The Life of Charlotte Brontë — Volume 1Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn
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The Life of Charlotte Brontë — Volume 1
Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn
Brontë, Charlotte, 1816-1855; Novelists, English -- 19th century -- Biography
"You have been very kind to me of late, and have spared me all those
little sallies of ridicule, which, owing to my miserable and wretched
touchiness of character, used formerly to make me wince, as if I had been
touched with a hot iron; things that nobody else cares for, enter into my
mind and rankle there like venom. I know these feelings are absurd, and
therefore I try to hide them, but they only sting the deeper for
concealment."
Compare this state of mind with the gentle resignation with which she had
submitted to be put aside as useless, or told of her ugliness by her
school-fellows, only three years before.
"My life since I saw you has passed as monotonously and unbroken as ever;
nothing but teach, teach, teach, from morning till night. The greatest
variety I ever have is afforded by a letter from you, or by meeting with
a pleasant new book. The 'Life of Oberlin,' and 'Leigh Richmond's
Domestic Portraiture,' are the last of this description. The latter work
strongly attracted and strangely fascinated my attention. Beg, borrow,
or steal it without delay; and read the 'Memoir of Wilberforce,'--that
short record of a brief uneventful life; I shall never forget it; it is
beautiful, not on account of the language in which it is written, not on
account of the incidents it details, but because of the simple narrative
it gives of a young talented sincere Christian."
* * * * *
About this time Miss W--- removed her school from the fine, open, breezy
situation of Roe Head, to Dewsbury Moor, only two or three miles distant.
Her new residence was on a lower site, and the air was less exhilarating
to one bred in the wild hill-village of Haworth. Emily had gone as
teacher to a school at Halifax, where there were nearly forty pupils.
"I have had one letter from her since her departure," writes Charlotte,
on October 2nd, 1836: "it gives an appalling account of her duties; hard
labour from six in the morning to eleven at night, with only one half-
hour of exercise between. This is slavery. I fear she can never stand
it."
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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