Epigraph
Beside her sisters lay her down to rest,
By the lone church that stands amid the moors;
And let her grave be wet with moorland showers;
Let moorland larks sing o’er her mouldering breast!
Hers was the keen true spirit, that confest
That she was nurtured in no garden bowers,
Nor taught to deck her brow with cultured flowers,
Nor by the soft and summer wind carest.
Her words came o’er us, as in harvest-tide
Come the swift rain-clouds o’er her native skies,
Scattering the thin sheaves by the heather’s side;
So fared it with our tame hypocrisies:
But lo! the clouds are past, and far and wide
The purple ridges glow beneath our eyes.
W. H. Charlton.
Hesleyside, 1855.
CHARLOTTE BRONTË.