, 1891-03-12
"THACKERAY AT HOME.
ACCOUNT BY HIS DAUGHTER OF
A RECEPTION TO AN AUTHOR.

ing room IN Dung street II "a kltSG never
TO be forgotten by me, a tiny, delicate, lit
tie person, whose small hand nevertheless
graspcd a mighty lever which set all the
literary world Of that day vibrating. l can
still see the scene quite plainlyl-the hot
summer evening. the open windows, the
carriage driving to the door as we all sat
silent and expectaut; my father, who rare
ly waited, waiting with US; our Eoverness
and my sister and / all in a row., and pre-
pared for the great event
We saw the carriage stop, and out Of It
spranE the active, well knit figure Of Mr..
George Smith, who was bringing Miss
Broute 10 see our father. Ny father, who
had been walking up and down the room,
goes out into the hall to meet his guests,
and then after a moments delay the door
opens wide, and the two gentlemen come
IN, leading a tiny, delicate, serious little
lady, pale, with fair, straight hair and
steady eyes. She may be a little over thir-
"; she is dressed in a little bnrege dress
with a pattern Of faint green moss,
She enters in mitteus. in silence, in Sc
robustness; our hearts are beating with
wild excitement. This, then, is the author
ess. the unknown power whose books have
set all london talking, reading, speculat-
ing; some people even say our father wrote
the bOoks-the wonderful books.
To say that we little girls had been given
Jane Eyre" 70 read scarcely represents
the facts Of the case, 70 say that we had
taken II without leave, read bits here and
read bits there been carried away by an
undreamed Of and hitherto unimagined
whirlwind into things, times, places, all
utterly absorbing and at the same time alb
solutely unintelligibls to us, would more
accurately describe our states OF mind on
that summers evening as we look Mt Jane
Eyre-the great Jane Eyre-the tiny little
lady.
The moment is so breathless that dinner
comes rs a relief to the solemnity Of the
occasion. and we all smile as my father
stoops to offer his arm, for, genius though
she may be, Miss Bronte can barely reach
his elbow. My own personal impressions
are that she is somewhat grave and stern,
specially to forward little girls who wish
to chatter. Mr.. George Smith has since told
me how she afterward remarked upon my
fathers wonderful forbearance and gentle
ness with our uucalled for incursicus into
the conversation She sat gazing at him
with kndliug eyes Of interest, lighting up
with "A sort Of illumination every now and
then AS she answered him ! can see her,
bending forward over the table, not eating,
but listening TO what he said AS he carved
the dish before him.
! think it must have been on this very
occasion that my father invited some Of
his friends in the evening 70 meet Miss
Brunte-for everybody was interested and
anxious TO see her. Mrs. Grove, the reciter
Of ghost stories, was there. Mrs. Brook
field, Ms, Carlyle, Mr.. Carlyle himself was
there, so ! am told, railing at the appear
Buce Of cockneys upon Scotch mountain
sides; there were also TOO many Americans
for his taste, but the Americans were as
God compared to the cockneys, +" says the
philosopher. Besides the Carlyles there
were Mrs. Elliott and Miss Perry, Mrs.
Proctor and her daughter, most Of my
fathers habitunl friends and companions.
In the recent life Of Lord Houghton ! was
amused to see a note quoted in which Lord
H]oughton was also convened. Would hat
he had been presentl-perhaps the party
would have gone on better. II was a
gloomy md n silent evening.
Every one waited for the brilliant CON
versation which never began at all. Miss
Bronte retired TO the sofa in the study, and
murmured "A low word now and then to
our kind g~overnness, Miss Truelock. The
room looked very dark, the lamp began to
smoke a little, the conversation grew linn
mer and more dim, the ladies sat around
still expectant, my father was too much
perturbed by the gloom and the silence to
be able TO cope with it at all.
Mrs. Brookield, who was in the doorway
by the study, near the corner in which Miss
Bronte was sitting, leaned forward with a
little commonplace, since bTillisnce was
not to be the order of the evening do
you like London, Miss Broute2" size said;
another silence, n pause, then Miss Brunte
answers Yes and mo" very gruyely,
and there the conversation drops.
Ny sister and I were much too young to
be- bored in those days; alarmed, impressed
we might be, but not yet bored. A party
was u party, Il lioness was a lioness; and
shall | confess itf-at that time an extra
dish Of biscuits was enough TO mark the
evening. We felt all the Importance Of
the occasion; tea spread in the dining
room, ludIes in the drawing room; we
roamed about inConvenicntly, no doubt,
and e~NcjJedly, and in one Of my excursions
crossing the ball | was surprised to see my
father opening the front door with his hat
on. He put his fingers TO his lips, walked
out into the darkness, aud shut the door
quietly behind him. When I went back
TO the drawing room again the ladies asked
me where lie was. | vaguely answered that
| thought he was coming back.
was puzzled at the time, nor was it all
made clear to me till long years a%fterward,
when one day Mrs. Proctor asked me II |
knew what had happened once when my
father had invited a party to meet Jane
Eyre at his house. 1t was one of the dull
est evenings she had ever spent in her life,
she said. And then, with II good deal Of
humor, she described the situation, the la
dies who all come expecting SO much de-
lightful conversation, and the gloom and
the Construint, and how finally, over
whelmed by the situation. my father had
quietly left the room. left the house and
gone off to his club.
The ladies waited, wondered, and finally
departed also; aud US we were going up TO
bed with our candles after everybody was
gone, | remember two pretty Miss LIS, in
shiny silk dresses, arriving, full Of eXpec-
tation. We still said we thought our
father would soon be back, but the Miss
LIS declined TO wait upon the chance,
laughed ana drove away again almost i'm
ulediAtely.
Since writing the preceding lines | have
delightful home where she used to stay
with Mrs. Gaskell. | have seen signs ard
tokens OF her presence, faint sketches van
ishiug away, the delicate writing in the
beautiful book she gave that warm FRIEND;
and | have also looked for and reread
the introduction TO Emma" that last
sketch and most touching chapter In the
nevgr-to-be-written book of Charlotte
Broute's happy married life. The paper Is
signed Wv. NJ. T." 1t was written by the
editor, and is printed in one Of the very
earliest number of The Cornhill Maya
Line.-Mrs. Richie in Macmillau's Maya
zine.
Remarkable Rescue.
Mrs. Michael Curtain, Plainfeld, Ill,
makes the statement that she caught
cold Ubich spttIad IN bar lungs. sba was