Author: insearchofannebronte@hotmail.com

As I type this I’m enjoying my honeymoon in beautiful Fuertaventura in the Canary Islands with my beautiful wife Yvette. It’s been a fabulous and much needed holiday, so I hope you’ll forgive me for repeating a post I first wrote in 2017. In this post we look at the Brontes on holiday, but as I return from my honeymoon soon I hope you can join me for an all new Bronte blog post next Sunday.

Anne Brontë and her sisters lived in a very different society to ours, and yet they had pressures and strains that we would recognise today. Like us, they needed on occasion to get away from the demands and mundanity of everyday life, an escape to a place of joy and relaxation – a holiday:

‘A little while, a little while,
The noisy crowd are barred away;
And I can sing and I can smile,
A little while I’ve holiday!
Where wilt thou go my harassed heart?
Full many a land invites thee now;
And places near, and far apart,
Have rest for thee, my weary brow –
There is a spot ‘mid barren hills,
Where winter howls and driving rain;
But, if the dreary tempest chills,
There is a light that warms again.
The house is old, the trees are bare,
And moonless bends the misty dome;
But what on earth is half so dear –
So longed for as the hearth of home?
The mute bird sitting on the stone,
The dank moss dripping from the wall,
The garden-walk with weeds o’ergrown,
I love them – how I love them all!
Shall I go there? or shall I seek,
Another clime, another sky,
Where tongues familiar music speak,
In accents dear to memory?
Yes, as I mused, the naked room,
The flickering firelight died away;
And from the midst of cheerless gloom,
I passed to bright, unclouded day –
A little and a lone green lane,
That opened on a common wide;
A distant, dreamy, dim blue chain,
Of mountains circling every side –
A heaven so clear, an earth so calm,
So sweet, so soft, so hushed an air;
And, deepening still the dream-like charm,
Wild moor-sheep feeding everywhere –
That was the scene – I knew it well;
I knew the pathways far and near,
That winding o’er each billowy swell,
Marked out the tracks of wandering deer.
Could I have lingered but an hour,
It well had paid a week of toil;
But truth has banished fancy’s power:
I hear my dungeon bars recoil –
Even as I stood with raptured eye,
Absorbed in bliss so deep and dear,
My hour of rest had fleeted by,
And given me back to weary care.’

Emily Brontë wrote this poem in December 1838, during her brief spell as a teacher at Law Hill near Halifax. It shows that for her there was only one place for a holiday – the old, familiar Haworth. Whilst Emily would become increasingly attached to the Parsonage and its surrounds, becoming a virtual recluse after her return from a year in Brussels, she could find relaxation and stimulation whenever she needed it, simply by walking across the moors she knew so well.

Out of all the Brontë sisters it was Charlotte who had the greatest yearning to travel. Even during the months and years that she resided at Haworth she would often journey to spend time with her friend Ellen Nussey at Birstall or at Hathersage, where her brother had been made vicar. These last sojourns proved particularly fruitful, as Hathersage was later recreated on paper as the Morton of ‘Jane Eyre’.

Charlotte’s love of travel developed in childhood. All of the Brontë siblings were fascinated by the tales of exploration and adventure that they read about in their father’s newspapers and magazines – this after all was a time of great exploration, led by people like Mungo Park and Hugh Clapperton. These tales were the catalyst for the creation of the imaginary lands of Angria and then Gondal, whose little books were the result of a ‘scribblemania’, as Charlotte put it, that would later find release in the novels we love so much today.

Whilst the other Brontës were happy to confine their adventures to the page, Charlotte wanted to explore in real life. This wanderlust was the reason that Charlotte jumped at the opportunity to head to Belgium at the beginning of 1842. Ostensibly travelling, with Emily beside her, to learn languages that would help attract pupils to their proposed school, she was really journeying to fulfill her dream of seeing new faces and places in a new country.

Charlotte’s Belgian adventure did not end well, returning to England with little more than a broken heart. She later found holiday-like enjoyment in her visits to London. After the death of her sisters, Charlotte began to appear within the London literary scene, and this gave her the chance to experience sights and events that were far removed from those she knew in Yorkshire. One event that had a particular impact on her was the Great Exhibition which ran in London’s Hyde Park from May to October of 1851. The huge structure in which it was held was christened the Crystal Palace, and within it were held treasures of science, art and culture from around the world. To Charlotte, and the millions of others who attended, it was a magical experience. She visited on numerous occasions, and gave a vivid description of what she saw:

‘Yesterday I went for the second time to the Crystal Palace. We remained in it about three hours, and I must say I was more struck with it on this occasion than at my first visit. It is a wonderful place – vast, strange, new and impossible to describe. Its grandeur does not consist in one thing, but in the unique assemblage of all things. Whatever human industry has created you find there, from the great compartments filled with railway engines and boilers, with mill machinery in full work, with splendid carriages of all kinds, with harness of every description, to the glass-covered and velvet-spread stands loaded with the most gorgeous work of the goldsmith and silversmith, and the carefully guarded caskets full of real diamonds and pearls worth hundreds of thousands of pounds. It may be called a bazaar or a fair, but it is such a bazaar or fair as Eastern genii might have created. It seems as if only magic could have gathered this mass of wealth from all the ends of the earth – as if none but supernatural hands could have arranged it this, with such a blaze and contrast of colours and marvellous power of effect. The multitude filling the great aisles seems ruled and subdued by some invisible influence. Amongst the thirty thousand souls that peopled it the day I was there not one loud noise was to be heard, not one irregular movement seen; the living tide rolls on quietly, with a deep hum like the sea heard from the distance.’

This was one of the greatest moments of Charlotte’s life, and a perfect holiday experience for her. Whilst she was captivated by the living tide, the sea of humanity, it was a very different tide that charmed her youngest sister Anne Brontë. From her earliest days, Anne loved the sea. The crashing, roaring waves with their white topped sprays held the same place in her heart that the wild purple moors held in Emily’s. We get a glimpse of Anne’s love of the sea in her 1839 picture ‘Sunrise Over Sea’. In this picture the sea is a vision of beauty, gilded by the golden rays of the sun, and at its centre is a woman with her back to us. With her characteristic long curled hair, it seems that this is a picture of Anne herself.

What is remarkable about this picture is that it was created before Anne had ever seen the sea, but a year later that would change. In June 1840 she made her first visit to Scarborough on the east coast of Yorkshire, spending around a month in Wood’s Lodgings in company with the Robinson family of Thorp Green, for whom she was working as a governess. She would make five such visits in all, and then one further visit in company with Charlotte and their friend Ellen Nussey in May 1849 – this was of course Anne’s final journey, as she had chosen to die in the place that meant so much to her.

Just what did Anne Brontë love so much about Scarborough? She liked the exciting new spa building and the grand bridge crossing to it, she loved the regular musical concerts given in the town, but most of all she loved to walk the sands and look out to the vast expanse of the sea. As she did so, she imagined two other women looking out to the sea from a similar beach in their childhood: her Aunt Elizabeth and Maria Branwell, the mother she had never known. Aunt Branwell was immensely proud of Penzance, and we know that she often talked about it. For Anne, who shared a room with her aunt throughout her childhood, these tales were magical, and they gave her a glimpse into the happy childhood her mother had spent by the Cornish coast. Anne would never travel to Penzance, it was after all further from Haworth than Brussels was, but Scarborough became her own substitute for it. Anne’s love of Scarborough, then, was a symbol of her love for her aunt and of her longing to have known her mother.

 

This weekend has been a very special one for me, as yesterday I married the love of my life Yvette, my wonderful Mrs Holland. It was a perfect day in every way, and we would like to thank the many of you who sent best wishes and congratulations!

As you can imagine this weekend has also been a very happy but also very busy and tiring one, so today’s post is simply going to share images of two -enactments of the wedding of Charlotte Brontë and Arthur Bell Nicholls. The wedding itself took place in 1854 in the Haworth church presided over by Charlotte’s father Patrick, and in which Arthur served as assistant curate. 

The first re-enactment pictured below occurred in 2004 to mark the 150th anniversary of Charlotte and Arthur’s big day.

The second re-enactment featured here took place in 2017, and here are some pictures I took, including of me holding a special commemorative confetti cone. I’m not sure they had those in 1854, but it was a wonderful, evocative event to be part of.

I leave you with a picture of myself and my beautiful bride. I couldn’t be happier, and I hope to see you here next Sunday for another new Brontë blog post.

This week, in two separate years, marked two landmark events in the Brontë story. It was a time for change in the Brontë family, and the coming days bring a major change for me as well, which I hope you won’t mind sharing with you. First, let’s look at two important Brontë events in 1815 and 1842.

We start by taking a journey back to February 8th 1815. It was a momentous month for European history, for in that month Napoleon left his exile on Elba, quickly assembled a large following and returned to France. It would spark a sequence of events which led to the Battle of Waterloo, 15 miles south of Brussels, just three months later.

In Haworth a very different event was taking place for it was on February 8th that the second Brontë child was born. She was named Elizabeth after her mother’s elder sister Elizabeth Branwell, a woman who herself would come to play a vital role in the Brontë story. Alas, Elizabeth’s life would never get to fulfil her destiny but, as I explained in an episode on my The House Of Brontë channel, I think it’s unfair that Elizabeth has become a forgotten Brontë.

Elizabeth was not, as a child, as gifted academically as her elder sister Maria nor her younger sisters, but that is not to say that she couldn’t have developed those skills, and she was praised by those who knew her for her kindness, pragmatism and common sense. Those would have been valuable assets within the Brontë family, and I have little doubt that she would have made a telling and positive contribution if she had been granted further years.

Certainly it seems to me that Emily Brontë never forgot her sister Elizabeth, never forgot the sister who led her on her first tentative trips onto those moors which radiate from Haworth on three sides.I believe that Emily’s chosen pen name of Ellis is a tribute to Elizabeth Brontë, and she may also be found in the character of Zillah the housekeeper in Wuthering Heights – after all, Elizabeth was being trained to be a housekeeper at Cowan Bridge school.

Let us wish Elizabeth Brontë a belated 210th birthday and hop forward to 1842. By this time her sisters and Cowan Bridge schoolmates Charlotte Brontë and Emily Brontë are setting out for another school – and their father Patrick is journeying with them.

On 8th February 1842 Charlotte and Emily Brontë began their journey from Haworth to Brussels, to enrol as adult pupils in the Pensionnat Heger school. Emily would be home a few months later, due to the death of the aforementioned Elizabeth ‘Aunt’ Branwell, but other than a brief return to Yorkshire Charlotte would remain in Belgium for two years.

They were two tumultuous years, full of triumphs and trauma. Charlotte excelled as a pupil to the extent that she became a teacher in her second year – but above all else, the Brussels experience was one of loneliness and frustration for her. Charlotte fell deeply into an unrequited love for Constantin Heger, husband of the school’s owner Clare Heger. It would leave her heart and mind indelibly scarred, but from these scars burst forth some of the greatest literature the world has ever seen. Heger is, after all, undoubtedly the prototype for both Rochester in Jane Eyre and Paul Emanuel in Villette.

Patrick travelled to Brussels with his daughters partly because he wanted to see them arrive safely, of course, but partly because he wanted to visit the site of the Waterloo battlefield. He had created for himself an English-French phrasebook for his journey, listing words in English, then French, and then as they were pronounced. Using this book, after taking leave of Charlotte and Emily, he travelled on to the Waterloo site – linking again the years 1842 and 1815.

February 8th was a time of change for the Brontë family then, and the effects of those changes can still be seen today in the brilliant novels the world loves so much. It is one week also to a major change for myself.

I hope you won’t mind me sharing my very special news that next Saturday, 15th February, I will be getting married to my beloved Yvette. At the age of 53 I have found the most exquisite happiness, and I can’t wait to see my beautiful bride walk down the aisle. I’m a very lucky man, and of course I will still continue to produce my weekly Brontë blog posts as always. Some of you who have already known of my upcoming happy event have asked if they can contribute a gift. We would not at all expect that of course, but anyone who wishes to do so can send a gift via the following page: https://withjoy.com/nick-and-yvette/registry

Life changed for the Brontës and life is changing for me, but my love of all things Brontë remains undiminished. I’ve been writing posts for this blog for over nine years now, and long may that continue – and as always, I will never have adverts on this site. I look forward to seeing you next Sunday, after my own big day, for another new Brontë blog post.

On this week in 1855 Haworth Parsonage was visited with joyous news after Dr William Macturk’s visit to a rather famous patient – Charlotte Brontë.

Charlotte was now styling herself Charlotte Brontë Nicholls after her marriage to Arthur Bell Nicholls in the summer of  1854. It was a very happy marriage, but at the start of 1855 Arthur was worried about an illness which seemed to have gripped his wife. She was frequently sick in the mornings, and although Arthur may well have assumed its cause he called in two physicians to put his mind at rest.

The first to examine Charlotte was Amos Ingham of Haworth. He was the village surgeon, which meant he was called upon to deal with medical maladies and necessities of all kinds. He was far from a specialist, however, and so on 30th January 1855 Dr Macturk of Bradford also arrived at the parsonage. Macturk was a celebrated physician, and was also renowned for founding both a church and a grammar school in the Manningham area of Bradford. We get the details of his visit in a letter Patrick Brontë sent to Charlotte’s fan and friend Sir James Kay-Shuttleworth on 3rd February 1855:

“Owing to my Dear Daughter’s indisposition, she has desired me to answer your kind letter, by return of post. For several days past, she has been confin’d to her bed, where she still lies, oppressed with nausea, sickness, irritation and a slow feverous feeling, and a complete want of appetite and digestion. Our Village Surgeon visits her daily, and we have had a visit from Dr Macturk of Bradford who both think her sickness is symptomatic – and after a few weeks they hope her health will again return.”

Some may speculate whether this could have been symptomatic of that great Brontë family curse tuberculosis, but we have further evidence that they meant it was symptomatic of pregnancy. 

On 21st February, Charlotte wrote to best friend Ellen Nussey and asked: ‘Write and tell me about Mrs. Hewitt’s case, how long she was ill and in what way.’

Mary Hewitt was another close friend of Ellen, and, tellingly, Mary had suffered severe sickness during her pregancy in the previous year, before giving birth to a son in December 1854. It seems clear then that Charlotte’s friends knew that she was pregnant, as further shown by the baby bonnet knitted by Charlotte’s friend, and former teacher and employer, Margaret Wooler, one of the most moving exhibits of the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

The great writer Elizabeth Gaskell, friend and biographer of Charlotte Brontë, also clarified the situation, explaining:

‘She [Charlotte] yielded to Mr. Nicholls’ wish that a doctor should be sent for. He came, and assigned a natural cause for her miserable indisposition; a little patience, and all would go right… Martha [parsonage servant Martha Brown] tenderly waited on her mistress, and from time to time tried to cheer her with the thought of the baby that was coming.”

Let us leave this snapshot in this happy moment, not least because I personally am entering into a very special and happy month. More on that next week, when I hope you can join me for another new Brontë blog post.

There are times in life when you are faced with sudden and unexpected challenges. At such times the luckiest among us, myself included, have a special someone that is there in their mind and heart, and that gives us enormous strength. Others turn to an inner stoicism and strength, the kind written about by Emily Brontë in a poem written in this week in 1846, one of the most remarkable and iconic poems: ‘No Coward Soul Is Mine.’

Emily Brontë was a genius of the highest order, everything she turned to (other than meeting people, for she was incredibly shy) she excelled at, and that included poetry. Emily shared her poetry with her sisters Charlotte and Anne from an early age, but she also had a secret notebook of hidden poems which delved into her deep, personal thoughts. It was this book which Charlotte Brontë ‘accidentally’ discovered in 1846, and this led directly to the first published Brontë book and then to the novels the world loves today. Charlotte herself later recalled the event:

‘One day, in the autumn of 1845, I accidentally lighted on a MS. volume of verse in my sister Emily’s handwriting.  Of course, I was not surprised, knowing that she could and did write verse: I looked it over, and something more than surprise seized me – a deep conviction that these were not common effusions, nor at all like the poetry women generally write.  I thought them condensed and terse, vigorous and genuine.  To my ear they had also a peculiar music – wild, melancholy, and elevating.’

Emily had no intention of her sisters seeing these hidden poems, let alone the whole world, but after a bitter argument Anne Brontë intervened and persuaded Emily to let them submit a joint poetry manuscript to publishers: the result was Poems by Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell and the world of literature was changed forever.

The manuscript, as with most manuscripts then and now, was rejected repeatedly, until on 6th February 1846 it was sent to Aylott & Jones, who agreed to publish the work if the Brontës, or the Bells as the publisher thought they were called, would cover the costs. We know that the sisters must have added poems to the manuscript, however, for perhaps its most celebrated poem was written just 11 days before it was sent to Aylott & Jones: Emily’s handwritten manuscript dates ‘No Coward Soul Is Mine’ to 25th January 1846. Here it is, in this manuscript form, in Emily’s own hand, and then transcribed:

No coward soul is mine
No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere
I see Heaven’s glories shine
And Faith shines equal arming me from Fear
O God within my breast
Almighty ever-present Deity
Life, that in me hast rest,
As I Undying Life, have power in Thee
Vain are the thousand creeds
That move men’s hearts, unutterably vain,
Worthless as withered weeds
Or idlest froth amid the boundless main
To waken doubt in one
Holding so fast by thy infinity,
So surely anchored on
The steadfast rock of Immortality.
With wide-embracing love
Thy spirit animates eternal years
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates and rears
Though earth and moon were gone
And suns and universes ceased to be
And Thou wert left alone
Every Existence would exist in thee
There is not room for Death
Nor atom that his might could render void
Since thou art Being and Breath
And what thou art may never be destroyed.

Just what does this poem tell us? It’s a short but complex poem which is open to many interpretations. At one level it is Emily Brontë looking at the nature of faith: she seems to be saying that faith isn’t found in a church or a book, it’s in oneself. Eternal, undying life is inside Emily, and so it needs no organised religion to win it for her. She also seems to attack organised religions as a whole: ‘vain are the thousand creeds that move men’s hearts, unutterably vain.”

And yet, above all, she has faith. It is this faith which provides the ultimate armour against fear – whatever life throws at her, she will face it head on. This sums up Emily’s beliefs and her actions: throughout all the challenges she faced she faced them head on, no coward soul was hers. It is a poem of defiance, of courage, of love for life – and one which still resonates today as it did in 1846. It certainly resonated with the great American poet Emily Dickinson, another trailblazing 19th century writer, who asked for just one poem to be read at her funeral: Emily Brontë’s ‘No Coward Soul Am I.’

Incidentally, you can read more about Emily and this poem in the new paperback edition of my book ‘Emily Brontë: A Life In 20 Poems’, released by The History Press on Feburary 25th. It’s updated with new sections and even more of Emily and her amazing life and work. I hope to see you here next Sunday for another new Brontë blog post.

This week has marked a joyous anniversary in the Brontë calendar, for it was on this week in 1820 that Anne Brontë was born in Thornton, near Bradford. The sixth and final child of the Brontë family, she has gained eternal fame as the youngest of the three writing Brontë sisters – and in my opinion her poetry and prose means that she deserves to be considered the equal of Charlotte and Emily Brontë.

In previous years we’ve marked this anniversary by looking at Anne Brontë’s skills as a writer, and at her place in the Brontë family and the wider world around it. Today we’re going to look at two first person accounts of Anne by those who had met and known her. 

There can little doubt that Anne Brontë was deeply loved by her family. She was the favourite of Aunt Branwell, who became like a second mother to the Brontë siblings, and she and Emily were like twins, walking together arm linked in arm. Charlotte Brontë called Anne the darling of her life, but what did the people of Haworth think?

The first account is from a Sarah Wood. By 1900 she was running a clothier’s shop in Haworth, but as a child she had been taught in Haworth Sunday school – and her teachers were some rather familiar children of the parish priest. Sarah recalled:

‘“Do I remember the Brontës?” was her greeting. “I should rather think I did. Miss Charlotte was my Sunday-school teacher. She was nice. But Miss Anne was my favourite: such a gentle creature.”’

Next we turn to someone who, as a youth, came to know the Brontë family very well. Tabitha Ratcliffe gave an interview in 1910 in her old age. Her maiden name was Tabitha Brown, she was the daughter of Haworth sexton (and friend of Branwell Brontë) John Brown, and the sister of parsonage servant Martha Brown. On occasion, Tabitha too was called upon to act as an additional servant to the Brontë family. She gave this fascinating recollection:

 ‘Her most interesting relic is a photograph on glass of the three sisters. “I believe Charlotte was the lowest and the broadest, and Emily was the tallest. She’d bigger bones and was stronger looking and more masculine, but very nice in her ways,” she comments. “But I used to think Miss Anne looked the nicest and most serious like; she used to teach at Sunday school. I’ve been taught by her and by Charlotte and all.” And it is on Anne that her glance rests as she says, “I think that is a good face.” There is no doubt which of the sisters of Haworth was Mrs Ratcliffe’s favourite.’

In the latter half of the nineteenth century a Haworth church guide was also interviewed, and he too recalled Anne Brontë in glowing terms:

‘Standing beside Charlotte’s last resting-place, I questioned my conductor respecting her, and found him at once ready and willing to oblige me with all the information in his possession. He had been but a little boy, he said, when all the family were living, but he remembered the three sisters well, and had often run errands for Mr Patrick. They used to take a great deal of notice of him when he was little; but Miss Annie was his favourite, perhaps because she always paid him so much attention. Baking-day never came round at the parsonage without her remembering to make a little cake or dumpling for him, and she seldom met him without having something good and sweet to bestow upon him.’

In my latest House Of Brontë video, I look at these accounts, and at just why Anne Brontë is so important today, and why her works are still so rewarding to read:

It was great to see that Anne Brontë was remembered in Thornton, the place of her birth, this weekend. The Brontë Birthplace put together what seemed to be a splendid Anne Brontë event. It looks like it was very well attended, and it has received unanimously positive feedback. I regret that I couldn’t attend due to wedding preparations, but I will certainly get to some of the events put on by the wonderful Brontë Birthplace team later this year. Here is a picture, from their social media, of the volunteers who helped to make the Anne Brontë celebration such a success. Well done to all involved, and to all who attended!

I hope to see you next week for another new Brontë blog post, and in the meantime let’s all join together to say ‘happy 205th birthday Anne Brontë!’

 

Jane Eyre like all the  Brontë novels is an entertaining and enjoyable read, one which works on many levels and which lingers in your mind and heart long after you have turned the last page. It has moments of terror, moments of triumph, moments of hate and moments of love, but there is one particular passage which has become controversial: the Romany fortune teller scene.

This particular scene came to my mind yesterday when I stopped to talk to a Romany lady who was selling lucky heather and charms. It was a scene which seemed to be much more prevalent in my childhood, but now it struck me as being something rarely seen in today’s modern, fast paced world. I happily bought some heather, chatted to the lady and what she said was absolutely fascinating – I was more than happy to cross her palm with silver for the privilege.

I had taken part in a longstanding tradition in this country, and it held a particular fascination for readers in the mid-nineteenth century. One reason why Romany references in both Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights seem controversial today is because of their use of a term which we would not readily use today: gipsy. It was, however, in common parlance of the time, used because of the prevailing opinion that in the midst of time these people had originally come from Egypt, bringing their own language and customs with them. Customs which, some said, included the ability to see into the spirit world and tell fortunes.

For middle class Victorians, who made up the vast majority of the book reading public at the time, visiting Romany camps was also seen as an exciting way to pass time, as we see in chapter 18 of Jane Eyre:

“The want of his animating influence appeared to be peculiarly felt one day that he had been summoned to Millcote on business, and was not likely to return till late. The afternoon was wet: a walk the party had proposed to take to see a gipsy camp, lately pitched on a common beyond Hay, was consequently deferred.”

This outing was postponed because of the weather (some things never change), but the suggestion of the visit had planted a seed in the mind of the party’s host – a certain Edward Rochester. It leads to one of Charlotte’s novel’s most divisive moments:
‘I was pondering these things, when an incident, and a somewhat unexpected one, broke the thread of my musings. Mr. Mason, shivering as some one chanced to open the door, asked for more coal to be put on the fire, which had burnt out its flame, though its mass of cinder still shone hot and red. The footman who brought the coal, in going out, stopped near Mr. Eshton’s chair, and said something to him in a low voice, of which I heard only the words, “old woman,” – “quite troublesome.”

“Tell her she shall be put in the stocks if she does not take herself off,” replied the magistrate.

“No – stop!” interrupted Colonel Dent. “Don’t send her away, Eshton; we might turn the thing to account; better consult the ladies.” And speaking aloud, he continued – “Ladies, you talked of going to Hay Common to visit the gipsy camp; Sam here says that one of the old Mother Bunches is in the servants’ hall at this moment, and insists upon being brought in before ‘the quality,’ to tell them their fortunes. Would you like to see her?”

“Surely, colonel,” cried Lady Ingram, “you would not encourage such a low impostor? Dismiss her, by all means, at once!”

“But I cannot persuade her to go away, my lady,” said the footman; “nor can any of the servants: Mrs. Fairfax is with her just now, entreating her to be gone; but she has taken a chair in the chimney-corner, and says nothing shall stir her from it till she gets leave to come in here.”

“What does she want?” asked Mrs. Eshton.

“‘To tell the gentry their fortunes,’ she says, ma’am; and she swears she must and will do it.”

“What is she like?” inquired the Misses Eshton, in a breath.

“A shockingly ugly old creature, miss; almost as black as a crock.”

“Why, she’s a real sorceress!” cried Frederick Lynn. “Let us have her in, of course.”

“To be sure,” rejoined his brother; “it would be a thousand pities to throw away such a chance of fun.”

“My dear boys, what are you thinking about?” exclaimed Mrs. Lynn.

“I cannot possibly countenance any such inconsistent proceeding,” chimed in the Dowager Ingram.

“Indeed, mama, but you can – and will,” pronounced the haughty voice of Blanche, as she turned round on the piano-stool; where till now she had sat silent, apparently examining sundry sheets of music. “I have a curiosity to hear my fortune told: therefore, Sam, order the beldame forward.”

“My darling Blanche! recollect – ”

“I do – I recollect all you can suggest; and I must have my will – quick, Sam!”

“Yes – yes – yes!” cried all the juveniles, both ladies and gentlemen. “Let her come – it will be excellent sport!”

The footman still lingered. “She looks such a rough one,” said he.

“Go!” ejaculated Miss Ingram, and the man went.

Excitement instantly seized the whole party: a running fire of raillery and jests was proceeding when Sam returned.

“She won’t come now,” said he. “She says it’s not her mission to appear before the ‘vulgar herd’ (them’s her words). I must show her into a room by herself, and then those who wish to consult her must go to her one by one.”

“You see now, my queenly Blanche,” began Lady Ingram, “she encroaches. Be advised, my angel girl – and – ”

“Show her into the library, of course,” cut in the “angel girl.” “It is not my mission to listen to her before the vulgar herd either: I mean to have her all to myself. Is there a fire in the library?”

“Yes, ma’am – but she looks such a tinkler.”

“Cease that chatter, blockhead! and do my bidding.”

Again Sam vanished; and mystery, animation, expectation rose to full flow once more.

“She’s ready now,” said the footman, as he reappeared. “She wishes to know who will be her first visitor.”

“I think I had better just look in upon her before any of the ladies go,” said Colonel Dent.

“Tell her, Sam, a gentleman is coming.”

Sam went and returned.

“She says, sir, that she’ll have no gentlemen; they need not trouble themselves to come near her; nor,” he added, with difficulty suppressing a titter, “any ladies either, except the young, and single.”

“By Jove, she has taste!” exclaimed Henry Lynn.

Miss Ingram rose solemnly: “I go first,” she said, in a tone which might have befitted the leader of a forlorn hope, mounting a breach in the van of his men.

“Oh, my best! oh, my dearest! pause – reflect!” was her mama’s cry; but she swept past her in stately silence, passed through the door which Colonel Dent held open, and we heard her enter the library.

A comparative silence ensued. Lady Ingram thought it “le cas” to wring her hands: which she did accordingly. Miss Mary declared she felt, for her part, she never dared venture. Amy and Louisa Eshton tittered under their breath, and looked a little frightened.

The minutes passed very slowly: fifteen were counted before the library-door again opened. Miss Ingram returned to us through the arch.

Would she laugh? Would she take it as a joke? All eyes met her with a glance of eager curiosity, and she met all eyes with one of rebuff and coldness; she looked neither flurried nor merry: she walked stiffly to her seat, and took it in silence.

“Well, Blanche?” said Lord Ingram.

“What did she say, sister?” asked Mary.

“What did you think? How do you feel? Is she a real fortune-teller?” demanded the Misses Eshton.

“Now, now, good people,” returned Miss Ingram, “don’t press upon me. Really your organs of wonder and credulity are easily excited: you seem, by the importance of you all – my good mama included – ascribe to this matter, absolutely to believe we have a genuine witch in the house, who is in close alliance with the old gentleman. I have seen a gipsy vagabond; she has practised in hackneyed fashion the science of palmistry and told me what such people usually tell. My whim is gratified; and now I think Mr. Eshton will do well to put the hag in the stocks to-morrow morning, as he threatened.”

Miss Ingram took a book, leant back in her chair, and so declined further conversation. I watched her for nearly half-an-hour: during all that time she never turned a page, and her face grew momently darker, more dissatisfied, and more sourly expressive of disappointment. She had obviously not heard anything to her advantage: and it seemed to me, from her prolonged fit of gloom and taciturnity, that she herself, notwithstanding her professed indifference, attached undue importance to whatever revelations had been made her.

Meantime, Mary Ingram, Amy and Louisa Eshton, declared they dared not go alone; and yet they all wished to go. A negotiation was opened through the medium of the ambassador, Sam; and after much pacing to and fro, till, I think, the said Sam’s calves must have ached with the exercise, permission was at last, with great difficulty, extorted from the rigorous Sibyl, for the three to wait upon her in a body.

Their visit was not so still as Miss Ingram’s had been: we heard hysterical giggling and little shrieks proceeding from the library; and at the end of about twenty minutes they burst the door open, and came running across the hall, as if they were half-scared out of their wits.

“I am sure she is something not right!” they cried, one and all. “She told us such things! She knows all about us!” and they sank breathless into the various seats the gentlemen hastened to bring them.

Pressed for further explanation, they declared she had told them of things they had said and done when they were mere children; described books and ornaments they had in their boudoirs at home: keepsakes that different relations had presented to them. They affirmed that she had even divined their thoughts, and had whispered in the ear of each the name of the person she liked best in the world, and informed them of what they most wished for.

Here the gentlemen interposed with earnest petitions to be further enlightened on these two last-named points; but they got only blushes, ejaculations, tremors, and titters, in return for their importunity. The matrons, meantime, offered vinaigrettes and wielded fans; and again and again reiterated the expression of their concern that their warning had not been taken in time; and the elder gentlemen laughed, and the younger urged their services on the agitated fair ones.

In the midst of the tumult, and while my eyes and ears were fully engaged in the scene before me, I heard a hem close at my elbow: I turned, and saw Sam.

“If you please, miss, the gipsy declares that there is another young single lady in the room who has not been to her yet, and she swears she will not go till she has seen all. I thought it must be you: there is no one else for it. What shall I tell her?”

“Oh, I will go by all means,” I answered: and I was glad of the unexpected opportunity to gratify my much-excited curiosity. I slipped out of the room, unobserved by any eye – for the company were gathered in one mass about the trembling trio just returned – and I closed the door quietly behind me.

“If you like, miss,” said Sam, “I’ll wait in the hall for you; and if she frightens you, just call and I’ll come in.”

“No, Sam, return to the kitchen: I am not in the least afraid.” Nor was I; but I was a good deal interested and excited.

The library looked tranquil enough as I entered it, and the Sibyl – if Sibyl she were – was seated snugly enough in an easy-chair at the chimney-corner. She had on a red cloak and a black bonnet: or rather, a broad-brimmed gipsy hat, tied down with a striped handkerchief under her chin. An extinguished candle stood on the table; she was bending over the fire, and seemed reading in a little black book, like a prayer-book, by the light of the blaze: she muttered the words to herself, as most old women do, while she read; she did not desist immediately on my entrance: it appeared she wished to finish a paragraph.

I stood on the rug and warmed my hands, which were rather cold with sitting at a distance from the drawing-room fire. I felt now as composed as ever I did in my life: there was nothing indeed in the gipsy’s appearance to trouble one’s calm. She shut her book and slowly looked up; her hat-brim partially shaded her face, yet I could see, as she raised it, that it was a strange one. It looked all brown and black: elf-locks bristled out from beneath a white band which passed under her chin, and came half over her cheeks, or rather jaws: her eye confronted me at once, with a bold and direct gaze.

“Well, and you want your fortune told?” she said, in a voice as decided as her glance, as harsh as her features.

“I don’t care about it, mother; you may please yourself: but I ought to warn you, I have no faith.”

“It’s like your impudence to say so: I expected it of you; I heard it in your step as you crossed the threshold.”

“Did you? You’ve a quick ear.”

“I have; and a quick eye and a quick brain.”

“You need them all in your trade.”

“I do; especially when I’ve customers like you to deal with. Why don’t you tremble?”

“I’m not cold.”

“Why don’t you turn pale?”

“I am not sick.”

“Why don’t you consult my art?”

“I’m not silly.”

The old crone “nichered” a laugh under her bonnet and bandage; she then drew out a short black pipe, and lighting it began to smoke. Having indulged a while in this sedative, she raised her bent body, took the pipe from her lips, and while gazing steadily at the fire, said very deliberately – 

“You are cold; you are sick; and you are silly.”

“Prove it,” I rejoined.

“I will, in few words. You are cold, because you are alone: no contact strikes the fire from you that is in you. You are sick; because the best of feelings, the highest and the sweetest given to man, keeps far away from you. You are silly, because, suffer as you may, you will not beckon it to approach, nor will you stir one step to meet it where it waits you.”

She again put her short black pipe to her lips, and renewed her smoking with vigour.

“You might say all that to almost any one who you knew lived as a solitary dependent in a great house.”

“I might say it to almost any one: but would it be true of almost any one?”

“In my circumstances.”

“Yes; just so, in your circumstances: but find me another precisely placed as you are.”

“It would be easy to find you thousands.”

“You could scarcely find me one. If you knew it, you are peculiarly situated: very near happiness; yes, within reach of it. The materials are all prepared; there only wants a movement to combine them. Chance laid them somewhat apart; let them be once approached and bliss results.”

“I don’t understand enigmas. I never could guess a riddle in my life.”

“If you wish me to speak more plainly, show me your palm.”

“And I must cross it with silver, I suppose?”

“To be sure.”

I gave her a shilling: she put it into an old stocking-foot which she took out of her pocket, and having tied it round and returned it, she told me to hold out my hand. I did. She approached her face to the palm, and pored over it without touching it.

“It is too fine,” said she. “I can make nothing of such a hand as that; almost without lines: besides, what is in a palm? Destiny is not written there.”

“I believe you,” said I.

“No,” she continued, “it is in the face: on the forehead, about the eyes, in the lines of the mouth. Kneel, and lift up your head.”

“Ah! now you are coming to reality,” I said, as I obeyed her. “I shall begin to put some faith in you presently.”

I knelt within half a yard of her. She stirred the fire, so that a ripple of light broke from the disturbed coal: the glare, however, as she sat, only threw her face into deeper shadow: mine, it illumined.

“I wonder with what feelings you came to me to-night,” she said, when she had examined me a while. “I wonder what thoughts are busy in your heart during all the hours you sit in yonder room with the fine people flitting before you like shapes in a magic-lantern: just as little sympathetic communion passing between you and them as if they were really mere shadows of human forms, and not the actual substance.”

“I feel tired often, sleepy sometimes, but seldom sad.”

“Then you have some secret hope to buoy you up and please you with whispers of the future?”

“Not I. The utmost I hope is, to save money enough out of my earnings to set up a school some day in a little house rented by myself.”

“A mean nutriment for the spirit to exist on: and sitting in that window-seat (you see I know your habits) – ”

“You have learned them from the servants.”

“Ah! you think yourself sharp. Well, perhaps I have: to speak truth, I have an acquaintance with one of them, Mrs. Poole – ”

I started to my feet when I heard the name.

“You have – have you?” thought I; “there is diablerie in the business after all, then!”

“Don’t be alarmed,” continued the strange being; “she’s a safe hand is Mrs. Poole: close and quiet; any one may repose confidence in her. But, as I was saying: sitting in that window-seat, do you think of nothing but your future school? Have you no present interest in any of the company who occupy the sofas and chairs before you? Is there not one face you study? one figure whose movements you follow with at least curiosity?”

“I like to observe all the faces and all the figures.”

“But do you never single one from the rest – or it may be, two?”

“I do frequently; when the gestures or looks of a pair seem telling a tale: it amuses me to watch them.”

“What tale do you like best to hear?”

“Oh, I have not much choice! They generally run on the same theme – courtship; and promise to end in the same catastrophe – marriage.”

“And do you like that monotonous theme?”

“Positively, I don’t care about it: it is nothing to me.”

“Nothing to you? When a lady, young and full of life and health, charming with beauty and endowed with the gifts of rank and fortune, sits and smiles in the eyes of a gentleman you – ”

“I what?”

“You know – and perhaps think well of.”

“I don’t know the gentlemen here. I have scarcely interchanged a syllable with one of them; and as to thinking well of them, I consider some respectable, and stately, and middle-aged, and others young, dashing, handsome, and lively: but certainly they are all at liberty to be the recipients of whose smiles they please, without my feeling disposed to consider the transaction of any moment to me.”

“You don’t know the gentlemen here? You have not exchanged a syllable with one of them? Will you say that of the master of the house!”

“He is not at home.”

“A profound remark! A most ingenious quibble! He went to Millcote this morning, and will be back here to-night or to-morrow: does that circumstance exclude him from the list of your acquaintance – blot him, as it were, out of existence?”

“No; but I can scarcely see what Mr. Rochester has to do with the theme you had introduced.”

“I was talking of ladies smiling in the eyes of gentlemen; and of late so many smiles have been shed into Mr. Rochester’s eyes that they overflow like two cups filled above the brim: have you never remarked that?”

“Mr. Rochester has a right to enjoy the society of his guests.”

“No question about his right: but have you never observed that, of all the tales told here about matrimony, Mr. Rochester has been favoured with the most lively and the most continuous?”

“The eagerness of a listener quickens the tongue of a narrator.” I said this rather to myself than to the gipsy, whose strange talk, voice, manner, had by this time wrapped me in a kind of dream. One unexpected sentence came from her lips after another, till I got involved in a web of mystification; and wondered what unseen spirit had been sitting for weeks by my heart watching its workings and taking record of every pulse.

“Eagerness of a listener!” repeated she: “yes; Mr. Rochester has sat by the hour, his ear inclined to the fascinating lips that took such delight in their task of communicating; and Mr. Rochester was so willing to receive and looked so grateful for the pastime given him; you have noticed this?”

“Grateful! I cannot remember detecting gratitude in his face.”

“Detecting! You have analysed, then. And what did you detect, if not gratitude?”

I said nothing.

“You have seen love: have you not? – and, looking forward, you have seen him married, and beheld his bride happy?”

“Humph! Not exactly. Your witch’s skill is rather at fault sometimes.”

“What the devil have you seen, then?”

“Never mind: I came here to inquire, not to confess. Is it known that Mr. Rochester is to be married?”

“Yes; and to the beautiful Miss Ingram.”

“Shortly?”

“Appearances would warrant that conclusion: and, no doubt (though, with an audacity that wants chastising out of you, you seem to question it), they will be a superlatively happy pair. He must love such a handsome, noble, witty, accomplished lady; and probably she loves him, or, if not his person, at least his purse. I know she considers the Rochester estate eligible to the last degree; though (God pardon me!) I told her something on that point about an hour ago which made her look wondrous grave: the corners of her mouth fell half an inch. I would advise her blackaviced suitor to look out: if another comes, with a longer or clearer rent-roll, – he’s dished – ”

“But, mother, I did not come to hear Mr. Rochester’s fortune: I came to hear my own; and you have told me nothing of it.”

“Your fortune is yet doubtful: when I examined your face, one trait contradicted another. Chance has meted you a measure of happiness: that I know. I knew it before I came here this evening. She has laid it carefully on one side for you. I saw her do it. It depends on yourself to stretch out your hand, and take it up: but whether you will do so, is the problem I study. Kneel again on the rug.”

“Don’t keep me long; the fire scorches me.”

I knelt. She did not stoop towards me, but only gazed, leaning back in her chair. She began muttering, – 

“The flame flickers in the eye; the eye shines like dew; it looks soft and full of feeling; it smiles at my jargon: it is susceptible; impression follows impression through its clear sphere; where it ceases to smile, it is sad; an unconscious lassitude weighs on the lid: that signifies melancholy resulting from loneliness. It turns from me; it will not suffer further scrutiny; it seems to deny, by a mocking glance, the truth of the discoveries I have already made, – to disown the charge both of sensibility and chagrin: its pride and reserve only confirm me in my opinion. The eye is favourable.

“As to the mouth, it delights at times in laughter; it is disposed to impart all that the brain conceives; though I daresay it would be silent on much the heart experiences. Mobile and flexible, it was never intended to be compressed in the eternal silence of solitude: it is a mouth which should speak much and smile often, and have human affection for its interlocutor. That feature too is propitious.

“I see no enemy to a fortunate issue but in the brow; and that brow professes to say, – ‘I can live alone, if self-respect, and circumstances require me so to do. I need not sell my soul to buy bliss. I have an inward treasure born with me, which can keep me alive if all extraneous delights should be withheld, or offered only at a price I cannot afford to give.’ The forehead declares, ‘Reason sits firm and holds the reins, and she will not let the feelings burst away and hurry her to wild chasms. The passions may rage furiously, like true heathens, as they are; and the desires may imagine all sorts of vain things: but judgment shall still have the last word in every argument, and the casting vote in every decision. Strong wind, earthquake-shock, and fire may pass by: but I shall follow the guiding of that still small voice which interprets the dictates of conscience.’

“Well said, forehead; your declaration shall be respected. I have formed my plans – right plans I deem them – and in them I have attended to the claims of conscience, the counsels of reason. I know how soon youth would fade and bloom perish, if, in the cup of bliss offered, but one dreg of shame, or one flavour of remorse were detected; and I do not want sacrifice, sorrow, dissolution – such is not my taste. I wish to foster, not to blight – to earn gratitude, not to wring tears of blood – no, nor of brine: my harvest must be in smiles, in endearments, in sweet – That will do. I think I rave in a kind of exquisite delirium. I should wish now to protract this moment ad infinitum; but I dare not. So far I have governed myself thoroughly. I have acted as I inwardly swore I would act; but further might try me beyond my strength. Rise, Miss Eyre: leave me; ‘the play is played out.’”

Where was I? Did I wake or sleep? Had I been dreaming? Did I dream still? The old woman’s voice had changed: her accent, her gesture, and all were familiar to me as my own face in a glass – as the speech of my own tongue. I got up, but did not go. I looked; I stirred the fire, and I looked again: but she drew her bonnet and her bandage closer about her face, and again beckoned me to depart. The flame illuminated her hand stretched out: roused now, and on the alert for discoveries, I at once noticed that hand. It was no more the withered limb of eld than my own; it was a rounded supple member, with smooth fingers, symmetrically turned; a broad ring flashed on the little finger, and stooping forward, I looked at it, and saw a gem I had seen a hundred times before. Again I looked at the face; which was no longer turned from me – on the contrary, the bonnet was doffed, the bandage displaced, the head advanced.

“Well, Jane, do you know me?” asked the familiar voice.

“Only take off the red cloak, sir, and then – ”

“But the string is in a knot – help me.”

“Break it, sir.”

“There, then – ‘Off, ye lendings!’” And Mr. Rochester stepped out of his disguise.

“Now, sir, what a strange idea!”

“But well carried out, eh? Don’t you think so?”

“With the ladies you must have managed well.”

“But not with you?”

“You did not act the character of a gipsy with me.”

“What character did I act? My own?”

“No; some unaccountable one. In short, I believe you have been trying to draw me out – or in; you have been talking nonsense to make me talk nonsense. It is scarcely fair, sir.”

“Do you forgive me, Jane?”

“I cannot tell till I have thought it all over. If, on reflection, I find I have fallen into no great absurdity, I shall try to forgive you; but it was not right.”

“Oh, you have been very correct – very careful, very sensible.”

I reflected, and thought, on the whole, I had. It was a comfort; but, indeed, I had been on my guard almost from the beginning of the interview. Something of masquerade I suspected. I knew gipsies and fortune-tellers did not express themselves as this seeming old woman had expressed herself; besides I had noted her feigned voice, her anxiety to conceal her features. But my mind had been running on Grace Poole – that living enigma, that mystery of mysteries, as I considered her. I had never thought of Mr. Rochester.

“Well,” said he, “what are you musing about? What does that grave smile signify?”

“Wonder and self-congratulation, sir. I have your permission to retire now, I suppose?”

“No; stay a moment; and tell me what the people in the drawing-room yonder are doing.”

“Discussing the gipsy, I daresay.”

“Sit down! – Let me hear what they said about me.”

“I had better not stay long, sir; it must be near eleven o’clock. Oh, are you aware, Mr. Rochester, that a stranger has arrived here since you left this morning?”

“A stranger! – no; who can it be? I expected no one; is he gone?”

“No; he said he had known you long, and that he could take the liberty of installing himself here till you returned.”

“The devil he did! Did he give his name?”

“His name is Mason, sir; and he comes from the West Indies; from Spanish Town, in Jamaica, I think.”

Mr. Rochester was standing near me; he had taken my hand, as if to lead me to a chair. As I spoke he gave my wrist a convulsive grip; the smile on his lips froze: apparently a spasm caught his breath.

“Mason! – the West Indies!” he said, in the tone one might fancy a speaking automaton to enounce its single words; “Mason! – the West Indies!” he reiterated; and he went over the syllables three times, growing, in the intervals of speaking, whiter than ashes: he hardly seemed to know what he was doing.

“Do you feel ill, sir?” I inquired.

“Jane, I’ve got a blow; I’ve got a blow, Jane!” He staggered.’

So there we have Jane’s encounter with the fortune-teller, who is of course actually Rochester. So controversial is this scene that it is often deleted or abridged in television and film adaptations of the novel, although the magnificent 1983 adaptation starting Timothy Dalton and Zelah Clarke included it in full. This post contains images from that adaptation.

It is not only the use of gipsy which renders it a controversial scene, as many say that it shows Rochester’s devious and controlling nature. He has certainly gone to great lengths to draw Jane Eyre’s hidden feelings out of her, but it should also be remembered that Charlotte herself thought of Rochester as a great romantic hero and went to lengths to defend his reputation in letters which drew sharp contrasts between he and Heathcliff.

Interestingly, Branwell Brontë’s great friend Francis Grundy revealed that Branwell often used to consult a famous Haworth fortune teller, an old man that my previous investigations revealed to be Jack Kaye.

I hope to see you again next week for another new Brontë blog post, and may your week and future ahead be a blessed one. Oh, and don’t forget that on this coming Saturday, 18th January, at Thornton’s St. James’s Church there is a special Anne Brontë celebration entitled The Three Anne(s). Proceeds go to help the wonderful Brontë Birthplace project. You can buy tickets online or pay on the day.

 

I hope your new year has got off to a happy start full of health and wealth. Alas, it was not to be in the Brontë household at the start of 1849 for it was on this very day that Anne Brontë was diagnosed with the thing her family dreaded – terminal consumption.

In just a handful of months this terrible disease had claimed her brother Branwell and her beloved sister Emily Brontë, and consumption, what we now call tuberculosis, had not finished with Haworth Parsonage yet.  By the time Emily’s funeral was held Anne was already exhibiting the classic symptoms of couging and shortness of breath upon any exertion. Soon these symptoms would be joined with sleepless nights, fatigue and wasting, and the coughing up of blood – as Anne Brontë’s blood spattered handkerchief shows all too clearly.

Patrick Brontë, all too aaware what these symptoms could mean but still clinging on to some hope asked a Dr Teale to attend the parsonage from Leeds. Teale was a consumption specialist, and Ellen Nussey, who was visiting the parsonage at the time in order to conceal Charlotte Brontë following Emily’s death, gave this moving account of what happened next:

“Anne was looking sweetly pretty and flushed, and in capital spirits for an invalid. While consultations were going on in Mr Brontë‘s study, Anne was very lively in conversation, walking around the room surrounded by me. Mr Brontë joined us after Mr Teale’s departure and, seating himself on the couch, he drew Anne towards him and said, “My dear little Anne.” That was all – but it was understood.’

The final chapter in Anne Brontë’s story had commenced – she had been diagnosed with the final stages of consumption, and there was nothing that medical science of the time could do. Anne’s life would be over all too quickly, and yet when we look back at our distance of two centuries we can see that it was a life of triumph. Anne’s life and works are remembered still, and always will be. I was delighted, therefore, to receive news of a fabulous Anne Brontë event taking place at the Brontë birthplace in Thornton, Bradford on January 18th. The event is called The Three Ann(e)s, and will be a celebration of Anne Brontë’s life with prose and piano. 

The event takes place at St. James’ Church, across from the Old Bell Chapel which saw Anne’s baptism. Doors open at 1.30 and the main event commences at 2pm. Over the course of a fascinating hour pianist Ann Airton and Brontë buff Anne Powell will celebrate Anne using music and words. It’s something that music loving Anne Brontë would definitely have approved of, especially as it’s just one day after Anne’s birthday.

It also marks the start of Bradford’s reign as 2025 City Of Culture. There will also be refreshments and a raffle, and an opportunity to mix with fellow Brontë enthusiasts in the village where the Brontë sisters’ story began. What better way could you spend a Saturday afternoon in January. For more information and tickets just click on this link. Oh, and by the way, the brilliant Brontë Birthplace is also seeking applicants for their Programme Manager position, so take a look at their website if you can help.

I hope to see you next week for another new Brontë blog post.

All too often our encounters with the Brontë stories are tragic ones, especially if we follow them week by week, as we do on this blog. Just last week we marked the tragic early death of Emily Brontë. It was anything but festive, but today we mark a much more joyous occasion as we celebrate the wedding of Patrick Brontë and Maria Branwell.

It was on this day in 1812 that Patrick and Maria became Mr and Mrs Brontë – marking the beginning of the Brontë story as we know it, the birth of the House of Brontë. Their married life produced six children, and it was a love match – which wasn’t always the case in the early nineteenth century. 

We can still visit the location of their wedding – St. Oswald’s church is in Guiseley, between Leeds and Bradford and three miles north of Woodhouse Grove school where Patrick and Maria first met, probably, in the summer of 1812. I say probably because there is a possibility they had met before, and I will explore that in another blog post. You can see this grand old church at the head of this post.

It was a doubly joyful occasion within St. Oswald’s as it was a double wedding – alongside Patrick and Maria, William Morgan (Patrick’s best friend) married Jane Fennell (Maria’s cousin). John Fennell, Patrick’s employer at the school where he was a Classics examiner, gave away the two brides – Jane and Maria were his daughter and niece.

To add to the unique nature of this event, 400 miles to the south, in Penzance, Cornwall, Charlotte Branwell, sister to Maria and cousin to Jane Fennell, was marrying yet another cousin, Joseph Branwell. On Christmas Day 1884, this Charlotte’s daughter, another Charlotte Branwell, gave this fulsome description to a local newspaper:

‘It was arranged that the two marriages [Patrick and Maria and William and Jane] should be solemnized on the same day as that of Miss Charlotte Branwell’s mother, fixed for 29th December in far off Penzance. And so, whilst the youngest sister of Mrs. Brontë was being married to her cousin, the late Mr Joseph Branwell, the double marriage, as already noted was taking place in Yorkshire. Miss Charlotte Branwell also adds that at Guiseley not only did the Rev. Mr Brontë and the Rev. Mr Morgan perform the marriage ceremony for one another, but the brides acted as bridesmaids for each other. Mr Fennell, who was a clergyman of the Church of England, would have united the young people, but he had to give both brides away. Miss Branwell notes these facts to prove that the arrangement for the three marriages on the same day was no caprice or eccentricity on the part of Mr Brontë, but was made entirely by the brides. She has many a time heard her mother speak of the circumstances. “It is but seldom,” continues Miss Branwell, “that two sisters and four cousins are united in holy matrimony on the same day. Those who were united on that day bore that relationship to each other. Mrs. Brontë (formerly Maria Branwell) and my mother, Charlotte Branwell, were sisters; my father was their cousin; and Jane Fennel was a cousin to them all, her father, the Rev. J. Fennell, having married a Miss Branwell of a former generation.

If the account I have given you is likely to be of any interest you are quite at liberty to use it as you think proper. I really think a deal of eccentricity has been ascribed to Mr Brontë which he never possessed, and from his letters to my dear mother, of which there are some still in existence, I should say he was a very worthy man, but one who had to pass through some great trials in the early death of a truly amiable wife and of a very gifted family.”’

Patrick and Maria, William and Jane, Joseph and Charlotte all ended the year on a high, and in my own way I am too. I’ve loved sharing lots of Brontë blog posts with you throughout the year, and I’m enjoying making videos for my new YouTube channel The House Of Brontë.

Today’s post is very appropriate for me too, as I look forward to my own wedding next year. 2025 promises to be a wonderful year for me, so thank you for all your support as always. I hope to see you here on Thursday for a special New Year’s Day Brontë blog post.

We’ve made it to another Christmas, and I hope yours is just as joyful and happy as mine is! I’m typing this on Christmas Day itself, and there’s lots of love and no bah humbug, so who could ask for more? As is traditional on this Brontë blog we are going to celebrate the big day with an Anne Brontë Christmas poem! I’ll intersperse it with some bizarre Victorian Christmas cards too – like this one!

It’s all too easy to think of the Brontë lives as relentlessly miserable, but in fact they also enjoyed moments of great happiness – especially when they were all together as a family. We can easily imagine Emily Brontë at the piano, with Anne singing in her quiet yet sweet voice. Tabby and Martha, the loyal Brontë servants, would be cooking up a treat for everyone to enjoy – I’m sure there would even be a scrap or two left over for the family pets as well!

They may, in later years, have received Christmas cards. I mentioned in a Christmas post from 2019 how the first Christmas modern card was invented by Sir Henry Cole in 1843, but recent research indicates that the origins of Christmas cards may in fact be much earlier.

I leave you now to enjoy Christmas with your loved ones, I hope it’s a truly special one for you. You can also catch my take on the Brontë Christmas on my YouTube channel The House Of Brontë. Thank you so much for all your positive comments, and to all who have subscribed and shared. It means a lot to me.

Here then is Anne Brontë’s ‘Music On Christmas Morning’, and may I wish you all a very merry Christmas! I will see you on Sunday, as always, for another new Brontë blog post.

‘Music I love – but never strain
Could kindle raptures so divine,
So grief assuage, so conquer pain,
And rouse this pensive heart of mine –
As that we hear on Christmas morn,
Upon the wintry breezes born.
Though Darkness still her empire keep,
And hours must pass, ere morning break;
From troubled dreams, or slumbers deep,
That music kindly bids us wake:
It calls us, with an angel’s voice,
To wake, and worship, and rejoice;
To greet with joy the glorious morn,
Which angels welcomed long ago,
When our redeeming Lord was born,
To bring the light of Heaven below;
The Powers of Darkness to dispel,
And rescue Earth from Death and Hell.
While listening to that sacred strain,
My raptured spirit soars on high;
I seem to hear those songs again
Resounding through the open sky,
That kindled such divine delight,
In those who watched their flocks by night.
With them – I celebrate His birth –
Glory to God, in highest Heaven,
Good will to men, and peace on Earth,
To us a saviour-king is given;
Our God is come to claim His own,
And Satan’s power is overthrown!
A sinless God, for sinful men,
Descends to suffer and to bleed;
Hell must renounce its empire then;
The price is paid, the world is freed.
And Satan’s self must now confess,
That Christ has earned a Right to bless:
Now holy Peace may smile from heaven,
And heavenly Truth from earth shall spring:
The captive’s galling bonds are riven,
For our Redeemer is our king;
And He that gave his blood for men
Will lead us home to God again.’