Chapter Nathaniel Hawthorne of Index by Simonds History of American Literature

delivered ourselves up to the free air, to live like the Indians or any less conventional race, during one bright semicircle of the sun."

In the Custom-House at Salem.

This pleasant period of our author's life was terminated in 1846 by an appointment to the surveyorship at the custom-house in Salem. Once more the Hawthornes were domiciled in the city of their birth. There were two children in the household, a daughter, Una, born in Concord, and Julian, well known as a writer in our own day, whose birth occurred in Boston just before the removal to Salem. It is in his companionship with these children, gayly, even boisterously participating in their sports and pastimes, that we catch our pleasantest glimpses of Hawthorne in this period. In 1849, following his enforced retirement from office, -- the result of political schemes, -- Hawthorne wrote The Scarlet Letter.

The Scarlet Letter.

Although Hawthorne's reputation as a writer of tales was already well established, it was through this remarkable novel that his mastery in the field of romantic fiction was really revealed. In this narrative the inheritance of ancestral tradition is easily perceived; so, too, the influence of the old New England religious atmosphere. The fact of sin and its effects on the soul, the workings of conscience, the problems of repentance and atonement, -- these are the themes with which Hawthorne works in the strong and impressive narrative of Hester Prynne, the young minister, Arthur Dimmesdale, and the elfish child, little Pearl. The sombre background of Puritan bigotry and persecution affords a setting as effective as it is appropriate. In construction and form it is beautifully developed, while its verbal style is exceptional in its delicacy and beauty. "The finest piece of imaginative writing yet put forth in this country;" so Henry James describes it.¹ The essay on The Custom-House, prefatory to the novel, is one of the most charming of Hawthorne's sketches. The picture of his associates at the seat of custom, humorous and ironical in tone, was, perhaps, too true to life to be relished; at all events (when this essay was read by his fellow citizens) irritation followed, and there was a general expression of hostility toward the novelist. He soon removed from Salem.

At Lenox.

For a year and a half the Hawthornes lived in Lenox, among the Berkshire Hills, -- the beautiful region in western Massachusetts where William Cullen Bryant had passed his early years. Here Hawthorne wrote The House of the Seven Gables (1851), the only one of his romances the scene of which is actually laid in Salem. This novel, thought by its author to be a greater work than The Scarlet Letter, is recognized as one of his best productions, although not placed above its predecessor. The working out of an ancient curse invoked upon the head of a family line is the theme of the romance.

The Children's Stories.

It must not be forgotten that this writer of weird tales and of sombre romance was also a successful story-teller for children, and that his essays in this field are still favorites among the children's classics. Here belong the earlier collections, like Grandfather's Chair (1841) and Biographical Stories (1842), which have not been previously mentioned. From the grim pages of The House of the Seven Gables, Hawthorne now turned to the preparation of the delightful Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys (1852); and here, with a fascinating freshness of style, simply, yet beautifully, he recounts the Greek myths of Midas, Pandora, of Hercules in Quest of the Golden Apples, Bellerophon and the Chimera, of Baucis and Philemon, of Perseus and Medusa. A second series of classical myths presented in the same entertaining manner appeared in Tanglewood Tales (1853).

The Blithedale Romance.

During a brief temporary residence in West Newton, Hawthorne wrote The Blithedale Romance, not one of his most attractive works. It is a sombre tale, but commands a peculiar interest because reminiscent