her writings. Hearing from Mr. Williams that
she had a longing to see me, I called on her yesterday. I found a
little, almost dwarfish figure, to which even I had to look down; not
deformed--that is, not hunch-backed, but long-armed and with a large
head, and (at first sight) a strange face. She met me half-frankly,
half-tremblingly; we sat down together, and when I had talked with
her five minutes, her face was no longer strange, but mournfully
familiar--it was Martha Taylor on every lineament. I shall try to
find a moment to see her again. She lives in a poor but clean and
neat little lodging. Her mother seems a somewhat weak-minded woman,
who can be no companion to her. Her father has quite deserted his
wife and child, and this poor little, feeble, intelligent, cordial
thing wastes her brains to gain a living. She is twenty-five years
old. I do not intend to stay here, at the furthest, more than a week
longer; but at the end of that time I cannot go home, for the house
at Haworth is just now unroofed; repairs were become necessary.

'I should like to go for a week or two to the sea-side, in which case
I wonder whether it would be possible for you to join me. Meantime,
with regards to all--Believe me, yours faithfully,

'C. B.'

But her acquaintance with Lewes had apparently begun three years earlier.

TO W. S. WILLIAMS

'_November_ 6_th_, 1847.

'DEAR SIR,--I should be obliged to you if you will direct the
inclosed to be posted in London as I wish to avoid giving any clue to
my place of residence, publicity not being my ambition.

'It is an answer to the letter I received yesterday, favoured by you.
This letter bore the signature G. H. Lewes, and the writer informs me
that it is his intention to write a critique on _Jane Eyre_ for the
December number of _Fraser's Magazine_, and possibly also, he
intimates, a brief notice to the _Westminster Review_. Upon the
whole he seems favourably inclined to the work, though he hints
disapprobation of the melodramatic portions.

'Can you give me any information respecting Mr. Lewes? what station
he occupies in the literary world and what works he has written? He
styles himself "a fellow novelist.