It is not necessary to dwell in detail upon the various occupations of the Brontë girls after Charlotte finally left Roehead. When at home they wrote, read, wandered on the moor, and pursued their household avocations. Emily remained continuously at Haworth, but Anne and Charlotte obtained situations as governesses. Anne's experiences in this capacity may be divined by the readers of "Agnes Grey," her first novel; Charlotte's are indicated in "Shirley," in that passage where Mrs. Pryor describes her early life. In speaking of this period to Mrs. Gaskell, Charlotte related how, in one family, just as she was beginning to gain some ascendancy over a group of children who had been perfect little savages when she arrived, the youngest, and to her the dearest, said to her one day at table in a sudden burst of affection, putting his chubby hand in hers:
"I love 'ou, Miss Brontë!"
Instantly the mother exclaimed, in a tone of astonishment and reproach:
"Love the governess, my dear!"
It is a relief to hear, after this incident, that in the last family where she occupied this situation, her treatment was far different. As she herself said, they could not make enough of her, and they remained her friends as long as she lived.
But, at the best, going out as governess did not prove remunerative, and the work overtaxed the feeble strength of both Anne and Charlotte. It was a slavery from which they longed to escape, and in concert with Emily, they gradually formed the plan of keeping a girls' boarding-school at their own home. To this end, however, they considered a better knowledge of French and German necessary; and, at length, in 1842, Charlotte and Emily went to Brussels to the school of M. and Madame Héger,
