The Bronte Family Volume Ii Part 5

Not time, but ocean, thins its flowing hair; Decay, not sorrow, lays its forehead bare; Its members move, but not in thankless toil, For seas are milder than this world's turmoil; Corruption robs its lips and cheeks of red, But wounded vanity grieves not the dead; And, though those members hasten to decay, No pang of suffering takes their strength away.

With untormented eye, and heart, and brain, Through calm and storm it floats across the main; Though love and joy have perished long ago, Its bosom suffers not one pang of woe; Though weeds and worms its cherished beauty hide, It feels not wounded vanity nor pride; Though journeying towards some far off sh.o.r.e, It needs no care nor gold to float it o'er; Though launched in voyage for eternity, It need not think upon what is _to be_; Though naked, helpless, and companionless, It feels not poverty, nor knows distress.

'Ah, corpse! if thou couldst tell my aching mind What scenes of sorrow thou hast left behind, How sad the life which, breathing, thou hast led, How free from strife thy sojourn with the dead; I would a.s.sume thy place--would long to be A world-wide wanderer o'er the waves with thee!

I have a misery, where thou hast none; My heart beats, bursting, whilst thine lies like stone; My veins throb wild, whilst thine are dead and dry; And woes, not waters, dim my restless eye; Thou longest not with one well loved to be, And absence does not break a chain with thee; No sudden agonies dart through thy breast; Thou hast what all men covet,--REAL REST.

I have an outward frame, unlike to thine, Warm with young life--not cold in death's decline; An eye that sees the sunny light of Heaven,-- A heart by pleasure thrilled, by anguish riven-- But, in exchange for thy untroubled calm, Thy gift of cold oblivion's healing balm, I'd give my youth, my health, my life to come, And share thy slumbers in thy ocean tomb.'

Here the poet, his soul longing for freedom from mortality, his crushed and wounded spirit hovering above the salt and restless wave, contemplates the pale and ghastly body that floats thereon, and, holding communion with it, touches in melancholy and beautiful words its isolation and oblivion. Accompanying the dead in its watery wanderings, he sees, with keen sympathy, its utter disseverance from the world it has left, and contrasts with its condition the hopeless sorrow of his own disappointed youth. He delineates, in words of singular power and felicity, this weird and lonely picture; and, as an artist and a poet, paints wildly, but beautifully, the decay of the drowned in the ocean, and of the living, through the effects of long-continued woe. Branwell had loved, indeed, however unfortunately; and the misery of his pa.s.sion caused him to turn his reflections within upon himself. As with the 'Wandering Jew,' who sees in every rock, in every bush, in every cloud, without hope of alleviation from his abiding woe, the _via crucis_ of his suffering Lord--every thought of Branwell's gifted mind, every conception of his fertile brain, every aspect, to him, of ocean, earth, and sky,--was, in one way or other, instinct with his own initial and irrepressible affection. Apart, however, from the illusions respecting the lady of his heart, under which he laboured, and which drove him to madness, there was a tendency to gloom and despondency implanted in his very nature, a disposition of mind in which his sister Emily largely resembled him. To such an extent was this the case that, in her poem of 'The Philosopher,' written in the October of 1845, she not only gives expression to similar weird thoughts and desires, but one might think there had been some interchange of ideas between the two,--that, perhaps, she had read his 'Real Rest,' and wrote the following words in half-censure of its tendency. She is speaking of an enlightening spirit:

'Had I but seen his glorious eye _Once_ light the clouds that wilder me; I ne'er had raised this coward cry To cease to think, and cease to be; I ne'er had called oblivion blest, Nor stretching eager hands to death, Implored to change for senseless rest This sentient soul, this living breath-- Oh, let me die--that power and will Their cruel strife may close; And conquered good and conquering ill Be lost in one repose!'

It is noteworthy that Charlotte, also, in the second part of her poem 'Gilbert,' has used the incident of a corpse floating upon the waters, which is seen by the unhappy man in his vision, not, indeed, to give him the calm of oblivion, but rather, in contrast to Branwell's poem, to wake in him the pains of sorrow and remorse.

Again, on the 25th of November, 1845, Branwell wrote to Leyland. He could not free himself from the unfortunate ideas which had perverted his understanding, but on every other subject he wrote justly.

'Haworth, 'Bradford, Yorks.

'MY DEAR SIR,

'I send you the enclosed,--and I ought to tell you why I wished anything of so personal a nature to appear in print.

'I have no other way, not pregnant with danger, of communicating with one whom I cannot help loving. Printed lines, with my usual signature, "Northangerland," could excite no suspicion--as my late unhappy employer shrank from the bare idea of my being able to write anything, and had a day's sickness after hearing that Macaulay had sent me a complimentary letter; so _he_ won't know the name.

'I sent through a private channel one letter of comfort in her great and agonizing present afflictions, but I recalled it through dread of the consequences of a discovery.

'These lines have only one merit,--that of really expressing my feelings, while sailing under the Welsh mountain, when the band on board the steamer struck up, "Ye banks and braes!" G.o.d knows that, for many different reasons, those feelings were far enough from pleasure.

'I suffer very much from that mental exhaustion which arises from brooding on matters useless at present to think of,--and active employment would be my greatest cure and blessing,--for really, after hours of thoughts which business would have hushed, I have felt as if I could not live, and, if long-continued, such a state will bring on permanent affection of the heart, which is already bothered with most uneasy palpitations.

'I should like extremely to have an hour's sitting with you, and, if I had the chance, I would promise to try not to look gloomy. You said you would be at Haworth ere long, but that "ere" has doubtless changed to "ne'er;" so I must wish to get to Halifax some time to see you.

'I saw Murray's monument praised in the papers, and I trust you are getting on well with Beckwith's, as well as with your own personal statue of living flesh and blood.

'Mine, like your Theseus, has lost its hands and feet, and I fear its head also, for it can neither move, write, nor think as it once could.

'I hope I shall hear from you on John Brown's return from Halifax, whither he has gone.

'I remain, &c.,

'P. B. BRONTe.'

The poem enclosed was ent.i.tled:

PENMAENMAWR.

'These winds, these clouds, this chill November storm Bring back again thy tempest-beaten form To eyes that look upon yon dreary sky As late they looked on thy sublimity; When I, more troubled than thy restless sea, Found, in its waves, companionship with thee.

'Mid mists thou frownedst over Arvon's sh.o.r.e, 'Mid tears I watched thee over ocean's roar, And thy blue front, by thousand storms laid bare, Claimed kindred with a heart worn down by care.

No smile had'st thou, o'er smiling fields aspiring, And none had I, from smiling fields retiring; Blackness, 'mid sunlight, tinged thy slaty brow, I, 'mid sweet music, looked as dark as thou; Old Scotland's song, o'er murmuring surges borne, Of "times departed,--never to return,"

Was echoed back in mournful tones from thee, And found an echo, quite as sad, in me; Waves, clouds, and shadows moved in restless change, Around, above, and on thy rocky range, But seldom saw that sovereign front of thine Changes more quick than those which pa.s.sed o'er mine.

And as wild winds and human hands, at length, Have turned to scattered stones the mighty strength Of that old fort, whose belt of boulders grey Roman or Saxon legions held at bay; So had, methought, the young, unshaken nerve-- That, when WILL wished, no doubt could cause to swerve, That on its vigour ever placed reliance, That to its sorrows sometimes bade defiance-- Now left my spirit, like thyself, old hill, With head defenceless against human ill; And, as thou long hast looked upon the wave That takes, but gives not, like a churchyard grave, I, like life's course, through ether's weary range, Never know rest from ceaseless strife and change.

'But, PENMAENMAWR! a better fate was thine, Through all its shades, than that which darkened mine; No quick thoughts thrilled through thy gigantic ma.s.s Of woe for what might be, or is, or was; Thou hadst no memory of the glorious hour When Britain rested on thy giant power; Thou hadst no feeling for the verdant slope That leant on thee as man's heart leads on hope; The pastures, chequered o'er with cot and tree, Though thou wert guardian, got no smile from thee; Old ocean's wrath their charms might overwhelm, But thou could'st still keep thy unshaken realm-- While I felt flashes of an inward feeling As fierce as those thy craggy form revealing In nights of blinding gleams, when deafening roar Hurls back thy echo to old Mona's sh.o.r.e.

I knew a flower, whose leaves were meant to bloom Till Death should s.n.a.t.c.h it to adorn a tomb, Now, blanching 'neath the blight of hopeless grief, With never blooming, and yet living leaf; A flower on which my mind would wish to shine, If but one beam could break from mind like mine.

I had an ear which could on accents dwell That might as well say "perish!" as "farewell!"

An eye which saw, far off, a tender form, Beaten, unsheltered, by affliction's storm; An arm--a lip--that trembled to embrace My angel's gentle breast and sorrowing face, A mind that clung to Ouse's fertile side While tossing--objectless--on Menai's tide!

'Oh, Soul! that draw'st yon mighty hill and me Into communion of vague unity, Tell me, can I obtain the stony brow That fronts the storm, as much unbroken now As when it once upheld the fortress proud, Now gone, like its own morning cap of cloud?

Its breast is stone. Can I have one of steel, To endure--inflict--defend--yet never feel?

It stood as firm when haughty Edward's word Gave hill and dale to England's fire and sword, As when white sails and steam-smoke tracked the sea, And all the world breathed peace, but waves and me.

'Let me, like it, arise o'er mortal care, All woes sustain, yet never know despair; Unshrinking face the grief I now deplore, And stand, through storm and shine, like moveless PENMAENMAWR!'

These lines are shadowed, like all his other writings, with the grief that day and night oppressed him. Throughout the theme, his eager yearning for mental quiet is finely expressed; and in it he contrasts the strength and calm of the everlasting hill in its chequered history, and in the ceaseless changes, and the lights and shadows that fall upon it, with his own wild and stormy existence; the lady, whose charms have bewildered his imagination, supplying him with a subject for sorrowful recollections. The giant hill is the mighty image with which his perturbed soul communes, and he implores for strength to enable him to rise superior to his misfortunes, and to face, like 'moveless Penmaenmawr,' the storm, adversity, and ruin that threaten him. But there was little likelihood of the lady seeing these lines.

We find Branwell, at the time, making efforts to obtain some employment that would divert him from useless brooding upon the unfortunate circ.u.mstances that destroyed his peace. Scarcely, also, was he less anxious to be away from home, for his presence there had been his greatest humiliation when his family knew of his disgrace; yet, with a method of which he was master, he appears to have kept silence there on the subject his madness made him so ready to repeat to others. However his sisters Emily and Anne might regard him, Charlotte, at least, looked upon him as one of the fallen. She thus writes to her friend concerning him on the 4th of November, 1845: 'I hoped to be able to ask you to come to Haworth. It almost seemed as if Branwell had a chance of getting employment, and I waited to know the result of his efforts in order to say, dear ----, come and see us. But the place (a secretaryship to a railway committee) is given to another person. Branwell still remains at home; and while _he_ is here, _you_ shall not come. I am more confirmed in that resolution the more I see of him. I wish I could say one word to you in his favour, but I cannot. I will hold my tongue. We are all obliged to you for your kind suggestion about Leeds; but I think our school schemes are, for the present, at rest.' Again, she says on December 31st of the same year: 'You say well, in speaking of ----, that no sufferings are so awful as those brought on by dissipation; alas! I see the truth of this observation daily proved. ---- and ---- must have as weary and burdensome a life of it in waiting upon their unhappy brother. It seems grievous, indeed, that those who have not sinned should suffer so largely.'[22] Charlotte also, writing to Nancy Garrs, who at times a.s.sisted at the parsonage, complained of the conduct of her brother; but, later, requested that the letter should be destroyed. Her wish was complied with.

[22] Gaskell's 'Life of Charlotte Bronte,' chap. xiii.

It is, indeed, an almost impossible task to convey to the reader, in the pages of a biography, an idea which will, in an adequate degree, approach the intimate acquaintance which those who lived, saw, and spoke with its subject possessed. And, yet, how necessary is such knowledge to the right understanding of anyone's letters! But with what chance of a true insight, then, shall we read the letters of Branwell Bronte and his sister, if we have an incorrect view of his character?

Miss Robinson has confidently concluded, from certain depreciatory references to himself, in his letters to Mr. Grundy, that, at this period, 'he was manifestly, and by his own confession, too physically prostrate for any literary effort,' with how much accuracy the reader has seen and will further see. And Mr. Wemyss Reid, with respect to the character of Mr. Bronte, adopting much of Mrs. Gaskell's view of him, and relying upon his children's letters, has produced a portrait of him to which, as he allows, 'some of those who knew him in his later years, including one who is above all others ent.i.tled to an opinion on the subject, have objected as being over-coloured.' We must not read, then, too literally all that we find in the letters. It would be folly to take word for word Charlotte's account of her father's anger when she announced to him a proposal of marriage which had been made to her, and which did not accord with his wish; or to believe that 'compa.s.sion or relenting is no more to be looked for from papa than sap from firewood,' when we know that he afterwards voluntarily gave way, and sacrificed his own opinion. Nor would it be right to accept any exaggerated confession of Charlotte about herself, in a literal sense.

And thus it does not sound well in Mrs. Gaskell, after completing her account of the outward events of Branwell's life, to say, 'All that is to be said more about Branwell Bronte shall be said by Charlotte herself, not by me;' and then to proceed to extract such portions of the sister's letters as condemned him, and to summarize or repress anything favourable. But Miss Robinson has gone further. She, by extracting a few censures from various letters, apart in date, and leaving out all mention of the chance of the secretaryship in the letter of November the 4th, and the words 'to him' in another, has left her reader under the impression that, after his dismissal, Branwell would not seek employment. 'Such was not his intention,' she says. But Branwell's efforts to obtain the secretaryship, to which Charlotte alludes, are sufficient evidence of a contrary disposition in him; and we shall find that he exerted himself in other directions also.

The failure of the school-keeping has likewise been duly laid to his charge, although, as we have seen, Mr. Bronte's oncoming blindness, in the first place, and the difficulty of procuring pupils at Haworth, were the causes of its failure. To the reason why no attempt was made to open a school elsewhere, I shall have further to allude.

We have been told by Mrs. Gaskell that, some months after Branwell's dismissal, he met the wife of his former employer clandestinely by appointment. 'There was,' she says, 'a strange lingering of conscience, when ... he refused to consent to the elopement which she proposed.'[23]

Miss Robinson, who adopts this report, thinks that the phrase 'herself and estate,' in the letter he sent to Mr. Grundy, throws quite a new light upon Mrs. Gaskell's opinion that there were any remains of conscience left in Branwell Bronte. She says he counselled 'a little longer waiting,'--that he might become possessed of the property, on the death of the lady's husband. But if this incident of the proposed elopement had actually taken place, the delay suggested by Branwell should surely be held as proof that anything positively dishonourable was repulsive to him. The lady, too, had an ample fortune of her own, of which, had she proposed an elopement, she would have informed him.

But, if we consider the possible sources from which such a story as this could arise, we may surmise that Mrs. Gaskell,--who first gave it to the public, and on whose authority it alone remains,--obtained it, with the many other incidents she has published, from the current scandal of Haworth,--where else could she have heard it?--and when we remember that the rumours of the village, though magnified a hundred-fold, had their origin in the infatuated belief and wild statements of Branwell himself, possibly we shall not be wrong if we conclude that it had no foundation whatever in fact. Certainly there is no sufficient evidence for it. And the story is in itself inherently improbable, for it alleges that the lady had been not only regardless of her reputation, but had cast to the winds all thoughts of those pecuniary considerations which, a little later, upon the death of her husband, are stated to have prevented her from marrying in honour the supposed object of her affections.

[23] 'Life of Charlotte Bronte,' chap, xiii., 1st edition.

I have, earlier in this work, spoken of a poem on one of the traditions of Lancashire, by Mr. Peters, ent.i.tled: 'Leyland's Daughter,' which is the story of a romantic elopement. Branwell, early in 1846, proposed to write a poem on Morley Hall, in the parish of Leigh, where the elopement took place in the reign of Edward VI., in which he also would touch upon the incident.

This tradition, and Branwell's intended work on the subject, became often a topic of conversation both at Haworth and Halifax: and, it is not improbable that, some ten years afterwards, when Mrs. Gaskell was searching at the former place for materials for her work, the story of this ancient elopement had become mixed with the stories of the village respecting Branwell and the lady of his late employer, and thus, with them, was ready for Mrs. Gaskell's hand, additions having been made as to time and place.

CHAPTER VII.

THE SISTERS' POEMS AND NOVELS.--BRANWELL'S LITERARY OCCUPATIONS.

The Sisters as Writers of Poetry--They Decide to Publish--Each begins a Novel--The Spirit under which the Work was Undertaken-- 'The Professor'--'Agnes Grey'--'Wuthering Heights'--Branwell's Condition--A Touching Incident--'Epistle from a Father to a Child in her Grave'--Letter with Sonnet--Publication of the Sisters'

Poems.

If Branwell Bronte had devoted himself to literature under the impulse of his misfortune, his sisters were not long unoccupied ere they also entered upon its pursuit. 'One day, in the autumn of 1845,' says Charlotte, 'I accidentally lighted on a MS. volume of verse in my sister Emily's handwriting.' The elder sister was not surprised, knowing that the younger could and did write verse; but she thought these were no common effusions. 'To my ear,' she says, 'they had also a peculiar music--wild, melancholy, and elevating. My sister Emily was not a person of demonstrative character, nor one on the recesses of whose mind and feelings even those nearest and dearest to her could, with impunity, intrude unlicensed; it took hours to reconcile her to the discovery I had made, and days to persuade her that such poems merited publication.' Charlotte Bronte here grasped, with unfailing precision, the very secret spell which we find in Emily's poetry; the strange, wild, weird voice, with which it speaks to us, spoke first of all to her, and she felt the heather-scented breath, even as we do, of the moorland air on which its music was borne. Anne also produced verses, which had 'a sweet, sincere pathos of their own;' and the three sisters, believing, after anxious deliberation, that they might get their respective productions accepted for publication in one volume, set on foot inquiries on the subject, and now adopted the pseudonyms of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, which were afterwards to become so famous. It was not, however, to be expected that the effusions of inexperienced and unknown writers would be of such value as to induce any publisher to take them on his own risk. Indeed, Miss Bronte says 'the great puzzle lay in the difficulty of getting answers of any kind from the publishers to whom we applied.' She wrote to Messrs. Chambers, of Edinburgh, asking advice, and received a brief and business-like reply, upon which the sisters acted, and at last made way.

On the 28th of January, 1846, Charlotte, as we have been informed, wrote to Messrs. Aylott and Jones, asking if they would publish a one-volume, octavo, of poems; if not at their own risk, on the authors'

account. Messrs. Aylott and Jones did not hesitate to accept the latter proposal.