he pale embraces of the two sisters whom fortune had
left her.

101. "No touch of love, no hint of fame, no hours of ease lie for you
across the knees of fate," exclaims Miss Mary Robinson, who has
chronicled this existence, in a fine outburst of sorrow. And truly,
viewed from without, what life could be more dreary and colourless,
more futile and icily cold, than that of Emily Bronte? But where shall
we take our stand, when we pass such a life in review, so as best to
discover its truth, to judge it, approve it, and love it? How different
it all appears as we leave the little parsonage, hidden away on the
moors, and let our eyes rest on the soul of our heroine! It is rare
indeed that we thus can follow the life of a soul in a body that knew
no adventure; but it is less rare than might be imagined that a soul
should have life of its own, which hardly depends, if at all, on
incident of week or of year. In "Wuthering Heights"--wherein this soul
gives to the world its passions, desires, reflections, realisations,
ideals, which is, in a word, its real history--in "Wuthering Heights"
there is more adventure, more passion, more energy, more ardour, more
love, than is needed to give life or fulfilment to twenty heroic
existences, twenty destinies of gladness or sorrow. Not a single event
ever paused as it passed by her threshold; yet did every event she
could claim take place in her heart, with incomparable force and
beauty, with matchless precision and detail. We say that nothing ever
happened; but did not all things really happen to her much more
directly and tangibly than unto most of us, seeing that everything that
took place about her, everything that she saw or heard, was transformed
within her into thoughts and feelings, into indulgent love, admiration,
adoration of life? What matter whether the event fall on our
neighbour's roof or our own? The rain-drops the cloud brings with it
are for him who will hold out his vessel; and the gladness, the beauty,
the peace, or the helpful disquiet that is found in the gesture of
fate, belongs only to him who has learned to reflect. Love never came
to her: there fell never once on her ear the lover's magical footfall;
and, for all that, this virgin, who died in her twenty-ninth year, has
known love, has spoken of love, has penetrated its most impenetrable
secrets to such a degree, that those who have loved the most deeply
must sometimes uneasily wonder what name they should give to