Shirley
Shirley,a novel by C. Brontë , published 1849 . The scene of the story is Yorkshire, and the period the latter part of the Napoleonic wars, the time of the Luddite riots , when the wool industry was suffering from the almost complete cessation of exports. In spite of these conditions, Robert Gérard Moore, half English, half Belgian by birth, a mill-owner of determined character, persists in introducing the latest labour-saving machinery, undeterred by the opposition of the workers, which culminates in an attempt first to destroy his mill, and finally to take his life. To overcome his financial difficulties he proposes to Shirley Keeldar, an heiress of independent spirit, while under the mistaken impression that she is in love with him; he himself loves not her but his gentle and retiring cousin Caroline Helstone, who is pining away for love of him and through enforced idleness in the oppressive atmosphere of her uncle's rectory. Robert is...
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