hundreds as against the tens of intrinsically more important rivals.
There are obvious reasons for this success. Mrs. Gaskell was herself a
popular novelist, who commanded a very wide audience, and _Cranford_, at
least, has taken a place among the classics of our literature. She
brought to bear upon the biography of Charlotte Bronte all those literary
gifts which had made the charm of her seven volumes of romance. And
these gifts were employed upon a romance of real life, not less
fascinating than anything which imagination could have furnished.
Charlotte Bronte's success as an author turned the eyes of the world upon
her. Thackeray had sent her his _Vanity Fair_ before he knew her name or
sex. The precious volume lies before me--

[Picture: First Thackeray Inscription]

And Thackeray did not send many inscribed copies of his books even to
successful authors. Speculation concerning the author of _Jane Eyre_ was
sufficiently rife during those seven sad years of literary renown to make
a biography imperative when death came to Charlotte Bronte in 1855. All
the world had heard something of the three marvellous sisters, daughters
of a poor parson in Yorkshire, going one after another to their death
with such melancholy swiftness, but leaving--two of them, at
least--imperishable work behind them. The old blind father and the
bereaved husband read the confused eulogy and criticism, sometimes with a
sad pleasure at the praise, oftener with a sadder pain at the grotesque
inaccuracy. Small wonder that it became impressed upon Mr. Bronte's mind
that an authoritative biography was desirable. His son-in-law, Mr.
Arthur Bell Nicholls, who lived with him in the Haworth parsonage during
the six weary years which succeeded Mrs. Nicholls's death, was not so
readily won to the unveiling of his wife's inner life; and although we,
who read Mrs. Gaskell's _Memoir_, have every reason to be thankful for
Mr. Bronte's decision, peace of mind would undoubtedly have been more
assured to Charlotte Bronte's surviving relatives had the most rigid
silence been maintained. The book, when it appeared in 1857, gave
infinite pain to a number of people, including Mr. Bronte and Mr.
Nicholls; and Mrs. Gaskell's subsequent experiences had the effect of
persuading her that all biographical literature was intolerable and
undesirable. She would seem to have given instructions that no biography
of herself should be written; and no