Brontës (92 page)

should the Address you speak of, be one to thank Dr Scoresby, the vicar of Bradford, for his past, able and faithful services, or to entreat him to continue in his present most important, but difficult situation, I
request and authorise you to affix my name
²
.

He also lent his beleaguered vicar a show of practical support, inviting him to Haworth to deliver the annual Sunday school sermon in the church.
³

Patrick had at long last secured a replacement curate in the place of the unsatisfactory Mr Smith. The Reverend Arthur Bell Nicholls had much in common with his new parson. He was an Irishman, like Patrick, born in January 1819 near Belfast in Northern Ireland. His father, William Nicholls, seems to have been a poor farmer, like Hugh Brontë, but Arthur was orphaned at an early age. From the age of seven he had been brought up and educated by his maternal uncle, Dr Alan Bell, who was headmaster of the renowned Royal School at Banagher in the south of Ireland. Dr Bell seems to have continued his financial support of his nephew, sending him up to Trinity College, Dublin as a fee-paying pensioner in July 1836. He matriculated the following year, in January 1837, when he would have been just eighteen, and he graduated as a Bachelor of Arts almost exactly seven years later, in February 1844.
⁴
When he came to Haworth, he was a young man, twenty-six years old, fresh from his ordination as a deacon at Ripon on 18 May 1845. He took his first duty the following Sunday, 25 May, followed by his first marriage on 28 May and his first burial the following day. Charlotte's earliest impressions were unusually favourable: ‘he appears a respectable young man, reads well, and I hope will give satisfaction'.
⁵
Within a few months of his arrival he had almost completely taken over all the official duties – a sign not only of Patrick's failing sight, but also of the fact that the new curate enjoyed his parson's full confidence.

The final innovations of this spring were also pleasant ones. On 29 April Patrick convened a meeting in the church vestry to consider raising a subscription to replace the three church bells with a peal of six. The response was enthusiastic and in just over two months enough money had been
raised to enable him to place an order for the casting of the bells with Mr Mears of London. By the end of October, the new bells were in place, enabling the team of ringers to join in the new fashion for change-ringing competitions.
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Of greater significance was the building of the first church in the newly created parish of Oakworth, which lay between Haworth and Keighley. This marked the beginning of a more realistic demarcation of the Haworth chapelry borders, belatedly taking into account the population changes over the last few decades. Patrick and Arthur Nicholls were undoubtedly among the clergy who attended the public ceremony on 28 July to lay the foundation stone of the new church.
⁷

Charlotte, meanwhile, moped about at home, unable to forget Monsieur Heger but doing little to help herself to do so. Despite an expense she could ill afford, for instance, she had all the books he had given her bound and took delight in contemplating her ‘little library'.
⁸
When Joe Taylor had announced the previous autumn that he was going to Brussels she seized the opportunity to write to Monsieur Heger, from whom she had heard nothing for over six months. She awaited Joe's return in the new year with eager anticipation, sure that he would at last bring her a letter. Her disappointment was doubly bitter when he returned empty-handed. In anger and sorrow she wrote reproachfully to Monsieur Heger yet again. ‘Mr Taylor has returned, I asked him if he had a letter for me – “No, nothing”. “Patience” – I say – “His sister will return soon” – Miss Taylor has returned “I have nothing for you from Monsieur Heger” says she “neither a letter nor a message.”' Unable to contain herself any longer, she burst out in uncontrollable pain and despair.

Day and night I find neither rest nor peace – if I sleep I have tortured dreams in which I see you always severe, always gloomy and annoyed with me –

Forgive me then Monsieur if I take the course of writing to you again – How can I endure life if I make no effort to alleviate my sufferings?

I know that you will be impatient when you read this letter – you will say again that I am over-excited – that I have black thoughts &c. It may be so Monsieur – I do not seek to justify myself, I submit to every kind of reproach – all I know – is that I cannot – that I will not resign myself to lose the friendship of my master completely – I would rather undergo the greatest physical sufferings than always have my heart torn apart by bitter regrets.

If my master withdraws his friendship entirely from me I will be completely without hope – if he gives me a little – very little – I will be content – happy, I
will have a reason for living – for working –

Monsieur, the poor do not need much to live – they only ask for the crumbs of bread which fall from the rich man's table – but if one refuses them these crumbs of bread – they die of hunger – Nor do I need much affection from those I love – I would not know what to do with an absolute and complete friendship – I am not used to such a thing – but you once showed me
a little
interest when I was your pupil in Brussels – and I cling on to preserving that
little
interest – I cling on to it as I cling to life.
⁹

One cannot but feel sorry for Monsieur Heger, a married man whose character and morals were above reproach. If he replied to his highly-strung former pupil, it merely encouraged her to write again. If he did not reply, in the hope that she might forget him, she brooded on his supposed neglect and became even more hysterical and obsessive. His own letters to her, infrequent as they seem to have been, contained nothing more than kindly advice about her character, her studies and her mode of life. He clearly had nothing to be ashamed of in his side of the correspondence, actually encouraging Mrs Gaskell to search for his own letters, which he was sure Charlotte would have preserved.
¹⁰

Fortunately for Charlotte, Monsieur Heger was no Zamorna; he had no wish to take advantage of her passion for him. Even after she was dead and rumours about him were rife, he refused to allow publication of Charlotte's letters to him as he had no wish to harm her reputation.
¹¹
In them, Charlotte showed all the servile and self-debasing devotion which her heroine, Mina Laury, had once displayed for Zamorna. Unlike Jane Eyre, Charlotte had no wish to be Monsieur Heger's equal: she wanted to be his inferior – even his slave – and she took a masochistic pleasure in desiring his dominance over her. Her poetry at this time also explored this type of relationship and, in at least one instance, seems to have drawn directly on her own experience.

At first I did attention give

Observance – deep esteem

His frown I failed not to forgive

His smile – a boon to deem

Attention rose to interest soon

Respect to homage changed

The smile became a valued boon

The frown like grief estranged

The interest ceased not with his voice

The homage tracked him near

Obedience was my heart's free choice

Whatere his word severe

His praise unfrequent – favour rare

Unduly precious grew

And too much power – a haunting fear

Around his anger threw –

His coming was my hope each day

His parting was my pain!

The chance that did his steps delay

Was ice in every vein

I gave entire affection now

I gave devotion sure

And strongly took root and fast did grow

One mighty feeling more

The truest love that ever heart

Felt at its kindled core

Through every vein with quickened start

A tide of life did pour
¹²

It was not as if Charlotte did not have distractions to divert her from her unhealthy obsession. In the new year Mary Taylor came to stay for a few days at Haworth,
¹³
a visit which Charlotte returned in February. After Mr Taylor's death the family had moved from Red House to the rather less salubrious Hunsworth House, which was right next to the Taylor mills in Cleckheaton. The visit had a sad purpose. After many delays and changes of plan, Mary had at last determined to emigrate to New Zealand with her brother. The imminent departure of one of her closest friends to the other side of the world did nothing to lift Charlotte's gloom. On her return she wrote to Ellen Nussey who was in Bridlington, nursing her brother George.

I spent a week at Hunsworth not very pleasantly; headache, sickliness, and flatness of spirits made me a poor companion, a sad drag on the vivacious and loquacious gaiety of all the other inmates of the house. I never was fortunate enough to be able to rally, for so much as a single hour, while I was there. I am sure all, with the exception perhaps of Mary, were very glad when I took my departure.
¹⁴

Mary, with typical forthrightness, had tried to tackle Charlotte about her depression and lack of motivation for the future which contrasted so strongly with her own ability to determine her fate. She described to Mrs Gaskell how they had talked over what Charlotte should do:

she told me she had quite decided to stay at home. She owned she did not like it. Her health was weak. She said she would like any change at first, as she had liked Brussels at first, and she thought that there must be some possibility for some people of having a life of more variety and more communion with human kind, but she saw none for her. I told her very warmly that she ought not to stay at home, that to spend the next five years at home, in solitude and weak health, would ruin her; that she would never recover it. Such a dark shadow came over her face when I said ‘Think of what you'll be five years hence!' that I stopped, and said, ‘Don't cry, Charlotte!' She did not cry, but went on walking up and down the room, and said in a little while, ‘But I intend to stay, Polly'.
¹⁵

Charlotte was well aware of her failings at this time, telling Ellen, ‘I begin to perceive that I have too little life in me, nowadays, to be fit company for any except very quiet people. Is it age, or what else, that changes one so?'
¹⁶
Even Joe Taylor fell victim to her increasingly bitter state of mind.

I saw his lordship in a new light last time I was at Hunsworth – sometimes I could scarcely believe my ears when I heard the stress he laid on wealth – Appearance Family – and all those advantages which are the acknowledged idols of the world – His conversation on Marriage – (and he talked much about it) differed in no degree from that of any hackneyed Fortune-Hunter – except that with his own peculiar and native audacity he avowed views & principles which more timid individuals conceal. Of course I raised no argument against anything he said I listened and laughed inwardly to think how indignant I should have been 8 years since if any one had accused Joe Taylor of being a worshipper of Mam [m] on and of Interest. Indeed I still believe that the Joe Taylor of 10 years
ago – is not the Joe Taylor of to-day – The world with its hardness and selfishness has utterly changed him – He thinks himself grown wiser than the wisest – in a worldly sense he is wise his feelings have gone through a process of petrification which will prevent them from ever warring against his interest – but Ichabod! all glory of principle and much elevation of character is gone!
¹⁷

Ellen's account of having mistaken a bachelor doctor in Bridlington for a married man and therefore having treated him with unwonted civility also made Charlotte consider the changes that time had wrought upon her. Ten years ago she would have laughed heartily at the tale and wondered how Ellen could possibly regret having been civil to a decent individual merely because he was unmarried. Now, however, she was able to see the commonsense behind such protocol. If women wished to avoid the stigma of husband-seeking,

they must act & look like marble or clay – cold – expressionless, bloodless – for every appearance of feeling of joy – sorrow – friendliness, antipathy, admiration – disgust are alike construed by the world into an attempt to hook in a husband –
¹⁸

If she truly believed this, one can only wonder what Charlotte thought she was doing in writing her impassioned letters to Monsieur Heger.

Charlotte's condemnation of the worldly attitude of her friends and society in general at this time seems to have owed at least something to her own obsession with money, or rather the lack of it. Mary Taylor, with her usual acute perceptiveness, was well aware that most of Charlotte's problems stemmed from her financial straits, describing her life as a ‘waking nightmare of “poverty and self-suppression”'. She herself had frequently urged on Charlotte the importance of earning money. ‘It seems to me hard indeed that you who would succeed better than anyone in making friends and keeping them should be condemned to solitude from you[r] poverty', Mary would write in 1850.

To no one would money bring more happiness, for no one would use it better than you would. – For me with my headlong self-indulgent habits I am perhaps better without it, but I am convinced it would give you great and noble pleasures. Look out then for success in writing. You ought to care as much for that as you do for going to Heaven.
¹⁹

In Brussels Charlotte had encountered a terrifying vision of her own possible future: a teacher, ten years older than herself, who used her male relatives to bear notes to unmarried men in the hope that one of them could be persuaded to marry her and save her from becoming a sister of charity if and when her present employment failed. Mary had then attempted to comfort her.