halice. Such scenes have a vitality that makes them as real to
me as scenes upon which my own eyes have rested.

Again, I know no writer who has caught the poetry of the hearth like
Charlotte Bronte. The evening hours, when the fire leaps in the
chimney, and the lamp is lit, and the homeless wind moans outside, and
the contented mind possesses its dreams--I know nothing like that in
any book.

Indeed, I do not know any books which give me quite the sense of genius
that Charlotte Bronte's bring me. I find it difficult to define where
the genius lies; but the love which she dares to depict seems to me to
have a different quality to any other love; it is the passionate ardour
of a pure soul; it embraces body, mind, and heart alike; it is a love
that pierces through all disguises, and is the worship of spirit for
spirit at the very root of being; such love is not lightly conceived or
easily given; it is not born of chance companionship, of fleshly
desire, of a craving to share the happiness of a buoyant spirit of
sunshine and sweetness; it is rather nurtured in gloom and sadness, it
demands a corresponding depth and intensity, it requires to discern in
its lover a deep passion for the beauty of virtue. It is one of the
triumphs of Jane Eyre that the love she feels for Mr. Rochester pierces
through those very superficial vices which would be most abhorrent to
the pure nature, if it were not for the certainty that such vice was
the disguise and not the essence of the soul. And here lies, I think,
the uplifting hopefulness of Jane Eyre, the Christ-like power of
recognising the ardent spirit of love behind gross faults of both the
animal and the intellectual nature.

I do not know if you ever came across a book--I must send it you if you
have not seen it--which moves me and feeds my spirit more than almost
any book I know--the Letters and Journals of William Cory. He was a
master at Eton, you know, but before our time; and his life was rather
a disappointed one; but he had that remarkable union of qualities which
I think is very rare--hard intellectual force with passionate
tenderness. I suppose that, as far as mental ability went, he was one
of the very foremost men of his day. He had a faultless memory, great
clearness and vigour of thought, and perfect lucidity of expression.
But he valued these gifts very little in comparison with feeling, which
was his real life. It always interests me deeply to find that he had
the sam