IN THE preface to a new edition of Wuth-
ering Heights and Agnes Grey, published in 1850, Charlotte
writes:

One day, in the autumn of 1845, I accidentally lighted
on a MS. of verse in my sister Emily's handwriting. Of
course, I was not surprised, knowing that she did and
could write verse. I looked it over, and something more
than surprise seized me--a deep conviction that these
were not common effusions, nor at all like the poetry
women write. I thought them condensed and terse, vig-
orous and genuine. To my ear they had also a peculiar
music, wild, melancholy, and elevating. My sister Emily
was not a person of demonstrative character, nor one on
the recesses of whose mind and feelings even those near-
est and dearest to her could, with impunity, intrude un-
licensed. It took hours to reconcile her to the discovery I
had made, and days to persuade her that such poems
merited publication."

Perhaps Charlotte did come across the poems accidentally.
Or perhaps she suspected their existence and went looking
for them. Emily's apparent anger might indicate the latter.
However, it would have been like Emily to be displeased at
this invasion of her privacy, even supposing Charlotte had

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