Part 8

Her character and disposition are partially reflected in 'Jane Eyre.' The calm, clear mind, the brave, independent spirit are there. But a fuller and more accurate picture of her character may be found in Lucy Snowe, the heroine of 'Villette.' Here we find especially that note of hopelessness that predominated in Charlotte's character. Mrs. Gaskell, in her admirable biography of Charlotte Bronté, has called attention to this absence of hope in her nature. Charlotte indeed never allowed herself to look forward to happy issues. She had no confidence in the future. The pressure of grief apparently crushed all buoyancy of expectation. It was in this attitude that when literary success greeted her, she made little of it, scarcely allowing herself to believe that the world really set a high value on her work. Throughout all the excitement that her books produced, she was almost indifferent. Brought up as she had been to regard literary work as something beyond the proper limits of her sex, she never could quite rid herself of the belief that in writing successfully, she had made of herself not so much a literary figure as a sort of social curiosity. Nor was that idea wholly foreign to her time.

Personally Charlotte Bronté was not unattractive. Though somewhat too slender and pale, and plain of feature, she had a pleasant expression, and her homelier features were redeemed by a strong massive forehead, luxuriant glossy hair, and handsome eyes. Though she had little faith in her powers of inspiring affection, she attracted people strongly and was well beloved by her friends. That she could stir romantic sentiment too was attested by the fact that she received and rejected three proposals of marriage from as many suitors, before her acceptance of Mr. Nicholls.

Allusion has been made to the work of Charlotte's two sisters, Emily and Anne. Of the two Emily is by far the more remarkable, revealing in the single novel we have from her pen a genius as distinct and individual as that of her more celebrated sister. Had she lived, it is more than likely that her literary achievements would have rivaled Charlotte's.

Emily Bronté has always been something of a puzzle to biographers. She was eccentric, an odd mixture of bashful reserve and unexpected spells of frankness, sweet, gentle, and retiring in disposition, but possessed of great courage. She was two years younger than Charlotte, but taller. She was slender, though well formed, and was pale in complexion, with great gray eyes of remarkable beauty. Emily's literary work is to be found in the volume of "Poems" of her sisters, her share in that work being considered superior in imaginative quality and in finish to that of the others; and in the novel "Wuthering Heights," a weird, horrid story of astonishing power, written when she was twenty-eight years of age. Considered purely as an imaginative work, "Wuthering Heights" is one of the most remarkable stories in English literature, and is worthy to be ranked with the works of Edgar A. Poe. Many will say that it might better not have been written, so utterly repulsive is it, but others will value it as a striking, though distorted, expression of unmistakable genius. It is a ghastly and gruesome creation. Not one bright ray redeems it. It deals with the most evil characters and the most evil phases of human experience. But it fascinates. Heathcliff, the chief figure in the book, is one of the greatest villains in fiction,--an abhorrent creature,--strange, monstrous, Frankensteinesque.

Anne Bronté is known by her share in the book of "Poems" and by two novels, "Agnes Gray" and "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall," both of which are disappointing. The former is based on the author's experiences as a governess, and is written in the usual placid style of romances of the time. "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall" found its suggestion in the wretched career of Branwell Bronté, and presents a sad and depressing picture of a life of degradation. The book was not a success, and would no doubt have sunk long ago into oblivion but for its association with the novels of Emily and Charlotte.

In studying the work of Charlotte Bronté, the gifted older sister of the group, one of the first of the qualities that impress the reader is her actual creative power. To one of her imaginative power, the simplest life was sufficient, the smallest details a fund of material. Mr. Swinburne has called attention to the fact that Charlotte Bronté's characters are individual creations, not types constructed out of elements gathered from a wide observation of human nature, and that they are _real_ creations; that they compel our interest and command our assent because they are true, inevitably true. Perhaps no better example of this individualism could be cited than Rochester. The character is unique. It is not a type, nor has it even a prototype, like so many of Charlotte Bronté's characters. Gossip insisted at one time that the author intended to picture Thackeray in Rochester, but this is groundless. Rochester is an original creation. The character of Jane Eyre, too, while reflecting something of the author's nature, was distinctly individual; and it is interesting to note here that with Jane Eyre came a new heroine into fiction, a woman of calm, clear reason, of firm positive character, and what was most novel, a plain woman, a homely heroine.

"Why is it," Charlotte had once said, "that heroines must always be beautiful?" The hero of romance was always noble and handsome, the heroine lovely and often insipid, and the scenes set in an atmosphere of exaggerated idealism. Against this idealism Charlotte Bronté revolted. Her effort was always toward realism.

In her realism she reveals a second characteristic scarcely less marked than her creative powers,--an extraordinary faculty of observation. She saw the essence, the spirit of things, and the simplest details of life revealed to her the secrets of human nature. What she had herself seen and felt--the plain rugged types of Yorkshire character, the wild scenery of the moorlands--she reflected with living truth. She got the real fact out of every bit of material in humanity and nature that her simple life afforded her. And where her experience could not afford her the necessary material, she drew upon some mysterious resources in her nature, which were apparently not less reliable than actual experience. On being asked once how she could describe so accurately the effects of opium as she does in 'Villette,' she replied that she knew nothing of opium, but that she had followed the process she always adopted in cases of this kind. She had thought intently on the matter for many a night before falling asleep; till at length, after some time, she waked in the morning with all clear before her, just as if she had actually gone through the experience, and then could describe it word for word as it happened.

Her sensitiveness to impressions of nature was exceedingly keen. She had what Swinburne calls "an instinct for the tragic use of landscape." By constant and close observation during her walks she had established a fellowship with nature in all her phases; learning her secrets from the voices of the night, from the whisper of the trees, and from the eerie moaning of the moorland blasts. She studied the cold sky, and had watched the "coming night-clouds trailing low like banners drooping."

Other qualities that distinguish her work are purity, depth and ardor of passion, and spiritual force and fervor. Her genius was lofty and noble, and an exalted moral quality predominates in her stories. She was ethical as sincerely as she was emotional.

We have only to consider her technique, in which she is characteristically original. This originality is noticeable especially in her use of words. There is a sense of fitness that often surprises the reader. Words at times in her hands reveal a new power and significance. In the choice of words Charlotte Bronté was scrupulous. She believed that there was just one word fit to express the idea or shade of meaning she wished to convey, and she never admitted a substitute, sometimes waiting days until the right word came. Her expressions are therefore well fitted and forcible. Though the predominant key is a serious one, there is nevertheless considerable humor in Charlotte Bronté's work. In 'Shirley' especially we find many happy scenes, and much wit in repartee. And yet, with all these merits, one will find at times her style to be lame, stiff, and crude, and even when strongest, occasionally coarse. Not infrequently she is melodramatic and sensational. But through it all there is that pervading sense of reality and it redeems these defects.

Of the unusual, the improbable, the highly colored in Charlotte Bronté's books we shall say little. In criticizing works so true to life and nature as these, one should not be hasty. We feel the presence of a seer. Some one once made an objection in Charlotte Bronté's presence to that part of 'Jane Eyre' in which she hears Rochester's voice calling to her at a great crisis in her life, he being many miles distant from her at the time. Charlotte caught her breath and replied in a low voice:--"But it is a true thing; it really happened." And so it might be said of Charlotte Bronté's work as a whole:--"It is a true thing; it really happened."

JANE EYRE'S WEDDING DAY

From 'Jane Eyre'

Sophie came at seven to dress me. She was very long indeed in accomplishing her task; so long that Mr. Rochester--grown, I suppose, impatient of my delay--sent up to ask why I did not come. She was just fastening my veil (the plain square of blonde, after all) to my hair with a brooch; I hurried from under her hands as soon as I could.

"Stop!" she cried in French, "Look at yourself in the mirror; you have not taken one peep."

So I turned at the door. I saw a robed and veiled figure, so unlike my usual self that it seemed almost the image of a stranger.

"Jane!" called a voice, and I hastened down. I was received at the foot of the stairs by Mr. Rochester. "Lingerer," he said, "my brain is on fire with impatience; and you tarry so long!"

He took me into the dining-room, surveyed me keenly all over, pronounced me "fair as a lily, and not only the pride of his life, but the desire of his eyes"; and then, telling me he would give me but ten minutes to eat some breakfast, he rang the bell. One of his lately hired servants, a footman, answered it.

"Is John getting the carriage ready?"

"Yes, sir."

"Is the luggage brought down?"

"They are bringing it down, sir."

"Go you to the church; see if Mr. Wood" (the clergyman) "and the clerk are there; return and tell me."

The church, as the reader knows, was but just beyond the gates; the footman soon returned.

"Mr. Wood is in the vestry, sir, putting on his surplice."

"And the carriage?"

"The horses are harnessing."

"We shall not want it to go to church; but it must be ready the moment we return--all the boxes and luggage arranged and strapped on, and the coachman in his seat."

"Yes, sir."

"Jane, are you ready?"

I rose. There were no groomsmen, no bridesmaids, no relatives to wait for or marshal; none but Mr. Rochester and I. Mrs. Fairfax stood in the hall as we passed. I would fain have spoken to her, but my hand was held by a grasp of iron; I was hurried along by a stride I could hardly follow; and to look at Mr. Rochester's face was to feel that not a second of delay would be tolerated for any purpose. I wondered what other bridegroom ever looked as he did--so bent up to a purpose, so grimly resolute; or who, under such steadfast brows, ever revealed such flaming and flashing eyes.

I know not whether the day was fair or foul; in descending the drive I gazed neither on sky nor earth; my heart was with my eyes, and both seemed migrated into Mr. Rochester's frame. I wanted to see the invisible thing on which, as we went along, he appeared to fasten a glance fierce and fell. I wanted to feel the thoughts whose force he seemed breasting and resisting.

At the churchyard wicket he stopped; he discovered I was quite out of breath.

"Am I cruel in my love?" he said. "Delay an instant; lean on me, Jane."

And now I can recall the picture of the gray old house of God rising calm before me, of a rook wheeling around the steeple, of a ruddy morning sky beyond. I remember something, too, of the green grave-mounds; and I have not forgotten, either, two figures of strangers, straying among the low hillocks, and reading the mementos graven on the few mossy headstones. I noticed them because as they saw us they passed around to the back of the church; and I doubted not they were going to enter by the side aisle door and witness the ceremony. By Mr. Rochester they were not observed; he was earnestly looking at my face, from which the blood had, I dare say, momentarily fled; for I felt my forehead dewy and my cheeks and lips cold. When I rallied, which I soon did, he walked gently with me up the path to the porch.

We entered the quiet and humble temple; the priest waited in his white surplice at the lowly altar, the clerk beside him. All was still; two shadows only moved in a remote corner. My conjecture had been correct; the strangers had slipped in before us, and they now stood by the vault of the Rochesters, their backs toward us, viewing through the rails the old time-stained marble tomb, where a kneeling angel guarded the remains of Damer de Rochester, slain at Marston Moor in the time of the civil wars, and of Elizabeth his wife.

Our place was taken at the communion-rails. Hearing a cautious step behind me, I glanced over my shoulder; one of the strangers--a gentleman, evidently--was advancing up the chancel. The service began. The explanation of the intent of matrimony was gone through: and then the clergyman came a step farther forward, and bending slightly toward Mr. Rochester, went on:--

"I require and charge you both (as ye will answer at the dreadful day of judgment, when the secrets of all hearts shall be disclosed) that if either of you know any impediment why ye may not lawfully be joined together in matrimony, ye do now confess it; for be ye well assured that so many as are coupled together otherwise than God's word doth allow are not joined together by God, neither is their matrimony lawful."

He paused, as the custom is. When is the pause after that sentence ever broken by reply? Not, perhaps, once in a hundred years. And the clergyman, who had not lifted his eyes from his book, and had held his breath but for a moment, was proceeding; his hand was already stretched toward. Mr. Rochester, as his lips unclosed to ask, "Wilt thou have this woman for thy wedded wife?"--when a distinct and near voice said, "The marriage cannot go on: I declare the existence of an impediment."

The clergyman looked up at the speaker and stood mute: the clerk did the same; Mr. Rochester moved slightly, as if an earthquake had rolled under his feet; taking a firmer footing, and not turning his head or eyes, he said, "Proceed!"

Profound silence fell when he had uttered that word, with deep but low intonation. Presently Mr. Wood said, "I cannot proceed without some investigation into what has been asserted, and evidence of its truth or falsehood."

"The ceremony is quite broken off," subjoined the voice behind us. "I am in a condition to prove my allegation; an insuperable impediment to this marriage exists."

Mr. Rochester heard, but heeded not; he stood stubborn and rigid; making no movement but to possess himself of my hand. What a hot and strong grasp he had!--and how like quarried marble was his pale, firm, massive front at this moment! How his eye shone, still, watchful, and yet wild beneath!

Mr. Wood seemed at a loss. "What is the nature of the impediment?" he asked. "Perhaps it may be got over--explained away?"

"Hardly," was the answer: "I have called it insuperable, and I speak advisedly."

The speaker came forward and leaned on the rails. He continued, uttering each word distinctly, calmly, steadily, but not loudly.

"It simply consists in the existence of a previous marriage. Mr. Rochester has a wife now living."

My nerves vibrated to those low-spoken words as they had never vibrated to thunder; my blood felt their subtle violence as it had never felt frost or fire; but I was collected, and in no danger of swooning. I looked at Mr. Rochester; I made him look at me. His whole face was colorless rock; his eye was both spark and flint. He disavowed nothing; he seemed as if he would defy all things. Without speaking, without smiling, without seeming to recognize in me a human being, he only twined my waist with his arm and riveted me to his side.

"Who are you?" he asked of the intruder.

"My name is Briggs, a solicitor of ---- Street, London."

"And you would thrust on me a wife?"

"I would remind you of your lady's existence, sir, which the law recognizes if you do not."

"Favor me with an account of her--with her name, her parentage, her place of abode."

"Certainly." Mr. Briggs calmly took a paper from his pocket, and read out in a sort of official, nasal voice:--

"I affirm and can prove that on the 20th of October, A.D.--" (a date of fifteen years back), "Edward Fairfax Rochester, of Thornfield Hall, in the county of ----, and of Ferndean Manor, in ---- shire, England, was married to my sister, Bertha Antoinetta Mason, daughter of Jonas Mason, merchant, and of Antoinetta his wife, a Creole, at ---- church, Spanish Town, Jamaica. The record of the marriage will be found in the register of that church--a copy of it is now in my possession. Signed, Richard Mason."

"That, if a genuine document, may prove I have been married, but it does not prove that the woman mentioned therein as my wife is still living."

"She was living three months ago," returned the lawyer.

"How do you know?"

"I have a witness to the fact whose testimony even you, sir, will scarcely controvert."

"Produce him--or go to hell!"

"I will produce him first--he is on the spot: Mr. Mason, have the goodness to step forward."

Mr. Rochester, on hearing the name, set his teeth: he experienced, too, a sort of strong convulsive quiver; near to him as I was, I felt the spasmodic movement of fury or despair run through his frame.

The second stranger, who had hitherto lingered in the background, now drew near; a pale face looked over the solicitor's shoulder--yes, it was Mason himself. Mr. Rochester turned and glared at him. His eye, as I have often said, was a black eye--it had now a tawny, nay, a bloody light in its gloom; and his face flushed--olive cheek and hueless forehead received a glow, as from spreading, ascending heart-fire; and he stirred, lifted his strong arm; he could have struck Mason--dashed him on the church floor--shocked by ruthless blow the breath from his body; but Mason shrank away, and cried faintly, "Good God!" Contempt fell cool on Mr. Rochester--his passion died as if a blight had shriveled it up; he only asked, "What have _you_ to say?"

An inaudible reply escaped Mason's white lips.

"The devil is in it if you cannot answer distinctly. I again demand, what have _you_ to say?"

"Sir--sir," interrupted the clergyman, "do not forget you are in a sacred place." Then addressing Mason, he inquired gently, "Are you aware, sir, whether or not this gentleman's wife is still living?"

"Courage," urged the lawyer; "speak out."

"She is now living at Thornfield Hall," said Mason, in more articulate tones. "I saw her there last April. I am her brother."

"At Thornfield Hall!" ejaculated the clergyman. "Impossible! I am an old resident in this neighborhood, sir, and I never heard of a Mrs. Rochester at Thornfield Hall."

I saw a grim smile contort Mr. Rochester's lip, and he muttered, "No, by God! I took care that none should hear of it, or of her under that name." He mused; for ten minutes he held counsel with himself: he formed his resolve, and announced it:--"Enough; all shall bolt out at once, like a bullet from the barrel. Wood, close your book and take off your surplice; John Green" (to the clerk) "leave the church: there will be no wedding to-day." The man obeyed.

Mr. Rochester continued hardily and recklessly:--"Bigamy is an ugly word! I meant, however, to be a bigamist; but fate has out-manoeuvred me, or Providence has checked me--perhaps the last. I am little better than a devil at this moment; and as my pastor there would tell me, deserve no doubt the sternest judgments of God, even to the quenchless fire and deathless worm.

"Gentlemen, my plan is broken up! what this lawyer and his client say is true: I have been married, and the woman to whom I was married lives! You say you never heard of a Mrs. Rochester at the house up yonder, Wood; but I dare say you have many a time inclined your ear to gossip about the mysterious lunatic kept there under watch and ward. Some have whispered to you that she is my bastard half-sister; some, my cast-off mistress: I now inform you that she is my wife, whom I married fifteen years ago--Bertha Mason by name; sister of this resolute personage who is now, with his quivering limbs and white cheeks, showing you what a stout heart men may bear. Cheer up, Dick! never fear me! I'd almost as soon strike a woman as you. Bertha Mason is mad; and she came of a mad family--idiots and maniacs through three generations! Her mother, the Creole, was both a mad-woman and a drunkard!--as I found out after I had wed the daughter; for they were silent on family secrets before. Bertha, like a dutiful child, copied her parent in both points. I had a charming partner--pure, wise, modest; you can fancy I was a happy man. I went through rich scenes! Oh! my experience has been heavenly, if you only knew it! But I owe you no further explanation. Briggs, Wood, Mason, I invite you all to come up to the house and visit Mrs. Poole's patient, and _my wife_! You shall see what sort of a being I was cheated into espousing, and judge whether or not I had a right to break the compact, and seek sympathy with something at least human. This girl," he continued, looking at me, "knew no more than you, Wood, of the disgusting secret: she thought all was fair and legal, and never dreamed that she was going to be entrapped into a feigned union with a defrauded wretch, already bound to a bad, mad, and imbruted partner! Come, all of you, follow."

Still holding me fast, he left the church: the three gentlemen came after. At the front door of the hall we found the carriage.

"Take it back to the coach-house, John," said Mr. Rochester, coolly: "it will not be wanted to-day."

At our entrance, Mrs. Fairfax, Adèle, Sophie, Leah, advanced to meet and greet us.

"To the right-about--every soul!" cried the master: "away with your congratulations! Who wants them? Not I! they are fifteen years too late!"