The Essence of the Brontes by Muriel Spark

Author:Muriel Spark [Muriel Spark]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847774705
Publisher: Carcanet
Published: 2014-10-22T16:00:00+00:00

97

CHARLOTTE BRONTË TO ELLEN NUSSEY

Haworth,

July 14th, 1849.

I do not much like giving you an account of myself. I like better to go out of myself, and talk of something more cheerful. My cold, wherever I got it, whether at Easton or elsewhere, is not vanished yet. It began in my head; then I had a sore throat, and then a sore chest, with a cough, but only a trifling cough, which I still have at times. The pains between my shoulders likewise annoyed me much. Say nothing about it, for I confess I am too much disposed to be nervous. This nervousness is a horrid phantom. I dare communicate no ailment to papa; his anxiety harrasses me inexpressibly.

My life is what I expected it to be. Sometimes when I wake in the morning, and know that Solitude, Remembrance, and Longing are to be almost my sole companions all day through, that at night I shall go to bed with them, that they will keep me sleepless, that next morning I shall wake to them again; sometimes, Ellen, I have a heavy heart of it. But crushed I am not yet; nor robbed of elasticity, nor of hope, nor quite of endeavour. Still I have some strength to fight the battle of life. I am aware, and can acknowledge, I have many comforts, many mercies. Still I can get on. But I do hope and pray, that never may you, or any one I love, be placed as I am. To sit in a lonely room, the clock ticking loud through a still house, and to have open before the mind’s eye the record of the last year, with its shocks, sufferings, losses, is a trial.

I write to you freely, because I believe you will hear me with moderation, that you will not take alarm or think me in any way worse off than I am. My love to your mother and sisters, and believe me yours sincerely,

C.B.

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