Memories of Hawthorne

xcept to one or two persons. Sophia had slipped away for a visit to friends in Boston; bu

, BOSTON, M

e not to see him. I am glad you enjoyed his visit so much. He told me he should be at the picture-gallery the next morning [Sophia went very early to avoid the crowd], and there I found him at eight o'clock. He came home with me through a piercing east wind, which he was sure would 'make me ill for a week. In the evening he came to see if it had given me a cold, but it had not. Caroline [Tappan] was busy with her children, and did not come down for half a

d a great regard for

it in a letter writt

rso

ASS., June

im a volume of "Twice-Told Tales," to exchange for mine. He said he thirsted for imaginative writing, and all the family had read the book with great delight. I am really provoked that I did not bring "The Token" with me, so as to have "The Mermaid" and "The Haunted Mind" to read to people. I was hardly seated here, after tea yesterday, before Mr. Emerson asked me what I had to say of Hawthorne, and told me that Mr. Bancroft said that Hawthorne was the most efficient and best of the Custom House officers. Pray tell that down in Herbert Street. Mr. Emerson seemed all congenial about him, but has not yet read his writings. He is in a good mood to do so, however, and I intend to bring him to his knees in a day or two, so that he will read the book, and all that Hawthorne has written. He is in a delightful state

more in Sal

29,

ng is his interest about my health. I am rejoiced that Mr. Emerson has uttered no heresies about our High Priest of Nature. For him to think that beca

u would never again accuse either of us of disregard of the claims of others. I told him what Mr. Bancroft said, and he blushed deeply, and replied, "What fame!" After he went away, I read "Bettina von Arnim." She is not to be judged; she is to be

declared they would toll the bells. Then it was granted that there should be joyful ringing at noon and sunset. They pealed forth jubilantly, and I heard the clash of cymbals in the afterno

foam of power, and the stillness of power. You must judge if I have succeeded. The figure of Una is now far better than the first one. You cannot imagine with what ease I draw; I feel as if I could and might do anything, now. Next week, if Outlines do not prevail, I shall begin again with oils. I feel on a height. Oh, I am so happy! But I have not ridden horse-back since Tuesday on account of the weather. Is it not well that I kept fast hold of the white hand of Hope, dear Betty? Fo

which affirms ever, for negation belongs to this world only. Its breath so informs the natural bod

om letters written

clock,

being as if the heavenly face and form had been shadowed forth in the air, instead of upon paper. It seems to me that it is our guardian angel, who kneels at the footstool of God

r 9, half past e

rd a coal-vessel. . . . Well-I have conquered the rebels, and proclaimed an amnesty; so to-morrow I shall return to that Paradise of Measures, the end of Long Wharf. Not to my

ON,

minds; but the thoughts of other minds make no change in your essence, as they do in almost everybody else's essence. You are still sweet Sophie Hawthorne, and still your soul and intellect breathe forth an influence like that of wildflowers, to which God, not man, gives all their sweetness.

self sometimes; and always they have a new charm. I am afraid I do not write very clearly, having been pretty ha

, for as great an interval as possible, causing consternation in Herbert Street, since there, the approach of any permanent chan

m-book, marked on the cover "Scrap-Book, 1839." The period covered is a brief portion of Hawthorne's service as weigher and g

, into the hold. My eyes, what a cabin! Three paces would more than measure it in any direction, and it was filled with barrels, not clean and new, but black, and containing probably the provender of the vessel; jugs, firkins, the cook's utensils and kitchen furniture-everything grimy and sable with coal dust. There were two or three tiers of berths; and the blankets, etc., are not to be thought of. A cooking stove, wherein was burning some of the coal-excellent fuel, burning as freely as wood, and without the bituminous melting of Newcastle coal. The cook of the vessel, a grimy, unshaven, middle-aged man, trimming the fire at need, and sometimes washing his dishes in water that seemed to have cleansed the whole world beforehand-the draining of gutters, or caught at sink-spouts. In the cessations of labor, the Irishmen in

before work is commenced, between the hours of one and two, etc. A salamander stove-a table of the signals, wharves,

observed, year after year, on revisiting his boyhood's residence in Salem, for thirty years. It was so situated under the eaves of the house, that he could put his hand in and feel the young ones. At last, he found the ne

had come from over-seas with a Captain Tanent, and had resided with him in Salem. He was said to be very wealthy, and was gayly appareled in the fashion of those times. After a while the Frenchman disappeared and Captain Tanent gave out that he had gone to some other place, and been killed there. After two or three years, it was found that the Captain had grown rich; but he squandered his money in dissipated habits, died poor-and there are now none left of the race. Many years afterwards, digging near his habitation, the workmen found a human skull; and it was supposed to be that of the young Frenchman, wh

The figure either vanished or went out of the room, and he resumed the reading of his newspaper. Again the narrator saw the same figure of a woman come in and look over his shoulder, bending forward her head. This time she did not speak, but hemmed so as to attract the old gentleman's attention; and again the apparition vanished. But a third time it entered the room, and glided behind the old gentleman's chair, as before, appeari

a boy's face, as plainly as ever he saw anything in his life, gazing at him. Another time-or, as I think, two or three other t

, and moreover to a sort of apoplectic fit, which compels [him] to sleep almost as erect as he sits; and if he were to lie down horizontally in bed, he would feel almost sure of one of these fits. When they seize him, he awakes feeling as if [his] head were swelled to enormous size, and on the point of bursting-with great pain. He has his perfect consciousness, but is unable to call for assistance, or make any noise except by blowing forcibly wi

s an assurance of salvation immediate from the Deity. Last Sunday, he

he personally met him, that he was not capable of hatred, but of strong affection,-that he always rem

ympathy for all who have wants, and seek the gratification of them through his medium, he were one with the parents of the child. He then tells the people, whenever they find lost children, not to keep them overnight, but to bring them to his office. "For it is a cruel thing"-to keep

s much briskness as he can, and finds a sculpin on the hook. The boys come around him, and eye his motions, and make pitying or impertinent remarks at his ill-luck-the old man answers not, but fishes on imperturbably. Anon, he gathers up his clams or worms, and his one sun-baked flounder-you think he is going home-but no, he is merely going to another corner of the wharf, where he throw

g from a vessel, and the weigher's scales standing conveniently. To stand on the elevated deck or rail of a ship, and look up the wharf, you see the whole space of it thronged with trucks and carts, rem

ware, made at Hingham. It is afloat, and is sometimes moored close to the wharf;-or, when another vessel wishe

ey are a sort of domestic concern, in which all the family take an interest. Not a cold, stately, unpersonified thing, like a merchant's tall ship, perhaps one of half

een a stout, likely country fellow, aboard one of these, to whom the scenes of a sea-port are entirely new, but who is brisk, re

ers rugged and coarse. The scene of landing them in boats, at the wharf-stairs, to the considerable display of their legs;-whence they are carried off to

h the mate, swearing at the stevedores and laboring m

t, sustaining a knife in a leathern sheath. Probably he

a foul anchor-and perhaps other naval insignia on his wrists and breast.

t he feels kindly towards it, and judges mildly of it; and enjoys it very tolerably well, although he has so slight a hold on it that it would not trouble him much to give it up. He said he hoped he should die at sea, because then it would be so little trouble to bury him. Me is a skeptic,-and when I asked him if he would not wish to live again, he spoke doubtfully and coldly. He said that he had been in England within two or three years-in his native county, Yorkshire-and finding his brother's children in very poor condition, he gave them sixty golden sovereigns. "I have always had too many poor friends," he said, "and that has kept me poor." This old man kept tally of the Alfred Tyler's cargo, on behalf of the Captain,

to Hawthorne

M., May

esire or like it, but notwithstanding your exquisite courtesy and conformableness and geniality there, I could see very plainly that you were not leading your ideal life. Never upon the face of any mortal was there such a divine expression of sweetness and kindliness as I saw upon yours

note, gives a glimpse of So

lready. Do you see Mr. Hawthorne often? It was a shame he did not talk more that nigh

ment is known, shows how peop

eminently Platonic love which one has for a friend in black and white [print]. He seems very near to me, for he is not only a dreamer, but wakes now and then with a pleasant 'Good-morrow'

led her to inclose this poem to her

not to man

self to draw th

t to pray this

ording grace i

n the largest

vision-mount h

pon the una

venly stream tha

, hast risen throu

insight of

adenced intu

eaven which Joh

rit lowly be

ion of thy

to Elizabeth, her su

ife been all things to me, so delicate as I have been. There is pastime, pleasure, and a touch of the infinitely beautiful to me in what is generally conside