Anne Brontë

“ Huntingdon - you may have forgotten the circumstance, but I never can. I admired you then most deeply, but I dared not love you. In the following autumn I saw so much of your perfections that I could not fail to love you, though I dared not show it. For upwards of three years I have endured a perfect martyrdom. From the anguish of suppressed emotions, intense and fruitless longings, silent sorrow, crushed hopes, and trampled affections, I have suffered more than I can tell, or you imagine - and you were the cause of it, and not altogether the innocent cause. My youth is wasting away ”

“ I know that there are feelings in your nature that have never yet been called forth; I know, too, that in your present neglected lonely state you are and must be miserable. You have it in your power to raise two human beings from a state of actual suffering to such unspeakable beatitude as only generous, noble, self-forgetting love can give (for you can love me if you will) ”

“ Huntingdon.' He departed. 'Mrs. Huntingdon,' she exclaimed, turning to me and still holding me fast by the hand, 'I'm quite shocked at you - you're just as angry, and distant, and cold as he is: and I'm determined you shall be as good friends as ever before you go.'
'Esther, how can you be so rude!' cried Mrs. Hargrave, who was seated gravely knitting in her easy-chair. 'Surely, you never will learn to conduct yourself like a lady!'
'Well, mamma, you said yourself - ' But the young lady was silenced by the uplifted finger of her mamma, accompanied with a very stern shake of the head. ”

“ That father, on the contrary, has no weight of sadness on his mind; is troubled with no fears, no scruples concerning his son's future welfare; and at evenings especially, the times when the child sees him the most and the oftenest, he is always particularly jocund and open-hearted: ready to laugh and to jest with anything or anybody but me, and I am particularly silent and sad: therefore, of course, the child dotes upon his seemingly joyous amusing, ever-indulgent papa, and will at any time gladly exchange my company for his. ”

“ Hargrave asked if I felt cold, and shut the door - a very unseasonable piece of officiousness, for I had meditated following the noisy playfellows if they did not speedily return. He then took the liberty of walking up to the fire himself, and asking me if I were aware that Mr. Huntingdon was now at the seat of Lord Lowborough, and likely to continue there some time. ”

“ Huntingdon,' said he, smiling; 'you are only half a woman - your nature must be half human, half angelic. Such goodness overawes me; I don't know what to make of it.'
'Then, sir, I fear you must be very much worse than you should be, if I, a mere ordinary mortal, am, by your own confession, so vastly your superior; and since there exists so little sympathy between us, I think we had better each look out for some more congenial companion.' And forthwith moving to the window, I began to look out for my little son and his gay young friend.
'No, I am the ordinary mortal, I maintain,' replied Mr. ”

“ It is His will that we should not injure others by the gratification of our own earthly passions; and you have a mother, and sisters, and friends who would be seriously injured by your disgrace; and I, too, have friends, whose peace of mind shall never be sacrificed to my enjoyment, or yours either, with my consent ”

“ He conducted himself, at first, with his usual cold, distant, half- stately, half-melancholy, altogether injured air; but Esther made no remark upon it this time: she had evidently been schooled into better manners. She talked to me, and laughed and romped with little Arthur, her loved and loving playmate. He, somewhat to my discomfort, enticed her from the room to have a run in the hall, and thence into the garden. I got up to stir the fire. Mr. ”