Volume I Part 1 (2/2)

'Should poverty, modest and clean, E'er please when presented to view, Should cabin on brown heath or green, Disclose aught engaging to you; Should Erin's wild harp soothe the ear, When touched by such fingers as mine, Then kindly attentive draw near, And candidly ponder each line.'

He describes a winter-scene on the mountains of Morne--a high range of hills in the north of Ireland--and thus alludes to his hospitable reception in the clean and industrious cabin of his verses:--

'Escaped from the pitiless storm, I entered the humble retreat; Compact was the building, and warm, In furniture simple and neat.

And now, gentle reader, approve The ardour that glowed in each breast, As kindly our cottagers strove To cherish and welcome their guest.'

It is unnecessary to give in this place further extracts from this book; suffice it to say that, in all probability, Mr. Bronte lived to see the day when he was pained and surprised that he had ever committed it to the press.

Although the poems of Mr. Bronte are inspired by the love of a peaceful and contented life, free from excitement and care, yet in times of trouble and emergency, such as those of the Luddite riots which occurred during the period of his ministration at Hartshead, he showed again the active and resolute spirit which had prompted and sustained the efforts of his early ambition; and his ardour in helping to suppress the turbulent spirit of the neighbourhood would have made him very unpopular with the disaffected people, had they not learned to respect the upright and unfailing rect.i.tude of his conduct. In the energetic character of Mr. Bronte's life in these early times, in his persistent ambition, and in the literary pursuits which clearly were dear to him, we may trace those factors of working power and literary aspiration and taste which made up the characteristic intellectual force of his children.

Mrs. Gaskell, in her 'Life of Charlotte Bronte,' has given some of the particulars of the Reverend Mr. Bronte's courts.h.i.+p and marriage, in which she appears to have taken a lively interest.

Mr. Bronte met his future wife, (Miss Maria Branwell--of whose character I shall speak in the next chapter--the third daughter of Mr.

T. Branwell of Penzance, deceased) for the first time about the summer of 1812, when she was on a visit to her uncle, the Rev. John Fennel, a Methodist minister and head-master of the Wesleyan Academy at Woodhouse Grove, near Bradford, but who became later a clergyman of the Establishment, and was made inc.u.mbent of Cross-stone, in the parish of Halifax. This meeting was soon followed by an engagement, and, says Mrs. Gaskell, there were plans for happy picnic-parties to Kirkstall Abbey in the glowing September days, when 'Uncle, Aunt, and Cousin Jane'--the last engaged to a Mr. Morgan, another clergyman--were of the party.

In the account which Mr. Bronte gives of the aim and scope of the work from which I have made an extract, and the state of his mind while engaged upon it, we have a retrospect of the inner life of the father of the Brontes, during his sojourn at Hartshead as perpetual curate, prior to his marriage with Miss Branwell. In this period of his life, he seems to have been perfectly happy, no cloud or antic.i.p.ation of future sorrow having obscured or diminished the fulness of his peace.

The marriage was celebrated on the 29th of December, 1812, at Guiseley, near Bradford, by the Rev. W. Morgan, minister of Bierley, the gentleman engaged to 'Cousin Jane.' It is a very curious circ.u.mstance that on the same day, and at the same place, Mr. Bronte performed the marriage ceremony between his wife's cousin, Miss Jane Fennel, only daughter of the Mr. Fennel alluded to above, and the Rev. W. Morgan, who had just been, as described, the officiating clergyman at his own wedding.

Mr. Fennel would naturally have performed the ceremony for his niece and Mr. Bronte, had it not fallen to his lot to give the lady away.

When Mr. Bronte found himself settled in married life at Hartshead, and with the probability of a young family rising around him, he felt pleasure in the contemplation of the future. Mrs. Bronte, ever gentle and affectionate in her household ways, comforted and encouraged him in his literary pursuits, and, by her acute observation and accurate judgment, directed and aided his own. It was at this time that Mr.

Bronte wrote a book, ent.i.tled 'The Rural Ministry,' which was published at Halifax, in 1813. The work consisted of a miscellany of descriptive poems, with the following t.i.tles: 'The Sabbath Bells,' 'Kirkstall Abbey,' 'Extempore Verses,' 'Lines to a Lady on her Birthday,' 'An Elegy,' 'Reflections by Moonlight,' 'Winter,' 'Rural Happiness,' 'The Distress and Relief,' 'The Christian's Farewell,' 'The Harper of Erin.'

It cannot be doubted that, in consequence of his two publications while he was at Hartshead, Mr. Bronte became known in the surrounding districts as an aspiring man, and one of literary culture and ability.

Mr. Bronte had taken his bride to his house at High Town, and it was there that his daughters Maria and Elizabeth were born. Maria was baptized on April the 23rd, 1814, and is entered in the register as the 'daughter of Patrick Bronte and Maria his wife.' The Rev. Mr. Morgan was the officiating minister. There is no such entry there relating to Elizabeth, for she was baptized at Thornton with the other children.

Mr. Bronte, after having been nearly five years minister of Hartshead-c.u.m-Clifton, resigned the benefice, and accepted, from the vicar of Bradford, the inc.u.mbency of Thornton, a perpetual curacy in that parish. This, probably, on the suggestion of Mr. Morgan, who was then inc.u.mbent of Christ's Church at Bradford.

Thornton is beautifully situated on the northern slope of a valley.

Green and fertile pastures spread over the adjacent hills, and wooded dells with shady walks beautify and enrich the district. 'The neighbourhood,' says Mrs. Gaskell, 'is desolate and wild; great tracts of bleak land, enclosed by stone d.y.k.es, sweeping up Clayton Heights.'

This disagreeable picture of the place, painted by the biographer of Charlotte, is scarcely justified by the actual appearance of the district. The soil is naturally fertile, and the inhabitants are notable for industry and enterprise. Hence no barren land, within the wide range of hill and vale, is now seen obtruding on the cultivated sweep.

The town is somewhat regularly built. In the main street is situated the house where Mr. Bronte took up his abode during his stay at Thornton. The hall door was reached by several steps. There was a dining-room on one side of the hall, and a drawing-room on the other.

Over the pa.s.sage to the front was a dressing-room, at the window of which the neighbours often saw Mr. Bronte at his toilet. Above the door of the house, on a stone slab, there are still visible the letters:

A.

J. S.

1802

These are the initials of John and Sarah Ashworth, former inhabitants of Thornton; and this residence remained as the parsonage until another was built below, nearer to the chapel, by the successor of Mr. Bronte.

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