The Blithedale Romance
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Nathaniel Hawthorne >> The Blithedale Romance
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When she had come to be quite at home among us, I used to fancy that
Priscilla played more pranks, and perpetrated more mischief, than any
other girl in the Community. For example, I once heard Silas Foster, in
a very gruff voice, threatening to rivet three horseshoes round
Priscilla's neck and chain her to a post, because she, with some other
young people, had clambered upon a load of hay, and caused it to slide
off the cart. How she made her peace I never knew; but very soon
afterwards I saw old Silas, with his brawny hands round Priscilla's waist,
swinging her to and fro, and finally depositing her on one of the oxen,
to take her first lessons in riding. She met with terrible mishaps in
her efforts to milk a cow; she let the poultry into the garden; she
generally spoilt whatever part of the dinner she took in charge; she
broke crockery; she dropt our biggest water pitcher into the well;
and---except with her needle, and those little wooden instruments for
purse-making--was as unserviceable a member of society as any young lady
in the land. There was no other sort of efficiency about her. Yet
everybody was kind to Priscilla; everybody loved her and laughed at her
to her face, and did not laugh behind her back; everybody would have
given her half of his last crust, or the bigger share of his plum-cake.
These were pretty certain indications that we were all conscious of a
pleasant weakness in the girl, and considered her not quite able to look
after her own interests or fight her battle with the world. And
Hollingsworth--perhaps because he had been the means of introducing
Priscilla to her new abode--appeared to recognize her as his own especial
charge.
Her simple, careless, childish flow of spirits often made me sad. She
seemed to me like a butterfly at play in a flickering bit of sunshine,
and mistaking it for a broad and eternal summer. We sometimes hold mirth
to a stricter accountability than sorrow; it must show good cause, or the
echo of its laughter comes back drearily. Priscilla's gayety, moreover,
was of a nature that showed me how delicate an instrument she was, and
what fragile harp-strings were her nerves. As they made sweet music at
the airiest touch, it would require but a stronger one to burst them all
asunder. Absurd as it might be, I tried to reason with her, and persuade
her not to be so joyous, thinking that, if she would draw less lavishly
upon her fund of happiness, it would last the longer. I remember doing
so, one summer evening, when we tired laborers sat looking on, like
Goldsmith's old folks under the village thorn-tree, while the young
people were at their sports.
"What is the use or sense of being so very gay?" I said to Priscilla,
while she was taking breath, after a great frolic. "I love to see a
sufficient cause for everything, and I can see none for this. Pray tell
me, now, what kind of a world you imagine this to be, which you are so
merry in."
"I never think about it at all," answered Priscilla, laughing. "But this
I am sure of, that it is a world where everybody is kind to me, and where
I love everybody. My heart keeps dancing within me, and all the foolish
things which you see me do are only the motions of my heart. How can I
be dismal, if my heart will not let me?"
"Have you nothing dismal to remember?" I suggested. "If not, then,
indeed, you are very fortunate!"
"Ah!" said Priscilla slowly.
And then came that unintelligible gesture, when she seemed to be
listening to a distant voice.
"For my part," I continued, beneficently seeking to overshadow her with
my own sombre humor, "my past life has been a tiresome one enough; yet I
would rather look backward ten times than forward once. For, little as
we know of our life to come, we may be very sure, for one thing, that the
good we aim at will not be attained. People never do get just the good
they seek. If it come at all, it is something else, which they never
dreamed of, and did not particularly want. Then, again, we may rest
certain that our friends of to-day will not be our friends of a few years
hence; but, if we keep one of them, it will be at the expense of the
others; and most probably we shall keep none. To be sure, there are more
to be had; but who cares about making a new set of friends, even should
they be better than those around us?"
"Not I!" said Priscilla. "I will live and die with these!"
"Well; but let the future go," resumed I. "As for the present moment, if
we could look into the hearts where we wish to be most valued, what
should you expect to see? One's own likeness, in the innermost, holiest
niche? Ah! I don't know! It may not be there at all. It may be a dusty
image, thrust aside into a corner, and by and by to be flung out of doors,
where any foot may trample upon it. If not to-day, then to-morrow! And
so, Priscilla, I do not see much wisdom in being so very merry in this
kind of a world."
It had taken me nearly seven years of worldly life to hive up the bitter
honey which I here offered to Priscilla. And she rejected it!
"I don't believe one word of what you say!" she replied, laughing anew.
"You made me sad, for a minute, by talking about the past; but the past
never comes back again. Do we dream the same dream twice? There is
nothing else that I am afraid of."
So away she ran, and fell down on the green grass, as it was often her
luck to do, but got up again, without any harm.
"Priscilla, Priscilla!" cried Hollingsworth, who was sitting on the
doorstep; "you had better not run any more to-night. You will weary
yourself too much. And do not sit down out of doors, for there is a
heavy dew beginning to fall."
At his first word, she went and sat down under the porch, at
Hollingsworth's feet, entirely contented and happy. What charm was there
in his rude massiveness that so attracted and soothed this shadow-like
girl? It appeared to me, who have always been curious in such matters,
that Priscilla's vague and seemingly causeless flow of felicitous feeling
was that with which love blesses inexperienced hearts, before they begin
to suspect what is going on within them. It transports them to the
seventh heaven; and if you ask what brought them thither, they neither
can tell nor care to learn, but cherish an ecstatic faith that there they
shall abide forever.
Zenobia was in the doorway, not far from Hollingsworth. She gazed at
Priscilla in a very singular way. Indeed, it was a sight worth gazing at,
and a beautiful sight, too, as the fair girl sat at the feet of that
dark, powerful figure. Her air, while perfectly modest, delicate, and
virgin-like, denoted her as swayed by Hollingsworth, attracted to him,
and unconsciously seeking to rest upon his strength. I could not turn
away my own eyes, but hoped that nobody, save Zenobia and myself, was
witnessing this picture. It is before me now, with the evening twilight
a little deepened by the dusk of memory.
"Come hither, Priscilla," said Zenobia. "I have something to say to you."
She spoke in little more than a whisper. But it is strange how
expressive of moods a whisper may often be. Priscilla felt at once that
something had gone wrong.
"Are you angry with me?" she asked, rising slowly, and standing before
Zenobia in a drooping attitude. "What have I done? I hope you are not
angry!"
"No, no, Priscilla!" said Hollingsworth, smiling. "I will answer for it,
she is not. You are the one little person in the world with whom nobody
can be angry!"
"Angry with you, child? What a silly idea!" exclaimed Zenobia, laughing.
"No, indeed! But, my dear Priscilla, you are getting to be so very
pretty that you absolutely need a duenna; and, as I am older than you,
and have had my own little experience of life, and think myself
exceedingly sage, I intend to fill the place of a maiden aunt. Every day,
I shall give you a lecture, a quarter of an hour in length, on the
morals, manners, and proprieties of social life. When our pastoral shall
be quite played out, Priscilla, my worldly wisdom may stand you in good
stead."
"I am afraid you are angry with me!" repeated Priscilla sadly; for,
while she seemed as impressible as wax, the girl often showed a
persistency in her own ideas as stubborn as it was gentle.
"Dear me, what can I say to the child!" cried Zenobia in a tone of
humorous vexation. "Well, well; since you insist on my being angry, come
to my room this moment, and let me beat you!"
Zenobia bade Hollingsworth good-night very sweetly, and nodded to me with
a smile. But, just as she turned aside with Priscilla into the dimness
of the porch, I caught another glance at her countenance. It would have
made the fortune of a tragic actress, could she have borrowed it for the
moment when she fumbles in her bosom for the concealed dagger, or the
exceedingly sharp bodkin, or mingles the ratsbane in her lover's bowl of
wine or her rival's cup of tea. Not that I in the least anticipated any
such catastrophe,--it being a remarkable truth that custom has in no one
point a greater sway than over our modes of wreaking our wild passions.
And besides, had we been in Italy, instead of New England, it was hardly
yet a crisis for the dagger or the bowl.
It often amazed me, however, that Hollingsworth should show himself so
recklessly tender towards Priscilla, and never once seem to think of the
effect which it might have upon her heart. But the man, as I have
endeavored to explain, was thrown completely off his moral balance, and
quite bewildered as to his personal relations, by his great excrescence
of a philanthropic scheme. I used to see, or fancy, indications that he
was not altogether obtuse to Zenobia's influence as a woman. No doubt,
however, he had a still more exquisite enjoyment of Priscilla's silent
sympathy with his purposes, so unalloyed with criticism, and therefore
more grateful than any intellectual approbation, which always involves a
possible reserve of latent censure. A man--poet, prophet, or whatever he
may be--readily persuades himself of his right to all the worship that is
voluntarily tendered. In requital of so rich benefits as he was to
confer upon mankind, it would have been hard to deny Hollingsworth the
simple solace of a young girl's heart, which he held in his hand, and
smelled too, like a rosebud. But what if, while pressing out its
fragrance, he should crush the tender rosebud in his grasp!
As for Zenobia, I saw no occasion to give myself any trouble. With her
native strength, and her experience of the world, she could not be
supposed to need any help of mine. Nevertheless, I was really generous
enough to feel some little interest likewise for Zenobia. With all her
faults (which might have been a great many besides the abundance that I
knew of), she possessed noble traits, and a heart which must, at least,
have been valuable while new. And she seemed ready to fling it away as
uncalculatingly as Priscilla herself. I could not but suspect that, if
merely at play with Hollingsworth, she was sporting with a power which
she did not fully estimate. Or if in earnest, it might chance, between
Zenobia's passionate force and his dark, self-delusive egotism, to turn
out such earnest as would develop itself in some sufficiently tragic
catastrophe, though the dagger and the bowl should go for nothing in it.
Meantime, the gossip of the Community set them down as a pair of lovers.
They took walks together, and were not seldom encountered in the
wood-paths: Hollingsworth deeply discoursing, in tones solemn and sternly
pathetic; Zenobia, with a rich glow on her cheeks, and her eyes softened
from their ordinary brightness, looked so beautiful, that had her
companion been ten times a philanthropist, it seemed impossible but that
one glance should melt him back into a man. Oftener than anywhere else,
they went to a certain point on the slope of a pasture, commanding nearly
the whole of our own domain, besides a view of the river, and an airy
prospect of many distant hills. The bond of our Community was such, that
the members had the privilege of building cottages for their own
residence within our precincts, thus laying a hearthstone and fencing in
a home private and peculiar to all desirable extent, while yet the
inhabitants should continue to share the advantages of an associated life.
It was inferred that Hollingsworth and Zenobia intended to rear their
dwelling on this favorite spot.
I mentioned those rumors to Hollingsworth in a playful way.
"Had you consulted me," I went on to observe, "I should have recommended
a site farther to the left, just a little withdrawn into the wood, with
two or three peeps at the prospect among the trees. You will be in the
shady vale of years long before you can raise any better kind of shade
around your cottage, if you build it on this bare slope."
"But I offer my edifice as a spectacle to the world," said Hollingsworth,
"that it may take example and build many another like it. Therefore, I
mean to set it on the open hillside."
Twist these words how I might, they offered no very satisfactory import.
It seemed hardly probable that Hollingsworth should care about educating
the public taste in the department of cottage architecture, desirable as
such improvement certainly was.
X. A VISITOR FROM TOWN
Hollingsworth and I--we had been hoeing potatoes, that forenoon, while
the rest of the fraternity were engaged in a distant quarter of the
farm--sat under a clump of maples, eating our eleven o'clock lunch, when
we saw a stranger approaching along the edge of the field. He had
admitted himself from the roadside through a turnstile, and seemed to
have a purpose of speaking with us.
And, by the bye, we were favored with many visits at Blithedale,
especially from people who sympathized with our theories, and perhaps
held themselves ready to unite in our actual experiment as soon as there
should appear a reliable promise of its success. It was rather ludicrous,
indeed (to me, at least, whose enthusiasm had insensibly been exhaled
together with the perspiration of many a hard day's toil), it was
absolutely funny, therefore, to observe what a glory was shed about our
life and labors, in the imaginations of these longing proselytes. In
their view, we were as poetical as Arcadians, besides being as practical
as the hardest-fisted husbandmen in Massachusetts. We did not, it is
true, spend much time in piping to our sheep, or warbling our innocent
loves to the sisterhood. But they gave us credit for imbuing the
ordinary rustic occupations with a kind of religious poetry, insomuch
that our very cowyards and pigsties were as delightfully fragrant as a
flower garden. Nothing used to please me more than to see one of these
lay enthusiasts snatch up a hoe, as they were very prone to do, and set
to work with a vigor that perhaps carried him through about a dozen
ill-directed strokes. Men are wonderfully soon satisfied, in this day of
shameful bodily enervation, when, from one end of life to the other, such
multitudes never taste the sweet weariness that follows accustomed toil.
I seldom saw the new enthusiasm that did not grow as flimsy and flaccid
as the proselyte's moistened shirt-collar, with a quarter of an hour's
active labor under a July sun.
But the person now at hand had not at all the air of one of these amiable
visionaries. He was an elderly man, dressed rather shabbily, yet
decently enough, in a gray frock-coat, faded towards a brown hue, and
wore a broad-brimmed white hat, of the fashion of several years gone by.
His hair was perfect silver, without a dark thread in the whole of it;
his nose, though it had a scarlet tip, by no means indicated the jollity
of which a red nose is the generally admitted symbol. He was a subdued,
undemonstrative old man, who would doubtless drink a glass of liquor, now
and then, and probably more than was good for him,--not, however, with a
purpose of undue exhilaration, but in the hope of bringing his spirits up
to the ordinary level of the world's cheerfulness. Drawing nearer, there
was a shy look about him, as if he were ashamed of his poverty, or, at
any rate, for some reason or other, would rather have us glance at him
sidelong than take a full front view. He had a queer appearance of
hiding himself behind the patch on his left eye.
"I know this old gentleman," said I to Hollingsworth, as we sat observing
him; "that is, I have met him a hundred times in town, and have often
amused my fancy with wondering what he was before he came to be what he
is. He haunts restaurants and such places, and has an odd way of lurking
in corners or getting behind a door whenever practicable, and holding out
his hand with some little article in it which he wishes you to buy. The
eye of the world seems to trouble him, although he necessarily lives so
much in it. I never expected to see him in an open field."
"Have you learned anything of his history?" asked Hollingsworth.
"Not a circumstance," I answered; "but there must be something curious in
it. I take him to be a harmless sort of a person, and a tolerably honest
one; but his manners, being so furtive, remind me of those of a rat,--a
rat without the mischief, the fierce eye, the teeth to bite with, or the
desire to bite. See, now! He means to skulk along that fringe of bushes,
and approach us on the other side of our clump of maples."
We soon heard the old man's velvet tread on the grass, indicating that he
had arrived within a few feet of where we Sat.
"Good-morning, Mr. Moodie," said Hollingsworth, addressing the stranger
as an acquaintance; "you must have had a hot and tiresome walk from the
city. Sit down, and take a morsel of our bread and cheese."
The visitor made a grateful little murmur of acquiescence, and sat down
in a spot somewhat removed; so that, glancing round, I could see his gray
pantaloons and dusty shoes, while his upper part was mostly hidden behind
the shrubbery. Nor did he come forth from this retirement during the
whole of the interview that followed. We handed him such food as we had,
together with a brown jug of molasses and water (would that it had been
brandy, or some thing better, for the sake of his chill old heart!), like
priests offering dainty sacrifice to an enshrined and invisible idol. I
have no idea that he really lacked sustenance; but it was quite touching,
nevertheless, to hear him nibbling away at our crusts.
"Mr. Moodie," said I, "do you remember selling me one of those very
pretty little silk purses, of which you seem to have a monopoly in the
market? I keep it to this day, I can assure you."
"Ah, thank you," said our guest. "Yes, Mr. Coverdale, I used to sell a
good many of those little purses."
He spoke languidly, and only those few words, like a watch with an
inelastic spring, that just ticks a moment or two and stops again. He
seemed a very forlorn old man. In the wantonness of youth, strength, and
comfortable condition,--making my prey of people's individualities, as my
custom was,--I tried to identify my mind with the old fellow's, and take
his view of the world, as if looking through a smoke-blackened glass at
the sun. It robbed the landscape of all its life. Those pleasantly
swelling slopes of our farm, descending towards the wide meadows, through
which sluggishly circled the brimful tide of the Charles, bathing the
long sedges on its hither and farther shores; the broad, sunny gleam over
the winding water; that peculiar picturesqueness of the scene where capes
and headlands put themselves boldly forth upon the perfect level of the
meadow, as into a green lake, with inlets between the promontories; the
shadowy woodland, with twinkling showers of light falling into its depths;
the sultry heat-vapor, which rose everywhere like incense, and in which
my soul delighted, as indicating so rich a fervor in the passionate day,
and in the earth that was burning with its love,--I beheld all these
things as through old Moodie's eyes. When my eyes are dimmer than they
have yet come to be, I will go thither again, and see if I did not catch
the tone of his mind aright, and if the cold and lifeless tint of his
perceptions be not then repeated in my own.
Yet it was unaccountable to myself, the interest that I felt in him.
"Have you any objection," said I, "to telling me who made those little
purses?"
"Gentlemen have often asked me that," said Moodie slowly; "but I shake my
head, and say little or nothing, and creep out of the way as well as I
can. I am a man of few words; and if gentlemen were to be told one thing,
they would be very apt, I suppose, to ask me another. But it happens
just now, Mr. Coverdale, that you can tell me more about the maker of
those little purses than I can tell you."
"Why do you trouble him with needless questions, Coverdale?" interrupted
Hollingsworth. "You must have known, long ago, that it was Priscilla.
And so, my good friend, you have come to see her? Well, I am glad of it.
You will find her altered very much for the better, since that winter
evening when you put her into my charge. Why, Priscilla has a bloom in
her cheeks, now!"
"Has my pale little girl a bloom?" repeated Moodie with a kind of slow
wonder. "Priscilla with a bloom in her cheeks! Ah, I am afraid I shall
not know my little girl. And is she happy?"
"Just as happy as a bird," answered Hollingsworth.
"Then, gentlemen," said our guest apprehensively," I don't think it well
for me to go any farther. I crept hitherward only to ask about Priscilla;
and now that you have told me such good news, perhaps I can do no better
than to creep back again. If she were to see this old face of mine, the
child would remember some very sad times which we have spent together.
Some very sad times, indeed! She has forgotten them, I know,--them and
me,--else she could not be so happy, nor have a bloom in her cheeks.
Yes--yes--yes," continued he, still with the same torpid utterance; "with
many thanks to you, Mr. Hollingsworth, I will creep back to town again."
"You shall do no such thing, Mr. Moodie," said Hollingsworth bluffly.
"Priscilla often speaks of you; and if there lacks anything to make her
cheeks bloom like two damask roses, I'll venture to say it is just the
sight of your face. Come,--we will go and find her."
"Mr. Hollingsworth!" said the old man in his hesitating way.
"Well," answered Hollingsworth.
"Has there been any call for Priscilla?" asked Moodie; and though his
face was hidden from us, his tone gave a sure indication of the
mysterious nod and wink with which he put the question. "You know, I
think, sir, what I mean."
"I have not the remotest suspicion what you mean, Mr. Moodie," replied
Hollingsworth; "nobody, to my knowledge, has called for Priscilla, except
yourself. But come; we are losing time, and I have several things to say
to you by the way."
"And, Mr. Hollingsworth!" repeated Moodie.
"Well, again!" cried my friend rather impatiently. "What now?"
"There is a lady here," said the old man; and his voice lost some of its
wearisome hesitation. "You will account it a very strange matter for me
to talk about; but I chanced to know this lady when she was but a little
child. If I am rightly informed, she has grown to be a very fine woman,
and makes a brilliant figure in the world, with her beauty, and her
talents, and her noble way of spending her riches. I should recognize
this lady, so people tell me, by a magnificent flower in her hair."
"What a rich tinge it gives to his colorless ideas, when he speaks of
Zenobia!" I whispered to Hollingsworth. "But how can there possibly be
any interest or connecting link between him and her?"
"The old man, for years past," whispered Hollingsworth, "has been a
little out of his right mind, as you probably see."
"What I would inquire," resumed Moodie, "is whether this beautiful lady
is kind to my poor Priscilla."
"Very kind," said Hollingsworth.
"Does she love her?" asked Moodie.
"It should seem so," answered my friend. "They are always together."
"Like a gentlewoman and her maid-servant, I fancy?" suggested the old
man.
There was something so singular in his way of saying this, that I could
not resist the impulse to turn quite round, so as to catch a glimpse of
his face, almost imagining that I should see another person than old
Moodie. But there he sat, with the patched side of his face towards me.
"Like an elder and younger sister, rather," replied Hollingsworth.
"Ah!" said Moodie more complacently, for his latter tones had harshness
and acidity in them,--" it would gladden my old heart to witness that.
If one thing would make me happier than another, Mr. Hollingsworth, it
would be to see that beautiful lady holding my little girl by the hand."
"Come along," said Hollingsworth, "and perhaps you may."
After a little more delay on the part of our freakish visitor, they set
forth together, old Moodie keeping a step or two behind Hollingsworth, so
that the latter could not very conveniently look him in the face. I
remained under the tuft of maples, doing my utmost to draw an inference
from the scene that had just passed. In spite of Hollingsworth's
off-hand explanation, it did not strike me that our strange guest was
really beside himself, but only that his mind needed screwing up, like an
instrument long out of tune, the strings of which have ceased to vibrate
smartly and sharply. Methought it would be profitable for us, projectors
of a happy life, to welcome this old gray shadow, and cherish him as one
of us, and let him creep about our domain, in order that he might be a
little merrier for our sakes, and we, sometimes, a little sadder for his.
Human destinies look ominous without some perceptible intermixture of
the sable or the gray. And then, too, should any of our fraternity grow
feverish with an over-exulting sense of prosperity, it would be a sort of
cooling regimen to slink off into the woods, and spend an hour, or a day,
or as many days as might be requisite to the cure, in uninterrupted
communion with this deplorable old Moodie!
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