Brontës
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12. CB to WSW, 4Jan 1848: MS HM 26008, Huntington [LCB, ii, 3–4].
13. Ibid., [LCB, ii, 4]. Mary and Phoebe Crowther were nos. 230 and 244 in CDSAR. Thomas Crowther’s ‘disparaging remarks’ were made to Nicholls: ABN in HG, 18 July 1857 p.3 (referring to ‘Mrs Baldwin’s own father’). Crowther was 54 in 1848: see his memorial tablet in Church of St John the Baptist in the Wilderness, Cragg Vale. Thomas Plummer, the only other likely candidate for the ‘elderly clergyman’ had died several years earlier: LI, 7 Dec 1839 p.5. I am grateful to Margaret Smith for this reference.
14. CB to WSW, 14 Dec 1847: MS pp.1–2, Princeton [LCB, i, 574].
15. CB to G.H. Lewes, 6 Nov 1847: MS Add 39763 pp.1–4, BL [LCB, i, 559].
16. CB to G.H. Lewes, 12 Jan 1848: MS Add 39763 pp.1–3, BL [LCB, ii, 9–10].
17. Ibid., p.4[LCB, ii, 10].
18. CB to WSW, 28 Jan 1848: MS p.3, Berg [LCB, ii, 23].
19. CB to WSW, 14 Dec 1847: MS pp.2–3, Princeton [LCB, i, 574]. Charlotte did embark on recasting the work: see CB, draft preface to The Professor, [Nov–Dec 1847]: MS Bon 109, BPM [CB, Jane Eyre, Clarendon Edn, 295–6].
20. CB, [John Henry], n.d.: MS at Princeton [CB, Shirley, Clarendon Edn, 805–35].
21. CB to WSW, 5 Feb 1848: MS Gr. F1 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 25]. Charlotte was right: Jane Eyre, or The Secret of Thornfield Manor by John Courtenay, took liberties with the novel, introducing a cast of comic servants led by Betty Bunce, who reveals that the pupils have been sent to school to be ‘thumped, bumped and con-sumptionized’; Patsy Stoneman, Jane Eyre on Stage, 1848–1898: An Illustrated Edition with Contextual Notes Aldershot, 2007), 17–63. A second adaptation, written by an English-born actor John Brougham, was staged in New York in 1849: ibid., 65–108.
22. CB to WSW, 15 Feb 1848: MS E9.4 pp.2–3, Boston [LCB, ii, 27]. Charlotte could not prevent the translation but was advised by Williams not to give it her formal sanction: CB to WSW, 28 Feb 1848: MS p.1, Harvard [LCB, ii, 35]; CB to GS, 17 Feb 1848: MS SG 13 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 28].
23. CB to WSW, 21 Dec 1847: MS p.1, Pforzheimer [LCB, i, 580].
24. CB to WSW, 13 Jan 1848: MS E.2008.6 p.2, BPM [LCB, ii, 12]; CB to EN, 12 June 1850: MS HM 24471 pp.3–4, Huntington [LCB, ii, 414]. Charlotte sent Kavanagh a copy of the second edition of Jane Eyre, knowing she had found the book ‘suggestive’ and saying ‘I know that suggestive books are valuable to authors’: CB to WSW, 22 Jan 1848: MS p.1, Law, photograph in MCP [LCB, ii, 16].
25. CB to R.H. Horne, 15 Dec 1847: MS p.1, Princeton [LCB, i, 577–8]; CB to WSW, 21 Dec 1847: MS p.1, Pforzheimer [LCB, i, 580]; CB to Smith, Elder & Co., 25 Dec 1847: MS SG 12 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, i, 586], where Charlotte punningly remarked that she found the contents as attractive as the cover: ‘the Honey is quite as choice as the Jar is elegant’.
26. CB to WSW, 21 Dec 1847: MS p.1, Pforzheimer [LCB, i, 580].
27. CB to WSW, 5Feb 1848: MS Gr. F1 p.3, BPM [LCB, ii, 25]; CB to GS, 17 Feb 1848: MS SG 13 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 29]. See also above, p.629–30 for Newby’s letter to Emily about her second novel; Newby published Anne’s second novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, in July 1848: see below, p.657.
28. CB to Amelia Ringrose, 24 Dec [1847]: MS p.3, Brotherton [LCB, i, 585]; CB to EN, 28 Jan 1848: MS p.1, Berg [LCB, ii, 20].
29. Ibid. See also CB to EN, [24 Dec 1847]: MS in Fales [LCB, i, 583–423]; CB to EN, 11 Jan 1848: MS in Law, photograph in MCP [LCB, ii, 8]. By the end of February Charlotte was worried that Ellen was offended at her lack of contact: CB to EN, 26 Feb 1848: MS HM 24457 p.1, Huntington [LCB, ii, 33].
30. CB to EN, 28 Jan 1848: MS p.3, Berg [LCB, ii, 21].
31. PBB to JBL, [?17 June 1848]: Ms p.1, Brotherton [LCB, ii, 76–7].
32. ECG to unidentified, [Sept 1853] [C&P, 249]; CB to WSW, 11 Mar 1848: MS pp.1–3, Harvard [LCB, ii, 40–1].
33. CB, Note to the third Edition of Jane Eyre, 13 Apr 1848 [CB, Jane Eyre, 6].
34. CB to EN, 28 Apr 1848: MS Bon 201 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 56]; CB to EN, [3May 1848]: MS n.l. [LCB, ii, 62].
35. MT to CB, June–24 July 1848: MS pp.1–2, PM [LCB, ii, 87–8]. The manuscript of this letter, the second part of which is in the Berg, is postmarked in Wellington on 24 July 1848 and in Keighley on 14 December 1848, from which information (confirmed by postmarks on other letters) I have concluded that the letters took six months to travel to and from New Zealand.
36. Unless Charlotte was trying to hide Mary’s responses to her own confidences, Mary also had her secrets from Ellen: Charlotte told Ellen that she had had an almost identical letter from Mary but she could not send it on because it contained ‘an allusion or two to points on which she enjoins secrecy but which concern herself alone’: CB to EN, 5 June 1847: MS HM 24453 p.2, Huntington [LCB, i, 528–9].
37. CB to WSW, 25 Feb 1848: MS E.9.4 pp.1–2, Boston [LCB, ii, 29–30]; CB to WSW, 28 Feb 1848: MS pp.3–4, Harvard [LCB, ii, 35].
38. CB to MW, 31 Mar 1848: MS FM 4 pp.2–4, Fitzwilliam [LCB, ii, 48].
39. HG, 1 Apr 1848 pp.4–5; BO, 13 Apr 1848 p.8; HG, 3June 1848 p.3; 13 May 1848 p.5.
40. CB to WSW, 20 Apr 1848: MS Ashley 166 pp.1–2, BL [LCB, ii, 51].
41. ECG, Life, 314. It is possible, of course, that Charlotte abandoned the attempt, begun in the characterization of William Farren, after reading Gaskell’s Mary Barton.
42. CB to WSW, 12 May 1848: MS Gr. F3 p.5, BPM [LCB, ii, 66].
43. CB to WSW, 15 June 1848: MS Egerton 2829 pp.14, 15 [LCB, ii, 72–3].
44. MT to CB, June–24 July 1848: MS p.1, PM [LCB, ii, 87].
45. CB to WSW, 22 June 1848: MS Bon 203 p.7, BPM [LCB, ii, 79]. Newby advertised that The Tenant of Wildfell Hall would be published on 27 June and the book appears in lists of new publications on Saturday 1July 1848: AB, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Clarendon Edn, xix; CB to MT, 4Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 pp.2–3, Rylands [LCB, ii, 112].
46. Ibid., p.2 [LCB, ii, 111]. This hardly tallies with Smith’s later recollection that his letter said ‘we should be glad to be in a position to contradict the statement, adding at the same time we were quite sure Mr Newby’s assertion was untrue’: Smith, A Memoir, 89.
47. CB to MT, 4Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 p.3, Rylands [LCB, ii, 112].
48. CB, Cash Book, [1848–9]: MS BS 22 p.2, BPM [BST:5:29:277]; CB to MT, 4Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 pp.3–4, Rylands [LCB, ii, 112].
49. Smith, A Memoir, 89.
50. CB to MT, 4Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 pp.4–6, Rylands [LCB, ii, 112–13].
51. Ibid., pp.6–7 [LCB, ii, 113].
52. Smith, A Memoir, 88, 91. The suggestion that Charlotte’s head was too large for her body is borne out by her self-caricature drawn in 1843: see plate 28.
53. Ibid., p.91.
54. CB to MT, 4 Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 p.11, Rylands [LCB, ii, 114].
55. Ibid., pp.11, 9 [LCB, ii, 114].
56. Ibid, p.9[LCB, ii, 113–4]. See also ECG, Life, 285–6.
57. Ibid., 287.
58. Ibid., 286; CB to MT, 4Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 p.9, Rylands [LCB, ii, 114].
59. Ibid., p.10 [LCB, ii, 114].
60. Ibid., pp.10–11 [LCB, ii, 114]. Smith was amused by Charlotte’s description of his house as ‘a very fine place – the rooms – the drawing-room especially – looked splendid to us’, writing ‘The house in which we lived is occupied by a hairdresser, and you may purchase cosmetics and hairpins in what used to be the dining-room, and have your hair cut, curled, singed and shampooed in the little room in which I read the manuscript of “Jane Eyre”‘: Smith, A Memoir, 102–3.
61. CB to MT, 4Sept 1848: MS E.L. f.B91 pp.11–12, Rylands [LCB, ii, 114–15]; CB to WSW, 8 July 1848: MS Gr. F4 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 83], accepting Williams’ invitation, is the first to which Charlotte put her real name rather than her pseudonym. Thereafter she always used her real name in her correspondence with Smith, Elder & Co.
62. MT to CB, 10 April 1849: MS Bon 256 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 198] says ‘I’ve been delighted to receive a very interesting letter from yo
u with an account of your pop visit to London &c … I wish you would give me some account of Newby, & what the man said when confronted with the real Ellis [sic] Bell.’ No such account exists, possibly because Charlotte’s preoccupation with her sisters’ health prevented her ever getting round to it.
63. CB, Cash Book, [1848–9]: MS BS 22 pp.2–3, BPM [BST:5:29:277–8].
64. EN, Reminiscences [L&L, ii, 228].
65. CB to EN, 26 June 1848: MS HM 24463 p.2, Huntington [LCB, ii, 81]. Ellen thought the reference to her naivety meant Charlotte had failed to realize that Ellen had recognized her as the author of Jane Eyre: in fact it meant that Charlotte was amused at her gauche attempts to get her to confess her authorship.
66. Ibid., pp.2–4 [LCB, ii, 81]. Charlotte heard nothing from Hunsworth for many months after this visit and suspected that Taylor had taken offence at her refusal to confide in him: Ellen later blamed him for making ‘an open secret’ of Charlotte’s authorship: CB to EN, 10 Dec 1848: MS p.4, Harvard [LCB, ii, 153]; EN, Reminiscences [L&L, ii, 228].
67. CB to WSW, 31 July 1848: MS pp.3–4, Princeton [LCB, ii, 94].
68. Unsigned review, Athenaeum, 8July 1848 pp.670–1 [Allott, 251].
69. Unsigned review, Spectator, 8July 1848 pp.662–3 [Allott, 250].
70. CB to WSW, 31 July 1848: MS pp.3–4, Princeton [LCB, ii, 94].
71. AB, Preface to second edition of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, 22 July 1848: MS n.l. [AB, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, 5]. For the date of the second edition see AB, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Clarendon Edn, xxii.
72. CB to GS, 7 Sept 1848: MS SG 17 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, ii, 117]; CB to WSW, [?early Sept 1848]: MS Ashley 164 p.4, BL [LCB, ii, 119].
73. CB to WSW, 18 Aug 1848: MS BS 65.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 102]. Through force of habit Charlotte signed the letter ‘Currer Bell’, adding a postscript ‘I forget my own name – but it does not signify;
74. PBB to JBL, [?17 June 1848]: MS p.1, Brotherton [LCB, ii, 77].
75. CB to EN, 28 July 1848: MS Gr. E14 pp.4, 1crossed, BPM [LCB, ii, 93].
76. ECG, Life, 226–7. Opium was then readily available over the counter for pain relief: in liquid form, as laudanum, it was taken as drops in alcohol, usually brandy, con-tributing to alcoholism as well as drug addiction.
77. PBB to John Brown, [summer 1848]: MS p.1, Brotherton [LCB, ii, 110–11].
78. Grundy, 90–1.
79. Ibid., 91.
80. Ibid., 91–2.
81. CB to Ann Nussey, 14 Oct 1848: MS BS 65.5 p.2, BPM [LCB, ii, 127]; CB to EN, 9 Oct 1848: MS Ashley 2452 p.2, BL [LCB, ii, 125].
82. Leyland, ii, 278; Cautley, ‘Old Haworth Folk who Knew the Brontës’, 78 quoting Tabitha Ratcliffe; CB to EN, 9Oct 1848: MS Ashley 2452 p.1, BL [LCB, ii, 125].
83. CB to WSW, 6 Oct 1848: MS Bon 204 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, ii, 124]; Leyland, ii, 278–9.
84. CB to WSW, 6Oct 1848: MS Bon 204 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, ii, 124]; CB to EN, 9Oct 1848: MS Ashley 2452 p.2, BL [LCB, ii, 125]; Leyland, ii, 279–80. Gaskell, Life, 289, 525, 539 says that Branwell had resolved in his last illness to die standing on his feet, declaring that so long as there was life there was strength of will to do as he chose: in his death throes he insisted on getting to his feet and died standing up, his pockets full of Mrs Robinson’s letters. Both Gaskell and Leyland, whose account I have preferred, quoted ‘one who attended Branwell in his last illness’, the likely informant in both cases being either John Brown or his daugh-ter, Martha, the Parsonage servant. I suspect, however, that Gaskell got her account second-hand, from Ellen, who quotes Branwell as saying ‘You have only to will a thing to get it’ in 1839: EN, Reminiscences: MS p.27, KSC. It is inherently unlikely that Branwell made such a claim on his deathbed and it seems probable that the descriptions of his final hours were simply embroidered for and by village gossip. Martha Brown herself flatly denied that Branwell had died with Mrs Robinson’s letters in his pockets, though unwittingly lending credence to the story by claiming they ‘were mostly from a gentleman of Branwell’s acquaintance, then living near the place of his former employment’: Leyland, ii, 284. Clearly Martha did not realize the role played by Dr Cosby in Branwell’s affair with Mrs Robinson. Though Branwell was 31 at his death, his funeral card and the newspapers all wrongly stated his age as 30: PBB, funeral card, 24 Sept 1848: MS BS X, F, BPM; BO, 28 Sept 1848 p.5; LM, 30 Sept 1848 p.8; LI, 30 Sept 1848 p.5 where a printing error reduced Branwell’s age to 20.
85. CB to WSW, 2 Oct 1848: MS MA 2696 R-V p.3, PM [LCB, ii, 122]. This is Charlotte’s claim: she evidently did not remember being at her mother’s deathbed.
86. CB to WSW, 6 Oct 1848: MS Bon 204 pp.3–4, BPM [LCB, ii, 124].
87. CB to WSW, 2Oct 1848: MS MA 2696 R-V pp.1–3, PM [LCB, ii, 122].
88. Ibid., p.3 [LCB, ii, 122].
89. CB to EN, 9Oct 1848: MS Ashley 2452 p.3, BL [LCB, ii, 126]; CB to WSW, 2Oct 1848: MS MA 2696 R-V p.3, PM [LCB, ii, 122].
90. AB to WSW, 29 Sept 1848: MS Ashley 155, BL [LCB, ii, 121].
91. Burials, Haworth (28 Sept 1848).
92. PBB, Death Certificate, 24 Sept 1848: MS BS x, D, BPM. ‘Marasmus’ meant literally ‘physically wasting away’. Charlotte herself told a friend that Branwell had been ‘long in weak health – and latterly consumptive – though we were far from apprehending immediate danger’: CB to Laetitia Wheelwright, 15 Mar 1849: MS pp.1–2, in private hands [LCB, ii, 190]. I am grateful to Roger Barrett for a photocopy of this letter and permission to quote from it. Ironically, given the volume and frequently lyrical quality of Branwell’s poetry over the year, his last effort appears to have been a vituperative and obscene attack on Wheelhouse, whose attentions he had not appreciated: PBB, ‘While holy Wheelhouse far above’ and ‘Say Dr Wheelhouse is a jewel’ [LFN], [1848]: MSS pp.3–6, Brotherton [VN PBB, 298–9].
93. Grundy, 92.
CHAPTER TWENTY: STRIPPED AND BEREAVED
Title: CB to WSW, 13 June 1849: MS Ashley 172 p.3, BL [LCB, ii, 220].
1. CB to WSW, 2Oct 1848: MS MA 2696 R-V p.1, PM [LCB, ii, 122]. The phrase is a quote from Genesis ch.23 v.4.
2. CB to WSW, 25 June 1849: MS BS 70 p.3, BPM [LCB, ii, 224].
3. CB to WSW, [?18 Oct 1848]: MS n.l. [LCB, ii, 128]. Charlotte actually wrote ‘less formidable’ rather than ‘more formidable’, an indication of her mental agitation at this time.
4. CB to EN, 29 Oct 1848: MS Gr. E15 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, ii, 130–1].
5. CB to WSW, 2Nov 1848: MS BS 66 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 132]; CB to GS, 7 Nov 1848: MS SG 18 p.2, BPM [LCB, ii, 138]; CB to WSW, 25 June 1849: MS BS 70 p.7, BPM [LCB, ii, 225].
6. CB to WSW, 2Nov 1848: MS BS 66 p.3, BPM [LCB, ii, 133].
7. Ibid., pp.2–3[LCB, ii, 132].
8. CB to WSW, 22 Nov 1848: MS Ashley 2452 pp.1–2, BL [LCB, ii, 142].
9. CB to EN, 23 Nov 1848: MS Gr. E16 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, ii, 145].
10. Ibid., p.2[LCB, ii, 145].
11. CB to EN, [?27 Nov 1848]: MS p.1, Princeton [LCB, ii, 146]; CB to WSW, 7Dec 1848: MS Gr. F6 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 147]; CB to WSW, 9Dec 1848, with accompanying statement of Emily’s symptoms: MS Gr. F5, BPM [LCB, ii, 150]; CB to EN, 10 Dec 1848: MS p.1, Harvard [LCB, ii, 152]; CB to EN, [19 Dec 1848]: MS in Pennsylvania [LCB, ii, 154].
12. CB to WSW, 7Dec 1848: MS Gr. F6 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, ii, 147].
13. CB to EN, 28 July 1848: MS Gr. E14 pp.3–4, BPM [LCB, ii, 92].
14. Ibid., p.4 [LCB, ii, 92]; CB to EN, 18 Aug 1848: MS Gr. E13 pp.3–4, BPM [LCB, ii, 104].
15. CB to EN, 23 Nov 1848: MS Gr. E16 p.3, BPM [LCB, ii, 145].
16. Ibid., pp.2–3[LCB, ii, 145]. [LCB, ii, 145]; Henry Clapham/Mary Robinson, draft Marriage Settlement, 18 Oct 1848: MS 23, Robinson Papers, BPM; CB to EN, 10 Dec 1848: MS p.3, Harvard [LCB, ii, 153].
17. CB to EN, 23 Nov 1848: MS Gr. E16 p.3, BPM [LCB, ii, 145].
18. CB to EN, 10 Dec 1848: MS p.3, Harvard [LCB, ii, 152–3].
19. Unsigned review, Sharpe’s London Magaz
ine, Aug 1848 pp.181–4[Allott, 263, 265].
20. Unsigned review, Rambler, Sept 1848 pp.65–6[Allott, 267].
21. E.P. Whipple, North American Review, Oct 1848 pp.354–69 [Allott, 248]; CB to WSW, 22 Nov 1848: MS Ashley 2452 pp.2–3, BL [LCB, ii, 142].
22. CB to EN, 10 Dec 1848: MS pp.1–2, Harvard [LCB, ii, 152]. Patrick’s own copy of Graham, Modern Domestic Medicine: HAOBP:bb210 p.239, BPM pointed out that diarrhoea occurs in the third and last stage of consumption and, as with Emily, ‘Till this period, and occasionally, indeed, through it, the patient supports his spirits, and flatters himself with ultimate success.’
23. CB, Biographical Notice, 363.
24. Robinson, Emily Brontë, 228, which gives no source for the dog-feeding incident and is uncorroborated; ECG, Life, 292.
25. Cautley, ‘Old Haworth Folk who Knew the Brontës’ 78, quoting Tabitha Ratcliffe. The alleged comb, acquired from the Brown family via the Dixon sale, is HAOBP:H121, BPM.
26. ECG to [?John Forster], [Sept 1853]: MS pp.12–13, Brotherton [C&P, 246]; CB to EN, [19 Dec 1848]: MS in Pennsylvania [LCB, ii, 154].
27. ECG, Life, 293. Wheelhouse’s presence is assumed from the fact that he signed the death certificate as being ‘in attendance’: EJB, Death Certificate, 19 Dec 1848: MS BS X, D, BPM. An ulcerated throat and mouth, inflicting hoarseness of the voice, were a recognized symptom of the final stages of consumption, according to Patrick’s copy of Graham, Modern Domestic Medicine: HAOBP:bb210 p.239, BPM (see above, n.22).
28. CB to WSW, 25 June 1849: MS BS 70 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 224]; CB to WSW, 13 June 1849: MS Ashley 172 pp.3–4, BL [LCB, ii, 220]. See also CB to EN, 23 Dec 1848: MS p.1, Berg [LCB, ii, 156]. The first person to suggest that Emily died on the sofa was Robinson, Emily Brontë, 230, claiming ‘she tried to rise, leaning with one hand upon the sofa. And thus the chord of life snapped.’ This sounds suspiciously like the Haworth stories of Branwell’s death (see above, p.1092 n.84) and Robinson gives no source for her information; Charlotte’s eye-witness references to Emily’s dying-bed and dying in the arms of those who loved her are more credible. In any case, the sofa in the parsonage dining-room (HAOBP: F5, BPM), made by William Wood of Haworth, probably post-dates Emily’s death: see JB ST no.8.