Brontës

by Juliet Barker

  122. CB to EN, 8Dec 1851: MS BS 84 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, ii, 726].

  123. CB to EN, [?16] Dec 1851: MS HM 24486 p.2, Huntington [LCB, ii, 730].

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: VILLETTE

  1. CB to EN, 31 Dec 1851: MS HM 24487 p.1, Huntington [LCB, ii, 734]. Charlotte later said Ellen could only be spared from home for a few days but mistakenly described the visit as taking place in early January: CB to Laetitia Wheelwright, 12 Apr 1852: MS p.1, Princeton [LCB, iii, 39].

  2. CB to MW, 20 Jan [1852]: MS FM 12 p.2, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 10]. As she often did at the start of a new year, Charlotte wrongly wrote the date as 1851. William Ruddock (1814–60), had studied in Leeds and London and in 1837 became a Licentiate of the Society of Apothecaries, ‘the basic legal qualification for a GP’; despite nearly killing his most famous patient he became a member of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1857. He lived in Keighley and is buried in the churchyard there: Ruddock Mackay, ‘Dr William Ruddock (1814–1860): A Brief Memoir’, BST:27:1:76–8.

  3. CB to EN, [?14 Jan 1852]: MS Bon 240 p.1, BPM [LCB, iii, 6]; CB to EN, 16 Jan 1852: MS HM 24488 pp.2–3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 7].

  4. CB to Laetitia Wheelwright, 12 Apr 1852: MS p.2, Princeton [LCB, iii, 39].

  5. W.E. Forster to Richard Monckton Milnes, [Jan 1852] [James Pope-Hennessy, Monckton Milnes: The Flight of Youth, 1851–1885 (London, 1951), 65–6].

  6. PB to Richard Monckton Milnes, 16 Jan 1852: MS pp.1–2, TCC [LRPB, 210–11].

  7. CB to EN, 16 Jan 1852: MS HM 24488 p.1, Huntington [LCB, iii, 7].

  8. CB to EN, 24 Jan 1852: MS HM 24489 pp.1–2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 12]. According to this letter, Charlotte was due to arrive at Brookroyd on 27 January.

  9. CB to ECG, 6Feb 1852: MS EL fB91 p.1, Rylands [LCB, iii, 39]. The quotation, which Charlotte often used in her letters and novels, is from Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane: Mark ch.26 v.27.

  10. CB to MW, 17 Feb 1852: MS FM 13 p.3, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 22]. According to this letter, Charlotte also met Margaret Wooler’s brother William and his family, though when and where is unclear.

  11. CB to GS, 29 Jan 1852: MS SG 66 p.1, BPM [LCB, iii, 12–13].

  12. CB to GS, 1 Jan 1852: MS SG 65 pp.1–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 3]; CB to GS, 31 Dec 1851: MS SG 64 pp.1–4, BPM [LCB, ii, 732–3].

  13. CB to HM, 10 Dec 1851: MS SG 62 pp.1–3, BPM [LCB, ii, 728–9]; CB to GS, 19 Dec 1851: MS SG 65 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, ii, 731–2]; CB to EN, [5 Mar 1852]: MS HM 24492 p.3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 25]; HM, Autobiography, 382. In Charlotte’s defence, Martineau may have misrepresented her enthusiasm for ‘Oliver Weld’. ‘There is a peculiar property in her’, Charlotte observed, ‘which must sooner or later be recognized as a great inconvenience by such of her acquaintance as admire her intellectual powers and her many excellent personal qualities without being able to agree in her views; she is prone to mistake liking for agreement, and with the same sanguine eagerness of her character thinks to sweep you along with her in her whirlwind course. This will not do.’: CB to GS, 31 Dec 1851: MS SG 64 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, ii, 732].

  14. CB to GS, 29 Jan 1852: MS SG 66 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 12–13]; CB to Mrs Smith, 29 Jan 1852: MS SG 12b pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 13].

  15. CB to GS, 14 Feb 1852: MS SG 68 pp.1–4, BPM [LCB, iii, 17–18].

  16. CB to GS, 19 Dec 1851: MS SG 63 p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 731]; CB to EN, 23 Mar 1852: MS HM 24494 pp.3–4, Huntington [LCB, iii, 31–2].

  17. CB to EN, 16 Feb 1852: MS HM 24490 pp.2–3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 19]; CB to EN, [5Mar 1852]: MS HM 24492 p.3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 25].

  18. CB to EN, 7 [?Apr] 1852: MS HM 24493 p.3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 38]. See also CB to EN, [?24 Feb 1852]: MS p.1, Princeton [LCB, iii, 24].

  19. CB to MW, 12 Mar 1853: MS FM 14 pp.1–2, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 28–9].

  20. CB, Villette, Clarendon Edn, xx, xxxi.

  21. CB, Villette, 193. For Charlotte’s personal experience see above, pp.498.

  22. CB to ECG, 22 May 1852: MS EL fB91 pp.2–3, Rylands [LCB, iii, 48]; CB to Mrs Gore, 28 May 1852: MS Bon 244 p.1, BPM [LCB, iii, 49].

  23. CB to EN, 1July 1852: MS 1532 p.2, Guildhall [LCB, iii, 39]. Charlotte later found out that Smith’s silence was due to extraordinary pressure of work: CB to GS, 19 Aug 1852: MS SG 73 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 62]. The dates of Ellen’s trip to Sussex are hazy but she was with her brother in London by the beginning of June and Charlotte expected her home at the beginning of October: CB to EN, 6 June 1852: MS HM 24496 pp.3–4, Huntington [LCB, iii, 52]; CB to EN, 5Oct 1852: MS p.1, Berg [LCB, iii, 69]. For Taylor’s failure to write see CB to EN, 7[?Apr] 1852: MS HM 24493 p.3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 38]; CB to EN, 4[May] 1852: MS HM 24491 pp.3–4, Huntington [LCB, iii, 44].

  24. LI, 17 Apr 1852 p.7. Cartman had substituted for Nicholls while the latter was away in Ireland: CB to PB, 7June 1851: MS MA 2696 R-V p.1, BPM [LCB, ii, 630].

  25. MT to CB, postmarked Keighley 27 Oct 1852: MS p.2, Berg [LCB, iii, 36]

  26. CB to EN, 4[May] 1852: MS HM 24491 pp.1–2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 43]. Charlotte dated this letter ‘March 4th /52’ but this was clearly a mistake for May when news of Ellen Taylor’s death reached England: the error is an indication of Charlotte’s distressed state.

  27. CB to MW, 12 Mar 1852: MS FM 14 p.3, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 29]; CB to EN, 7[?Apr] 1852: MS HM 24493 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 38].

  28. CB to EN, 6June 1852: MS HM 24496 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 51]. Charlotte stayed at Cliff House, Filey for about a month, c.27 May–24 June: LCB, iii, 47 n.2]. Her letter to Mrs Gore (see above, n.22), is dated from Filey on 28 May.

  29. CB to PB, 2 June 1852: MS MA 2696 R-V pp.2–4, PM [LCB, iii, 49–50].

  30. Ibid., p.4, PM [LCB, iii, 49–50]; HG, 29 May 1853 p.5.

  31. CB to MW, 23 June 1852: MS FM 15 p.2, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 55].

  32. CB to EN, 1July 1852: MS 1532 p.2, Guildhall [LCB, iii, 57].

  33. CB to MW, 23 June 1852: MS FM 15 pp.2–3, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 55]; CB to EN, 6June 1852: MS HM 24496 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 51]. Charlotte says ‘Filey Bridge’ but she clearly meant the local landmark, a rocky promontory known as the Brigg.

  34. Ibid., p.1[LCB, iii, 51]; CB to MW, 23 June 1852: MS FM 15 p.3, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 56].

  35. Ibid.; CB to EN, 1July 1852: MS 1532 p.3, Guildhall [LCB, iii, 57].

  36. CB to PB, 2June 1852: MS MA 2696 R-V p.5, PM [LCB, iii, 50]; PB, Account Book, [c.1845–61]: MS BS 173 p.13, BPM.

  37. CB to EN, 1 July 1852: MS 1532 p.3, Guildhall [LCB, iii, 57]. Martineau was a student of phrenology, hence her reference to Taylor’s ‘organ of combativeness and contradiction’.

  38. The suggestion that ‘Tim’ might derive from ‘Timon’ comes from CB, Villette, 292, 591 where, more appropriately, Ginevra Fanshawe refers to Lucy Snowe as ‘Timon’ and ‘Tim’. I am grateful to Allegra Huston for suggesting a reason why the name might have been appropriate to the baby.

  39. CB to EN, 11 May 1852: MS HM 24495 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 45]; CB to EN, 23 Mar 1852: MS HM 24494 p.3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 31]. See also CB to MW, 21 Oct 1851: MS FM 11 p.4, Fitzwilliam [LCB, ii, 705].

  40. CB to EN, 22 Apr 1852: MS in Beinecke [LCB, iii, 41].

  41. CB, Villette, 595–6; CB to EN, [5 Mar 1852]: MS HM 24492 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 24]. The youthful sufferer in Villette survived 5’brushes with death’; Emily Martha Taylor died just before her 7th birthday in August 1858, 9 months after her father and only 2 years before her mother: Stevens, 117 n.1.

  42. CB to EN, 26 July 1852: MS pp.1–3, Haverford [LCB, iii, 58]; CB to EN, 3 Aug 1852: MS HM 20069 pp.1–2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 60]; CB to EN, 12 Aug 1852: MS pp.1–2, Brotherton [LCB, iii, 60–1].

  43. Richard Butterfield, the Merralls, Joseph Greenwood, Mrs Ferrand et al., Petition to the General Board of Health, 10 Dec 1851: MS n.l. [L&D, 436–7]. William Ranger came to Haworth on 30 July 1852 in response to this petition: ibid., 437.

  44. CB to EN, 25 Aug 1852: MS HM 24498 p.1, Huntington [LCB
, iii, 63]; CB to MW, 2Sept 1851: MS FM 16 pp.1–2, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 64–5]. According to the church registers, Nicholls took all the parish duties throughout August and most of September.

  45. CB to GS, 19 Aug 1852: MS SG 73 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 561–2].

  46. CB to EN, 25 Aug 1852: MS HM 24498 pp.3–4, Huntington [LCB, iii, 63]. The word ‘burden’ replaces a deleted word which I am unable to decipher.

  47. CB to EN, [?24 Sept 1852]: MS HM 24499 pp.2–3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 67–8]. Charlotte simply thanked Ellen for sending the Times report of Wellington’s death on 14 September 1852 and comments, ‘what it said on the mighty and mournful subject was well said – All at once the whole Nation seems now to take a just view of that great character.’

  48. CB to MW, 2Sept 1851: MS FM 16 pp.1–2, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 65].

  49. CB to EN, 5Oct 1852: MS pp.1–2, Berg [LCB, iii, 69].

  50. See, for example, CB to EN, 12 Aug 1852: MS pp.3–4, Brotherton [LCB, iii, 61]; CB to EN, 25 Aug 1852: MS HM 24498 pp.2–3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 63].

  51. CB to EN, 9Oct 1852: MS MA 4500, PM [LCB, iii, 69–70].

  52. CB to MW, 21 Oct 1852: MS FM 17 pp.3–4, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 57]. Charlotte changed the date of this letter from September to October.

  53. CB to EN, [?26 Oct 1852]: MS n.l. [LCB, iii, 73]; CB to WSW, 26 Oct 1852: MS Eng lett e 30 p.187, Bodleian [LCB, iii, 72].

  54. CB to EN, 1July 1852: MS 1532 pp.2–3, Guildhall [LCB, iii, 57]; CB to WSW, 3Apr 1852: MS HM 24401, Huntington [LCB, iii, 34–5]; CB to WSW, 28 July 1852: MS in Buffalo [LCB, iii, 59].

  55. CB to GS, 30 Oct 1852: MS SG 74 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 74].

  56. CB to EN, 16 Nov 1849: MS p.2, Harvard [LCB, ii, 285].

  57. CB, Villette, 368–70.

  58. CB to GS, 30 Oct 1852: MS SG 74 pp.1, 4, BPM [LCB, iii, 74–5].

  59. CB to GS, 3Nov, 1852: MS SG 75 pp.1–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 77–8].

  60. CB to WSW, 6 Nov 1852: MS Gr. F11 pp.1–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 80].

  61. Ibid. p.2[LCB, iii, 80].

  62. CB, Villette, Clarendon Edn, xxxiv.

  63. CB to GS, 3Nov, 1852: MS SG 75 p.2, BPM [LCB, iii, 77]; CB to GS, 10 Nov 1852: MS SG 76 p.1, BPM [LCB, iii, 81]. The single-volume edition of Shirley was published in November 1852, though it bears an 1853 imprint on its title page: see Athenaeum, 20 Nov 1852 p.1259 for an advertisement describing it as ‘Now ready’. The announcement of ‘A NEW NOVEL BY CURRER BELL’ appeared opposite the title page in just the large letters Charlotte had feared. I am grateful to Margaret Smith for this information.

  64. CB to GS, 10 Nov 1852: MS SG 76 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 81]. Charlotte had said the third volume would be ready in the course of 2or 3weeks in CB to WSW, 26 Oct 1852: MS Eng lett e 30 p.187, Bodleian [LCB, iii, 72].

  65. CB to GS, 20 Nov 1852: MS SG 13b pp.1–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 83–4].

  66. CB to EN, 22 Nov 1852: MS pp.1–2, Harvard [LCB, iii, 85].

  67. CB to Mrs Smith, 25 Nov 1852: MS SG 15b p.2, BPM [LCB, iii, 86–7].

  68. CB to GS, 1 Dec 1852: MS SG 77 p.1, BPM [LCB, iii, 87].

  69. CB to GS, 6 Dec 1852: MS SG 78 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 88].

  70. Ibid., pp.2–3 [LCB, iii, 88].

  71. CB to EN, [?9 Dec 1852]: MS Montague [LCB, iii, 91]. The ‘female character’ referred to is almost certainly Paulina who had been the subject of Charlotte’s previous letter to Smith: CB to GS, 6Dec 1852: MS SG 78 p.3, BPM [LCB, iii, 88].

  72. Ibid., p.3[LCB, iii, 88]; CB to EN, [?9Dec 1852]: MS Montague [LCB, iii, 91].

  73. CB to GS, 6Dec 1852: MS SG 78 pp.3–4, BPM [LCB, iii, 88]. For Miss Wooler’s visit see CB to MW, 7 Dec [1852]: MS FM 18 pp.1, 2, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 90]. For Charlotte’s return see CB to EN, [?9Dec 1852]: MS Montague [LCB, iii, 91].

  74. CB to MW, 27 Jan 1853: MS FM 19 pp.3–5, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 111].

  75. HM to ECG, no details given [L&L, iv, 39 n.1].

  76. CB to Mrs Smith, 10 Dec 1852: MS Bon 246 p.1, BPM [LCB, iii, 92].

  77. CB to EN, 15 Dec 1852: MS pp.1–4, Berg [LCB, iii, 92–3]. It was not true that Patrick was opposed even to the idea of Charlotte marrying: he had supported James Taylor’s proposal.

  78. CB to EN, [?28 July 1851]: MS p.2, TCC [LCB, ii, 671].

  79. CB to PB, 2 June 1852: MS MA 2696 R-V p.3, PM [LCB, iii, 50]; CB to EN, 10 July 1846: MS Gr. E10 p.3, BPM [LCB, i, 483], where she also counters rumours of her engagement to Nicholls.

  80. Cautley, ‘Old Haworth Folk who Knew the Brontës’, 79; Whiteley Turner, A Spring-Time Saunter Round and About Brontëland (Halifax, 1913), 212 quoting Mrs Widdop jnr. The dog, which features in many of the stories about Nicholls, actually belonged to Patrick who purchased it from Mr Summerscale, master of the National School, in the summer of 1855: PB, Account Book, [c.1845–61]: MS BS 173 p.1, BPM.

  81. CB to EN, 18 Dec 1852: MS pp.3, 1–2, Berg [LCB, iii, 94–5].

  82. Ibid., p.2[LCB, iii, 94–5]; CB to EN, 2Jan 1853: MS p.3, Law, photograph in MCP [LCB, iii, 101].

  83. Ibid., p.2[LCB, iii, 101].

  84. CB to Mrs Smith, 30 Dec 1852: MS SG 16b pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 96].

  85. CB to EN, [?9Dec 1852]: MS Montague [LCB, iii, 91].

  86. CB to EN, 11 Jan 1853: MS HM 26001 pp.1–3, Huntington [LCB, iii, 102–3]. In Smith, A Memoir, 15 he describes the punishing routine he followed at this time, dictating to 2clerks while 2others were occupied in copying. ‘It was a common thing for me and many of the clerks to work until three or four o’clock in the morning, and occasionally, where there was but a short interval between the arrival and departure of the Indian mails, I used to start work at nine o’clock of one morning, and neither leave my room nor cease dictating until seven o’clock the next evening, when the mail was despatched.’

  87. CB to GS, 26 Mar 1853: MS SG 81 p.2, BPM [LCB, iii, 142].

  88. CB to EN, 11 Jan 1853: MS HM 26001 pp.3–4, Huntington [LCB, iii, 103].

  89. CB to EN, 19 Jan 1853: MS HM 26002 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 108]; Smith, A Memoir, 91.

  90. CB to GS, 30 Oct 1852: MS SG 74 p.3, BPM [LCB, iii, 75]. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852) was thinly disguised propaganda for the abolitionist cause in America.

  91. CB to ECG, 12 Jan 1853: MS EL fB91 p.3, Rylands [LCB, iii, 104].

  92. Ibid., p.3[LCB, iii, 104].

  93. CB to EN, 28 Jan [1853]: MS p.2, Law, photograph in MCP [LCB, iii, 113], mentioning Ellen’s copy; CB to EN, 19 Jan 1853: MS HM 26002 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 108]; Miss Wooler’s inscribed copy is in Louis Clarke Case 4g, Fitzwilliam, and a sale notice of Dr Forbes’ copy is to be found inside it.

  94. CB to ECG, 24 Feb 1853: MS EL fB91 p.3, Rylands [LCB, iii, 127].

  95. CB to EN, 28 Jan [1853]: MS p.3, Law, photograph in MCP [LCB, iii, 113]; Smith, A Memoir, 95 acknowledges the mutual unease created by Villette.

  96. PB to CB, Jan 1853: MS BS 196 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 105–6]. Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741–1801), a Swiss pastor, founded physiognomics, the science of judging a person’s character by their face. The ‘Australian Diggins’ is a reference to the recent Antipodean Gold Rush: Nicholls was planning to emigrate as a missionary there: see below p.845.

  97. [PB] ‘Old Flossy’ to CB, Jan 1853: MS BS 193 pp.1–2, BPM [LCB, iii, 107].

  98. ABN to the Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 28 Jan 1853, with accompanying questionnaire: MSS in the archives, USPG.

  99. Revd Sutcliffe Sowden to the Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 31 Jan 1853: MS pp.2, 4, USPG. Sowden had also been Branwell’s friend: see above, pp.434.

  100. Revd Joseph B. Grant, to Revd W.J. Bullock, Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 1 Feb 1853: MS p.1, USPG.

  101. Revd William Cartman to the Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 31 Jan 1853: MS pp.1–2, 4, USPG.

  102. PB to Revd W.J. Bullock, Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 31 Jan 1853: MS pp.1–2, USPG [LRPB, 215].

&nb
sp; 103. ABN to the Secretary of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, 28 Jan 1853: MS p.1, USPG.

  104. CB to EN, 28 Jan 1853: MS p.3, Law, photograph in MCP [LCB, iii, 113].

  105. EB to EN, [22 Nov 1852]: MS p.1, Harvard [LCB, iii, 85].

  106. Unsigned review [Albany Fonblanque or John Forster], Examiner, 5 Feb 1853 pp.84–5[Allott, 175]; unsigned review, Literary Gazette, 5Feb 1853 pp.123–5[Allott, 178].

  107. See, for example, unsigned review, Athenaeum, 12 Feb 1853 pp.186–7 [Allott, 188]; unsigned review, Critic, 15 Feb 1853 pp.94–5[Allott, 192]. Even Harriet Martineau thought Paulina and her father the best drawn characters in the book: HM, Daily News, 3 Feb 1853 p.2[Allott, 174].

  108. Unsigned review, Spectator, 12 Feb 1853 pp.155–6 [Allott, 182].

  109. Unsigned review, Guardian, 23 Feb 1853 pp.128–9 [Allott, 193]; CB to WSW, 9Mar 1853: MS HM 26009 p.2, Huntington [LCB, iii, 132].

  110. HM, Daily News, 3Feb 1853 p.2[Allott, 172–4]. HM, Autobiography, 382 recounts how the 2women had disagreed about Catholicism when it appeared as an issue in Martineau’s abandoned novel ‘Oliver Weld’. Martineau had claimed credit for Catholics as far as their good works extended, to which Charlotte replied ‘Their good deeds I don’t dispute; but I regard them as the hectic bloom on the cheek of disease. I believe the Catholics, in short, to be always doing evil that good may come, or doing good that evil may come’.

  111. ABN copy of HM to CB, [Feb 1853]: MS HM 93 p.5, Birmingham [LCB, iii, 117]. This is Nicholls’ transcript from Martineau’s original letter, not the bowdlerized version she gave Gaskell from memory for inclusion in later editions of her biography: ECG, Life, Haworth Edn., 595–8.

  112. CB to HM, [Feb 1853]: MS n.l. [LCB, iii, 118]. Charlotte added the postscript, ‘To differ from you gives me keen pain.’

  113. W.M. Thackeray to Lucy Baxter, 11 Mar 1853 [Allott, 97–8].

  114. CB to G.H. Lewes, [Jan 1850]: MS Add 39763(7), BL [LCB, iii 330]: see above, p.725.

  115. CB to GS, 26 Mar 1853: MS SG 81 pp.2–3, BPM [LCB, iii, 142].

  116. CB to MW, 13 Apr 1853: MS FM 21 pp.3–4, Fitzwilliam [LCB, iii, 154].