Heights” and “Agnes Grey,” and this firm announced the new book in America as by the author of “Jane Eyre,” although Messrs. Smith, Elder & Co. had entered into an agreement with an American house for the publication of “Currer Bell’s” next tale.  On hearing of this, the sisters, Charlotte and Anne, set off instantly for London to prove personally that they were two and not one; and women, not men.

On reaching Mr. Smith’s office, Charlotte put his own letter into his hand as an introduction.

“Where did you get this?” said he, as if he could not believe that the two young ladies dressed in black, of slight figures and diminutive stature, looking pleased yet agitated, could be the embodied Currer and Acton Bell for whom curiosity had been hunting so eagerly in vain.

An explanation ensued, and the publisher at once began to form plans for the amusement of the visitors during their three days’ stay in London.

In September, 1848, her brother Branwell died.  After the Sunday succeeding Branwell’s death, Emily Bronte never went out of doors, and in less than three months she, too, was dead.  To the last she adhered tenaciously to her habits of independence.  She would suffer no one to assist her.  On the day of her death she arose, dressed herself, and tried to take up her sewing.

Anne Bronte, too, drooped and sickened from this time in a similar consumption, and on May 28, 1849, died peacefully at Scarborough, pathetically appealing to Charlotte with her ebbing breath:  “Take courage, Charlotte; take courage.”

VI.—­Charlotte Bronte’s Closing Years

“Shirley” had been begun soon after the publication of “Jane Eyre.”  Shirley herself is Charlotte’s representation of Emily as she would have been if placed in health and prosperity.  It was published five months after Anne’s death.  The reviews, Charlotte admitted, were “superb.”

Visits to London made Miss Bronte acquainted with many of the literary celebrities of the day, including Thackeray and Miss Martineau.  In Yorkshire her success caused great excitement.  She tells herself how “Martha came in yesterday puffing and blowing, and much excited.  ’Please, ma’am, you’ve been and written two books—­the grandest books that ever was seen.  They are going to have a meeting at the Mechanics’ Institute to settle about ordering them.’  When they got the volumes at the Mechanics’ Institute, all the members wanted them.  They cast lots, and whoever got a volume was allowed to keep it two days, and was to be fined a shilling per diem for longer detention.”

In the spring of 1850, Charlotte Bronte paid another visit to London, and later to Scotland, where she found Edinburgh “compared to London like a vivid page of history compared to a dull treatise on political economy; as a lyric, brief, bright, clean, and vital as a flash of lightning, compared to a great rumbling, rambling, heavy epic.”

She was in London again in 1851, and was dismayed by the attempts to lionise her.  “Villette,” written in a constant fight against ill-health, was published in 1853, and was received with one burst of acclamation.  This brought to a close the publication of Charlotte’s life-time.