'The perfection of warmth, snugness and comfort...'
Charlotte, Emily and Anne did most of their writing here and the room was the focus of their creativity. 'Jane Eyre', 'Wuthering Heights' and 'Agnes Grey' were written in this room. It was the sisters' habit to walk around the table until about eleven o'clock, reading and discussing their writing plans and projects. After the deaths of Emily and Anne, Charlotte walked in solitude, unable to sleep without this nightly ritual. Martha Brown, servant at the Parsonage, described how, 'My heart aches to hear Miss Brontë walking, walking on alone.'
The dining room would also have been used to entertain visitors, and therefore it is the room most often described in articles and contemporary accounts. The dining room, sometimes called the parlour, is furnished in a simple style. Elizabeth Gaskell said, 'The parlour has evidently been refurbished within the last few years, since Miss Brontë's success has enabled her to have a little more money to spend... The prevailing colour of the room is crimson... There is her likeness by Richmond, an engraving from Lawrence's picture of Thackeray, and two recesses, on each side of the high, narrow, old-fashioned mantel-piece, filled with books.' The books on the shelves are of the period, while those owned by the Brontës themselves are stored securely elsewhere. The house would have been lit with a combination of oil lamps, rushlights and candles. Charlotte recalled little about her mother, who died in 1821 when Charlotte was just five years old, but a treasured, vague memory was of Mrs Brontë nursing Branwell in this room.