The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-03-13


 many of the crudities and absurdities <which are blemishes in that first book or "Currer Bells" Of course Jane Eyre" will always exceed Shirley in popularity But from an artistic and literary point of view Shirley Is much the better story In Shirley" Char lotte Bronte drew her characters from real life, used people with whom she was associated, her own family and her dearest friends, as models for her nctfon people, and did it with as little falter- ing and as frankly as did Dickens, who did not hesitate to portray the weak ness of his own father and mother to advance his literary fame and his worldly fortune. Shirley" 1t will be seen in reading the story, was rather inclined to be strong minded" So was "Jane Eyre" 1t will be remembered, so are most of Charlotte Brontes heroines r-so was Charlotte herself.
 VVYYHEN Robert Gerald Moore came N/ to the West Riding of York WV shire and leased Follows Mill the people of the neighborhood regaro- ed him not as a countryman returned 10 4hem. but as a mi-foreigner. And TOT etrpers at that time. whether or the whole or semi-variety, were not popu-
  manufacturers who persisted in intro ducinR into their mills those new fangled machines, one of which did the work of half a dozen hands, and there by deprived working people, honest or dishonest, of the chance of making living. Times were hard enough, any way. without machinery coming In to make them harder, for 1t was at about the darkest hour of that great struggle which a determined, stolid nation was waxing against the power and splendor of a world-compelling genius.
 Napoleon and England had grappled in a struggle a entrance. The rest Of the nations were pawns on the chess board of the mighty game. In response to Napoleons Milan and Berlin decrees the British government had issued It's celebrated Orders in Council. Napoleon prohibited all commercial intercourse with Britain-even by neutrals. The British government prohibited all com mercial intercourse with nations which accepted the Napoleonic decrees. Amer lea. irritated, declared an embargo. The commerce of the world stood still. The
  cafly lost to the manufacturers of Eng land, and now the American market upon which they mainly relied, was closed to them, their warehouses were piled high with unstable goods; mill owners shut down or ran their estab- lishments with reduced hands. Hunger was in the cottage of the operative and bankruptcy in the counting house of the mill owner.
 Then came machinery to make mat ters worse, as the working people thought; as a straw to clutch at. the owners thought. Improved machinery means less demand for labor, said the operative. Improved machinery means a lessened cost for production, said the owner. Workmen went about destroy ing the new inventions. It was time of harvest for the agitator, the worth less being who lives by the sweat of other mems brows and waits himself to ease and power upon the breath of pop ular discontent; who craftily plays upon ignorance and amuses himself with fan ming the flames of civil discord. Anc the aeitators took advantage of the op- portunity.
 This was the condition of affairs in commercial England which supervened soon after Robert Moore had set to work at Follows mill with fixed de- termination to carry out purpose which he felt sacred--the purpose ol making enough money to pay off the debts of his father and re-establish the name of the once great firm of Gerard & Moore above the gloom of the bank ruptcy into which 1t had fallen. His mother had been a native of Antwerr and his father of one of the oldest fam flies of Yorkshire The principal office of the house of Gerard 6 Moore hat been in Antwerp, and there his father had married his mother. there Rober had been born, and there he had speni much of his youth. though some of i had been passed with his grandfath CT who ran the Yorkshire end of the bus iness. Those great continental ware which swept away nations and thrones also swept away mercantile houses, ant among them that of Gerard & Moore They are a proud lot, those mercantile families of long descent, as proud as i they had "all the blood of the How ards" and the credit of their nam is dear to them. When Robert Moor came back to Yorkshire the one idea o re-establishing the name of tho hous obsessed him. Neither love nor mere, should stand in his way Then he foun himself confronted by the situation stated.
 Briarfields was the nearest village t Hollow's Mill, and the rector of Brfar nelds was a sort of relative by marri age of Robert; his brother had marie the half sister of Roberts father, an living with the Reverend Helstone, tn rector, was Caroline Helstone, the onl offspring of this marriage. Of her mother Caroline knew nothing. Tn wild and dissipated career of her hus hand had been such that when tn crisis came and the rector had offere to take charge of the girl the mothel oeeing in her face the looks of he father had abandoned her to the charg ox her uncle and had disappeared. Tn Door woman shuddered as she locke at the replica in the face of her chil of that false, fair face of him who ha
 wrecked her life and abandoned he 0Io one ever mentioned her mother t Caroline. When she inquired of her sh was put off with evasive answers. Sh oaw that her mother had committe come crime-as she thought. What roally was those of whom she ask C n~s |. the x,aothar had uof hoor +r,,