I buoyed up my mind with the
expectation of receiving a letter from you, but as, however, I have
got none, I suppose I must have been mistaken.
'C. B.
'Mr. Jenkins has called. He brought no letter from you, but said you
were at Harrogate, and that they could not find the letter you had
intended to send. He informed me of the death of your sister. Poor
Sarah, when I last bid her good-bye I little thought I should never
see her more. Certainly, however, she is happy where she is
gone--far happier than she was here. When the first days of mourning
are past, you will see that you have reason rather to rejoice at her
removal than to grieve for it. Your mother will have felt her death
much--and you also. I fear from the circumstance of your being at
Harrogate that you are yourself ill. Write to me soon.'
It was in September that the incident occurred which has found so
dramatic a setting in _Villette_--the confession to a priest of the Roman
Catholic Church of a daughter of the most militant type of Protestantism;
and not the least valuable of my newly-discovered Bronte treasures is the
letter which Charlotte wrote to Emily giving an unembellished account of
the incident.
TO MISS EMILY J.
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