Etexts from The Snow Image by Hawthorne

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From THE SNOW IMAGE

Contents

The Snow Image: A Childish Miracle
The Great Stone Face
Ethan Brand
The Canterbury Pilgrims
The Devil in Manuscript
My Kinsman, Major Molineux

THE SNOW-IMAGE:

A CHILDISH MIRACLE

One afternoon of a cold winter's day, when the sun shone forth
with chilly brightness, after a long storm, two children asked
leave of their mother to run out and play in the new-fallen snow.
The elder child was a little girl, whom, because she was of a
tender and modest disposition, and was thought to be very
beautiful, her parents, and other people who were familiar with
her, used to call Violet. But her brother was known by the style
and title of Peony, on account of the ruddiness of his broad and
round little phiz, which made everybody think of sunshine and
great scarlet flowers. The father of these two children, a
certain Mr. Lindsey, it is important to say, was an excellent but
exceedingly matter-of-fact sort of man, a dealer in hardware, and
was sturdily accustomed to take what is called the common-sense
view of all matters that came under his consideration. With a
heart about as tender as other people's, he had a head as hard
and impenetrable, and therefore, perhaps, as empty, as one of the
iron pots which it was a part of his business to sell. The
mother's character, on the other hand, had a strain of poetry in
it, a trait of unworldly beauty,--a delicate and dewy flower, as
it were, that had survived out of her imaginative youth, and
still kept itself alive amid the dusty realities of matrimony and
motherhood.

So, Violet and Peony, as I began with saying, besought their
mother to let them run out and play in the new snow; for, though
it had looked so dreary and dismal, drifting downward out of the
gray sky, it had a very cheerful aspect, now that the sun was
shining on it. The children dwelt in a city, and had no wider
play-place than a little garden before the house, divided by a
white fence from the street, and with a pear-tree and two or
three plum-trees overshadowing it, and some rose-bushes just in
front of the parlor-windows. The trees and shrubs, however, were
now leafless, and their twigs were enveloped in the light snow,
which thus made a kind of wintry foliage, with here and there a
pendent icicle for the fruit.

"Yes, Violet,--yes, my little Peony," said their kind mother,
"you may go out and play in the new snow."

Accordingly, the good lady bundled up her darlings in woollen
jackets and wadded sacks, and put comforters round their necks,
and a pair of striped gaiters on each little pair of legs, and
worsted mittens on their hands, and gave them a kiss apiece, by
way of a spell to keep away Jack Frost. Forth sallied the two
children, with a hop-skip-and-jump, that carried them at once
into the very heart of a huge snow-drift, whence Violet emerged
like a snow-bunting, while little Peony floundered out with his
round face in full bloom. Then what a merry time had they! To
look at them, frolicking in the wintry garden, you would have
thought that the dark and pitiless storm had been sent for no
other purpose but to provide a new plaything for Violet and
Peony; and that they themselves had beer created, as the
snow-birds were, to take delight only in the tempest, and in the
white mantle which it spread over the earth.

At last, when they had frosted one another all over with handfuls
of snow, Violet, after laughing heartily at little Peony's
figure, was struck with a new idea.

"You look exactly like a snow-image, Peony," said she, "if your
cheeks were not so red. And that puts me in mind! Let us make an
image out of snow,--an image of a little girl,--and it shall be
our sister, and shall run about and play with us all winter long.
Won't it be nice?"

"Oh yes!" cried Peony, as plainly as he could speak, for he was
but a little boy. "That will be nice! And mamma shall see it!"

"Yes," answered Violet; "mamma shall see the new little girl. But
she must not make her come into the warm parlor; for, you know,
our little snow-sister will not love the warmth."

And forthwith the children began this great business of making a
snow-image that should run about; while their mother, who was
sitting at the window and overheard some of their talk, could not
help smiling at the gravity with which they set about it. They
really seemed to imagine that there would be no difficulty
whatever in creating a live little girl out of the snow. And, to
say the truth, if miracles are ever to be wrought, it will be by
putting our hands to the work in precisely such a simple and
undoubting frame of mind as that in which Violet and Peony now
undertook to perform one, without so much as knowing that it was
a miracle. So thought the mother; and thought, likewise, that the
new snow, just fallen from heaven, would be excellent material to
make new beings of, if it were not so very cold. She gazed at the
children a moment longer, delighting to watch their little
figures,--the girl, tall for her age, graceful and agile, and so
delicately colored that she looked like a cheerful thought more
than a physical reality; while Peony expanded in breadth rather
than height, and rolled along on his short and sturdy legs as
substantial as an elephant, though not quite so big. Then the
mother resumed her work. What it was I forget; but she was either
trimming a silken bonnet for Violet, or darning a pair of
stockings for little Peony's short legs. Again, however, and
again, and yet other agains, she could not help turning her head
to the window to see how the children got on with their
snow-image.

Indeed, it was an exceedingly pleasant sight, those bright little
souls at their task! Moreover, it was really wonderful to observe
how knowingly and skilfully they managed the matter. Violet
assumed the chief direction, and told Peony what to do, while,
with her own delicate fingers, she shaped out all the nicer parts
of the snow-figure. It seemed, in fact, not so much to be made by
the children, as to grow up under their hands, while they were
playing and prattling about it. Their mother was quite surprised
at this; and the longer she looked, the more and more surprised
she grew.

"What remarkable children mine are!" thought she, smiling with a
mother's pride; and, smiling at herself, too, for being so proud
of them. "What other children could have made anything so like a
little girl's figure out of snow at the first trial? Well; but
now I must finish Peony's new frock, for his grandfather is
coming to-morrow, and I want the little fellow to look handsome."

So she took up the frock, and was soon as busily at work again
with her needle as the two children with their snow-image. But
still, as the needle travelled hither and thither through the
seams of the dress, the mother made her toil light and happy by
listening to the airy voices of Violet and Peony. They kept
talking to one another all the time, their tongues being quite as
active as their feet and hands. Except at intervals, she could
not distinctly hear what was said, but had merely a sweet
impression that they were in a most loving mood, and were
enjoying themselves highly, and that the business of making the
snow-image went prosperously on. Now and then, however, when
Violet and Peony happened to raise their voices, the words were
as audible as if they had been spoken in the very parlor where
the mother sat. Oh how delightfully those words echoed in her
heart, even though they meant nothing so very wise or wonderful,
after all!

But you must know a mother listens with her heart much more than
with her ears; and thus she is often delighted with the trills of
celestial music, when other people can hear nothing of the kind.

"Peony, Peony!" cried Violet to her brother, who had gone to
another part of the garden, "bring me some of that fresh snow,
Peony, from the very farthest corner, where we have not been
trampling. I want it to shape our little snow-sister's bosom
with. You know that part must be quite pure, just as it came out
of the sky!"

"Here it is, Violet!" answered Peony, in his bluff tone,--but a
very sweet tone, too,--as he came floundering through the
half-trodden drifts. "Here is the snow for her little bosom. O
Violet, how beau-ti-ful she begins to look!"

"Yes," said Violet, thoughtfully and quietly; "our snow-sister
does look very lovely. I did not quite know, Peony, that we could
make such a sweet little girl as this."

The mother, as she listened, thought how fit and delightful an
incident it would be, if fairies, or still better, if
angel-children were to come from paradise, and play invisibly
with her own darlings, and help them to make their snow-image,
giving it the features of celestial babyhood! Violet and Peony
would not be aware of their immortal playmates,--only they would
see that the image grew very beautiful while they worked at it,
and would think that they themselves had done it all.

"My little girl and boy deserve such playmates, if mortal
children ever did!" said the mother to herself; and then she
smiled again at her own motherly pride.

Nevertheless, the idea seized upon her imagination; and, ever and
anon, she took a glimpse out of the window, half dreaming that
she might see the golden-haired children of paradise sporting
with her own golden-haired Violet and bright-cheeked Peony.

Now, for a few moments, there was a busy and earnest, but
indistinct hum of the two children's voices, as Violet and Peony
wrought together with one happy consent. Violet still seemed to
be the guiding spirit, while Peony acted rather as a laborer, and
brought her the snow from far and near. And yet the little urchin
evidently had a proper understanding of the matter, too!

"Peony, Peony!" cried Violet; for her brother was again at the
other side of the garden. "Bring me those light wreaths of snow
that have rested on the lower branches of the pear-tree. You can
clamber on the snowdrift, Peony, and reach them easily. I must
have them to make some ringlets for our snow-sister's head!"

"Here they are, Violet!" answered the little boy. "Take care you
do not break them. Well done! Well done! How pretty!"

"Does she not look sweetly?" said Violet, with a very satisfied
tone; "and now we must have some little shining bits of ice, to
make the brightness of her eyes. She is not finished yet. Mamma
will see how very beautiful she is; but papa will say, 'Tush!
nonsense!--come in out of the cold!' "

"Let us call mamma to look out," said Peony; and then he shouted
lustily, "Mamma! mamma!! mamma!!! Look out, and see what a nice
'ittle girl we are making!"

The mother put down her work for an instant, and looked out of
the window. But it so happened that the sun--for this was one of
the shortest days of the whole year--had sunken so nearly to the
edge of the world that his setting shine came obliquely into the
lady's eyes. So she was dazzled, you must understand, and could
not very distinctly observe what was in the garden. Still,
however, through all that bright, blinding dazzle of the sun and
the new snow, she beheld a small white figure in the garden, that
seemed to have a wonderful deal of human likeness about it. And
she saw Violet and Peony,--indeed, she looked more at them than
at the image,--she saw the two children still at work; Peony
bringing fresh snow, and Violet applying it to the figure as
scientifically as a sculptor adds clay to his model. Indistinctly
as she discerned the snow-child, the mother thought to herself
that never before was there a snow-figure so cunningly made, nor
ever such a dear little girl and boy to make it.

"They do everything better than other children," said she, very
complacently. "No wonder they make better snow-images!"

She sat down again to her work, and made as much haste with it as
possible; because twilight would soon come, and Peony's frock was
not yet finished, and grandfather was expected, by railroad,
pretty early in the morning. Faster and faster, therefore, went
her flying fingers. The children, likewise, kept busily at work
in the garden, and still the mother listened, whenever she could
catch a word. She was amused to observe how their little
imaginations had got mixed up with what they were doing, and
carried away by it. They seemed positively to think that the
snow-child would run about and play with them.

"What a nice playmate she will be for us, all winter long!" said
Violet. "I hope papa will not be afraid of her giving us a cold!
Sha'n't you love her dearly, Peony?"

"Oh yes!" cried Peony. "And I will hug her, and she shall sit
down close by me and drink some of my warm milk!"

"Oh no, Peony!" answered Violet, with grave wisdom. "That will
not do at all. Warm milk will not be wholesome for our little
snow-sister. Little snow people, like her, eat nothing but
icicles. No, no, Peony; we must not give her anything warm to
drink!"

There was a minute or two of silence; for Peony, whose short legs
were never weary, had gone on a pilgrimage again to the other
side of the garden. All of a sudden, Violet cried out, loudly and
joyfully,--"Look here, Peony! Come quickly! A light has been
shining on her cheek out of that rose-colored cloud! and the
color does not go away! Is not that beautiful!"

"Yes; it is beau-ti-ful," answered Peony, pronouncing the three
syllables with deliberate accuracy. "O Violet, only look at her
hair! It is all like gold!"

"Oh certainly," said Violet, with tranquillity, as if it were
very much a matter of course. "That color, you know, comes from
the golden clouds, that we see up there in the sky. She is almost
finished now. But her lips must be made very red,--redder than
her cheeks. Perhaps, Peony, it will make them red if we both kiss
them!"

Accordingly, the mother heard two smart little smacks, as if both
her children were kissing the snow-image on its frozen mouth.
But, as this did not seem to make the lips quite red enough,
Violet next proposed that the snow-child should be invited to
kiss Peony's scarlet cheek.

"Come, 'ittle snow-sister, kiss me!" cried Peony.

"There! she has kissed you," added Violet, "and now her lips are
very red. And she blushed a little, too!"

"Oh, what a cold kiss!" cried Peony.

Just then, there came a breeze of the pure west-wind, sweeping
through the garden and rattling the parlor-windows. It sounded so
wintry cold, that the mother was about to tap on the window-pane
with her thimbled finger, to summon the two children in, when
they both cried out to her with one voice. The tone was not a
tone of surprise, although they were evidently a good deal
excited; it appeared rather as if they were very much rejoiced at
some event that had now happened, but which they had been looking
for, and had reckoned upon all along.

"Mamma! mamma! We have finished our little snow-sister, and she
is running about the garden with us!"

"What imaginative little beings my children are!" thought the
mother, putting the last few stitches into Peony's frock. "And it
is strange, too that they make me almost as much a child as they
themselves are! I can hardly help believing, now, that the
snow-image has really come to life!"

"Dear mamma!" cried Violet, "pray look out and see what a sweet
playmate we have!"

The mother, being thus entreated, could no longer delay to look
forth from the window. The sun was now gone out of the sky,
leaving, however, a rich inheritance of his brightness among
those purple and golden clouds which make the sunsets of winter
so magnificent. But there was not the slightest gleam or dazzle,
either on the window or on the snow; so that the good lady could
look all over the garden, and see everything and everybody in it.
And what do you think she saw there? Violet and Peony, of course,
her own two darling children. Ah, but whom or what did she see
besides? Why, if you will believe me, there was a small figure of
a girl, dressed all in white, with rose-tinged cheeks and
ringlets of golden hue, playing about the garden with the two
children! A stranger though she was, the child seemed to be on as
familiar terms with Violet and Peony, and they with her, as if
all the three had been playmates during the whole of their little
lives. The mother thought to herself that it must certainly be
the daughter of one of the neighbors, and that, seeing Violet and
Peony in the garden, the child had run across the street to play
with them. So this kind lady went to the door, intending to
invite the little runaway into her comfortable parlor; for, now
that the sunshine was withdrawn, the atmosphere, out of doors,
was already growing very cold.

But, after opening the house-door, she stood an instant on the
threshold, hesitating whether she ought to ask the child to come
in, or whether she should even speak to her. Indeed, she almost
doubted whether it were a real child after all, or only a light
wreath of the new-fallen snow, blown hither and thither about the
garden by the intensely cold west-wind. There was certainly
something very singular in the aspect of the little stranger.
Among all the children of the neighborhood, the lady could
remember no such face, with its pure white, and delicate
rose-color, and the golden ringlets tossing about the forehead
and cheeks. And as for her dress, which was entirely of white,
and fluttering in the breeze, it was such as no reasonable woman
would put upon a little girl, when sending her out to play, in
the depth of winter. It made this kind and careful mother shiver
only to look at those small feet, with nothing in the world on
them, except a very thin pair of white slippers. Nevertheless,
airily as she was clad, the child seemed to feel not the
slightest inconvenience from the cold, but danced so lightly over
the snow that the tips of her toes left hardly a print in its
surface; while Violet could but just keep pace with her, and
Peony's short legs compelled him to lag behind.

Once, in the course of their play, the strange child placed
herself between Violet and Peony, and taking a hand of each,
skipped merrily forward, and they along with her. Almost
immediately, however, Peony pulled away his little fist, and
began to rub it as if the fingers were tingling with cold; while
Violet also released herself, though with less abruptness,
gravely remarking that it was better not to take hold of hands.
The white-robed damsel said not a word, but danced about, just as
merrily as before. If Violet and Peony did not choose to play
with her, she could make just as good a playmate of the brisk and
cold west-wind, which kept blowing her all about the garden, and
took such liberties with her, that they seemed to have been
friends for a long time. All this while, the mother stood on the
threshold, wondering how a little girl could look so much like a
flying snow-drift, or how a snow-drift could look so very like a
little girl.

She called Violet, and whispered to her.

"Violet my darling, what is this child's name?" asked she. "Does
she live near us?"

"Why, dearest mamma," answered Violet, laughing to think that her
mother did not comprehend so very plain an affair, "this is our
little snow-sister whom we have just been making!"

"Yes, dear mamma," cried Peony, running to his mother, and
looking up simply into her face. "This is our snow-image! Is it
not a nice 'ittle child?"

At this instant a flock of snow-birds came flitting through the
air. As was very natural, they avoided Violet and Peony. But--and
this looked strange--they flew at once to the white-robed child,
fluttered eagerly about her head, alighted on her shoulders, and
seemed to claim her as an old acquaintance. She, on her part, was
evidently as glad to see these little birds, old Winter's
grandchildren, as they were to see her, and welcomed them by
holding out both her hands. Hereupon, they each and all tried to
alight on her two palms and ten small fingers and thumbs,
crowding one another off, with an immense fluttering of their
tiny wings. One dear little bird nestled tenderly in her bosom;
another put its bill to her lips. They were as joyous, all the
while, and seemed as much in their element, as you may have seen
them when sporting with a snow-storm.

Violet and Peony stood laughing at this pretty sight; for they
enjoyed the merry time which their new playmate was having with
these small-winged visitants, almost as much as if they
themselves took part in it.

"Violet," said her mother, greatly perplexed, "tell me the truth,
without any jest. Who is this little girl?"

"My darling mamma," answered Violet, looking seriously into her
mother's face, and apparently surprised that she should need any
further explanation, "I have told you truly who she is. It is our
little snow-image, which Peony and I have been making. Peony will
tell you so, as well as I."

"Yes, mamma," asseverated Peony, with much gravity in his crimson
little phiz; "this is 'ittle snow-child. Is not she a nice one?
But, mamma, her hand is, oh, so very cold!"

While mamma still hesitated what to think and what to do, the
street-gate was thrown open, and the father of Violet and Peony
appeared, wrapped in a pilot-cloth sack, with a fur cap drawn
down over his ears, and the thickest of gloves upon his hands.
Mr. Lindsey was a middle-aged man, with a weary and yet a happy
look in his wind-flushed and frost-pinched face, as if he had
been busy all the day long, and was glad to get back to his quiet
home. His eyes brightened at the sight of his wife and children,
although he could not help uttering a word or two of surprise, at
finding the whole family in the open air, on so bleak a day, and
after sunset too. He soon perceived the little white stranger
sporting to and fro in the garden, like a dancing snow-wreath,
and the flock of snow-birds fluttering about her head.

"Pray, what little girl may that be?" inquired this very sensible
man. "Surely her mother must be crazy to let her go out in such
bitter weather as it has been to-day, with only that flimsy white
gown and those thin slippers!"

"My dear husband," said his wife, "I know no more about the
little thing than you do. Some neighbor's child, I suppose. Our
Violet and Peony," she added, laughing at herself for repeating
so absurd a story, "insist that she is nothing but a snow-image,
which they have been busy about in the garden, almost all the
afternoon."

As she said this, the mother glanced her eyes toward the spot
where the children's snow-image had been made. What was her
surprise, on perceiving that there was not the slightest trace of
so much labor!--no image at all!--no piled up heap of
snow!--nothing whatever, save the prints of little footsteps
around a vacant space!

"This is very strange!" said she.

"What is strange, dear mother?" asked Violet. "Dear father, do
not you see how it is? This is our snow-image, which Peony and I
have made, because we wanted another playmate. Did not we,
Peony?"

"Yes, papa," said crimson Peony. "This be our 'ittle snow-sister.
Is she not beau-ti-ful? But she gave me such a cold kiss!"

"Poh, nonsense, children!" cried their good, honest father, who,
as we have already intimated, had an exceedingly common-sensible
way of looking at matters. "Do not tell me of making live figures
out of snow. Come, wife; this little stranger must not stay out
in the bleak air a moment longer. We will bring her into the
parlor; and you shall give her a supper of warm bread and milk,
and make her as comfortable as you can. Meanwhile, I will inquire
among the neighbors; or, if necessary, send the city-crier about
the streets, to give notice of a lost child."

So saying, this honest and very kind-hearted man was going toward
the little white damsel, with the best intentions in the world.
But Violet and Peony, each seizing their father by the hand,
earnestly besought him not to make her come in.

"Dear father," cried Violet, putting herself before him, "it is
true what I have been telling you! This is our little snow-girl,
and she cannot live any longer than while she breathes the cold
west-wind. Do not make her come into the hot room!"

"Yes, father," shouted Peony, stamping his little foot, so
mightily was he in earnest, "this be nothing but our 'ittle
snow-child! She will not love the hot fire!"

"Nonsense, children, nonsense, nonsense!" cried the father, half
vexed, half laughing at what he considered their foolish
obstinacy. "Run into the house, this moment! It is too late to
play any longer, now. I must take care of this little girl
immediately, or she will catch her death-a-cold!"

"Husband! dear husband!" said his wife, in a low voice,--for she
had been looking narrowly at the snow-child, and was more
perplexed than ever,--"there is something very singular in all
this. You will think me foolish,--but--but--may it not be that
some invisible angel has been attracted by the simplicity and
good faith with which our children set about their undertaking?
May he not have spent an hour of his immorttality in playing with
those dear little souls? and so the result is what we call a
miracle. No, no! Do not laugh at me; I see what a foolish thought
it is!"

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