FROM CONCORD TO LENOX: 1845-1849
In May, 1845, Paymaster Bridge found himself again on the American
coast. Meeting with Franklin Pierce in Boston, they agreed to go
to Concord together, and look into Hawthorne’s affairs. Soon after
breakfast, Mrs. Hawthorne espied them coming through the gateway. She
had never met Pierce, but she recognized Bridge’s tall, elegant figure,
when he waved his hat to her in the distance. Hawthorne himself was
sawing and splitting in the wood-shed, and thither she directed his
friends--to his no slight astonishment when they appeared before
him. Pierce had his arm across Hawthorne’s broad shoulders when they
reappeared. There is one pleasure, indeed, which young people cannot
know, and that is, the meeting of old friends. Mrs. Hawthorne was
favorably impressed with Franklin Pierce’s personality; while Horatio
Bridge danced about and acted an impromptu pantomime, making up faces
like an owl. They assured Hawthorne that something should be done to
relieve his financial embarrassment.[Footnote: J. Hawthorne, 281.]
All those whose attention Hawthorne attracted out of the rush and hurry
of the world were sure to become interested in his welfare. O’Sullivan,
the editor of the _Democratic Review_, had already exerted himself
in Hawthorne’s behalf; but President Polk evidently did not know who
Hawthorne was, so that O’Sullivan was obliged to have a puff inserted in
his review for the President’s better information. George Bancroft was
now in the Cabinet, and could easily have obtained a lucrative post for
Hawthorne, but it is plain that Bancroft was not over-friendly to him
and that Hawthorne was fully aware of this. Hawthorne had suggested
the Salem postmastership, but when O’Sullivan mentioned this, Bancroft
objected on the ground that the present incumbent was too good a man to
be displaced, and proposed the consulates of Genoa and Marseilles, two
deplorable positions and quite out of the question for Hawthorne, in the
condition of his family at that time. Perhaps it would have been better
for him in a material sense, if he had accepted the invitation to dine
with Margaret Fuller.
The summer wore away, but nothing was acomplished; and late in the
autumn Hawthorne left the Old Manse to return to his Uncle Robert
Manning’s house in Salem, where he could always count on a warm welcome.
There he spent the winter with his wife and child, until suddenly, in
March, 1846, he was appointed Surveyor of the Port, or, as it is now
more properly called, Collector of Customs.
This was, in truth, worth waiting for. The salary was not large, but it
was a dignified position and allowed Hawthorne sufficient leisure
for other pursuits,--the leisure of the merchant or banker. Salem
had already begun to lose its foreign trade, and for days together
it sometimes happened that there was nothing to do. Hawthorne’s chief
business was to prevent the government from being cheated, either by the
importers or by his own subordinates; and it required a pretty sharp eye
to do this. All the appointments, even to his own clerks, were made by
outside politicians, and when a reduction of employees was necessary,
Hawthorne consulted with the local Democratic Committee, and followed
their advice. Such a method was not to the advantage of the public
service, but it saved Hawthorne from an annoying responsibility. His
strictness and impartiality, however, soon brought him into conflict
with his more self-important subordinates, who were by no means
accustomed to exactness in their dealings, and this finally produced a
good deal of official unpleasantness; and the unfavorable reports
which were afterward circulated concerning Hawthorne’s life during this
period, probably originated in that quarter.
[Illustration: THE CUSTOM HOUSE, SALEM, MASS., WHERE HAWTHORNE WAS
EMPLOYED AS SURVEYOR OF THE FORT OF SALEM, AT THE TIME OF HIS WRITING
“THE SCARLET LETTER”]
All the poetry that Hawthorne could extract from his occupation at the
Custom House is to be found in his preface to “The Scarlet Letter,” but
he withholds from us the prosaic side of it,--as he well might. At times
he comes close to caricature, especially in his descriptions of “those
venerable incumbents who hibernated during the winter season, and then
crawled out during the warm days of spring to draw their pay and
perform those pretended duties, for which they were engaged.” There were
formerly large numbers of moss-grown loafers in the government service,
with whiskey-reddened noses and greasy old clothing, who would sun
themselves on the door-steps, and tell anecdotes of General Jackson,
Senator Benton, and other popular heroes, with whom they would intimate
a good acquaintance at some remote period of their lives. If removed
from office, they were quite as likely to turn up in a neighboring jail
as in any other location. This is no satire, but serious truth; and
instances of it can be given.
Hawthorne’s life during the next three years was essentially domestic.
In June, 1846, his son Julian was born--a remarkably vigorous baby--at
Doctor Peabody’s house in West Street, Boston; Mrs. Hawthorne wisely
preferring to be with her own mother during her confinement. [Footnote:
At the age of thirty-five, Julian resembled his father so closely that
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s old friends were sometimes startled by him, as if
they had seen an apparition. He was, however, of a stouter build, and
his eyes were different.] With two small children on her hands, Mrs.
Hawthorne had slight opportunity to enjoy general society, fashionable
or otherwise. Rebecca Manning says, however:
“Neither Hawthorne nor his wife could be said to be ‘in society’ in the
technical sense. When the Peabody family lived in Salem, they were,
I have been told, somewhat straitened pecuniarily. After Hawthorne’s
marriage, I think I remember hearing of his wife going to parties and
dinners occasionally. Dr. Loring’s wife was her cousin. Other friends
were the Misses Howes, one of whom is now Mrs. Cabot of Boston. Mrs.
Foote, who was a daughter of Judge White, was a friend, and I remember
some Silsbees who were also her friends. Hawthorne’s wife knew how to
cultivate her friends and make the most of them far better than either
Hawthorne or his sisters did. I have been told that when Hawthorne was a
young man, before his marriage, if he had chosen to enter Salem’s ‘first
circle’ he would have been welcome there.”
During this last sojourn in his native city Hawthorne was chosen on
the committee for the lyceum lecture course, and proved instrumental
in bringing Webster to Salem,--where he had not been popular since the
trial of the two Knapps,--to deliver an oration on the Constitution; of
which Mrs. Hawthorne has given a graphic description in a letter to her
mother on November 19, 1848:
“The old Lion walked the stage with a sort of repressed rage, when he
referred to those persons who cried out, ‘Down with the Constitution!’
‘Madmen! Or most wicked if not mad!’ said he with a glare of fire.”
A pure piece of acting. The national Constitution was not even
endangered by the Southern rebellion,--much less by the small band of
original abolitionists; and Webster was too sensible not to be aware of
this.
While Hawthorne was at the Salem Custom House, he made at least two
valuable friends: Doctor George B. Loring, who had married a cousin of
Mrs. Hawthorne, and William B. Pike, who occupied a subordinate
position in the Custom House, but whom Hawthorne valued for moral and
intellectual qualities of which he would seem to have been the first
discoverer. They were not friends who would be likely to affect
Hawthorne’s political views, except to encourage him in the direction to
which he had always tended. Four years earlier, Doctor Loring had
been on cordial terms with Longfellow and Sumner, being a refined and
intellectual sort of man, but like Hillard, had withdrawn from them on
account of political differences. He was an able public speaker, and
became a Democratic politician, until 1862, when he went over to the
Republicans; but after that he was looked upon with a good deal of
suspicion by both parties. The governorship was supposed to have been
the object of his ambition, but he never could obtain the nomination.
Late in life he was appointed Commissioner of Agriculture, a post for
which he was eminently fitted, and finally went to Portugal as United
States Minister.
William B. Pike either lacked the opportunity or the necessary
concentration to develop his genius in the larger world, but Hawthorne
continued to communicate with him irregularly until the close of his
life. He invited him to Lenox when he resided there, and Mrs. Lathrop
recollects seeing him at the Wayside in Concord, after Hawthorne’s
return from Europe. She discribes him as a “short, sturdy, phlegmatic
and plebeian looking man,” but with a gentle step and a finely
modulated voice. It may have been as well for him that he never became
distinguished. [Footnote: Mrs. Lathrop, “Memories of Hawthorne,” 154.]
The war with Mexico was now fairly afield, and Franklin Pierce, who left
the United States Senate on account of his wife’s health, was organizing
a regiment of New Hampshire volunteers, as a “patriotic duty.” Salem
people thought differently, and party feeling there soon rose to the
boiling-point. There is no other community where political excitement is
so likely to become virulent as in a small city. In a country town, like
Concord, every man feels the necessity for conciliating his neighbor,
but the moneyed class in Salem was sufficient for its own purposes,
and was opposed to the war in a solid body. The Whigs looked upon the
invasion of Mexico as a piratical attempt of the Democratic leaders to
secure the permanent ascendency of their party, and this was probably
the true reason for Franklin Pierce’s joining it. In their eyes,
Hawthorne was the representative of a corrupt administration, and they
would have been more than human if they had not wished him to feel this.
The Salem gentry could not draw him into an argument very well, but
they could look daggers at him on the street and exhibit their coldness
toward him when they went on business to the Custom House. It is evident
that he was made to suffer in some such manner, and to a tenderhearted
man with a clear conscience, it must have seemed unkind and unjust.
[Footnote: When the engagement between the “Chesapeake” and the
“Shannon” took place off Salem harbor in August, 1813, and Captain
Lawrence was killed in the action, the anti-war sentiment ran so high
that it was difficult to find a respectable mansion where his funeral
would be permitted.] In his Custom House preface, Hawthorne compares
the Whigs rather unfavorably with the Democrats, and this is not to be
wondered at; but he should have remembered that it was his own party
which first introduced the spoils-of-office system.
The first use that Hawthorne made of his government salary was to cancel
his obligations to the Concord tradespeople, and the next was to provide
a home for his wife and mother. They first moved to 18 Chestnut
Street, in June, 1846; and thence to a larger house, 14 Mall Street, in
September, 1847, in which “The Snow Image” was prepared for publication,
and “The Scarlet Letter” was written. Hawthorne’s study or workshop was
the front room in the third story, an apartment of some width but with a
ceiling in direct contradiction to the elevated thoughts of the writer.
There is an ominous silence in the American Note-book between 1846 and
1850, which is rather increased than diminished by the publication from
his diary of a number of extracts concerning the children. The babies of
geniuses do not differ essentially from those of other people, and it
is not supposable that Hawthorne’s reflections during this period
were wholly confined to his own family. It is to be hoped that fuller
information will yet be given to the public concerning their affairs in
Salem; for the truth deserves to be told.
In January, 1846, Mrs. Hawthorne wrote to her mother:
“No one, I think, has a right to break the will of a child, but God;
and if the child is taught to submit to Him through love, all other
submission will follow with heavenly effect upon the character. God
never drives even the most desperate sinner, but only invites or
suggests through the events of His providence.”
Nothing is more unfortunate than to break the will of a child, for
all manliness and womanliness is grounded in the will; but it is often
necessary to control the desires and humors of children for their
self-preservation. Hawthorne himself was not troubled with such fancies.
Alcott, who was his nearest neighbor at the Wayside, once remarked
that there was only one will in the Hawthorne family, and that was
Nathaniel’s. His will was law and no one thought of disputing it.
Yet what he writes concerning children is always sweet, tender, and
beautiful, with the single exception of a criticism of his own daughter,
which was published long after his death and could not have been
intended for the public eye.
The war with Mexico was wonderfully successful from a military point
of view, but its political effects were equally confounding to the
politicians who projected it. The American people resemble the French,
quite as much perhaps as they do the English, and the admiration of
military glory is one of their Gallic traits. It happened that the two
highest positions in the army were both held by Whig generals, and the
victory of Buena Vista carried Zachary Taylor into the White House,
in spite of the opposition of Webster and Clay, as well as that of
the Democrats and the Free Soilers. Polk, Bancroft, and Pierce had
all contributed to the defeat of their own party. The war proved their
political terminus to the two former; but, _mirabile dictu_, it became
the cap of Fortunatus to Pierce and Hawthorne.
This, however, could not have been foreseen at the time, and the
election of Taylor in November, 1848, had a sufficiently chilling effect
on the little family in Mall Street. Hawthorne entertained the hope that
he might be spared in the general out-turning, as a distinguished writer
and an inoffensive partisan, and this indicates how loath he was to
relinquish his comfortable position. Let us place ourselves in his
situation and we shall not wonder at it. He was now forty-five, with a
wife and two children, and destitution was staring him in the face. For
ten years he had struggled bravely, and this was the net result of all
his endeavors. Never had the future looked so gloomy to him.
The railroad had superseded his Uncle Manning’s business, as it had that
of half the mercantile class in the city, and his father-in-law was in a
somewhat similar predicament. At this time Elizabeth Peabody was keeping
a small foreign book-store in a room of her father’s house on West
Street. One has to realize these conditions, in order to appreciate the
mood in which Hawthorne’s Custom House preface was written.
There is one passage in it, however, that is always likely to be
misunderstood. It is where he says:
“I thought my own prospects of retaining office, to be better than those
of my Democratic brethren; but who can see an inch into futurity, beyond
his nose? My own head was the first that fell!”
It is clear that some kind of an effort was made to prevent his removal,
presumably by George S. Hillard, who was a Whig in good favor; but the
conclusion which one would naturally draw from the above, that Hawthorne
was turned out of office in a summary and ungracious manner, is not
justified by the evidence. He was not relieved from duty until June 14,
1849; that is, he was given a hundred days of grace, which is much more
than officeholders commonly are favored with, in such cases. We
may consider it morally certain that Hillard did what he could
in Hawthorne’s behalf. He was well acquainted with Webster, but
unfortunately Webster had opposed the nomination of General Taylor, and
was so imprudent as to characterize it as a nomination not fit to be
made. This was echoed all over the country, and left Webster without
influence at Washington. For the time being Seward was everything, and
Webster was nothing.
In a letter to Horace Mann, shortly after his removal, Hawthorne refers
to two distinct calumnies which had been circulated concerning him in
Salem, and only too widely credited. The most important of these--for
it has seriously compromised a number of Salem gentlemen--was never
explained until the publication of Mrs. Lathrop’s “Memories of
Hawthorne” in 1897; where we find a letter from Mrs. Hawthorne to her
mother, dated June 10, 1849, and containing the following passage:
“Here is a pretty business, discovered in an unexpected manner to Mr.
Hawthorne by a friendly and honorable Whig. Perhaps you know that the
President said before he took the chair that he should make no removals
except for dishonesty and unfaithfulness. It is very plain that neither
of these charges could be brought against Mr. Hawthorne. Therefore
a most base and incredible falsehood has been told--written down and
signed and sent to the Cabinet in secret. This infamous paper certifies
among other things (of which we have not heard)--that Mr. Hawthorne
has been in the habit of writing political articles in magazines and
newspapers!” So it appears that the gutta-percha formula [Footnote: By
which eighty-eight per cent, of the classified service were removed.]
of President Cleveland in regard to “offensive partisanship” was really
invented forty years before his time, and had as much value in one case
as in the other. It is possible that such a document as Mrs. Hawthorne
describes was circulated, signed, and sent to Washington, to make the
way easy for President Taylor’s advisers, and if so it was a highly
contemptible proceeding; but the statement rests wholly on the
affirmation of a single witness, whose name has always been withheld,
and even if it were true that Hawthorne had written political articles
for Democratic papers the fact would have in no wise been injurious to
his reputation. The result must have been the same in any case. General
Taylor was an honorable man, and no doubt intended to keep his word,
as other Presidents have intended since; but what could even a brave
general effect against the army of hungry office-seekers who were
besieging the White House,--a more formidable army than the Mexicans
whom he had defeated at Buena Vista? In all probability he knew nothing
of Hawthorne and never heard of his case.
The second calumny which Hawthorne refers to was decidedly second-rate,
and closely resembles a servant’s intrigue. The Department at
Washington, in a temporary fit of economy, had requested him to
discharge two of his supervisors. He did not like to take the men’s
bread away from them, and made a mild protest against the order. At the
same time he consulted his chief clerk as to what it might be best to
do, and they agreed upon suspending two of the supervisors who might
suffer less from it than some others. As it happened, the Department
considered Hawthorne’s report favorably, and no suspension took place;
but his clerk betrayed the secret to the two men concerned, who hated
Hawthorne in consequence, and afterward circulated a report that he had
threatened to discharge them unless they contributed to the Democratic
campaign fund. This return of evil for good appears to have been a
new experience for Hawthorne, but those who are much concerned in
the affairs of the world soon become accustomed to it, and pay little
attention to either the malice or the mendacity of mankind.
Twenty years later one of Hawthorne’s clerks, who had prudently shifted
from the Democratic to the Republican ranks, held a small office in the
Boston Navy Yard, and was much given to bragging of his intimacy with
“Nat,” and of the sprees they went on together; but the style and
description of the man were sufficient to discredit his statements
without further evidence. There were, however, several old shipmasters
in the Salem Custom House who had seen Calcutta, Canton, and even a
hurricane or two; men who had lived close to reality, with a vein
of true heroism in them, moreover; and if Hawthorne preferred their
conversation to that of the shipowners, who had spent their lives in
calculating the profits of commercial adventures, there are many among
the well educated who would agree with him. He refers particularly to
one aged inspector of imports, whose remarkable adventures by flood and
field were an almost daily recreation to him; and if the narratives
of this ancient mariner were somewhat mixed with romance, assuredly
Hawthorne should have been the last person to complain of them on that
account.
At first he was wholly unnerved by his dismissal. He returned to Mall
Street and said to his wife: “I have lost my place. What shall we now do
for bread?” But Mrs. Hawthorne replied: “Never fear. You will now have
leisure to finish your novel. Meanwhile, I will earn bread for us with
my pencil and paint-brush.” [Footnote: Mrs. George S. Hillard.] Besides
this, she brought forward two or three hundred dollars, which she had
saved from his salary unbeknown to him; but who would not have been
encouraged by such a brave wife? Fortunately her pencil and paint-brush
were not put to the test; at least so far as we know. Already on June 8,
her husband had written a long letter to Hillard, explaining the state
of his affairs and containing this pathetic appeal:
“If you could do anything in the way of procuring me some stated
literary employment, in connection with a newspaper, or as corrector of
the press to some printing establishment, etc., it could not come at a
better time. Perhaps Epes Sargent, who is a friend of mine, would know
of something. I shall not stand upon my dignity; that must take care of
itself. Perhaps there may be some subordinate office connected with
the Boston Athenæum (Literary). Do not think anything too humble to be
mentioned to me.” [Footnote: Conway, 113.]
There have been many tragical episodes in the history of literature,
but since “Paradise Lost” was sold for five pounds and a contingent
interest, there has been nothing more simply pathetic than this,--that
an immortal writer should feel obliged to apply for a subordinate
position in a counting-room, a description of work which nobody likes
too well, and which to Hawthorne would have been little less than a
death in life. “Do not think anything too humble to be mentioned to me”!
What Hillard attempted to do at this time is uncertain, but he was not
the man to allow the shrine of genius to be converted into a gas-burner,
if he could possibly prevent it. We may presume that he went to Salem
and encouraged Hawthorne in his amiable, half-eloquent manner. But we do
not hear of him again until the new year. Meanwhile Madam Hawthorne fell
into her last illness and departed this life on July 31; a solemn event
even to a hard-hearted son--how much more to such a man as she had
brought into the world. Three days before her death, he writes in his
diary of “her heart beating its funeral march,” and diverts his mind
from the awful _finale_ by an accurate description of his two children
playing a serio-comic game of doctor and patient, in the adjoining room.
It was under such tragical conditions, well suited to the subject,
that he continued his work on “The Scarlet Letter,” and his painfully
contracted brow seemed to indicate that he suffered as much in
imagination, as the characters in that romance are represented to have
suffered. In addition he wrote “The Great Stone Pace,” one of the most
impressive of his shorter pieces (published, alas! in a Washington
newspaper), and the sketch called “Main Street,” both afterward included
in the volume of “The Snow Image.” On January 17, 1850, he was greatly
surprised to receive a letter from George S. Hillard with a large check
in it,--more than half-way to a thousand dollars,--which the writer
with all possible delicacy begged him to accept from a few of his Boston
admirers. It was only from such a good friend as Hillard that Hawthorne
would have accepted assistance in this form; but he always considered it
in the character of a loan, and afterward insisted on repaying it to
the original subscribers,--Professor Ticknor, Judge Curtis, and others.
Hillard also persuaded James T. Fields, the younger partner of Ticknor
& Company, to take an interest in Hawthorne as an author who required
to be encouraged, and perhaps coaxed a little, in order to bring out the
best that was in him. Fields accordingly went to Salem soon afterward,
and has given an account of his first interview with Hawthorne in
“Yesterdays with Authors,” which seems rather melodramatic: “found him
cowering over a stove,” and altogether in a woe-begone condition. The
main point of discussion between them, however, was whether “The Scarlet
Letter” should be published separately or in conjunction with other
subjects. Hawthorne feared that such a serious plot, continued with so
little diversity of motive, would not be likely to produce a favorable
impression unless it were leavened with material of a different kind.
Fields, on the contrary, thought it better that the work should stand by
itself, in solitary grandeur, and feared that it would only be dwarfed
by any additions of a different kind. He predicted a good sale for the
book, and succeeded in disillusionizing Hawthorne from the notions he
had acquired from the failure of “Fanshawe.”
As it was late in the season, Fields would not even wait for the romance
to be finished, but sent it to the press at once; and on February 4,
Hawthorne wrote to Horatio Bridge:
“I finished my book only yesterday; one end being in the press at
Boston, while the other was in my head here at Salem; so that, as you
see, the story is at least fourteen miles long.”
The time of publication was a propitious one: the gold was flowing in
from California, and every man and woman had a dollar to spend. The
first edition of five thousand copies was taken up within a month, and
after this Hawthorne suffered no more financial embarrassments. The
succeeding twelve years of his life were as prosperous and cheerful as
his friends and readers could desire for him; although the sombre past
still seemed to cast a ghostly shadow across his way, which even the
sunshine of Italy could not entirely dissipate.
“THE SCARLET LETTER”
The germ of this romance is to be found in the tale of “Endicott and the
Red Cross,” published in the _Token_ in 1838, so that it must have been
at least ten years sprouting and developing in Hawthorne’s mind. In
that story he gives a tragically comic description of the Puritan
penitentiary,--in the public square,--where, among others, a
good-looking young woman was exposed with a red letter A on her breast,
which she had embroidered herself, so elegantly that it seemed as if it
was rather intended for a badge of distinction than as a mark of infamy.
Hawthorne did not conjure this up wholly out of his imagination, for in
1704 the General Court of Massachusetts Bay passed the following law,
which he was no doubt aware of:
“Convicted before the Justice of Assize,--both Man and Woman to be set
on the Gallows an Hour with a Rope about their Necks and the other end
cast over the Gallowses. And in the way from thence to the common Gaol,
to be Scourged not exceeding Forty Stripes. And forever after to wear
a Capital A of two inches long, of a contrary colour to their cloathes,
sewed on their upper Garments, on the Back or Arm, in open view. And as
often as they appear without it, openly to be Scourged, not exceeding
Fifteen Stripes.” [Footnote: Boston, Timothy Green, 1704.]
The most diligent investigation, however, has failed to discover an
instance in which punishment was inflicted under this law, so that we
must conclude that Hawthorne invented that portion of his statement. In
fact, nothing that Hawthorne published himself is to be considered of
historical or biographical value. It is all fiction. He sported with
historical facts and traditions, as poets and painters always have done,
and the manuscript which he pretends to have discovered in his office at
the Custom House, written by one of his predecessors there, is a piece
of pure imagination, which serves to give additional credibility to his
narrative. He knew well enough how large a portion of what is called
history is fiction after all, and the extent to which professed
historians deal in romance. He felt that he was justified so long as he
did not depart from the truth of human nature. We may thank him that he
did not dispel the illusion of his poetic imagery by the introduction of
well-known historical characters. This is permissible in a certain class
of novels, but its effect is always more or less prosaic.
Our Puritan ancestors evidently did not realize the evil effects
of their law against faithless wives,--its glaring indelicacy, and
brutalizing influence on the minds of the young; but it was of a
piece with their exclusion of church-music and other amenities of
civilization. Was it through a natural attraction for the primeval
granite that they landed on the New England coast? Their severe
self-discipline was certainly well adapted to their situation, but,
while it built up their social edifice on an enduring foundation, its
tendency was to crush out the gentler and more sympathetic qualities
in human nature. In no other community would the story of Hester Prynne
acquire an equal cogency and significance. A German might, perhaps,
understand it; but a Frenchman or an Italian not at all.
The same subject has been treated in its most venial form by Shakespeare
in “Measure for Measure,” and in its most condemnable form in Goethe’s
“Faust.” “The Scarlet Letter” lies midway between these two. Hester
Prynne has married a man of morose, vindictive disposition, such as no
woman could be happy with. He is, moreover, much older than herself,
and has gone off on a wild expedition in pursuit of objects which he
evidently cares for, more than for his wife. She has not heard from him
for over a year, and knows not whether he has deserted her, or if he
is no longer living. She is alone in a strange wild country, and it is
natural that she should seek counsel and encouragement from the young
clergyman, who is worthy of her love, but, unfortunately, not a strong
character. Lightning is not swifter than the transition in our minds
from good to evil, and in an unguarded moment he brings ruin upon
himself, and a life-long penance on Hester Prynne. Hawthorne tells this
story with such purity and delicacy of feeling that a maiden of sixteen
can read it without offence.
“The Scarlet Letter” is at once the most poetic and the most powerful
of Hawthorne’s larger works, much more powerful than “The Vicar of
Wakefield,” which has been accepted as the type of a romance in all
languages. Goldsmith’s tale will always be more popular than “The
Scarlet Letter,” owing to its blithesome spirit, its amusing incidents
and bright effects of light and shade; but “The Scarlet Letter” strikes
a more penetrating chord in the human breast, and adheres more closely
to the truth of life. There are certain highly improbable circumstances
woven in the tissue of “The Vicar of Wakefield,” which a prudent,
reflective reader finds it difficult to surmount. It is rather
surprising that the Vicar should not have discovered the true social
position of his friend Mr. Burchell, which must have been known to every
farmer in the vicinity; and still more so that Mr. Burchell should have
permitted the father of a young woman in whom he was deeply interested,
to be carried to prison for debt without making an inquiry into his
case. “The Scarlet Letter” is, as Hawthorne noticed, a continual
variation on a single theme, and that a decidedly solemn one; but its
different incidents form a dynamic sequence, leading onward to the final
catastrophe, and if its progress is slow--the narrative extends over a
period of seven years--this is as inevitable as the march of Fate.
From the first scene in the drama, we are lifted above ourselves, and
sustained so by Hawthorne’s genius, until the close.
This sense of power arises from dealing with a subject which demanded
the whole force and intensity of Hawthorne’s nature. Hester Prynne
herself is a strong character, and her errors are those of strength and
independence rather than of weakness. She says to Mr. Dimmesdale that
what they did “had a consecration of its own,” and it is this belief
which supports her under a weight of obloquy that would have crushed
a more fragile spirit. She does not collapse into a pitiful nonentity,
like Scott’s Effie Deans, nor is she maddened to crime like George
Eliot’s “Hetty Sorrel”; [Footnote: A name apparently compounded from
Hester Prynne and Schiller’s Agnes Sorrel.] but from the outset she
forms definite resolutions,--first to rehabilitate her own character,
and next to protect the partner of her shame. This last may seem to be a
mistaken devotion, and contrary to his true interest, for the first
step in the regeneration from sin is to acknowledge manfully the
responsibility of it; but to give the repentance even the appearance
of sincerity, the confession must be a voluntary one, and not be forced
upon the delinquent person by external pressure. We cannot withhold our
admiration for Hester’s unswerving fidelity to this twofold purpose.
We may condemn her in our minds, but we cannot refuse her a measure of
sympathy in our hearts.
I believe this to be the explanation of her apparent inconsistency
at the close of the book. Many of Hawthorne’s commentators have been
puzzled by the fact that Hester, after so many years of contrition,
should advise Dimmesdale to fly to England, and even offered to
accompany him. Women have not the same idea of law that men have. In
their ideas of right and wrong they depend chiefly on their sense of
purity; and it is very difficult to persuade a woman that she could be
wrong in obeying the dictates of her heart. Hester perceives that
her former lover is being tortured to death by the silent tyranny of
Chillingworth; the tide of affection so long restrained flows back into
her soul; and her own reputation is as nothing compared with the life of
the man she hopes to save. There is no other passage in American fiction
so pathetic as that woodland meeting, at which their mutual hopes of
happiness blaze up like the momentary brightness of a dying flame.
Hester’s innocent child, however, representing the spirit of
truthfulness, is suddenly seized with an aversion to her father and
refuses to join their company,--an unfavorable omen and dark presage of
the minister’s doom.
Pearl’s behavior, on this occasion, may be supposed to represent
the author’s own judgment. How far shall we agree with him? The past
generation witnessed one of the noblest of women uniting herself, for
life and death, to a man whom she could not marry on account of purely
legal objections. Whether Hester’s position in the last act of this
drama is comparable with that of Marian Evans every one must decide
according to his or her conscience.
Hawthorne certainly proves himself a good Puritan when he says, “And be
the stern and sad truth spoken that the breach which guilt has once
made into the human soul, is never in this mortal state repaired.” The
magnitude of the evil of course makes a difference; but do we not all
live in a continual state of sinning, and self-correction? That is
the road to self-improvement, and those who adhere most closely to
inflexible rules of conduct discover at length that the rules themselves
have become an evil. Mankind has not yet fully decided as to what things
are evil, and what are good; and neither Hawthorne nor the Puritan
lawmakers would seem to have remembered Christ’s admonition on a similar
occasion: “Let him who is without sin among you, cast the first stone.”
A writer in the _Andover Review_, some twenty years ago, criticised the
impersonation of Pearl as a fable--“a golden wreck.” He quoted Emerson
to the effect that in all the ages that man has been upon the earth, no
communication has been established between him and the lower animals,
and he affirmed that we know quite as little of the thoughts and motives
of our own children. Both conclusions are wide of the mark. There
is much more communication between man and the domestic animals than
between animals of the same species. The understanding between an Arab
and his horse is almost perfect, and so is that between a sportsman and
his setters. Even the sluggish ox knows the word of command. Then what
shall we say of the sympathetic relation between a mother and her child?
Who can describe it--that clairvoyant sensibility, intangible, too swift
for words? Who has depicted it, except Hawthorne and Raphael? Pearl is
like a pure spirit in “The Scarlet Letter,” reconciling us to its gloomy
scenes. She is like the sunshine in a dark forest, breaking through
the tree-tops and dancing in our pathway. It is true that Hawthorne has
carried her clairvoyant insight to its furthest limits, but this is in
accordance with the ideal character of his work. She has no rival except
Goethe’s Mignon.
Hawthorne’s method of developing his stories resembled closely that
of the historical painter; and it was only in this way that he could
produce such vivid effects. He selected models for his principal
characters and studied them as his work progressed. The original of
Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale was quickly recognized in Salem as an amiable
inoffensive person, of whom no one suspected any evil,--and that was, no
doubt, the reason why Hawthorne selected him for his purpose. It was no
discredit to the man himself, although tongues were not wanting to blame
Hawthorne for it. Who Hester may have been still remains a mystery;
but it was evidently some one with whom the author was well
acquainted,--perhaps his younger sister. So Rubens painted his own wife
at one time an angel, and at another in the likeness of Herodias. It is
still more probable that Pearl is a picture of Hawthorne’s own daughter,
who was of the right age for such a study, and whose sprightly, fitful,
and impulsive actions correspond to those of Hester’s child. This would
also explain why her father gave Una so much space in his Note-book. He
may have noticed the antagonism between her and the Whig children of
the neighborhood and have applied it to Pearl’s case. It was also his
custom, as appears from his last unfinished work, to leave blank spaces
in his manuscript while in the heat of composition, which, like a
painter’s background, were afterwards filled in with descriptions of
scenery or some subsidiary narrative.
The models of the novelist cannot be hired for the purpose, like those
used by the painter or sculptor, but have to be studied when and where
they can be found, for the least self-consciousness spoils the effect.
Hawthorne in this only followed the example of the best authors and
dramatists; and those who think that good fiction or dramatic poetry can
be written wholly out of a man’s or a woman’s imagination, would do well
to make the experiment themselves.