[84] See pages 136 and 140. [85] See my remarks on Mrs. Pryor in Appendix on _Shirley_. [86] Mrs. Gaskell's _Life of Charlotte Brontë_. [87] See footnote on page 97. [88] _Sydney Dobell: Life and Letters_; 1878. [89] Of course Mr. Dobell did not know that by the terms of arrangement with Mr. Newby, the publisher of _Wuthering Heights_, it was virtually impossible for Charlotte Brontë, after the success of _Jane Eyre_, to admit her authorship of _Wuthering Heights_ publicly. See my remarks hereon in Chapter I. [90] For this see Leyland's _The Brontë Family_. [91] See footnote, page 13. [92] _Charlotte Brontë and her Sisters_, page 162. [93] Mrs. Gaskell's _Life of Charlotte Brontë_. [94] The fact that towards the end great affection sprang up between the Rev. Patrick Brontë and his only surviving daughter cannot be too strongly emphasized. A most touching narration of him and the dying Currer Bell, related by Martha Brown, the Brontë servant, and herself the eye-witness, is given by Mr. William Scruton, in _Thornton and The Brontës_, page 133 (1898):--"When Charlotte heard her father coming upstairs to her, she would strain every nerve to give him a pleasing reception. On his entering the room she would greet him with, 'See, papa, I am looking a little better.'" Mr. Home was "papa" to Paulina. Compare the lightsome Paulina with the younger Catherine of _Wuthering Heights_; and Mrs. Home's death, _Villette_, chap, xxiv., with Mrs. Helstone's _Shirley_, chap. iv. [95] The letters in _The Times_ in the close of 1906, and in the early part of 1907, attacking the authenticity of the Héger portrait, were written by Mr. Shorter. My footnote in _The Fortnightly_ ran:--"In attacking the water-colour portrait of Charlotte Brontë purchased by the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery, the discovery of which, signed 'Paul Héger, 1850,' was inimical to Mr. Clement Shorter's contention that Charlotte Brontë had but distantly interested M. Héger, Mr. Shorter said, 'M. Héger certainly did not know even in 1850 that Miss Brontë, his old pupil, and Currer Bell were identical,' and with another asserted M. Héger and Charlotte Brontë never met after 1844. We shall see here, however, that M. Héger knew all Miss Brontë's literary secrets in 1850, and that they must have met after 1844, for M. Héger could have acquired these secrets only in most intimate conversation with Currer Bell herself: to none other would she have revealed them."