The Professor

Preface
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
Chapter XVI
Chapter XVII
Chapter XVIII
Chapter XIX
Chapter XX
Chapter XXI
Chapter XXII
Chapter XXIII
Chapter XXIV
Chapter XXV

This little book was written before either "Jane Eyre" or
"Shirley," and yet no indulgence can be solicited for it on the
plea of a first attempt. A first attempt it certainly was not,
as the pen which wrote it had been previously worn a good deal in
a practice of some years. I had not indeed published anything
before I commenced "The Professor," but in many a crude effort,
destroyed almost as soon as composed, I had got over any such
taste as I might once have had for ornamented and redundant
composition, and come to prefer what was plain and homely. At
the same time I had adopted a set of principles on the subject
of incident, &c., such as would be generally approved in theory,
but the result of which, when carried out into practice, often
procures for an author more surprise than pleasure.

I said to myself that my hero should work his way through life as
I had seen real living men work theirs—that he should never get
a shilling he had not earned—that no sudden turns should lift
him in a moment to wealth and high station; that whatever small
competency he might gain, should be won by the sweat of his brow;
that, before he could find so much as an arbour to sit down in,
he should master at least half the ascent of "the Hill of
Difficulty;" that he should not even marry a beautiful girl or a
lady of rank. As Adam's son he should share Adam's doom, and
drain throughout life a mixed and moderate cup of enjoyment.

In the sequel, however, I find that publishers in general
scarcely approved of this system, but would have liked something
more imaginative and poetical—something more consonant with a
highly wrought fancy, with a taste for pathos, with sentiments
more tender, elevated, unworldly. Indeed, until an author has
tried to dispose of a manuscript of this kind, he can never know
what stores of romance and sensibility lie hidden in breasts he
would not have suspected of casketing such treasures. Men in
business are usually thought to prefer the real; on trial the
idea will be often found fallacious: a passionate preference for
the wild, wonderful, and thrilling—the strange, startling, and
harrowing—agitates divers souls that show a calm and sober
surface.

Such being the case, the reader will comprehend that to have
reached him in the form of a printed book, this brief narrative
must have gone through some struggles—which indeed it has. And
after all, its worst struggle and strongest ordeal is yet to come
but it takes comfort—subdues fear—leans on the staff of a
moderate expectation—and mutters under its breath, while
lifting its eye to that of the public,

"He that is low need fear no fall."

CURRER BELL.

The foregoing preface was written by my wife with a view to the
publication of "The Professor," shortly after the appearance of
"Shirley." Being dissuaded from her intention, the authoress
made some use of the materials in a subsequent work—"Villette,"
As, however, these two stories are in most respects unlike, it
has been represented to me that I ought not to withhold "The
Professor" from the public. I have therefore consented to its
publication.

A. B. NICHOLLS

Haworth Parsonage,
September 22nd, 1856.

THE other day, in looking over my papers, I found in my desk the
following copy of a letter, sent by me a year since to an old
school acquaintance:—

"DEAR CHARLES,
"I think when you and I were at Eton together, we were neither of
us what could be called popular characters: you were a
sarcastic, observant, shrewd, cold-blooded creature; my own
portrait I will not attempt to draw, but I cannot recollect that
it was a strikingly attractive one—can you? What animal
magnetism drew thee and me together I know not; certainly I never
experienced anything of the Pylades and Orestes sentiment for
you, and I have reason to believe that you, on your part, were
equally free from all romantic regard to me. Still, out of
school hours we walked and talked continually together; when the
theme of conversation was our companions or our masters we
understood each other, and when I recurred to some sentiment of
affection, some vague love of an excellent or beautiful object,
whether in animate or inanimate nature, your sardonic coldness
did not move me. I felt myself superior to that check THEN as I
do NOW.

"It is a long time since I wrote to you, and a still longer time
since I saw you. Chancing to take up a newspaper of your county
the other day, my eye fell upon your name. I began to think of
old times; to run over the events which have transpired since we
separated; and I sat down and commenced this letter. What you
have been doing I know not; but you shall hear, if you choose to
listen, how the world has wagged with me.

"First, after leaving Eton, I had an interview with my maternal
uncles, Lord Tynedale and the Hon. John Seacombe. They asked me
if I would enter the Church, and my uncle the nobleman offered me
the living of Seacombe, which is in his gift, if I would; then my
other uncle, Mr. Seacombe, hinted that when I became rector of
Seacombe-cum-Scaife, I might perhaps be allowed to take, as
mistress of my house and head of my parish, one of my six
cousins, his daughters, all of whom I greatly dislike.

"I declined both the Church and matrimony. A good clergyman is a
good thing, but I should have made a very bad one. As to the
wife—oh how like a night-mare is the thought of being bound for
life to one of my cousins! No doubt they are accomplished and
pretty; but not an accomplishment, not a charm of theirs,
touches a chord in my bosom. To think of passing the winter
evenings by the parlour fire-side of Seacombe Rectory alone with
one of them—for instance, the large and well-modelled statue,
Sarah—no; I should be a bad husband, under such circumstances,
as well as a bad clergyman.

"When I had declined my uncles' offers they asked me 'what I
intended to do?' I said I should reflect. They reminded me that
I had no fortune, and no expectation of any, and, after a
considerable pause, Lord Tynedale demanded sternly, 'Whether I
had thoughts of following my father's steps and engaging in
trade?' Now, I had had no thoughts of the sort. I do not think
that my turn of mind qualifies me to make a good tradesman; my
taste, my ambition does not lie in that way; but such was the
scorn expressed in Lord Tynedale's countenance as he pronounced
the word TRADE—such the contemptuous sarcasm of his tone—that I
was instantly decided. My father was but a name to me, yet that
name I did not like to hear mentioned with a sneer to my very
face. I answered then, with haste and warmth, 'I cannot do
better than follow in my father's steps; yes, I will be a
tradesman.' My uncles did not remonstrate; they and I parted
with mutual disgust. In reviewing this transaction, I find that
I was quite right to shake off the burden of Tynedale's
patronage, but a fool to offer my shoulders instantly for the
reception of another burden—one which might be more intolerable,
and which certainly was yet untried.

"I wrote instantly to Edward—you know Edward—my only brother,
ten years my senior, married to a rich mill-owner's daughter, and
now possessor of the mill and business which was my father's
before he failed. You are aware that my father-once reckoned a
Croesus of wealth—became bankrupt a short time previous to his
death, and that my mother lived in destitution for some six
months after him, unhelped by her aristocratical brothers, whom
she had mortally offended by her union with Crimsworth, the
—shire manufacturer. At the end of the six months she brought
me into the world, and then herself left it without, I should
think, much regret, as it contained little hope or comfort for
her.

"My father's relations took charge of Edward, as they did of me,
till I was nine years old. At that period it chanced that the
representation of an important borough in our county fell vacant;
Mr. Seacombe stood for it. My uncle Crimsworth, an astute
mercantile man, took the opportunity of writing a fierce letter
to the candidate, stating that if he and Lord Tynedale did not
consent to do something towards the support of their sister's
orphan children, he would expose their relentless and malignant
conduct towards that sister, and do his best to turn the
circumstances against Mr. Seacombe's election. That gentleman
and Lord T. knew well enough that the Crimsworths were an
unscrupulous and determined race; they knew also that they had
influence in the borough of X—; and, making a virtue of
necessity, they consented to defray the expenses of my education.
I was sent to Eton, where I remained ten years, during which
space of time Edward and I never met. He, when he grew up,
entered into trade, and pursued his calling with such diligence,
ability, and success, that now, in his thirtieth year, he was
fast making a fortune. Of this I was apprised by the occasional
short letters I received from him, some three or four times a
year; which said letters never concluded without some expression
of determined enmity against the house of Seacombe, and some
reproach to me for living, as he said, on the bounty of that
house. At first, while still in boyhood, I could not understand
why, as I had no parents, I should not be indebted to my uncles
Tynedale and Seacombe for my education; but as I grew up, and
heard by degrees of the persevering hostility, the hatred till
death evinced by them against my father—of the sufferings of my
mother—of all the wrongs, in short, of our house—then did I
conceive shame of the dependence in which I lived, and form a
resolution no more to take bread from hands which had refused to
minister to the necessities of my dying mother. It was by these
feelings I was influenced when I refused the Rectory of
Seacombe, and the union with one of my patrician cousins.

"An irreparable breach thus being effected between my uncles and
myself, I wrote to Edward; told him what had occurred, and
informed him of my intention to follow his steps and be a
tradesman. I asked, moreover, if he could give me employment.
His answer expressed no approbation of my conduct, but he said I
might come down to —shire, if I liked, and he would 'see what
could be done in the way of furnishing me with work.' I
repressed all—even mental comment on his note—packed my trunk
and carpet-bag, and started for the North directly.