Hearts of Controversy by Alice Christiana Thompson Meynell
page 47 of 67 (70%)
page 47 of 67 (70%)
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in the sealed house that was only less narrow than their graves. The
rich may set apart and dedicate a room, the poor change their street, but Charlotte Bronte, in the close captivity of the fortunes of mediocrity, rested in the chair that had been her dying sister's, and held her melancholy bridals in the dining room that had been the scene of terrible and reluctant death. But closer than the conscious house was the conscious mind. Locked with intricate wards within the unrelaxing and unlapsing thoughts of this lonely sister, dwelt a sorrow inconsolable. It is well for the perpetual fellowship of mankind that no child should read this life and not take therefrom a perdurable scar, albeit her heart was somewhat frigid towards childhood, and she died before her motherhood could be born. Mistress of some of the best prose of her century, Charlotte Bronte was subject to a Lewes, a Chorley, a Miss Martineau: that is, she suffered what in Italian is called _soggezione_ in their presence. When she had met six minor contemporary writers--by-products of literature--at dinner, she had a headache and a sleepless night. She writes to her friend that these contributors to the quarterly press are greatly feared in literary London, and there is in her letter a sense of tremor and exhaustion. And what nights did the heads of the critics undergo after the meeting? Lewes, whose own romances are all condoned, all forgiven by time and oblivion, who gave her lessons, who told her to study Jane Austen? The others, whose reviews doubtless did their proportionate part in still further hunting and harrying the tired English of their day? And before Harriet Martineau she bore herself reverently. Harriet Martineau, albeit a woman of masculine understanding (we may imagine we hear her contemporaries give her the title), could not thread her way safely in and out of two or three negatives, but wrote--about this very Charlotte |
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