But it is of the church that Miss Buss has most to say in her notes of the day—
“August 18, 1879.
“A party of seven started at eleven, in a waggonette, for Haworth, a drive of eighteen miles through several villages and the town of Keighley. Haworth (pronounced Horth) consists of one long, straggling street, frightfully steep, so that one can neither drive up nor down, but must walk.
“We went to the Black Bull for lunch, and then visited the church and churchyard. Oh, what an abomination the church is! It is very old, dating from a very early period. It has only two naves, and no chancel, nor transept, nor anything to break its hideous straightness. Where the communion-table stands is a window, small, and, on both sides, another window, very large. High, worm-eaten, rotten pews, a deep gallery at one end, and on one side, and broken or worm-eaten beams everywhere; narrow seats, on which it is impossible to sit; no ventilation, the whole place reeking with the accumulated foul air of centuries. Such is Haworth Church!
“Charlotte Brontë died twenty-five years ago—in 1855. In her time the organ stood over the communion-table, and over the rectory-pew! It seems impossible, but this is a fact. The successor to Mr. Brontë has moved the organ into the side gallery, and has taken away the pew, to leave room for some benches for the choir. In this church Grimshaw, Wesley, and Whitfield preached.
“We, of course, saw Charlotte Brontë’s wedding-register. We wandered round the parsonage, which has been enlarged since the time of the Brontës; we walked behind the house on the moors, and entered the school where she and her sisters taught.
“All the houses are built of stone, and look cold and grey. Hundreds of English-speaking people visit the place yearly, through the interest in the home of those remarkable women, the Brontës, and yet the church is to be pulled down in three weeks’ time. It seems a pity that no one can be found to build a new church, and let the old one be preserved that we and our successors may see how and in what places our fathers worshipped.... Poor Charlotte Brontë! After seeing the place, one understands how infinitely sad life must have been in it.”
In striking contrast with this desolate scene was another experience, when we spent a few very pleasant days in the last home of George Eliot, at Witley, which had been taken by our friend Mr. Neate. Miss Buss writes to her cousin—
“‘Daniel Deronda’ was written in her boudoir, now turned into a spare bedroom, in which I slept. What a crowd of thoughts come into one’s mind as one stands in that particular room. If walls could speak!
“The grounds are 3½ acres, so they are extensive enough to afford variety. The house stands on the top of a hill, surrounded by trees and shrubs. The sun is glorifying everything, and the distant landscape reminds me of one of the lower valleys in Switzerland. There are hills on hills, low, of course, in elevation, but making the view very diversified.