relation of mine, one Patrick Boanerges, has set off to seek his fortune
in the wild, wandering, knight-errant-like capacity of clerk on the
Leeds and Manchester Railroad." And she goes on to chaff Miss Nussey
about Celia Amelia, the curate. "I know Mrs. Ellen is burning with
eagerness to hear something about W. Weightman, whom she adores in her
heart, and whose image she cannot efface from her memory."

Some of her critics, including Mrs. Oliphant (far less indulgent than
the poor curates who forgave her nobly), have grudged Charlotte her
amusement. There is nothing, from her fame downwards, that Mrs. Oliphant
did not grudge her. Mr. Birrell sternly disapproves; even Mr. Swinburne,
at the height of his panegyric, is put off. Perhaps Charlotte's humour
was not her most attractive quality; but nobody seems to have seen the
pathos and the bravery of it. Neither have they seen that Miss Nussey
was at the bottom of its worst development, the "curate-baiting". Miss
Nussey used to go and stay at Haworth for weeks at a time. Haworth was
not amusing, and Miss Nussey had to be amused. All this school-girlish
jesting, the perpetual and rather tiresome banter, was a playing down to
Miss Nussey. It was a kind of tender "baiting" of Miss Nussey, who had
tried on several occasions to do Charlotte good. And it was the natural,
healthy rebound of the little Irish _gamine_ that lived in Charlotte
Brontë, bursting with cleverness and devilry. I, for my part, am glad to
think that for one happy year she gave it full vent.

She was only twenty-four. Even as late as the mid-Victorian era to be
twenty-four and unmarried was to be middle-aged. But (this cannot be too
much insisted on) Charlotte Brontë was the revolutionist who changed all
that. She changed it not only in her novels but in her person. Here
again she has been misrepresented. There are no words severe enough for
Mrs. Oliphant's horrible portrait of her as a plain-faced, lachrymose,