CHAPTER VI
1 (p. 344) “I had thought to bring the ‘Leader’: The Leader (1850) was a radical literary periodical founded by G. H. Lewes.
2 (p. 347) to join the friends with whom she had been staying in town: Gaskell skims over the unorthodox nature of Brontë’s trip to Scotland with George Smith, an unmarried man, and his sister. Both Smith’s mother and Ellen Nussey urged against it. Brontë reassures Ellen: “My six or eight years of seniority not to say nothing of lack of all pretension to beauty &c. are a perfect safeguard—I should not in the least fear to go with him to China” (Charlotte Brontë to Ellen Nussey, June 20, 1850; in The Letters of Charlotte Brontë, vol. 2, p. 419).
3 (p. 349) “Papa had worked himself up to a sad pitch... obviously joining him”: The letter continues: “I can’t deny but I was annoyed.... Papa’s great discomposure had its origin in ... the vague fear of my being somehow about to be married to somebody.” In editing out this portion of the letter Gaskell suppresses Patrick’s fear that Brontë and George Smith had formed a romantic attachment.
CHAPTER VII
1 (p. 352) I shall probably convey my first impressions... a longer description: The text that follows is extracted from two of Gaskell’s letters. One is to Catherine Winkworth, on August 25, 1850, and another, written on the same date, is to an unknown correspondent.
2 (p. 353) “liking ‘Modern Painters’... Father Newman’s Lectures”: John Ruskin (1819-1900) wrote Modern Painters (1843-1860) and The Seven Lamps of Architecture (1849). Father Newman, later a cardinal, is John Henry Newman (1801-1890), a leader of the Oxford Movement within the Anglican Church. He later converted to Roman Catholicism.
3 (p. 353) “invitation to drink tea quietly at Fox How”: Fox How was the home of the widow and children of Dr. Thomas Arnold (1795-1842), moralist, social reformer and educational theorist. The curricular innovations Arnold instituted as headmaster of Rugby School influenced the course of British education. He was the father of poet and critic Matthew Arnold (1822-1888).
4 (p. 356) ‘Westminster Review’: The Westminster Review was a reform-minded periodical acquired by John Stuart Mill in 1836.
5 (p. 357) “I have read Tennyson’s ‘In Memoriam’ ”: On Gaskell’s recommendation Brontë read, or rather, attempted to read Alfred Tennyson’s In Memoriam (1850), an elegy to his friend Arthur Henry Hallam. Presumably to educate her new friend in her own aesthetic preferences, Brontë sends Gaskell the final edition of Wordsworth’s autobiographical The Prelude, which was published posthumously in 1850.
6 (p. 359) “I should be glad if you would include... ‘Life of Dr. Arnold’”: Brontë wanted to read Arthur Penrhyn Stanley’s Life and Correspondence of Thomas Arnold (1844).
CHAPTER VIII
1 (p. 360) task of editing them: Brontë wrote a “Biographical Notice” of her sisters for this edition, published by Smith, Elder and Company, and she appended a heavily edited selection of their poetry.
2 (p. 361) That gentleman says:—: G. H. Lewes, writing to George Smith. Gaskell wanted input from Lewes but, unlike Brontë, would not correspond with him directly because of his reputed immorality (The Letters of Mrs. Gaskell, letter 314). In 1854 he dissolved his open marriage to live with writer George Eliot.
3 (p. 362) “I lent her some of Balzac’s and George Sand’s novels”: The novels of Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850) that G. H. Lewes is talking about are Modeste Mignon (1844) and Illusions Perdues (1837-1843). Gaskell is quick to give anecdotal evidence of Brontë’s “disgust” for Balzac, who was not considered proper reading for a lady. George Sand’s Lettres d’un Voyageur (Letters of a Traveler), part autobiography, part travel narrative, appeared in 1837.
4 (p. 366) “ ‘The Roman’ ”: The Roman (1850) was a poem by Sydney Dobell, the critic who had endeared himself to Brontë with his praise of Wuthering Heights.
CHAPTER IX
1 (p. 372) “You ask me whether Miss Martineau made me convert to mesmerism”: Mesmerism, a form of hypnotism thought to cure disease, was first practiced by Franz Mesmer (1734-1815), a Viennese physician. Harriet Martineau was a believer.
2 (p. 373) Your account of Mr. A—”: Henry Atkinson and Martineau coauthored Letters on the Laws of Man’s Nature and Development (1851).
3 (p. 377) great Exhibition: The Great Exhibition of 1851, held at the Crystal Palace in London, was an international industrial show intendedto showcase British ascendancy. Brontë visited it five tim“under coercion.” On a subsequent trip to London, Brontë made her own itinerary and “selected the real in preference to the decorative side of life” (see the Introduction).
4 (p. 386) “‘Phrenological Character’” : Phrenology was a pseudo-science in which a person’s character was analyzed by examining his or her skull structure. Brontë and George Smith posed as brother and sister and had a phrenological reading done by a physician in London. See Gérin, Appendix B, for his report.
CHAPTER X
1 (p. 389) “I have read the ‘Saint’s Tragedy’ ”: Brontë is referring to The Saint’s Tragedy: or, The True Story of Elizabeth of Hungary (1848) , by Charles Kingsley (1819-1875).
2 (p. 391) “James Martineau’s sermons”: James Martineau (1805-1900), brother of Harriet Martineau, was a Unitarian minister and moral philosopher.
3 (p. 391) “I have seen none, except ... Emancipation of Women”: The article is “The Enfranchisement of Women,” which appeared in the Westminster Review 55 (July 1851): 289-311. Although J. S. Mill is given authorial credit, Harriet Taylor (1807-1858), Mill’s collaborator, companion, and eventually his wife, is believed to have been the primary author.
4 (p. 396) “Melville seemed to me... Maurice whose ministry I should frequent”: The Evangelical Henry Melville (1798-1871) was considered one of the greatest preachers of his day. F. D. Maurice (1805-1872), a Christian Socialist, believed the church should be an instrument of social equality.
5 (p. 403) “the close seemed to me scarcely equal to ’Rose Douglas’ ”: Sarah R. Whitehead wrote Rose Douglas; or, Sketches of a Country Parish, Being the Autobiography of a Scotch Minister’s Daughter (1851) and Two Families (1852).