VOLUME 1***





Transcribed from the 1906 Smith, Elder, and Co. edition by David Price,
email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk





THE LIFE OF CHARLOTTE BRONTE--VOLUME 1


CHAPTER I


The Leeds and Skipton railway runs along a deep valley of the Aire; a
slow and sluggish stream, compared to the neighbouring river of Wharfe.
Keighley station is on this line of railway, about a quarter of a mile
from the town of the same name.  The number of inhabitants and the
importance of Keighley have been very greatly increased during the last
twenty years, owing to the rapidly extended market for worsted
manufactures, a branch of industry that mainly employs the factory
population of this part of Yorkshire, which has Bradford for its centre
and metropolis.

Keighley is in process of transformation from a populous, old-fashioned
village, into a still more populous and flourishing town.  It is evident
to the stranger, that as the gable-ended houses, which obtrude themselves
corner-wise on the widening street,