Who that has known her books has not admired the artist's noble English, the burning love of truth, the bravery, the simplicity, the indignation at wrong, the eager sympathy, the pious love and reverence, the passionate honor, so to speak, of the woman? What a story is that of that family of poets in their solitude yonder on the gloomy northern moors! At nine o'clock at night, Mrs.Gaskell tells, after evening prayers, when their guardian and relative had gone to bed, the three poetesses--the three maidens, Charlotte, and Emily, and Anne--Charlotte being the "motherly friend and guardian to the other two"--"began, like restless wild animals, to pace up and down their parlor, 'making out' their wonderful stories, talking over plans and projects, and thoughts of what was to be their future life."One evening, at the close of 1854, as Charlotte Nicholls sat with her husband by the fire, listening to the howling of the wind about the house, she suddenly said to her husband, "If you had not been with me, I must have been writing now." She then ran up stairs, and brought down, and read aloud, the beginning of a new tale.When she had finished, her husband remarked, "The critics will accuse you of repetition." She replied, "Oh! I shall alter that.I always begin two or three times before I can please myself." But it was not to be.The trembling little hand was to write no more.The heart newly awakened to love and happiness, and throbbing with maternal hope, was soon to cease to beat; that intrepid outspeaker and champion of truth, that eager, impetuous redresser of wrong, was to be called out of the world's fight and struggle, to lay down the shining arms, and to be removed to a sphere where even a noble indignation cor ulterius nequit lacerare, and where truth complete, and right triumphant, no longer need to wage war.
I can only say of this lady, vidi tantum.I saw her first just as Irose out of an illness from which I had never thought to recover.Iremember the trembling little frame, the little hand, the great honest eyes.An impetuous honesty seemed to me to characterize the woman.Twice I recollect she took me to task for what she held to be errors in doctrine.Once about Fielding we had a disputation.
She spoke her mind out.She jumped too rapidly to conclusions.(Ihave smiled at one or two passages in the "Biography," in which my own disposition or behavior forms the subject of talk.) She formed conclusions that might be wrong, and built up whole theories of character upon them.New to the London world, she entered it with an independent, indomitable spirit of her own; and judged of contemporaries, and especially spied out arrogance or affectation, with extraordinary keenness of vision.She was angry with her favorites if their conduct or conversation fell below her ideal.
Often she seemed to me to be judging the London folk prematurely:
but perhaps the city is rather angry at being judged.I fancied an austere little Joan of Arc marching in upon us, and rebuking our easy lives, our easy morals.She gave me the impression of being a very pure, and lofty, and high-minded person.A great and holy reverence of right and truth seemed to be with her always.Such, in our brief interview, she appeared to me.As one thinks of that life so noble, so lonely--of that passion for truth--of those nights and nights of eager study, swarming fancies, invention, depression, elation, prayer; as one reads the necessarily incomplete, though most touching and admirable history of the heart that throbbed in this one little frame--of this one amongst the myriads of souls that have lived and died on this great earth--this great earth?--this little speck in the infinite universe of God,--with what wonder do we think of to-day, with what awe await to-morrow, when that which is now but darkly seen shall be clear! As I read this little fragmentary sketch, I think of the rest.Is it? And where is it?
Will not the leaf be turned some day, and the story be told? Shall the deviser of the tale somewhere perfect the history of little EMMA'S griefs and troubles? Shall TITANIA come forth complete with her sportive court, with the flowers at her feet, the forest around her, and all the stars of summer glittering overhead?
How well I remember the delight, and wonder, and pleasure with which I read "Jane Eyre," sent to me by an author whose name and sex were then alike unknown to me; the strange fascinations of the book; and how with my own work pressing upon me, I could not, having taken the volumes up, lay them down until they were read through! Hundreds of those who, like myself, recognized and admired that master-work of a great genius, will look with a mournful interest and regard and curiosity upon the last fragmentary sketch from the noble hand which wrote "Jane Eyre."
End
