V Life as a Governess
Moved by the hope of lightening the family expenses and enabling Branwell to get a thorough artistic training at the Royal Academy, Charlotte resolved to go out as a governess. Her first “place” was at her old school at Roehead, where she was with her friend, Miss Wooler, and where she was also very near the home of her confidante, Miss N——. Emily went with her for a time, but she soon sickened and pined for the moors, and after a trial of but a few months she returned to Haworth. A great deal of sympathy has been bestowed upon the Brontës in connection with their lives as governesses; nor am I prepared to say that this sympathy is wholly misplaced. Their reserve, their affection for each other, their ignorance of the world, combined to make “the cup of life as it is mixed for the class termed governesses”—to use Charlotte’s own phrase—particularly distasteful to them. But it is a mistake to suppose that they were treated with harshness during their governess life, or that Charlotte, at least, felt her trials to be at all unbearable. It was decidedly unpleasant to sacrifice the independence and the family companionship of Haworth for drudgery and loneliness in the household of a stranger; but it was a duty, and as such it was accepted without repining by two, at least, of the sisters. Emily’s peculiar temperament made her quite unfitted for life among strangers; she made many attempts to overcome her reserve, but all were unavailing; and after a brief experience in one or two families in different parts of Yorkshire, she returned to Haworth to reside there permanently as her father’s housekeeper. There is no need to dwell upon this episode in the lives of the Brontës. They were living among unfamiliar faces, and had little temptation to display themselves in their true characters, but extracts from a few of Charlotte’s letters to her friends will show something of the course of her thought at this time. With the exception of a detached sentence or two these letters will be quite new to the readers of Mrs. Gaskell’s “Life:”
I have been waiting for an opportunity of sending a letter to you as you wished; but as no such opportunity offers itself, I have at length determined to write to you by post, fearing that if I delayed any longer you would attribute my tardiness to indifference. I can scarcely realise the distance that lies between us, or the length of time which may elapse before we meet again. Now, Ellen, I have no news to tell you, no changes to communicate. My life since I saw you last has passed away as monotonously and unvaryingly as ever—nothing but teach, teach, teach, from morning till night. The greatest variety I ever have is afforded by a letter from you, a call from the T——s, or by meeting with a pleasant new book. The “Life of Oberlin,” and Legh Richmond’s “Domestic Portraiture,” are the last of this description I have perused. The latter work strongly attracted and strangely fascinated my attention. Beg, borrow, or steal it without delay, and read the “Memoir of Richmond.” That short record of a brief and uneventful life I shall never forget. It is beautiful, not on account of the language in which it is written, not on account of the incidents it details, but because of the simple narration it gives of the life and death of a young, talented, sincere Christian. Get the book, Ellen (I wish I had it to give you), read it, and tell me what you think of it. Yesterday I heard that you had been ill since you were in London. I hope you are better now. Are you any happier than you were? Try to reconcile your mind to circumstances, and exert the quiet fortitude of which I know you are not destitute. Your absence leaves a sort of vacancy in my feelings which nothing has as yet offered of sufficient interest to supply. I do not forget ten o’clock. I remember it every night, and if a sincere petition for your welfare will do you any good you will be benefited. I know the Bible says: “The prayer of the righteous availeth much,” and I am not righteous. Nevertheless I believe God despises no application that is uttered in sincerity. My own dear E——, good-bye. I can write no more, for I am called to a less pleasant avocation.
Dewsbury Moor, Oct. 2, 1836.
I should have written to you a week ago, but my time has of late been so wholly taken up that till now I have really not had an opportunity of answering your last letter. I assure you I feel the kindness of so early a reply to my tardy correspondence. It gave me a sting of self-reproach…. My sister Emily is gone into a situation as teacher in a large school of near forty pupils, near Halifax. I have had one letter from her since her departure. It gives an appalling account of her duties. Hard labour from six in the morning till near eleven at night, with only one half-hour of exercise between. This is slavery. I fear she will never stand it. It gives me sincere pleasure, my dear Ellen, to learn that you have at last found a few associates of congenial minds. I cannot conceive a life more dreary than that passed amidst sights, sounds, and companions all alien to the nature within us. From the tenor of your letters it seems that your mind remains fixed as it ever was, in no wise dazzled by novelty or warped by evil example. I am thankful for it. I could not help smiling at the paragraphs which related to ——. There was in them a touch of the genuine unworldly simplicity which forms part of your character. Ellen, depend upon it, all people have their dark side. Though some possess the power of throwing a fair veil over the defects, close acquaintance slowly removes the screen, and one by one the blots appear; till at last we see the pattern of perfection all slurred over with stains which even affection cannot efface.
The affectionate commendations of her friend are constantly accompanied by references of a very different character to herself.
If I like people—she says in one of her letters—it is my nature to tell them so, and I am not afraid of offering incense to your vanity. It is from religion that you derive your chief charm, and may its influence always preserve you as pure, as unassuming, and as benevolent in thought and deed as you are now. What am I compared to you? I feel my own utter worthlessness when I make the comparison. I’m a very coarse, commonplace wretch! I have some qualities that make me very miserable, some feelings that you can have no participation in—that few, very few people in the world can at all understand. I don’t pride myself on these peculiarities. I strive to conceal and suppress them as much as I can, but they burst out sometimes, and then those who see the explosion despise me, and I hate myself for days afterwards.
All my notes to you, Ellen, are written in a hurry. I am now snatching an opportunity. Mr. J—— is here; by his means it will be transmitted to Miss E——, by her means to X——, by his means to you. I do not blame you for not coming to see me. I am sure you have been prevented by sufficient reasons; but I do long to see you, and I hope I shall be gratified momentarily, at least, ere long. Next Friday, if all be well, I shall go to G——. On Sunday I hope I shall at least catch a glimpse of you. Week after week I have lived on the expectation of your coming. Week after week I have been disappointed. I have not regretted what I said in my last note to you. The confession was wrung from me by sympathy and kindness, such as I can never be sufficiently thankful for. I feel in a strange state of mind; still gloomy, but not despairing. I keep trying to do right, checking wrong feelings; repressing wrong thoughts—but still, every instant I find myself going astray. I have a constant tendency to scorn people who are far better than I am. A horror at the idea of becoming one of a certain set—a dread lest if I made the slightest profession I should sink at once into Phariseeism, merge wholly in the ranks of the self-righteous. In writing at this moment I feel an irksome disgust at the idea of using a single phrase that sounds like religious cant. I abhor myself; I despise myself. If the doctrine of Calvin be true, I am already an outcast. You cannot imagine how hard, rebellious, and intractable all my feelings are. When I begin to study on the subject I almost grow blasphemous, atheistical in my sentiments. Don’t desert me—don’t be horrified at me. You know what I am. I wish I could see you, my darling. I have lavished the warmest affections of a very hot, tenacious heart upon you. If you grow cold it is over.
You will excuse a very brief and meagre answer to your kind note when I tell you that at the moment it reached me, and that just now whilst I am scribbling a reply, the whole house is in the bustle of packing and preparation, for on this day we all go home. Your palliation of my defects is kind and charitable, but I dare not trust its truth. Few would regard them with so lenient an eye as you do. Your consolatory admonitions are kind, Ellen; and when I can read them over in quietness and alone, I trust I shall derive comfort from them. But just now, in the unsettled, excited state of mind which I now feel, I cannot enter into the pure scriptural spirit which they breathe. It would be wrong of me to continue the subject. My thoughts are distracted and absorbed by other ideas. You do not mention your visit to Haworth. Have you spoken of it to the family? Have they agreed to let you come? But I will write when I get home. Ever since last Friday I have been as busy as I could be in finishing up the half-year’s lessons, which concluded with a terrible fog in geographical problems (think of explaining that to Misses —— and ——!), and subsequently in mending Miss ——’s clothes. Miss —— is calling me: something about my protégée’s nightcap. Good-bye. We shall meet again ere many days, I trust.
Here it will be seen that the religious struggle was renewed. The woman who was afterwards to be accused of “heathenism” was going through tortures such as Cowper knew in his darkest hours, and, like him, was acquiring faith, humility, and resignation in the midst of the conflict. But such letters as this are only episodical; in general she writes cheerfully, sometimes even merrily.
What would the Quarterly reviewer and the other charitable people, who openly declared their conviction that the author of “Jane Eyre” was an improper person, who had written an improper book, have said had they been told that she had written the following letter on the subject of her first offer of marriage—written it, too, at the time when she was a governess, and in spite of the fact that the offer opened up to her a way of escape from all anxiety as to her future life?
You ask me whether I have received a letter from T——. I have about a week since. The contents I confess did a little surprise me; but I kept them to myself, and unless you had questioned me on the subject I would never have adverted to it. T—— says he is comfortably settled at ——, and that his health is much improved. He then intimates that in due time he will want a wife, and frankly asks me to be that wife. Altogether the letter is written without cant or flattery, and in common-sense style which does credit to his judgment. Now there were in this proposal some things that might have proved a strong temptation. I thought if I were to marry so —— could live with me, and how happy I should be. But again I asked myself two questions: Do I love T—— as much as a woman ought to love her husband? Am I the person best qualified to make him happy? Alas! my conscience answered “No” to both these questions. I felt that though I esteemed T——, though I had a kindly leaning towards him, because he is an amiable, well-disposed man, yet I had not and never could have that intense attachment which would make me willing to die for him—and if ever I marry it must be in that light of adoration that I will regard my husband. Ten to one I shall never have the chance again; but n’importe. Moreover, I was aware he knew so little of me he could hardly be conscious to whom he was writing. Why, it would startle him to see me in my natural home character. He would think I was a wild, romantic enthusiast indeed. I could not sit all day long making a grave face before my husband. I would laugh and satirise, and say whatever came into my head first; and if he were a clever man and loved me, the whole world weighed in the balance against his smallest wish would be light as air. Could I, knowing my mind to be such as that, conscientiously say that I would take a grave, quiet young man like T——? No; it would have been deceiving him, and deception of that sort is beneath me. So I wrote a long letter back in which I expressed my refusal as gently as I could, and also candidly avowed my reasons for that refusal. I described to him, too, the sort of character I thought would suit him for a wife.
The girl who could thus calmly decline a more than merely “eligible” offer, and thus honestly state her reasons for doing so to the friend she trusted, was strangely different from the author of “Jane Eyre” pictured by the critics and the public. Perhaps the full cost of the refusal related in the foregoing letter is only made clear when it is brought into contrast with such a confession as the following, made very soon afterwards:
I am miserable when I allow myself to dwell on the necessity of spending my life as a governess. The chief requisite for that station seems to me to be the power of taking things easily when they come, and of making oneself comfortable and at home wherever one may chance to be—qualities in which all our family are singularly deficient. I know I cannot live with a person like Mrs. ——; but I hope all women are not like her, and my motto is “Try again.”
How thoroughly at all times she could sympathise alike with the joys and sorrows of others, is proved by many letters extending over the whole period of her life. The following is neither the earliest nor the most characteristic of those utterances of a tender and heartfelt sympathy with her special friend, which are to be found in her correspondence, but as Mrs. Gaskell has not made use of it, I may quote it here:
1838.
We were at breakfast when your note reached me, and I consequently write in great hurry. Your trials seem to thicken. I trust God will either remove them or give you strength to bear them. If I could but come to you and offer you all the little assistance either my head or hands could afford! But that is impossible. I scarcely dare offer to comfort you about —— lest my consolation should seem like mockery. I know that in cases of sickness strangers cannot measure what relations feel. One thing, however, I need not remind you of. You will have repeated it over and over to yourself before now: God does all for the best; and even should the worst happen, and Death seem finally to destroy hope, remember that this will be but a practical test of the strong faith and calm devotion which have marked you a Christian so long. I would hope, however, that the time for this test is not yet come, that your brother may recover, and all be well. It grieves me to hear that your own health is so indifferent. Once more I wish I were with you to lighten at least by sympathy the burden that seems so unsparingly laid upon you. Let me thank you for remembering me in the midst of such hurry and affliction. We are all apt to grow selfish in distress. This, so far as I have found, is not your case. When shall I see you again? The uncertainty in which the answer to that question must be involved gives me a bitter feeling. Through all changes, through all chances, I trust I shall love you as I do now. We can pray for each other and think of each other. Distance is no bar to recollection. You have promised to write to me, and I do not doubt that you will keep your word. Give my love to M—— and your mother. Take with you my blessing and affection, and all the warmest wishes of a warm heart for your welfare.
From one of her situations as governess in a private family (she had long since left the kind shelter of Miss Wooler’s house) she writes in 1841 a series of letters showing how little she relished the “cup of life as it is mixed for the class termed governesses.”
It is twelve o’clock at night; but I must just write you a word before I go to bed. If you think I’m going to refuse your invitation, or if you sent it me with that idea, you’re mistaken. As soon as I had read your shabby little note, I gathered up my spirits directly, walked on the impulse of the moment into Mrs. ——’s presence, popped the question, and for two minutes received no answer. “Will she refuse me when I work so hard for her?” thought I. “Ye—e—es,” drawled madam in a reluctant, cold tone. “Thank you, madam!” said I with extreme cordiality, and was marching from the room when she recalled me with “You’d better go on Saturday afternoon, then, when the children have holiday, and if you return in time for them to have all their lessons on Monday morning, I don’t see that much will be lost.” You are a genuine Turk, thought I; but again I assented, and so the bargain was struck. Saturday after next, then, is the day appointed. I’ll come, God knows, with a thankful and joyful heart, glad of a day’s reprieve from labour. If you don’t send the gig I’ll walk. I am coming to taste the pleasure of liberty; a bit of pleasant congenial talk, and a sight of two or three faces I like. God bless you! I want to see you again. Huzza for Saturday afternoon after next! Good-night, my lass!
During the last three weeks that hideous operation called “a thorough clean” has been going on in the house. It is now nearly completed, for which I thank my stars, as during its progress I have fulfilled the double character of nurse and governess, while the nurse has been transmuted into cook and housemaid. That nurse, by-the-bye, is the prettiest lass you ever saw…. I was beginning to think Mrs. —— a good sort of body in spite of her bouncing and toasting, her bad grammar and worse orthography; but I have had experience of one little trait in her character which condemns her a long way with me. After treating a person on the most familiar terms of equality for a long time, if any little thing goes wrong, she does not scruple to give way to anger in a very coarse, unladylike manner, though in justice no blame could be attached where she ascribed it all. I think passion is the true test of vulgarity or refinement. This place looks exquisitely beautiful just now. The grounds are certainly lovely, and all as green as an emerald. I wish you would just come and look at it.