Charlotte
Bronte, the author of the Victorian-era novel, “Jane Eyre,” left many letters,
reminiscences and biographical sketches behind.
In “The Life
of Charlotte Bronte” by Elizabeth Gaskell, Charlotte speaks about the illness,
(tuberculosis) and subsequent death of her sister Emily. (And, indeed, she had
lost several young siblings before her).
“But a great
change approached. Affliction came in that shape which to anticipate is dread;
to look back on is grief. In the very heat and burden of the day the laborers
failed over their work. My sister Emily declined. Never in her life had she
lingered over any task that lay before her, and she did not linger now. She
sank rapidly. She made haste to leave us. Day by day, when I saw with what a brave
front she met suffering, I looked on her with an anguish of wonder and love. I
have seen nothing like it. But, indeed, I have never seen her parallel in
anything. Stronger than a man, simpler than a child, her nature stood alone.
“The awful
point was that, while full of compassion for others, on herself she had no
pity. The spirit was inexorable to the flesh. From the trembling hands, the
unnerved limbs, the fading eyes, the same service was exacted as they first
rendered in health. To stand by and witness this, and not dare to remonstrate
was a pain no words can render.”
However, for
whatever reason, in all of her suffering it seems Emily refused to see a
doctor, or to take medication.
Emily grew
worse, and now she could only whisper in gasps. Now, when it was far too late,
she said to her sister, Charlotte,
“If you will
send for a doctor, I will see him now.”
She died at
2 o’clock in the afternoon.
Pt. 2
Charlotte
continues her reminiscence of her beloved sister.
“Emily
suffers no more from pain or weakness now. She never will suffer more in this
world. She is gone after a hard, short conflict. She died on a Tuesday. I
thought it very possible that she would still be with us for weeks. But a few
hours afterwards, she was in eternity. There is no Emily in time or on earth
now. Yesterday we put her poor, wasted mortal frame quietly under the church
pavement. We are very calm at present. Why should we be otherwise? The anguish
of seeing her suffer is over. The spectacle of the pains of death is gone by.
The funeral is past. We feel she is at peace. No need to tremble for the hard
frost and the fierce wind. Emily does not feel them. She died in a time of
promise. We saw her taken from life in its prime. But, it is God’s will and the
place where she has gone is better than that she has left.”
Now, Charlotte’s
friend and biographer enlightens us on the dynamics of Emily’s final
arrangements.
“As the old,
bereaved father and his two surviving children followed the coffin to the
grave, they were joined by ‘Keeper,’ Emily’s fierce, faithful bulldog. He
walked alongside the mourners, and into the church, and stayed quietly there
all the time the burial service was being read. When he came home, he lay at
Emily’s bedroom door, and howled pitifully for many days.”
It might be
said here that I am keenly aware of other animals which mourned the passing of their
masters. When my young nephew passed away, his little pooch refused food, and
ultimately starved himself to death. And, of course, many of my readers are familiar
with a dog which has been referred to as “Grayfriars Bobby” which lay on his master’s
gravesite for multiplied years until the specter of death claimed his own
little mortal body. Bobby was interred in the same cemetery as his beloved
owner, and a beautiful pink granite headstone graces this sacred spot today. My
wife and I visited Edinburgh, Scotland earlier this year, and I stood and paid
my respects at Bobby’s final resting place.
Afterward
I have little
or no agenda here other than to describe the singular courage of a memorable little
lady who selflessly surrendered her young life to the God who made her, though she
most assuredly struggled with a huge dearth of understanding, to reflect on her
sister’s tribute to her tenacity, and the hole which was forever carved into
her own proverbial heart, and to honor the stout undying love which God
instilled in the beloved pooch which would mourn her passing.
Excerpt from "The Life of Charlotte Bronte" by Elizabeth Gaskell
Blog by William McDonald, PhD. Copyright Pending
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