'I hope Mr. Smith will not risk a cheap edition of _Jane Eyre_ yet,
he had better wait awhile--the public will be sick of the name of
that one book. I can make no promise as to when another will be
ready--neither my time nor my efforts are my own. That absorption in
my employment to which I gave myself up without fear of doing wrong
when I wrote _Jane Eyre_, would now be alike impossible and blamable;
but I do what I can, and have made some little progress. We must all
be patient.
'Meantime, I should say, let the public forget at their ease, and let
us not be nervous about it. And as to the critics, if the Bells
possess real merit, I do not fear impartial justice being rendered
them one day. I have a very short mental as well as physical sight
in some matters, and am far less uneasy at the idea of public
impatience, misconstruction, censure, etc., than I am at the thought
of the anxiety of those two or three friends in Cornhill to whom I
owe much kindness, and whose expectations I would earnestly wish not
to disappoint. If they can make up their minds to wait tranquilly,
and put some confidence in my goodwill, if not my power, to get on as
well as may be, I shall not repine; but I verily believe that the
"nobler sex" find it more difficult to wait, to plod, to work out
their destiny inch by inch, than their sisters do.
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