A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Bronte, Charlotte, Emily, and Ann
BRONTE, CHARLOTTE, EMILY, and ANN,
United as they are in death, as they were in life, and in the fame which followed the publication of their extraordinary works, these gifted sisters must appear in our pages as a triad of intellectual personifications; their names cannot be separated without injury to their individual characteristics, without rending apart sympathies and affections which united them more closely, and inextricably, than three of one family and household were perhaps ever knit before. They are the three strains, distinct, and yet ever blending intimately and harmoniously, of a wild sad melody, such as we might listen to amid the stillness of the solemn night, and scarcely know whether it came from earth or heaven. Those three voices, arising, as they did together, from the Yorkshire wolds; from that old quiet manse "on the very verge of the churchyard mould," and taking possession of the public ear, gradually enchaining attention, and causing a general inquiry of "who can it be?" Then as the strains grow louder and bolder, giving evidence of power and passionate energy, as well as a delicate perception of all the secret windings and workings of the human heart, while yet the singers were veiled under the mysterious cognomen of "Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell," how the wonder deepened, and the question sped through France and Germany, and across the wide Atlantic, and back again, "who can it be?"
But let us come down to more sober narrative, and answer this query, once so rife among readers, and still asked by some to whom the sad secrets of the Yorkshire manse have not yet been revealed. There, in his silent study, sits the aged clergyman, Mr. Bronte—a descendant of the Bronterres, of Ireland, an ancient and honourable family—sits lonely and desolate in his parsonage house at Haworth, near Keighley, in the West-Riding. Long years ago his wife laid her down to rest in the green churchyard near at hand, and several of his children were taken while the dew of childhood yet lay fresh upon their hearts, as it were to bear her company. Four daughters and a son remained, to cheer his heart with parental hopes, and sometimes to gladden his home with loving looks and tones of affection; but only at intervals, for he was poor, and his children might not eat the bread of idleness. The sisters all went out as governesses, and suffered many of the hardships and insults to which that useful but despised class of persons are too commonly exposed. One of them came home and died in consequence, it is said, of what she had to endure at a school in which she was a teacher. In all, there was no doubt a pre-disposition to pulmonary disease, and the shortening of their lives may be attributed to the excessive toil, hard fare, and other miseries attendant on their state of dependence at educational establishments. The elder sister, Charlotte, (Currer Bell,) was for a year and a half at one of these establishments at Brussels, and while there she describes herself as never free from the gnawing sensation, or consequent feebleness, of downright hunger.
To this deprivation of sufficient food she attributes the smallness of her stature, which was below that of most women. In her novel of "Jane Eyre," she no doubt exhibits some of her school experiences at this place of torture for mind and body. It was probably the desire to escape from such a thraldom as this which induced the girls to determine on trying their hands at authorship. "We had very early," says Charlotte, in the preface to her third and last novel—'Villette'—"cherished the dream of becoming authors. This dream, never relinquished, even when distance divided, and absorbing tasks occupied us, now, (in 1845, when the three sisters were at home together,) suddenly acquired strength and consistency: it took the character of a resolve," and led, we may add, after many obstacles were overcome, to the publication of a volume of "Poems, by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell," a title which gave no indication of the sex of the writers. This volume did not attract much attention; but, nothing daunted, the sisters set to work each upon a prose tale. Emily, "Wuthering Heights;" and Ann, "Agnes Grey." The title of Charlotte's first tale we do not learn; but it seems to have failed at the time in obtaining a publisher; and while it was going the round of the trade, its author was industriously working at her second and most successful novel, "Jane Eyre," which, when finished, was at once accepted by Messrs. Smith and Elder, and achieved a decided success. "There are," says a contemporary critic, "but few instances to be found in the literary history of the time, in which an unknown writer has taken a firmer hold at once on the public mind, than the authoress of "Jane Eyre." The startling individuality of her portraits, drawn to the life, however strange and wayward that life may be, fixes them on the mind, and seems to 'dare you to forget.' Successions of scenes, rather than of story, are dashed off under a fit of inspiration, until the reader, awed as it were by the presence of this great mental power, draws breath, and confesses it must be truth; though perhaps not to be recognised among the phases of any life he may have known, or scenes he may have witnessed."
Such is the wonderful story on which the literary reputation of Miss Bronte is based. Its appearance, in the autumn of 1847, took the world completely by surprise, and the sensation which it created was deepened in intensity by the mystery of its authorship; as well as that of the two other works by the younger sisters, which although certainly inferior in power and grasp of intellect, were yet evidently works of genius. Alas I they were the only ones which their authors lived to complete. With "Wuthering Heights," finished the mental and all other labours of Emily Bronte, who died of consumption in December, 1848; and in six months from that time, the grave, on which the grass had only just begun to spring, was opened to receive the mortal remains of the younger sister Ann. In the same year died also the brother, a young man, we are told, of great promise; and Charlotte Bronte and her infirm father were left alone, to think over their bereavements, and to bear up as best they could against these heavy blows of affliction. In a touching tribute to the memory of her sisters, appended to her last work, "Villette," Miss Bronte observes—"I may sum up all by saying, that for strangers they were nothing, for superficial observers less than nothing; but for those who had known them all their lives, in the intimacy of close relationship, they were genuine, good, and truly great."
The novel in which these remarks appeared, was published in 1853; "unlike her preceding works it was marked by no stirring incidents, no remote details. It is simply the history of life in a foreign school, (such as her own experience could supply,) but that little world is made to contain the elements of a sphere as extensive as humanity itself. Although not calculated from its deficiency of story, to be as universally popular as "Jane Eyre," it met with high appreciation, as a remarkable result of that high order of genius which imparts its own powerful fascinations to the detail of events of the simplest character." The critic from whom we here quote, also observes that "Currer Bell may almost be said to have founded a school of fiction, in which the 'flower is shewn in the bud,' and the child literally made 'father to the man;' in which some young spirit, starved of sympathy, turns inward and revenges the injuries of the few in scorn and distrust of the many; isolated and self-concentrated, till the well-spring of love, frozen, but not dried up, bursts its bonds under the influence of the first sunshine of affection, and expands itself with the reckless prodigality of a miser suddenly turned spendthrift."
Miss Bronte's second novel, "Shirley," appeared in 1849. It was conceived and wrought out in the midst of fearful domestic grief, the sad experiences of that terrible year of bereavements. "There was something inexpressibly touching in the aspect of the frail little creature who had done such wonderful things, and who was able to bear up with so bright an eye, and so composed a countenance under such a weight of sorrow and such a prospect of solitude, In her 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, if not of silence, she seemed a perfect household image, irresistably recalling Wordsworth's description of the domestic treasure; and she was this. She was as able at the needle as the pen. The household knew the excellency of her cookery, before they heard of that of her books. In so utter a seclusion as she lived, in those dreary wilds where she was not strong enough to roam over the hills; in that retreat where her studious father rarely broke the silence, and there was no (me else to do it; in that forlorn house planted in the miry clay of the churchyard, where the graves of her sisters were before her window; in such a living sepulchre her mind could not but prey upon itself; and how it did suffer, we see, in the more painful portions of 'Villette.' She said, with a change in her steady countenance, that 'she should feel very lonely when her aged father died.' But she formed new ties after that; she married, and it is the aged father who survives to mourn her." Thus is the cabinet picture drawn by one who evidently knew much of the inner life of Currer Bell.
A correspondent of the "Literary Gazette" will furnish us with the touching conclusion to this sad history. "Mr. Bronte is the Incumbent of Ha worth, and the father of 'the three sisters;' two had already died, when Mr. Nicholls, his curate, wished to marry the last sole hope. To this Mr. Bronte objected, as it might deprive him of his only child; and although they were much attached, the connection was so far broken, that Mr. Nicholls was to leave. Then the Vicar of Bradford interposed, by offering to secure for Mr; Nicholls the Incumbency of Haworth, after Mr. Bronte's death. This obviated all objection, and last summer (1854) a study was built to the parsonage, and the lovers were married, remaining under the father's roof. But alas! in three months the bride's lungs were attacked, and in three more the father and husband committed, their loved one to the grave. Is it not a sad reality in which the romance ends. May God comfort the two mourners!"