d brightness; but when I stoop down to
drink of the pure waters they fly from my lips as if I were Tantalus.

"You are far too kind and frequent in your invitations. You puzzle
me. I hardly know how to refuse, and it is still more embarrassing to
accept. At any rate, I cannot come this week, for we are in the very
thickest melee of the Repetitions. I was hearing the terrible fifth
section when your note arrived. But Miss Wooler says I must go to
Mary next Friday, as she promised for me on Whit-Sunday; and on Sunday
morning I will join you at church, if it be convenient, and stay till
Monday. There's a free and easy proposal! Miss W--- has driven me to
it. She says her character is implicated."

Good, kind Miss W---! however monotonous and trying were the duties
Charlotte had to perform under her roof, there was always a genial and
thoughtful friend watching over her, and urging her to partake of any
little piece of innocent recreation that might come in her way. And in
those Midsummer holidays of 1836, her friend E. came to stay with her at
Haworth, so there was one happy time secured.

Here follows a series of letters, not dated, but belonging to the latter
portion of this year; and again we think of the gentle and melancholy
Cowper.

"My dear dear E.,

"I am at this moment trembling all over with excitement, after reading
your note; it is what I never received before--it is the unrestrained
pouring out of a warm, gentle, generous heart . . . I thank you with
energy for this kindness. I will no longer shrink from answering your
questions. I _do_ wish to be better than I am. I pray fervently
sometimes to be made so. I have stings of conscience, visitings of
remorse, glimpses of holy, of inexpressible things, which formerly I
used to be a stranger to; it may all die away, and I may be in utter
midnight, but I implore a merciful Redeemer, that, if this be the dawn
of the gospel, it may still brighten to perfect day. Do not mistake
me--do not think I am good; I only wish to be so. I only hate my
former flippancy and forwardness. Oh! I am no better than ever I was.
I am in that state of horrid, gloomy uncertainty that, at this moment,
I would submit to be old, grey-haired, to have passed all my youthful
days of enjoyment, and to be settling on the verge of the grave, if I
could only thereby ensure the prospect of reconciliat