in the north was hard and cold; it affected Miss Brontë’s health less than usual, however, probably because the change and the medical advice she had taken in London had done her good; probably, also, because her friend had come to pay her a visit, and enforced that attention to bodily symptoms which Miss Brontë was too apt to neglect, from a fear of becoming nervous herself about her own state, and thus infecting her father. But she could scarcely help feeling much depressed in spirits as the anniversary of her sister Emily’s death came round; all the recollections connected with it were painful, yet there were no outward events to call off her attention, and prevent them from pressing hard upon her. At this time, as at many others, I find her alluding in her letters to the solace which she found in the books sent her from Cornhill.

  “What, I sometimes ask, could I do without them? I have recourse to them as to friends; they shorten and cheer many an hour that would be too long and too desolate otherwise; even when my tired sight will not permit me to continue reading, it is pleasant to see them on the shelf, or on the table. I am still very rich, for my stock is far from exhausted. Some other friends have sent me books lately. The perusal of Harriet Martineau’s ‘Eastern Life’ has afforded me great pleasure; and I have found a deep and interesting subject of study in Newman’s work on the ‘Soul.’ Have you read this work? It is daring,—it may be mistaken,—but it is pure and elevated. Froude’s ‘Nemesis of Faith’1 I did not like; I thought it morbid; yet in its pages, too, are found sprinklings of truth.”

  By this time, “Airedale, Wharfedale, Calderdale, and Ribblesdale” all knew the place of residence of Currer Bell. She compared herself to the ostrich hiding its head in the sand; and says that she still buries hers in the heath of Haworth moors; but “the concealment is but self-delusion.”

  Indeed it was. Far and wide in the West Riding had spread the intelligence that Currer Bell was no other than a daughter of the venerable clergyman of Haworth; the village itself caught up the excitement.

  “Mr.—, having finished ‘Jane Eyre,’ is now crying out for the ‘other book;’ he is to have it next week.... Mr. R—has finished

  ‘Shirley;’ he is delighted with it. John—s wife2 seriously thought him gone wrong in the head, as she heard him giving vent to roars of laughter as he sat alone, clapping and stamping on the floor. He would read all the scenes about the curates aloud to papa.” ... ”Martha came in yesterday, puffing and blowing, and much excited. ‘I’ve heard sich news!’ she began. ‘What about?’ ‘Please, ma’am, you’ve been and written two books—the grandest books that ever was seen. My father has heard it at Halifax, and Mr. G—T—and Mr. G—and Mr. M—at Bradford; and they are going to have a meeting at the Mechanics’ Institute, and to settle about ordering them.’ ‘Hold your tongue, Martha, and be off’ I fell into a cold sweat. ‘Jane Eyre’ will be read by J—B—, by Mrs.T—, and B—. Heaven help, keep, and deliver me! “ ... ”The Haworth people have been making great fools of themselves about ’Shirley;‘ they have taken it in an enthusiastic light. When they got the volumes at the Mechanics’ Institute,3 all the members wanted them. They cast lots for the whole three, and whoever got a volume was only allowed to keep it two days, and was to be fined a shilling per diem for longer detention. It would be mere nonsense and vanity to tell you what they s
ay.”

  The tone of these extracts is thoroughly consonant with the spirit ofYorkshire and Lancashire people, who try as long as they can to conceal their emotions of pleasure under a bantering exterior, almost as if making fun of themselves.—Miss Brontë was extremely touched in the secret places of her warm heart by the way in which those who had known her from her childhood were proud and glad of her success. All round about the news had spread; strangers came “from beyond Bromley” to see her, as she went quietly and unconsciously into church; and the sexton “gained many a half-crown” for pointing her out.

  But there were drawbacks to this hearty and kindly appreciation which was so much more valuable than fame. The January number of the “Edinburgh Review” had contained the article on “Shirley,” of which her correspondent, Mr. Lewes, was the writer. I have said that Miss Brontë was especially anxious to be criticised as a writer, without relation to her sex as a woman. Whether right or wrong, her feeling was strong on this point. Now in this review of “Shirley,” the headings of the first two pages ran thus: “Mental Equality of the Sexes?” “Female Literature,” and through the whole article the fact of the author’s sex is never forgotten.