"DEAR LITTLE WIFE,--After finishing my record in the journal, I sat
a long time in grandmother's chair thinking of many things; but the
thought of thee, the great thought of thee, was among all other
thoughts, like the pervading sunshine falling through the boughs
and branches of a tree and tinging every separate leaf. And surely
thou shouldst not have deserted me without manufacturing a
sufficient quantity of sunshine to last till thy return. Art thou
not ashamed?"
Concord was never the same to them after their return from Rome. The
shadow of the coming separation was already around them. He writes,
after the appearance of Longfellow's poem: "I, too, am weary, and look
forward to the Wayside Inn." And, spite of the most loving ministrations
of family and friends, he was soon brought to the rest which awaited him
there. None could really regret that he had found the peace he sought;
but the world seemed more thinly populated when it was known that the
hand which had written "The Scarlet Letter," "The House of the Seven
Gables," and "The Marble Faun" would write no more. "We carried him,"
said Fields, "through the blossoming orchards of Concord, and laid him
down under a group of pines on a hill-side overlooking historic fields;
the unfinished romance which had cost him such anxiety laid upon his
coffin." And there, upon that Concord height which he has rendered
world-famous, made a Delphian vale or a Mecca to so many pilgrims from
his own land and from over sea, he sleeps well. There the sweet spring
flowers of dear old New England bloom for him; there the Mayflower
pierces the melting snow, and the shy, sweet violet gems the earliest
green; there the dandelion glows in golden splendor, and the snowy
daisies star the grass, and all the sweet succession of summer flowers
troop in orderly array, until Autumn waves her torch, and the sumach and
the goldenrod blaze out in wild magnificence, and the blue-fringed
gentian hides in secret coverts. These are the fitting decorations of
that grave. Piled marble or towering granite would lie too heavy on the
heart of this child of Nature. And as the years shall pass, still will
the humble grave continue to be visited. "Forgotten" will never be
written upon the tombstone of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Still through the
clear brilliance of New England winter nights will the stars look down
tenderly upon it. Arcturus will stand guard over it, golden-belted Orion
will send down quivering lances of light to illumine it, the pomp of
blazing Jupiter shall envelop it, and the first radiance of the dawn
shall silver its sacred slopes forever.
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