V.-HESTER AT HER NEEDLE.

ester Prynne’s term of confinement was
now at an end. Her prison-door was thrown
open, and she came forth into the sunshine,
which, falling on all alike, seemed, to her
sick and morbid heart, as if meant for no
other purpose than to reveal the scarlet letter
on her breast. Perhaps there was a more real torture in her
first unattended footsteps from the threshold of the prison, than
even in the procession and spectacle that have been described,
where she was made the common infamy, at which all mankind
was summoned to point its finger. Then, she was supported by
an unnatural tension of the nerves, and by all the combative
energy of her character, which enabled her to convert the scene
into a kind of lurid triumph. It was, moreover, a separate and
insulated event, to occur but once in her lifetime, and to meet
which, therefore, reckless of economy, she might call up the vital
strength that would have sufficed for many quiet years. The
very law that condemned her—a giant of stern features, but
with vigor to support, as well as to annihilate, in his iron arm—had
held her up, through the terrible ordeal of her ignominy.
But now, with this unattended walk from her prison-door, began
the daily custom; and she must either sustain and carry it
forward by the ordinary resources of her nature, or sink beneath
it. She could no longer borrow from the future to help her
through the present grief. To-morrow would bring its own trial
with it; so would the next day, and so would the next; each its
own trial, and yet the very same that was now so unutterably
grievous to be borne. The days of the far-off future would toil
onward, still with the same burden for her to take up, and bear
along with her, but never to fling down; for the accumulating
days, and added years, would pile up their misery upon the heap
of shame. Throughout them all, giving up her individuality, she
would become the general symbol at which the preacher and
moralist might point, and in which they might vivify and embody
their images of woman’s frailty and sinful passion. Thus the
young and pure would be taught to look at her, with the scarlet
letter flaming on her breast,—at her, the child of honorable
parents,—at her, the mother of a babe, that would hereafter be
a woman,—at her, who had once been innocent,—as the figure,
the body, the reality of sin. And over her grave, the infamy that
she must carry thither would be her only monument.esterIt may seem marvellous, that, with the world before her,—kept
by no restrictive clause of her condemnation within the
limits of the Puritan settlement, so remote and so obscure,—free
to return to her birthplace, or to any other European land,
and there hide her character and identity under a new exterior,
as completely as if emerging into another state of being,—and
having also the passes of the dark, inscrutable forest open to
her, where the wildness of her nature might assimilate itself with
a people whose customs and life were alien from the law that
had condemned her,—it may seem marvellous, that this woman
should still call that place her home, where, and where only, she
must needs be the type of shame. But there is a fatality, a feeling
so irresistible and inevitable that it has the force of doom,
which almost invariably compels human beings to linger around
and haunt, ghost-like, the spot where some great and marked
event has given the color to their lifetime; and still the more
irresistibly, the darker the tinge that saddens it. Her sin, her
ignominy, were the roots which she had struck into the soil.
It was as if a new birth, with stronger assimilations than the
first, had converted the forest-land, still so uncongenial to every
other pilgrim and wanderer, into Hester Prynne’s wild and dreary,
but life-long home. All other scenes of earth—even that village
of rural England, where happy infancy and stainless maidenhood
seemed yet to be in her mother’s keeping, like garments put
off long ago—were foreign to her, in comparison. The chain
that bound her here was of iron links, and galling to her inmost
soul, but could never be broken.It might be, too,—doubtless it was so, although she hid the
secret from herself, and grew pale whenever it struggled out
of her heart, like a serpent from its hole,—it might be that
another feeling kept her within the scene and pathway that had
been so fatal. There dwelt, there trode the feet of one with
whom she deemed herself connected in a union, that, unrecognized
on earth, would bring them together before the bar of
final judgment, and make that their marriage-altar, for a joint
futurity of endless retribution. Over and over again, the tempter
of souls had thrust this idea upon Hester’s contemplation, and
laughed at the passionate and desperate joy with which she
seized, and then strove to cast it from her. She barely looked
the idea in the face, and hastened to bar it in its dungeon. What
she compelled herself to believe—what, finally, she reasoned
upon, as her motive for continuing a resident of New England—was
half a truth, and half a self-delusion. Here, she
said to herself, had been the scene of her guilt, and here should
be the scene of her earthly punishment; and so, perchance, the
torture of her daily shame would at length purge her soul, and
work out another purity than that which she had lost; more
saint-like, because the result of martyrdom.Hester Prynne, therefore, did not flee. On the outskirts of the
town, within the verge of the peninsula, but not in close vicinity
to any other habitation, there was a small thatched cottage. It
had been built by an earlier settler, and abandoned because the
soil about it was too sterile for cultivation, while its comparative
remoteness put it out of the sphere of that social activity
which already marked the habits of the emigrants. It stood on
the shore, looking across a basin of the sea at the forest-covered
hills, towards the west. A clump of scrubby trees, such as alone
grew on the peninsula, did not so much conceal the cottage
from view, as seem to denote that here was some object which
would fain have been, or at least ought to be, concealed. In
this little, lonesome dwelling, with some slender means that she
possessed, and by the license of the magistrates, who still kept
an inquisitorial watch over her, Hester established herself, with
her infant child. A mystic shadow of suspicion immediately
attached itself to the spot. Children, too young to comprehend
wherefore this woman should be shut out from the sphere
of human charities, would creep nigh enough to behold her
plying her needle at the cottage-window, or standing in the
doorway, or laboring in her little garden, or coming forth along
the pathway that led townward; and, discerning the scarlet
letter on her breast, would scamper off with a strange, contagious
fear.Lonely as was Hester’s situation, and without a friend on
earth who dared to show himself, she, however, incurred no risk
of want. She possessed an art that sufficed, even in a land that
afforded comparatively little scope for its exercise, to supply food
for her thriving infant and herself. It was the art—then, as
now, almost the only one within a woman’s grasp—of needlework.
She bore on her breast, in the curiously embroidered
letter, a specimen of her delicate and imaginative skill, of which
the dames of a court might gladly have availed themselves, to
add the richer and more spiritual adornment of human ingenuity
to their fabrics of silk and gold. Here, indeed, in the sable
simplicity that generally characterized the Puritanic modes of
dress, there might be an infrequent call for the finer productions
of her handiwork. Yet the taste of the age, demanding whatever
was elaborate in compositions of this kind, did not fail to
extend its influence over our stern progenitors, who had cast
behind them so many fashions which it might seem harder to
dispense with. Public ceremonies, such as ordinations, the installation
of magistrates, and all that could give majesty to the forms
in which a new government manifested itself to the people, were,
as a matter of policy, marked by a stately and well-conducted
ceremonial, and a sombre, but yet a studied magnificence. Deep
ruffs, painfully wrought bands, and gorgeously embroidered gloves,
were all deemed necessary to the official state of men assuming
the reins of power; and were readily allowed to individuals
dignified by rank or wealth, even while sumptuary laws forbade
these and similar extravagances to the plebeian order. In the
array of funerals, too,—whether for the apparel of the dead
body, or to typify, by manifold emblematic devices of sable cloth
and snowy lawn, the sorrow of the survivors,—there was a frequent
and characteristic demand for such labor as Hester Prynne
could supply. Baby-linen—for babies then wore robes of state—afforded
still another possibility of toil and emolument.By degrees, nor very slowly, her handiwork became what would
now be termed the fashion. Whether from commiseration for
a woman of so miserable a destiny; or from the morbid curiosity
that gives a fictitious value even to common or worthless
things; or by whatever other intangible circumstance was then,
as now, sufficient to bestow, on some persons, what others might
seek in vain; or because Hester really filled a gap which must
otherwise have remained vacant; it is certain that she had ready
and fairly requited employment for as many hours as she saw
fit to occupy with her needle. Vanity, it may be, chose to
mortify itself, by putting on, for ceremonials of pomp and state,
the garments that had been wrought by her sinful hands. Her
needlework was seen on the ruff of the Governor; military men
wore it on their scarfs, and the minister on his band; it decked
the baby’s little cap; it was shut up, to be mildewed and moulder
away, in the coffins of the dead. But it is not recorded that,
in a single instance, her skill was called in aid to embroider
the white veil which was to cover the pure blushes of a bride.
The exception indicated the ever-relentless rigor with which society
frowned upon her sin.Hester sought not to acquire anything beyond a subsistence,
of the plainest and most ascetic description, for herself, and
a simple abundance for her child. Her own dress was of the
coarsest materials and the most sombre hue; with only that one
ornament,—the scarlet letter,—which it was her doom to wear.
The child’s attire, on the other hand, was distinguished by a
fanciful, or, we might rather say, a fantastic ingenuity, which
served, indeed, to heighten the airy charm that early began to
develop itself in the little girl, but which appeared to have also
a deeper meaning. We may speak further of it hereafter. Except
for that small expenditure in the decoration of her infant, Hester
bestowed all her superfluous means in charity, on wretches less
miserable than herself, and who not unfrequently insulted the
hand that fed them. Much of the time, which she might readily
have applied to the better efforts of her art, she employed in
making coarse garments for the poor. It is probable that there
was an idea of penance in this mode of occupation, and that she
offered up a real sacrifice of enjoyment, in devoting so many
hours to such rude handiwork. She had in her nature a rich,
voluptuous, Oriental characteristic,—a taste for the gorgeously
beautiful, which, save in the exquisite productions of her needle,
found nothing else, in all the possibilities of her life, to exercise
itself upon. Women derive a pleasure, incomprehensible to
the other sex, from the delicate toil of the needle. To Hester
Prynne it might have been a mode of expressing, and therefore
soothing, the passion of her life. Like all other joys, she rejected
it as sin. This morbid meddling of conscience with an immaterial
matter betokened, it is to be feared, no genuine and steadfast
penitence, but something doubtful, something that might
be deeply wrong, beneath.In this manner, Hester Prynne came to have a part to perform
in the world. With her native energy of character, and rare
capacity, it could not entirely cast her off, although it had set
a mark upon her, more intolerable to a woman’s heart than that
which branded the brow of Cain. In all her intercourse with
society, however, there was nothing that made her feel as if she
belonged to it. Every gesture, every word, and even the silence
of those with whom she came in contact, implied, and often
expressed, that she was banished, and as much alone as if she
inhabited another sphere, or communicated with the common
nature by other organs and senses than the rest of human kind.
She stood apart from moral interests, yet close beside them, like
a ghost that revisits the familiar fireside, and can no longer make
itself seen or felt; no more smile with the household joy, nor
mourn with the kindred sorrow; or, should it succeed in manifesting
its forbidden sympathy, awakening only terror and horrible
repugnance. These emotions, in fact, and its bitterest scorn
besides, seemed to be the sole portion that she retained in the
universal heart. It was not an age of delicacy; and her position,
although she understood it well, and was in little danger
of forgetting it, was often brought before her vivid self-perception,
like a new anguish, by the rudest touch upon the tenderest spot.
The poor, as we have already said, whom she sought out to be
the objects of her bounty, often reviled the hand that was stretched
forth to succor them. Dames of elevated rank, likewise, whose
doors she entered in the way of her occupation, were accustomed
to distil drops of bitterness into her heart; sometimes through
that alchemy of quiet malice, by which women can concoct a
subtle poison from ordinary trifles; and sometimes, also, by
a coarser expression, that fell upon the sufferer’s defenceless
breast like a rough blow upon an ulcerated wound. Hester had
schooled herself long and well; she never responded to these
attacks, save by a flush of crimson that rose irrepressibly over
her pale cheek, and again subsided into the depths of her bosom.
She was patient,—a martyr, indeed,—but she forbore to pray
for her enemies; lest, in spite of her forgiving aspirations, the
words of the blessing should stubbornly twist themselves into
a curse.Continually, and in a thousand other ways, did she feel the
innumerable throbs of anguish that had been so cunningly contrived
for her by the undying, the ever-active sentence of the
Puritan tribunal. Clergymen paused in the street to address
words of exhortation, that brought a crowd, with its mingled
grin and frown, around the poor, sinful woman. If she entered
a church, trusting to share the Sabbath smile of the Universal
Father, it was often her mishap to find herself the text of the
discourse. She grew to have a dread of children; for they had
imbibed from their parents a vague idea of something horrible
in this dreary woman, gliding silently through the town, with
never any companion but one only child. Therefore, first allowing
her to pass, they pursued her at a distance with shrill cries,
and the utterance of a word that had no distinct purport to
their own minds, but was none the less terrible to her, as proceeding
from lips that babbled it unconsciously. It seemed to
argue so wide a diffusion of her shame, that all nature knew
of it; it could have caused her no deeper pang, had the leaves
of the trees whispered the dark story among themselves,—had
the summer breeze murmured about it,—had the wintry blast
shrieked it aloud! Another peculiar torture was felt in the gaze
of a new eye. When strangers looked curiously at the scarlet
letter,—and none ever failed to do so,—they branded it afresh
into Hester’s soul; so that, oftentimes, she could scarcely refrain,
yet always did refrain, from covering the symbol with her hand.
But then, again, an accustomed eye had likewise its own anguish
to inflict. Its cool stare of familiarity was intolerable. From
first to last, in short, Hester Prynne had always this dreadful
agony in feeling a human eye upon the token; the spot never
grew callous; it seemed, on the contrary, to grow more sensitive
with daily torture.But sometimes, once in many days, or perchance in many
months, she felt an eye—a human eye—upon the ignominious
brand, that seemed to give a momentary relief, as if half of her
agony were shared. The next instant, back it all rushed again,
with still a deeper throb of pain; for, in that brief interval,
she had sinned anew. Had Hester sinned alone?Her imagination was somewhat affected, and, had she been
of a softer moral and intellectual fibre, would have been still
more so, by the strange and solitary anguish of her life. Walking
to and fro, with those lonely footsteps, in the little world
with which she was outwardly connected, it now and then appeared
to Hester,—if altogether fancy, it was nevertheless too potent
to be resisted,—she felt or fancied, then, that the scarlet letter
had endowed her with a new sense. She shuddered to believe,
yet could not help believing, that it gave her a sympathetic
knowledge of the hidden sin in other hearts. She was terror-stricken
by the revelations that were thus made. What were
they? Could they be other than the insidious whispers of the
bad angel, who would fain have persuaded the struggling woman,
as yet only half his victim, that the outward guise of purity
was but a lie, and that, if truth were everywhere to be shown,
a scarlet letter would blaze forth on many a bosom besides Hester
Prynne’s? Or, must she receive those intimations—so obscure,
yet so distinct—as truth? In all her miserable experience, there
was nothing else so awful and so loathsome as this sense. It
perplexed, as well as shocked her, by the irreverent inopportuneness
of the occasions that brought it into vivid action. Sometimes
the red infamy upon her breast would give a sympathetic
throb, as she passed near a venerable minister or magistrate,
the model of piety and justice, to whom that age of antique
reverence looked up, as to a mortal man in fellowship with angels.
“What evil thing is at hand?” would Hester say to herself.
Lifting her reluctant eyes, there would be nothing human within
the scope of view, save the form of this earthly saint! Again,
a mystic sisterhood would contumaciously assert itself, as she
met the sanctified frown of some matron, who, according to the
rumor of all tongues, had kept cold snow within her bosom
throughout life. That unsunned snow in the matron’s bosom,
and the burning shame on Hester Prynne’s,—what had the two
in common? Or, once more, the electric thrill would give her
warning,—“Behold, Hester, here is a companion!”—and, looking
up, she would detect the eyes of a young maiden glancing
at the scarlet letter, shyly and aside, and quickly averted with
a faint, chill crimson in her cheeks; as if her purity were somewhat
sullied by that momentary glance. O Fiend, whose talisman
was that fatal symbol, wouldst thou leave nothing, whether in
youth or age, for this poor sinner to revere?—such loss of faith
is ever one of the saddest results of sin. Be it accepted as a proof
that all was not corrupt in this poor victim of her own frailty,
and man’s hard law, that Hester Prynne yet struggled to believe
that no fellow-mortal was guilty like herself.The vulgar, who, in those dreary old times, were always contributing
a grotesque horror to what interested their imaginations,
had a story about the scarlet letter which we might readily work
up into a terrific legend. They averred, that the symbol was
not mere scarlet cloth, tinged in an earthly dye-pot, but was
red-hot with infernal fire, and could be seen glowing all alight,
whenever Hester Prynne walked abroad in the night-time. And
we must needs say, it seared Hester’s bosom so deeply, that
perhaps there was more truth in the rumor than our modern
incredulity may be inclined to admit.