The Tenant of Wildfell Hall was not qualified to handle at once vigorously and truthfully. The simple and natural – quiet description and simple pathos – are, I think Acton Bell's forte. I liked "Agnes Grey" better than the present work." Juliet Barker, in her biography of the Brontës, concluded that "Charlotte, it appears, was prepared to consign her sister’s novel to oblivion because she considered its subject at odds with her own perception of what Anne’s character was and ought to have been." Elizabeth Gaskell repeated Charlotte's words about Anne in "The Life of Charlotte Brontë", claiming that the subject of "The Tenant" "was
Helen Graham (The Tenant of Wildfell Hall) and is badly injured. As he is unwilling to stop drinking alcohol, Arthur's health deteriorates and he eventually dies. Now unburdened by her marriage to Arthur, Helen and Gilbert marry and have at least two children together. By the end of the novel, Little Arthur is grown up and is residing at Grassdale Manor with his wife, Helen Hattersley (the daughter of Milicent Hargrave and Ralph Hattersley). Helen is described by Gilbert in the first chapter of the novel when he sees her at church: Later he revealed that her eyes were very dark grey, almost black and a 'large,