e reception by Mr. Bronte of his children's literary successes has been
very pleasantly recorded by Charlotte. He was proud of his daughters,
and delighted with their fame. He seems to have had no small share of
their affection. Charlotte loved and esteemed him. There are hundreds
of her letters, in many of which are severe and indeed unprintable things
about this or that individual; but of her father these letters contain
not one single harsh word. She wrote to him regularly when absent. Not
only did he secure the affection of his daughter, but the people most
intimately associated with him next to his own children gave him a
lifelong affection and regard. Martha Brown, the servant who lived with
him until his death, always insisted that her old master had been
grievously wronged, and that a kinder, more generous, and in every way
more worthy man had never lived. Nancy Garrs, another servant, always
spoke of Mr. Bronte as 'the kindest man who ever drew breath,' and as a
good and affectionate father. Forty years have gone by since Charlotte
Bronte died; and thirty-six years have flown since Mr. Nicholls left the
deathbed of his wife's father; but through all that period he has
retained the most kindly memories of one with whom his life was
intimately associated for sixteen years, with whom at one crisis of his
life, as we shall see, he had a serious difference, but whom he ever
believed to have been an entirely honourable and upright man.

A lady visitor to Haworth in December 1860 did not, it is true, carry
away quite so friendly an impression. 'I have been to see old Mr.
Bronte,' she writes, 'and have spent about an hour with him. He is
completely confined to his bed, but talks hopefully of leaving it again
when the summer comes round. I am afraid that it will not be leaving it
as he plans, poor old man! He is touchingly softened by illness; but
still talks in his pompous way, and mingles moral remarks and somewhat
stale sentiments with his conversation on ordinary subjects.' This is
severe, but after all it was a literary woman who wrote it. On the whole
we may safely assume, with the evidence before us, that Mr. Bronte was a
thoroughly upright and honourable man who came manfully through a
somewhat severe life battle. That is how his daughters thought of him,
and we cannot do better than think with them. {53}

Mr. Bronte died on June 7, 1861, and his funeral in Haworth Church is
described in the _Bra