Emily Brontë
Anne are pretty well too. Emily is much obliged to you for
the seeds you sent. She wishes to know if the Sicilian pea
and the crimson cornflower are hardy flowers, or if they are
delicate and should be sown in warm and sheltered
situations. Write to me to-morrow and let me know how you
all are, if your mother continues to get better....
"Good morning, dear Nell, I shall say no more to you at
present.
"C. BRONTE."
"Monday morning.
"Our poor little cat has been ill two days and is just dead.
It is piteous to see even an animal lying lifeless. Emily
_is_ sorry."
Side by side with all these lighter cares went on the schemes for the
school. At last the two sisters determined to begin as soon as they saw
a fair chance of getting pupils. They began the search in good earnest;
but fortunately, postponed the necessary alterations in the house until
they had the secure promise of, at any rate, three or four. Then their
demands lessened as day by day that chance became more difficult and
fainter. In early summer Charlotte writes: "As soon as I can get a
chance of only _one_ pupil, I will have cards of terms printed and will
commence the repairs necessary in the house. I wish all to be done
before the winter. I think of fixing the board and English education at
L25 per annum."
Still no pupil was heard of, but the girls went courageously on, writing
to every mother of daughters with whom they could claim acquaintance.
But, alas, it was the case with one, that her children were already at
school in Liverpool, with another that her child had just been promised
to Miss C., with a third that she thought the undertaking praiseworthy,
but Haworth was so very remote a spot. In vain did the girls explain
that from some points of view the retired situation was an advantage;
since, had they set up school in some fashionable place, they would have
had house-rent to pay, and could not possibly have offered an excellent
education for L25 a year. Parents are an expectant people. Still, every
lady promised to recommend the school to mothers less squeamish, or less
engaged; and, knowing how well they would show themselves worthy of the
chance, once they had obtained it, Charlotte and Emily took heart to
hope.
The holidays arrived and still nothing was settled. Anne came home and
helped in the laying of schemes and writing of letters--but, alas,
Branwell also came home, irritable, extravagant, wildly gay, or gloomily
moping. His sisters could no longer blind themselves to the fact that he
drank, drank habitually, to excess. And Anne had fears--vague, terrible,
foreboding--which she could not altogether make plain.
By this time they had raised the charge to L35, considering, perhaps,
that their first offer had been so low as to discredit their attempt.
But still they got no favourable answers. It was hard, for the girls had
not been chary of time, money, or trouble to fit themselves for their
occupation. Looking round they could count up many schoolmistresses far
less thoroughly equipped. Only the Brontes had no interest.
Meanwhile Branwell amused himself as best he could. There was always the
"Black Bull," with its admiring circle of drink-fellows, and the girls
who admired Patrick's courteous bow and Patrick's winning smile. Good
people all, who little dreamed how much vice, how much misery they were
encouraging by their approbation. Mr. Grundy, too, came over now and
then to see his old friend. "I knew them all," he says--"The father,
upright, handsome, distantly courteous, white-haired, tall; knowing me
as his son's friend, he would treat me in the Grandisonian fashion,
coming himself down to the little inn to invite me, a boy, up to his
house, where I would be coldly uncomfortable until I could escape with
Patrick Branwell to the moors. The daughters--distant and distrait,
large of nose, small of figure, red of hair (!), prominent of
spectacles; showing great intellectual development, but with eyes
constantly cast down, very silent, painfully retiring. This was about
the time of their first literary adventures, say 1843 or 1844."[14]
But of literary adventure there was at present little thought. The
school still occupied their thoughts and dreams. At last, no pupil
coming forward, some cards of terms were printed and given for
distribution to the friends of Charlotte and Anne; Emily had no friends.
There are none left of them, those pitiful cards of terms never granted;
records of such unfruitful hopes. They have fitly vanished, like the
ghosts of children never born; and quicker still to vanish was the dream
that called them forth. The weeks went on, and every week of seven
letterless mornings, every week of seven anxious nights, made the
sisters more fully aware that notice and employment would not come to
them in the way they had dreamed; made them think it well that
Branwell's home should not be the dwelling of innocent children.
Anne went back to her work leaving the future as uncertain as before.
In October Charlotte, always the spokeswoman, writes again to her friend
and diligent helper in this matter:--
"DEAR NELL,
"I, Emily, and Anne are truly obliged to you for the efforts
you have made in our behalf; and if you have not been
successful you are only like ourselves. Everyone wishes us
well; but there are no pupils to be had. We have no present
intention, however, of breaking our hearts on the subject;
still less of feeling mortified at our defeat. The effort
must be beneficial, whatever the result may be, because it
teaches us experience and an additional knowledge of this
world.
"I send you two additional circulars, and will send you two
more, if you desire it, when I write again."
Those four circulars also came to nothing; it was now more than six
months since the three sisters had begun their earnest search for
pupils: more than three years since they had taken for the ruling aim of
their endeavours the formation of this little school. Not one pupil
could they secure; not one promise. At last they knew that they were
beaten.
In November Charlotte writes again to Ellen:--
"We have made no alterations yet in our house. It would be
folly to do so while there is so little likelihood of our
ever getting pupils. I fear you are giving yourself too much
trouble on our account.
"Depend on it, if you were to persuade a mama to bring her
child to Haworth, the aspect of the place would frighten
her, and she would probably take the dear girl back with her
instanter. We are glad that we have made the attempt, and we
will not be cast down because it has not succeeded."[15]
There was no more to be said, only to put carefully by, as one puts by
the thoughts of an interrupted marriage, all the dreams that had filled
so many months only to lay aside in a drawer, as one lays aside the long
sewn at garments of a still-born child, the plans drawn out for the
builder, the printed cards, the lists of books to get; only to face
again a future of separate toil among strangers, to renounce the vision
of a home together.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 14: 'Pictures of the Past.']
[Footnote 15: Mrs. Gaskell.]
CHAPTER XI.
BRANWELL'S FALL.
As the spring grew upon the moors, dappling them with fresh verdant
shoots, clearing the sky overhead, loosening the winds to rush across
them; as the beautiful season grew ripe in Haworth, every one of its
days made clearer to the two anxious women waiting there in what shape
their blurred foreboding would come true at last. They seldom spoke of
Branwell now.
It was a hard and anxious time, ever expectant of an evil just at hand.
Minor troubles, too, gathered round this shapeless boded grief: Mr.
Bronte was growing blind; Charlotte, ever nervous, feared the same fate,
and could do but little sewing with her weak, cherished eyesight. Anne's
letters told of health worn out by constant, agonising suspicion. It was
Emily, that strong bearer of burdens, on whom the largest share of work
was laid.
Charlotte grew really weak as the summer came. Her sensitive, vehement
nature felt anxiety as a physical pain. She was constantly with her
father; her spirit sank with his, as month by month his sight grew
sensibly weaker. The old man, to whom his own importance was so dear,
suffered keenly, indeed, from the fear of actual blindness, and more
from the horror of dependence, than from the dread of pain or privation.
"He fears he will be nothing in the parish," says sorrowful Charlotte.
And as her father, never impatient, never peevish, became more deeply
cast down and anxious, she, too, became nervous and fearful; she, too,
dejected.
At last, when June came and brought no brightness to that grey old
house, with the invisible shadow ever hovering above it, Charlotte was
persuaded to seek rest and change in the home of her friend near Leeds.
Anne was home now; she had come back ill, miserable. She had suspicions
that made her feel herself degraded, pure soul, concerning her brother's
relation with her employer's wife. Many letters had passed between them,
through her hands too. Too often had she heard her unthinking little
pupils threaten their mother into more than customary indulgence,
saying: "Unless you do as we wish, we shall tell papa about Mr. Bronte."
The poor girl felt herself an involuntary accomplice to that treachery,
that deceit.
To lie down at night under the roof, to break by day the bread of the
good, sick, bedridden man, whose honour, she could not but fear, was in
jeopardy from her own brother, such dire strain was too great for that
frail, dejected nature. And yet to say openly to herself that Branwell
had committed this disgrace--it was impossible. Rather must her
suspicions be the morbid promptings of a diseased mind. She was wicked
to have felt them. Poor, gentle Anne, sweet, "prim, little body," such
scenes, such unhallowed vicinities of lust, were not for you. At last
sickness came and set her free. She went home.
Home, with its constant labour, pure air of good works; home, with its
sickness and love, its dread for others and noble sacrifice of self; how
welcome was it to her wounded spirit! And yet this infinitely lighter
torment was wearing Charlotte out. They persuaded her to go away, and,
when she had yielded, strove to keep her away.
Emily writes to Ellen in July:--
"DEAR MISS NUSSEY--If you have set your heart on Charlotte
staying another week, she has our united consent. I, for
one, will take everything easy on Sunday. I am glad she is
enjoying herself; let her make the most of the next seven
days to return stout and hearty. Love to her and you from
Anne and myself, and tell her all are well at home.--Yours,
"EMILY BRONTE."
Charlotte stayed the extra week, benefiting largely thereby. She started
for home, and enjoyed her journey, for she travelled with a French
gentleman, and talked again with delight the sweet language which had
left such lingering echoes in her memory, which forbade her to feel
quite contented any more in her secluded Yorkshire home. Slight as it
was, the little excitement did her good; feeling brave and ready to face
and fight with a legion of shadows, she reached the gate of her own
home, went in. Branwell was there.
He had been sent home a day or two before, apparently for a holiday. He
must have known that some discovery had been made at last; he must have
felt he never would return. Anne, too, must have had some misgivings;
yet the worst was not known yet. Emily, at least, could not guess it.