to make, and above all things, dolls to dress." And Mrs. Sidgwick
complained that Charlotte did not love the children, and forgot how
little she liked it when the children loved Charlotte, and was unaware,
poor lady, that it was recorded of her, and would be recorded to all
time, that she had said, "Love the _governess_, my dear!" when her
little impulsive boy put his hand in Charlotte's at the dinner-table,
and cried "I love 'ou, Miss Brontë." It was the same little, impulsive
boy who threw the Bible at Charlotte, and also threw a stone which hit
her.

No wonder that Miss Brontë's one and only "pleasant afternoon" was when
Mr. Sidgwick went out walking in his fields with his children and his
Newfoundland dog, and Charlotte (by order) followed and observed him
from behind.

Of course, all these old tales should have gone where Mrs. Sidgwick's
old muslin caps went; but they have not, and so it has got about that
Charlotte Brontë was not fond of children. Even Mr. Swinburne, at the
height of his magnificent eulogy, after putting crown upon crown upon
her head, pauses and wonders: had she any love for children? He finds in
her "a plentiful lack of inborn baby-worship"; she is unworthy to
compare in this with George Eliot, "the spiritual mother of Totty, of
Eppie, and of Lillo". "The fiery-hearted Vestal of Haworth," he says,
"had no room reserved in the palace of her passionate and high-minded
imagination as a nursery for inmates of such divine and delicious
quality." There was little Georgette in _Villette_, to say nothing of
Polly, and there was Adèle in _Jane Eyre_. But Mr. Swinburne had
forgotten about little Georgette. Like George Henry Lewes he is
"well-nigh moved to think one of the most powerfully and exquisitely
written chapters in _Shirley_ a chapter which could hardly have been