Delphi Complete Works of the Brontes Charlotte, Emily, Anne Brontë (Illustrated) (583 page)

‘In spirit she is resigned; at heart she is, I believe, a true Christian.  She looks beyond this life, and regards her home and rest as elsewhere than on earth.  May God support her and all of us through the trial of lingering sickness, and aid her in the last hour when the struggle which separates soul from body must be gone through!

‘We saw Emily torn from the midst of us when our hearts clung to her with intense attachment, and when, loving each other as we did — well, it seemed as if (might we but have been spared to each other) we could have found complete happiness in our mutual society and affection.  She was scarcely buried when Anne’s health failed, and we were warned that consumption had found another victim in her, and that it would be vain to reckon on her life.

‘These things would be too much if Reason, unsupported by Religion, were condemned to bear them alone.  I have cause to be most thankful for the strength which has hitherto been vouchsafed both to my father and myself.  God, I think, is specially merciful to old age; and for my own part, trials which in prospective would have seemed to me quite intolerable, when they actually came, I endured without prostration.  Yet, I must confess, that in the time which has elapsed since Emily’s death, there have been moments of solitary, deep, inert affliction, far harder to bear than those which immediately followed our loss.  The crisis of bereavement has an acute pang which goads to exertion, the desolate after-feeling sometimes paralyses.

 
‘I have learned that we are not to find solace in our own strength: we must seek it in God’s omnipotence.  Fortitude is good, but fortitude itself must be shaken under us to teach us how weak we are.

‘With best wishes to yourself and all dear to you, and sincere thanks for the interest you so kindly continue to take in me and my sister, — Believe me, my dear Miss Wooler, yours faithfully,

‘C. Brontë.’

TO W. S. WILLIAMS

‘
April
16
th
, 1849.

‘My dear Sir, — Your kind advice on the subject of Homœopathy deserves and has our best thanks.  We find ourselves, however, urged from more than one quarter to try different systems and medicines, and I fear we have already given offence by not listening to all.  The fact is, were we in every instance compliant, my dear sister would be harassed by continual changes.  Cod-liver oil and carbonate of iron were first strongly recommended.  Anne took them as long as she could, but at last she was obliged to give them up: the oil yielded her no nutriment, it did not arrest the progress of emaciation, and as it kept her always sick, she was prevented from taking food of any sort.  Hydropathy was then strongly advised.  She is now trying Gobold’s Vegetable Balsam; she thinks it does her some good; and as it is the first medicine which has had that effect, she would wish to persevere with it for a time.  She is also looking hopefully forward to deriving benefit from change of air.  We have obtained Mr. Teale’s permission to go to the seaside in the course of six or eight weeks.  At first I felt torn between two duties — that of staying with papa and going with Anne; but as it is papa’s own most kindly expressed wish that I should adopt the latter plan, and as, besides, he is now, thank God! in tolerable health, I hope to be spared the pain of resigning the care of my sister to other hands, however friendly.  We wish to keep together as long as we can.  I hope, too, to derive from the change some renewal of physical strength and mental composure (in neither of which points am I what I ought or wish to be) to make me a better and more cheery nurse.

 
‘I fear I must have seemed to you hard in my observations about
The Emigrant Family
.  The fact was, I compared Alexander Harris with himself only.  It is not equal to the
Testimony to the Truth
, but, tried by the standard of other and very popular books too, it is very clever and original.  Both subject and the manner of treating it are unhackneyed: he gives new views of new scenes and furnishes interesting information on interesting topics.  Considering the increasing necessity for and tendency to emigration, I should think it has a fair chance of securing the success it merits.

‘I took up Leigh Hunt’s book
The Town
with the impression that it would be interesting only to Londoners, and I was surprised, ere I had read many pages, to find myself enchained by his pleasant, graceful, easy style, varied knowledge, just views, and kindly spirit.  There is something peculiarly anti-melancholic in Leigh Hunt’s writings, and yet they are never boisterous.  They resemble sunshine, being at once bright and tranquil.

‘I like Carlyle better and better.  His style I do not like, nor do I always concur in his opinions, nor quite fall in with his hero worship; but there is a manly love of truth, an honest recognition and fearless vindication of intrinsic greatness, of intellectual and moral worth, considered apart from birth, rank, or wealth, which commands my sincere admiration.  Carlyle would never do for a contributor to the
Quarterly
.  I have not read his
French Revolution
.

‘I congratulate you on the approaching publication of Mr. Ruskin’s new work.  If the
Seven Lamps of Architecture
resemble their predecessor,
Modern Painters
, they will be no lamps at all, but a new constellation — seven bright stars, for whose rising the reading world ought to be anxiously agaze.

‘Do not ask me to mention what books I should like to read.  Half the pleasure of receiving a parcel from Cornhill consists in having its contents chosen for us.  We like to discover, too, by the leaves cut here and there, that the ground has been travelled before us.  I may however say, with reference to works of fiction, that I should much like to see one of Godwin’s
 
works, never having hitherto had that pleasure —
Caleb Williams
or
Fleetwood
, or which you thought best worth reading.

‘But it is yet much too soon to talk of sending more books; our present stock is scarcely half exhausted.  You will perhaps think I am a slow reader, but remember, Currer Bell is a country housewife, and has sundry little matters connected with the needle and kitchen to attend to which take up half his day, especially now when, alas! there is but one pair of hands where once there were three.  I did not mean to touch that chord, its sound is too sad.

‘I try to write now and then.  The effort was a hard one at first.  It renewed the terrible loss of last December strangely.  Worse than useless did it seem to attempt to write what there no longer lived an “Ellis Bell” to read; the whole book, with every hope founded on it, faded to vanity and vexation of spirit.

‘One inducement to persevere and do my best I still have, however, and I am thankful for it: I should like to please my kind friends at Cornhill.  To that end I wish my powers would come back; and if it would please Providence to restore my remaining sister, I think they would.

‘Do not forget to tell me how you are when you write again.  I trust your indisposition is quite gone by this time. — Believe me, yours sincerely,

‘C. Brontë.’

TO MISS ELLEN NUSSEY

‘
May
1
st
, 1849.

‘Dear Ellen, — I returned Mary Taylor’s letter to Hunsworth as soon as I had read it.  Thank God she was safe up to that time, but I do not think the earthquake was then over.  I shall long to hear tidings of her again.

‘Anne was worse during the warm weather we had about a week ago.  She grew weaker, and both the pain in her side and her cough were worse; strange to say, since it is colder, she has appeared rather to revive than sink.  I still hope that if she gets over May she may last a long time.

 
‘We have engaged lodgings at Scarbro’.  We stipulated for a good-sized sitting-room and an airy double-bedded lodging room, with a sea view, and if not deceived, have obtained these desiderata at No. 2 Cliff.  Anne says it is one of the best situations in the place.  It would not have done to have taken lodgings either in the town or on the bleak steep coast, where Miss Wooler’s house is situated.  If Anne is to get any good she must have every advantage.  Miss Outhwaite [her godmother] left her in her will a legacy of £200, and she cannot employ her money better than in obtaining what may prolong existence, if it does not restore health.  We hope to leave home on the 23rd, and I think it will be advisable to rest at York, and stay all night there.  I hope this arrangement will suit you.  We reckon on your society, dear Ellen, as a real privilege and pleasure.  We shall take little luggage, and shall have to buy bonnets and dresses and several other things either at York or Scarbro’; which place do you think would be best?  Oh, if it would please God to strengthen and revive Anne, how happy we might be together!  His will, however, must be done, and if she is not to recover, it remains to pray for strength and patience.

‘C. B.’

TO W. S. WILLIAMS

‘
May
8
th
, 1849.

‘My dear Sir, — I hasten to acknowledge the two kind letters for which I am indebted to you.  That fine spring weather of which you speak did not bring such happiness to us in its sunshine as I trust it did to you and thousands besides — the change proved trying to my sister.  For a week or ten days I did not know what to think, she became so weak, and suffered so much from increased pain in the side, and aggravated cough.  The last few days have been much colder, yet, strange to say, during their continuance she has appeared rather to revive than sink.  She not unfrequently shows the very same symptoms which were apparent in Emily only a few days before she died — fever in the evenings, sleepless nights, and a sort of lethargy in the morning hours; this creates acute
 
anxiety — then comes an improvement, which reassures.  In about three weeks, should the weather be genial and her strength continue at all equal to the journey, we hope to go to Scarboro’.  It is not without misgiving that I contemplate a departure from home under such circumstances; but since she herself earnestly wishes the experiment to be tried, I think it ought not to be neglected.  We are in God’s hands, and must trust the results to Him.  An old school-fellow of mine, a tried and faithful friend, has volunteered to accompany us.  I shall have the satisfaction of leaving papa to the attentions of two servants equally tried and faithful.  One of them is indeed now old and infirm, and unfit to stir much from her chair by the kitchen fireside; but the other is young and active, and even she has lived with us seven years.  I have reason, therefore, you see, to be thankful amidst sorrow, especially as papa still possesses every faculty unimpaired, and though not robust, has good general health — a sort of chronic cough is his sole complaint.

‘I hope Mr. Smith will not risk a cheap edition of
Jane Eyre
yet, he had better wait awhile — the public will be sick of the name of that one book.  I can make no promise as to when another will be ready — neither my time nor my efforts are my own.  That absorption in my employment to which I gave myself up without fear of doing wrong when I wrote
Jane Eyre
, would now be alike impossible and blamable; but I do what I can, and have made some little progress.  We must all be patient.

‘Meantime, I should say, let the public forget at their ease, and let us not be nervous about it.  And as to the critics, if the Bells possess real merit, I do not fear impartial justice being rendered them one day.  I have a very short mental as well as physical sight in some matters, and am far less uneasy at the idea of public impatience, misconstruction, censure, etc., than I am at the thought of the anxiety of those two or three friends in Cornhill to whom I owe much kindness, and whose expectations I would earnestly wish not to disappoint.  If they can make up their minds to wait tranquilly,
 
and put some confidence in my goodwill, if not my power, to get on as well as may be, I shall not repine; but I verily believe that the “nobler sex” find it more difficult to wait, to plod, to work out their destiny inch by inch, than their sisters do.  They are always for walking so fast and taking such long steps, one cannot keep up with them.  One should never tell a gentleman that one has commenced a task till it is nearly achieved.  Currer Bell, even if he had no let or hindrance, and if his path were quite smooth, could never march with the tread of a Scott, a Bulwer, a Thackeray, or a Dickens.  I want you and Mr. Smith clearly to understand this.  I have always wished to guard you against exaggerated anticipations — calculate low when you calculate on me.  An honest man — and woman too — would always rather rise above expectation than fall below it.

‘Have I lectured enough? and am I understood?

‘Give my sympathising respects to Mrs. Williams. I hope her little daughter is by this time restored to perfect health.  It pleased me to see with what satisfaction you speak of your son.  I was glad, too, to hear of the progress and welfare of Miss Kavanagh.  The notices of Mr. Harris’s works are encouraging and just — may they contribute to his success!