The House of the seven gables;

'

.

D

H.S.G. "Hepzibah led in the stranger."

Page 127.
A

The House of the
Seven Gables fjf

By
Nathaniel Hawthorne

Illustrated
By

A. A. Dixon

Collins' Clear-Type Press
London and Glasgow

I'gfel

A I

PREFACE. l£6!b

MAIN

WHEN a writer calls his work a Romance, it need
hardly be observed that he wishes to claim a certain
latitude, both as to its fashion and material, which
he would not have felt himself entitled to assume,
had he professed to be writing* a Novel. The later
form of composition is presumed to aim at a very
minute fidelity, not merely to the possible, but to
the probable and ordinary course of man's experience.
t The former — while as a work of art it must rig-idly
subject itself to laws, and while it sins unpardonably
so far as it may swerve aside from the truth of the
human heart — has fairly a right to present that
truth under circumstances, to a great extent, of
the writer's own choosing* or creation. If he think
fit, also, he may so manage his atmospherical
medium as to bring out or mellow the lights, and
deepen and enrich the shadows, of the picture.
He will be wise, no doubt, to make a very moderate
use of the privileges here stated, and, especially,
to mingle the Marvellous rather as a slight, delicate,
and evanescent flavour, than as any portion of the
actual substance of the dish offered to the public.
He can hardly be said, however, to commit a literary
crime, even if he disregard this caution.

In the present work, the author has proposed

960

4 PREFACE.

to himself — but with what success, fortunately, it
is not for him to judge — to keep undeviatingly
within his immunities. The point of view in which
this tale comes under the Romantic definition lies
in the attempt to connect a bygone time with the
very present that is flitting away from us. It is a
legend, prolonging itself, from an epoch now gray
in the distance, down into our own broad daylight,
and bringing along with it some of its legendary
mist, which the reader, according to his pleasure,
may either disregard, or allow it to float almost
imperceptibly about the characters and events, for
the sake of a picturesque effect. The narrative,
it may be, is woven of so humble a texture as to
require this advantage, and, at the same time, tp
render it the more difficult of attainment.

Many writers lay very great stress upon some
definite moral purpose, at which they profess to
aim their works. Not to be deficient in this
particular, the author has provided himself with a
moral — the truth, namely, that the wrong-doing
of one generation lives into the successive ones,
and, divesting itself of every temporary advantage,
becomes a pure and uncontrollable mischief; and
he would feel it a singular gratification, if this
romance might effectually convince mankind — or,
indeed, any one man — of the folly of tumbling
down an avalanche of ill-gotten gold, or real estate,
on the heads of an unfortunate posterity, thereby

.

PREFACE. 5

to maim and crush them, until the accumulated
mass shall be scattered abroad in its original atoms.
In good faith, however, he is not sufficiently imagina
tive to flatter himself with the slightest hope of
this kind. When romances do really teach anything,
or produce any effective operation, it is usually
through a far more subtle process than the ostensible
one. The author has considered it hardly worth
his while, therefore, relentlessly to impale the story
with its moral, as with an iron rod — or, rather,
as by sticking a pin through a butterfly — thus at
once depriving it of life, and causing it to stiffen
in an ungainly and unnatural attitude. A high
truth, indeed, fairly, finely, and skilfully wrought
out, brightening at every step, and crowning the
final development of a work of fiction, may add an
artistic glory, but is never any truer, and seldom
any more evident, at the last page than at the first.

The reader may perhaps choose to assign an
actual locality to the imaginary events of this
narrative. If permitted by the historical connection
— which, though slight, was essential to his plan
— the author would very willingly have avoided
anything of this nature. Not to speak of other
objections, it exposes the romance to an inflexible
and exceedingly dangerous species of criticism, by
bringing his fancy-pictures almost into positive
contact with the realities of the moment. It has
been no part of his object, however, to describe

6 PREFACE.

local manners, nor in any way to meddle with the
characteristics of a community for whom he cherishes
a proper respect and a natural regard. He trusts
not to be considered as unpardonably offending-, by
laying out a street that infringes upon nobody's
private rights, and appropriating a lot of land which
had no visible owner, and building a house, of
materials long in use for constructing castles in the
air. The personages of the tale — though they give
themselves out to be of ancient stability and con
siderable prominence — are really of the author's
own making, or, at all events, of his own mixing ;
their virtues can shed no lustre, nor their defects
redound, in the remotest degree, to the discredit
of the venerable town of which they profess to
be inhabitants. He would be glad, therefore, if —
especially in the quarter to which he alludes — the
book may be read strictly as a Romance, having
a great deal more to do with the clouds overhead
than with any portion of the actual soil of the
, County of Essex.

L\:xox, January 27, 1851.

CONTENTS.

PAG:-:

I. THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY . . « . 9

II. THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW .^ . « . . 40

III. THE FIRST CUSTOMER _, . . « . 54

IV. A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER . , a . 7 1
V. MAY AND NOVEMBER ' .- ._';*• ... 88

vi. MAULE'S WELL 107

VII. THE GUEST .« . . . • • I2°

VIII. THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY * " • . • • HO

IX. CLIFFORD AND PHCEBE ,^: * ' ... . , l6l

X. THE PYNCHEON GARDEN . .' • fej . . 175

XL THE ARCHED WINDOW . , • . .* : . 192

XII. THE DAGUERREOTYPIST v . . .* . » . 209

XIII. ALICE PYNCHEON \ ..,.'. . . . 226

xiv. PHCEBE'S GOOD-BYE . , 2^^

O«3

XV. THE SCOWL AND SMILE ..... 268

xvi. CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER , , ^ w * . . 288

XVII. THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS .... 304

XVIII. GOVERNOR PYNCHEON * . ' . V , . 321

xix. ALICE'S POSIES ." ^ / . , .341

XX. THE FLOWER OF EDEN . \., » . . 361

XXI. THE DEPARTURE »»««,. 372

The House of the Seven
Gables.

i.

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY.

HALF-WAY down a by-street of one of our New England
towns, stands a rusty wooden house, with seven
acutely-peaked gables, facing towards various points
of the compass, and a huge, clustered chimney in the
midst. The street is Pyncheon Street ; the house is
the old Pyncheon House ; and an elm-tree, of wide
circumference, rooted before the door, is familiar to
every town -born child by the title of the Pyncheon
elm. On my occasional visits to the town afore
said, I seldom fail to turn down Pyncheon Street,
for the sake of passing through the shadow of these
two antiquities — the great elm -tree, and the weather-
beaten edifice.

The aspect of the venerable mansion has always
affected me like a human countenance, bearing the
traces not merely of outward storm and sunshine, but
expressive, also, of the long lapse of mortal life, and
accompanying vicissitudes that have passed within.
Were these to be worthily recounted, they would form
a narrative of no small interest and instruction, and
possessing, moreover, a certain remarkable unity,
which might almost seem the result of artistic arrange
ment. But the story would include a chain of events

II. 3. G. 9 A 2

io HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

extending over the better part of two centuries, and,
written out with reasonable amplitude, would fill a
bigger folio volume, or a longer series of duodecimos,
than could prudently be appropriated to the annals
of all New England during a similar period. It
consequently becomes imperative to make short work
with most of the traditionary lore of which the old
Pyncheon House, otherwise known as the House of
the Seven Gables, has been the theme. With a brief
sketch, therefore, of the circumstances amid which the
foundation of the house was laid, and a rapid glimpse
at its quaint exterior, as it grew black in the prevalent
east wind — pointing*, too, here and there, at some spot
of more verdant mossiness on its roof and walls — we
shall commence the real action of our tale at an epoch
not very remote from the present day. Still, there
will be a connection with the long past — a reference
to forgotten events and personages, and to manners,
feelings, and opinions almost or wholly obsolete —
which, if adequately translated to the reader, would
serve to illustrate how much of old material goes to
make up the freshest novelty of human life. Hence,
too, might be drawn a weighty lesson from the little-
regarded truth, that the act of the passing generation
is the germ which may and must produce good or evil
fruit in a far-distant time ; that, together with the seed
of the merely temporary crop, which mortals term
expediency, they inevitably sow the acorns of a more
enduring growth, which may darkly overshadow their
posterity.

The House of the Seven Gables, antique as it now
looks, was not the first habitation erected by civilised
man on precisely the same spot of ground. Pyncheon

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. n

Street formerly bore the humbler appellation of Maule's
Lane, from the name of the original occupant of the
soil, before whose cottage-door it was a cow-path.
A natural spring of soft and pleasant water — a rare
treasure on the sea-girt peninsula, where the Puritan
settlement was made — had early induced Matthew
Maule to build a hut, shaggy with thatch, at this point,
although somewhat too remote from what was then
the centre of the village. In the growth of the town,
however, after some thirty or forty years, .the site
covered by this rude hovel had become exceedingly
desirable in the eyes of a prominent and powerful
personage, who asserted plausible claims to the
proprietorship of this, and a large adjacent tract of
land, on the strength of a grant from the legislature.
Colonel Pyncheon, the claimant, as we gather from
whatever traits of him are preserved, was characterised
by an iron energy of purpose. Matthew Maule, on the
other hand, though an obscure man, was stubborn in
the defence of what he considered his right ; and, for
several years, he succeeded in protecting the acre or
two of earth, which, with his own toil, he had hewn
out of the primeval forest, to be his garden-ground
and homestead. No written record of this dispute
is known to be in existence. Our acquaintance with
the whole subject is derived chiefly from tradition.
It would be bold, therefore, and possibly unjust,
to venture a decisive opinion as to its merits ; although
it appears to have been at least a matter of doubt,
whether Colonel Pyncheon's claim were not unduly
stretched, in order to make it cover the small metes
and bounds of Matthew Maule. What greatly
strengthens such a suspicion is the fact that this

12 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

controversy between two ill-matched antagonists — at
a period, moreover, laud it as we may, when personal
influence had far more weight than now — remained for
years undecided, and came to a close only with the
death of the party occupying the disputed soil. The
mode of his death, too, affects the mind differently, in
our day, from what it did a century and a half ago.
It was a death that blasted with strange horror the
humble name of the dweller in the cottage, and made it
seem almost a religious act to drive the plough over
the little area of his habitation, and obliterate his place
and memory from among men.

Old Matthew Maule, in a word, was executed for the
crime of witchcraft. He was one of the martyrs to
that terrible delusion, which should teach us, among
its other morals, that the influential classes, and those
who take upon themselves to be leaders of the people,
are fully liable to all the passionate error that has ever
characterised the maddest mob. Clergymen, judges,
statesmen — the wisest, calmest, holiest persons of their
day — stood in the inner circle round about the gallows,
loudest to applaud the work of blood, latest to confess
themselves miserably deceived. If any one part of
their proceedings can be said to deserve less blame
than another, it was the singular indiscrimination with
which they persecuted, not merely the poor and aged,
as in former judicial massacres, but people of all ranks ;
their own equals, brethren, and wives. Amid the
disorder of such various ruin, it is not strange that a
man of inconsiderable note, like Maule, should have
trodden the martyr's path to the hill of execution
almost unremarked in the throng of his fellow-
sufferers. But, in after days, when the frenzy of

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 13

that hideous epoch had subsided, it was remembered
how loudly Colonel Pyncheon had joined in the
general cry, to purge the land from witchcraft ; nor
did it fail to be whispered, that there was an invidious
acrimony in the zeal with which he had sought the
condemnation of Matthew Maule. It was well known
that the victim had recognised the bitterness of personal
enmity in his persecutor's conduct towards him, and
that he declared himself hunted to death for his spoil.
At the moment of execution — with the halter about his
neck and while Colonel Pyncheon sat on horseback,
grimly gazing at the scene — Maule had addressed him
from the scaffold, and uttered a prophecy, of which
history, as well as fireside tradition, has preserved the
very words. "God," said the dying man, pointing
his finger, with a ghastly look, at the undismayed
countenance of his enemy — " God will give him blood
to drink ! "

After the reputed wizard's death, his humble home
stead had fallen an easy spoil into Colonel Pyncheon's
grasp. When it was understood, however, that the
colonel intended to erect a family mansion — spacious,
ponderously framed of oaken timber, and calculated
to endure for many generations of his posterity —
over the spot first covered by the log-built hut of
Matthew Maule, there was much shaking of the
head among the village gossips. Without absolutely
expressing a doubt whether the stalwart Puritan had
acted as a man of conscience and integrity, through
out the proceedings which have been sketched, they
nevertheless hinted that he was about to build his
house over an unquiet grave. His home would
include the home of the dead and buried wizard,

14 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and would thus afford the ghost of the latter a kind
of privilege to haunt its new apartments, and the
chambers into which future bridegrooms were to
lead their brides, and where children of the Pyncheon
blood were to be born. The terror and ugliness of
Maule's crime, and the wretchedness of his punish
ment, would darken the freshly - plastered walls,
and infect them early with the scent of an old and
melancholy house. Why, then — while so much of
the soil around him was bestrewn with the virgin
forest-leaves: — why should Colonel Pyncheon prefer
a site that had already been accurst ?

But the Puritan soldier and magistrate was not
a man to be turned aside from his well-considered
scheme, either by dread of the wizard's ghost, or by
flimsy sentimentalities of any kind, however specious.
Had he been told of a bad air, it might have moved
him somewhat ; but he was ready to encounter
an evil spirit on his own ground. Endowed with
common-sense, as massive and hard as blocks of
granite, fastened together by stern rigidity of purpose,-
as with iron clamps, he followed out his original
design, probably without so much as imagining
an objection to it. On the score of delicacy, or
any scrupulousness which a finer sensibility might
have taught him, the colonel, like most of his breed
and generation, was impenetrable. He, therefore,
dug his cellar, and laid the deep foundations of his
mansion, on the square of earth whence Matthew
Maule, forty years before, had first swept away the
fallen leaves. It was a curious, and, as some people
thought, an ominous fact, that, very soon after the
workmen began their operations, the spring of

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 15

water, above mentioned, entirely lost the delicious-
ness of its pristine quality. Whether its sources
were disturbed by the depth of the new cellar, or
whatever subtler cause might lurk at the bottom,
it is certain that the water of Maule's Well, as it
continued to be called, grew hard and brackish.
Even such we find it now ; and any old woman of
the neighbourhood will certify that it is productive
of intestinal mischief to those who quench their
thirst there.

The reader may deem it singular that the head
carpenter of the new edifice was no other than the
son of the very man from whose dead grip the
property of the soil had been wrested. Not im
probably he was the best workman of his time ; or,
perhaps, the colonel thought it expedient, or was
impelled by some better feeling, thus openly to cast
aside all animosity against the race of his fallen
antagonist. Nor was it out of keeping with the
general coarseness and matter-of-fact character of
the age, that the son should be willing to earn an
honest penny, or, rather, a weighty amount of ster
ling pounds, from the purse of his father's deadly
enemy. At all events, Thomas Maule became the
architect of the House of the Seven Gables, and
performed his duty so faithfully that the timber
frame - work, fastened by his hands, still holds
together.

Thus the great house was built. Familiar as it
stands in the writer's recollection — for it has been
an object of curiosity with him from boyhood, both
as a specimen of the best and stateliest architecture
of a long-past epoch, and as the scene of events

16 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

more full of human interest, perhaps, than those
of a gray feudal castle — familiar as it stands, in its
rusty old age, it is therefore only the more difficult
to imagine the bright novelty with which it first
caught the sunshine. The impression of its actual
state, at this distance of a hundred and sixty years,
darkens, inevitably, through the picture which we
would fain give of its appearance on the morning
when the Puritan magnate bade all the town to be
his guests. A ceremony of consecration, festive as
well as religious, was now to be performed. A
prayer and discourse from the Rev. Mr. Higginson,
and the outpouring of a psalm from the general
throat of the community, was to be made acceptable
to the grosser sense by ale, cider, wine, and brandy,
in copious effusion, and, as some authorities aver,
by an ox roasted whole, or, at least, by the weight
and substance of an ox, in more manageable joints
and sirloins. The carcass of a deer, shot within
twenty miles, had supplied material for the vast
circumference of a pasty. A cod-fish, of sixty
pounds, caught in the bay, had been dissolved
into the rich liquid of a chowder. The chimney of
the new house, in short, belching forth its kitchen-
smoke, impregnated the whole air with the scent
of meats, fowls, and fishes, spicily concocted with
odoriferous herbs, and onions in abundance. The
mere smell of such festivity, making its way to
everybody's nostrils, was at once an invitation and
an appetite.

Maule's Lane, or Pyncheon Street, as it were now
more decorous to call it, was thronged, at the
appointed hour, as with a congregation on its way

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 17

to church. All, as they approached, looked upward
at the imposing- edifice, which was henceforth to
assume its rank among- the habitations of mankind.
There it rose, a little withdrawn from the line of
the street, but in pride, not modesty. Its whole
visible exterior was ornamented with quaint fig'ures,
conceived in the grotesqueness of a Gothic fancy,
and drawn or stamped in the glittering plaster,
composed of lime, pebbles, and bits of glass, with
which the wood-work of the walls was overspread.
On every side, the seven gables pointed sharply
towards the sky, and presented the aspect of a
whole sisterhood of edifices, breathing through the
spiracles of one great chimney. The many lattices,
with their small, diamond-shaped panes, admitted
the sunlight into hall and chamber, while, neverthe
less, the second storey, projecting far over the base,
and itself retiring beneath the third, threw a shadow
and thoughtful gloom into the lower rooms. Carved
globes of wood were affixed under the jutting storeys.
Little spiral rods of iron beautified each of the
seven peaks. On the triangular portion of the gable,
that fronted next the street, was a dial, put up that
very morning, and on which the sun was still
marking the passage of the first bright hour in a
history that was not destined to be all so bright.
All around were scattered shavings, chips, shingles,
and broken halves of bricks ; these, together with
the lately turned earth, on which the grass had
not begun to grow, contributed to the impression
of strangeness and novelty proper to a house that
had yet its place to make among men's daily
interests

i8 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

The principal entrance, which had almost the
breadth of a church door, was in the angle between
the two front gables, and was covered by an open
porch, with benches beneath its shelter. Under
this arched doorway, scraping their feet on the
unworn threshold, now trod the clergymen, the
elders, the magistrates, the deacons, and whatever of
aristocracy there was in town or country. Thither,
too, thronged the plebeian classes, as freely as their
betters, and in larger number. Just within the
entrance, however, stood two serving-men, pointing
some of the guests to the neighbourhood of the
kitchen, and ushering others into the statelier rooms — •
hospitable alike to all, but still with a scrutinising
regard to the high or low degree of each. Velvet
garments, sombre but rich, stiffly-plaited ruffs and
bands, embroidered gloves, venerable beards, the
mien and countenance of authority, made it easy to
distinguish the gentleman of worship, at that period,
from the tradesman with his plodding air, or the
labourer, in his leathern jerkin, stealing awe-stricken
into the house which he had perhaps helped to build.

One inauspicious circumstance there was, which
awakened a hardly -concealed displeasure in the
breasts of a few of the more punctilious visitors.
The founder of this stately mansion — a gentleman
noted for the square ajid ponderous courtesy of his
demeanour — ought surely to have stood in his own
hall, and to have offered the first welcome to so many
eminent personages as here presented themselves in
honour of his solemn festival. He was as yet in
visible ; the most favoured of the guests had not
beheld him. This sluggishness on Colonel Pvncheon's

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 19

part became still more unaccountable, when the
second dignitary of the province made his appear
ance, and found no more ceremonious a reception.
The lieutenant-governor, although his visit was
one of the anticipated glories of the day, had
alighted from his horse, and assisted his lady from
her side-saddle, and crossed the colonel's threshold,
without other greeting than that of the principal
domestic.

This person — a gray-headed man, of quiet and
most respectful deportment — found it necessary to
explain that his master still remained in .his study,
or private apartment ; on entering which, an hour
before, he had expressed a wish on no account to
be disturbed.

" Do not you see, fellow," said the High Sheriff of
the county, taking the servant aside, " that this is no
less a man than the lieutenant-governor ? Summon
Colonel Pyncheon at once ! I know that he received
letters from England this morning ; and, in the
perusal and consideration of them, an hour may have
passed away without his noticing it.. But he will be
ill-pleased, I judge, if you suffer him to neglect the
courtesy due to one of our chief rulers, and who may
be said to represent King William, in the absence of
the governor himself. Call your master instantly ! "

"Nay, please your worship," answered the man,
in much perplexity, but with a backwardness that
strikingly indicated the hard and severe character of
Colonel Pyncheon's domestic rule; "my master's
orders were exceeding strict ; and, as your worship
knows, he permits of no discretion in the obedience
of those who owe him service. Let who list open

20 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

yonder door ; I dare not, though the governor's own
voice should bid me do it ! "

"Pooh, pooh, Master High Sheriff!" cried the
lieutenant-governor, who had overheard the foregoing
discussion, and felt himself high enough in station to
play a little with his dignity. " I will take the matter
into my own hands. It is time that the good colonel
came forth to greet his friends ; else we shall be apt
to suspect that he has taken a sip too much of his
Canary wine, in his extreme deliberation which cask
it were best to broach in honour of the day ! But
since he is so much behindhand, I will give him a
remembrancer myself ! "

Accordingly, with such a tramp of his ponderous
riding-boots as might of itself have been audible in
the remotest of the seven gables, he advanced to the
door, which the servant pointed out, and made its
new panels re-echo with a loud, free knock. Then,
looking round, with a smile, to the spectators, he
awaited a response. As none came, however, he
knocked again, but with the same unsatisfactory
result as at first. And now, being a trifle choleric
in his temperament, the lieutenant-governor uplifted
the heavy hilt of his sword, wherewith he so beat and
banged upon the door, that, as some of the bystanders
whispered, the racket might have disturbed the dead.
Be that as it might, it seemed to produce no awaken
ing effect on Colonel Pyncheon. When the sound
subsided, the silence through the house was deep,
dreary, and oppressive, notwithstanding that the
tongues of many of the guests had already been
loosened by a surreptitious cup or two of wine or
spirits.

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 21

" Strange, forsooth! — very strange!" cried the
lieutenant-governor, whose smile was changed to a
frown. "But seeing that our host sets us the good
example of forgetting ceremony, I shall likewise throw
it aside, and make free to intrude on his privacy ! "

He tried the door, which yielded to his hand, and
was flung wide open by a sudden gust of wind that
passed, as with a loud sigh, from the outermost
portal, through all the passages and apartments of
the new house. It rustled the silken garments of the
ladies, and waved the long curls of the gentlemen's
wigs, and shook the window -hangings and the
curtains of the bed-chambers ; causing everywhere a
singular stir, which yet was more like a hush. A
shadow of awe and half-fearful anticipation — nobody
knew wherefore, nor of what — had all at once fallen
over the company.

They thronged, however, to the now open door,
pressing the lieutenant-governor, in the eagerness
of their curiosity, into the room in advance of them.
At the first glimpse, they beheld nothing extra
ordinary : a handsomely furnished room, of moderate
size, somewhat darkened by curtains ; books arranged
on shelves ; a large map on the wall, and likewise
a portrait of Colonel Pyncheon, beneath which sat
the original colonel himself, in an oaken elbow-chair,
with a pen in his hand. Letters, parchments, and
blank sheets of paper were on the table before him.
He appeared to gaze at the curious crowd, in front
of which stood the lieutenant-governor ; and there
was a frown on his dark and massive countenance,
as if sternly resentful of the boldness that had impelled
them into his private retirement.

22 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

A little boy — the colonel's grandchild, and the only
human being- that ever dared to be familiar with him
— now made his way among the guests, and ran
towards the seated figure ; then pausing half-way, he
began to shriek with terror. The company, tremu
lous as the leaves of a tree, when all were shaking
together, drew nearer, and perceived that there was
an unnatural distortion in the fixedness of Colonel
Pyncheon's stare ; that there was blood on his ruff,
and that his hoary beard was saturated with it. It
was too late to give assistance. The iron-hearted
Puritan, the relentless persecutor, the grasping and
strong-willed man, was dead ! Dead, in his new
house ! There is a tradition, only worth alluding to
as lending a tinge of superstitious awe to a scene
perhaps gloomy enough without it, that a voice spoke
loudly among the guests, the tones of which were
like those of old Matthew Maule, the executed wizard
— " God hath given him blood to drink ! "

Thus early had that one guest — the only guest who
is certain, at one time or another, to find his way
into every human dwelling — thus early had Death
stepped across the threshold of the House of the
Seven Gables !

Colonel Pyncheon's sudden and mysterious end
made a vast deal of noise in its day. There were
many rumours, some of which have vaguely drifted
down to the present time, how that appearances
indicated violence ; that there were the marks of
fingers on his throat, and the print of a bloody hand
on his plaited ruff ; and that his peaked beard was
dishevelled, as if it had been fiercely clutched and
pulled. It was averred, likewise, that the lattice

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 23

window, near the colonel's chair, was open ; and
that, only a few minutes before the fatal occurrence,
the figure of a man had been seen clambering" over
the garden fence, in the rear of the house. But it
were folly to lay any stress on stories of this kind,
which are sure to spring up around such an event
as that now related, and which, as in the present
case, sometimes prolong themselves for ages after
wards, like the toadstools that indicate where the
fallen and buried trunk of a tree has long- since
mouldered into the earth. For our own part, we
allow them just as little credence as to that other
fable of the skeleton hand which the lieutenant-
governor was said to have seen at the colonel's
throat, but which vanished away as he advanced
farther into the room. Certain it is, however, that
there was a great consultation and dispute of
doctors over the dead body. One — John Swinnerton
by name — who appears to have been a man of
eminence, upheld it, if we have rightly understood
his terms of art, to be a case of apoplexy. His
professional brethren, each for himself, adopted
various hypotheses, more or less plausible, but all
dressed out in a perplexing mystery of phrase,
which, if it do not show a bewilderment of mind
in these erudite physicians, certainly causes it in the
unlearned peruser of their opinions. The coroner's
jury sat upon the corpse, and, like sensible men,
returned an unassailable verdict of " Sudden Death! "
It is indeed difficult to imagine that there could
have been a serious suspicion of murder, or the
slightest grounds for implicating any particular
individual as the perpetrator. The rank, wealth,

24 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and eminent character of the deceased must have
insured the strictest scrutiny into every ambiguous
circumstance. As none such is on record, it is snfe
to assume that none existed. Tradition — which
sometimes brings down truth that history has let
slip, but is oftener the wild babble of the time,
such as was formerly spoken at the fireside, and
now congeals in newspapers — tradition is responsible
for all contrary averments. In Colonel Pyncheon's
funeral sermon, which was printed, and is still
extant, the Rev. Mr. Higginson enumerates, among
the many felicities of his distinguished parishioner's
earthly career, the happy seasonableness of his death.
His duties all performed — the highest prosperity
attained — -his race and future generations fixed on
a stable basis, and with a stately roof to shelter
them, for centuries to come — what other upward
step remained for this good man to take, save the
final step from earth to the golden gate of heaven !
The pious clergyman surely would not have uttered
words like these, had he in the least suspected that
the colonel had been thrust into the other world
with the clutch of violence upon his throat.

The family of Colonel Pyncheon, at the epoch
of his death, seemed destined to as fortunate a
permanence as can anywise consist with the inherent
instability of human affairs. It might fairly be
anticipated that the progress of time would rather
increase and ripen their prosperity, than wear away
and destroy it ; for, not only had his son and heir
come into immediate enjoyment of a rich estate,
but there was a claim, through an Indian deed,
confirmed by a subsequent grant of the General

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 25

Court, to a vast and as yet unexplored and un
measured tract of eastern lands. These possessions
— for as such they might almost certainly be
reckoned — comprised the greater part of what is
now known as Waldo County, in the State of Maine,
and were more extensive than many a dukedom,
or even a reigning" prince's territory, on European
soil. When the pathless forest, that still covered
this wild principality, should give place — as it in
evitably must, though perhaps not till ages hence
—to the golden fertility of human culture, it would
be the source of incalculable wealth to the Pyncheon
blood. Had the colonel survived only a few weeks
longer, it is probable that his great political influ
ence, and powerful connections, at home and abroad,
would have consummated all that was necessary to
render the claim available. But, in spite of good
Mr. Higginson's congratulatory eloquence, this ap
peared to be the one thing which Colonel Pyncheon,
provident and sagacious as he was, had allowed
to go at loose ends. So far as the prospective
territory was concerned, he unquestionably died too
soon. His son lacked not merely the father's
eminent position, but the talent and force of char
acter to achieve it : he could, therefore, effect
nothing by dint of political interest ; and the bare
justice or legality of the claim was not so apparent,
after the colonel's decease, as it had been pro
nounced in his lifetime. Some connecting link had
slipped out of the evidence, and could not anywhere
be found.

Efforts, it is true, were made by the Pyncheons,
not only then, but at various periods for nearly a

26 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

hundred years afterwards, to obtain what they
stubbornly persisted in deeming- their right. But,
in course of time, the territory was partly re-granted
to more favoured individuals, and partly cleared
and occupied by actual settlers. These last, if they
ever heard of the Pyncheon title, would have laughed
at the idea of any man's asserting a right — on the
strength of mouldy parchments, signed with the
faded autographs of governors and legislators long
dead and forgotten — to the lands which they or
their fathers had wrested from the wild hand of
Nature, by their own sturdy toil. This impalpable
claim, therefore, resulted in nothing more solid than
to cherish, from generation to generation, an absurd
delusion of family importance, which all along
characterised the Pyncheons. It caused the poorest
member of the race to feel as if he inherited a kind
of nobility, and might yet come into the possession
of princely wealth to support it. In the better
specimens of the breed, this peculiarity threw an
ideal grace over the hard material of human life,
without stealing away any truly valuable quality.
In the baser sort, its effect was to increase the
liability to sluggishness and dependence, and induce
the victim of a shadowy hope to remit all self-
effort while awaiting the realisation of his dreams.
Years and years after their claim had passed out
of the public memory, the Pyncheons were accus
tomed to consult the colonel's ancient map, which
had been projected while Waldo County was still
an unbroken wilderness. Where the old land-
surveyor had put down woods, lakes, and rivers,
they marked out the cleared spaces, and dotted the

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 27

villages and towns, and calculated the progressively
increasing value of the territory, as if there were
yet a prospect of its ultimately forming a princedom
for themselves.

In almost every generation, nevertheless, there
happened to be some one descendant of the family
gifted with a portion of the hard, keen sense, and
practical energy, that had so remarkably distin
guished the original founder. His character, indeed,
might be traced all the way down, as distinctly as
if the colonel himself, a little diluted, had been
gifted with a sort of intermittent immortality on
earth. At two or three epochs, when the fortunes
of the family were low, this representative of heredi
tary qualities had made his appearance, and caused
the traditionary gossips of the town to whisper
among themselves : " Here is the old Pyncheon
come again ! Now the Seven Gables will be new-
shingled ! " From father to son, they clung to the
ancestral house, with singular tenacity of home
attachment. For various reasons, however, and
from impressions often too vaguely founded to be
put on paper, the writer cherishes the belief that
many, if not most, of the successive proprietors of
this estate, were troubled with doubts as to their
moral right to hold 'it. Of their legal tenure there
could be no question ; but old Matthew "Maule, it
is to be feared, trod downward from his own age
to a far later one, planting a heavy footstep, all
the way, on the conscience of a Pyncheon. If so,
we are left to dispose of the awful query, whether
each inheritor of the property — conscious of wrong,
and failing to rectify it — did not commit anew the

28 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

great guilt of his ancestor, and incur all its original
responsibilities. And supposing such to be the case,
would it not be a far truer mode of expression to
say, of the Pyncheon family, that they inherited a
great misfortune, than the reverse ?

We have already hinted that it is not our purpose
to trace down the history of the Pyncheon family,
in its unbroken connection with the House of the
Seven Gables ; nor to show, as in a magic picture,
how the rustiness and infirmity of age gathered
over the venerable house itself. As regards its
interior life, a large, dim looking-glass used to
hang in one of the rooms, and was fabled to contain
within its depths all the shapes that had ever been
reflected there — the old colonel himself, and his
many descendants, some in the garb of antique
babyhood, and others in the bloom of feminine
beauty or manly prime, or saddened with the
wrinkles of frosty age. Had we the secret of the
mirror, we would gladly sit down before it and
transfer its revelations to our page. But there was
a story, for which it is difficult to conceive any
foundation, that the posterity of Matthew Maule had
some connection with the mystery of the looking-
glass, and that, by what appears to have been a
sort of mesmeric process, they could make its inner
region all alive with the departed Pyncheons ; not
as they had shown themselves to the world, nor in
their better and happier hours, but as doing over
again some deed of sin, or in the crisis of life's
bitterest sorrow. The popular imagination, indeed,
long kept itself busy with the affair of the old Puritan
Pvncheon and the wizard Maule ; the curse, which

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 29

the latter flung from his scaffold, was remembered,
with the very important addition, that it had become
a part of the Pyncheon inheritance. If one of the
family did but gurgle in his throat, a bystander
would be likely enough to whisper, between jest
and earnest — "He has Maule's blood to drink!"
The sudden death of a Pyncheon, about a hundred
years ago, with circumstances very similar to what
have been related of the colonel's exit, was held as
giving additional probability to the received opinion
on this topic. It was considered, moreover, an
ugly and ominous circumstance, that Colonel
Pyncheon's picture — in obedience, it was said, to a
provision of his will — remained affixed to the wall
of the room in which he died. Those stern, im
mitigable features seemed to symbolise an evil
influence, and so darkly to mingle the shadow of
their presence with the sunshine of the passing
hour, that no good thoughts or purposes could ever
spring up and blossom there. To the thoughtful
mind, there will be no tinge of superstition in what
we figuratively express, by affirming that the ghost
of a dead progenitor — perhaps as a portion of his
own punishment — is often doomed to become the
Evil Genius of his family.

The Pyncheons, in brief, lived along, for the
better part of two centuries, with perhaps less of
outward vicissitude than has attended most other
New England families during the same period of
time. Possessing" very distinctive traits of their
own, they nevertheless took the general character
istics of the little community in which they dwelt ;
a town noted for its frugal, discreet, well-ordered,

3o HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and home-loving- inhabitants, as well as for the
somewhat confined scope of its sympathies ; but in
which, be it said, there are odder individuals, and,
now and then, stranger occurrences, than one meets
with almost anywhere else. During the Revolution,
the Pyncheon of that epoch, adopting- the royal side,
became a refugee ; but repented, and made his
reappearance, just at the point of time to preserve
the House of the Seven Gables from confiscation.
For the last seventy years, the most noted event
in the Pyncheon annals had been likewise the heaviest
calamity that ever befel the race ; no less than
the violent death — for so it was adjudg-ed — of one
member of the family, by the criminal act of another.
Certain circumstances attending- this fatal occurrence
had brought the deed irresistibly home to a nephew
of the deceased Pyncheon. The young man was
tried and convicted of the crime ; but either the
circumstantial nature of the evidence, and possibly
some lurking* doubt in the breast of the executive,
or, lastly — an argument of greater weight in a
republic than it could have been under a monarchy
— the high respectability and political influence of
the criminal's connections, had availed to mitigate
his doom from death to perpetual imprisonment.
This sad affair had chanced about thirty years before
the action of our story commences. Latterly, there
were rumours (which few believed, and only one or
two felt greatly interested in) that this long-buried
man was likely, for some reason or other, to be
summoned forth from his living tomb.

It is essential to say a few words respecting the
victim of this now almost forgotten murder. He

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 31

was an old bachelor, and possessed of great wealth,
in addition to the house and real estate which
constituted what remained of the ancient Pyncheon
property. Being- of an eccentric and melancholy
turn of mind, and greatly given to rummaging old
records and hearkening" to old traditions, he had
brought himself, it is averred, to the conclusion
that Matthew Maule, the wizard, had been foully
wronged out of his homestead, if not out of his
life. Such being the case, and he, the old bachelor,
in possession of the ill-gotten spoil — with the black
stain of blood sunken deep into it, and still to be
scented by conscientious nostrils — the question
occurred, whether it were not imperative upon him,
even at this late hour, to make restitution to
Maule's posterity. To a man living so much in
the past, and so little in the present, as the secluded
and antiquarian old bachelor, a century and a half
seemed not so vast a period as to obviate the
propriety of substituting right for wrong. It was
the belief of those who knew him best, that he
would positively have taken the very singular step
of giving up the House of the Seven Gables to the
representative of Matthew Maule, but for the un
speakable tumult which a suspicion of the old
gentleman's project awakened among his Pyncheon
relatives. Their exertions had the effect of sus
pending his purpose ; but it was feared that he
would perform, after death, by the operation of his
last will, what he had so hardly been prevented
from doing in his proper lifetime. But there is
no one thing which men so rarely do, whatever
the provocation or inducement, as to bequeath

32 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

patrimonial property away from their own blood.
They may love other individuals far better than
their relatives — they may even cherish dislike, or
positive hatred, to the latter ; but yet, in view of
death, the strong- prejudice of propinquity revives,
and impels the testator to send down his estate in
the line marked out by custom so immemorial that
it looks like nature. In all the Pyncheons, this
feeling had the energy of disease. It was too
powerful for the conscientious scruples of the old
bachelor ; at whose death, accordingly, the
mansion-house, together with most of his other
riches, passed into the possession of his next legal
representative.

This was a nephew, the cousin of the miserable
young man who had been convicted of the uncle's
murder. The new heir, up to the period of his
accession, was reckoned rather a dissipated youth,
but had at once reformed, and made himself an
exceedingly respectable member of society. In fact,
he showed more of the Pyncheon quality, and had
won higher eminence in the world, than any of his
race, since the time of the original Puritan. Apply
ing himself in earlier manhood to the study of the
law, and having a natural tendency towards office,
he had attained, many years ago, to a judicial
situation in some inferior court, which gave him
for life the very desirable and imposing title of
judge. Later, he had engaged in politics, and
served a part of two terms in Congress, besides
making a considerable figure in both branches of
the state legislature. Judge Pyncheon was un
questionably an honour to his race. He had built

n.s.G. «

Sheets of paper were on the table." Page21-

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 33

himself a country-seat within a few miles of his
native town, and there spent such portions of his
time as could be spared from public service in the
display of every grace and virtue — as a newspaper
phrased it, on the eve of an election — befitting- the
Christian, the good citizen, the horticulturist, and
the gentleman.

There were few of the Pyncheons left to sun
themselves in the glow of the judge's prosperity.
In respect to natural increase, the breed had not
thriven ; it appeared rather to be dying out. The
only members of the family known to be extant
were, first, the judge himself, and a single surviving
son^, who was now travelling in Europe ; next, the
thirty years prisoner already alluded to, and a sister
of the latter, who occupied, in an extremely retired'
manner, the House of the Seven Gables, in which
she had a life estate by the will of the old bachelor.
She was understood to be wretchedly poor, and
seemed to make it her choice to remain so ; inas
much as her affluent cousin, the judge, had repeatedly
offered her all the comforts of life, either in the old
mansion or his own modern residence. The last
and youngest Pyncheon was a little country-girl of
seventeen, the daughter of another of the judge's
cousins, who had married a young woman of no
family or property, and died early and in poor
circumstances. His widow had recently taken
another husband.

As for Matthew Maule's posterity, it was supposed

now to be extinct. For a very long period after

the witchcraft delusion, however, the Maules had

continued to inhabit the town where their progenitor

H.S.G. B

34 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

had suffered so unjust a death. To all appearance,
they were a quiet, honest, well-meaning* race of
people, cherishing" no malice against individuals or
the public, for the wrong" which had been done them ;
or if, at their own fireside, they transmitted, from
father to child, any hostile recollection of the wizard's
fate, and their lost patrimony, it was never acted
upon, nor openly expressed. Nor would it have
been singular had they ceased to remember that
the House of the Seven Gables was resting" its heavy
frame-work on a foundation that was rightfully their
own. There is something so massive, stable, and
almost irresistibly imposing in the exterior present
ment of established rank and great possessions, that
their very existence seems to give them a right* to
5xist ; at least, so excellent a counterfeit of right,
that few poor and humble men have moral force
enough to question it, even in their secret minds.
Such is the case now, after so many ancient
prejudices have been overthrown : and it was far
more so in ante- revolutionary days, when the
aristocracy could venture to be proud, and the low
were content to be abased. Thus the Maules, at
all events, kept their resentments within their own
breasts. They were generally poverty - stricken ;
always plebeian and obscure ; working with un
successful diligence at handicraft ; labouring on
the wharves, or following the sea, as sailors before
the mast ; living here and there about the town,
•in hired tenements, and coming finally to the alms-
house, as the natural home of their old age. At
last, after creeping, as it were, for such a length
of time, along the utmost verge of the opaque

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 35

puddle of obscurity, they had taken that downright
plunge which, sooner or later, is the destiny of
all families, whether princely or plebeian. For thirty
years past, neither town -record, nor grave -stone,
nor the directory, nor the knowledge or memory
of man, bore any trace of Matthew Maule's descend
ants. His blood might possibly exist elsewhere ;
here, where its lowly current could be traced so
far back, it had ceased to keep an onward course.

So long as any of the race were to be found, they
had been marked out from other men — not strikingly,
nor as with a sharp line, but with an effect that was
felt, rather than spoken of — by an hereditary character
of reserve. Their companions, or those who en
deavoured to become such, grew conscious of a
circle round about the Maules, within the sanctity
or the spell of which, in spite of an exterior of
sufficient frankness and good - fellowship, it was
impossible for any man to step. It was this in
definable peculiarity, perhaps, that, by insulating
them from human aid, kept them always so un
fortunate in life. It certainly operated to prolong,
in their case, and to confirm to them, as their only
inheritance, those feeling's of repugnance and super
stitious terror with which the people of the town,
even after awakening from their frenzy, continued
to regard the memory of the reputed witches. The
mantle, or rather the ragged cloak, of old Matthew
Maule, had fallen upon his children. They were
half believed to inherit mysterious attributes ; the
family eye was said to possess strange power.
Among other good - for - nothing properties and
privileges, one was especially assigned them — of

36 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

exercising an influence over people's dreams. The
Pyncheons, if all stories were true, haughtily as they
bore themselves in the noon-day streets of their
native town, were no better than bond-servants to
these plebeian Maules, on entering- the topsy-turvy
commonwealth of sleep. Modern psychology, it
may be, will endeavour to reduce these alleged
necromancies within a system, instead of rejecting*
them as altogether fabulous.

A descriptive paragraph or two, treating of the
seven-gable mansion in its more recent aspect, will
bring this preliminary chapter to a close. The street
in which it upreared its venerable peaks has long
ceased to be a fashionable quarter of the town ; so
that, though the old edifice was surrounded by
habitations of modern date, they were mostly small,
built entirely of wood, and typical of the most
plodding uniformity of common life. Doubtless,
however, the whole story of human existence may
be latent in each of them, but with no picturesque-
ness, externally, that can attract the imagination or
sympathy to seek it there. But as for the old
structure of our story, its white-oak frame, and its
boards, shingles and crumbling plaster, and even
the huge, clustering chimney in the midst, seemed
to constitute only the least and meanest part of its
reality. So much of mankind's varied experience
had passed there — so much had been suffered, and
something, too, enjoyed — that the very timbers were
oozy, as with the moisture of a heart. It was itself
like a great human heart, with a life of its own, and
full of rich and sombre reminiscences.

The deep projection of the second storey gave the

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 37

house such a meditative look, that you could not
pass it without the idea that it had secrets to keep,
and an eventful history to moralise upon. In front,
just on the edge of the unpaved sidewalk, grew the
Pyncheon elm, which, in reference to such trees as
one usually meets with, might well be termed
gig-antic. It had been planted by a great-grandson
of the first Pyncheon, and, though now fourscore
years of age, or perhaps nearer a hundred, was still
in its strong and broad maturity, throwing its
shadow from side to side of the street, overtopping
the seven gables, and sweeping the whole black
roof with its pendent foliage. It gave beauty to
the old edifice, and seemed to make it a part of
nature. The street having been widened about
forty years ago, the front gable was now precisely
on a line with it. On either side extended a ruinous
wooden fence of open lattice-work, through which
could be seen a grassy yard, and, especially in the
angles of the building, an enormous fertility of
burdocks, with leaves, it is hardly an exaggeration
to say, two or three feet long. Behind the house
there appeared to be a garden, which undoubtedly
had once been extensive, but was now infringed
upon by other inclosures, or shut in by habitations
and out-buildings that stood on another street. It
would be an omission, trifling, indeed, but un
pardonable, were we to forget the green moss that
had long since gathered over the projections of the
windows, and on the slopes of the roof; nor must
we fail to direct the reader's eye to a crop, not of
weeds, but flower-shrubs, which were growing aloft
in the air, not a great way from the chimney, in

38 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the nook between two of the gables. They were
called Alice's posies. The tradition was, that a
certain Alice Pyncheon had flung- up the seeds, in
sport, and that the dust of the street and the decay
of the roof gradually formed a kind of soil for them,
out of which they grew, when Alice had long been
in her grave. However the flowers might have
come there, it was both sad and sweet to observe
how Nature adopted to herself this desolate,
decaying, gusty, rusty old house of the Pyncheon
family ; and how the ever-returning summer did her
best to gladden it with tender beauty, and grew
melancholy in the effort.

There is one other feature, very essential to be
noticed, but which, we greatly fear, may damage
any picturesque and romantic impression which we
have been willing to throw over our sketch of this
respectable edifice. In the front gable, under the
impending brow of the second storey, and contiguous
to the street, was a shop-door, divided horizontally
in the midst, and with a window for its upper
segment, such as is often seen in dwellings of a
somewhat a^gfent date. This same shop-door had
been a subject of no slight mortification to the
present occupant of the august Pyncheon House, as
well as to some of her predecessors. The matter
is disagreeably delicate to handle ; but, since the
reader must needs be let into the secret, he will
please to understand, that, about a century ago, the
head of the Pyncheons found himself involved in
serious financial difficulties. The fellow (gentleman,
as he styled himself) can hardly have been other than
a spurious interloper ; for, instead of seeking office

THE OLD PYNCHEON FAMILY. 39

from the king or the royal governor, or urging his
hereditary claim to eastern lands he bethought
himself of no better avenue to wealth than by cut
ting a shop-door through the side of his ancestral
residence. It was the custom of the time, indeed,
for merchants to store their goods and transact
business in their own dwellings. But there was
something pitifully small in this old Pyncheon's mode
of setting about his commercial operations ; it was
whispered, that, with his own hands, all beruffled
as they were, he used to give change for a shilling,
and would turn a halfpenny twice over, to make
sure that it was a good one. Beyond all question,
he had the blood of a petty huckster in his veins,
through whatever channel it may have found its
way there.

Immediately on his death, the shop-door had been
locked, bolted, and barred, and, down to the period
of our story, had probably never once been opened.
The old counter, shelves, and other fixtures of the
little shop, remained just as he had left them. It
used to be affirmed, that the dead shopkeeper, in
a white wig, a faded velvet coat, an apron at his
waist, and his ruffles carefully turned back from his
wrists, might be seen through the chinks of the
shutters, any night of the year, ransacking his till,
or poring over the dingy pages of his day-book.
From the look of unutterable woe upon his face, it
appeared to be his doom to spend eternity in a vain
effort to make his accounts balance.

And now — in a very humble way, as will be seen —
we proceed to open our narrative.

40 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

11.

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW.

IT still lacked half an hour of sunrise, when Miss
Hepzibah Pyncheon — we will not say awoke ; it being
doubtful whether the poor lady had so much as closed
her eyes, during the brief night of midsummer — but,
at all events, arose from her solitary pillow, and began
what it would be mockery to term the adornment of
her person. Far from us be the indecorum of
assisting, even in imagination, at a maiden lady's
toilet ! Our story must therefore await Miss Hepzibah
at the threshold of her chamber ; only presuming,
meanwhile, to note some of the heavy sighs that
laboured from her bosom, with little restraint as to
their lugubrious depth and volume of sound, inas
much as they could be audible to nobody, save a
disembodied listener like durself. The Old Maid was
alone in the old house. Alone, except for a certain
respectable and orderly young man, an artist in the
daguerreotype line, who, for about three months
back, had been a lodger in a remote gable — quite
a house by itself, indeed — with locks, bolts, and
oaken bars, on all the intervening doors. Inaudible,
consequently, were poor Miss Hepzibah's gusty sighs.
Inaudible, the creaking joints of her stiffened knees,
as she knelt down by the bedside. And inaudible, too,
by mortal ear, but heard with all-comprehending love
and pity in the furthest Heaven, that almost agony
of prayer — now whispered, now a groan, now a
struggling silence — wherewith she besought the

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 41

Divine assistance through the day ! Evidently, this
is to be a day of more than ordinary trial to Miss
Hepzibah, who, for above a quarter of a century gone
by, has dwelt in strict seclusion, taking no part in the
business of life, and just as little in its intercourse and
pleasures. Not with such fervour prays the torpid
recluse, looking forward to the cold, sunless, stag
nant calm of a day that is to be like innumerable
yesterdays !

The maiden lady's devotions are concluded. Will
she now issue forth over the threshold of our story ?
Not yet, by many moments. First, every drawer in
the tall, old-fashioned bureau is to be opened, with
difficulty, and with a succession of spasmodic jerks ;
then, all must close again, with the same fidgety
reluctance. There is a rustling of stiff silks ; a tread
of backward and forward footsteps, to and fro, across
the chamber. We suspect Miss Hepzibah, moreover,
of taking a step upward into a chair, in order to give
heedful regard to her appearance, on all sides, and at
full length, in the oval, dingy-framed toilet-glass, that
hangs above her table. Truly ! well, indeed ! who
would have thought it ! Is all this precious time to
be lavished on the matutinal repair and beautifying
of an elderly person, .who never goes abroad, whom
nobody ever visits, and from whom, when she shall
have done her utmost, it were the best charity to turn
one's eyes another way ?

Now she is almost ready. Let us pardon her one
other pause ; for it is given to the sole sentiment, or,
we might better say — heightened and rendered in
tense, as it has been, by sorrow and seclusion — to the
strong passion, of her life. We heard the turning of

H. S. G. I; 2

42 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

a key in a small lock ; she has opened a secret drawer
of an escritoire, and is probably looking at a certain
miniature, done in Malbone's most perfect style, and
representing* a face worthy of no less delicate a pencil.
It was once our good fortune to see this picture.
It is a likeness of a young man, in a silken
dressing-gown of an old fashion, the soft richness
of which is well adapted to the countenance of
reverie, with its full, tender lips, and beautiful eyes,
that seem to indicate not so much capacity of
thought, as gentle and voluptuous emotion. Of
the possessor of such features we shall have a right
to ask nothing, except that he would take the rude
world easily, and make himself happy in it. Can it
have been an early lover of Miss Hepzibah ? No ;
she never had a lover — poor thing, how could she ? —
nor ever knew, by her own experience, what love
technically means. And yet, her undying faith and
trust, her fresh remembrance, and continual devoted-
ness towards the original of that miniature, have
been the only substance for her heart to feed upon.

She seems to have put aside the miniature, and is
standing again before the toilet-glass. There are
tears to be wiped off. A few more footsteps to and
fro ; and here, at last — with another pitiful sigh, like
a gust of chill, damp wind out of a long-closed vault,
the door of which has accidentally been set ajar — here
comes Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon ! Forth she steps
into the dusky, time-darkened passage ; a tall figure,
clad in black silk, with a long and shrunken waist,
feeling her way towards the stairs like a near-sighted
person, as in truth she is.

The sun, meanwhile, if not already above the

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 43

horizon, was ascending nearer and nearer to its
verge. A few clouds, floating high upward, caught
some of the earliest light, and threw down its golden
gleam on the windows of all the houses in the street,
not forgetting the House of the Seven Gables, which
— many such sunrises as it had witnessed — looked
cheerfully at the present one. The reflected radiance
served to show, pretty distinctly, the aspect and
arrangement of the room which Hepzibah entered,
after descending the stairs. It was a .low-studded
room, with a beam across the ceiling, panelled with
dark wood, and having a large chimney-piece, set
round with pictured tiles, but now closed by an iron
fire-board, through which ran the funnel of a modern
stove. There was a carpet on the floor, originally of
rich texture, but so worn and faded, in these latter
years, that its once brilliant figure had quite vanished
into one indistinguishable hue. In the way of
furniture, there were two tables : one, constructed
with perplexing intricacy, and exhibiting as many
feet as a centipede ; the other, most delicately
wrought, with four long and slender legs, so ap
parently frail that it was almost incredible what a
length of time the ancient tea-table had stood upon
them. Half a dozen . chairs stood about the room,
straight and stiff, and so ingeniously contrived for
the discomfort of the human person that they were
irksome even to sight, and conveyed the ugliest
possible idea of the state of society to which they
could have been adapted. One exception there was,
however, in a very antique elbow-chair, with a high
back, carved elaborately in oak, and a roomy depth
within its arms, that made up, by its spacious

44 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

comprehensiveness, for the lack of any of those
artistic curves which abound in a modern chair.

As for ornamental articles of furniture, we recollect
but two, if such they may be called. One was a
map of the Pyncheon territory at the eastward, not
engraved, but the handiwork of some skilful old
draughtsman, and grotesquely illuminated writh
pictures of Indians and wild beasts, among which
was seen a lion ; the natural history of the region
being as little known as its geography, which was
put down most fantastically awry. The other adorn
ment was the portrait of old Colonel Pyncheon, at
two-thirds length, representing the stern features of
a Puritanic-looking personage, in a skull-cap, with
a laced band and a grizzly beard ; holding a Bible
with one hand, and in the other uplifting an iron
sword-hilt. The latter object, being more success
fully depicted by the artist, stood out in far greater
prominence than the sacred volume. Face to face
with this picture, on entering the apartment, Miss
Hepzibah Pyncheon came to a pause ; regarding it
with a singular scowl, a strange contortion of the
brow, which, by people who did not know her, would
probably have been interpreted as an expression of
bitter anger and ill-will. But it was no such thing.
She, in fact, felt a reverence for the pictured visage
of which only a far-descended and time-stricken
virgin could be susceptible ; and this forbidding
scowl was the innocent result of her near-sightedness,
and an effort so to concentrate her powers of vision
as to substitute a firm outline of the object instead of
a vague one.

We must linger a moment on this unfortunate

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 45

expression of poor Hepzibah's brow. Her scowl — as
the world, or such part of it as sometimes caught a
transitory glimpse of her at the window, wickedly
persisted in calling it — her scowl had done Miss
Hepzibah a very ill office, in establishing her
character as an ill-tempered old maid ; nor does it
appear improbable that, by often gazing at herself
in a dim looking-glass, and perpetually encountering
her own frown within its ghostly sphere, she had
been led to interpret the expression almost as unjustly
as the world did. " How miserably cross I look!"
she must often have whispered to herself; — and
ultimately have fancied herself so, by a sense of
inevitable doom. But her heart never frowned. It
was naturally tender, sensitive, and full of little
tremors and palpitations ; all of which weaknesses
it retained, while her visage was growing1 so per
versely stern, and even fierce. Nor had Hepzibah
ever any hardihood, except what came from the very
warmest nook in her affections.

All this time, however, we are loitering faint
heartedly on the threshold of our story. In very
truth, we have an invincible reluctance to disclose
what Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon was about to do.

It has already been observed that, in the basement
storey of the gable fronting on the street, an
unworthy ancestor, nearly a century ago, had fitted
up a shop. Ever since the old gentleman retired
from trade, and fell asleep under his coffin-lid, not
only the shop-door, but the inner arrangements, had
been suffered to remain unchanged ; while the dust
of ages gathered inch-deep over the shelves and
counter, and partlv filled an old pair of scales, as if

46 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

it were of value enough to be weighed. It treasured
itself up, too, in the half-open till, where there still
lingered a base sixpence, worth neither more nor less
than the hereditary pride which had here been put
to shame. Such had been the state and condition
of the little shop in old Hepzibah's childhood, when
she and her brother used to play at hide-and-seek in
its forsaken precincts. So it had remained until within
a few days past.

But now, though the shop-window was still closely
curtained from the public gaze, a remarkable change
had taken place in its interior. The rich and heavy
festoons of cobweb, which it had cost a long ancestral
succession of spiders their life's labour to spin and
weave, had been carefully brushed away from the
ceiling. The counter, shelves, and floor, had all been
scoured, and the latter was overstrewn with fresh
blue sand. The brown scales, too, had evidently
undergone rigid discipline, in an unavailing effort to
rub off the rust, which, alas ! had eaten through
and through their substance. Neither was the little
shop any longer empty of merchantable goods. A
curious eye, privileged to take an account of stock,
and investigate behind the counter, would have
discovered a barrel — yea, two or three barrels, and
half ditto — one containing flour, another apples,
and a third, perhaps, Indian meal. There was
likewise a square box of pine-wood, full of soap
in bars ; also, another of the same size, in which
were tallow candles, ten to the pound. A small
stock of brown sugar, some white beans and split
peas, and a few other commodities of low price,
and such as are constantly in demand, made up

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 47

the bulkier portion of the merchandise. It might
have been taken for a ghostly or phantasmagoric
reflection of the old shopkeeper Pyncheon's shabbily-
provided shelves, save that some of the articles were
of a description and outward form which could hardly
have been known in his day. For instance, there
was a glass pickle-jar, filled with fragments of
Gibraltar rock ; not, indeed, splinters of the veritable
stone foundation of the famous fortress, but bits of
delectable candy, neatly done up in white paper.
Jim Crow, moreover, was seen executing his world-
renowned dance, in gingerbread. A party of leaden
dragoons were galloping along one of the shelves,
in equipments and uniform of modern cut ; and there
were some sugar figures, with no strong resemblance
to the humanity of any epoch, but less unsatisfactorily
representing our own fashions than those of a hundred
years ago. Another phenomenon, still more strikingly
modern, was a package of lucifer matches, which,
in old times, would have been thought actually to
borrow their instantaneous flame from the nether
fires of Tophet.

In short, to bring the matter at once to a point,
it was incontrovertibly evident that somebody had
taken the shop and fixtures of the long-retired and
forgotten Mr. Pyncheon, and was about to renew
the enterprise of that departed worthy, with a
different set of customers. Who could this bold
adventurer be ? And, of all places in the world,
why had he chosen the House of the Seven Gables
as the scene of his commercial speculations ?

We return to the elderly maiden. She at length
withdrew her eyes from the dark countenance of

48 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the colonel's portrait, heaved a sigh — indeed, her
breast was a very cave of ^olus, that morning —
and stepped across the room on tiptoe, as is the
customary gait of elderly women. Passing through
an intervening passage, she opened a door that
communicated with the shop, just now so elaborately
described. Owing to the projection of the upper
storey — and still more to the thick shadow of the
Pyncheon elm, which stood almost directly in front
of the gable — the twilight, here, was still as much
akin to night as morning. Another heavy sigh from
Miss Hepzibah ! After a moment's pause on the
threshold, peering towards the window with her
near-sighted scowl, as if frowning down some bitter
enemy, she suddenly projected herself into the shop.
The haste, and, as it were, the galvanic impulse
of the movement, were really quite startling.

Nervously — in a sort of frenzy, we might almost
say — she began to busy herself in arranging some
children's playthings, and other little wares, on
the shelves, and at the shop-window. In the aspect
of this dark-arrayed, pale-faced, lady-like old figure,
there was a deeply tragic character, that contrasted
irreconcilably with the ludicrous pettiness of her
employment. It seemed a queer anomaly, that so
gaunt and dismal a personage should take a toy
in hand ; a miracle, that the toy did not vanish
in her grasp ; a miserably absurd idea, that she
should go on perplexing her stiff and sombre intellect
with the question how to tempt little boys into her
premises ! Yet such is undoubtedly her object.
Now she places a gingerbread elephant against the
window, but with so tremulous a touch that it

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 49

tumbles upon the floor, with the dismemberment
of three legs and its trunk ; it has ceased to be
an elephant, and has become a few bits of musty
gingerbread. There, again, she has upset a tumbler
of marbles, all of which roll different ways, and
each individual marble, devil-directed, into the most
difficult obscurity that it can find. Heaven help
our poor old Hepzibah, and forgive us for taking
a ludicrous view of her position ! As her rigid
and rusty frame goes down upon its hands and
knees, in quest of the absconding marbles, we posi
tively feel so much the more inclined to shed tears
of sympathy, from the very fact that we must needs
turn aside and laugh at her. For here — and if we
fail to impress it suitably upon the reader, it is our
own fault, not that of the theme — here is one of
the truest points of melancholy interest that occur
in ordinary life. It was the final throe of what
called itself old gentility. A lady — who had fed
herself from childhood with the shadowy food of
aristocratic reminiscences, and whose religion it was
that a lady's hand soils itself irremediably by doing
aught for bread — this born lady, after sixty years
of narrowing means, is fain to step down from her
pedestal of imaginary rank. Poverty, treading
closely at her heels for a lifetime, has come up
with her at last. She must earn her own food, or
starve ! And wre have stolen upon Miss Hepzibah
Pyncheon, too irreverently, at. the instant ot time
when the patrician lady is to be transformed into
the plebeian woman.

In this republican country, amid the fluctuating
waves of our social life, somebody is always at the

50 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES

drowning-point. The tragedy is enacted with as
continual a repetition as that of a popular drama
on a holiday ; and, nevertheless, is felt as deeply,
perhaps, as when an hereditary noble sinks below
his order. More deeply ; since, with us, rank is
the grosser substance of wealth and a splendid
establishment, and has no spiritual existence after
the death of these, but dies hopelessly along with
them. And, therefore, since we have been un
fortunate enough to introduce our heroine at so
inauspicious a juncture, we would entreat for a mood
of due solemnity in the spectators of her fate. Let
us behold, in poor Hepzibah, the immemorial lady —
two hundred years old, on this side of the water,
and thrice as many on the other — with her antique
portraits, pedigrees, coats -of- arms, records and
traditions, and her claim, as joint heiress, to that
princely territory at the eastward, no longer a
wilderness, but a populous fertility — born, too, in
Pyncheon Street, under the Pyncheon elm, and in
the Pyncheon House, where she has spent all her
days — reduced now, in that very house, to be the
hucksteress of a cent-shop !

This business of setting up a petty shop is almost
the only resource of women, in circumstances at
all similar to those of our unfortunate recluse.
With her near-sightedness, and those tremulous
fingers of hers, at once inflexible and delicate, she
could not be a seamstress ; although her sampler,
of fifty years gone by, exhibited some of the most
recondite specimens of ornamental needlework. A
school for little children had been often in her
thoughts ; and, at one time, she had begun a review

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 51

of her early studies in the New England primer,
with a view to prepare herself for the office of
instructress. But the love of children had never
been quickened in Hepzibah's heart, and was now
torpid, if not extinct ; she watched the little people
of the neighbourhood from her chamber-window,
and doubted whether she could tolerate a more
intimate acquaintance with them. Besides, in our
day, the very ABC has become a science, greatly
too abstruse to be any longer taught by pointing
a pin from letter to letter. A modern child could
teach old Hepzibah more than old Hepzibah could
teach the child. So — with many a cold, deep heart-
quake at the idea of at last coming into sordid
contact with the world, from which she had so long
kept aloof, while every added day of seclusion had
rolled another stone against the cavern-door of her
hermitage — the poor thing bethought herself of the
ancient shop-window, the rusty scales, and dusty
till. She might have held back a little longer ; but
another circumstance, not yet hinted at, had some
what hastened her decision. Her humble prepara
tions, therefore, were duly made, and the enterprise
was now to be commenced. Nor was she entitled
to complain of any remarkable singularity in her
fate ; for, in the town of her nativity, we might
point to several little shops of a similar description',^'
some of them in houses as ancient as that of the
seven gables ; and one or two, it may be, where
a decayed gentlewoman stands behind the counter,
as grim an image of family pride as Miss Hepzibah
Pyncheon herself.

It was overpoweringly ridiculous — we must honestly

52 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

confess it — the deportment of the maiden lady while
setting her shop in order for the public eye. She stole
on tiptoe to the window, as cautiously as if she con
ceived some bloody-minded villain to be watching
behind the elm-tree, with intent to take her life.
Stretching out her long, lank arm, she put a paper of
pearl-buttons, a Jew's-harp, or whatever the small
article might be, in its destined place, and straightway
vanished back into the dusk, as if the world need never
hope for another glimpse of her. It might have been
fancied, indeed, that she expected to minister to the
wants of the community unseen, like a disembodied
divinity, or enchantress, holding forth her bargains
to the reverential and awe-stricken purchaser, in an
invisible hand. But Hepzibah had no such flattering
dreams. She was well aware that she must ultimately
come forward, and stand revealed in her proper
individuality ; but, like other sensitive persons, she
could not bear to be observed in the gradual process,
and chose rather to flash forth on the world's astonished
gaze at once.

The inevitable moment was not much longer to be
delayed. The sunshine might now be seen stealing
down the front of the opposite house, from the windows
of which came a reflected gleam struggling through the
boughs of the elm-tree, and enlightening the interior
of the shop more distinctly than heretofore. The
town appeared to be waking up. A baker's cart had
already rat .id through the street, chasing away the
latest vestige of night's sanctity with the jingle-jangle
of its dissonant bells. A milkman was distributing
the contents of his cans from door to door ; and the
harsh peal of a fisherman's conch-shell was heard far

THE LITTLE SHOP-WINDOW. 53

off, around the corner. None of these tokens escaped
Hepzibah 's notice. The moment had arrived. To
delay longer would be only to lengthen out her misery.
Nothing remained, except to take down the bar from
the shop door, leaving the entrance free — more than
free — welcome, as if all were household friends — to
every passer-by, whose eyes might be attracted by the
commodities at the window. This last act Hepzibah
now. performed, letting the bar fall with what srnote
upon her excited nerves as a most astounding clatter.
Then — as if the only barrier betwixt herself and the
world had been thrown down, and a flood of evil con
sequences would come tumbling through the gap —
she fled into the inner parlour, threw herself into the
ancestral elbow-chair, and wept.

Our miserable old Hepzibah ! It is a heavy
annoyance to a writer, who endeavours to represent
nature, its various attitudes arid circumstances, in a
reasonably correct outline and true colouring, that so
much of the mean and ludicrous should be hopelessly
mixed up with the purest pathos which life anywhere
supplies to him. What tragic dignity, for example, "
can be wrought into a scene like this ! How can we
elevate our history of retribution for the sin of long
ago, when, as one of pur most prominent figures, we
are compelled to introduce — not a young and lovely
woman, nor even the stately remains of beauty, storm-
shattered by affliction — but a gaunt, sallow, rusty-
jointed maiden, in a long-waisted silk gown, and with
the strange horror of a turban on her head ! Her
visage is not even ugly. It is redeemed from insignifi
cance only by the contraction of her eyebrows into a
near-sighted scowl. And, finally, her great life-trial

54 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

seems to be, that, after sixty years of idleness, she
finds it convenient to earn comfortable bread by setting
up a shop in a small way. Nevertheless, if we look
through all the heroic fortunes of mankind, we shall
find this same entanglement of something mean and
trivial with whatever is noblest in joy or sorrow.
Life is made up of marble and mud. And, without all
the deeper trust in a comprehensive sympathy above
us, we might hence be led to suspect the insult of a
sneer, as well as an immitigable frown, on the iron
countenance of fate. What is called poetic insight is
the gift of discerning, in this sphere of strangely-
mingled elements, the beauty and the majesty which
are compelled to assume a garb so sordid.

Ill

THE FIRST CUSTOMER

Miss HEPZIBAH PYNCHEON sat in the oaken elbow-chair,
with her hands over her face, giving way to that heavy
down-sinking* of the heart which most persons have
experienced, when the image of hope itself seems
ponderously moulded of lead, on the eve of an enter
prise at once doubtful and momentous. She was
suddenly startled by the tinkling alarum — high,
sharp, and irregular — of a little bell. The maiden
lady arose upon her feet, as pale as a ghost at cock
crow ; for she was an enslaved spirit, and this the
talisman to which she owed obedience. This little
bell — to speak in plainer terms — being fastened over
the shop-door, was so contrived as to vibrate by means
of a steel spring, and thus convey notice to the inner

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 55

regions of the house, when any customer should cross
the threshold. Its ugly and spiteful little din (heard
now for the first time, perhaps, since Hepzibah's
periwigged predecessor had retired from trade) at
once set every nerve of her body in responsive
and tumultuous vibration. The crisis was upon her !
Her first customer was at the door !

Without giving herself time for a second thought,
she rushed into the shop, pale, wild, desperate in
gesture and expression, scowling portentously, and
looking far better qualified to do fierce battle with a
housebreaker than to stand smiling behind the counter,
bartering small wares for a copper recompense. Any
ordinary customer, indeed, would have turned and
fled. And yet there was nothing fierce in Hepzibah's
poor old heart ; nor had she, at the moment, a single
bitter thought against the world at large, or one
individual man or woman. She wished them all well,
but wished, too, that she herself were done with them,
and in her quiet grave.

The applicant, by this time, stood within the door
way. Coming freshly, as he did, out of the morning
light, he appeared to have brought some of its cheery
influences into the shop along with him. It was a
slender young man, not more than one or two and
twenty years old, with rather a grave and thoughtful
expression for his years, but likewise a springy
alacrity and vigour. These qualities were not only
perceptible, physically, in his make and motions,
but made themselves felt almost immediately in his
character. A brown beard, not too silken in its
texture, fringed his chin, but as yet without com
pletely hiding it ; he wore a short moustache, too,

56 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and his dark, high-featured countenance looked all
the better for these natural ornaments. As for his
dress, it was of the simplest kind ; a summer sack of
cheap and ordinary material, thin, checkered panta
loons, and a straw hat, by no means of the finest
braid. Oak Hall might have supplied his entire
equipment. He was chiefly marked as a gentleman —
if s*uch, indeed, he made any claim to be — by the
rather remarkable whiteness and nicety of his clean
linen.

He met the scowl of old Hepzibah without apparent
alarm, as having heretofore encountered it, and found
it harmless.

/ " So, my dear Miss Pyncheon," said the daguerreo.
typist — for it was that sole other occupant of the
seven-gabled mansion — " I am glad to see that you
have not shrunk from your good purpose. I merely
look in to offer my best wishes, and to ask if I can
assist you any further in your preparations."

People in difficulty and distress, or in any manner
at odds with the world, can endure a vast amount of
harsh treatment, and perhaps be only the stronger
for it ; whereas, they give way at once before the
simplest expression of what they perceive to be
genuine sympathy. So it proved with poor Hep
zibah ; for, when she saw the young man's smile —
looking so much the brighter on a thoughtful face — •
and heard his kindly tone, she broke first into a
hysteric giggle, and then began to sob.

"Ah, Mr. Holgrave," cried she, as soon as she
could speak, "I never can go through with it!
Never, never, never ! I wish I were dead, and in
the old family tomb, with all my forefathers ! With

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 57

my father, and my mother, and my sister ! Yes,
and with my brother, who had far better find
me there than here ! The world is too chill and
hard — and I am too old, and too feeble, and too
hopeless ! "

"Oh, believe me, Miss Hepzibah," said the young
man quietly, " these feelings will not trouble you any
longer, after you are once fairly in the midst of your
enterprise. They are unavoidable at this moment,
standing, as you do, on the outer verge of your long
seclusion, and peopling the world with ugly shapes,
which you will soon find to be as unreal as the giants
and ogres of a child's story-book. I find nothing so
singular in life, as that everything appears to lose
its substance, the instant one actually grapples with
it. So it will be with what you think so terrible. "

44 But I am a woman!" said Hepzibah piteously.
" I was going to say, a lady — but I consider that
as past."

" Well : no matter if it be past!" answered the
artist, a strange gleam of half-hidden sarcasm flashing
through the kindliness of his manner. " Let it go !
You are the better without it. I speak frankly, my
dear Miss Pyncheon : for are we not friends ? 1 look
upon this as one of the fortunate days of your life.
It ends an epoch, and begins one. Hitherto, the
life-blood has been gradually chilling in your veins,
as you sat aloof, within your circle of gentility, while
the rest of the world was fighting out its battle with
one kind of necessity or another. Henceforth, you
will at least have the sense of healthy and natural
effort for a purpose, and of lending your strength —
be it great or small — to the united struggle of

58 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

mankind. This is success — all the success that
anybody meets with ! "

"It is natural enough, Mr. Holgrave, that you
should have ideas like these," rejoined Hepzibah,
drawing up her gaunt figure, with slightly offended
dignity. " You are a man, a young man, and brought
up, I suppose, as almost everybody is nowadays, with
a view to seeking your fortune. But I was born a
lady, and have always lived one ; no matter in what
narrowness of means, always a lady ! "

" But I was not born a gentleman ; neither have I
lived like one," said Holgrave, slightly smiling; "so
my dear madam, you will hardly expect me to sym
pathise with sensibilities of this kind ; though, unless
I deceive myself, I have some imperfect comprehen
sion of them. These names of ' gentleman ' and * lady '
had a meaning, in the past history of the world, and
conferred privileges, desirable or otherwise, on those
entitled to bear them. In the present — and still more
in the future condition of society — they imply, not
privilege, but restriction ! "

"These are new notions," said the old gentle
woman, shaking her head. " I shall never under
stand them ; neither do I wish it."

"We will cease to speak of them, then," replied
the artist, with a friendlier smile than his last one,
"and I will leave you to feel whether it is not better
to be a true woman than a lady. Do you really think,
Miss Hepzibah, than any lady of your family has ever
done a more heroic thing, since this house was built,
than you are performing in it to-day? Never; and
if the Pyncheons had always acted so nobly, I doubt
whether an old wizard Maule's anathema, of which

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 59

you told me once, would have had much weight with
Providence against them."

4 'Ah! — no, no!" said Hepzibah, not displeased at
this allusion to the sombre dignity of an inherited
curse. " If old Maule's ghost, or a descendant of
his, could see me behind the counter to-day, he would
call it the fulfilment of his worst wishes. But I thank
you for your kindness, Mr. Holgrave, and I will do
my utmost to be a good shopkeeper."

4 'Pray do," said Holgrave, "and let me have the
pleasure of being your first customer. I am about
taking a walk to the seashore, before going to my
rooms, where I misuse Heaven's blessed sunshine, by
tracing out human features, through its agency. A
few of those biscuits, dipped in sea-water, will be
just what I need for breakfast. What is the price
of half a dozen ? "

" Let me be a lady a moment longer," replied
Hepzibah, with a manner of antique stateliness, to
which a melancholy smile lent a kind of grace. She
put the biscuits into his hand, but rejected the
compensation. " A Pyncheon must not, at all events,
under her forefathers' roof, receive money for a
morsel of bread from her only friend ! "

Holgrave took his departure, leaving her, for the
moment, with spirits not quite so much depressed.
Soon, however, they had subsided nearly to their
former dead level. With a beating heart, she listened
to the footsteps of early passengers, which now began
to be frequent along the street. Once or twice, they
seemed to linger ; these strangers, or neighbours, as
the case might be, were looking at the display of toys
and petty commodities in Hepzibah's shop-window.

6o HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

She was doubly tortured ; in part, with a sense of
overwhelming shame, that strange and unloving eyes
should have the privilege of gazing, and partly
because the idea occurred to her, with ridiculous
importunity, that the window was not arranged so
skilfully, nor nearly to so much advantage, as it
might have been. It seemed as if the whole fortune
or failure of her shop might depend on the display
of a different set of articles, or substituting a fairer
apple for one which appeared to be specked. So she
made the change, and straightway fancied that every
thing was spoiled by it ; not recognising that it was
the nervousness of the juncture, and her own native
squeamishness, as an old maid, that wrought all the
seeming mischief.

Anon, there was an encounter, just at the door
step, betwixt two labouring men, as their rough
voices denoted them to be. After some slight talk
about their own affairs, one of them chanced to
notice the shop-window, and directed the other's
attention to it.

" See here!" cried he; " what, do you think of
this ? Trade seems to be looking up, in Pyncheon
Street ! "

"Well, well, this is a sight, to be sure!" ex
claimed the other. " In the old Pyncheon House,
and underneath the Pyncheon elm ! Who would
have thought it ? Old Maid Pyncheon is setting up
a cent-shop ! "

44 Will she make it go, think you, Dixey ? " said
his friend. " I don't call it a very good stand.
There's another shop, just round the corner."

" Make it go!" cried Dixey, with a most

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 61

contemptuous expression, as if the very idea were
impossible to be conceived. "Not a bit of it!
Why, her face — I've seen it, for I dug- her garden
for her, one year — her face is enough to frighten
the Old Nick himself, if he had ever so great a
mind to trade with her. People can't stand it, I
tell you ! She scowls dreadfully, reason or none,
out of pure ugliness of temper ! "

" Well, that's not so much matter," remarked the
other man. "These sour-tempered folks are mostly
handy at business, and know pretty well what they
are about. But, as you say, I don't think she'll
do much. This business of keeping cent-shops is
overdone, like all other kinds of trade, handicraft,
and bodily labour. I know it, to my cost ! My wife
kept a cent-shop three months, and lost five dollars
on her outlay ! "

"Poor business!" responded Dixey, in a tone
as if he were shaking his head — " poor business ! "

For some reason or other, not very easy to
analyse, there had hardly been so bitter a pang, in
all her previous misery about the matter, as what
thrilled Hepzibah's heart, on overhearing the above
conversation. The testimony in regard to her scowl
was frightfully important ; it seemed to hold up her
image, wholly relieved from the false light of her
self-partialities, and so hideous that she dared not
look at it. She was absurdly hurt, moreover, by
the slight and idle effect that her setting up shop — an
event of such breathless interest to herself — appeared
to have upon the public, of which these two men
were the nearest representatives. A glance ; a
passing word or two ; a coarse laugh ; and she was

62 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

doubtless forgotten, before they turned the corner !
They cared nothing for her dignity, and just as
little for her degradation. Then, also, the augury
of ill-success, uttered from the sure wisdom of
experience, fell upon her half-dead hope like a clod
into a grave. The man's wife had already tried the
same experiment, and failed ! Ho*w could the born
lady — the recluse of half a lifetime, utterly un
practised in the world, at sixty years of age — how
could she ever dream of succeeding, when the hard,
vulgar, keen, busy, hackneyed, New England woman,
had lost five dollars on her little outlay ! Success
presented itself as an impossibility, and the hope of
it as a wild hallucination.

Some malevolent spirit, doing his utmost to drive
Hepzibah mad, unrolled before her imagination a
kind of panorama, representing the great thorough
fare of a city, all astir with customers. So many
and so magnificent shops as there were ! Groceries,
toy-shops, dry-goods stores, with their immense
panes of plate-glass, their gorgeous fixtures, their
vast and complete assortments of merchandise, in
which fortunes had been invested ; gyid those noble
mirrors at the farther end of each establishment,
doubling all this wealth by a brightly burnished
vista of unrealities ! On one side of the street, this
splendid bazaar, with a multitude of perfumed and
glossy salesmen, smirking, smiling, bowing, and
measuring out the goods. On the other, the dusky
old House of the Seven Gables, with the antiquated
shop - window under its projecting storey, and
Hepzibah herself, in a gown of rusty black silk,
behind the counter, scowling at the world as it

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 63

went by ! This mighty contrast thrust itself
forward, as a fair expression of the odds against
which she was to begin her struggle for a sub
sistence. Success ? Preposterous ! She would
never think of it again ! The house might just as
well be buried in an eternal fog, while all other
houses had the sunshine on them ; for not a foot
would ever cross the threshold, nor a hand so much
as try the door !

But, at that instant, the shop-bell, right over her
head, tinkled as if it were bewitched. The old
gentlewoman's heart seemed to be attached to the
same steel spring, for it went through a series of
sharp jerks, in unison with the sound. The door
was thrust open, although no human form was
perceptible on the other side of the half-window.
Hepzibah, nevertheless, stood at a gaze, with her
hands clasped, looking very much as if she had
summoned up an evil spirit, and were afraid, yet
resolved, to hazard the encounter.

" Heaven help me ! " she groaned, mentally.
" Now is my hour of need ! "

The door, which moved with difficulty on its
creaking and rusty hinges, being forced quite open,
a square and sturdy little urchin became apparent,
with cheeks as red as an apple. He was clad rather
shabbily (but, as it seemed, more owing to his
mother's carelessness than his father's poverty), in
a blue apron, very wide and short trousers, shoes
somewhat out at the toes, and a chip hat, with the
frizzles of his curly hair sticking through its crevices.
A book and a small slate, under his arm, indicated
that he was on his way to school. He stared at

64 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

Hepzibah a moment as an elder customer than
himself would have been likely enough to do, not
knowing what to make of the tragic attitude and
queer scowl wherewith she regarded him.

"Well, child," said she, taking heart at sight of
a personage so little formidable, "well, my child,
what did you wish for ? "

" That Jim Crow, there, in the window," answered
the urchin, holding out a cent, and pointing to the
gingerbread figure that had attracted his notice, as
he loitered along to school; "the one that has not
a broken foot."

So Hepzibah put forth her lank arm, and taking
the effigy from the shop-window, delivered it to her
first customer.

"No matter for the money," said she, giving him
a little push towards the door ; for her old gentility
was contumaciously squeamish at sight of the copper
coin, and, besides, it seemed such pitiful meanness
to take the child's pocket-money in exchange for
a bit of stale gingerbread. " No matter for the
cent. You are welcome to Jim Crow."

The child, staring, with round eyes, at this in
stance of liberality, wholly unprecedented in his
large experience of cent-shops, took the man of
gingerbread, and quitted the premises. No sooner
had he reached the sidewalk (little cannibal that he
was !) than Jim Crow's head was in his mouth. As
he had not been careful to shut the door, Hepzibah
was at the pains of closing it after him, with a
pettish ejaculation or two about the troublesomeness
of young people, and particularly of small boys.
She had just placed another representative of the

U.S.G. u

He stared at Hepzibah a moment." P<w64.

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 65

renowned Jim Crow at the window, when again the
shop-bell tinkled clamorously, and again the door
being thrust open, with its characteristic jerk and
jar, disclosed the same sturdy little urchin who,
precisely two minutes ago, had made his exit. The
crumbs and discolouration of the cannibal feast, as
yet hardly consummated, were exceedingly visible
about his mouth.

"What is it now, child?" asked the maiden lady,
rather impatiently; "did you come back to shut the
door?"

" No," answered the urchin, pointing to the figure
that had just been put up ; "I want that other Jim
Crow."

"Well, here it is for you," said Hepzibah, reach
ing it down ; but, recognising that this pertinacious
customer would not quit her on any other terms,
so long as she had a gingerbread figure in her shop,
she partly drew back her extended hand: "Where
is the cent? "

The little boy had the cent ready, but, like a true-
born Yankee, would have preferred the better bargain
to the worse. Looking somewhat chagrined, he put
the coin into Hepzibah's hand, and departed, sending
the second Jim Crow in quest of the former one.
The new shopkeeper dropped the first solid result
of her commercial -enterprise into the till. It was
done ! The sordid stain of that copper coin could
never be washed away from her palm. The little
schoolboy, aided by the impish figure of the negro
dancer, had wrought an irreparable ruin. The
structure of ancient aristocracy had been demolished
by him, even as if his childish gripe had torn down

H.S.G. C

66 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the seven-gabled mansion ! Now let Hepzibah turn
the old Pyncheon portraits with their faces to the
wall, and take the map of her eastern territory to
kindle the kitchen fire, and blow up the flame with
the empty breath of her ancestral traditions ! What
had she to do with ancestry ? Nothing ; no more
than with posterity ! No lady now, but simply
Hepzibah Pyncheon, a forlorn old maid, and keeper
of a cent-shop !

Nevertheless, even while she paraded these ideas
somewhat ostentatiously through her mind, it is
altogether surprising what a calmness had come over
her. The anxiety and misgivings which had tormented
her, whether asleep or in melancholy day-dreams,
ever since her project began to take an aspect oi
solidity, had now vanished quite away. She felt the
novelty of her position, indeed, but no longer with
disturbance or affright. Now and then, there came
a thrill of almost youthful enjoyment. It was the
invigorating breath of a fresh outward atmosphere,
after the long torpor and monotonous seclusion of
her life. So wholesome is effort ! So miraculous
the strength that we do not know of! The healthiest
glow that Hepzibah had known for years had come
now, in the dreaded crisis, when, for the first time,
she had put forth her hand to help herself. The
little circlet of the schoolboy's copper coin — dim and
lustreless though it was, with the small services which
it had been doing here and there about the world —
had proved a talisman, fragrant with good, and
deserving to be set in gold and worn next her heart.
It was as potent, and perhaps endowed with the
same kind of efficacy, as a galvanic ring ! Hepzibah,

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 67

at all events, was indebted to its subtle operation,
both in body and spirit ; so much the more, as it
inspired her with energy to get some breakfast, at
which, still the better to keep up her courage, she
allowed herself an extra spoonful in her infusion of
black tea.

Her introductory day of shopkeeping did not run
on, however, without many and serious interruptions
of this mood of cheerful vigour. As a general rule,
Providence seldom vouchsafes to mortals any more
than just that degree of encouragement which suffices
to keep them at a reasonably full exertion of their
powers. In the case of our old gentlewoman, after
the excitement of new effort had subsided, the
despondency of her whole life threatened, ever and
anon, to return. It was like the heavy mass of
clouds which we may often see obscuring the sky,
and making a gray twilight everywhere, until,
towards nightfall, it yields temporarily to a glimpse
of sunshine. But, always, the envious cloud strives
to gather again across the streak of celestial azure.

Customers came in, as the forenoon advanced, but
rather slowly ; in some cases, too, it must be owned,
with little satisfaction either to themselves or Miss
Hepzibah ; nor, on the whole, with an aggregate of
very rich emolument to the till. A little girl, sent by
her mother to match a skein of cotton thread, of a
peculiar hue, took one that the near-sighted old lady
pronounced extremely like, but soon came running
back, with a blunt and cross message, that it would
not do, and, besides, was very rotten ! Then, there
was a pale, care-wrinkled woman, not old but haggard,
and already with streaks of gray among her hair, like

68 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

silver ribbons ; one of those women, naturally delicate,
whom you at once recognise as worn to death by a
brute — probably a drunken brute — of a husband, and
at least nine children. She wanted a few pounds
of flour, and offered the money, which the decayed
gentlewoman silently rejected, and gave the poor soul
better measure than if she had taken it. Shortly
afterwards, a man in a blue cotton frock, much
soiled, came in and bought a pipe, filling the whole
shop, meanwhile, with the hot odour of strong drink,
not only exhaled in the torrid atmosphere of his
breath, but oozing out of his entire system, like an
inflammable gas. It was impressed on Hepzibah's
mind that this was the husband of the care-wrinkled
woman. He asked for a paper of tobacco ; and
as she had neglected to provide herself with the
article, her brutal customer dashed down his newly-
bought pipe, and left the shop, muttering some
unintelligible words, which had the tone and
bitterness of a curse. Hereupon, Hepzibah threw
up her eyes, unintentionally scowling in the face of
Providence !

No less than five persons, during the forenoon,
inquired for ginger-beer, or root-beer, or any drink
of a similar brewage, and, obtaining nothing of the
kind, went off in an exceedingly bad humour. Three
of them left the door open, and the other two pulled
it so spitefully in going out that the little bell played
the very deuce with Hepzibah's nerves. A round,
bustling, fire-ruddy housewife of the neighbourhood,
burst breathless into the shop, fiercely demanding-
yeast ; and when the poor gentlewoman, with her
cold shyness of manner, gave her hot customer

THE FIRST CUSTOMER. 69

to understand that she did not keep the article,
this very capable housewife took upon herself to
administer a regular rebuke.

"A cent-shop, and no yeast!'' quoth she; "that
will never do! Who ever heard of such a thing-?
Your loaf will never rise, no more than mine will
to-day. You had better shut up shop at once."

"Well," said Hepzibah, heaving a deep sigh,
"perhaps I had!"

Several times, moreover, besides the above instance,
her ladylike sensibilities were seriously infringed upon
by the familiar, if not rude tone, with which people
addressed her. They evidently considered themselves
not merely her equals, but her patrons and superiors.
Now, Hepzibah had unconsciously flattered herself
with the idea that there would be a gleam or halo, of
some kind or other, about her person, which would
insure an obeisance to her sterling gentility, or, at
least, a tacit recognition of it. On the other hand,
nothing tortured her more intolerably than when this
recognition was too prominently expressed. To one
or two rather officious offers of sympathy, her
responses were little short of acrimonious ; and, we
regret to say, Hepzibah was thrown into a positively
unchristian state of mind, by the suspicion that one
of her customers was drawn to the shop not by any
real need of the article which she pretended to seek,
but by a wicked wish to stare at her. The vulgar
creature was determined to see for herself what sort
of a figure a mildewed piece of aristocracy, after
wasting all the bloom, and much of the decline of
her Hte, apart from the world, would cut behind a
counter. In this particular case, however mechanical

70 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and innocuous it might be at other times, Hepzibah's
contortion of brow served her in good stead.

" I never was so frightened in my life ! " said the
curious customer, in describing the incident to one
of her acquaintances. " She's a real old vixen, take
my word of it ! She says little, to be sure ; but if
you could only see the mischief in her eye ! "

On the whole, therefore, her new experience led
our decayed gentlewoman to very disagreeable
conclusions as to the temper and manners of what
she termed the lower classes, whom heretofore she
had looked down upon with a gentle and pitying
complaisance, as herself occupying a sphere of un
questionable superiority. But, unfortunately, she
had likewise to struggle against a bitter emotion of
a directly opposite kind : a sentiment of virulence,
we mean, toward the idle aristocracy to which it had
so recently been her pride to belong. When a lady,
in a delicate and costly summer garb, with a floating
veil and gracefully-swaying gown, and, altogether,
an ethereal lightness that made you look at her
beautifully-slippered feet, to see whether she trod on
the dust or floated in the air — when such a vision
happened to pass through this retired street, leaving
it tenderly and delusively fragrant with her passage,
as if a bouquet of tea-roses had been borne along —
then, again, it is to be feared, old Hepzibah's scowl
could no longer vindicate itself entirely on the plea of
near-sightedness.

" For what end," thought she, giving vent to that
feeling of hostility which is the only real abasement
of the poor, in presence of the rich, "for what good
end, in the wisdom of Providence, does that woman

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 71

live? Must the whole world toil, that the palms of
her hands may be kept white and delicate ? "

Then, ashamed and penitent, she hid her face.

" May God forgive me ! " said she.

Doubtless, God did forgive her. But, taking the
inward and outward history of the first half-day into
consideration, Hepzibah began to fear that the shop
would prove her ruin in a moral and religious point
of view, without contributing very essentially towards
even her temporal welfare.

IV.

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER.

TOWARDS noon, Hepzibah saw an elderly gentleman,
large and portly, and of remarkably dignified de
meanour, passing slowly along, on the opposite side
of the white and dusty street. On coming within the
shadow of the Pyncheon elm, he stopped, and (taking
off his hat, meanwhile, to wipe the perspiration from
his brow) seemed to scrutinise, with especial interest,
the dilapidated and rusty-visaged House of the Seven
Gables. He himself, in a very different style, \vas as
well worth looking at as the house. No better model
need be sought, nor could have been found, of a very
high order of respectability, which, by some inde
scribable magic, not merely expressed itself in his
looks and gestures, but even governed the fashion of
his garments, and rendered them all proper and
essential to the man. Without appearing to differ,
in any tangible way, from other people's clothes,
there was yet a wide and rich gravity about them,

72 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

that must have been a characteristic of the
wearer, since it could not be defined as pertaining
either to the cut or material. His gold-headed
cane, too — a serviceable staff, of dark, polished wood
— had similar traits, and had it chosen to take a
walk by itself, would have been recognised anywhere
as a tolerably adequate representative of its master.
This character — which showed itself so strikingly in
everything about him, and the effect of which we
seek to convey to the reader — went no deeper than
his station, habits of life, and external circumstances.
One perceived him to be a personage of mark,
influence, and authority ; and, especially, you could
feel just as certain that he was opulent as if he had
exhibited his bank account, or as if you had seen
him touching the twigs of the Pyncheon elm, and,
Midas-like, transmuting them to gold.

In his youth, he had probably been considered a
handsome man ; at his present age, his brow was too
heavy, his temples too bare, his remaining hair too
gray, his eye too cold, his lips too closely com
pressed, to bear any relation to mere personal
beauty. He would have made a good and massive
portrait ; better now, perhaps, than at any previous
period of his life, although his look might grow
positively harsh, in the process of being fixed upon
the canvas. The artist would have found it desirable
to study his face, and prove its capacity for varied
expression ; to darken it with a frown — to kindle it
up with a smile.

While the elderly gentleman stood looking at the
Pyncheon House, both the frown and the smile passed
successively over his countenance. His eye rested on

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 73

the shop-window, and, putting up a pair of gold-
bowed spectacles, which he held in his hand, he
minutely surveyed Hepzibah's little arrangement of
toys and commodities. At first it seemed not to
please him — nay, to cause him exceeding displeasure
— and yet, the very next moment, he smiled. While
the latter expression was yet on his lips, he caught a
glimpse of Hepzibah, who had involuntarily bent
forward to the window ; and then the smile changed
from acrid and disagreeable to the sunniest com
placency and benevolence. He bowed, with a happy
mixture of dignity and courteous kindliness, and
pursued his way.

"There he is ! " said Hepzibah to herself, gulping
down a very bitter emotion, and, since she could not
rid herself of it, trying to drive it back into her heart.
"What does he think of it, I wronder? Does it
please him ? Ah ! — he is looking back ! "

The gentleman had paused in the street, and
turned himself half about, still with his eyes fixed
on the shop-window. In fact, he wheeled wholly
round, and commenced a step or two, as if designing
to enter the shop ; but, as it chanced, his purpose
was anticipated by Hepzibah's first customer, the
little cannibal of Jim Crow, who, staring up at the
window, was irresistibly attracted by an elephant
of gingerbread. What a grand appetite had this
small urchin ! — two Jim Crows, immediately after
breakfast ! — and now an elephant, as a preliminary
whet before dinner ! By the time this latter pur
chase was completed, the elderly gentleman had
resumed his way, and turned the street corner.

"Take it as you like, Cousin Jaffrey ! " muttered

H.S.G. C2

74 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the maiden lady, as she drew back, after cautiously
thrusting- out her head, and looking up and down
the street. " Take it as you like! You have seen
my little shop-window ! Well ! — What have you to
say ? — is not the Pyncheon House my own, while
I'm alive?"

After this incident, Hepzibah retreated to the
back parlour, where she at first caught up a half-
finished stocking, and began knitting at it with
nervous and irregular jerks ; but quickly finding
herself at odds with the stitches, she threw it aside,
and walked hurriedly about the room. At length,
she paused before the portrait of the stern old
Puritan, her ancestor, and the founder of the house.
In one sense, this picture had almost faded into
the canvas, and hidden itself behind the duskiness
of age ; in another, she could not but fancy that it
had been growing* more prominent, and strikingly
expressive, ever since her earliest familiarity with
it, as a child. For, while the physical outline and
substance were darkening- away from the beholder's
eye, the bold, hard, and, at the same time, indirect
character of the man, seemed to be brought out
in a kind of spiritual relief. Such an effect may
occasionally be observed in pictures of antique date.
They acquire a look which an artist (if he have
anything" like the complacency of artists now
adays) would never dream of presenting- to a patron
as his own characteristic expression, but which,
nevertheless, we at once recognise as reflecting the
unlovely truth of a human soul. In such cases, the
painter's deep conception of his subject's inward
traits has wrought itself into the essence of the

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 75

picture, and is seen after the superficial colouring
has been rubbed off by time.

While gazing at the portrait, Hepzibah trembled
under its eye. Her hereditary reverence made her
afraid to judge the character of the original so
harshly as a perception of the truth compelled her
to do. But still she gazed, because the face of the
picture enabled her — at least she fancied so — to read
more accurately, and to a greater depth, the face
which she had just seen in the street.

"This is the very man!" murmured she to her
self. " Let Jaffrey Pyncheon smile as he will, there
is that look beneath ! Put on him a skull-cap, and
a band, and a black cloak, and a Bible in one hand
and a sword in the other — then let Jaffrey smile
as he might — nobody would doubt that it was the
old Pyncheon come again ! He has proved himself
the very man to build up a new house ! Perhaps,
too, to draw down a new curse ! "

Thus did Hepzibah bewilder herself with these
fantasies of the old time. She had dwelt too much
alone — too long' in the Pyncheon House — until her
very brain was impregnated with the dry rot of its
timbers. She needed a walk along the noonday
street, to keep her sane.

By the spell of contrast, another portrait rose up
before her, painted with more daring flattery than
any artist would have ventured upon, but yet so
delicately touched that the likeness remained per
fect. Malbone's miniature, though from the same
original, was far inferior to Hepzibah's air-drawn
picture, at which affection and sorrowful re
membrance wrought together. Soft, mildly and

76 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

cheerfully contemplative, with full, red lips, just on the
verge of a smile, which the eyes seemed to herald
by a gentle kindling-up of their orbs ! Feminine
traits, moulded inseparably with those of the other
sex ! The miniature, likewise, had this last peculi
arity ; so that you inevitably thought of the original
as resembling his mother, and she, a lovely and
lovable woman, with perhaps some beautiful infirmity
of character, that made it all the pleasanter to know,
and easier to love her.

4 'Yes," thought Hepzibah, with grief of which
it was only the more tolerable portion that welled
up from her heart to the eyelids, "they persecuted
his mother in him ! He never was a Pyncheon ! "

But here the shop-bell rang ; it was like a sound
from a remote distance — so far had Hepzibah
descended into the sepulchral depths of her remi
niscences. On entering the shop, she found an old
man there, a humble resident of Pyncheon Street,
and whom, for a great many years past, she had
suffered to be a kind of familiar of the house. He
was an immemorial personage, who seemed always
to have had a white head and wrinkles, and never
to have possessed but a single tooth, and that a
half-decayed one, in the front of the upper jaw.
Well advanced as Hepzibah was, she could not
remember when Uncle Venner, as the neighbour
hood called him, had not gone up and down the
street, stooping a little and drawing his feet heavily
over the gravel or pavement. But still there was
something tough and vigorous about him, that not
only kept him in daily breath, but enabled him to
fill a place which would else have been vacant in

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 77

the apparently crowded world. To go of errands,
with his slow and shuffling gait, which made you
doubt how he ever was to arrive anywhere ; to
saw a small household's foot or two of fire-wood,
or knock to pieces an old barrel, or split up a pine
board, for kindling* stuff ; in summer, to dig- the
few yards of garden ground appertaining to a low-
rented tenement, and share the produce of his
labour at the halves ; in winter, to shovel away the
snow from the side-walk, or open paths to the
woodshed, or along the clothes-line ; such were
some of the essential offices which Uncle Venner
performed among at least a score of families.
Within that circle, he claimed the same sort of
privilege, and probably felt as much warmth of
interest, as a clergyman does in the range of his
parishioners. Not that he laid claim to the tithe
pig ; but, as an analogous mode of reverence,
he went his rounds, every morning, to gather up
the crumbs of the table and overflowings of the
dinner-pot, as food for a pig of his own.

In his younger days — for, after all, there was a
dim tradition that he had been, not young, but
younger — Uncle Venner was commonly regarded as
rather deficient, than otherwise, in his wits. In
truth, he had virtually pleaded guilty to the charge,
by scarcely aiming at such success as other men
seek, and by taking only that humble and modest
part in the intercourse of life which belongs to
the alleged deficiency. But now, in the extreme
old age — whether it were that his long and hard
experience had actually brightened him, or that his
decaying judgment rendered him less capable of

78 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

fairly measuring himself — the venerable man made
pretensions to no little wisdom, and really enjoyed
the credit of it. There was likewise, at times, a
vein of something' like poetry in him ; it was the
moss or wall-flower of his mind in its small dilapida
tion, and gave a charm to what might have been
vulgar and commonplace in his earlier and middle
life. Hepzibah had a regard for him, because his
name was ancient in the town, and had formerly
been respectable. It was a still better reason for
awarding him a species of familiar reverence, that
Uncle Venner was himself the most ancient exist
ence, whether of man or thing, in Pyncheon Street,
except the House of the Seven Gables, and perhaps
the elm that overshadowed it.

This patriarch now presented himself before Hep-
libah, clad in an old blue coat, which had a fashionable
jar, and must have accrued to him from the cast-off
cvardrobe of some dashing clerk. As for his trousers,
they were of tow-cloth, very short in the legs, and
bagging down strangely in the rear, but yet having a
suitableness to his figure which his other garment
entirely lacked. His hat had relation to no other part
of dress, and but very little to the head that wore it.
Thus Uncle Venner was a miscellaneous old gentleman,
partly himself, but, in good measure, somebody else ;
patched together, too, of different epochs ; an epitome
of times and fashions.

" So you have really begun trade, " said he, " really
begun trade ! Well, I'm glad to see it. Young
people should never live idle in the world, nor old
ones neither, unless when the rheumatize gets hold of
them. It has given me warning already ; and in two

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 79

or three years longer, I shall think of putting aside
business, and retiring to my farm. That's yonder —
the great brick house, you know — the workhouse,
most folks call it ; but I mean to do my work first,
and to go there to be idle and enjoy myself. And I'm
glad to see you beginning to do your work, Miss
Hepzibah ! "

" Thank you, Uncle Venner," said Hepzibah,
smiling ; for she always felt kindly towards the simple
and talkative old man. Had he been an old woman,
she might probably have repelled the freedom which
she now took in good part. " It is time for me to
begin work, indeed ! Or, to speak the truth, I have
just begun, when I ought to be giving it up."

" Oh, never say that, Miss Hepzibah," answered the
old man. "You are a young woman yet. Why, I
hardly thought myself younger than I am now, it
seems so little while ago since I used to see you
playing about the door of the old house, quite a small
child ! Oftener, though, you used to be sitting at the
threshold, and looking gravely into the street ; for
you had always a grave kind of way with you — a
grown-up air, when you were only the height of my
knee. It seems as if I saw you now ; and your
grandfather with his red cloak, and his white wig, and
his cocked hat, and his cane, coming out of the
house, and stepping so grandly up the street ! Those
old gentlemen that grew up before the Revolution
used to put on grand airs. In my young- days, the
great man of the town was commonly called King ;
and his wife, not Queen to be sure, but Lady. Now
adays, a man would not dare to be called King ;
and if he feels himself a little above common folks,

8o HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

he only stoops so much the lower to them. I met
your cousin, the judge, ten minutes ago ; and, in my
old tow-cloth trousers, as you see, the judge raised
his hat to me, I do believe ! At any rate, the judge
bowed and smiled ! "

4 'Yes," said Hepzibah, with something bitter
stealing unawares into her tone ; " my cousin Jaffrey
is thought to have a very pleasant smile ! "

"And so he has!" replied Uncle Venner. "And
that's rather remarkable in a Pyncheon ; for, begging
your pardon, Miss Hepzibah, they never had the name
of being an easy and agreeable set of folks. There
was no getting close to them. But now, Miss
Hepzibah, if an old man may be bold to ask, why
don't Judge Pyncheon, with his great means, step
forward, and tell his cousin to shut up her little shop
at once? It's for your credit to be doing something ;
but it's not for the judge's credit to let you ! "

"We won't talk of this, if you please, Uncle
Venner, " said Hepzibah coldly. " I ought to say,
however, that, if I choose to earn bread for myself,
it is not Judge Pyncheon's fault. Neither will he
deserve the blame," added she, more kindly, re
membering Uncle Venner's privileges of age and
humble familiarity, " if I should, by and by, find it
convenient to retire with you to your farm. "

" And it's no bad place, neither, that farm of mine ! "
cried the old man cheerily, as if there were something
positively delightful in the prospect. " No bad place
is the great brick farm-house, especially for them that
will find a good many old cronies there, as will be my
case. I quite long to be among them, sometimes, of
the winter evenings ; for it is but dull business for a

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 81

lonesome elderly man, like me, to be nodding, by the
hour together, with no company but his air-tight
stove. Summer or winter, there's a great deal to be
said in favour of my farm ! And, take it in the autumn,
what can be pleasanter than to spend a whole day on
the sunny side of a barn or a wood-pile, chatting
with somebody as old as one's self ; or, perhaps,
idling away the time with a natural born simpleton,
who knows how to be idle, because even our busy
Yankees never have found out how to put him to any
use ? Upon my word, Miss Hepzibah, I doubt
whether I've ever been so comfortable as I mean to be
at my farm, which most folks call the workhouse. But
you — you're a young woman yet — you never need go
there ! Something still better will turn up for you.
I'm sure of it ! "

Hepzibah fancied that there was something peculiar
in her venerable friend's look and tone ; insomuch,
that she gazed into his face with considerable earnest
ness, endeavouring to discover what secret meaning,
if any, might be lurking there. Individuals whose
affairs have reached an utterly desperate crisis almost
invariably keep themselves alive with hopes, so much
the more airily magnificent, as they have the less of
solid matter within their grasp, whereof to mould any
judicious and moderate expectation of good. Thus,
all the while Hepzibah was perfecting the scheme of
her little shop, she had cherished an unacknowledged
idea that some harlequin trick of fortune would
intervene in her favour. For example, an uncle —
who had sailed for India, fifty years before, and
never been heard of since — might yet return, and
adopt her to be the comfort of his very extreme and

82 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

decrepit age, and adorn her with pearls, diamonds,
and Oriental shawls and turbans, and make her the
ultimate heiress of his unreckonable riches. Or the
member of parliament, now at the head of the English
branch of the family — with which the elder stock, on
this side of the Atlantic, had held little or no inter
course for the last two centuries — this eminent
gentleman might invite Hepzibah to quit the ruinous
House of the Seven Gables, and come over to dwell
with her kindred at Pyncheon Hall. But, for reasons
the most imperative, she could not yield to his request.
It was more probable, therefore, that the descendants
of a Pyncheon who had emigrated to Virginia, in
some past generation, and became a great planter
there— hearing of Hepzibah's destitution, and impelled
by the splendid generosity of character with which
their Virginian mixture must have enriched the New
England blood — would send her a remittance of a
thousand dollars, with a hint of repeating the favour
annually. Or — and, surely, anything so undeniably
just could not be beyond the limits of reasonable
anticipation — the great claim to the heritage of Waldo
County might finally be decided in favour of the
Pyncheons ; so that, instead of keeping a cent-shop,
Hepzibah would build a palace, and look down from
its highest tower on hill, dale, forest, field, and town,
as her own share of the ancestral territory.

These were some of the fantasies which she had
long dreamed about ; and, aided by these, Uncle
Venner's casual attempt at encouragement kindled
a strange festal glory in the poor, bare, melancholy
chambers of her brain, as if that inner world were
suddenly lighted up with gas. But either he knew

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 83

nothing* of her castles in the air — as how should he ? —
or else her earnest scowl disturbed his recollection, as
it might a more courageous man's. Instead of
pursuing any weightier topic, Uncle Venner was
pleased to favour Hepzibah with some sage counsel
in her shopkeeping capacity.

" Give no credit ! " — these were some of his golden
maxims — " Never take paper-money ! Look well to
your change ! Ring the silver on the four-pound
weight ! Shove back all English halfpence and
base copper tokens, such as are very plenty about
town ! At your leisure hours, knit children's woollen
socks and mittens ! Brew your own yeast, and
make your own ginger-beer ! "

And while Hepzibah was doing her utmost to
digest the hard little pellets of his already uttered
wisdom, he gave vent to his final, and what he
declared to be his all-important, advice, as follows : —

4 'Put on a bright face for your customers, and
smile pleasantly as you hand them what they ask
for ! A stale article, if you dip it in a good, warm,
sunny smile, will go off better than a fresh one that
you've scowled upon."

To this last apothegm poor Hepzibah responded
with a sigh so deep and heavy that it almost rustled
Uncle Venner quite away, like a withered leaf — as
he was— before an autumnal gale. Recovering him
self, however, be bent forward, and, with a good
deal of feeling in his ancient visage, beckoned her
nearer to him.

" When do you expect him home?" whispered he.

"Whom do you mean?" asked Hepzibah, turning
pale.

84 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" Ah ! you don't love to talk about it," said Uncle
Venner. "Well, well! we'll say no more, though
there's word of it, all over town. I remember him,
Miss Hepzibah, before he could run alone ! "

During the remainder of the day, poor Hepzibah
acquitted herself even less creditably, as a shop
keeper, than in her earlier efforts. She appeared to
be walking in a dream ; or, more truly, the vivid
life and reality assumed by her emotions made all
outward occurrences unsubstantial, like the teasing
phantasms of a half-conscious slumber. She still
responded, mechanically, to the frequent summons
of the shop-bell, and, at the demand of her
customers, went prying with vague eyes about the
shop, proffering them one article after another, and,
thrusting aside — perversely, as most of them sup
posed — the identical thing they asked for. There is
sad confusion, indeed, when the spirit thus flits
away into the past, or into the more awful future,
or, in any manner, steps across the spaceless
boundary betwixt its own region and the actual
world ; \vhere the body remains to guide itself, as
best it may, with little more than the mechanism
of animal life. It is like death, without death's
quiet privilege — its freedom from mortal care.
Worst of all, when the actual duties are comprised
in such petty details as now vexed the brooding
soul of the old gentlewoman. As the animosity of
fate would have it, there was a great influx of
custom, in the course of the afternoon. Hepzibah
blundered to and fro about her small place of
business, committing the most unheard of errors :
now stringing up twelve, and now seven tallow

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 85

candles, instead of ten to the pound ; selling- ginger
for Scotch snuff, pins for needles, and needles for
pins ; misreckoning her change, sometimes to the
public detriment, and much oftener to her own ;
and thus she went on, doing her utmost to bring
chaos back again, until, at the close of the day's
labour, to her inexplicable astonishment, she found
the money-drawer almost destitute of coin. After
all her painful traffic, the whole proceeds were
perhaps half a dozen coppers, and a questionable
ninepence, which ultimately proved to be copper
likewise.

At this price, or at whatever price, she rejoiced
that the day had reached its end. Never before
had she had such a sense of the intolerable length
of time that creeps between dawn and sunset, and
of the miserable irksomeness of having aught to
do, and of the better wisdom that it would be, to
lie down at once, in sullen resignation, and let life,
and its toils and vexations, trample over one's
prostrate body, as they may ! Hepzibah's final
operation was with the little devourer of Jim Crow
and the elephant, who now proposed to eat a camel.
In her bewilderment, she offered him first a wooden
dragoon, and next a handful of marbles ; neither of
which being adapted to his else omnivorous appetite,
she hastily held out her whole remaining stock, of
natural history in gingerbread, and huddled the
small customer out of the shop. She then muffled
the bell in an unfinished stocking, and put up the
oaken bar across the door.

During the latter process, an omnibus came to
a standstill under the branches of the elm-tree.

86 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

Hepzibah's heart was in her mouth. Remote and
dusky, and with no sunshine on all the intervening
space, was that region of the Past whence her only
guest might be expected to arrive ! Was she to
meet him now ?

Somebody, at all events, was passing from the
furthest interior of the omnibus towards its entrance.
A gentleman alighted ; but it was only to offer his
hand to a young girl, whose slender figure, nowise
needing such assistance, now lightly descended the
steps, and made an airy little jump from the final
one to the sidewalk. She rewarded her cavalier
with a smile, the cheery glow of which was seen
reflected on his own face, as he re-entered the vehicle.
The girl then turned towards the House of the
Seven Gables ; to the door of which, meanwhile —
not the shop-door, but the antique portal — the
omnibus-man had carried a light trunk and a hand-
box. First giving a sharp rap of the old iron
knocker, he left his passenger and her luggage at
the door-step, and departed.

44 Who can it be?" thought Hebzibah, who had
been screwing her visual organs into the acutest
focus of which they were capable. " The girl must
have mistaken the house ! "

She stole softly into the hall, and, herself in
visible, gazed through the dusty side-lights of the
portals at the young, blooming, and very cheerful
face, which presented itself for admittance into the
gloomy old mansion. It was a face to which almost
any door would have opened of its own accord.

The young girl, so fresh, so unconventional, and
yet so orderly and obedient to common rules, as

A DAY BEHIND THE COUNTER. 87

you at once recognised her to be, was widely in
contrast, at that moment, with everything- about
her. The sordid and ugly luxuriance of gigantic
weeds that grew in the angle of the house, and the
heavy projection that overshadowed her, and the
timeworn framework of the door — none of these
things belonged to her sphere. But, even as a ray
of sunshine, fall into what dismal place it may,
instantaneously creates for itself a propriety in being
there, so did it seem altogether fit that the girl
should be standing at the threshold. It was no less
evidently proper that the door should swing open
to admit her. The maiden lady, herself sternly
inhospitable in her first purposes, soon began to
feel that the door ought to be shoved back, and
the rusty key be turned in the reluctant lock.

4 'Can it be Phcebe ? " questioned she within her
self. "It must be little Phcebe; for it can be
nobody else — and there is a look of her father
about her, too ! But what does she want here ?
And how like a country cousin, to come down upon
a poor body in this way, without so much as a
day's notice, or asking- whether she would be wel
come ! Well ; she must have a night's lodging,
I suppose ; and to-morrow the child shall go back
to her mother ! "

Phcebe, it must be understood, was that one little
offshoot of the Pyncheon race to whom we have
already referred, as a native of a rural part of New
England, where the old fashions and feelings of
relationship are still partially kept up. In her own
circle, it was regarded as by no means improper for
kinsfolk to visit one another, without invitation, or

88 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

preliminary and ceremonious warning. Yet, in con
sideration of Miss Hepzibah's recluse way of life, a
letter had actually been written and despatched, con
veying- information of Phcebe's projected visit. This
epistle, for three or four days past, had been in the
pocket of the penny-postman, who, happening- to have
no other business in Pyncheon Street, had not yet
made it convenient to call at the House of the Seven
Gables.

" No ! — she can stay only one night," said Hepzibah,
unbolting the door. " If Clifford were to find her
here, it might disturb him*! "

V.

MAY AND NOVEMBER.

PHCEBE PYNCHEON slept, on the night of her arrival,
in a chamber that looked down on the garden of the
old house. It fronted towards the east, so that at a
very seasonable hour a glow of crimson light came
flooding through the window, and bathed the dingy
ceiling and paper-hangings in its own hue. There
v/ere curtains to Phcebe's bed ; a dark, antique canopy
and ponderous festoons, of a stuff which had been rich,
and even magnificent, in its time ; but which now
brooded over the girl like a cloud, making a night in
that one corner, while elsewhere it was beginning to
be day. The morning light, however, soon stole into
the aperture at the foot of the bed, betwixt those
faded curtains. Finding the new guest there — with a
bloom on her cheeks like the morning's own, and a
gentle stir of departing slumber in her limbs, as when

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 89

an early breeze moves the foliage — the dawn kissed
her brow. It was the caress which a dewy maiden — •
such as the Dawn is, immortally — gives to her sleeping
sister, partly from the impulse of irresistible fondness,
and partly as a pretty hint that it is time now to
unclose her eyes.

At the touch of those lips of light, Phcebe quietly
awoke, and, for a moment, did not recognise where
she was, nor how those heavy curtains chanced to be
festooned around her. Nothing, indeed, was absolutely
plain to her, except that it was now early morning,
and that, whatever might happen next, it was proper,
first of all, to get up and say her prayers. She was
the more inclined to devotion, from the grim aspect of
the chamber and its furniture, especially the tall, stiff
chairs ; one of which stood close by her bedside, and
looked as if some old-fashioned personage had been
sitting there all night, and had vanished only just in
season to escape discovery.

When Phoebe was quite dressed, she peeped out of
the window, and saw a rose-bush in the garden. Being
a very tall one, and of luxurious growth, it had been
propped up against the side of the house, and was
literally covered with a rare and very beautiful species
of wrhite rose. A large portion of them, as the girl
afterwards discovered, had blight or mildew at their
hearts ; but viewed at a fair distance, the whole rose
bush looked as if it had been brought from Eden that
very summer, together with the mould in which it
grew. The truth was, nevertheless, that it had been
planted by Alice Pyncheon — she was Phoebe's great-
great-grand-aunt — in soil which, reckoning only its
cultivation as a gardenplat, was now unctuous with

90 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

nearly two hundred years of vegetable decay. Growing
as they did, however, out of the old earth, the flowers
still sent a fresh and sweet incense up to their Creator ;
nor could it have been the less pure and acceptable,
because Phoebe's young breath mingled with it, as the
fragrance floated past the window. Hastening down
the creaking and carpetless staircase, she found her
way into the garden, gathered some of the most perfect
of the roses, and brought them to her chamber.

Little Phoebe was one of those persons who possess,
as their exclusive patrimony, the gift of practical
arrangement. It is a kind of natural magic that
enables these favoured ones to bring out the hidden
capabilities of things around them ; and particularly
to give a look of comfort and habitableness to any
place which, for however brief a period, may happen
to be their home. A wild hut of underbrush, tossed
together by wayfarers through the primitive forest,
would acquire the home aspect by one night's lodging
of such a woman, and would retain it long after her
quiet figure had disappeared into the surrounding
shade. No less a portion of such homely witchcraft
was requisite, to reclaim, as it were, Phoebe's waste,
cheerless, and dusky chamber, which had been un-
tenanted so long — except by spiders, and mice, and
rats, and ghosts — that it was all overgrown with the
desolation which watches to obliterate every trace of
man's happier hours. [ What was precisely Phoebe's
process, we find it impossible to say. She appeared
to have no preliminary design, but gave a touch here
and another there ; brought some articles of furniture
to light, and dragged others into the shadow ; looped
up or let down a window-curtain ; and, in the course

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 91

of half an hour, had fully succeeded in throwing- a
kindly and hospitable smile over the apartment. No
longer ago than the night before, it had resembled
nothing1 so much as the old maid's heart ; for there
was neither sunshine nor household fire in one nor the
other, and, save for ghosts and ghostly reminiscences,
not a guest, for many years gone by, had entered the
heart or the chamberT)

There was still anoTner peculiarity of this inscrutable^
charm. The bedchamber, no doubt, was a chamber
of very great and varied experience, as a scene of
human life : the joy of bridal nights had throbbed
itself away here ; new immortals had first drawn
earthly breath here ; and here old people had died.
But — whether it were the white roses, or whatever
the subtle influence might be — a person of delicate
instinct would have known, at once, that it was now
a maiden's bedchamber, and had been purified of all
former evil and sorrow by her sweet breath and happy
thoughts. Her dreams of the past night, being such
cheerful ones, had exorcised the gloom, and now
haunted the chamber in its stead.

After arranging matters to her satisfaction, Phcebe
emerged from her chamber, with a purpose to descend
again into the garden. Besides the rose-bush, she
had observed several other species of flowers, growing
there in a wilderness of neglect, and obstructing one
another's development (as is often the parallel case
in human society) by their uneducated entanglement
and confusion. At the head of the stairs, however,
she met Hepzibah, who, it being still early, invited
her into a room which she would probably have
called her boudoir, had her education embraced any

92 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

such French phrase. It was strewn about with a few
old books, and a work-basket, and a dusty writing-
desk ; and had, on one side, a large, black article of
furniture, of very strange appearance, which the old
gentlewoman told Phcebe was a harpsichord. It
looked more like a coffin than anything else ; and,
indeed — not having been played upon, or opened, for
years — there must have been a vast deal of dead
music in it, stifled for want of air. Human finger
was hardly known to have touched its chords since
the days of Alice Pyncheon, who had learned the
sweet accomplishment of melody in Europe.

Hepzibah bade her young guest sit down, and,
herself taking a chair near by, looked as earnestly at
Phoebe's trim little figure as if she expected to see
right into its springs and motive secrets.

"Cousin Phcebe/' said she at last, "I really can't
see my way clear to keep you with me."

These words, however, had not the inhospitable
bluntness with which they may strike the reader ; for
the two relatives, in a talk before bedtime, had
arrived at a certain degree of mutual understanding.
Hepzibah knew enough to enable her to appreciate
the circumstances (resulting from the second marriage
of the girl's mother) which made it desirable for
Phcebe to establish herself in another home. Nor did
she misinterpret Phcebe's character, and the genial
activity pervading it — one of the most valuable traits
of the true New England woman — which had impelled
her forth, as might be said, to seek her fortune, but
with a self-respecting purpose to confer as much
benefit as she could anywise receive. As one of her
nearest kindred, she had naturally betaken herself

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 93

to Hepzibah, with no idea of forcing herself on her
cousin's protection, but only for a visit of a week or
two, which might be indefinitely extended, should it
prove for the happiness of both.

To Hepzibah's blunt observation, therefore, Phoebe
replied as frankly and more cheerfully.

" Dear cousin, I cannot tell how it will be/' said
she. " But I really think we may suit one another
much better than you suppose."

4 'You are a nice girl — I see it plainly," continued
Hepzibah; "and it is not any question as to that
point which makes me hesitate. But, Phcebe, this
house of mine is but a melancholy place for a young
person to be in. It lets in the wind and rain, and the
snow, too, in the g*arret and upper chambers, in
winter-time ; but it never lets in the sunshine ! And
as for myself, you see what I am — a dismal and
lonesome old woman (for I begin to call myself old,
Phcebe), whose temper, I am afraid, is none of the
best, and whose spirits are as bad as can be. I
cannot make your life pleasant, Cousin Phcebe,
neither can I so much as give you bread to eat."

" You will find me a cheerful little body," answered
Phcebe, smiling, and yet with a kind of gentle
dignity ; " and I mean to earn my bread. You know
I have not been brought up a Pyncheon. A girl
learns many things in a New England village."

"Ah! Phoebe," said Hepzibah, sighing, "your
knowledge would do but little for you here ! And
then it is a wretched thought, that you should fling
away your young days in a place like this. Those
cheeks would not be so rosy, after a month or two.
Look at my face ! " — and, indeed, the contrast was

94 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

very striking1 — "you see how pale I am ! It is my
idea that the dust and continual decay of these old
houses are unwholesome for the lungs."

"There is the garden — the flowers to be taken care
of," observed Phoebe. " I should keep myself healthy
with exercise in the open air."

" And, after all, child," exclaimed Hepzibah,
suddenly rising, as if to dismiss the subject, "it is
not for me to say who shall be a guest or inhabitant
of the old Pyncheon House. Its master is coming."

" Do you mean Judge Pyncheon ? " asked Phoebe,
in surprise.

"Judge Pyncheon !" answered her cousin angrily.
" He will hardly cross the threshold while I live !
No, no ! But, Phoebe, you shall see the face of him
I speak of."

She went in quest of the miniature already de
scribed, and returned with it in her hand. Giving it
to Phoebe, she watched her features narrowly, and
with a certain jealousy as to the mode in which the
girl would show herself affected by the picture.

" How do you like the face ? " asked Hepzibah.

" It is handsome ! — it is very beautiful ! " said
Phoebe admiringly. "It is as sweet a face as a
man's can be, or ought to be. It has something of
a child's expression — and yet not childish — only, one
feels so very kindly towards him ! He ought never to
suffer anything. One would bear much for the sake
of sparing him toil or sorrow. Who is it, Cousin
Hepzibah?"

" Did you never hear," whispered her cousin,
bending towards her, " of Clifford Pyncheon?"

" Never ! I thought there were no Pyncheons left,

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 95

except yourself and our cousin Jaffrey," answered
Phoebe. "And yet I seem to have heard the name
of Clifford Pyncheon. Yes ! — from my father, or my
mother ; but has he not been a long- while dead ? "

"Well, well, child, perhaps he has!" said
Hepzibah, with a sad, hollow laugh ; " but, in old
houses like this, you know, dead people are very
apt to come back again ! We shall see. And,
Cousin Phoebe, since, after all that I have said, your
courage does not fail you, we will not part so soon.
You are welcome, my child, for the present, to such
a home as your kinswoman can offer you."

With this measured, but not exactly cold assurance
of a hospitable purpose, Hepzibah kissed her cheek.

They now went below stairs, where Phoebe — not
so much assuming the office as attracting it to
herself, by the magnetism of innate fitness — took the
most active part in preparing breakfast. The mistress
of the house, meanwhile, as is usual with persons of
her stiff and unmaileable cast, stood mostly aside ;
willing to lend her aid, yet conscious that her natural
inaptitude would be likely to impede the business in
hand. Phoebe, and the fire that boiled the tea-kettle,
were equally bright, cheerful, and efficient, in their
respective offices. Hepzibah gazed forth from her
habitual sluggishness, the necessary result of long
solitude, as from another sphere. She could not
help being interested, however, and even amused,
at the readiness with which her new inmate adapted
herself to the circumstances, and brought the house,
moreover, and all its rusty old appliances, into a
suitableness for her purposes. Whatever she did,
too, was done without conscious effort, and with

96 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

frequent outbreaks of song, which were exceedingly
pleasant to the ear. _This natural tunefulness made
Phcebe seem like a bird in a shadowy tree ; or con
veyed the idea that the stream of life warbled through
her heart as a brook sometimes warbles through a
pleasant little dell. It betokened the cheeriness of an
active temperament, finding joy in its activity, and,
therefore, rendering it beautiful ; it was a New England
trait — the stern old stuff of Puritanism, with a gold
thread in the web.

Hepzibah brought out some old silver spoons, with
the family crest upon them, and a china tea-set,
painted over with grotesque figures of man, bird,
and beast, in as grotesque a landscape. These
pictured people were odd humorists, in a world of
their own — a world of vivid brilliancy, so far as
colour went, and still unfaded, although the tea-pot
and small cups were as ancient as the custom itself
of tea-drinking.

u Your great-great-great-great-grandmother had
these cups, when she was married," said Hepzibah
to Phcebe. " She was a Davenport, of a good family.
They were almost the first tea-cups ever seen in the
colony ; and if one of them were to be broken, my
heart would break with it. But it is nonsense to
speak so about a little tea-cup, when I remember
what my heart has gone through, without breaking."

The cups — not having been used, perhaps, since
Hepzibah 's youth — had contracted no small burden
of dust, which Phcebe washed away with so much
care and delicacy as to satisfy even the proprietor of
this invaluable china.

** What a nice little housewife you are ! " exclaimed

H.S.G.

"She watched her features narrowly."

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 97

the latter, smiling-, and, at the same time, frowning
so prodigiously that the smile was sunshine under a
thunder-cloud. " Do you do other things as well?
Are you as good at your book as you are at washing
tea-cups ? "

" Not quite, I am afraid," said Phcebe, laughing
at the form of Hepzibah's question. "But I was
schoolmistress for the little children in our district,
last summer, and might have been so still."

"Ah! 'tis all very well!" observed the maiden
lady, drawing herself up. — "But these things must
have come to you with your mother's blood. I never
knew a Pyncheon that had any turn for them."

It is very queer, but not the less true, that people
are generally quite as vain, or even more so, of their
deficiencies, than of their available gifts ; as was
Hepzibah of this native inapplicability, so to speak,
of the Pyncheons, to any useful purpose. She
regarded it as an hereditary trait ; and so, perhaps,
it was, but, unfortunately, a morbid one, such as is
often generated in families that remain long above
the surface of society.

Before they left the breakfast-table, the shop-bell
rang sharply, and Hepzibah set down the remnant
of her final cup of tea, with a look of sallow despair
that was truly piteous to behold. In cases of dis
tasteful occupation, the second day is generally
worse than the first ; we return to the rack with all
the soreness of the preceding torture in our limbs.
At all events, Hepzibah had fully satisfied herself ot
the impossibility of ever becoming wonted to this
peevishly obstreperous little bell. Ring as often as
it might, the sound always smote upon her nervous
H.S.G. D

98 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

system rudely and suddenly. And especially now,
while, with her crested tea-spoons and antique china,
she was flattering herself with ideas of gentility,
she felt an unspeakable disinclination to confront
a customer.

" Do not trouble yourself, dear cousin!" cried
Phcebe, starting lightly up. " I am shopkeeper
to-day. "

"You, child !" exclaimed Hepzibah. "What can
a little country-girl know of such matters ? "

"Oh, I have done all the shopping for the family,
at our village store," said Phcebe. " And I have had
a table at a fancy fair, and made better sales than
anybody. These things are not to be learned ; they
depend upon a knack, that comes, I suppose," added
she, smiling, "with one's mother's blood. You shall
see that I am as nice a little saleswoman as I am
a housewife ! "

The old gentlewoman stole behind Phcebe, and
peeped from the passage-way into the shop, to note
how she would manage her undertaking. It was a
case of some intricacy. A very ancient woman, in
a white short gown, and a green petticoat, with a
string of gold beads about her neck, and what looked
like a night-cap on her head, had brought a quantity
of yarn to barter for the commodities of the shop.
She was probably the very last person in town who
still kept the time-honoured spinning-wheel in constant
revolution. It was worth while to hear the croaking
and hollow tones of the old lady, and the pleasant
voice of Phoebe, mingling in one twisted thread of
talk ; and still better, to contrast their figures — so
light and bloomy — so decrepit and dusky — with only

MAY AND DECEMBER. 99

the counter betwixt them, in one sense, but more
than threescore years, in another. As for the
bargain, it was wrinkled slyness and craft, pitted
against native truth and sagacity.

"Was not that well done?" asked Phoebe,
laughing, when the customer was gone.

" Nicely done, indeed, child ! " answered Hepzibah.
"I could not have gone through with it nearly so
well. As you say, it must be a knack that belongs to
you on the mother's side."

It is a very genuine admiration, that with which
persons too shy or too awkward to take a due part
in the bustling world, regard the real actors in life's
stirring scenes ; so genuine, in fact, that the former
are usually fain to make it palatable to their self-
love, by assuming that these active and forcible
qualities are incompatible with others, which they
choose to deem higher and more important. Thus,
Hepzibah was well content to acknowledge Phoebe's
vastly superior gifts as a shopkeeper ; she listened,
with compliant ear, to her suggestion of various
methods whereby the influx of trade might be in
creased, and rendered profitable, without a hazardous
outlay of capital. She consented that the village
maiden should manufacture yeast, both liquid and
in cakes ; and should brew a certain kind of beer,
nectareous to the palate, and of rare stomachic
virtues ; and, moreover, should bake and exhibit
for sale *some little spice-cakes, which whosoever
tasted would longingly desire to taste again. All
such proofs of a ready mind, and skilful handiwork,
were highly acceptable to the aristocratic hucksteress,
so long as she could murmur to herself, with a grim

ioo HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

smile, and a half-natural sigh, and a sentiment of
mixed wonder, pity, and growing" affection —

" What a nice little body she is ! If she could
only be a lady, too ! — but that's impossible ! Phoebe
is no Pyncheon. She takes everything from her
mother."

As to Phoebe's not being a lady, or whether she
were a lady or no, it was a point, perhaps, difficult
to decide, but which could hardly have come up for
judgment at all, in any fair and healthy mind. Out
of New England, it would be impossible to meet with
a person combining so many ladylike attributes with
so many others that form no necessary (if compatible)
part of the character. She shocked no canon of
taste ; she was admirably in keeping with herself,
and never jarred against surrounding circumstances.
Her figure, to be sure — so small as to be almost
childlike, and so elastic that motion seemed as easy
or easier to it than rest — would hardly have suited
one's idea of a countess. Neither did her face — with
the brown ringlets on either side, and the slightly
piquant nose, and the wholesome bloom, and the clear
shade of tan, and the half a dozen freckles, friendly
remembrancers of the April sun and breeze — precisely
give us a right to call her beautiful. But there was
both lustre and depth in her eyes. She was very
pretty ; as graceful as a bird, and graceful much in
the same way ; as pleasant about the house as a
gleam of sunshine, falling on the floor through a
shadow of twinkling leaves, or as a ray of firelight
that dances on the wall, while evening is drawing
nigh. Instead of discussing her claim to rank among-
ladies, it would be preferable to regard Phoebe as the

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 101

example of feminine grace and availability combined,
in a state of society, if there were any such, where
ladies did not exist. There it should be woman's
office to move in the midst of practical affairs, and to
gild them all, the very homeliest — were it even the
scouring of pots and kettles — with an atmosphere of
loveliness and joy.

Such was the sphere of Phcebe. To find the born
and educated lady, on the other hand, we need look
no further than Hepzibah, our forlorn old maid, in her
rustling and rusty silks, with her deeply-cherished and
ridiculous consciousness of long descent, her shadowy
claims to princely territory, and, in the way of accom
plishment, her recollections, it may be, of having for
merly thrummed on a harpsichord, and walked a
minuet, and worked an antique tapestry-stitch on
her sampler. It was a fair parallel between new
Plebeianism and old Gentility.

It really seemed as if the battered visage of the
House of the Seven Gables, black and heavy-browed
as it still certainly looked, must have shown a kind of
cheerfulness glimmering through its dusky windows,
as Phcebe passed to and fro in the interior. Other
wise, it is impossible to explain how the people of the
neighbourhood so soon became aware of the girl's
presence. There was a great run of custom setting
steadily in, from about ten o'clock until towards noon
— relaxing, somewhat, at dinner-time, but recom
mencing in the afternoon, and finally, dying away a
half an hour or so before the long day's sunset. One
of the staunchest patrons was little Ned Wiggins, the
devourer of Jim Crow and the elephant, who to-day
had signalised his omnivorous prowess by swallowing

102 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

two dromedaries and a locomotive. Phoebe laughed,
as she summed up her aggregate of sales, upon the
slate, while Hepzibah, first drawing on a pair of silk
gloves, reckoned over the sordid accumulation of
copper coin, not without silver intermixed, that had
jingled into the till.

"We must renew our stock, Cousin Hepzibah!"
cried the little saleswoman. "The gingerbread
figures are all gone, and so are those Dutch wooden
milkmaids, and most of our other playthings. There
has been constant inquiry for cheap raisins, and a
great cry for whistles, and trumpets, and Jew's-
harps ; and at least a dozen little boys have asked
for molasses-candy. And we must contrive to get
a peck of russet apples, late in the season as it is.
But, dear cousin, what an enormous heap of copper !
Positively a copper mountain ! "

" Well done ! well done ! well done ! " quoth Uncle
Venner, who had taken occasion to shuffle in and
out of the shop several times, in the course of the
day. " Here's a girl that will never end her days at
my farm ! Bless my eyes, what a brisk little soul ! "

"Yes, Phoebe is a nice girl !" said Hepzibah, with
a scowl of austere approbation. " But, Uncle Venner,
you have known the family a great many years. Can
you tell me whether there ever was a Pyncheon whom
she takes after ? "

" I don't believe there ever was," answered the
venerable man. " At any rate, it never was my luck
to see her like among them, nor, for that matter, any
where else. I've seen a great deal of the world, not
only in people's kitchens and back-yards, but at the
street-corners, and on the wharves, and in other

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 103

places where my business calls me ; and I'm free to
say, Miss Hepzibah, that I never knew a human
creature do her work so much like one of God's
angels as this child Phcebe does ! "

Uncle Venner's eulogium, if it appear rather too
high-strained for the person and occasion, had, never
theless, a sense in which it was both subtle and true.
There was a spiritual quality in Phoebe's activity.
The life of the long and busy day — spent in occupa
tions that might so easily have taken a squalid and
ugly aspect — had been made pleasant, and even
lovely, by the spontaneous grace with which these
homely duties seemed to bloom out of her character ;
so that labour, while she dealt with it, had the easy
and flexible charm of play. Angels do not toil, but
let their good works grow out of them ; and so did
Phoebe.

The two relatives — the young maid and the old
one — found time, before nightfall, in the intervals
of trade, to make rapid advances towards affection
and confidence. A recluse, like Hepzibah, usually
displays remarkable frankness, and at least temporary
affability, on being absolutely cornered, and brought
to the point of personal intercourse ; like the angel
whom Jacob wrestled with, she is ready to bless
you, when once overcome.

The old gentlewoman took a dreary and proud
satisfaction in leading Phcebe from room to room
of the house, and recounting the traditions, with
which, as we may say, the walls were lugubriously
frescoed. She showed the indentations made by the
lieutenant-governor's sword-hilt in the door panels
of the apartment where old Colonel Pyncheon, a

104 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

dead host, had received his affrighted visitors with
an awful frown. The dusky terror of that frown,
Hepzibah observed, was thought to be lingering
ever since in the passage-way. She bade Phoebe
step into one of the tall chairs, and inspect the
ancient map of the Pyncheon territory at the east
ward. In a tract of land on which she laid her
finger, there existed a silver mine, the locality of
which was precisely pointed out in some memoranda
of Colonel Pyncheon himself, but only to be made
known when the family claim should be recognised
by Government. Thus it was for the interest of all
New England that the Pyncheons should have justice
done them. She told, too, how that there was
undoubtedly an immense treasure of English guineas
hidden somewhere about the house, or in the cellar,
or possibly in the garden.

"If you should happen to find it, Phoebe," said
Hepzibah, glancing aside at her, with a grim yet
kindly smile, "we will tie up the shop-bell for good
and all ! "

"Yes, dear cousin," answered Phoebe; "but, in
the meantime, I hear somebody ringing it ! "

When the customer was gone, Hepzibah talked
rather vaguely, and at great length, about a certain
Alice Pyncheon, who had been exceedingly beautiful
and accomplished in her lifetime, a hundred years
ago. The fragrance of her rich and delightful
character still lingered about the place where she
had lived, as a dried rose-bud scents the drawer
where it has withered and perished. This lovely
Alice had met with some great and mysterious
calamity, and had grown thin and white, and

MAY AND NOVEMBER. 105

gradually faded out of the world. But, even now,
she was supposed to haunt the House of the Seven
Gables, and, a great many times — especially when
one of the Pyncheons was to die — she had been
heard playing sadly and beautifully on the harpsi
chord. One of these tunes, just as it had sounded
from her spiritual touch, had been written down
by an amateur of music ; it was so exquisitely
mournful that nobody, to this day, could bear to
hear it played, unless when a great sorrow had
made them know the still profounder sweetness
of it.

" Was it the same harpsichord that you showed
me ? " inquired Phoebe.

"The very same," said Hepzibah. " It was Alice
Pyncheon's harpsichord. When I was learning
music, my father would never let me open it. So,
as I could only play on my teacher's instrument, I
have forgotten all my music, long ago."

Leaving these antique themes, the old lady began
to talk about the daguerreotypist, whom, as he seemed
to be a well-meaning and orderly young man, and in
narrow circumstances, she had permitted to take up
his residence in one of the seven gables. But, on
seeing more of Mr. Holgrave, she hardly knew what
to make of him. He had the strangest companions
imaginable : men with long beards, and dressed in
linen blouses, and other such new-fangled and ill-
fitting garments ; reformers, temperance lecturers,
and all manner of cross-looking philanthropists ; com
munity-men, and come-outers, as Hepzibah believed,
who acknowledged no law, and ate no solid food,
but lived on the scent of other people's cookery,

H.S.G. D2

io6 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and turned up their noses at the fare. As for the
daguerreotypist, she had read a paragraph in a
penny-paper, the other day, accusing him of making
a speech full of wild and disorganising matter, at a
meeting of his banditti-like associates. For her own
part, she had reason to believe that he practised
animal magnetism, and, if such things were in
fashion nowadays, should be apt to suspect him of
studying the Black Art, up there in his lonesome
chamber.

"But, dear cousin," said Phcebe, "if the young
man is so dangerous, why do you let him stay? If
he does nothing worse, he may set the house on
fire ! "

" Why, sometimes," answered Hepzibah, " I have
seriously made it a question, whether I ought not
to send him away. But, with all his oddities, he is
a quiet kind of a person, and has such a way of
taking hold of one's mind, that, without exactly
liking him (for I don't know enough of the young
man), I should be sorry to lose sight of him entirely.
A woman clings to slight acquaintances, when she
lives so much alone as I do."

" But if Mr. Holgrave is a lawless person ! " remon
strated Phoebe, a part of whose essence it was to
keep within the limits of law.

"Oh!" said Hepzibah carelessly — for, formal as
she was, still, in her life's experience, she had
gnashed her teeth against human law — " I suppose
he has a law of his own 1 "

MAULE'S WELL 107

VI.
MAULE'S WELL.

AFTER an early tea, the little country-girl strayed into
the garden. The inclosure had formerly been very
extensive, but was now contracted within small com
pass, and hemmed about, partly by high wooden
fences, and partly by the out-buildings of houses that
stood on another street. In its centre was a grass-
plat, surrounding a ruinous little structure, which
showed just enough of its original design to indicate
that it had once been a summer-house. A hop-vine,
springing from last year's root, was beginning to
clamber over it, but would be long in covering the
roof with its green mantle. Three of the seven
gables either fronted or looked side-ways, with a
dark solemnity of aspect, down into the garden.

The black, rich soil had fed itself with the decay
of a long period of time ; such as fallen leaves, the
petals of flowers, and the stalks and seed-vessels of
vagrant and lawless plants, more useful after their
death than ever while flaunting in the sun. The evil
of these departed years would naturally have sprung
up again, in such rank weeds (symbolic of the
transmitted vices of society) as are always prone
to root themselves about human dwellings. Phoebe
saw, however, that their growth must have been
checked by a degree of careful labour, bestowed daily
and systematically on the garden. The white double
rose-bush had evidently been propped up anew against
the house, since the commencement of the season ;

io8 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and a pear-tree and three damson-trees, which,
except a row of currant-bushes, constituted the only
varieties of fruit, bore marks of the recent amputation
of several superfluous or defective limbs. There were
also a few species of antique and hereditary flowers,
in no very flourishing condition, but scrupulously
weeded ; as if some person, either out of love or
curiosity, had been anxious to bring them to such
perfection as they were capable of attaining. The
remainder of the garden presented a well-selected
assortment of esculent vegetables, in a praiseworthy
state of advancement. Summer squashes, almost in
their golden blossom ; cucumbers, now evincing a
tendency to spread away from the main stock, and
ramble far and wide ; two or three rows of string-
beans, and as many more that were about to festoon
themselves on poles ; tomatoes, occupying a site so
sheltered and sunny that the plants were already
gigantic, and promised an early and abundant harvest.

Phcebe wondered \vhose care and toil it could have
been that had planted these vegetables, and kept the
soil so clean and orderly. Not, surely, her cousin
Hepzibah's, who had no taste nor spirits for the lady
like employment of cultivating flowers, and — with her
recluse habits, and tendency to shelter herself within
the dismal shadow of the house — would hardly have
come forth, under the speck of open sky, to weed and
hoe among the fraternity of beans and squashes.

It being her first day of complete estrangement from
rural objects, Phcebe found an unexpected charm in
this little nook of grass, and foliage, and aristocratic
flowers, and plebeian vegetables. The eye of Heaven
seemed to look down into it pleasantly, and with a

MAULE'S WELL. 109

peculiar smile, as if glad to perceive that Nature,
elsewhere overwhelmed, and driven out of the dusty
town, had here been able to retain a breathing-place.
The spot acquired a somewhat wilder grace, and yet a
very gentle one, from the fact that a pair of robins had
built their nest in the pear-tree, and were making
themselves exceedingly busy and happy in the dark
intricacy of its boughs. Bees, too — strange to say —
had thought it worth their while to come hither,
possibly from the range of hives beside some farm
house, miles away. How many aerial voyages might
they have made, in quest of honey, or honey-laden,
betwixt dawn and sunset ! Yet, late as it now was,
there still arose a pleasant hum out of one or two of
the squash blossoms, in the depths of which these bees
were plying their golden labour. There was one
other object in the garden which Nature might fairly
claim as her inalienable property, in spite of whatever
man could do to render it his own. This was a
fountain, set round with a rim of old, mossy stones,
and paved, in its bed, with what appeared to be a
sort of mosaic-work of variously coloured pebbles.
The play and slight agitation of the water, in its
upward gush, wrought magically with these variegated
pebbles, and made a continually shifting apparition of
quaint figures, vanishing too suddenly to be definable.
Thence, swelling over the rim of moss-grown stones,
the water stole away under the fence, through what
we regret to call a gutter, rather than a channel.

Nor must we forget to mention a hen-coop of very
reverend antiquity that stood in the farther corner of
the garden, not a great way from the fountain. It
now contained only Chanticleer, his two wives, and a

no HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

solitary chicken. All of them were pure specimens of
a breed which had been transmitted down as an heir
loom in the Pyncheon family, and were said, while in
their prime, to have attained almost the size of
turkeys, and, on the score of delicate flesh, to be fit
for a prince's table. In proof of the authenticity of
this legendary renown, Hepzibah could have exhibited
the shell of a great egg, which an ostrich need hardly
have been ashamed of. Be that as it might, the hens
were now scarcely larger than pigeons, and had a
queer, rusty, withered aspect, and a gouty kind of
movement, and a sleepy and melancholy tone through
out all the variations of their clucking and cackling.
It was evident that the race had degenerated, like
many a noble race besides, in consequence of too
strict a watchfulness to keep it pure. These feathered
people had existed too long in their distinct variety ;
a fact of which the present representatives, judging
by their lugubrious deportment, seemed to be aware.
They kept themselves alive, unquestionably, and laid
now and then an egg, and hatched a chicken ; not for
any pleasure of their own, but that the world might
not absolutely lose what had once been so admirable
a breed of fowls. The distinguishing mark of the
hens was a crest of lamentably scanty growth, in
these latter days, but so oddly and wickedly analogous
to Hepzibah's turban, that Phoebe — to the poignant
distress of her conscience, but inevitably — was led to
fancy a general resemblance betwixt these forlorn
bipeds and her respectable relative.

The girl ran into the house to get some crumbs of
bread, cold potatoes, and other such scraps as were
suitable to the accommodating appetite of fowls.

MAULE'S WELL. in

Returning, she gave a peculiar call, which they
seemed to recognise. The chicken crept through the
pales of the coop, and ran, with some show of
liveliness, to her feet ; while Chanticleer and the ladies
of his household regarded her with queer, sidelong
glances, and then croaked one to another, as if
communicating their sage opinions of her character.
So wise, as well as antique, was their aspect, as to
give colour to the idea, not merely that they were
the descendants of a time-honoured race, but that
they had existed, in their individual capacity, ever
since the House of the Seven Gables was founded,
and were somehow mixed up with its destiny. They
were a species of "tutelary sprite or Banshee ;
although winged and feathered differently from most
other guardian angels.

" Here, you odd little chicken ! " said Phoebe ;
" here are some nice crumbs for you ! "

The chicken, hereupon, though almost as venerable
in appearance as its mother — possessing, indeed,
the whole antiquity of its progenitors, in miniature
— mustered vivacity enough to flutter upward and
alight on Phoebe's shoulder.

4 * That little fowl pays you a high compliment!"
said a voice behind Phoebe.

Turning quickly, she was surprised at sight of
a young man, who had found access into the
garden by a door opening out of another gable than
that whence she had emerged. He held a hoe in
his hand, and, while Phoebe was gone in quest of
the crumbs, had begun to busy himself with drawing
up fresh earth about the roots of the tomatoes.

"The chicken really treats you like an old

ii2 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

acquaintance," continued he, in a quiet way, while
a smile made his face pleasanter than Phoebe at first
fancied it. " Those venerable personages in the
coop, too, seem very affably disposed. You are
lucky to be in their good graces so soon ! They
have known me much longer, but never honour me
with any familiarity, though hardly a day passes
without my bringing them food. Miss Hepzibah,
I suppose, will interweave the fact with her other
traditions, and set it down that the fowls know you
to be a Pyncheon ! "

"The secret is," said Phoebe, smiling, "that I
have learned how to talk with hens and chickens."

"Ah! but these hens," answered the young man
— "these hens of aristocratic lineage would scorn
to understand the vulgar language of a barn-yard
fowl. I prefer to think — and so would Miss Hepzibah
— that they recognise the family tone. For you are
a Pyncheon ? "

" My name is Phcebe Pyncheon," said the girl,
with a manner of some reserve ; for she was aware
that her new acquaintance could be no other than
the daguerreotypist, of whose lawless propensities
the old maid had given her a disagreeable idea.
" I did not know that my cousin Hepzibah's garden
was under another person's care."

" Yes," said Holgrave, " I dig, and hoe, and weed,
in this black old earth, for the sake of refreshing my
self with what little nature and simplicity may be left
in it, after men have so long sown and reaped here. I
turn up the earth by way of pastime. My sober occu
pation, so far as I have any, is with a lighter material.
In short, I make pictures out of sunshine ; and, not to

MAULE'S WELL. 113

be too much dazzled with my own trade, I have pre
vailed with Miss Hepzibah to let me lodge in one of
these dusky gables. It is like a bandage over one's
eyes, to come into it. But would you like to see a
specimen of my productions ? "

"A daguerreotype likeness, do you mean?'' asked
Phoebe, with less reserve ; for, in spite of prejudice,
her own youthfulness sprang forward to meet his. " I
don't much like pictures of that sort — they are so hard
and stern ; besides dodging away from the eye, and
trying to escape altogether. They are conscious of
looking very unamiable, I suppose, and therefore hate
to be seen."

" If you would permit me," said the artist, looking
at Phoebe, " I should like to try whether the daguerreo
type can bring out disagreeable traits on a perfectly
amiable face. But there certainly is truth in what
you have said. Most of my likenesses do look un
amiable ; but the very sufficient reason, I fancy, is,
because the originals are so. There is a wonderful
insight in Heaven's broad and simple sunshine. While
we give it credit only for depicting the merest surface,
it actually brings out the secret character with a truth
that no painter would ever venture upon, even could
he detect it. There is, at least, no flattery in my
humble line of art. Now, here is a likeness which I
have taken over and over again, and still with no
better result. Yet the original wears, to common
eyes, a very different expression. It would gratify me
to have your judgment on this character."

He exhibited a daguerreotype miniature, in a
morocco case. Phoebe merely glanced at it, and
gave it back

ii4 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" I know the face," she replied ; " for its stern eye
has been following" me about, all day. It is my
Puritan ancestor, who hangs yonder in the parlour.
To be sure, you have found some way of copying the
portrait without its black velvet cap and gray beard,
and have given him a modern coat and satin cravat,
instead of his cloak and band. I don't think him
improved by your alterations."

" You would have seen other differences, had you
looked a little longer," said Holgrave, laughing, yet
apparently much struck. " I can assure you that this
is a modern face, and one which you will very probably
meet. Now, the remarkable point is, that the original
wears, to the world's eye — and, for aught I know, to
his most intimate friends — an exceedingly pleasant
countenance, indicative of benevolence, openness of
heart, sunny good humour, and other praiseworthy
qualities of that cast. The sun, as you see, tells quite
another story, and will not be coaxed out of it, after
haTFa~do~zeri~patient attempts on my part. Here we
have the man, sly, subtle, hard, imperious, and, withal,
cold as ice. Look at that eye ! Would you like to
be at its mercy ? At that mouth ! Could it ever
smile ? And yet, if you could only see the benign smile
of the original ! It is so much the more unfortunate,
as he is a public character of some eminence, and the
likeness was intended to be engraved."

44 Well, I don't wish to see it any more," observed
Phcebe, turning away her eyes. " It is certainly very
like the old portrait. But my cousin Hepzibah has
another picture — a miniature. If the original is still
in the world, I think he might defy the sun to make
him look stern and hard."

MAULE'S WELL. 115

"You have seen that picture, then!" exclaimed
the artist, with an expression of much interest. " I
never did, but have a great curiosity to do so. And
you judge favourably of the face ? "

"There never was a sweeter one," said Phoebe.
"It is almost too soft and gentle for a man's."

"Is there nothing wild in the eye?" continued
Holgrave, so earnestly that it embarrassed Phoebe, as
did also the quiet freedom with which he presumed
on their so recent acquaintance. " Is there nothing
dark or sinister, anywhere ? Could you not conceive
the original to have been guilty of a great crime ? "

"It is nonsense," said Phoebe, a little impatiently,
" for us to talk about a picture which you have never
seen. You mistake it for some other. A crime, in
deed ! Since you are a friend of my cousin Hepzibah's,
you should ask her to show you the picture."

" It will suit my purpose still better to see the
original," replied the daguerreotypist coolly. "As to
his character, we need not discuss its points ; they
have already been settled by a competent tribunal, or
one which called itself competent. But, stay ! Do
not go yet, if you please ! I have a proposition to
make you."

Phoebe was on the. point of retreating, but turned
back, with some hesitation ; for she did not exactly
comprehend his manner, although, on better observa
tion, its feature seemed rather to be lack of ceremony
than any approach to offensive rudeness. There was
an odd kind of authority, too, in what he now pro
ceeded to say, rather as if the garden were his own
than a place to which he was admitted merely by
Hepzibah's courtesy.

n6 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" If agreeable to you/' he observed, " it would give
me pleasure to turn over these flowers, and those
ancient and respectable fowls, to your care. Coming
fresh from country air and occupations, you will soon
feel the need of some such out-of-door employment.
My own sphere does not so much lie among flowers.
You can trim and tend them, therefore, as you please ;
and I will ask only the least trifle of a blossom, now
and then, in exchange for all the good, honest
kitchen-vegetables with which I propose to enrich
Miss Hepzibah's table. So we will be fellow-
labourers, somewhat on the community system."

Silently, and rather surprised at her own compliance,
Phoebe accordingly betook herself to weeding a flower
bed, but busied herself still more with cogitations
respecting this young man, with whom she so un
expectedly found herself on terms approaching to
familiarity. She did not altogether like him. His
character perplexed the little country-girl, as it might
a more practised observer ; for, while the tone of his
conversation had generally been playful, the impression
left on her mind was that of gravity, and, except as
his youth modified it, almost sternness. She rebelled,
as it were, against a certain magnetic element in
the artist's nature, which he exercised towards her,
possibly without being conscious of it.

After a little while, the twilight, deepened by the
shadows of the fruit-trees, and the surrounding
buildings, threw an obscurity over the garden.

" There," said Holgrave, "it is time to give over
work ! That last stroke of the hoe has cut off a bean
stalk. Good-night, Miss Phcebe Pyncheon ! Any
bright day, if you will put one of those rose-buds in

MAULE'S WELL. 117

your hair, and come to my rooms in Central Street, I
will seize the purest ray of sunshine, and make a
picture of the flower and its wearer."

He retired towards his own solitary gable, but
turned his head, on reaching- the door, and called to
Phoebe, with a tone which certainly had laughter in it,
yet which seemed to be more than half in earnest.

"Be careful not to drink at Maule's well!" said
he. " Neither drink nor bathe your face in it ! "

"Maule's well!" answered Phoebe. "Is that it
with the rim of mossy stones? I have no thought
of drinking there — but why not ? "

"Oh," rejoined the daguerreotypist, "because,
like an old lady's cup of tea, it is water bewitched ! "

He vanished ; and Phoebe, lingering a moment,
saw a glimmering light, and then the steady beam
of a lamp, in a chamber of the gable. On returning
into Hepzibah's department of the house, she found
the low-studded parlour so dim and dusky that her
eyes could not penetrate the interior. She was
indistinctly aware, however, that the gaunt figure
of the old gentlewoman was sitting in one of the
straight-backed chairs, a little withdrawn from the
window, the faint gleam of which showed the
blanched paleness of her cheek, turned sideway
towards a corner.

"Shall I light a lamp, Cousin Hepzibah ? " she
asked.

"Do, if you please, my dear child," answered
Hepzibah. "But put it on the table in the corner
of the passage. My eyes are weak ; and I can
seldom bear the lamp-light on them."

What an instrument is the human voice ! How

u8 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

wonderfully responsive to every emotion of the
human soul ! In Hepzibah's tone, at that moment,
there was a certain rich depth and moisture, as if
the words, commonplace as they were, had been
steeped in the warmth of her heart. Again, while
lighting the lamp in the kitchen, Phoebe fancied
that her cousin spoke to her.

" In a moment, cousin!" answered the girl.
" These matches just glimmer, and go out."

But, instead of a response from Hepzibah, she
seemed to hear the murmur of an unknown voice.
It was strangely indistinct, however, and less like
articulate words than an unshaped sound, such as
would be the utterance of feeling and sympathy,
rather than of the intellect. So vague was it, that
its impression or echo in Phoebe's mind was that
of unreality. She concluded that she must have
mistaken some other sound for that of the human
voice ; or else that it was altogether in her fancy.

She set the lighted lamp in the passage, and
again entered the parlour. Hepzibah's form, though
its sable outline mingled with the dusk, was now
less imperfectly visible. In the remoter parts of
the room, however, its walls being so ill adapted
to reflect light, there was nearly the same obscurity
as before.

" Cousin," said Phoebe, "did you speak to me
just now? "

" No, child ! " replied Hepzibah.

Fewer words than before, but with the same
mysterious music in them ! Mellow, melancholy,
yet not mournful, the tone seemed to gush up out
of the deep well of Hepzibah's heart, all steeped

MAULE'S WELL. 119

in its profoundest emotion. There was a tremor
in it, too, that— as all strong feeling is electric —
partly communicated itself to Phcebe. The girl sat
silently for a moment. But soon, her senses being
very acute, she became conscious of an irregular
respiration in an obscure corner of the room.
Her physical organisation, moreover, being at once
delicate and healthy, gave her a perception, operating
with almost the effect of a spiritual medium, that
somebody was near at hand.

" My dear cousin," asked she, overcoming an
indefinable reluctance, " is there not some one in
the room with us ? "

" Phcebe, my dear little girl," said Hepzibah,
after a moment's pause, "you were up betimes,
and have been busy all day. Pray go to bed ; for
I am sure you must need rest. I will sit in the
parlour a while, and collect my thoughts. It has
been my custom for more years, child, than you
have lived ! "

While thus dismissing her, the maiden lady stepped
forward, kissed Phcebe, and pressed her to her heart,
which beat against the girl's bosom with a strong,
high, and tumultuous swell. How came there to
be so much love in this desolate old heart, that
it could afford to well over thus abundantly ?

"Good-night, cousin," said Phcebe, strangely
affected by Hepzibah's manner. " If you begin
to love me, I am glad ! "

She retired to her chamber, but did not soon
fall asleep, nor then very profoundly. At some
uncertain period in the depths of night, and as it
were, through the thin veil of a dream, she was

120 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

conscious of a footstep mounting the stairs, heavily,
but not with force and decision. The voice of
Hepzibah, with a hush through it, was going up
along with the footsteps ; and, again, responsive
to her cousin's voice, Phcebe heard that strange,
vague murmur, which might be likened to an
indistinct shadow of human utterance.

VII.

THE GUEST.

WHEN Phcebe awoke — which she did with the early
twittering of the conjugal couple of robins in the
pear-tree — she heard movements below-stairs, and,
hastening down, found Hepzibah already in the
kitchen. She stood by a window, holding a book
in close contiguity to her nose, as if with the hope
of gaining an olfactory acquaintance with its contents,
since her imperfect vision made it not very easy to
read them. If any volume could have manifested
its essential wisdom in the mode suggested, it
would certainly have been the one now in Hepzibah's
hand ; and the kitchen, in such an event, would
forthwith have steamed with the fragrance of venison,
turkeys, capons, larded partridges, puddings, cakes,
and Christmas-pies, in all manner of elaborate mixture
and concoction. It was a cookery book, full of
innumerable old fashions of English dishes, and
illustrated with engravings, which represented the
arrangements of the table at such banquets as it
might have befitted a nobleman to give, in the
great hall of his castle. And, amid these rich and

THE GUEST. 121

potent devices of the culinary art (not one of which,
probably, had been tested, within the memory of
any man's grandfather), poor Hepzibah was seeking
for some nimble little titbit, which, with what skill
she had, and such materials as were at hand, she
might toss up for a breakfast.

Soon, with a deep sigh, she put aside the savoury
volume, and inquired of Phcebe whether old Speckle,
as she called one of the hens, had laid an egg the
preceding day. Phcebe ran to see, but returned
without the expected treasure in her hand. At that
instant, however, the blast of a fish-dealer's conch
was heard, announcing his approach along the street.
With energetic raps at the shop-window, Hepzibah
summoned the man in, and made purchase of what
he warranted as the finest mackerel in his cart, and
as fat a one as ever he felt with his finger so early in
the season. Requesting Phcebe to roast some coffee
— which she casually observed was the real Mocha,
and so long kept that each of the small berries ought
to be worth its weight in gold — the maiden lady
heaped fuel into the vast receptacle of the ancient
fireplace in such quantity as soon to drive the linger
ing dusk out of the kitchen. The country-girl,
willing to give her utmost assistance, proposed to
make an Indian cake, after her mother's peculiar
method, of easy manufacture, and which she could
vouch for as possessing a richness, and, if rightly
prepared, a delicacy, unequalled by any other mode
of breakfast-cake. Hepzibah gladly assenting, the
kitchen was soon the scene of savoury preparation.
Perchance, amid their proper element of smoke,
which eddied forth from the ill-constructed chimney,

122 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the g-hosts of departed cook-maids looked wonder-
ingly on, or peeped down the great breadth of the
flue, despising the simplicity of the projected meal,
yet ineffectually pining to thrust their shadowy
hands into each inchoate dish. The half-starved
rats, at any rate, stole visibly out of their hiding-
places, and sat on their hind-legs, snuffing the fumy
atmosphere, and wistfully awaiting an opportunity
to nibble.

Hepzibah had no natural turn for cookery5 and, to
say the truth, had fairly incurred her present meagre-
ness, by often choosing to go without her dinner,
rather than be attendant on the rotation of the spit,
or ebullition of the pot. Her zeal over the fire, there
fore, was quite an heroic test of sentiment. It was
touching, and positively worthy of tears (if Phcebe,
the only spectator, except the rats and ghosts afore
said, had not been better employed than in shedding
them), to see her rake out a bed of fresh and
glowing coals, and proceed to broil the mackerel.
Her usually pale cheeks were all ablaze with heat
and hurry. She watched the fish with as much
tender care and minuteness of attention as if — we
know not how to express it otherwise — as if her
own heart were on the gridiron, and her immortal
happiness were involved in its being done precisely
to a turn !

Life, within-doors, has few pleasanter prospects than
a neatly-arranged and well-provisioned breakfast-
table. We come to it freshly, in the dewy youth of
the day, and when our spiritual and sensual elements
are in better accord than at a later period ; so that
the material delights of the morning meal are capable

THE GUEST. 123

of being- fully enjoyed, without any very grievous
reproaches, whether gastric or conscientious, for
yielding even a trifle overmuch to the animal depart
ment of our nature. The thoughts, too, that run
around the ring of familiar guests, have a piquancy
and mirthfulness, and oftentimes a vivid truth, which
more rarely find their way into the elaborate inter
course of dinner. Hepzibah's small and ancient
table, supported on its slender and graceful legs,
and covered with a cloth of the richest damask,
looked worthy to be the scene and centre of one of
the cheerfullest of parties. The vapour of the broiled
fish arose like incense from the shrine of a barbarian
idol, while the fragrance of the Mocha might have
gratified the nostrils of a tutelary Lar, or whatever
power has scope over a modern breakfast-table.
Phoebe's Indian cakes were the sweetest offering of
all — in their hue befitting the rustic altars of the
innocent and golden age — or, so bright.ly yellow
were they, resembling some of the bread which was
changed to glistening gold, when Midas tried to eat
it. The butter must not be forgotten — butter which
Phcebe herself had churned, in her own rural home,
and brought it to her cousin as a propitiatory gift —
smelling of clover-blossoms, and diffusing the charm
of pastoral scenery through the dark-panelled parlour.
All this, with the quaint gorgeousness of the old
china cups and saucers, and the crested spoons, and
a silver cream-jug (Hepzibah's only other article of
plate, and shaped like the rudest porringer), set out
a board at which the stateliest of old Colonel
Pyncheon's guests need not have scorned to take
his place. But the Puritan's face scowled down

i24 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

out of the picture, as if nothing* on the table pleased
his appetite.

By way of contributing what grace she could,
Phoebe gathered some roses and a few other flowers,
possessing either scent or beauty, and arranged them
in a glass pitcher, which, having long ago lost its
handle, was so much the fitter for a flower-vase.
The early sunshine — as fresh as that which peeped
into Eve's bower, while she and Adam sat at
breakfast there — came twinkling through the branches
of the pear-tree, and fell quite across the table. All
was now ready. There were chairs and plates for
three. A chair and plate for Hepzibah — the same
for Phoebe — but what other guest did her cousin
look for ?

Throughout this preparation, there had been a
constant tremor in Hepzibah's frame ; an agitation
so powerful that Phoebe could see the quivering of
her gaunt shadow, as thrown by the firelight on the
kitchen wall, or by the sunshine on the parlour floor.
Its manifestations were so various, and agreed so
little with one another, that the girl knew not what
to make of it. Sometimes it seemed an ecstasy of
delight and happiness. At such moments, Hepzibah
would fling out her arms, and enfold Phcebe in them,
and kiss her cheek as tenderly as ever her mother
had ; she appeared to do so by an inevitable impulse,
and as if her bosom were oppressed with tenderness,
of which she must needs pour out a little, in order
to gain breathing-room. The next moment, without
any visible cause for the change, her unwonted joy
shrank back, appalled as it were, and clothed itself
in mourning ; or it ran and hid itself, so to speak,

THE GUEST. 125

in the dungeon of her heart, where it had long' lain
chained, while a cold, spectral sorrow took the place
of the imprisoned joy, that was afraid to be en
franchised — a sorrow as black as that was bright.
She often broke into a little, nervous, hysterical
laugh, more touching* than any tears could be ; and
forthwith, as if to try which was the most touching,
a gust of tears would follow ; or perhaps the laughter
and tears came both at once, and surrounded our
poor Hepzibah, in a moral sense, with a kind of pale,
dim rainbow. Towards Phcebe, as we have said,
she was affectionate — far tenderer than ever before,
in their brief acquaintance, except for that one kiss
on the preceding night — yet with a continually
recurring pettishness and irritability. She would
speak sharply to her ; then, throwing aside all the
starched reserve of her ordinary manner, ask pardon,
and the next instant renew the just-forgiven injury.

At last, when their mutual labour was all finished,
she took Phoebe's hand in her own trembling one.

"Bear with me, my dear child," she cried; "for
truly my heart is full to the brim ! Bear with me ;
for I love you, Phcebe, though I speak so roughly !
Think nothing of it, dearest child ! By and by, I
shall be kind, and only kind ! "

"My dearest cousin, cannot you tell me what has
happened ? " asked Phcebe, with a sunny and tearful
sympathy. " What is it that moves you so ? "

"Hush! hush! He is coming!" whispered
Hepzibah, hastily wiping her eyes. " Let him see
you first, Phcebe ; for you are young and rosy, and
cannot help letting a smile break out, whether or
no. He always liked bright faces ! And mine is

126 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

old, now, and the tears are hardly dry on it. He
never could abide tears. There ; draw the curtain a
little, so that the shadow may fall across his side of
the table ! But let there be a good deal of sunshine,
too ; for he never was fond of gloom, as some
people are. He has had but little sunshine in his
life — poor Clifford — and, oh, what a black shadow !
Poor, poor Clifford ! "

Thus murmuring, in an undertone, as if speaking
rather to her own heart than to Phcebe, the old
gentlewoman stepped on tiptoe about the room,
making such arrangements as suggested themselves
at the crisis.

Meanwhile, there was a step in the passage-way,
above stairs. Phcebe recognised it as the same
which had passed upward, as through her dream,
in the night-time. The approaching guest, whoever
it might be, appeared to pause at the head of the
staircase ; he paused twice or thrice in the descent ;
he paused again at the foot. Each time, the delay
seemed to be without purpose, but rather from a
forgetfulness of the purpose which had set him in
motion, or as if the person's feet came involuntarily
to a standstill, because the motive power was too
feeble to sustain his progress. Finally, he made
a long pause at the threshold of the parlour. He
took hold of the knob of the door ; then loosened
his grasp, without opening it. Hepzibah, her hands
convulsively clasped, stood gazing at the entrance.

" Dear Cousin Hepzibah, pray don't look so ! "
said Phcebe, trembling ; for her cousin's emotion,
and this mysteriously reluctant stop, made her feel
as if a ghost were coming into the room. "You

THE GUEST. 127

really frighten me ! Is something awful going to
happen ? "

" Hush ! " whispered Hepzibah. " Be cheerful !
whatever may happen, be nothing but cheerful ! "

The final pause at the threshold proved so long,
that Hepzibah, unable to endure the suspense, rushed
forward, threw open the door, and led in the stranger
by the hand. At the first glance, Phoebe saw an
elderly personage, in an old-fashioned dressing-gown
of faded damask, and wearing his gray, or almost
white hair, of an unusual length. It quite over
shadowed his forehead, except when he thrust it
back, and stared vaguely about the room. After
a very brief inspection of his face, it was easy to
conceive that his footstep must necessarily be such an
one as that which, slowly, and with as indefinite an
aim as a child's first journey across a floor, had
just brought him hitherward. Yet there was no
tokens that his physical strength might not have
sufficed for a free and determined gait. It was the
spirit of the man that could not walk. The expres
sion of his countenance — while, notwithstanding,
it had the light of reason in it — seemed to waver,
and glimmer, and nearly to die away, and feebly
to recover itself again. It was like a flame which
we see twinkling among half-extinguished embers ;
we gaze at it more intently than if it were a positive
blaze, gushing vividly upward — more intently, but
with a certain impatience, as if it ought either to
kindle itself into satisfactory splendour, or be at
once extinguished.

For an instant after entering the room, the guest
stood still, retaining Hepzibah's hand, instinctively,

128 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

as a child does that of the grown person who guides
it. He saw Phoebe, however, and caught an illumina
tion from her youthful and pleasant aspect, which,
indeed, threw a cheerfulness about the parlour, like
the circle of reflected brilliancy around the glass
vase of flowers that was standing in the sunshine.
He made a salutation, or, to speak nearer the
truth, an ill-defined, abortive attempt at courtesy.
Imperfect as it was, however, it conveyed an idea,
or, at least, gave a hint, of indescribable grace,
such as no practised art of external manners could
have attained. It was too slight to seize upon,
at the instant ; yet, as recollected afterwards, seemed
to transfigure the whole man.

"Dear Clifford," said Hepzibah, in the tone with
which one soothes a wayward infant, "this is our
cousin Phcebe — little Phcebe Pyncheon — Arthur's only
child, you know. She has come from the country
to stay with us a while ; for our old house has
grown to be very lonely now."

" Phcebe ?— Phcebe Pyncheon ?— Phcebe ?" repeated
the guest, with a strange, sluggish, ill-defined
utterance. "Arthur's child! Ah, I forget! No
matter ! She is very welcome ! "

"Come, dear Clifford, take this chair," said
Hepzibah, leading him to his place. "Pray, Phoebe,
lower the curtain a very little more. Now let us
begin breakfast."

The guest seated himself in the place assigned
him, and looked strangely around. He was evidently
trying to grapple with the present scene, and bring
it home to his mind with a more satisfactory distinct
ness. He desired to be certain, at least, that he

THE GUEST. 129

was here, in the low-studded, cross-beamed, oaken-
panelled parlour, and not in some other spot, which
had stereotyped itself into his senses. But the effort
was too great to be sustained with more than a
fragmentary success. Continually, as we may
express it, he faded away out of his place ; or, in
other words, his mind and consciousness took their
departure, leaving- his wasted, gray, and melancholy
figure — a substantial emptiness, a material ghost — *
to occupy his seat at table. Again, after a blank
moment, there would be a flickering taper-gleam
in his eye-balls. It betokened that his spiritual
part had returned, and was doing its best to kindle
the heart's household fire, and light up intellectual
lamps in the dark and ruinous mansion, where it
was doomed to be a forlorn inhabitant.

At one of these moments, of less torpid, yet still
imperfect animation, Phcebe became convinced of
what she had at first rejected as too extravagant
and startling an idea. She saw that the person
before her must have been the original of the
beautiful miniature in her cousin Hepzibah's posses
sion. Indeed, with a feminine eye for costume, she
had at once identified the damask dressing-gown,
which enveloped him, as the same in figure, material,
and fashion, with that so elaborately represented in
the picture. This old, faded garment, with all its
pristine brilliancy extinct, seemed, in some indescrib
able way, to translate the wearer's untold misfortune,
and make it perceptible to the beholder's eye. It
was the better to be discerned, by this exterior type,
how worn and old were the soul's more immediate
garments ; that form and countenance, the beauty
H.S.G. E

130 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and grace of which had almost transcended the skill
of the most exquisite of artists. It could the more
adequately be known that the soul of the man must
have suffered some miserable wrong, from its earthly
experience. There he seemed to sit, with a dim
veil of decay and ruin betwixt him and the world,
but through which, at flitting intervals, might be
caught the same expression, so refined, so softly
imaginative, which Malbone — venturing a happy
touch, with suspended breath — had imparted to the
miniature ! There had been something- so innately
characteristic in this look, that all the dusky years,
and the burthen of unfit calamity which had fallen
upon him, did not suffice utterly to destroy it.

Hepzibah had now poured out a cup of deliciously
fragrant coffee, and presented it to her guest.
As his eyes met hers, he seemed bewildered and
disquieted.

" Is this you, Hepzibah?" he murmured sadly;
then, more apart, and perhaps unconscious that he
was overheard, " How changed ! how changed !
And is she angry with me ? Why does she bend
her head so ? "

Poor Hepzibah ! It was that wretched scowl,
which time, and her near-sightedness, and the fret
of inward discomfort, had rendered so habitual that
any vehemence of mood invariably evoked it. But,
at the indistinct manner of his words, her whole
face grew tender, and even lovely, with sorrowful
affection ; the harshness of her features disappeared,
as it were, behind the warm and misty glow.

' ' Angry!" she repeated; " angry with you,
Clifford ! "

THE GUEST. 131

Her tone, as she uttered the exclamation, had a
plaintive and really exquisite melody thrilling through
it, yet without subduing a certain something which an
obtuse auditor might still have mistaken for asperity.
It was as if some transcendant musician should draw
a soul-stirring sweetness out of a cracked instrument,
which makes its physical imperfection heard in the
midst of ethereal harmony, so deep was the sensibility
that found an organ in Hepzibah's voice !

''There is nothing but love, here, Clifford," she
added — " nothing but love ! You are at home ! "

The guest responded to her tone by a smile, which did
not half light up his face. Feeble as it was, however,
and gone in a moment, it had a charm of wonderful
beauty. It was followed by a coarser expression ; or
one that had the effect of coarseness on the fine mould
and outline of his countenance, because there was
nothing intellectual to temper it. It was a look of
appetite. He ate food with what might almost be
termed voracity ; and seemed to forget himself,
Hepzibah, the young girl, and everything else around
him, in the sensual enjoyment which the bountifully-
spread table afforded. In his natural system, though
high-wrought and delicately refined, a sensibility to
the delights of the palate was probably inherent. It
would have been kept in check, however, and even
converted into an accomplishment, and one of the
thousand modes of intellectual culture, had his more
ethereal characteristics retained their vigour. But, as
it existed now, the effect was painful, and made Phoebe
droop her eyes.

In a little while the guest became sensible of the
fragrance of the yet untasted coffee. He quaffed it

I32 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

eagerly. The subtle essence acted on him like a
charmed draught, and caused the opaque substance of
his animal being to grow transparent, or, at least,
translucent ; so that a spiritual g'leam was transmitted
through it, with a clearer lustre than hitherto.

" More, more ! " he cried, with nervous haste in his
utterance, as if anxious to retain his grasp of what
sought to escape him. "This is what I need ! Give
me more ! "

Under this delicate and powerful influence, he sat
more erect, and looked out from his eyes with a glance
that took note of what it rested on. It was not so
much that his expression grew more intellectual ; this,
though it had its share, was not the most peculiar
effect. Neither was what we call the moral nature so
forcibly awakened as to present itself in remarkable
prominence. But a certain fine temper of being was
now — not brought out in full relief, but chang'eably
and imperfectly betrayed — of which it was the function
to deal with all beautiful and enjoyable things. In a
character where it should exist as the chief attribute,
it would bestow on its possessor an exquisite taste,
and an enviable susceptibility of happiness. Beauty
would be his life ; his aspirations would all tend
toward it ; and, allowing his frame and physical
organs to be in consonance, his own developments
would likewise be beautiful. Such a man should have
nothing to do with sorrow ; nothing with strife ;
nothing with the martyrdom which, in an infinite
variety of shapes, awaits those who have the heart,
and will, and conscience, to fight a battle with the
world. To these heroic tempers, such martyrdom is
the richest meed in the world's gift. To the individual

THE GUEST. 133

before us, it could only be a grief, intense in due pro
portion with the severity of the infliction. He had no
right to be a martyr ; and, beholding him so fit to be
happy, and so feeble for all other purposes, a generous,
strong, and noble spirit would, methinks, have been
ready to sacrifice what little enjoyment it might have
planned for itself — it would have flung down the hopes,
so paltry in its regard — if thereby the wintry blasts of
our rude sphere might come tempered to such a man.
Not to speak it harshly or scornfully, it seemed
Clifford's nature to be a Sybarite. It was perceptible,
even there, in the dark old parlour, in the inevitable
polarity with which his eyes were attracted towards
the quivering play of sunbeams through the shadowy
foliage. It was seen in his appreciating notice of the
vase of flowers, the scent of which he inhaled with a
zest almost peculiar to a physical organisation so
refined that spiritual ingredients are moulded in with
it. It was betrayed in the unconscious smile with
which he regarded Phoebe, whose fresh and maidenly
figure was both sunshine and flowrers — their essence,
in a prettier and more agreeable mode of manifestation.
Not less evident was this love and necessity for the
Beautiful, in the instinctive caution with which, even
so soon, his eyes turned away from his hostess, and
wandered to any quarter rather than come back. It
was Hepzibah's misfortune — not Clifford's fault. How
could he — so yellow as she was, so wrinkled, so sad
of mien, with that odd uncouthness of a turban on her
head, and that most perverse of scowls contorting her
brow — how could he love to gaze at her ? But, did
he owe her no affection for so much as she had silently
£"iven ? He owed her nothing. A nature like Clifford's

134 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

can contract no debts of that kind. It is — we say it
without censure, nor in diminution of the claim which
it indefeasibly possesses on beings of another mould —
it is always selfish in its essence ; and we must give
it leave to be so, and heap up our heroic and dis
interested love upon it so much the more, without a
recompense. Poor Hepzibah knew this truth, or, at
least, acted on the instinct of it. So long estranged
from what was lovely, as Clifford had been, she rejoiced
— rejoiced, though with a present sigh, and a secret
purpose to shed tears in her own chamber — that he
had brighter objects now before his eyes than her
aged and uncomely features. They never possessed
a charm ; and if they had, the canker of her grief for
him would long since have destroyed it.

The guest leaned back in his chair. Mingled in
his countenance with a dreamy delight, there was a
troubled look of effort and unrest. He was seeking
to make himself more fully sensible of the scene around
him ; or, perhaps, dreading it to be a dream, or a
play of imagination, was vexing the fair moment with
a struggle for some added brilliancy and more durable
illusion.

" How pleasant ! — How delightful ! " he murmured,
but not as if addressing any one. "Will it last?
How balmy the atmosphere, through that open
window ! An open window ! How beautiful that
play of sunshine ! Those flowers, how very fragrant !
That young girl's face, how cheerful, how blooming !
— a flower with the dew on it, and sunbeams in the
dew-drops ! Ah ! this must be all a dream ! A dream !
A dream ! But it has quite hidden the four stone
walls !

THE GUEST. 135

Then his face darkened, as if the shadow of a cavern
or a dungeon had come over it ; there was no more
light in its expression than might have come through
the iron grates of a prison window — still lessening,
too, as if he were sinking further into the depths.
Phoebe (being of that quickness and activity of
temperament that she seldom long refrained from
taking a part, and generally a good one, in what was
going forward) now felt herself moved to address the
stranger.

" Here is a new kind of rose, which I found this
morning, in the garden," said she, choosing a small
crimson one from among the flowers in the vase.
" There will be but five or six on the bush, this season.
This is the most perfect of them all ; not a speck of
blight or mildew in it. And how sweet it is ! — sweet
like no other rose ! One can never forget that
scent ! "

" Ah!— let me see !— let me hold it!" cried the
guest, eagerly seizing the flower, which, by the spell
peculiar to remembered odours, brought innumerable
associations along with the fragrance that it exhaled.
" Thank you ! This has done me good. I remember
how I used to prize this flower — long ago, I suppose,
very long ago ! — or was it only yesterday? It makes
me feel young again ! Am I young ? Either this
remembrance is singularly distinct, or this conscious
ness strangely dim ! But how kind of the fair young
girl ! Thank you ! Thank you ! "

The favourable excitement derived from this little
crimson rose afforded Clifford the brightest moment
which he enjoyed at the breakfast-table. It might
have lasted longer, but that his eyes happened, soon

136 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

afterwards, to rest on the face of the old Puritan,
who, out of his dingy frame and lustreless canvas, was
looking* down on the scene like a ghost, and a most
ill-tempered and ungenial one. The guest made an
impatient gesture of the hand, and addressed Hepzibah
with what might easily be recognised as the licensed
irritability of a petted member of the family.

"Hepzibah! — Hepzibah!" cried he, with no little
force and distinctness — "why do you keep that
odious picture on the wall ? Yes, yes ! — that is
precisely your taste ! I have told you, a thousand
times, that it was the evil genius of the house ! — my
evil genius particularly ! Take it down, at once ! "

"Dear Clifford," said Hepzibah sadly, "you know
it cannot be !."

"Then, at all events," continued he, still speaking
with some energy, "pray cover it with a crimson
curtain, broad enough to hang in folds, and with a
golden border and tassels. I cannot bear it ! It
must not stare me in the face ! "

"Yes, dear Clifford, the picture shall be covered,"
said Hepzibah soothingly. "There is a crimson
curtain in a trunk above-stairs — a little faded and
moth-eaten, I'm afraid — but Phoebe and I will do
wonders with it."

"This very day, remember!" said he; and then
added, in a low, self-communing voice, " Why
should we live in this dismal house at all ? Why
not go to the south of France ? — to Italy ? — Paris,
Naples, Venice, Rome ? Hepzibah will say, we have
not the means. A droll idea, that ! "

He smiled to himself, and threw a glance of fine
sarcastic meaning towards Hepzibah.

THE GUEST. 137

But the several moods of feeling, faintly as they
were marked, through which he had passed, occurring
in so brief an interval of time, had evidently wearied
the stranger. He was probably accustomed to a sad
monotony of life, not so much flowing in a stream,
however sluggish, as stagnating in a pool around
his feet. A slumberous veil diffused itself over his
countenance, and had an effect, morally speaking,
on its naturally delicate and elegant outline, like
that which a brooding mist, with no sunshine in it,
throws over the features of a landscape. He appeared
to become grosser — almost cloddish. If aught of
interest or beauty — even ruined beauty — had hereto
fore been visible in this man, the beholder might
now begin to doubt it, and to accuse his own
imagination of deluding him with whatever grace
had flickered over that visage, and whatever exquisite
lustre had gleamed in those filmy eyes.

Before he had quite sunken away, however, the
sharp and peevish tinkle of the shop-bell made itself
audible. Striking most disagreeably on Clifford's
auditory organs and the characteristic sensibility of
his nerves, it caused him to start upright in his
chair.

4 'Good heavens, Hepzibah ! what horrible dis
turbance have we now in the house ? " cried he,
wreaking his resentful impatience — as* a matter of
course, and a custom of old — on the one person in
the world that loved him. " I have never heard
such a hateful clamour ! Why do you permit it? In
the name of all dissonance, what can it be ? "

It was very remarkable into what prominent relief-
even as if a dim picture should leap suddenly from

H.S.G. E2

138 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

its canvas — Clifford's character was thrown, by this
apparently trifling annoyance. The secret was, that
an individual of his temper can always be pricked
more acutely through his sense of the beautiful and
harmonious than through his heart. It is even
possible — for similar cases have often happened —
that if Clifford, in his foregoing life, had enjoyed
the means of cultivating his taste to its utmost
perfectibility, that subtle attribute might, before this
period, have completely eaten out or filed away his
affections. Shall we venture to pronounce, therefore,
that his long and black calamity may not have had
a redeeming drop of mercy at the bottom ?

"Dear Clifford, I wish I could keep the sound
from your ears," said Hepzibah patiently, but
reddening with a painful suffusion of shame. " It
is very disagreeable even to me. But, do you know,
Clifford, I have something to tell you ? This ugly
noise — pray run, Phcebe, and see who is there ! —
this naughty little tinkle is nothing but our
shop-bell ! "

"Shop-bell !" repeated Clifford, with a bewildered
stare.

"Yes, our shop-bell," said Hepzibah, a certain
natural dignity, mingled with deep emotion, now
asserting itself in her manner. " For you must
know, deares't Clifford, that we are very poor. And
there was no other resource, but either to accept
assistance from a hand that I would push aside (and
so would you ! ) were it to offer bread when we were
dying for it — no help, save from him, or else to earn
our subsistence with my own hands ! Alone, I might
have been content to starve. But you were to be

THE GUEST. 139

given back to me ! Do you think then, dear
Clifford," added she, with a wretched smile, " that
I have brought an irretrievable disgrace on the old
house, by opening* a little shop in the front gable ?
Our great -great -grandfather did the same, when
there was far less need ! Are you ashamed of me ? "

"Shame! Disgrace! Do you speak these words
to me, Hepzibah ? " said Clifford — not angrily,
however ; for when a man's spirit has been
thoroughly crushed, he may be peevish at small
offences, but never resentful of great ones. So he
spoke with only a grieved emotion. " It was not
kind to say so, Hepzibah ! What shame can befall
me now ? "

And then the unnerved man — he that had been
born for enjoyment, but had met a doom so very
wretched — burst into a woman's passion of tears.
It was but of brief continuance, however ; soon
leaving him in a quiescent, and, to judge by his
countenance, not an uncomfortable state. From
this mood, too, he partially rallied, for an instant,
and looked at Hepzibah with a smile, the keen,
half-derisory purport of which was a puzzle to her.

" Are we so very poor, Hepzibah ? " said he.

Finally, his chair being deep and softly cushioned,
Clifford fell asleep. Hearing the more regular rise
and fall of his breath — (which, however, even then,
instead of being strong and full, had a feeble kind
of tremor, corresponding with the lack of vigour
in his character) — hearing these tokens of settled
slumber, Hepzibah seized the opportunity to peruse
his face more attentively than she had yet dared to
do. Her heart melted away in tears ; her profoundest

140 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

spirit sent forth a moaning voice, low, gentle, but
inexpressibly sad. In this depth of grief and pity,
she felt that there was no irreverence in gazing at
his altered, aged, faded, ruined face. But no sooner
was she a little relieved than her conscience smote
her for gazing curiously at him, now that he was
so changed ; and, turning hastily away, Hepzibah
let down the curtain over the sunny window, and
left Clifford to slumber there.

VIII

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY.

PHCEBE, on entering the shop, beheld there the
already familiar face of the little devourer — if we
can reckon his mighty deeds aright — of Jim Crow,
the elephant, the camel, the dromedaries, and the
locomotive. Having expended his private fortune,
on the two preceding days, in the purchase of the
above unheard-of luxuries, the young gentleman's
present errand was on the part of his mother, in
quest of three eggs and half a pound of raisins.
These articles Phcebe accordingly supplied, and, as
a mark of gratitude for his previous patronage, and
a slight superadded morsel after breakfast, put
likewise into his hand a whale ! The great fish,
reversing his experience with the prophet of Nineveh,
immediately began his progress down the same red
pathway of fate whither so varied a caravan had
preceded him. This remarkable urchin, in truth,
was the very emblem of old Father Time, both in
respect of his all-devouring appetite for men and

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 141

thing's, and because he, as well as Time, after
engulfing- thus much of creation, looked almost
as youthful as if he had been just that moment
made.

After partly closing the door, the child turned
back, and mumbled something to Phcebe, which, as
the whale was but half disposed of, she could not
perfectly understand.

" What did you say, my little fellow? " asked she.

"Mother wants to know," repeated Ned Wiggins,
more distinctly, "how Old Maid Pyncheon's brother
does? Folks say he has got home."

"My cousin Hepzibah's brother!" exclaimed
Phoebe, surprised at this sudden explanation of the
relationship between Hepzibah and her guest. " Her
brother ! And where can he have been ? "

The little boy only put his thumb to his broad
snub-nose, with that look of shrewdness which a
child, spending much of his time in the street, so
soon learns to throw over his features, however
unintelligent in themselves. Then as Phcebe con
tinued to gaze at him, without answering his
mother's message, he took his departure.

As the child went down the steps, a gentleman
ascended them, and - made his entrance into the
shop. It was the portly, and, had it possessed
the advantage of a little more height, would have
been the stately figure of a man considerably in the
decline of life, dressed in a black suit of some thin
stuff, resembling broadcloth as closely as possible.
A gold-headed cane, of rare Oriental wood, added
materially to the high respectability of his aspect,
as did also a white neckcloth of the utmost snowy

142 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

purity, and the conscientious polish of his boots.
His dark, square countenance, with its almost
shaggy depth of eyebrows, was naturally impressive,
and would, perhaps, have been rather stern, had not
the gentleman considerately taken upon himself to
mitigate the harsh effect by a look of exceeding
good-humour and benevolence. Owing, however,
to a somewhat massive accumulation of animal
substance about the lower region of his face, the
look was, perhaps, unctuous, rather than spiritual,
and had, so to speak, a kind of fleshy effulgence, not
altogether so satisfactory as he doubtless intended
it to be. A susceptible observer, at any rate, might
have regarded it as affording very little evidence of
the genuine benignity of soul whereof it purported
to be the outward reflection. And if the observer
chanced to be ill-natured, as well as acute and
susceptible, he would probably suspect that the
smile on the gentleman's face was a good deal akin
to the shine on his boots, and that each must have
cost him and his boot-black, respectively, a good
deal of hard labour to bring out and preserve them.

As the stranger entered the little shop, where the
projection of the second storey and the thick foliage
of the elm-tree, as well as the commodities at the
window, created a sort of gray medium, his smile
grew as intense as if he had set his heart on
counteracting the whole gloom of the atmosphere
(besides any moral gloom pertaining to Hepzibah
and her inmates) by the unassisted light of his
countenance. On perceiving a young rosebud of a
girl, instead of the gaunt presence of the old maid,
a look of surprise was manifest. He at first knit

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 143

his brows ; then smiled with more unctuous benignity
than ever.

" Ah, I see how it is ! " said he, in a deep voice — •
a voice which, had it come from the throat of an
uncultivated man, would have been gruff, but, by
dint of careful training, was now sufficiently agreeable
— " I was not aware that Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon
had commenced business under such favourable
auspices. You are her assistant, I suppose ? "

" I certainly am," answered Phoebe, and added,
with a little air of ladylike assumption (for, civil as
the gentleman was, he evidently took her to be a
young person serving for wages), " I am a cousin
of Miss Hepzibah, on a visit to her."

" Her cousin? — and from the country? Pray
pardon me, then," said the gentleman, bowing and
smiling, as Phcebe never had been bowed to or smiled
on^before ; ' ' in that case, we must be better acquainted ;
for, unless I am sadly mistaken, you are my own
little kinswoman likewise ! Let me see — Mary ? —
Dolly ? — Phcebe ? — yes, Phcebe is the name ! Is it
possible that you are Phcebe Pyncheon, only child
of my dear cousin and classmate, Arthur ? Ah, I
see your father now, about your mouth ! Yes, yes !
we must be better acquainted ! I am your kinsman,
my dear. Surely you must have heard of Judge
Pyncheon ? "

As Phcebe courtesied in reply, the judge bent
forward, with the pardonable and even praiseworthy
purpose — considering the nearness of blood, and the
difference of age — of bestowing on his young* relative
a kiss of acknowledged kindred and natural affection.
Unfortunately (without design, or only with such

144 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

instinctive design as gives no account of itself to
the intellect), Phcebe, just at the critical moment,
drew back ; so that her highly respectable kinsman,
with his body bent over the counter, and his lips
protruded, was betrayed into the rather absurd
predicament of kissing the empty air. It was a
modern parallel to the case of Ixion embracing a
cloud, and was so much the more ridiculous, as the
judge prided himself on eschewing all airy matter,
and never mistaking a shadow for a substance. The
truth was — and it is Phoebe's only excuse — that,
although Judge Pyncheon's glowing benignity might
not be absolutely unpleasant to the feminine beholder,
with the width of a street, or even an ordinary-sized
room, interposed between, yet it became quite too
intense, when this dark, full-fed physiognomy (so
roughly bearded, too, that no razor could ever make
it smooth) sought to bring itself into actual contact
with the object of its regards. The man, the sex,
somehow or other, was entirely too prominent in
the judge's demonstrations of that sort. Phoebe's
eyes sank, and, without knowing why, she felt
herself blushing deeply under his look. Yet she
had been kissed before, and without any particular
squeamishness, by perhaps half a dozen different
cousins, younger, as well as older, than this dark-
browed, grisly - bearded, white - neckclothed, and
unctuously - benevolent judge ! Then, why not by
him ?

On raising her eyes, Phcebe was startled by the
change in Judge Pyncheon's face. It was quite as
striking, allowing for the difference of scale, as that
betwixt a landscape under a broad sunshine and just

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 145

before a thunder-storm ; not that it had the passionate
intensity of the latter aspect, but was cold, hard,
im mi tig-able, like a day-long brooding cloud.

"Dear me! what is to be done now?" thought
the country-girl to herself. " He looks as if there
were nothing softer in him than a rock, nor milder
than the east wind ! I meant no harm ! Since he is
really my cousin, I would have let him kiss me if
I could ! " .

Then, all at once, it struck Phoebe that this very
Judge Pyncheon was the original of the miniature
which the daguerreotypist had shown her in the
garden, and that the hard, stern, relentless look, now
on his face, \vas the same that the sun had so inflexibly
persisted in bringing out. Was it, therefore, no
momentary mood, but, however skilfully concealed,
the settled temper of his life ? And not merely so,
but was it hereditary in him, and transmitted down,
as a precious heirloom, from that bearded ancestor,
in whose picture both the expression, and, to a
singular degree, the features, of the modern judge
were shown as by a kind of prophecy. A deeper
philosopher than Phoebe might have found some
thing very terrible in this idea. It implied that the
weakness and defects, the bad passions, the mean
tendencies, and the moral diseases, which lead to
crime, are handed down from one generation to
another, by a far surer process of transmission than
human law has been able to establish, in respect to
the riches and honours which it seeks to entail upon
posterity.

But, as it happened, scarcely had Phoebe's eyes
rested again on the judge's countenance, than all

146 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

its ugly sternness vanished ; and she found herself
quite overpowered by the sultry, dog-day heat, as
it were, of benevolence, which this excellent man
diffused out of his great heart into the surrounding
atmosphere — very much like a serpent, which, as a
preliminary to fascination, is said to fill the air with
his peculiar odour.

" I like that, Cousin Phcebe ! " cried he, with an
emphatic nod of approbation. "I like it much, my
little cousin ! You are a good child, and know how
to take care of yourself. A young girl — especially if
she be a very pretty one — can never be too chary
of her lips."

" Indeed, sir," said Phoebe, trying to laugh the
matter off, " I did not mean to be unkind."

Nevertheless, whether or no it were entirely owing
to the inauspicious commencement of their acquaint
ance, she still acted under a certain reserve, which
was by no means customary to her frank and genial
nature. The fantasy would not quit her,, that the
original Puritan, of whom she had heard so many
sombre traditions — the progenitor of the whole race
of New England Pyncheons, the founder of the House
of the Seven Gables, and who had died so strangely
in it — had now stepped into the shop. In these days
of off-hand equipment, the matter was easily enough
arranged. On his arrival from the other world, he
had merely found it necessary to spend a quarter of
an hour at a barber's, who had trimmed down the
Puritan's full beard into a pair of grizzled whiskers ;
then, patronising a ready-made clothing establishment,
he had exchanged his velvet doublet and sable cloak,
with the richly-worked band under his chin, for a

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 147

white collar and cravat, coat, vest, and pantaloons ;
and lastly, putting aside his steel-hilted broadsword
to take up a gold-headed cane, the Colonel Pyncheon,
of two centuries ago, steps forward as the judge,
of the passing moment !

Of course, Phcebe was far too sensible a girl to
entertain this idea in any other way than as matter
for a smile. Possibly, also, could the two personages
have stood together before her eye, many points of
difference would have been perceptible, and perhaps
only a general resemblance. The long lapse of
intervening years, in a climate so unlike that which
had fostered the ancestral Englishman, must inevitably
have wrought important changes in the physical
system of his descendant. The judge's volume of
muscle could hardly be the same as the colonel's ;
there was undoubtedly less beef in him. Though
looked upon as a weighty man, among his contem
poraries, in respect of animal substance, and as
favoured with a remarkable degree of fundamental
development, well adapting him for the judicial
bench, we conceive that the modern Judge Pyncheon,
if weighed in the same balance with his ancestor,
would have required at least an old-fashioned fifty-six
to keep the scale in equilibrio. Then the judge's face
had lost the ruddy English hue, that showed its
warmth through all the duskiness of the colonel's
weather-beaten cheek, and had taken a sallow shade,
the established complexion of his countrymen. If we
mistake not, moreover, a certain quality of nervous
ness had become more or less manifest, even in so
solid a specimen of Puritan descent as the gentle
man now under discussion. As one of its effects, it

148 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

bestowed on his countenance a quicker mobility than
the old Englishman's had possessed, and keener
vivacity, but at the expense of a sturdier something,
on which these acute endowments seemed to act like
dissolving acids. This process, for aught we know,
may belong to the great system of human progress,
which, with every ascending footstep, as it diminishes
the necessity for animal force, may be destined
gradually to spiritualise us, by refining away our
grosser attributes of body. If so, Judge Pyncheon
could endure a century or two more of such
refinement, as well as most other men.

The similarity, intellectual and moral, between the
judge and his ancestor, appears to have been at least
as strong as the resemblance of mien and feature
would afford reason to anticipate. In old Colonel
Pyncheon's funeral discourse, the clergyman absolutely
canonised his deceased parishioner, and opening, as
it were, a vista through the roof of the church, and
thence through the firmament above, showed him
seated, harp in hand, among the crowned choristers
of the spiritual world. On his tombstone, too, the
record is highly eulogistic ; nor does history, so far
as he holds a place upon its page, assail the con
sistency and uprightness of his character. So also, as
regards the Judge Pyncheon of to-day, neither clergy
man, nor legal critic, nor inscriber of tombstones, nor
historian of general or local politics, would venture
a word against this eminent person's sincerity as a
Christian, or respectability as a man, or integrity as
a judge, or courage and faithfulness as the often-tried
representative of his political party. But, besides
these cold, formal, and empty words of the chisel that

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 149

inscribes, the voice that speaks, and the pen that
writes, for the public eye and for distant time — and
which inevitably lose much of their truth and freedom
by the fatal consciousness of so doing — there were
traditions about the ancestor, and private diurnal
gossip about the judge, remarkably accordant in their
testimony. It is often instructive to take the
woman's — the private and domestic view of a public
man ; nor can anything be more curious than the vast
discrepancy between portraits intended for engraving*,
and the pencil-sketches that pass from hand to hand,
behind the original's back.

For example, tradition affirmed that the Puritan
had been greedy of wealth ; the judge, too, with all
the show of liberal expenditure, was said to be as
close-fisted as if his gripe were of iron. The ancestor
had clothed himself in a grim assumption of kindli
ness, a rough heartiness of word and manner, which
most people took to be the genmine warmth of nature,
making its way through the thick and inflexible hide
of a manly character. His descendant, in compliance
with the requirements of a nicer age, had etherealised
this rude benevolence into that broad benignity of
smile, wherewith he shone like a noonday sun along
the streets, or glowed like a household fire in the
drawing-rooms of his private acquaintance. The
Puritan — if not belied by some singular stories,
murmured, even at this day, under the narrator's
breath — had fallen into certain transgressions to
which men of his great animal development, what
ever their faith or principles, must continue liable,
until they put off impurity, along with the gross
earthly substance that involves it. We must not

150 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

stain our page with any contemporary scandal, to a
similar purport, that may have been whispered
against the judge. The Puritan, again, an autocrat
in his own household, had worn out three wives,
and, merely by the remorseless weight and hardness
of his character in the conjugal relation, had sent
them, one after another, broken-hearted, to their
graves. Here, the parallel, in some sort, fails. The
judge had wedded but a single wife, and lost her
in the third or fourth year of their marriage. There
was a fable, however — for such we choose to
consider it, though, not impossibly, typical of Judge
Pyncheon's marital deportment — that the lady got
her death-blow in the honeymoon, and never smiled
again, because her husband compelled her to serve
him with coffee, every morning, at his bedside, in
token of fealty to her liege-lord and master.

But it is too fruitful a subject, this of hereditary
resemblances — the frequent recurrence of which, in
a direct line, is truly unaccountable, when we
consider how large an accumulation of ancestry
lies behind every man, at the distance of one or
two centuries. We shall only add, therefore, that
the Puritan — so, at least, says chimney-corner tradi
tion, which often preserves traits of character with
marvellous fidelity — was bold, imperious, relentless,
crafty ; laying his purposes deep, and following
them out with an inveteracy of pursuit that knew
neither rest nor conscience ; trampling on the weak,
and, when essential to his ends, doing his utmost
to beat down the strong. Whether the judge in
any degree resembled him, the further progress oi
our narrative mav show.

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 151

Scarcely any of the items in the above-drawn
parallel occurred to Phoebe, whose country birth and
residence, in truth, had left her pitifully ignorant of
most of the family traditions, which lingered, like cob
webs and incrustations of smoke, about the rooms and
chimney-corners of the House of the Seven Gables.
Yet there was a circumstance, very trifling in itself,
which impressed her with an odd degree of horror.
She had heard of the anathema flung by Maule,
the executed wizard, against Colonel Pyncheon and
his posterity — that God would give them blood to
drink — and likewise of the popular notion, that this
miraculous blood might now and then be heard
gurgling in their throats. The latter scandal — as
became a person of sense, and, more especially, a
member of the Pyncheon family — Phoebe had set
down for the absurdity which it unquestionably was.
But ancient superstitions, after being steeped in N
human hearts, and embodied in human breath, and
passing from lip to ear, in manifold repetition,
through a series of generations, become imbued
with an effect of homely truth. The smoke of the
domestic hearth has scented them, through and
through. By long transmission among household
facts, they grow to look like them, and have such
a familiar way of making themselves at home, that
their influence is usually greater than we suspect.
Thus it happened, that when Phoebe heard a certain
noise in Judge Pyncheon's throat — rather habitual
with him, not altogether voluntary, yet indicative of
nothing, unless it were a slight bronchial complaint,
or, as some people hinted, an apoplectic symptom
— when the girl heard this queer and awkward

152 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

ingurgitation (which the writer never did hear, and
therefore cannot describe), she, very foolishly, started,
" and clasped her hands.

Of course, it was exceedingly ridiculous in Phcebe
to be discomposed by such a trifle, and still more
unpardonable to show her discomposure to the
individual most concerned in it. But the incident
chimed in so oddly with her previous fancies about
the colonel and the judge, that, for the moment, it
seemed quite to mingle their identity.

"What is the matter with you, young woman?"
said Judge Pyncheon, giving her one of his harsh
looks. " Are you afraid of anything ? "

"Oh, nothing, sir — nothing in the world!"
answered Phoebe, with a little laugh of vexation at
herself. " But perhaps you wish to speak with my
cousin Hepzibah. Shall I call her ? "

"Stay a moment, if you please," said the judge,
again beaming sunshine out of his face. "You seem
to be a little nervous this morning. The town
air, Cousin Phoebe, does not agree with your
good, wholesome country habits. Or, has anything
happened to disturb you ? — anything remarkable in
Cousin Hepzibah's family? — An arrival, eh? I
thought so ! No wonder you are out of sorts, my
little cousin. To be an inmate with such a guest
may well startle an innocent young girl ! "

"You quite puzzle me, sir," replied Phoebe, gazing
inquiringly at the judge. u There is no frightful
guest in the house, but only a poor, gentle, child
like man, whom I believe to be Cousin Hepzibah's
brother. I am afraid (but you, sir, will know better
than I) that he is not quite in his sound senses ; but

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 153

so mild and quiet he seems to be, that a mother
might trust her baby with him ; and I think he
would play with the baby, as if he were only a few
years older than itself. He startle me ! — Oh, no
indeed ! "

" I rejoice to hear so favourable and so ingenu
ous an account of my cousin Clifford," said the
benevolent judge. "Many years ago, when we
were boys and young men together, I had a great
affection for him, and still feel a tender interest in
all his concerns. You say, Cousin Phoebe, he
appears to be weak-minded. Heaven grant him
at least enough of intellect to repent of his past
sins ! "

"Nobody, I fancy," observed Phcebe, "can have
fewer to repent of."

"And is it possible, my dear," rejoined the judge,
with a commiserating look, " that you have never
heard of Clifford Pyncheon ? — that you know nothing
of his history ? Well, it is all right ; and your
mother has shown a very proper regard for the good
name of the family with which she connected herself.
Believe the best you can of this unfortunate person,
and hope the best ! It is a rule which Christians
should always follow in their judgments of one
another ; and especially is it right and wise among
near relatives, whose characters have necessarily a
degree of mutual dependence. But is Clifford in the
parlour ? I will just step in and see."

"Perhaps, sir, I had better call my cousin
Hepzibah," said Phcebe ; hardly knowing, however,
whether she ought to obstruct the entrance of so
affectionate a kinsman into the private regions of

154 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the house. " Her brother seemed to be just falling
asleep, after breakfast ; and I am sure she would
not like him to be disturbed. Pray, sir, let me give
her notice ! "

But the judge showed a singular determination to
«;nter unannounced ; and as Phcebe, with the vivacity
of a person whose movements unconsciously answer
to her thoughts, had stepped towards the door, he
used little or no ceremony in putting her aside.

44 No, no, Miss Phcebe," said Judge Pyncheon,
in a voice as deep as a thunder-growl, and with a
frown as black as the cloud whence it issues. " Stay
you here ! I know the house, and know my cousin
Hepzibah, and know her brother Clifford likewise !
— nor need my little country cousin put herself to
the trouble of announcing me ! " — in these latter
words, by the bye, there were symptoms of a change
from his sudden harshness into his previous benignity
of manner. — " I am at home here, Phcebe, you must
recollect, and you are the stranger. I will just step
in, therefore, and see for myself how Clifford is,
and assure him and Hepzibah of my kindly feelings
and best wishes. It is right, at this juncture, that
they should both hear from my own lips how much
I desire to serve them. Ha ! here is Hepzibah
herself!"

Such was the case. The vibrations of the judge's
voice had reached the old gentlewoman in the parlour,
where she sat, with face averted, waiting on her
brother's slumber. She now issued forth, as would
appear, to defend the entrance, looking, we must
needs say, amazingly like the dragon which, in fairy
tales, is wont to be the guardian over an enchanted

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY, 155

beauty. The habitual scowl of her brow was, un
deniably, too fierce, at this moment, to pass itself
off on the innocent score of near-sightedness ; and
it was bent on Judge Pyncheon in a way that
seemed to confound, if not alarm him, so inade
quately had he estimated the moral force of a
deeply-grounded antipathy. She made a repelling
gesture with her hand, and stood, a perfect picture
of prohibition, at full length, in the dark frame of
the doorway. But we must betray Hepzibah's
secret, and confess that the native timorousness
of her character even now developed itself, in a
quick tremor, which, to her own perception, set
each of her joints at variance with its fellows.

Possibly, the judge was aware how little true
hardihood lay behind Hepzibah's formidable front.
At any rate, being a gentleman of steady nerves,
he soon recovered himself, and failed not to approach
his cousin with outstretched hand ; adopting the
sensible precaution, however, to cover his advance
with a smile, so broad and sultry, that, had it been
only half as warm as it looked, a trellis of grapes
might at once have turned purple under its summer-
like exposure. It may have been his purpose, indeed,
to melt poor Hepzibah on the spot, as if she were
a figure of yellow wax.

4 * Hepzibah, my beloved cousin, I am rejoiced!"
exclaimed the judge, most emphatically. " Now,
at length, you have something to live for. Yes,
and all of us, let me say, your friends and kindred,
have more to live for than we had yesterday. I
have lost no time in hastening to offer any assistance
in my power towards making Clifford comfortable.

156 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

He belongs to us all. I know how much he requires,
— how much he used to require — with his delicate
taste, and his love of the beautiful. Anything in
my house — pictures, books, wine, luxuries of the
table — he may command them all ! It would afford
me most heart-felt gratification to see him ! Shall
I step in, this moment ? "

"No," replied Hepzibah, her voice quivering too
painfully to allow of many words. " He cannot see
visitors ! "

"A visitor, my dear cousin! — do you call me
so ? " cried the judge, whose sensibility, it seems,
was hurt by the coldness of the phrase. " Nay,
then, let me be Clifford's host, and your own
likewise. Come at once to my house. The country
air, and all the conveniences — I -may say luxuries —
that I have gathered about me, will do wonders for
him. And you and I, dear Hepzibah, will consult
together, and watch together, and labour together,
to make our dear Clifford happy. Come ! why
should we make more words about what is both
a duty and a pleasure, on my part ? Come to me
at once ! "

On hearing these so hospitable offers, and such
generous recognition of the claims of kindred, Phcebe
felt very much in the mood of running up to Judge
Pyncheon, and giving him, of her own accord, the
kiss from which she had so recently shrunk away.
It was quite otherwise with Hepzibah ; the judge's
smile seemed to operate on her acerbity of heart
like sunshine upon vinegar, making it ten times
sourer than ever.

"Clifford," said she — still too agitated to utter

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 157

more than an abrupt sentence — " Clifford has a home
here ! "

''May Heaven forgive you, Hepzibah," said Judge
Pyncheon, reverently lifting- his eyes towards that
high court of equity to which he appealed, " if you
suffer any ancient prejudice or animosity to weigh
with you in this matter ! I stand here, with an
open heart, willing and anxious to receive yourself
and Clifford into it. Do not refuse my good offices
• — my earnest propositions for your welfare ! They
are such, in all respects, as it behooves your nearest
kinsman to make. It will be a heavy responsibility,
cousin, if you confine your brother to this dismal
house and stifled air, when the delightful freedom
of my country-seat is at his command/'

" It would never suit Clifford," said Hepzibah,
as briefly as before.

"Woman!" broke forth the judge, giving way
to his resentment, "what is the meaning of all
this ? Have you other resources ? Nay, I suspected
as much ! Take care, Hepzibah, take care ! Clifford
is on the brink of as black a ruin as ever befell him
yet ! But why do I talk with you, woman as you
are ? Make way ! — I must see Clifford ! "

Hepzibah spread out her gaunt figure across the
door, and seemed really to increase in bulk ; looking
the more terrible, also, because there was so much
terror and agitation in her heart. But Judge
Pyncheon 's evident purpose of forcing a passage
was interrupted by a voice from the inner room ;
a weak, tremulous, wailing voice, indicating helpless
alarm, with no more energy for sjelf-defence than
belongs to a frightened infant.

158 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" Hepzibah, Hepzibah ! " cried the voice; " go
down on your knees to him ! Kiss his feet ! Entreat
him not to come in ! Oh, let him have mercy on
me ! Mercy ! — mercy ! "

For the instant, it appeared doubtful whether it
were not the judge's resolute purpose to set Hepzibah
aside, and step across the threshold into the parlour,
whence issued that broken and miserable murmur
of entreaty. It was not pity that restrained him,
for, at the first sound of the enfeebled voice, a red
fire kindled in his eyes, and he made a quick pace
forward, with something inexpressibly fierce and grim
darkening forth, as it were, out of the whole man.
To know Judge Pyncheon, was to see him at that
moment. After such a revelation, let him smile with
what sultriness he would, he could much sooner turn
grapes purple, or pumpkins yellow, than melt the
iron-branded impression out of the beholder's memory.
And it rendered his aspect not the less, but more
frightful, that it seemed not to express wrath or
hatred, but a certain hot fellness of purpose, which
annihilated everything but itself.

Yet, after all, are we not slandering an excellent
and amiable man ? Look at the judge now ! He
is apparently conscious of having erred, in too
energetically pressing his deeds of loving-kindness
on persons unable to appreciate them. He will await
their better mood, and hold himself as ready to
assist them, then, as at this moment. As he draws
back from the door, an all-comprehensive benignity
blazes from his visage, indicating that he gathers
Hepzibah, little Phcebe, and the invisible Clifford,
all three, together with the whole world besides,

THE PYNCHEON OF TO-DAY. 159

into his immense heart, and gives them a warm
bath in its flood of affection.

" You do me great wrong, dear Cousin Hepzibah ! "
said he, first kindly offering her his hand, and then
drawing on his glove, preparatory to departure.
" Very great wrong ! But I forgive it, and will
study to make you think better of me. Of course,
our poor Clifford being in so unhappy a state of
mind, I cannot think of urging an interview at
present. But I shall watch over his welfare, as
if he were my own beloved brother ; nor do I at
all despair, my dear cousin, of constraining both
him and you to acknowledge your injustice. When
that shall happen, I desire no other revenge than your
acceptance of the best offices in my power to do you. "

With a bow to Hepzibah, and a degree of paternal
benevolence in his parting nod to Phoebe, the judge
left the shop, and went smiling along the street. As
is customary with the rich, when they aim at the
honours of a republic, he apologised, as it were, to
the people, for his wealth, prosperity, and elevated
station, by a free and hearty manner towards those ,
who knew him ; putting off the more of his dignity,
in due proportion with the humbleness of the man
whom he saluted, and thereby proving a haughty
consciousness of his advantages as irrefragably as if
he had marched forth preceded by a troop of lackeys
to clear the way. On this particular forenoon, so
excessive was the warmth of Judge Pyncheon's kindly
aspect, that (such, at least, was the rumour about
town) an extra passage of the water-carts was found
essential, in order to lay the dust occasioned by so
much extra sunshine !

160 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

No sooner had he disappeared than Hepzibah grew
deadly white, and, staggering towards Phoebe, let her
head fall on the young* girl's shoulder.

"Oh, Phoebe!" murmured she, "that man has
been the horror of my life ! Shall I never, never have
the courage — will my voice never cease from trembling"
long enough to let me tell him what he is ? "

"Is he so very wicked ? " asked Phoebe. " Yet his
offers were surely kind ! "

" Do not speak of them — he has a heart of iron ! "
rejoined Hepzibah. "Go, now, and talk to Clifford !
Amuse and keep him quiet ! It would disturb him
wretchedly to see me so agitated as I am. There,
go, dear child, and I will try to look after the shop."

Phoebe went, accordingly, but perplexed herself
meanwhile, with queries as to the purport. of the
scene which she had just witnessed, and also, whether
judges, clergymen, and other characters of that eminent
stamp and respectability, could really, in any single
instance, be otherwise than just and uprignt men.
A doubt of this nature has a most disturbing influence,
and, if shown to^be a fact, comes with fearful and
startling effect, on minds of the trim, orderly, and
limit-loving class, in which we find our little country-
girl. Dispositions more boldly speculative may
derive a stern enjoyment from the discovery, since
there must be evil in the world, that a high man is
as likely to grasp his share of it as a low one. A
wider scope of view, and a deeper insight, may see
rank, dignity, and station, all proved illusory, so far
as regards their claim to human reverence, and yet
not feel as if the universe were thereby tumbled
headlong into chaos. But Phoebe, in order to keep

CLIFFORD AND PHCEBE. 161

the universe in its old place, was fain to smother,
in some degree, her own intuitions as to Judge
Pyncheon's character. And as for her cousin's
testimony in disparagement of it, she concluded that
Hepzibah's judgment was embittered by one of those
family feuds, which render hatred the more deadly,
by the dead and corrupted love that they intermingle
with its native poison.

IX.

CLIFFORD AND PHGEBE.

TRULY was there something high, generous, and noble,
in the native composition of our poor old Hepzibah !
Or else — and it was quite as probably the case — she
had been enriched by poverty, developed by sorrow,
elevated by the strong" and solitary affection of her
life, and thus endowed with heroism, which never
could have characterised her in what are called
happier circumstances. Through dreary years,
Hepzibah had looked forward — for the most part
despairingly, never with any confidence of hope, but
always with the feeling that it was her brightest
possibility — to the very position in which she now
found herself. In her own behalf, she had asked
nothing of Providence, but the opportunity of devoting
herself to this brother, whom she had so loved — so
admired for what he was, or might have been — and
to whom she had kept her faith, alone of all the world,
wholly, unfalteringly, at every instant, and through
out life. And here, in his late decline, the lost one
had come back out of his long and strange misfortune,

162 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and was thrown on her sympathy, as it seemed, not
merely for the bread of his physical existence, but
for everything that should keep him morally alive.
She had responded to the call. She had come
forward — our poor, gaunt Hepzibah, in her rusty
silks, with her rigid joints, and the sad perversity
of her scowl — ready to do her utmost ; and with
affection enough, if that were all, to do a hundred
times as much ! There could be few more tearful
sights — and Heaven forgive us, if a smile insist on
mingling with our conception of it ! — few sights with
truer pathos in them, than Hepzibah presented, on
that first afternoon.

How patiently did she endeavour to wrap Clifford
up in her great, warm love, and make it all the world
to him, so that he should retain no torturing sense
of the coldness and dreariness without ! Her little
efforts to amuse him ! How pitiful, yet magnanimous,
they were !

Remembering his early love of poetry and fiction,
she unlocked the bookcase, and took down several
books that had been excellent reading in their day.
There was a volume of Pope, with the Rape of the
Lock in it, and another of the Taller, and an odd one
of Dryden's Miscellanies^ all with tarnished gilding
on their covers, and thoughts of tarnished brilliancy
inside. They had no success with Clifford. These,
and all such writers of society, whose new works
glow like the rich texture of a just-woven carpet,
must be content to relinquish their charm, for every
reader, after an age or two ; and could hardly be
supposed to retain any portion of it for a mind that
had utterly lost its estimate of modes and manners.

CLIFFORD AND PHGEBE. 163

Hepzibah th'en took up Rasselas, and began to read
of the Happy Valley, with a vague idea that some
secret of a contended life had there been elaborated,
which might at least serve Clifford and herself for
this one day. But the Happy Valley had a cloud
over it. Hepzibah troubled her auditor, moreover, by
innumerable sins of emphasis, which he seemed to
detect, without any reference to the meaning ; nor,
in fact, did he appear to take much note of the sense
of what she read, but evidently felt the tedium of
the lecture, without harvesting its profit. His sister's
voice, too, naturally harsh, had, in the course of her
sorrowrful lifetime, contracted a kind of croak, which,
when it once gets into the human throat, is as ineradi
cable as sin. In both sexes, occasionally, this lifelong
croak, accompanying each word of joy or sorrow,
is one of the symptoms of a settled melancholy ; and,
wherever it occurs, the whole history of misfortune
is conveyed in its slightest accent. The effect is as
if the voice had been dyed black ; or — if we must use
a more moderate simile — this miserable croak, running
through all the variations of the voice, is like a black
silken thread, on which the crystal beads of speech
are strung, and whence they take their hue. Such
voices have put on mourning for dead hopes ; and
they ought to die and be buried along with them !

Discerning that Clifford was not gladdened by
her efforts, Hepzibah searched about the house for
the means of more exhilarating pastime. At one
time, her eyes chanced to rest on Alice Pyncheon's
harpsichord. It was a moment of great peril ; for —
despite the traditionary awe that had gathered over
this instrument of music, and the dirges which spiritual

1 64 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

fingers were said to play on it — the devoted sister
had solemn thoug'hts of thrumming* on its chords for
Clifford's benefit, and accompanying the performance
with her voice. Poor Clifford ! Poor Hepzibah !
Poor harpsichord ! All three would have been
miserable together. By some good agency — possibly
by the unrecognised interposition of the long-buried
Alice herself — the threatening calamity was averted.

But the worst of all — the hardest stroke of fate for
Hepzibah to endure, and perhaps for Clifford too —
was his invincible distaste for her appearance. Her
features, never the most agreeable, and now harsh
with age and grief, and resentment against the world
for his sake ; her dress, and especially her turban ;
the queer and quaint manners, which had unconsciously
grown upon her in solitude ; such being the poor
gentlewoman's outward characteristics, it is no great
marvel, although the mournfullest of pities, that the
instinctive lover of the Beautiful was fain to turn away
his eyes. There was no help for it. It would be the
latest impulse to die within him. In his last extremity,
the expiring breath stealing faintly through Clifford's
lips, he would doubtless press Hepzibah's hand, in
fervent recognition of all her lavished love, and close
his eyes — but not so much to die, as to be constrained
to look no longer on her face ! Poor Hepzibah ! She
took counsel with herself what might be done, and
thought of putting ribbons on her turban ; but, by
the instant rush of several guardian angels, was with
held from an experiment that could hardly have proved
less than fatal to the beloved object of her anxiety.

To be brief, besides Hepzibah's disadvantages of
person, there was an uncouthness pervading all her

CLIFFORD AND PHGEBE. 165

deeds ; a clumsy something, that could but ill adapt
itself for use, and not at all for ornament. She was a
grief to Clifford, and she knew it. In this extremity,
the antiquated virgin turned to Phoebe. No grovelling
jealousy was in her heart. Had it pleased Heaven
to crown the heroic fidelity of her life by making her
personally the medium of Clifford's happiness, it would
have rewarded her for all the past, by a joy with no
bright tints, indeed, but deep and true, and worth a
thousand gayer ecstasies. This could not be. She
therefore turned to Phoebe, and resigned the task into
the young girl's hands. The latter took it up,
cheerfully, as she did everything, but with no sense
of a mission to perform, and succeeding all the better
for that same simplicity.

By the involuntary effect of a genial temperament,
Phoebe soon grew to be absolutely essential to the
daily comfort, if not the daily life, of her two forlorn
companions. The grime and sordidness of the House
of the Seven Gables seemed to have vanished, since
her appearance there ; the gnawing tooth of the dry-
rot was stayed, among the old timbers of its skeleton
frame ; the dust had ceased to settle down so densely,
from the antique ceilings, upon the floors and furniture
of the rooms below ; qr, at any rate, there was a little
housewife, as lightfooted as the breeze that sweeps a
garden walk, gliding hither and thither, to brush it
all away. The shadows of gloomy events, that haunted
the else lonely and desolate apartments ; the heavy,
breathless scent which death had left in more than
one of the bedchambers, ever since his visits of long
ago ; these were less powerful than the purifying
influence scattered throughout the atmosphere of the

1 66 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

household by the presence of one youthful, fresh, and
thoroughly wholesome heart. There was no morbid
ness in Phcebe ; if there had been, the old Pyncheon
House was the very locality to ripen it into incurable
disease. But now her spirit resembled, in its potency,
a minute quantity of ottar of rose in one of Hepzibah's
huge, iron-bound trunks, diffusing its fragrance
through the various articles of linen and wrought-lace,
kerchiefs, caps, stockings, folded dresses, gloves, and
whatever else was treasured there. As every article
in the great trunk was the sweeter for the rose-scent,
so did all the thoughts and emotions of Hepzibah and
Clifford, sombre as they might seem, acquire a subtle
attribute of happiness from Phoebe's intermixture with
them. Her activity of body, intellect, and heart,
impelled her continually to perform the ordinary little
toils that offered themselves around her, and to think
the thought proper for the moment, and to sympathise
— now with the twittering gaiety of the robins in the
pear-tree, and now to such a depth as she could with
Hepzibah's dark anxiety, or the vague moan of her
brother. This facile adaptation was at once the
symptom of perfect health, and its best preservative.

A nature like Phoebe's has invariably its due influence,
but is seldom regarded with due honour. Its spiritual
force, however, may be partially estimated by the fact
of her having found a place for herself, amid circum
stances so stern as those which surrounded the mistress
of the house ; and also by the effect which she pro
duced on a character of so much more mass than her
own. For the gaunt, bony frame and limbs of
Hepzibah, as compared with the tiny lightsomeness
of Phcebe's figure, were perhaps in some fit proportion

CLIFFORD AND PHOEBE. 167

with the moral weight and substance, respectively, of
the woman and the girl.

To the guest — to Hepzibah's brother — or Cousin
Clifford, as Phoebe now began to call him — she was
especially necessary. Not that he could ever be said
to converse with her, or often manifest, in any other
very definite mode, his sense of a charm in her society.
But, if she were a long while absent, he became pettish
and nervously restless, pacing the room to and fro,
with the uncertainty that characterised all his move
ments ; or else would sit broodingly in his great chair,
resting his head on his hands, and evincing life only
by an electric sparkle of ill-humour, whenever Hepzibah
endeavoured to arouse him. Phoebe's presence, and
the contiguity of her fresh life to his blighted one, was
usually all that he required. Indeed, such was the
native gush and play of her spirit, that she was seldom
perfectly quiet and undemonstrative, any more than a
fountain ever ceases to dimple and .warble with its
flow. She possessed the gift of song, and that, too,
so naturally, that you would as little think of inquiring
whence she had caught it, or what master had taught
her, as of asking the same questions about a bird, in
whose small strain of music we recognise the voice of
the Creator as distinctly as in the loudest accents of
His thunder. So long as Phoebe sang, she might stray
at her own will about the house. Clifford was content,
whether the sweet, airy homeliness of her tones came
down from the upper chambers, or along the passage
way from the shop, or was sprinkled through the
foliage of the pear-tree, inward from the garden, with
the twinkling sunbeams. He would sit quietly, with
a gentle pleasure gleaming over his face, brighter

i68 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

now, and now a little dimmer, as the song happened
to float near him, or was more remotely heard. It
pleased him best, however, when she sat on a low
footstool at his knee.

It is perhaps remarkable, considering her tempera
ment, that Phoebe oftener chose a strain of pathos
than of gaiety. But the young and happy are not
ill pleased to temper their life with a transparent
shadow. The deepest pathos of Phoebe's voice and
song, moreover, came sifted through the golden
texture of a cheery spirit, and was somehow so
interfused with the quality thence acquired, that one's
heart felt all the lighter for having wept at it. Broad
mirth, in the sacred presence of dark misfortune,
would have jarred harshly and irreverently with the
solemn symphony that rolled its undertone through
Hepzibah's and her brother's life. Therefore, it was
well that Phoebe so often chose sad themes, and not
amiss that they, ceased to be so sad while she was
singing them.

Becoming habituated to her companionship, Clifford
readily showed how capable of imbibing pleasant
tints and gleams of cheerful light from all quarters
his nature must originally have been. He grew
youthful, while she sat by him. A beauty — not
precisely real, even in its utmost manifestation,
and which a painter would have watched long to
seize and fix upon his canvas, and, after all, in
vain — beauty, nevertheless, that was not a mere
dream, would sometimes play upon and illuminate his
face. It did more than to illuminate ; it transfigured
him with an expression that could only be interpreted
as the glow of an exquisite and happy spirit. That

CLIFFORD AND PHCEBE. 169

gray hair, and those furrows — with their record of
infinite sorrow, so deeply written across his brow,
and so compressed, as with a futile effort to crowd
in all the tale, that the whole inscription was made
illegible — these, for the moment, vanished. An eye,
at once tender and acute, might have beheld in the
rnan some shadow of what he was meant to be.
Anon, as age came stealing, like a sad twilight,
back over his figure, you would have felt tempted
to hold an argument with Destiny, and affirm, that
either this being should not have been made mortal,
or mortal existence should have been tempered to
his qualities. There seemed no necessity for his
having drawn breath, at all — the world never
wanted him — but, as he had breathed, it ought
always to have been the balmiest of summer air.
The same perplexity will invariably haunt us with
regard to natures that tend to feed exclusively upon
the Beautiful, let their earthly fate be as lenient as
it may.

Phoebe, it is probable, had but a very imperfect
comprehension of the character over which she had
thrown so beneficent a spell. Nor was it necessary.
The fire upon the hearth can gladden a whole semi
circle of faces round about it, but need not know the
individuality of one among them all. Indeed, there
was something too fine and delicate in Clifford's
traits to be perfectly appreciated by one whose
sphere lay so much in the Actual as Phoebe's did.
For Clifford, however, the reality, and simplicity,
and thorough homeliness, of the girl's nature, were
as powerful a charm as any that she possessed.
Beauty, it is true, and beauty almost perfect in its

H.S.G. F2

170 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

own style, was indispensable. Had Phoebe been
coarse in feature, shaped clumsily, of a harsh voice,
and uncouthly mannered, she might have been rich
with all good gifts, beneath this unfortunate exterior,
and still, so long as she wore the guise of woman,
she would have shocked Clifford, and depressed him
by her lack of beauty. But nothing more beautiful —
nothing prettier, at least — was ever made than
Phcebe. And, therefore, to this man — whose whole
poor and impalpable enjoyment of existence, hereto
fore, and until both his heart and fancy died within
him, had been a dream — whose images of women
had more and more lost their warmth and substance,
and been frozen, like the pictures of secluded artists,
into the chillest ideality — to him, this little figure of
the cheeriest household life was just what he required
to bring him back into the breathing world. Persons
who have wandered, or been expelled, out of the
common track of things, even were it for a better
system, desire nothing so much as to be led back.
They shiver in their loneliness, be it on a mountain-
top or in a dungeon. Now, Phoebe's presence made
a home about her — that very sphere which the
outcast, the prisoner, the potentate — the wretch
beneath mankind, the wretch aside from it, or the
wretch above it — instinctively pines after — a home !
She was real ! Holding her hand, you felt something ;
a tender something ; a substance, and a warm one :
and so long as you should feel its grasp, soft as it
was, you might be certain that your place was good
in the whole sympathetic chain of human nature.
The world was no longer a delusion.

By looking a little further in this direction, we

CLIFFORD AND PHCEBE. 171

might suggest an explanation of an often-suggested
mystery. Why are poets so apt to choose their
mates, not for any similarity of poetic endowment,
but for qualities which might make the happiness of
the rudest handicraftsman as well as that of the
ideal craftsman of the spirit? Because, probably, at
his highest elevation, the poet needs no human
intercourse ; but he finds it dreary to descend, and
be a stranger.

There was something very beautiful in the relation
that grew up between this pair, so closely and
constantly linked together, yet with such a waste of
gloomy and mysterious years from his birthday to
hers. On Clifford's part, it was the feeling of a man
naturally endowed with the liveliest sensibility to
feminine influence, but who had never quaffed the
cup of passionate love, and knew that it was now
too late. He knew it, with the instinctive delicacy
that had survived his intellectual decay. Thus, his
sentiment for Phoebe, without being paternal, was
not less chaste than if she had been his daughter.
He was a man, it is true, and recognised her as
a woman. She was his only representative of
womankind. He took unfailing note of every charm
that appertained to her sex, and saw the ripeness of
her lips, and the virginal development of her bosom.
All her little womanly ways, budding out of her like
blossoms on a young fruit-tree, had their effect on
him, and sometimes caused his very heart to tingle
with the keenest thrills of pleasure. At such
moments — for the effect was seldom more than
momentary — the half-torpid man would be full of
harmonious life, just as a long-silent harp is full of

172 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES,

sound, when the musician's fingers sweep across it.
But, after all, it seemed rather a perception, or a
sympathy, than a sentiment belonging- to himself as
an individual. He read Phoebe, as he would a sweet
and simple story ; he listened to her, as if she were
a verse of household poetry, which God, in requital
of his bleak and dismal lot, had permitted some
angel, that most pitied him, to warble through the
house. She was not an actual fact for him, but
the interpretation of all that he had lacked on earth,
brought warmly home to his conception ; so that
this mere symbol, or lifelike picture, had almost the
comfort of reality.

But we strive in vain to put the idea into words.
No adequate expression of the beauty and profound
pathos with which it impresses us is attainable. This
being, made only for happiness, and heretofore so
miserably failing to be happy — his tendencies so
hideously thwarted, that, some unknown time ago,
the delicate springs of his character, never morally
or intellectually strong, had given way, and he was
now imbecile — this poor, forlorn voyager from the
Islands of the Blest, in a frail bark, on a tempestuous
sea, had been flung, by the last mountain-wave of
his shipwreck, into a quiet harbour. There, as he
lay more than half lifeless on the strand, the
fragrance of an earthly rose-bud had come to his
nostrils, and, as odours will, had summoned up
reminiscences or visions of all the living and breathing
beauty amid which he should have had his home.
With his native susceptibility of happy influences,
he inhales the slight, ethereal rapture into his soul,
and expires !

CLIFFORD AND PHGEBE. 173

And how did Phoebe regard Clifford? The girl's
was not one of those natures which are most
attracted by what is strange and exceptional in
human character. The path which would best have
suited her was the well-worn track of ordinary life ;
the companions in whom she would most have
delighted were such as one encounters at every
turn. The mystery which enveloped Clifford, so far
as it affected her at all, was an annoyance, rather
than the piquant charm which many women might
have found in it. Still, her native kindliness was
brought strongly into play, not by what was darkly
picturesque in his situation, nor so much, even, by
the finer grace of his character, as by the simple
appeal of a heart so forlorn as his to one so full
of genuine sympathy as hers. She gave him an
affectionate regard, because he needed so much
love, and seemed to have received so little. With
a ready tact, the result of ever-active and wholesome
sensibility, she discerned what was good for him
and did it. Whatever was morbid in his mind and
experience, she ignored ; and thereby kept their
intercourse healthy, by the incautious, but, as it
were, heaven-directed freedom of her whole conduct.
The sick in mind, , and, perhaps, in body, are
rendered more darkly and hopelessly so, by the
manifold reflection of their disease, mirrored back
from all quarters, in the deportment of those about
them ; they are compelled to inhale the poison of
their own breath, in infinite repetition. But Phoebe
afforded her poor patient a supply 6iT purer air.
She impregnated it, too, not with a wild-flower scent,
— for wildness was no trait of hers — but with the

174 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

perfume of garden-roses, pinks, and other blossoms
of much sweetness, which nature and man have
consented together in making grow, from summer
to summer, and from century to century. Such
a flower was Phcebe, in her relation with Clifford,
and such the delight that he inhaled from her.

Yet, it must be said, her petals sometimes drooped
a little, in consequence of the heavy atmosphere about
her. She grew more thoughtful than heretofore.
Looking aside at Clifford's face, and seeing the
dim, unsatisfactory elegance, and the intellect almost
quenched, she would try to inquire what had been
his life. Was he always thus? Had this veil been
over him from his birth ? — this veil, under which
far more of his spirit was hidden than revealed,
and through which he so imperfectly discerned the
actual world — or was its gray texture woven of
some dark calamity? Phoebe loved no riddles, and
would have been glad to escape the perplexity of
this one. Nevertheless, there was so far a good
result of her meditations on Clifford's character that,
when her involuntary conjectures, together with the
tendency of every strange circumstance to tell its
own story, had gradually taught her the fact, it
had no terrible effect upon her. Let the world have
done him what vast wrong it might, she knew
Cousin Clifford too well — or fancied so — ever to
shudder at the touch of his thin, delicate fingers.

Within a few days after the appearance of this
remarkable inmate, the routine of life had estab
lished itself with a good deal of uniformity in the
old house of our narrative. In the morning, very
shortly after breakfast, it was Clifford's custom to

THE PYNCr^EON GARDEN. 175

fall asleep in his chair ; nor, unless accidentally
disturbed, would he emerge from a dense cloud of
slumber, or the thinner mists that flitted to and
fro, until well towards noonday. These hours of
drowsy head were the season of the old gentle
woman's attendance on her brother, while Phcebe
took charge of the shop ; an arrangement which
the public speedily understood, and evinced their
decided preference of the younger shopwoman by
the multiplicity of their calls during her administra
tion of affairs. Dinner over, Hepzibah took her
knitting-work — a long stocking of gray yarn, for
her brother's winter wear — and with a sigh, and a
scowl of affectionate farewell to Clifford, and a
gesture enjoining watchfulness on Phcebe, went to
take her seat behind the counter. It was now the
young girl's turn to be the nurse — the guardian,
the playmate — or whatever is the fitter phrase — of
the gray-haired man.

X.

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN.

CLIFFORD, except for Phcebe's more active instiga
tion, would ordinarily have yielded to the torpor
which had crept through all his modes of being,
and which sluggishly counselled him to sit in his
morning chair till eventide. But the girl seldom
failed to propose a removal to the garden, where
Uncle Venner and the daguerreotypist had made such
repairs on the roof of the ruinous arbour, or summer-
house, that it was now a sufficient shelter from
sunshine and casual showers. The hop-vine, too,

176 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

had begun to grow luxuriantly over the sides of
the little edifice, and made an interior of verdant
seclusion, with innumerable peeps and glimpses into
the wider solitude of the garden.

Here, sometimes, in this green play-place of
flickering light, Phcebe read to Clifford. Her
acquaintance, the artist, who appeared to have a
literary turn, had supplied her with works of fiction,
in pamphlet form, and a few volumes of poetry,
in altogether a different style and taste from those
which Hepzibah selected for his amusement. Small
thanks were due to the books, however, if the girl's
readings were in any degree more successful than
her elderly cousin's. Phoebe's voice had always a
pretty music in it, and could either enliven Clifford
by its sparkle and gaiety of tone, or soothe him
by a continued flow of pebbly and brook-like
cadences. But the fictions — in which the country-
g-irl, unused to works of that nature, often became
deeply absorbed — interested her strange auditor
very little, or not at all. Pictures of life, scenes
of passion or sentiment, wit, humour, and pathos,
were all thrown away, or worse than thrown away,
on Clifford ; either because he lacked an experience
by which to test their truth, or because his own
griefs were a touchstone of reality that few feig'ned
emotions could withstand. When Phoebe broke into
a peal of merry laughter at what she read, he
would now and then laugh for sympathy, but
oftener respond with a troubled, questioning look.
If a tear — a maiden's sunshiny tear, over imaginary
woe — dropped upon some melancholy page, Clifford
either took it as a token of actual calamity, or else

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 177

grew peevish, and angrily motioned her to close
the volume. And wisely, too ! Is not the world
sad enough, in genuine earnest, without making" a,
pastime of mock sorrows ?

With poetry, it was rather better. He delighted
in the swell and subsidence of the rhythm, and the
happily-recurring rhyme. Nor was Clifford incapable
of feeling the sentiment of poetry — not, perhaps,
where it was highest or deepest, but where it was
most flitting and ethereal. It was impossible to
foretell in what exquisite verse the awakening spell
might lurk ; but, on raising her eyes from the page
to Clifford's face, Phoebe would be made aware, by
the light breaking through it, that a more delicate
intelligence than her own had caught a lambent
flame from what she read. One glow of this kind,
however, was often the precursor of gloom for many
hours afterwards ; because, when the glow left him,
he seemed conscious of a missing sense and power,
and groped about for them, as if a blind man should
go seeking his lost eyesight.

It pleased him more, and was better for his inward
welfare, that Phoebe should talk, and make passing
occurrences vivid to his mind by her accompanying
description and remarks. The life of the garden
offered topics enough for such discourse as suited
Clifford best. He never failed to inquire what
flowers had bloomed since yesterday. His feeling
for flowers was very exquisite, and seemed not so
much a taste as an emotion ; he was fond of sitting
with one in his hand, intently observing it, and
looking from its petals into Phoebe's face, as if the
garden-flower were the sister of the household-

178 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

maiden. Not merely was there a delight in the
flower's perfume, or pleasure in its beautiful form,
and the delicacy or brightness of its hue ; but
Clifford's enjoyment was accompanied with a per
ception of life, character, and individuality, that
made him love these blossoms of the garden, as if
they were endowed with sentiment and intelligence.
This affection and sympathy for flowers is almost
exclusively a woman's trait. Men, if endowed with
it by nature, soon lose, forget, and learn to despise
it, in their contact with coarser things than flowers.
Clifford, too, had long forgotten it ; but found it
again, now, as he slowly revived from the chill
torpor of his life.

It is wonderful how many pleasant incidents
continually came to pass in that secluded garden-
spot, when once Phoebe had set herself to look for
them. She had seen or heard a bee there, on the
first day of her acquaintance with the place. And
often — almost continually, indeed — since then, the
bees kept coming thither, Heaven knows why, or by
what pertinacious desire for far-fetched sweets, when,
no doubt, there were broad clover-fields, and all
kinds of garden growth, much nearer home than
this. Thither the bees came, however, and plunged
into the squash-blossoms, as if there was no other
squash-vines within a long day's flight, or as if the
soil of Hepzibah's garden gave its productions just
the very quality which these laborious little wizards
wanted, in order to impart the Hymettus odour to
their whole hive of New England honey. When
Clifford heard their sunny, buzzing murmur, in the
heart of the great yellow blossoms, he looked about

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 179

him with a joyful sense of warmth, and blue sky,
and green grass, and of God's free air in the whole
height from earth to heaven. After all, there need
be no question why the bees came to that one green
nook, in the dusty town. God sent them thither,
to gladden our poor Clifford. They brought the rich
summer with them, in requital of a little honey.

When the bean-vines began to flower on the poles,
there was one particular variety which bore a vivid
scarlet blossom. The daguerreotypist had found
these beans in a garret, over one of the seven gables,
treasured up in an old chest of drawers, by some
horticultural Pyncheon of days gone by, who, doubt
less, meant to sow them the next summer, but was
himself first sown in Death's garden-ground. By
way of testing whether there was still a living germ
in such ancient seeds, Holgrave had planted some
of them ; and the result of his experiment was a
splendid row of bean-vines, clambering, early, to the
full height of the poles, and arraying them, from
top to bottom, in a spiral profusion of red blossoms.
And, ever since the unfolding of the first bud, a
multitude of humming - birds had been attracted
thither. At times, it seemed as if for every one of
the hundred blossoms there was one of these tiniest
fowls of the air ; a thumb's bigness of burnished
plumage, hovering and vibrating about the bean
poles. It was with indescribable interest, and even
more than childish delight, that Clifford watched the
humming-birds. He used to thrust his head softly
out of the arbour, to see them the better ; all the
while, too, motioning Phcebe to be quiet, and snatch
ing glimpses of the smile upon her face, so as to

i8o HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

heap his enjoyment up the higher with her sympathy.
He had not merely grown young- ; he was a child
again.

Hepzibah, whenever she happened to witness one
of these fits of miniature enthusiasm, would shake
her head, with a strange mingling of the mother
and sister, and of pleasure and sadness, in her aspect.
She said that it had always been thus with Clifford,
when the humming-birds came — always, from his
babyhood — and that his delight in them had been
one of the earliest tokens by which he showed his
love for beautiful things. And it was a wonderful
coincidence, the good lady thought, that the artist
should have planted these scarlet-flowering beans —
which the humming-birds sought far and wide, and
which had not grown in the Pyncheon garden before
for forty years — on the very summer of Clifford's
return.

Then would the tears stand in poor Hepzibah's
eyes, or overflow them with a too abundant gush,
so that she was fain to betake herself into some
corner, lest Clifford should espy her agitation.
Indeed, all the enjoyments of this period were
provocative of tears. Coming so late as it did, it
was a kind of Indian summer, with a mist in its
balmiest sunshine, and decay and death in its
gaudiest delight. The more Clifford seemed to taste
the happiness of a child, the sadder was the difference
to be recognised. With a mysterious and terrible
Past, which had annihilated his memory, and a blank
Future before him, he had only this visionary and
impalpable Now, which, if you once look closely at
it, is nothing. He himself, as was perceptible by

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 181

many symptoms, lay darkly behind his pleasure, and
knew it to be a baby-play, which he was to toy and
trifle with, instead of thoroughly believing-. Clifford
saw, it may be, in the mirror of his deeper conscious
ness, that he was an example and representative of
that great class of people whom an inexplicable
Providence is continually putting at cross-purposes
with the world ; breaking what seems its own
promise in their nature ; withholding their proper
food, and setting poison before them for a banquet ;
and thus — when it might so easily, as one would
think, have been adjusted otherwise — making their
existence a strangeness, a solitude, arid torment.
All his life long, he had been learning how to be
wretched, as one learns a foreign tongue ; and now,
with the lesson thoroughly at heart, he could
with difficulty comprehend his little airy happiness.
Frequently, there was a dim shadow of doubt in his
eyes. "Take my hand, Phoebe," he would sayT"
"and pinch it hard with your little fingers! Give
me a rose, that I may press its thorns, and prove
myself awake, by the sharp touch of pain ! "
Evidently, he desired this prick of a trifling anguish,
in order to assure himself, by that quality which
he best knew to be real, that the garden, and the
seven weather-beaten gables, and Hepzibah's scowl
and Phoebe's smile were real likewise. Without this
signet in his flesh, he could have attributed no more
substance to them than to the empty confusion of
imaginary scenes with which he had fed his spirit, ,
until even that poor sustenance was exhausted.

The author needs great faith in his reader's ^
sympathy ; else he must hesitate to give details so

182 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

minute, and incidents apparently so trifling, as are
essential to make up the idea of this garden-life.
It was the Eden of a thunder-smitten Adam, who
had fled for refuge thither out of the same dreary
and perilous wilderness into which the original Adam
was expelled.

One of the available means of amusement, of which
Phcebe made the most, in Clifford's behalf, was that
feathered society, the hens, a breed of whom, as
we have already said, was an immemorial heirloom
in the Pyncheon family. In compliance with a whim
of Clifford, as it troubled him to see them in con
finement, they had been set at liberty, and now
roamed at will about the garden ; doing some little
mischief, but hindered from escape by buildings,
on three sides, and the difficult peaks of a wooden
fence, on the other. They spent much of their
abundant leisure on the margin of Maule's Well,
which was haunted by a kind of snail, evidently
a titbit to their palates ; and the brackish water
itself, however nauseous to the rest of the world,
was so greatly esteemed by these fowls, that they
might be seen tasting, turning up their heads, and
smacking their bills, with precisely the air of wine-
bibbers round a probationary cask. Their generally
quiet, yet often brisk, and constantly diversified talk,
one to another, or sometimes in soliloquy — as they
scratched worms out of the rich, black soil, or
pecked at such plants as suited their taste — had
such a domestic tone, that it was almost a wonder
why you could not establish a regular interchange
of ideas about household matters, human and galli
naceous. All hens are well worth studying, for the

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 183

piquancy and rich variety of their manners ; but
by no possibility can there have been other fowls
of such odd appearance and deportment as these
ancestral ones. They probably embodied the tradi
tionary peculiarities of their whole line of progenitors,
derived through an unbroken succession of eggs ;
or else this individual Chanticleer and his two wives
had grown to be humorists, and a little crack-
brained withal, on account of their solitary way of
life, and out of sympathy for Hepzibah, their
lady-patroness.

Queerly, indeed, they looked ! Chanticleer himself,
though stalking on two stilt-like legs, with the
dignity of interminable descent in all its gestures,
was hardly bigger than an ordinary partridge ; his
two wives were about the size of quails ; and as
for the one chicken, it looked small enough to be
still in the egg, and, at the same time, sufficiently
old, withered, wizened, and experienced, to have
been the founder of the antiquated race. Instead
of being the youngest of the family, it rather seemed
to have aggregated into itself the ages, not only
of these living specimens of the breed, but of all its
forefathers and foremothers, whose united excellences
and oddities were squeezed into its little body. Its
mother evidently regarded it as the one chicken of
the world, and as necessary, in fact, to the world's
continuance, or, at any rate, to the equilibrium of
the present system of affairs, whether in Church or
state. No lesser sense of the infant fowl's import
ance could have justified, even in a mother's eyes,
the perseverance with which she watched over its
safety, ruffling her small person to twice its proper

184 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

size, and flying- in everybody's face that so much
as looked towards her hopeful progeny. No lower
estimate could have vindicated the indefatigable zeal
with which she scratched, and her unscrupulousness
in digging up the choicest flower or vegetable
for the sake of the fat earth-worm at its root ; her
nervous cluck, when the chicken happened to be
hidden in the long grass or under the squash-leaves ;
her gentle croak of satisfaction, while sure of it
beneath her wing- ; her note of ill-concealed fear
and obstreperous defiance, when she saw her arch
enemy, a neighbour's cat, on the top of the high
fence ; one or other of these sounds was to be
heard at almost every moment of the day. By
degrees, the observer came to feel nearly as much
interest in this chicken of illustrious race as the
mother-hen did.

Phcebe, after getting1 well acquainted with the
old hen, was sometimes permitted to take the
chicken in her hand, which was quite capable of
grasping its cubic inch or two of body. While she
curiously examined its hereditary marks — the peculiar
speckle of its plumage, the funny tuft on its head,
and a knob on each of its legs — the little biped,
as she insisted, kept giving her a sagacious wink.
The daguerreotypist once whispered her that these
marks betokened the oddities of the Pyncheon family,
and that the chicken itself was a symbol of the life
of the old house, embodying- its interpretation, like
wise, although an unintelligible one, as such clues
generally are. It was a feathered riddle ; a mystery
hatched out of an egg, and just as mysterious as
if the egg had been addle !

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 185

The second of Chanticleer's two wives, ever since
Phcebe's arrival, had been in a state of heavy
despondency, caused, as it afterwards appeared, by
her inability to lay an egg". One day, however,
by her self-important gait, the side-way turn of
her head, and the cock of her eye, as she pried
into one and another nook of the garden — croaking
to herself, all the while, with inexpressible com
placency — it was made evident that this identical
hen, much as mankind undervalued her, carried
something about her person, the worth of which
was not to be estimated either in gold or precious
stones. Shortly after, there was a prodigious
cackling and gratulation of Chanticleer and all his
family, including the wizened chicken, who appeared
to understand the matter quite as well as did his
sire, his mother, or his aunt. That afternoon Phcebe
found a diminutive egg — not in the regular nest —
it was far too precious to be trusted there — but
cunningly hidden under the currant-bushes, on some
dry stalks of last year's grass. Hepzibah, on
learning- the fact, took possession of the egg and
appropriated it to Clifford's breakfast, on account
of a certain delicacy of flavour, for which, as she
affirmed, these eggs had always been famous. Thus
unscrupulously did the old gentlewoman sacrifice
the continuance, perhaps, of an ancient feathered
race, with no better end than to supply her brother
with a dainty that hardly filled the bowl of a tea
spoon ! It must have been in reference to this
outrage that Chanticleer, the next day, accompanied
by the bereaved mother of the egg, took his post
jn front of Phcebe and Clifford, and delivered himself

i86 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

of a harangue that might have proved as long as
his own pedigree, but for a fit of merriment on
Phoebe's part. Hereupon, the offended fowl stalked
away on his long stilts, and utterly withdrew his
notice from Phoebe and the rest of human nature,
until she made her peace with an offering of spice-
cake, which, next to snails, was the delicacy most
in favour with his aristocratic taste.

We linger too long, no doubt, beside this paltry
rivulet of life that flowed through the garden of
the Pyncheon House. But we deem it pardonable to
record these mean incidents, and poor delights,
because they proved so greatly to Clifford's benefit.
They had the earth-smell in them, and contributed
to give him health and substance. Some of his
occupations wrought less desirably upon him. He
had a singular propensity, for example, to hang
over Maule's Well, and look at the constantly shift
ing phantasmagoria of figures produced by the
agitation of the water over the mosaic-work of
coloured pebbles at the bottom. He said that faces
looked upward to him there — beautiful faces, arrayed
in bewitching smiles — each momentary face so fair
and rosy, and every smile so sunny, that he felt
wronged at its departure, until the same flitting
witchcraft made a new one. But sometimes he would
suddenly cry out, "The dark face gazes at me!"
and be miserable the whole day afterwards. Phoebe,
when she hung over the fountain by Clifford's side,
could see nothing of all this — neither the beauty nor
the ugliness — but only the coloured pebbles, looking
as if the gush of the water shook and disarranged
them. And the dark face, that so troubled Clifford,

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 187

was no more than the shadow thrown from a branch
of one of the damson-trees, and breaking" the inner
light of Maule's Well. The truth was, however,
that his fancy— reviving- faster than his will and
judgment, and always stronger than they — created
shapes of loveliness that were symbolic of his native
character, and now and then a stern and dreadful
shape, that typified his fate.

On Sundays, after Phoebe had been at Church — for
the girl had a church-going1 conscience, and would
hardly have been at ease had she missed either
prayer, singing*, sermon, or benediction — after church-
time, therefore, there was, ordinarily, a sober little
festival in the garden. In addition to Clifford,
Hepzibah, and Phcebe, two guests made up the
company. One was the artist, Holgrave, who, in
spite of his consociation with reformers, and his
other queer and questionable traits, continued to
hold an elevated place in Hepzibah's regard. The
other, we are almost ashamed to say, was the
venerable Uncle Venner, in a clean shirt, and a
broadcloth coat, more respectable than his ordinary
wear, inasmuch as it was neatly patched on each
elbow, and might be called an entire garment, except
for a slight inequality in the length of its skirts.
Clifford, on several occasions, had seemed to enjoy
the old man's intercourse, for the sake of his mellow,
cheerful vein, which was like the sweet flavour of
a frost-bitten apple, such as one picks up under the
tree in December. A man at the very lowest point
of the social scale was easier and more agreeable
for the fallen gentleman to encounter than a person
at any of the intermediate degrees ; and, moreover,

1 88 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

as Clifford's young* manhood had been lost, he was
fond of feeling- himself comparatively youthful, now
in apposition with the patriarchal age of Uncle
Venner. In fact, it was sometimes observable that
Clifford half wilfully hid from himself the conscious
ness of being* stricken in years, and cherished visions
of an earthly future still before him ; visions, however,
too indistinctly drawn to be followed by disappoint
ment — though, doubtless, by depression — when any
casual incident or recollection made him sensible
of the withered leaf.

So this oddly-composed little social party used to
assemble under the ruinous arbour. Hepzibah —
stately as ever, at heart, and yielding- not an inch
of her old gentility, but resting- upon it so much
the more, as justifying a princess-like condescension
— exhibited a not ungraceful hospitality. She talked
kindly to the vagrant artist, and took sage counsel —
lady as she was — with the wood-sawyer, the messenger
of everybody's petty errands, the patched philosopher.
And Uncle Venner, who had studied the world at
street corners, and at other posts equally well
adapted for just observation, was as ready to give
out his wisdom as a town pump to give water.

"Miss Hepzibah, ma'am," said he once, after
they had all been cheerful together, " I really enjoy
these quiet little meetings of a Sabbath afternoon.
They are very much like what I expect to have, after
I retire to my farm ! "

" Uncle Venner," observed Clifford, in a drowsy,
inward tone, "is always talking about his farm.
But I have a better scheme for him, by and by. We
shall see ! "

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 189

"Ah, Mr. Clifford Pyncheon ! " said the man of
patches, "you may scheme for me as much as you
please ; but I'm not going to give up this one scheme
of my own, even if I never bring it really to pass.
It does seem to me that men make a wonderful
mistake in trying to heap up property upon property.
If I had done so, I should feel as if Providence was
not bound to take care of me ; and, at all events,
the city wouldn't be ! I'm one of those people who
think that infinity is big enough for us all — and
eternity long enough ! "

"Why, so they are, Uncle Venner," remarked
Phoebe, after a pause ; for she had been trying* to
fathom the profundity and appositeness of this con
cluding apothegm. '* But, for this short life of ours,
one would like a house and a moderate garden-spot
of one's own."

t( It appears to me," said the daguerreotypist,
smiling, "that Uncle Venner has the principles of
P'ourier at the bottom of his wisdom ; only they have
not quite so much distinctness, in his mind, as in
that of the systematising Frenchman."

"Come, Phoebe," said Hepzibah, "it is time to
bring the currants."

And then, while the yellow richness of the declining
sunshine still fell into the open space of the garden,
Phoebe brought out a loaf of bread, and a china bowl
of currants, freshly gathered from the bushes, and
crushed with sugar. These, with water — but not
from the fountain of ill omen, close at hand — con
stituted all the entertainment. Meanwhile, Holgrave
took some pains to establish an intercourse with
Clifford, actuated, it might seem, entirely by an

IQO HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

impulse of kindliness, in order that the present hour
might be cheerfuller than most which the poor recluse
had spent, or was destined yet to spend. Neverthe
less, in the artist's deep, thoughtful, all-observant
eyes, there was, now and then, an expression, not
sinister, but questionable ; as if he had some other
interest in the scene than a stranger, a youthful and
unconnected adventurer, might be supposed to have.
With great mobility of outward mood, however, he
applied himself to the task of enlivening the party ;
and with so much success, that even dark-hued
Hepzibah threw off one tint of melancholy, and made
what shift she could with the remaining portion.
Phoebe said to herself, " How pleasant he can be ! ''
As for Uncle Venner, as a mark of friendship and
approbation, he readily consented to afford the young
man his countenance in the way of his profession —
not metaphorically, be it understood, but literally,
by allowing a daguerreotype of his face, so familiar
to the towrn, to be exhibited at the entrance of
Holgrave's studio.

Clifford, as the company partook of their little
banquet, grew to be the gayest of them all. Either
it was one of those up-quivering flashes of the spirit,
to which minds in an abnormal state are liable, or
else the artist had subtly touched some chord that
made musical vibration. Indeed, what with the
pleasant summer evening, and the sympathy of this
little circle of not unkindly souls, it was perhaps
natural that a character so susceptible as Clifford's
should become animated, and show itself readily re
sponsive to what was said around him. But he gave
out his own thoughts, likewise, with an airy and

THE PYNCHEON GARDEN. 191

fanciful glow ; so that they glistened, as it were,
through the arbour, and made their escape among the
interstices of the foliage. He had been as cheerful,
no doubt, while alone with Phcebe, but never with
such tokens of acute, although partial intelligence.

But, as the sunlight left the peaks of the seven
gables, so did the excitement fade out of Clifford's
eyes. He gazed vaguely and mournfully about him,
as if he missed something precious, and missed it
the more drearily for not knowing precisely what it
was.

"I want my happiness!" at last he murmured,
hoarsely and indistinctly, hardly shaping out the
words. " Many, many years have I waited for it !
It is late ! It is late ! I want my happiness ! "

Alas, poor Clifford ! You are old, and worn with
troubles that ought never to have befallen you. You
are partly crazy, and partly imbecile ; a ruin, a failure,
as almost everybody is — though some in less degree,
or less perceptibly, than their fellows. Fate has no
happiness in store for you ; unless your quiet home
in the old family residence with the faithful Hepzibah,
and your long summer afternoons with Phcebe, and
these Sabbath festivals with Uncle Venner and the
daguerreotypist, deserve to be called happiness !
Why not ? If not the thing itself, it is marvellously
like it, and the more so for that ethereal and intan
gible quality which causes it all to vanish, at too
close an introspection. Take it, therefore, while you
may ! Murmur not — question not — but make the
most of it !

I92 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

w XL

THE ARCHED WINDOW.

FROM the inertness, or what we may term the vegeta
tive character, of his ordinary mood, Clifford would
perhaps have been content to spend one day after
another, interminably — or, at least, throughout the
summer-time — in just the kind of life described in
the preceding pages. Fancying, however, that it
might be for his benefit occasionally to diversify the
scene, Phcebe sometimes suggested that he should
look out upon the life of the street. For this purpose,
they used to mount the staircase together, to the
second storey of the house, where, at the termination
of a wide entry, there was an arched window of
uncommonly large dimensions, shaded by a pair of
curtains. It opened above the porch, where there
had formerly been a balcony, the balustrade of which
had long since gone to decay, and been removed.
At this arched window, throwing it open, but keeping
himself in comparative obscurity by means of the
curtain, Clifford had an opportunity of witnessing
such a portion of the great world's movement as
might be supposed to roll through one of the retired
streets of a not very populous city. But he and Phcebe
made a sight as well worth seeing as any that the city
could exhibit. The pale, gray, childish, aged, melan
choly, yet often simply cheerful, and sometimes
delicately intelligent aspect of Clifford, peering from
behind the faded crimson of the curtain — watching
the monotony of everyday occurrences with a kind

H.S.G. "She made a repelling gesture.

5? Pa ge 155.

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 193

of inconsequential interest and earnestness, and, at
every pretty throb of his sensibility, turning" for
sympathy to the eyes of the bright young girl !

If once he were fairly seated at the window, even
Pyncheon Street would hardly be so dull and lonely
but that, somewhere or other along its extent,
Clifford might discover matter to occupy his eye,
and titillate, if not engross, his observation. Things
familiar to the youngest child that had begun its
outlook at existence seemed strange to him. A
cab ; an omnibus, with its populous interior, dropping
here and there a passenger, and picking up another,
and thus typifying that vast rolling vehicle, the
world, the end of whose journey is everywhere and
nowhere ; these objects he followed eagerly with
his eyes, but forgot them, before the dust raised
by the horses and wheels had settled along their
track. As regarded novelties (among which cabs
and omnibuses were to be reckoned), his mind
appeared to have lost its proper gripe and retentive-
ness. Twice or thrice, for example, during the
sunny hours of the day, a water-cart went along
by the Pyncheon House, leaving a broad wake of
moistened earth, instead of the white dust that had
risen at a lady's lightest footfall ; it was like a
summer shower, which the city authorities had
caught and tamed, and compelled it into the
commonest routine of their convenience. With the
water-cart Clifford could never grow familiar ; it
always affected him with just the same surprise as
at first. His mind took an apparently sharp im
pression from it, but lost the recollection of this
perambulatory shower, before its next reappearance,
H.S.G. o

194 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

as completely as did the street itself, along which
the heat so quickly strewed white dust again. It
was the same with the railroad. Clifford could
hear the obstreperous howl of the steam-devil, and,
by leaning a little way from the arched window,
could catch a glimpse of the trains of cars, flashing
a brief transit across the extremity of the street.
The idea of terrible energy, thus forced upon him,
was new at every recurrence, and seemed to affect
him as disagreeably, and with almost as much
surprise, the hundredth time as the first.

Nothing gives a sadder sense of decay than this
loss or suspension of the power to deal with un
accustomed things, and to keep up with the swift
ness of the passing moment. It can merely be a
suspended animation ; for, were the power actually
to perish, there would be little use of immortality.
We are less than ghosts, for the time being,
whenever this calamity befalls us.

Clifford was indeed the most inveterate of con
servatives. All the antique fashions of the street
were dear to him ; even such as were characterised
by a rudeness that would naturally have annoyed
his fastidious senses. He loved the old rumbling
and jolting carts, the former track of which he
still found in his long-buried remembrance, as the
observer of to-day finds the wheel-tracks of ancient
vehicles, in Herculaneum. The butcher's cart, with
its snowy canopy, was an acceptable object ; so
was the fish-cart, heralded by its horn ; so, likewise,
was the countryman's cart of vegetables, plodding
from door to door, with long pauses of the patient
horse, while his owner drove a trade in turnips,

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 195

carrots, summer-squashes, string beans, green peas,
and new potatoes, with half the housewives of the
neighbourhood. The baker's cart, with the harsh
music of its bells, had a pleasant effect on Clifford,
because, as few things else did, it jingled the very
dissonance of yore. One afternoon, a scissor-grinder
chanced to set his wheel agoing under the Pyncheon
elm, and just in front of the arched window.
Children came running with their mothers' scissors,
or the carving-knife, or the paternal razor, or any
thing else that lacked an edge (except, indeed, poor
Clifford's wits), that the grinder might apply the
article to his magic wheel, and give it back as
good as new. Round went the busily-revolving
machinery, kept in motion by the scissor-grinder's
foot, and wore away the hard steel against the
hard stone, whence issued an intense and spiteful
prolongation of a hiss, as fierce as those emitted
by Satan and his compeers in Pandemonium, though
squeezed into smaller compass. It was an ugly
little venomous serpent of a noise, as ever did petty
violence to human ears. But Clifford listened with
rapturous delight. The sound, however disagree
able, had very brisk life in it, and, together with
the circle of curious "children watching the revolu
tions of the wheel, appeared to give him a more
vivid sense of active, bustling, and sunshiny exist
ence, than he had attained in almost any other
way. Nevertheless, its charm lay chiefly in the
past ; for the scissor-grinder's wheel had hissed in
his childish ears.

He sometimes made doleful complaint that there
were no stage-coaches, nowadays. And he asked,

196 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

in an injured tone, what had become of all those
old square-top chaises, with wing's sticking- out on
either side, that used to be drawn by a plough-
horse, and driven by a farmer's wife and daughter,
peddling whortleberries and blackberries, about the
town. Their disappearance made him doubt, he
said, whether the berries had not left off growing
in the broad pastures, and along the shady country
lanes.

But anything that appealed to the sense of beauty,
in however humble a way, did not require to be
recommended by these old associations. This was
observable when one of those Italian boys (who are
rather a modern feature of our streets) came along
with his barrel-organ, and stopped under the wide
and cool shadows of the elm. With his quick pro
fessional eye, he took note of the two faces watching
him from the arched window, and, opening his
instrument, began to scatter its melodies abroad.
He had a monkey on his shoulder, dressed in a
Highland plaid ; and, to complete the sum of splendid
attractions wherewith he presented himself to the
public, there was a company of little figures, whose
sphere and habitation was in the mahogany case
of his organ, and whose principle of life was the
music which the Italian made it his business to
grind out. In all their variety of occupation — the
cobbler, the blacksmith, the soldier, the lady with
her fan, the toper with his bottle, the milkmaid
sitting by her cow — this fortunate little society might
truly be said to enjoy a harmonious existence, and
to make life literally a dance. The Italian turned
a crank ; and behold ! every one of these small

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 197

individuals started into the most curious vivacity.
The cobbler wrought upon a shoe ; the blacksmith
hammered his iron ; the soldier waved his glittering-
blade ; the lady raised a tiny breeze with her fan ;
the jolly toper swigged lustily at his bottle ; a
scholar opened his book, with eager thirst for
knowledge, and turned his head to and fro along
the page ; the milkmaid energetically drained her
cow; and a miser counted gold into his strong-box
— all at the same turning of a crank. Yes ; and,
moved by the self-same impulse, a lover saluted his
mistress on her lips ! Possibly some cynic, at once
merry and bitter, had desired to signify, in this
pantomimic scene, that we mortals, whatever our
business or amusement — however serious, however
trifling — all dance to one identical tune, and, in
spite of our ridiculous activity, bring nothing finally
to pass. For the most remarkable aspect of the
affair was that, at the cessation of the music,
everybody was petrified, at once, from .the most
extravagant life into a dead torpor. Neither was
the cobbler's shoe finished, nor the blacksmith's iron
shaped out ; nor was there a drop less of brandy
in the toper's bottle, nor a drop more of milk in the
milkmaid's pail, nor one additional coin in the
miser's strong-box, nor was the scholar a page
deeper in his book. All were precisely in the same
condition as before they made themselves so ridiculous
by their haste to toil, to enjoy, to accumulate gold,
and to become wise. Saddest of all, moreover, the
lover was none the happier for the maiden's granted
kiss ! But, rather than swallow this last too acrid
ingredient, we reject the whole moral of the show

198 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

The monkey, meanwhile, with a thick tail curling
out into preposterous prolixity from beneath his
tartans, took his station at the Italian's feet. He
turned a wrinkled and abominable little visage to
every passer-by, and to the circle of children that
soon gathered round, and to Hepzibah's shop-door,
and upward to the arched window, whence Phcebe
and Clifford were looking down. Every moment,
also, he took off his Highland bonnet, and performed
a bow and scrape. Sometimes, moreover, he made
personal application to individuals, holding out his
small black palm, and otherwise plainly signifying
his excessive desire for whatever filthy lucre might
happen to be in anybody's pocket. The mean and
low, yet strangely man-like expression of his wilted
countenance ; the prying and crafty glance, that
showed him ready to gripe at every miserable
advantage ; his enormous tail (too enormous to be
decently concealed under his gabardine), and the
devilry of nature which it betokened — take this
monkey just as he was, in short, and you could
desire no better image of the Mammon of copper-
coin, symbolising the grossest form of the love of
money. Neither was there any possibility of satis
fying the covetous little devil. Phcebe threw down
a whole handful of cents, which he picked up with
joyless eagerness, handed them over to the Italian
for safe-keeping, and immediately recommenced a
series of pantominic petitions for more.

Doubtless, more than one New Englander — or,
let him be of what country he might, it is as
likely to be the case — passed by, and threw a look
at the monkey, and went on, without imagining

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 199

how nearly his own moral condition was here
exemplified. Clifford, however, was a being of
another order. He had taken childish delight in
the music, and smiled, too, at the figures which
it set in motion. But, after looking a while at the
long-tailed imp, he was so shocked by his horrible
ugliness, spiritual as well as physical, that he actually
began to shed tears ; a weakness which men of
merely delicate endowments, and destitute of the
fiercer, deeper, and more tragic power of laughter,
can hardly avoid, when the worst and meanest
aspect of life happens to be presented to them.

Pyncheon Street was sometimes enlivened by
spectacles of more imposing pretensions than the
above, and which brought the multitude along
with them. With a shivering repugnance at the
idea of personal contact with the world, a powerful
impulse still seized on Clifford, whenever the rush
and roar of the human tide grew strongly audible
to him. This was made evident, one day, when a
political procession, with hundreds of flaunting
banners, and drums, fifes, clarions, and cymbals,
reverberating between the rows of buildings,
marched all through town, and trailed its length
of trampling footsteps, and most infrequent uproar,
past the ordinarily quiet House of the Seven Gables.
As a mere object of sight, nothing is more deficient
in picturesque features than a procession, seen in
its passage through narrow streets. The spectator
feels it to be fool's play, when he can distinguish
the tedious commonplace of each man's visage, with
the perspiration and weary self-importance on it,
and the very cut of his pantaloons, and the stiffness

200 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

or laxity of his shirt-collar, and the dust on the
back of his black coat, In order to become majestic,
it should be viewed from some vantage-point, as
it rolls its slow and long array through the centre
of a wide plain, or the stateliest public square of
a city ; for then, by its remoteness, it melts all the
petty personalities, of which it is made up, into one
broad mass of existence — one great life — one collected
body of mankind, with a vast, homogeneous spirit
animating it. But, on the other hand, if an
impressible person, standing alone, over the brink
of one of these processions, should behold it, not
in its atoms, but in its aggregate — as a mighty
river of life, massive in its tide, and black with
mystery, and, out of its depths, calling to the
kindred depth within him — then the contiguity
would add to the effect. It might so fascinate
him that he would hardly be restrained from
plunging into the surging stream of human
sympathies.

So it proved with Clifford. He shuddered ; he
grew pale ; he threw an appealing look at Hepzibah
and Phcebe, who were with him at the window.
They comprehended nothing of his emotions, and
supposed him merely disturbed by the unaccustomed
tumult. At last, with tremulous limbs, he started
up, set his foot on the window-sill, and, in an instant
more, would have been in the unguarded balcony.
As it was, the whole procession might have seen him,
a wild, haggard figure, his gray locks floating in the
wind that waved their banners ; a lonely being,
estranged from his race, but now feeling himself
man again, by virtue of the irrepressible instinct that

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 201

possessed him. Had Clifford attained the balcony,
he would probably have leaped into the street ; but
whether impelled by the species of terror that some
times urges its victim over the very precipice which
he shrinks from, or by a natural magnetism, tending
towards the great centre of humanity, it were not
easy to decide. Both impulses might have wrought
on him at once.

But his companions, affrighted by his gesture —
which was that of a man hurried away, in spite of
himself — seized Clifford's garment and held him back.
Hepzibah shrieked. Phoebe, to whom all extrava
gance was a horror, burst into sobs and tears.

" Clifford, Clifford! are you crazy?" cried his
sister.

" i hardly know, Hepzibah," said Clifford, drawing
a long breath. " Fear nothing — it is over now — but
had I taken that plunge, and survived it, methinks
it would have made me another man ! "

Possibly, in some sense, Clifford may have been
right. He needed a shock ; or perhaps he required
to take a deep, deep plunge, into the ocean of human
life, and to sink down and be covered by its pro
foundness, and then to emerge, sobered, invigorated,
restored to the world and to himself. Perhaps,
again, he required nothing less than the great final
remedy — death !

A similar yearning to renew the broken links of
brotherhood with his kind sometimes showed itself
in a milder form ; and once it was made beautiful
by the religion that lay even deeper than itself. In
the incident now to be sketched, there was a touching
recognition, on Clifford's part, of God's care and love

H.S.G. 02

202 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

towards him — towards this poor, forsaken man, who,
if any mortal could, might have been pardoned for
regarding himself as thrown aside, forgotten, and
left to be the sport of some fiend, whose playfulness
was an ecstasy of mischief.

It was the Sabbath morning ; one of those bright,
calm Sabbaths, with its own hallowed atmosphere,
when Heaven seems to diffuse itself over the earth's
face in a solemn smile, no less sweet than solemn.
On such a Sabbath morn, were we pure enough to
be its medium, we should be conscious of the earth's
natural worship ascending through our frames, on
whatever spot of ground we stood. The church-bells,
with various tones, but all in harmony, were calling
out, and responding to one another, " It is the
Sabbath !— The Sabbath !— Yea ; the Sabbath ! "—
and over the whole city the bells scattered the blessed
sounds, now slowly, now with livelier joy, now one
bell alone, now all the bells together, crying
earnestly, " It is the Sabbath!" and flinging their
accents afar off, to melt into the air, and pervade it
with the holy word. The air, with God's sweetest
and tenderest sunshine in it, was meet for mankind
to breath into their hearts, and send it forth again
as the utterance of prayer.

Clifford sat at the window, with Hepzibah, watch
ing the neighbours as they stepped into the street.
All of them, however unspiritual on other days,
were transfigured by the Sabbath influence ; so that
their very garments — whether it were an old man's
decent coat, well brushed for the thousandth time,
or a little boy's first sack and trousers, finished
yesterday by his mother's needle — had somewhat of

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 203

the quality of ascension-robes. Forth, likewise,
from the portal of the old house, stepped Phoebe,
putting* up her small green sunshade, and throwing
upward a glance and smile of parting kindness to
the faces at the arched window. In her aspect there
was a familiar gladness, and a holiness that you
could play with, and yet reverence it as much as
ever. She was like a prayer, offered up in the
homeliest beauty of one's mother-tongue. Fresh
was Phcebe, moreover, and airy and sweet in her
apparel ; as if nothing that she wore — neither her
gown, nor her small straw bonnet, nor her little
kerchief, any more than her snowy stockings — had
ever been put on before ; or, if worn, were all the
fresher for it, and with a fragrance as if they had
lain among the rose-buds.

The girl waved her hand to Hepzibah and Clifford,
and went up the street ; a religion in herself, warm,
simple, true, with a substance that could walk on
earth, and a spirit that was capable of heaven.

" Hepzibah," asked Clifford, after watching Phoebe
to the corner, " do you never go to church ? "

" No, Clifford!" she replied, "not these many,
many years ! "

"Were I to be there," he rejoined, "it seems to
me that I could pray once more, when so many
human souls were praying all around me ! "

She looked into Clifford's face, and beheld there a
soft, natural effusion ; for his heart gushed out, as
it were, and ran over at his eyes, in delightful
reverence for God, and kindly affection for his human
brethren. The emotion communicated itself to
Hepzibah. She yearned to take him by the hand,

204 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and go and kneel down, they two tog-ether — both so
long separate from the world, and, as she now
recognised, scarcely friends with Him above — to
kneel down among- the people, and be reconciled to
God and man at once.

"Dear brother," said she earnestly, "let us go I
We belong- nowhere. We have not a foot of space
in any church to kneel upon ; but let us g-o to
some place of worship, even if we stand in the
broad aisle. Poor and forsaken as we are, some
pew-door will be opened to us ! "

So Hepzibah and her brother made themselves
ready — as ready as they could, in the best of their
old-fashioned garments, which had hung on pegs,
or been laid away in trunks, so long that the damp
ness and mouldy smell of the past was on them —
made themselves ready, in their faded bettermost,
to go to church. They descended the staircase
together — gaunt, sallow Hepzibah, and pale,
emaciated, age-stricken Clifford ! They pulled open
the front door, and stepped across the threshold,
and felt, both of them, as if they were standing in
the presence of the whole world, and with mankind's
great and terrible eye on them alone. The eye of
their Father seemed to be withdrawn, and gave them
no encouragement. The warm, sunny air of the street
made them shiver. Their hearts quaked within them,
at the idea of taking one step further.

" It cannot be, Hepzibah ! — it is too late," said
Clifford, with deep sadness. — "We are ghosts ! We
have no right among human beings — no right
anywhere, but in this old house, which has a
curse on it, and which therefore we are doomed to

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 205

haunt ! And besides," he continued, with a fastidious
sensibility, inalienably characteristic of the man,
"it would not be fit nor beautiful to go! It is an
ugly thought, that I should be frightful to my
fellow-beings, and that children would cling to their
mothers' gowns, at sight of me ! "

They shrank back into the dusky passage-way,
and closed the door. But, going up the staircase
again, they found the whole interior of the house
tenfold more dismal, and the air closer and heavier,
for the glimpse and breath of freedom which they
had just snatched. They could not flee ; their jailer
had but left the door ajar, in mockery, and stood
behind it, to watch them stealing* out. At the thres
hold they felt his pitiless gripe upon them. For,
what other dungeon is so dark as one's own heart !
What jailer so inexorable as one's self!

But it would be no fair picture of Clifford's state
of mind, were we to represent him as continually
or prevailingly wretched. On the contrary, there
was no other man in the city, we are bold to affirm,
of so much as half his years, who enjoyed so many
lightsome and griefless moments as himself. He
had no burthen of care upon him ; there were none
of those questions and contingencies with the future
to be settled, which wear away all other lives, and
render them not worth having by the very process
of providing for their support. In this respect, he
was a child — a child for the whole term of his
existence, be it long or short. Indeed, his life
seemed to be standing still at a period little in
advance of childhood, and to cluster all his remini
scences about that epoch ; just as, after the torpor

206 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

oi a heavy blow, the sufferer's reviving consciousness
goes back to a moment considerably behind the
accident that stupefied him. He sometimes told
Phcebe and Hepzibah his dreams, in which he
invariably played the part of a child, or a very
young man. So vivid were they, in his relation of
them, that he once held a dispute with his sister
as to the particular figure or print of a chintz
morning-dress, which he had seen their mother
wear, in the dream of the preceding night. Hepzibah,
piquing herself on a woman's accuracy in such matters,
held it to be slightly different from what Clifford
^described ; but, producing the very gown from an
old trunk, it proved to be identical with his remem
brance of it. Had Clifford, every time that he
emerged out of dreams so lifelike, undergone the
torture of transformation from a boy into an old
and broken man, the daily recurrence of the shock
would have been too much to bear. It would have
caused an acute agony to thrill, from the morning
twilight, all the day through, until bedtime ; and
even then would have mingled a dull, inscrutable
pain, and pallid hue of misfortune, with the visionary
bloom and adolescence of his slumber. But the
nightly moonshine interwove itself with the morning
mist, and enveloped him as in a robe, which he
hugged about his person, and seldom let realities
pierce through ; he was not often quite awake, but
slept open-eyed, and perhaps fancied himself most
dreaming then.

Thus, lingering always so near his childhood,
he had sympathies with children, and kept his heart
the fresher thereby, like a reservoir into which

THE ARCHED WINDOW. 207

rivulets were pouring, not far from the fountain-
head. Though prevented, by a subtle sense of
propriety, from desiring* to associate with them, he
loved few things better than to look out of the
arched window, and see a little girl driving her
hoop along the sidewalk, or schoolboys at a game of
ball. Their voices, also, were very pleasant to him,
heard at a distance, all swarming and intermingling
together, as flies do in a sunny room.

Clifford would, doubtless, have been glad to share
their sports. One afternoon, he was seized with
an irresistible desire to blow soap-bubbles ; an amuse
ment, as Hepzibah told Phoebe apart, that had been
a favourite one with her brother, when they were
both children. Behold him, therefore, at the arched
window, with an earthen pipe in his mouth ! Behold
him, with his gray hair, and a wan, unreal smile
over his countenance, where still hovered a beautiful
grace, which his worst enemy must have acknow
ledged to be spiritual and immortal, since it had
survived so long ! Behold him, scattering airy
spheres abroad, from the window into the street !
Little, impalpable worlds were those soap-bubbles,
with the big world depicted, in hues bright as
imagination, on the "nothing of their surface. It
was curious to see how the passers-by regarded
these brilliant fantasies, as they came floating
down, and made the dull atmosphere imaginative
about them. Some stopped to gaze, and, perhaps,
carried a pleasant recollection of the bubbles onward
as far as the street-corner ; some looked angrily
upward, as if poor Clifford wronged them, by
setting an image of beauty afloat so near their

208 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

dusty pathway. A great many put out their fingers
or their walking-sticks, to touch, withal ; and were
perversely gratified, no doubt, when the bubble, with
all its pictured earth and sky scene, vanished as if
it had never been.

At length, just as an elderly gentleman, of very
dignified presence, happened to be passing, a large
bubble sailed majestically down, and burst right
against his nose ! He looked up — at first with a
stern, keen glance, which penetrated at once into
the obscurity behind the arched window — then with
a smile, which might be conceived as diffusing a
dog-day sultriness for the space of several yards
about him.

"Aha, Cousin Clifford!" cried Judge Pyncheon.
" What ! still blowing soap-bubbles ! "

The tone seemed as if meant to be kind and
soothing, but yet had a bitterness of sarcasm in it.
As for Clifford, an absolute palsy of fear came over
him. Apart from any definite cause of dread which
his past experience might have given him, he felt
that native and original horror of the excellent judge
which is proper to a weak, delicate, and apprehensive
character, in the presence of massive strength.
Strength is incomprehensible by weakness, and,
therefore, the more terrible. There is no greater
bugbear than a strong-willed relative, in the circle
of his own connections.

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 209

XII.

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST.

IT must not be supposed that the life of a personage
naturally so active as Phoebe could be wholly confined
within the precincts of the old Pyncheon House.
Clifford's demands upon her time were usually
satisfied, in those long- days, considerably earlier
than sunset. Quiet as his daily existence seemed,
it nevertheless drained all the resources by which
he lived. It was not physical exercise that over
wearied him ; for — except that he sometimes wrought
a little with a hoe, or paced the garden-walk, or,
in rainy weather, traversed a large, unoccupied room
— it was his tendency to remain only too quiescent,
as regarded any toil of the limbs and muscles. But,
either there was a smouldering fire within him that
consumed his vital energy, or the monotony that
would have dragged itself with benumbing effect
over a mind differently situated was no monotony
to Clifford. Possibly, he was in a state of second
growth and recovery, and was constantly assimilating
nutriment for his spirit and intellect from sights,
sounds, and events, which passed as a perfect void
to persons more practised with the world. As all
is activity and vicissitude to the new mind of
a child, so might it be, likewise, to a mind that
had undergone a kind of new creation, after its
long-suspended life.

Be the cause what it might, Clifford commonly
retired to rest, thoroughly exhausted, while the

210 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

sunbeams were still melting through his window-
curtains, or were thrown with late lustre on the
chamber wall. And while he thus slept early, as
other children do, and dreamed of childhood, Phoebe
was free to follow her own tastes for the remainder
of the day and evening*.

This was a freedom essential to the health even of a
character so little susceptible of morbid influences as
that of Phcebe. The old house, as we have already
said, had both the dry-rot and the damp-rot in its
walls ; it was not good to breathe no other atmosphere
than that. Hepzibah, though she had her valuable
and redeeming traits, had grown to be a kind of
lunatic, by imprisoning herself so long in one place,
with no other company than a single series of ideas,
and but one affection, and one bitter sense of wrong.
Clifford, the reader may perhaps imagine, was too
inert to operate morally on his fellow-creatures, how
ever intimate and exclusive their relations with him.
But the sympathy or magnetism among human beings
is more subtle and universal than we think ; it exists,
indeed, among different classes of organised life, and
vibrates from one to another. A flower, for instance,
as Phoebe herself observed, always began to droop
sooner in Clifford's hand, or Hepzibah's, than in her
own ; and by the same law, converting her whole
daily life into a flower-fragrance for these two sickly
spirits, the blooming girl must inevitably droop and
fade much sooner than if worn on a younger and
happier breast. Unless she had now and then in
dulged her brisk impulses, and breathed rural air in a
suburban walk, or ocean-breezes along the shore —
had occasionally obeyed the impulse of nature, in

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. '211

New England girls, by attending a metaphysical
or philosophical lecture, or viewing a seven-mile
panorama, or listening to a concert — had gone
shopping about the city, ransacking entire depots of
splendid merchandise, and bringing home a ribbon —
had employed, likewise, a little time to read the Bible
in her chamber, and had stolen a little more to think
of her mother and her native place — unless for such
moral medicines as the above, we should soon have
beheld our poor Phcebe grow thin, and put on a
bleached, unwholesome aspect, and assume strange,
shy ways, prophetic of old-maidenhood and a
cheerless future.

Even as it was, a change grew visible ; a change
partly to be regretted, although whatever charm it
infringed upon was repaired by another, perhaps more
precious. She was not so constantly gay, but had
her moods of thought, which Clifford, on the whole,
liked better than her former phase of unmingled
cheerfulness ; because now she understood him better
and more delicately, and sometimes even interpreted
him to himself. Her eyes looked larger, and darker,
and deeper ; so deep, at some silent moments, that
they seemed like Artesian wells, down, down, into
the infinite. She was* less girlish than when we first
beheld her, alighting from the omnibus ; less girlish,
but more a woman.

The only youthful mind with which Phcebe had an
opportunity of frequent intercourse was that of the
daguerreotypist. Inevitably, by the pressure of the
seclusion about them, they had been brought into
habits of some familiarity. Had they met under
different circumstances, neither of these young persons

212 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

would have been likely to bestow much thought upon
the other ; unless, indeed, their extreme dissimilarity
should have proved a principle of mutual attraction.
Both, it is true, were characters proper to New
England life, and possessing a common ground,
therefore, in their more external developments ; but
as unlike, in their respective interiors, as if their native
climes had been at world-wide distance. During
the early part of their acquaintance, Phoebe had held
back rather more than was customary with her frank
and simple manners from Holgrave's not very marked
advances. Nor was she yet satisfied that she knew
him well, although they almost daily met and talked
together, in a kind, friendly, and what seemed to be a
familiar way.

The artist, in a desultory manner, had imparted to
Phcebe something of his history. Young as he was,
and had his career terminated at the point already
attained, there had been enough of incident to
fill, very creditably, an autobiographic volume. A
romance on the plan of Gil Bias, adapted to American
society and manners, would cease to be a romance.
The experience of many individuals among us, who
think it hardly worth the telling, would equal the
vicissitudes of the Spaniard's earlier life ; while their
ultimate success, or the point whither they tend,
may be incomparably higher than any that a novelist
would imagine for his hero. Holgrave, as he told
Phcebe, somewhat proudly, could not boast of his
origin, unless as being exceedingly humble, nor of
his education, except that it had been the scantiest
possible, and obtained by a few winter months'
attendance at a district school. Left early to his

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 213

own guidance, he had begun to be self-dependent
while yet a boy ; and it was a condition aptly united
to his natural force of will. Though now but twenty-
two years old (lacking some months, which are years
in such a life), he had already been, first, a country
schoolmaster ; next, a salesman in a country store ;
and, either at the same time or afterwards, the
political editor of a country newspaper. He had
subsequently travelled New England and the Middle
States, as a peddler, in the employment of a
Connecticut manufactory of Cologne-water and other
essences. In an episodical way, he had studied and
practised dentistry, and with very flattering success,
especially in many of the factory towns along our
inland streams. As a supernumerary official, of
some kind or other, aboard a packet-ship, he had
visited Europe, and found means, before his return,
to see Italy, and part of France and Germany. At
a later period, he had spent some months in a
community of Fourierists. Still more recently, he
had been a public lecturer on Mesmerism, for which
science (as he assured Phcebe, and, indeed, satis
factorily proved, by putting Chanticleer, who
happened to be scratching near by, to sleep) he
had very remarkable endowments.

His present phase, as a daguerreotypist, was of
no more importance in his own view, nor likely to
be more permanent, than anjLj3£jthe_4ireceding ones.
It had been taken up with the careless alacrity of
an adventurer, who had his bread to earn. It would
be thrown aside as carelessly, whenever he should
choose to earn his bread by some other equally
digressive means. But what was most remarkable,

2i4 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and, perhaps, showed a more than common poise
in the young man, was the fact, that, amid all these
personal vicissitudes, he had never lost his identity.
Homeless as he had been — continually changing his
whereabout, and, therefore, responsible neither to
public opinion nor to individuals — putting off one
exterior, and snatching up another, to be soon
shifted for a third — he had never violated the inner
most man, but had carried his conscience along with
him. It was impossible to know Holgrave, without
recognising this to be the fact. Hepzibah had seen
it. Phoebe soon saw it, likewise, and gave him
the sort of confidence which such a certainty inspires.
She was startled, however, and sometimes repelled —
not by any doubt of his integrity to whatever law
he acknowledged — but by a sense that his law
differed from her own. He made her uneasy, and
seemed to unsettle everything around her, by his
lack of reverence for what was fixed, unless, at a
moment's warning, it could establish its right to hold
its ground.

Then, moreover, she scarcely thought him affec
tionate in his nature. He was too calm and cool
an observer. Phcebe felt his eye, often ; his heart,
seldom, or never. He took a certain kind of interest
in Hepzibah and her brother, and Phcebe herself.
He studied them attentively, and allowed no slightest
circumstance of their individualities to escape him.
He was ready to do them whatever good he might ;
but, after all, he never exactly made common cause
with them, nor gave "any reliable evidence that he
loved them better, in proportion as he knew them
more. In his relations with them, he seemed to be

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 215

in quest of mental food, not heart-sustenance. Phoebe
could not conceive what interested him so much in
her friends and herself, intellectually, since he cared
nothing for them, or, comparatively, so little, as
objects of human affection.

Always, in his interviews with Phcebe, the artist
made especial inquiry as to the welfare of Clifford,
whom, except at the Sunday festival, he seldom saw.

" Does he still seem happy ? " he asked, one day.

44 As happy as a child," answered Phcebe ; " but —
like a child, too — very easily disturbed."

" How disturbed?" inquired Holgrave. " By
thing's without, or by thoughts within ? "

"I cannot see his thoughts! How should I?"
replied Phcebe, with simple piquancy. u Very often,
his humour changes without any reason that can be
guessed at, just as a cloud comes over the sun.
Latterly, since I have begun to know him better, I
feel it to be not quite right to look closely into his
moods. He has had such a great sorrow, that his
heart is made all solemn and sacred by it. When he
is cheerful — when the sun shines into his mind — then
I venture to peep in, just as far as the light reaches,
but no further. It is holy ground where the shadow
falls ! "

" How prettily you express this sentiment ! " said
the artist. " I can understand the feeling, without
possessing it. Had I your opportunities, no scruples
would prevent me from fathoming Clifford to the
full depths of my plummet-line ! "

" How strange that you should wish it ! " remarked
<f Phcebe involuntarily. "What is Cousin Clifford to
you ? "

216 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" Oh, nothing" — of course, nothing ! " answered
Holgrave, with a smile. " Only this is such an odd
and incomprehensible world ! The more I look at
it, the more it puzzles me, and I begin to suspect
that a man's bewilderment is the measure of his
wisdom. Men and women, and children, too, are
such strange creatures, that one never can be certain
that he really knows them ; nor ever guess what they
have been, from what he sees them to be now. Judge
Pyncheon ! Clifford ! What a complex riddle — a
complexity of complexities — do they present ! It
requires intuitive sympathy, like a young girl's, to
solve it. A mere observer, like myself (who never
have any intuitions, and am, at best, only subtle and
acute), is pretty certain to go astray."

The artist now turned the conversation to themes
less dark than that which they had touched upon.
Phoebe and he were young together ; nor had Hol
grave, in his premature experience of life, wasted
entirely that beautiful spirit of youth, which, gushing
forth from one small heart and fancy, may diffuse
itself over the universe, making it all as bright as
on the first day of creation. Man's own youth is the
world's youth ; at least, he feels as if it were, and
imagines that the earth's granite substance is some
thing not yet hardened, and which he can mould into
whatever shape he likes. So it was with Holgrave.
He could talk sagely about the world's old age, but
never actually believed what he said ; he was a young
man still, and therefore looked upon the world — that
gray-bearded and wrinkled profligate, decrepit, with
out being venerable — as a tender stripling, capable of
being improved into all that it ought to be, but

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 217

scarcely yet had shown the remotest promise of becom
ing. He had that sense, or inward prophecy — which a,
young" man had better never have been born than not
to have, and a mature man had better die at once
than utterly to relinquish — that we are not doomed
to creep on for ever in the old, bad way, but that,
this very now, there are the harbingers abroad of a
golden era, to be accomplished in his own lifetime.
It seemed to Holgrave — as doubtless it has seemed
to the hopeful of every century, since the epoch of
Adam's grandchildren — that in this age, more than
ever before, the moss-grown and rotten Past is to be
torn down, and lifeless institutions to be thrust out
of the way, and their dead corpses buried, and
everything to begin anew.

As to the main point — may we never live to doubt
it ! — as to the better centuries that are coming, the
artist was surely right. His error lay in supposing
that this age, more than any past or future one,
is destined to see the tattered garments of Antiquity
exchanged for a new suit, instead of gradually
renewing themselves by patchwork ; in applying his
own little life-span as the measure of an interminable
achievement ; and, more than all, in fancying that
it mattered anything to the great end in view,
whether he himself should contend for it or against
it. Yet it was well for him to think so. This
enthusiasm, infusing itself through the calmness of
his character, and thus taking an aspect of settled
thought and wisdom, would serve to keep his youth
pure, and make his aspirations high. And when^
with the years settling down more weightily upon
him, his early faith should be modified by inevitable

2i8 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

experience, it would t>e with no harsh and sudden
revolution of his sentiments. He would still have
faith in man's brightening destiny, and perhaps love
him all the better, as he should recognise his
helplessness in his own behalf ; and the haughty
faith, with which he began life, would be well
bartered for a far humbler one, at its close, in dis
cerning that man's best-directed effort accomplishes
a kind of dream, while God is the sole worker of
realities.

Holgrave had read very little, and that little in
passing through the thoroughfare of life, where the
mystic language of his books was necessarily mixed
up with the babble of the multitude, so that both
one and the other were apt to lose any sense that
might have been properly their own. He considered
himself a thinker, and was certainly of a thoughtful
turn, but, with his own path to discover, had
perhaps hardly yet reached the point where an
educated man begins to think. The true value of
his character lay in that deep consciousness of
inward strength, which made all his past vicissitudes
seem merely like a change of garments ; in that
enthusiasm, so quiet that he scarcely knew of its
existence, but which gave a warmth to everything
that he laid his hand on ; in that personal ambition,
hidden — from his own as well as other eyes— among
his more generous impulses, but in which lurked
a certain efficacy, that might solidify him from a
theorist into the champion of some practicable cause.
Altogether, in his culture and want of culture — in
his crude, wild, and misty philosophy, and the
practical experience that counteracted some of its

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 219

tendencies ; in his magnanimous zeal for man's
welfare, and his recklessness of whatever the ages
had established in man's behalf; in his faith, and
in his infidelity ; in what he had, and in what he
lacked — the artist might fitly enough stand forth as
the representative of many compeers in his native
land.

. His career it would be difficult to prefigure. There
appeared to be qualities in Holgrave, such as, in
a country where everything is free to the hand that
can grasp it, could hardly fail to put some of the
world's prizes within his reach. But these matters
are delightfully uncertain. At almost every step in
life, we meet with young men of just about Holgrave's
age, for whom we anticipate wonderful things, but
of whom, even after much and careful inquiry, we
never happen to hear another word. The effer
vescence of youth and passion, and the fresh gloss
of the intellect and imagination, endow them with
a false brilliancy, which makes fools of themselves
and other people. Like certain chintzes, calicoes,
and ginghams, they show finely in their first newness,
but cannot stand the sun and rain, and assume a
very sober aspect after washing-day.

But our business is with Holgrave as we find
him on this particular afternoon, and in the arbour
of the Pyncheon garden. In that point of view, it
was a pleasant sight to behold this young man,
with so much faith in himself, and so fair an appear
ance of admirable powers — so little harmed, too, by
the many tests that had tried his metal — it was
pleasant to see him in his kindly intercourse with
Phcebe. Her thought had scarcely done him justice,

220 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

when it pronounced him cold ; or, if so, he had
grown warmer now. Without such purpose on her
part, and unconsciously on his, she made the House
of the Seven Gables like a home to him, and the
garden a familiar precinct. With the insight on
which he prided himself, he fancied that he could
look through Phoebe, and all around her, and could
read her off like a page of a child's story-book. But
these transparent natures are often deceptive in their
depth ; those pebbles at the bottom of the fountain
are farther from us than we think. Thus the artist,
whatever he might judge of Phoebe's capacity, was
beguiled, by some silent charm of hers, to talk freely
of what he dreamed of doing in the world. He
poured himself out as to another self. Very possibly,
he forgot Phoebe while he talked to her, and was
moved only by the inevitable tendency of thought,
when rendered sympathetic by enthusiasm and
emotion, to flow into the first safe reservoir which it
finds. But, had you peeped at them through the
chinks of the garden-fence, the young man's earnest
ness and heightened colour might have led you to
suppose that he was making love to the young
girl!

At length, something was said by Holgrave that
made it apposite for Phoebe to inquire what had
first brought him acquainted with her cousin
Hepzibah, and why he now chose to lodge in the
desolate old Pyncheon House. Without directly
answering her, he turned from the Future, which had
heretofore been the theme of his discourse, and began
to speak of the influences of the Past. One subject,
indeed, is but the reverberation of the other.

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 221

1 ( Shall we never, never get rid of this Past?"
cried he, keeping up the earnest tone of his preced
ing conversation. — " It lies upon the Present like a
giant's dead body! In fact, the case is just as if a
young giant were compelled to w^aste all his strength
in carrying about the corpse of the old giant, his
grandfather, who died a long while ago, and only
needs to be decently buried. Just think a moment,
and it will startle you to see what slaves we are to
bygone times — to Death, if we give the matter the
right word ! "

" But I do not see it." observed Phcebe.

" For example, then," continued Holgrave, "a
dead man, if he happen to have made a will, disposes
of wealth no longer his own ; or, if he die intestate,
it is distributed in accordance with the notions of
men much long'er dead than he. A dead man sits
on all our judgment-seats ; and living judges do but
search out and repeat his decisions. We read in
dead men's books ! We laugh at dead men's jokes,
and cry at dead men's pathos ! We are sick of
dead men's diseases, physical and moral, and die of
the same remedies with which dead doctors killed
their patients ! We worship the living Deity accord
ing to dead men's forms and creeds ! Whatever we
seek to do, of our own free motion, a dead man's icy
hand obstructs us ! Turn our eyes to what point we
may, a dead man's white, immitigable face encounters
them, and freezes our very heart ! And we must be
dead ourselves, before we can begin to have our proper
influence on our own world, which will then be no
longer our world, but the world of another generation,
with which we shall have no shadow of a right to

222 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

interfere. I ought to have said, too, that we live in
dead men's houses ; as, for instance, in this of the
seven gables ! "

" And why not," said Phoebe, " so long as we can
be comfortable in trfem ? "

/ " But we shall live to see the day, I trust, " went
on the artist, "when no man shall build his house
* for posterity. Why should he ? He might just as
reasonably order a durable suit of clothes — leather,
or gutta-percha, or whatever else lasts longest — so
that his great-grandchildren should have the benefit
of them, and cut precisely the same figure in the
world that he himself does. If each generation were
allowed and expected to build its own houses, that
single change, comparatively unimportant in itself,
would imply almost every reform which society is
now suffering for. I doubt whether even our public
edifices, our capitols, state-houses, court-houses,
city-halls, and churches — ought to be built of such
permanent materials as stone or brick. It were
better that they should crumble to ruin, once in
twenty years, or thereabouts, as a hint to the people
to examine into and reform the institutions which
they symbolise. "

" How you hate everything old ! " said Phoebe, in
dismay. " It makes me dizzy to think of such a
shifting world ! "

" I certainly love nothing mouldy," answered
Holgrave. " Now, this old Pyncheon House ! Is
it a wholesome place to live in, with its black
shingles, and the green moss that shows how damp
they are ? — its dark, low-studded rooms ? — its grime
and sordidness, which are the crystallisation on its

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 223

walls of the human breath, that has been drawn and
exhaled here, in discontent and anguish ? The
house ought to be purified with fire — purified till
only its ashes remain ! "

4 ' Then why do you live in it?" aske.d Phoebe, a
little piqued.

" Oh, I am pursuing" my studies here ; not in
books, however," replied Holgrave. " The house, in
my view, is expressive of that odious and abominable
Past, with all its bad influences, against which I
have just been declaiming. I dwell in it for a while,
that I may know the better how to hate it. By the
bye, did you ever hear the story of Maule, the
wizard, and what happened between him and your
immeasurably great-grandfather ? "

" Yes indeed!" said Phoebe; " I heard it long
ago, from my father, and two or three times from
my cousin Hepzibah, in the month that I have been
here. She seems to think that all the calamities
of the Pyncheons began from that quarrel with the
wizard, as you call him. And you, Mr. Holgrave,
look as if you thought so too ! How singular,
that you should believe what is so very absurd,
when you reject many, things that are a great deal
worthier of credit ! "

" I do believe it," said the artist seriously; "not
as a superstition, however, but as proved by
unquestionable facts, and as exemplifying a theory.
Now, see ; under those seven gables, at which we
now look up — and which old Colonel Pyncheon
meant to be the house of his descendants, in
prosperity and happiness, down to an epoch far
beyond the present — under that roof, through a

224 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

portion of three centuries, there has been perpetual
remorse of conscience, a constantly defeated hope,
strife amongst kindred, various misery, a strange
form of death, dark suspicion, unspeakable disgrace
— all, or most of which calamity, I have the means
of tracing to the old Puritan's inordinate desire to
plant and endow a family. To plant a family ! This
idea is at the bottom of most of the wrong and
mischief which men do. The truth is, that, once
in every half-century, at longest, a family should
be merged in the great, obscure mass of humanity,
" and forget all about its ancestors. Human blood,
in order to keep its freshness, should run in hidden
streams, as the water of an aqueduct is conveyed
in subterranean pipes. In the family existence of
these Pyncheons, for instance — forgive me, Phoebe,
but I cannot think of you as one of them — in their brief
New England pedigree, there has been time enough to
infect them all with one kind of lunacy or another ! "

" You speak very unceremoniously of my kindred,"
said Phoebe, debating with herself whether she ought
to take offence.

" I speak true thoughts to a true mind ! " answered
Holgrave, with a vehemence which Phoebe had not
before witnessed in him. "The truth is as I say!
Furthermore, the original perpetrator and father of
this mischief appears to have perpetuated himself,
and still walks the street — at least, his very image,
in mind and body — with the fairest prospect of
transmitting to posterity as rich, and as wretched
an inheritance as he has received ! Do you remember
the daguerreotype, and its resemblance to the old
portrait?"

H.S.O. "Little worlds were those soap-bubbles."

Page 207,

THE DAGUERREOTYPIST. 225

" How strangely in earnest you are ! " exclaimed
Phcebe, looking at him with surprise and perplexity :
half alarmed, and partly inclined to laugh. " You talk
of the lunacy of the Pyncheons ; is it contagious ? "

" I understand you ! " said the artist, colouring and
laughing. "I believe I am a little mad. This
subject has taken hold of my mind with the strangest
tenacity of clutch, since I have lodged in yonder old
gable. As one method of throwing it off, I have put
an incident of the Pyncheon family history, with
which I happen to be acquainted, into the form of
a legend, and mean to publish it in a magazine."

4 'Do you write for the magazines?" inquired
Phcebe.

"Is it possible you did not know it?" cried
Holgrave. — " Well, such is literary fame ! Yes, Miss
Phcebe Pyncheon, among the multitude of my
marvellous gifts, I have that of writing stories ; and
my name has figured, I can assure, you on the covers
of Graham and Godey, making as respectable an
appearance, for ought I could see, as any of the
canonised bead-roll with which it was associated.
In the humorous line, I am thought to have a very
pretty way with me ; and, as for pathos, I am as
provocative of tears as an onion. But, shall I read
you my story ? "

"Yes, if it is not very long," said Phcebe — and
added, laughingly — "nor very dull."

As this latter point was one which the daguerreo-
typist could not decide for himself, he forthwith
produced his roll of manuscript, and, while the late
sunbeams gilded the seven gables, began to read.

H.S.G. H

220 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.
XIII.

ALICE PYNCHEON.

THERE was a message brought, one day, from the
worshipful Gervayse Pyncheon to young Matthew
Maule, the carpenter, desiring his immediate presence
at the House of the Seven Gables.

" And what does your master want with me ? " said
the carpenter to Mr. Pyncheon's black servant.
" Does the house need any repair? Well it may,
by this time ; and no blame to my father who built
it, neither ! I was reading the old colonel's tomb
stone, no longer ago than last Sabbath ; and reckoning
from that date, the house had stood seven-and-thirty
years. No wonder if there should be a job to do
on the roof."

11 Don't know what massa wants," answered
Scipio. "The house is a berry good house, and old
Colonel Pyncheon think so too, I reckon ; else why
the old man haunt it so, and frighten a poor nigga,
as he does ? "

" Well, well, friend Scipio; let your master know
that I'm coming," said the carpenter, with a laugh.
" For a fair, workman-like job, he'll find me his
man. And so the house is haunted, is it ? It will
take a tighter workman than I am to keep the spirits
out of the seven gables. Even if the colonel would
be quit," he added, muttering to himself, " my old
grandfather, the wizard, will be pretty sure to stick
to the Pyncheons, as long as their walls hold
together."

ALICE PYNCHEON. 227

" What's that you mutter to yourself, Matthew
Maule ? " asked Scipio. " And what for do you
look so black at me ? "

" No matter, darkey!" said the carpenter. "Do
you think nobody is to look black but yourself? Go
tell your master I'm coming ; and if you happen to
see Mistress Alice, his daughter, give Matthew
Maule's humble respects to her. She has brought
a fair face from Italy — fair, and gentle, and proud —
has that same Alice Pyncheon ! "

" He talk of Mistress Alice ! " cried Scipio, as he
returned from his errand. "The low carpenter-man !
He no business so much as to look at her a great
way off!"

This young Matthew Maule, the carpenter, it must
be observed, was a person little understood, and not
very generally liked, in the town where he resided ;
not that anything could be alleged against his integrity,
or his skill and diligence in the handicraft which he
exercised. The aversion (as it might justly be called)
with which many persons regarded him, was partly
the result of his own character and deportment,
and partly an inheritance.

He was the grandson of a former Matthew Maule,
one of the early settlers of the town, and who had
been a famous and terrible wizard in his day. This
old reprobate was one of the sufferers when Cotton
Mather, and his brother ministers, and the learned
judges, and other wise men, and Sir William Phipps,
the sagacious governor, made such laudable efforts
to weaken the great enemy of souls, by sending a
multitude of his adherents up the rocky pathway of
Gallows Hill. Since those days, no doubt, it had

228 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

grown to be suspected, that, in consequence of an
unfortunate overdoing" of a work praiseworthy in
itself, the proceedings against the witches had proved
far less acceptable to the Beneficent Father than to
that very Arch Enemy whom they were intended to
distress and utterly overwhelm. It is not the less
certain, however, that awe and terror brooded over
the memories of those who had died for this horrible
crime of witchcraft. Their graves, in the crevices
of the rocks, were supposed to be incapable of
retaining" the occupants who had been so hastily
thrust into them. Old Matthew Maule, especially,
was known to have as little hesitation or difficulty
in rising" out of his grave as an ordinary man in
getting out of bed, and was as often seen at midnight
as living people at noonday. This pestilent wizard
(in whom his just punishment seemed to have
wrought no manner of amends) had an inveterate
habit of haunting a certain mansion, styled the
House of the Seven Gables, against the owner of
which he pretended to hold an unsettled claim for
ground-rent. The ghost, it appears — with the
pertinacity which was one of his distinguishing
characteristics while alive — insisted that he was the
rightful proprietor of the site upon which the house
stood. His terms were, that either the aforesaid
ground-rent, from the day when the cellar began
to be dug, should be paid down, or the mansion
itself given up ; else he, the ghostly creditor, would
have his finger in all the affairs of the Pyncheons,
and make everything go wrong with them, though
it. should be a thousand years after his death. It
was a wild story, perhaps, but seemed not altogether

ALICE PYNCUEON. 229

so incredible, to those who could remember what
an inflexibly obstinate old fellow this wizard Maule
had been.

Now, the wizard's grandson, the young Matthew
Maule of our story, was popularly supposed to have
inherited some of his ancestor's questionable traits.
It is wonderful how many absurdities were promul
gated in reference to the young man. He was
fabled, for example, to have a strange power of
getting into people's dreams, and regulating matters
there according to his own fancy, pretty much like
the stage-manager of a theatre. There was a great
deal of talk among the neighbours, particularly the
petticoated ones, about what they called the witch
craft of Maule's eye. Some said that he could look
into people's minds ; others, that by the marvellous
power of his eye, he could draw people into his own
mind, or send them, if he pleased, to do errands
to his grandfather, in the spiritual world ; others,
again, that it was what is termed an Evil Eye, and
possessed the valuable faculty of blighting corn,
and drying children into mummies with the heart
burn. But, after all, what worked most to the
young carpenter's disadvantage was, first, the reserve
and sternness of his natural disposition, and next,
the fact of his not being a Church-communicant, and
the suspicion of his holding heretical tenets in
matters of religion and polity.

After receiving Mr. Pyncheon's message, the
carpenter merely tarried to finish a small job, which
he happened to have in hand, and then took his way
towards the House of the Seven Gables. This noted
edifice, though its style might be getting a little out

230 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

of fashion, was still as respectable a family residence
as that of any gentleman in town. The present
owner, Gervayse Pyncheon, was said to have con
tracted a dislike to the house, in consequence of a
shock to his sensibility, in early childhood, from the
sudden death of his grandfather. In the very act of
running to climb Colonel Pyncheon's knee, the boy
had discovered the old Puritan to be a corpse ! On
arriving at manhood, Mr. Pyncheon had visited
England, where he married a lady of fortune, and
had subsequently spent many years, partly in the
mother country, and partly in various cities on the
continent of Europe. During this period, the family
mansion had been consigned to the charge of a kinsman,
who was allowed to make it his home, for the time
being, in consideration of keeping the premises in
thorough repair. So faithfully had this contract been
fulfilled, that now, as the carpenter approached the
house, his practised eye could detect nothing to
criticise in its condition. The peaks of the seven
gables rose up sharply ; the shingled roof looked
thoroughly water-tight ; and the glittering plaster-
work entirely covered the exterior walls, and sparkled
in the October sun, as if it had been new.tonly a week
ago.

The house had that pleasant aspect of life which is
like the cheery expression of comfortable activity in
the human countenance. You could see, at once,
that there was the stir of a large family within it. A
huge load of oak-wood was passing through the gate
way, towards the out-buildings in the rear ; the fat
cook — or probably it might be the housekeeper — stood
at the side-door, bargaining for some turkeys and

ALICE PYNCHEON. 231

poultry, which a countryman had brought for sale.
Now and then, a maid-servant, neatly dressed, and
now the shining sable face of a slave, might be seen
bustling across the windows, in the lower part of the
house. At an open window of a room in the second
storey, hanging over some pots of beautiful and deli
cate flowers — exotics, but which had never known a
more genial sunshine than that of the New England
autumn — was the figure of a young lady, an exotic,
like the flowers, and beautiful and delicate as they.
Her presence imparted an indescribable grace and faint
witchery to the whole edifice. In other respects, it
was a substantial, jolly-looking mansion, and seemed
fit to be the residence of a patriarch, who might
establish his own headquarters in the front gable,
and assign one of the remainder to each of his six
children ; while the great chimney in the centre should
symbolise the old fellow's hospitable heart, which
kept them all warm, and made a great whole of the
seven smaller ones.

There was a vertical sun-dial on the front gable ;
and as the carpenter passed beneath it, he looked up
and noted the hour.

" Three o'clock ! " said he to himself. " My father
told me that dial was put up only an hour before the
old colonel's death. How truly it has kept time
these seven-and-thirty years past ! The shadow creeps
and creeps, and is always looking over the shoulder of
the sunshine ! "

It might have befitted a craftsman, like Matthew
Maule, on being sent for to a gentleman's house,
to go to the back door, where servants and work
people were usually admitted ; or at least to the

232 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

side entrance, where the better class of tradesmen
made application. But the carpenter had a great
deal of pride and stiffness in his nature ; and, at
this moment, moreover, his heart was bitter with
the sense of hereditary wrong, because he considered
the great Pyncheon House to be standing on soil
which should have been his own. On this very site,
beside a spring of delicious water, his grandfather
had felled the pine-trees and built a cottage, in which
children had been born to him ; and it was only
from a dead man's stiffened fingers that Colonel
Pyncheon had wrested away the title-deeds. So
young Maule went straight to the principal entrance,
beneath a portal of carved oak, and gave such a
peal of the iron knocker that you would have
imagined the stern old wizard himself to be standing
at the threshold.

Black Scipio answered the summons, in a pro
digious hurry ; but showed the whites of his eyes,
in amazement, on beholding only the carpenter.

" Lord-a-mercy ! what a great man he be, this
carpenter fellow ! " mumbled Scipio, down in his
throat. "Anybody think he beat on the door with
his biggest hammer ! "

" Here I am ! " said Maule sternly. " Show me
the way to your master's parlour ! "

As he stepped into the house, a note of sweet and
melancholy music thrilled and vibrated along the
passage-way, proceeding from one of the rooms
above-stairs. It was the harpsichord which Alice
Pyncheon had brought with her from beyond the
sea. The fair Alice bestowed most of her maiden
leisure between flowers and music, although the

ALICE PYNCHEON. 233

former were apt to droop, and the melodies were
often sad. She was of foreign education, and could
not take kindly to New England modes of life, in
which nothing beautiful had ever been developed.

As Mr. Pyncheon had been impatiently awaiting
Maule's arrival, black Scipio, of course, lost no time
in ushering the carpenter into his master's presence.
The room in which this gentleman sat was a parlour
of moderate size, looking out upon the garden of the
house, and having its windows partly shadowed by
the foliage of fruit-trees. It was Mr. Pyncheon's
peculiar apartment, and was provided with furniture,
in an elegant and costly style, principally from
Paris ; the floor (which was unusual, at that day)
being covered with a carpet, so skilfully and richly
wrought, that it seemed to glow as with living
flowers. In one corner stood a marble woman, to
whom her own beauty was the sole and sufficient
garment. Some pictures — that looked old, and had
a mellow tinge diffused through all their artful
splendour — hung on the walls. Near the fireplace
was a large and very beautiful cabinet of ebony,
inlaid with ivory ; a piece of antique furniture,
which Mr. Pyncheon had bought in Venice, and
which he used as the treasure-place for medals,
ancient coins, and whatever small and valuable
curiosities he had picked up, on his travels. Through
all this variety of decoration, however, the room
showed its original characteristics ; its low stud,
its cross-beam, its chimney-piece, with the old-
fashioned Dutch tiles ; so that it was the emblem
of a mind industriously stored with foreign ideas,
and elaborated into artificial refinement, but neither

234 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

larger, nor, in its proper self, more elegant, than
before.

There were two objects that appeared rather out
of place in this very handsomely furnished room.
One was a large map, or surveyor's plan, of a tract
of land, which looked as if it had been drawn a good
many years ago, and was now dingy with smoke, and
soiled, here and there, with the touch of fingers.
The other was a portrait of a stern old man, in a
Puritan garb, painted roughly, but with a bold effect,
and a remarkably strong expression of character.

At a small table, before a fire of English sea-coal,
sat Mr. Pyncheon, sipping coffee, which had grown
to be a very favourite beverage with him in France.
He was a middle-aged and really handsome man,
with a wig flowing down upon his shoulders ; his
coat was of blue velvet, with lace on the borders
and at the buttonholes ; and the firelight glistened on
the spacious breadth of his waistcoat, which was
flowered all over with gold. On the entrance of
Scipio, ushering in the carpenter, Mr. Pyncheon
turned partly round, but resumed his former position,
and proceeded deliberately to finish his cup of coffee,
without immediate notice of the guest whom he had
summoned to his presence. It was not that he
intended any rudeness, or improper neglect — which,
indeed, he would have blushed to be guilty of — but
it never occurred to him that a person in Maule's
station had a claim on his courtesy, or would trouble
himself about it, one way or the other.

The carpenter, however, stepped at once to the
hearth, and turned himself about, so as to look
Mr. Pyncheon in the face.

ALICE PYNCHEON. 235

" You sent for me," said he. " Be pleased to
explain your business, that I may go back to my
own affairs."

"Ah! excuse me," said Mr. Pyncheon quietly.
" I did not mean to tax your time without a
recompense. Your name, I think, is Maule — Thomas
or Matthew Maule — a son or grandson of the builder
of this house ? "

1 ' Matthew Maule," replied the carpenter; "son
of him who built the house — grandson of the rightful
proprietor of the soil."

"I know the dispute to which you allude," ob
served Mr. Pyncheon, with undisturbed equanimity.
4 ' I am well aware that my grandfather was com
pelled to resort to a suit at law, in order to establish
his claim to the foundation-site of this edifice. We
will not, if you please, renew the discussion. The
matter was settled at the time, and by the competent
authorities — equitably, it is to be presumed — and,
at all events, irrevocably. Yet, singularly enough,
there is an incidental reference to this very subject
in what I am now about to say to you. And this
same inveterate grudge — excuse me, I mean no
offence — this irritability, which you have just shown,
is not entirely aside from the matter."

" If you can find anything for your purpose, Mr.
Pyncheon," said the carpenter, "in a man's natural
resentment for the wrongs done to his blood, you
are welcome to it ! "

" I take you at your word, Goodman Maule," said
the owner of the seven gables, with a smile, "and
will proceed to suggest a mode in which your
hereditary resentments — justifiable, or otherwise—

236 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

may have had a bearing" on my affairs. You have
heard, I suppose, that the Pyncheon family, ever
since rny grandfather's days, have been prosecuting"
a still unsettled claim to a very large extent of
territory at the eastward ? "

" Often," replied Maule, and it is said that a
smile came over his face; "very often — from my
father ! "

"This claim," continued Mr. Pyncheon, after
pausing* a moment, as if to consider what the
carpenter's smile might mean, "appeared to be on
the very verge of a settlement and full allowance,
at the period of my grandfather's decease. It was
well known, to those in his confidence, that he
anticipated neither difficulty nor delay. Now,
Colonel Pyncheon, I need hardly say, was a practical
man, well acquainted with public and private
business, and not at all the person to cherish ill-
founded hopes, or to attempt the following out of
an impracticable scheme. It is obvious to con
clude, therefore, that he had grounds, not apparent
to his heirs, for his confident anticipation of success
in the matter of this eastern claim. In a word,
I believe — and my legal advisers coincide in the
belief, which, moreover, is authorised, to a certain
extent, by the family traditions — that my grand
father was in possession in some deed, or other
document, essential to this claim, but which has
since disappeared."

"Very likely," said Matthew Maule, and again,
it is said, there was a dark smile on his face; "but
what can a poor carpenter have to do with the
grand affairs of the Pyncheon family? "

ALICE PYNCHEON. 237

" Perhaps nothing," returned Mr. Pyncheon ;
" possibly, much ! "

Here ensued a great many words between Matthew
Maule and the proprietor of the seven gables, on
the subject which the latter had thus broached.
It seems (although Mr. Pyncheon had some hesita
tion in referring to stories so exceedingly absurd
in their aspect) that the popular belief pointed to
some mysterious connection and dependence, existing
between the family of the Maules and these vast,
unrealised possessions of the Pyncheons. It was
an ordinary saying that the old wizard, hanged
though he was, had obtained the best end of the
bargain, in his contest with Colonel Pyncheon ;
inasmuch as he had got possession of the great
eastern claim, in exchange for an acre or two of
garden-ground. A very aged woman, recently
dead, had often used the metaphorical expression,
in her fireside talk, that miles and miles of the
Pyncheon lands had been shovelled into Maule's
grave ; which, by the bye, was but a very shallow
nook, between two rocks, near the summit of Gallows
Hill. Again, when the lawyers were making inquiry
for the missing document, it was a byword that
it would never be found, unless in the wizard's
skeleton-hand. So much weight had the shrewd
lawyers assigned to these fables, that — (but Mr.
Pyncheon did not see fit to inform the carpenter
of the fact) — they had secretly caused the wizard's
grave to be searched. Nothing was discovered,
however, except that, unaccountably, the right
hand of the skeleton was gone.

Now, what was unquestionably important, a

238 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

portion of these popular rumours could be traced,
though rather doubtfully and indistinctly, to chance
words and obscure hints of the executed wizard's
son and the father of this present Matthew Maule.
And here Mr. Pyncheon could bring an item of his
own personal evidence into play. Though but a
child at the time, he either remembered or fancied
that Matthew's father had some job to perform,
on the day before, or possibly the very morning
of the colonel's decease, in the private room where
he and the carpenter were at this moment talking.
Certain papers belonging to Colonel Pyncheon, as
his grandson distinctly recollected, had been spread
out on the table.

Matthew Maule understood the insinuated suspicion.

"My father," he said — but still there was that
dark smile, making a riddle of his countenance —
" my father was an honester man than the bloody
old colonel ! Not to get his rights back again
would he have carried off one of those papers ! "

" I shall not bandy words with you," observed
the foreign-bred Mr. Pyncheon, with haughty com
posure. "Nor will it become me to resent any
rudeness towards either my grandfather or myself.
A gentleman, before seeking intercourse with a
person of your station and habits, will first consider
whether the urgency of the end may compensate
for the disagreeableness of the means. It does so,
in the present instance."

He then renewed the conversation, and made
great pecuniary offers to the carpenter, in case the
latter should give information leading to the discovery
of the lost document, and the consequent success of

ALICE PYNCHEON. 239

the eastern claim. For a long- time Matthew Maule
is said to have turned a cold ear to these propositions.
At last, however, with a strange kind of laugh, he
inquired whether Mr. Pyncheon would make over
to him the old wizard's homestead ground, together
with the House of the Seven Gables, now standing
on it, in requital of the documentary evidence so
urgently required.

The wild, chimney-corner legend (which, without
copying all its extravagances, my narrative essentially
follows) here gives an account of some very strange
behaviour on the part of Colonel Pyncheon's portrait.
This picture, it must be understood, was supposed
to be so intimately connected with the fate of the
house, and so magically built into its walls, that,
if once it should be removed, that very instant the
whole edifice would come thundering down in a heap
of dusty ruin. All through the foregoing conversa
tion between Mr. Pyncheon and the carpenter, the
portrait had been frowning, clenching its fist, and
giving many such proofs of excessive discomposure,
but without attracting the notice of either of the
two colloquists. And finally, at Matthew Maule's
audacious suggestion "of a transfer of the seven-
gabled structure, the ghostly portrait is averred to
have lost all patience, and to have shown itself on
the point of descending bodily from its frame. But
such incredible incidents are merely to be mentioned
aside.

"Give up this house!" exclaimed Mr. Pyncheon,
in amazement at the proposal. " Were I to do so
my grandfather would not rest quiet in his grave ! "

" He never has, if all stories are true," remarked

24o HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the carpenter composedly. " But that matter con
cerns his grandson more than it does Matthew Maule.
I have no other terms to propose."

Impossible as he at first thought it to comply
with Maule's conditions, still, on a second glance,
Mr. Pyncheon was of opinion that they might at
least be made matter of discussion. He himself had
no personal attachment for the house, nor any
pleasant associations connected with his childish
residence in it. On the contrary, after seven-and-
thirty years, the presence of his dead grandfather
seemed still to pervade it, as on that morning when
the affrighted boy had beheld him, with so ghastly
an aspect, stiffening in his chair. His long abode
in foreign parts, moreover, and familiarity with many
of the castles and ancestral halls of England, and
the marble palaces of Italy, had caused him to look
contemptuously at the House of the Seven Gables,
whether in point of splendour or convenience. It
was a mansion exceedingly inadequate to the style of
living which it would be incumbent on Mr. Pyncheon
to support, after realising his territorial rights. His
steward might deign to occupy it, but never, certainly,
the great landed proprietor himself. In the event
of success, indeed, it was his purpose to return to
England ; nor, to say the truth, would he recently
have quitted that more congenial home, had not his
own fortune, as well as his deceased wife's, begun
to give symptoms of exhaustion. The eastern claim
once fairly settled, and put upon the firm basis of
actual possession, Mr. Pyncheon's property — to be
measured by miles, not acres — would be worth an
earldom, and would reasonably entitle him to solicit,

ALICE PYNCHEON. 241

or enable him to purchase, that elevated dignity from
the British monarch. Lord Pyncheon ! — or the Earl
of Waldo ! — how could such a magnate be expected
to contract his grandeur within the pitiful compass
of seven shingled gables ?

In short, on an enlarged view of the business, the
carpenter's terms appeared so ridiculously easy, that
Mr. Pyncheon could scarcely forbear laughing in his
face. He was quite ashamed, after the foregoing
reflections, to propose any diminution of so moderate
a recompense for the immense service to be rendered.

" I consent to your proposition, Maule," cried he.
"Put me in possession of the document essential to
establish my rights, and the House of the Seven
Gables is your own ! "

According to some versions of the story, a regular x
contract to the above effect was drawn up by a
lawyer, and signed and sealed in the presence of
witnesses. Others say that Matthew Maule was
contented with a private written agreement, in which
Mr. Pyncheon pledged his honour and integrity to
the fulfilment of the terms concluded upon. The
gentleman then ordered wine, which he and the
carpenter drank together, in confirmation of their
bargain. During the whole preceding discussion
and subsequent formalities, the old Puritan's portrait
seems to have persisted in its shadowy gestures of
disapproval ; but without effect, except that, as Mr.
Pyncheon set down the emptied glass, he thought he /
beheld his grandfather frown.

" This sherry is too potent a wine for me ; it has
affected my brain already," he observed, after
a somewhat startled look at the picture. " On

242 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

returning1 to Europe, I shall confine myself to the
more delicate vintages of Italy and France, the best
of which will not bear transportation."

" My Lord Pyncheon may drink what wine he will,
and wherever he pleases," replied the carpenter, as
if he had been privy to Mr. Pyncheon's ambitious
projects ; "but first, sir, if you desire tidings of this
lost document, I must crave the favour of a little
talk with your fair daughter Alice."

"You are mad, Maule ! " exclaimed Mr. Pyncheon
haughtily ; and now, at last, there was anger mixed
up with his pride. " What can my daughter have
to do with a business like this ? "

Indeed, at this new demand on the carpenter's
part, the proprietor of the seven gables was even
more thunderstruck than at the cool proposition to
surrender his house. There was, at least, an assign
able motive for the first stipulation ; there appeared
to be none whatever for the last. Nevertheless,
Matthew Maule sturdily insisted on the young lady
being* summoned, and even gave her father to
understand, in a mysterious kind of explanation —
which made the matter considerably darker than it
looked before — that the only chance of acquiring the
requisite knowledge was through the clear, crystal
medium of a pure and virgin intelligence, like that
of the fair Alice. Not to encumber our story with
Mr. Pyncheon's scruples, whether of conscience,
pride, or fatherly affection, he at length ordered his
daughter to be called. He well knew that she was
in her chamber, and engaged in no occupation that
could not readily be laid aside ; for, as it happened,
ever since Alice's name had been spoken, both her

ALICE PYNCHEONo 243

father and the carpenter had heard the sad and sweet
music of her harpsichord, and the airier melancholy
of her accompanying voice.

So Alice Pyncheon was summoned, and appeared.
A portrait of this young* lady, painted by a Venetian
artist, and left by her father in England, is said to
have fallen into the hands of the present Duke of
Devonshire, and to be now preserved at Chatsworth ;
not on account of any associations with the original,
but for its value as a picture, and the high character
of beauty in the countenance. If ever there was a
lady born, and set apart from the world's vulgar
mass by a certain gentle and cold stateliness, it
was this very Alice Pyncheon. Yet there was the
womanly mixture in her ; the tenderness, or, at least,
the tender capabilities. For the sake of that re
deeming quality, a man of generous nature would
have forgiven all her pride, and have been content,
almost, to lie down in her path, and let Alice set
her slender foot upon his heart. All that he would
have required, was simply the acknowledgment that
he was indeed a man, and a fellow-being, moulded
of the same elements as she.

As Alice came into the room, her eyes fell upon the
carpenter, who was standing near its centre, clad in
a green woollen jacket, a pair of loose breeches,
open at the knees, and with a long pocket for his
rule, the end of which protruded ; it was as proper
a mark of the artisan's calling, as Mr. Pyncheon's
full-dress sword of that gentleman's aristocratic pre
tensions. A glow of artistic approval brightened
over Alice Pyncheon's face ; she was struck with
admiration — which she made no attempt to conceal —

244 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

of the remarkable comeliness, strength and energy,
of Maule's figure. But that admiring glance (which
most other men, perhaps, would have cherished as
a sweet recollection, all through life) the carpenter
never forgave. It must have been the devil himself
that made Maule so subtle in his perception.

" Does the girl look at me as if I were a brute
beast?" thought he, setting his teeth. " She shall
know whether I have a human spirit ; and the worse
for her, if it prove stronger than her own ! "

"My father, you sent for me/' said Alice, in her
sweet and harp-like voice. "But, if you have
business with this young man, pray let me go
again. You know I do not love this room, in
spite of that Claude, with which you try to bring
back sunny recollections."

"Stay a moment, young lady, if you please!"
said Matthew Maule. " My business with your
father is over. With yourself, it is now to begin ! "

Alice looked towards her father, in surprise and
inquiry.

"Yes, Alice, " said Mr. Pyncheon, with some
disturbance and confusion. "This young man — his
name is Matthew Maule — professes, so far as I can
understand him, to be able to discover, through
your means, a certain paper or parchment, which
was missing long before your birth. The importance
of the document in question renders it advisable to
neglect no possible, even if improbable, method of
regaining it. You will therefore oblige me, my
dear Alice, by answering this person's inquiries,
and complying with his lawful and reasonable
requests, so far as they may appear to have the

ALICE PYNCHEON. 247

aforesaid object in view. As I shall remain in the
room, you need apprehend no rude nor unbecoming
deportment, on the young man's part ; and, at
your slightest wish, of course, the investigation,
or whatever we may call it, shall immediately be
broken off."

"Mistress Alice Pyncheon," remarked Matthew
Maule, with the utmost deference, but yet a half-hidden
sarcasm in his look and tone, "will no doubt feel
herself quite safe in her father's presence, and under
his all-sufficient protection."

" I certainly shall entertain no manner of appre
hension, with my father at hand," said Alice, with
maidenly dignity. " Neither do I conceive that a
lady, while true to herself, can have aught to fear,
from whomsoever, or in any circumstances ! "

Poor Alice ! By what unhappy impulse did she
thus put herself at once on terms of defiance against
a strength which she could not estimate ?

"Then, Mistress Alice," said Matthew Maule,
handing a chair — gracefully enough, for a craftsman
— "will it please you only to sit down, and do
me the favour (though altogether beyond a poor
carpenter's deserts) to fix your eyes on mine ! "

Alice complied. She was very proud. Setting
aside all advantages of rank, this fair girl deemed
herself conscious of a power — combined of beauty,
high, unsullied purity, and the preservative force
of womanhood — that could make her sphere im
penetrable, unless betrayed by treachery within.
She instinctively knew, it may be, that some sinister
or evil potency was now striving to pass her barriers ;
nor would she decline the contest. So Alice put

2AA HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES, y

woman's might against man's might ; a match not
often equal, on the part of woman.

Her father, meanwhile, had turned away, and
seemed absorbed in the contemplation of a land
scape by Claude, where a shadowy and sun-streaked
vista penetrated so remotely into an ancient wood,
that it would have been no wonder if his fancy had
lost itself in the picture's bewildering depths. But,
in truth, the picture was no more to him, at that
moment, than the blank wall against which it hung.
His mind was haunted with the many and strange
tales which he had heard, attributing mysterious
if not supernatural endowments to these Maules,
as well the grandson, here present, as his two
immediate ancestors. Mr. Pyncheon's long residence
abroad, and intercourse with men of wit and fashion
• — courtiers, worldlings, and free-thinkers — had done
much towards obliterating the grim Puritan super
stitions, which no man of New England birth, at
that early period, could entirely escape. But, on
the other hand, had not a whole community believed
Maule's grandfather to be a wizard ? Had not the
crime been proved? Had not the wizard died for
it? Had he not bequeathed a legacy of hatred
against the Pyncheons to this only grandson, who,
as it appeared, was now about to exercise a subtle
influence over the daughter of his enemy's house ?
Might not this influence be the same that was called
witchcraft? •

Turning half round, he caught a glimpse of
Maule's figure in the looking-glass. At some paces
from Alice, with his arms uplifted in the air, the
carpenter made a gesture, as if directing downward

ALICE PYNCHEON. 247

a slow, ponderous, and invisible weight upon the
maiden.

" Stay, Maule ! " exclaimed Mr. Pyncheon, stepping
forward. " I forbid your proceeding further ! "

" Pray, my dear father, do not interrupt the young
man," said Alice, without changing her position.
" His efforts, I assure you, will, prove very
harmless."

Again Mr. Pyncheon turned his eyes towards the
Claude. It was then his daughter's will, in opposi
tion to his own, that the experiment should be
fully tried. Henceforth, therefore, he did but con
sent, not urge it. And was it not for her sake,
far more than for his own, that he desired its
success? That lost parchment once restored, the
beautiful Alice Pyncheon, with the rich dowry which
he could then bestow, might wed an English duke,
or a German reigning prince, instead of some New
England clergyman or lawyer ! At the thought, the
ambitious father almost consented, in his heart,
that, if the devil's power were needed to the accom
plishment of this great object, Maule might evoke
him. Alice's own purity would be her safeguard.

With his mind full of imaginary magnificence,
Mr. Pyncheon heard a half-uttered exclamation from
his daughter. It was very faint and low ; so in
distinct that there seemed but half a will to shape
out the words, and too undefined a purport to
be intelligible. Yet it was a call for help ! — his
conscience never doubted it — and, little more than
a whisper to his ear, it was a dismal shriek, and
• long re-echoed so, in the region round his heart !
But, this time, the father did not turn.

248 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

After a further interval, Maule spoke.

" Behold your daughter ! " said he.

Mr. Pyncheon came hastily forward. The carpenter
was standing erect in front of Alice's chair, and
pointing his finger towards the maiden with an
expression of triumphant power, the limits of which
could not be defined, as, indeed, its scope stretched
vaguely towards the unseen and the infinite. Alice
sat in an attitude of profound repose, with the long
brown lashes drooping over her eyes.

" There she is!" said the carpenter. u Speak to
her ! "

" Alice ! My daughter ! " exclaimed Mr. Pyncheon.
" My own Alice ! "

She did not stir.

" Louder ! " said Maule, smiling.

" Alice ! Awake ! " cried her father. " It troubles
me to see you thus ! Awake ! "

He spoke loudly, with terror in his voice, and
close to that delicate ear, which had always been
so sensitive to every discord. But the sound
evidently reached her not. It is indescribable what
a sense of remote, dim, unattainable distance,
betwixt himself and Alice, was impressed on the
father by this impossibility of reaching her with his
voice.

" Best touch her ! " said Matthew Maule. " Shake
the girl, and roughly too ! My hands are hardened
with too much use of axe, saw, and plane — else I
might help you ! "

Mr. Pyncheon took her hand, and pressed it with
the earnestness of startled emotion. He kissed her,
with so great a heart-throb in the kiss, that he

ALICE PYNCHEON. 249

thought she must needs feel it. Then, in a gust of
anger at her insensibility, he shook her maiden
form, with a violence which, the next moment, it
affrighted him to remember. He withdrew his en
circling arms, and Alice — whose figure, though
flexible, had been wholly impassive — relapsed into
the same attitude as before these attempts to
arouse her. Maule having shifted his position, her
face was turned towards him, slightly, but with
what seemed to be a reference of her very slumber
to his guidance.

Then it was a strange sight to behold how the
man of conventionalities shook the powder out of
his periwig ; how the reserved and stately gentle
man forgot his dignity ; how the gold-embroidered
waistcoat flickered and glistened in the firelight,
with the convulsion of rage, terror, and sorrow, in
the human heart that was beating under it.

"Villain!" cried Mr. Pyncheon, shaking his
clenched fist at Maule. "You and the fiend
together have robbed me of my daughter ! Give
her back, spawn of the old wizard, or you shall
climb Gallows Hill in your grandfather's footsteps ! "

" Softly, Mr. Pyncheon ! " said the carpenter, with
scornful composure. " Softly, an it please your
worship, else you will spoil those rich lace ruffles
at your wrists ! Is it my crime if you have sold
your daughter for the mere hope of getting a sheet
of yellow parchment into your clutch ? There sits
Mistress Alice, quietly asleep ! Now let Matthew
Maule try whether she be as proud as the carpenter
found her a while since. "

He spoke, and Alice responded, with a soft,

250 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

subdued, inward acquiescence, and a bending of her
form towards him, like the flame of a torch when
it indicates a gentle draught of air. He beckoned with
his hand, and, rising from her chair — blindly, but
undoubtingly, as tending to her sure and inevitable
centre — the proud Alice approached him. He waved
her back, and, retreating, Alice sank again into her
seat.

"She is mine!" said Matthew Maule. " Mine,
by the right of the strongest spirit ! "

In the further progress of the legend, there is
a long, grotesque, and occasionally awe-striking
account of the carpenter's incantations (if so they
are to be called), with a view of discovering the
lost document. It appears to have been his object
to convert the mind of Alice into a kind of telescopic
medium, through which Mr. Pyncheon and himself
might obtain a glimpse into the spiritual world.
He succeeded, accordingly, in holding an imperfect
sort of intercourse, at one remove, with the departed
personages, in whose custody the so much valued
secret had been carried beyond the precincts of
earth. During her trance, Alice described three
figures as being present to her spiritualised percep
tion. One was an aged, dignified, stern-looking
gentleman, clad, as for a solemn festival, in grave
and costly attire, but with a great blood-stain on
his richly-wrought band ; the second, an aged man,
meanly dressed, with a dark and malign counten
ance, and a broken halter about his neck ; the
third, a person not so advanced in life as the
former two, but beyond the middle age, wearing a
coarse woollen tunic and leather breeches, and with

ALICE PYNCHEON. 251

a carpenter's rule sticking out of his side-pocket.
These three visionary characters possessed a mutual
knowledge of the missing document. One of them,
in truth — it was he with the blood-stain on his
band — seemed, unless his gestures were misunder
stood, to hold the parchment in his immediate
keeping, but was prevented, by his two partners
in the mystery, from disburthening himself of the
trust. Finally, when he showed a purpose of shout
ing forth the secret, loudly enough to be heard
from his own sphere into that of mortals, his
companions struggled with him, and pressed their
hands over his mouth ; and forthwith — whether that
he were choked by it, or that the secret itself was
of a crimson hue — there was a fresh flow of blood
upon his band. Upon this, the two meanly-dressed
figures mocked and jeered at the much-abashed old
dignitary, and pointed their fingers at the stain.

At this juncture, Maule turned to Mr. Pyncheon.

" It will never be allowed," said he. " The custody
of this secret, that would so enrich his heirs, makes
part of your grandfather's retribution. He must
choke with it until it is no longer of any value.
And keep you the House of the Seven Gables ! It
is too dear-bought an inheritance, and too heavy
with the curse upon it, to be shifted yet awhile
from the colonel's posterity ! "

Mr. Pyncheon tried to speak, but — what with fear
and passion — could make only a gurgling murmur
in his throat. The carpenter smiled.

" Aha, worshipful sir ! — so you have old Maule's
blood to drink ! " said he jeeringly.

" Fiend in man's shape ! why dost thou keep

252 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

dominion over my child ? " cried Mr. Pyncheon,
when his choked utterance could give way. "Give
me back my daughter ! Then go thy ways ; and
may we never meet again ! "

" Your daughter ! " said Matthew Maule. " Why,
she is fairly mine ! Nevertheless, not to be too hard
with fair Mistress Alice, I will leave her in your
keeping ; but I do not warrant you that she shall
never have occasion to remember Maule, the
carpenter."

He waved his hands with an upward motion ; and,
after a few repetitions of similar gestures, the
beautiful Alice Pyncheon awoke from her strange
trance. She awoke, without the slightest recollection
of her visionary experience ; but as one losing
herself in a momentary reverie, and returning to the
consciousness of actual life, in almost as brief an
interval as the down-sinking flame of the hearth
should quiver again up the chimney. On recognising
Matthew Maule, she assumed an air of somewhat
cold but gentle dignity, the rather, as there was a
certain peculiar smile on the carpenter's visage, that
stirred the native pride of the fair Alice. So ended,
for that time, the quest of the lost title-deed of the
Pyncheon territory at the eastward ; nor, though
often subsequently renewed, has it ever yet befallen
a Pyncheon to set his eye upon that parchment.

But, alas for the beautiful, the gentle, yet too
haughty Alice ! A power, that she little dreamed
of, had laid its grasp upon her maiden soul. A will,
most unlike her own, constrained her to do its
grotesque and fantastic bidding. Her father, as it
proved, had martyred his poor child to an inordinate

ALICE PYNCHEON. 253

desire for measuring his land by miles, instead of
acres. And, therefore, while Alice Pyncheon lived,
she was Maule's slave, in a bondage more humiliating,
a thousandfold, than * that which binds its chain
around the body. Seated by his humble fireside,
Maule had but to wave his hand ; and, wherever
the proud lady chanced to be — whether in her
chamber, or entertaining her father's stately guests,
or worshipping at Church — whatever her place or
occupation, her spirit passed from beneath her own
control, and bowed itself to Maule. " Alice, laugh ! "
the carpenter, beside his hearth, would say ; or
perhaps intensely will it, without a spoken word.
And, even were it prayer-time, or at a funeral,
Alice must break into wild laughter. " Alice, be
sad ! " — and, at the instant, down would come her
tears, quenching all the mirth of those around her,
like sudden rain upon a bonfire. " Alice, dance!"
— and dance she would, not in such court-like
measures as she had learned abroad, but some high-
paced jig, or hop-skip rigadoon, befitting the brisk
lasses at a rustic merry-making. It seemed to be
Maule's impulse not to ruin Alice, nor to visit her
with any black or gigantic mischief, which would
have crowned her sorrows with the grace of tragedy,
but to wreak a low, ungenerous scorn upon her.
Thus all the dignity of life was lost. She felt herself
too much abased, arid longed to change natures with
some worm !

One evening, at a bridal-party — (but not her
own ; for, so lost from self-control, she would have
deemed it sin to marry) — poor Alice was beckoned
forth by her unseen despot, and constrained, in her

254 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

gossamer white dress and satin slippers, to hasten
along the street to the mean dwelling of a labouring-
man'. There was laughter and good cheer within ;
for Matthew Maule, that night, was to wed the
labourer's daughter, and had summoned proud Alice
Pyncheon to wait upon his bride. And so she did ;
and when the twain were one, Alice awoke out of
her enchanted sleep. Yet, no longer proud — humbly,
and with a smile all steeped in sadness — she kissed
Maule's wife, and went her way. It was an
inclement night ; the south-east wind drove the
mingled snow and rain into her thinly-sheltered
bosom ; her satin slippers were wet through and
through, as she trod the muddy sidewalks. The
next day, a cold ; soon, a settled cough ; anon, a
hectic cheek, a wasted form, that sat beside the
harpsichord, and filled the house with music ! Music,
in which a strain of the heavenly choristers was echoed !
O joy ! For Alice had borne her last humiliation !
O greater joy ! For Alice was penitent of her one
earthly sin, and proud no more !

The Pyncheons made a great funeral for Alice.
The kith and kin were there, and the whole respecta
bility of the town besides. But, last in the pro
cession, came Matthew Maule, gnashing his teeth,
as if he would have bitten his own heart in twain —
the darkest and woefullest man that ever walked
behind a corpse ! He meant to humble Alice — not
to kill her ; but he had taken a woman's delicate
soul into his rude gripe, to play with — and she was
dead!

PHOEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 255

XIV

PHCEBE'S GOOD-BYE.

HOLGRAVE, plunging into his tale with the energy
and absorption natural to a young author, had given
a good deal of action to the parts capable of being
developed and exemplified in that manner. He now
observed a certain remarkable drowsiness (wholly
unlike that with which the reader possibly feels
himself affected) had been flung over the senses of
his auditress. It was the effect, unquestionably, of
the mystic gesticulations by which he had sought
to bring bodily before Phoebe's perception the figure
of the mesmerising carpenter. With the lids droop
ing over her eyes — now lifted, for an instant, and
drawn down again, as with leaden weights — she
leaned slightly towards him, and seemed almost to
regulate her breath by his. Holgrave gazed at her,
as he rolled up his manuscript, and recognised an
incipient stage of that curious psychological con
dition, which, as he had himself told Phoebe, he
possessed more than an ordinary faculty of producing.
A veil was beginning to be muffled about her, in
which she could behold only him, and live only in
his thoughts and emotions. His glance, as he
fastened it on the young girl, grew involuntarily
more concentrated ; in his attitude there was the
consciousness of power, investing his hardly mature
figure with a dignity that did not belong to its
physical manifestation. It was evident that, with
but one wave of his hand and a corresponding

256 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

effort of his will, he could complete his mastery
over Phoebe's yet free and virgin spirit ; he could
establish an influence over this good, pure, and
simple child, as dangerous, and perhaps as disastrous,
as that which the carpenter of his legend had acquired
and exercised over the ill-fated Alice.

To a disposition like Holgrave's, at once speculative
/and active, there is no temptation so great as the
opportunity of acquiring empire over the human spirit ;
nor any idea more seductive to a young man than to
become the arbiter of a young girl's destiny. Let us,
therefore — whatever his defects of nature and educa
tion, and in spite of his scorn for creeds and institutions
— concede to the daguerreotypist the rare and high
quality of reverence for another's individuality. Let
us allow him integrity, also for ever after to be con
fided in ; since he forbade himself to twine that one
link more which might have rendered his spell over
x Phoebe indissoluble.

He made a slight gesture upward with his hand.

"You really mortify, me, my dear Miss Phoebe ! "
he exclaimed, smiling half-sarcastically at her. " My
poor story, it is but too evident, will never do for
Godey or Graham ! Only think of your falling asleep
at what I hoped the newspaper critics would pronounce
a most brilliant, powerful, imaginative, pathetic, and
original winding up ! Well, the manuscript must
serve to light lamps with ; if, indeed, being so imbued
with my gentle dulness, it is any longer capable of
flame ! "

"Me asleep! How can you say so?" answered
Phoebe, as unconscious of the crisis through which
she had passed as an infant of the precipice to the

PHCEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 257

verge of which it has rolled. " No, no ! I consider
myself as having been very attentive ; and, though I
don't remember the incidents quite distinctly, yet
I have an impression of a vast deal of trouble
and calamity — so, no doubt, the story will prove
exceedingly attractive."

By this time, the sun had gone down, and was
tinting the clouds towards the zenith with those bright
hues which are riot seen there until some time after
sunset, and when the horizon has quite lost its richer
brilliancy. The moon, too, which had long been
climbing overhead, and unobtrusively melting its
disc into the azure — like an ambitious demagogue,
who hides his aspiring purpose by assuming the
prevalent hue of popular sentiment — now began to
shine out, broad and oval, in its middle pathway.
These silvery beams were already powerful enough to
change the character of the lingering daylight. They
softened and embellished the aspect of the old house ;
although the shadows fell deeper into the angles of its
many gables, and lay brooding under the projecting
storey, and within the half-open door. With the
lapse of every moment, the garden grew more
picturesque ; the fruit-trees, shrubbery and flower-
bushes had a dark obscurity among them. The
commonplace characteristics — which, at noontide, it
seemed to have taken a century of sordid life to
accumulate — were now transfigured by a charm of
romance. A hundred mysterious years were whisper
ing among the leaves, whenever the slight sea-breeze
found its way thither and stirred them. Through the
foliage that roofed the little summer-house the moon
light flickered to and fro, and fell silvery white on the
H.S.G. i

258 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

dark floor, the table, and the circular bench, with a
continual shift and play, according as the chinks and
wayward crevices among the twigs admitted or shut
out the glimmer.

So sweetly cool was the atmosphere, after all the
feverish day, that the summer eve might be fancied as
sprinkling dews and liquid moonlight, with a dash of
icy temper in them, out of a silver vase. Here and
there, a few drops of this freshness were scattered on
a human heart, and gave it youth again, and sympathy
with the eternal youth of nature. The artist chanced
to be one on whom the reviving influence fell. It
made him feel — what he sometimes almost forgot,
thrust so early as he had been into the rude struggle
of man with man — how youthful he still was.

"It seems tome," he observed, " that I never
watched the coming of so beautiful an eve, and
never felt anything ^so very much like happiness as
at this moment. After all, what a good world we
live in ! How good, and beautiful ! How young
it is, too, with nothing really rotten or age-worn
in it ! This old house, for example, which some
times has positively oppressed my breath with its
smell of decaying timber ! And this garden, where
the black mould always clings to my spade, as if
I were a sexton, delving in a graveyard ! Could
I keep the feeling that now possesses me, the garden
would every day be virgin soil, with the earth's first
freshness in the flavour of its beans and squashes ;
and the house ! — it would be like a bower in Eden,
blossoming with the earliest roses that God ever
made. Moonlight, and the sentiment in man's
heart responsive to it, are the greatest of renovators

PHCEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 259

and reformers. And all other reform and renovation,
I suppose, will prove to be no better than moonshine ! "

" I have been happier than I am now ; at least,
much gayer," said Phoebe thoughtfully. "Yet I
am sensible of a great charm in this brightening
moonlight ; and I love to watch how the day, tired
as it is, lags away reluctantly, and hates to be
called yesterday so soon. I never cared much about
moonlight before. What is there, I wonder, so
beautiful in it, to-night ? "

"And you have never felt it before?" inquired the
artist, looking earnestly at the girl, through the
twilight.

" Never," answered Phoebe ; " and life does not
look the same, now that I have felt it so. It seems
as if I had looked at everything, hitherto, in broad
daylight, or else in the ruddy light of a cheerful fire,
glimmering and dancing through a room. Ah, poor
me ! " she added, with a half melancholy laugh. " I
shall never be so merry as before I knew Cousin
Hepzibah and poor Cousin Clifford. I have grown
a great deal older, in this little time. Older, and,
I hope, wiser, and — not exactly sadder — but, cer
tainly, with not half so much lightness in my spirits !
I have given them my sunshine, and have been glad
to give it ; but, of course, I cannot both give and
keep it. They are welcome, notwithstanding ! "

" You have lost nothing, Phcebe, worth keeping,
nor which it was possible to keep," said Holgrave,
after a pause. " Our first youth is of no value ; for
we are never conscious of it, until after it is gone.
But sometimes — always, I suspect, unless one is
exceedingly unfortunate — there comes a sense of

260 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

second youth, gushing out of the heart's joy at
being in love ; or possibly, it may come to crown
some other grand festival in life, if any other such
there be. This bemoaning of one's self (as you do
now) over the first, careless, shallow gaiety of youth
departed, and this profound happiness at youth
regained — so much deeper and richer than that
we lost — are essential to the soul's development.
In some cases, * the two states come almost simul
taneously, and mingle the sadness and the rapture
in one mysterious emotion."

" I hardly think I understand you," said Phcebe.

" No wonder," replied Holgrave, smiling; "for
I have told you a secret which I hardly began to
know, before I found myself giving it utterance.
Remember it, however ; and when the truth becomes
clear to you, then think of this moonlight scene ! "

" It is entirely moonlight now, except only a little
flush of faint crimson, upward from the west, between
those buildings," remarked Phcebe. " I must go
in. Cousin Hepzibah is not quick at figures, and
will give herself a headache over the day's accounts,
unless I help her."

But Holgrave detained her a little longer.

" Miss Hepzibah tells me," observed he, " that you
return to the country in a few days."

"Yes, but only for a little while," answered
Phcebe; "for I look upon this as my present home.
I go to make a few arrangements, and to take a
more deliberate leave of my mother and friends. It
is pleasant to live where one is much desired, and
very useful ; and I think I may have the satisfaction
of feeling myself so, here."

PHOEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 261

44 You surely may, and more than you imagine, "
said the artist. " Whatever health, comfort, and
natural life exists in the house, is embodied in your
person. These blessings came along- with you, and
will vanish when you leave the threshold. Miss
Hepzibah, by secluding herself from society, has
lost all true relation with it, and is, in fact, dead ;
although she galvanises herself into a semblance of
life, and stands behind her counter, afflicting the
world with a greatly-to-be-deprecated scowl. Your
poor cousin Clifford is another dead and long-buried
person, on whom the governor and council have
wrought a necromantic miracle. I should not wonder
if he were to crumble away, some morning, after you
are gone, and nothing be seen of him more, except
a heap of dust. Miss Hepzibah, at any rate, will
lose what little flexibility she has. They both exist
by you."

" I should be very sorry to think so," answered
Phoebe gravely. " But it is true that my small
abilities were precisely what they needed ; and I
have a real interest in their welfare — an odd kind
of motherly sentiment — which I wish you would
not laugh at ! And let me tell you frankly,
Mr. Holgrave, I am sometimes puzzled to know
whether you wish them well or ill."

' ' Undoubtedly," said the daguerreotypist, "I do
feel an interest in this antiquated, poverty-stricken
old maiden lady, and this degraded and shattered
gentleman — this abortive lover of the beautiful. A
kindly interest, too, helpless old children that they
are ! But you have no conception what a different
kind of heart mine is from your own. It is not my

262 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

impulse, as regards these two individuals, either to
help or hinder ; but to look on, to analyse, to explain
matters to myself, and to comprehend the drama
which, for almost two hundred years, has been
dragging its slow length over the ground where
you and I now tread. If permitted to witness the
close, I doubt not to derive a moral satisfaction from
it, go matters how they may. There is a conviction
within me that the end draws nigh. But, though
Providence sent you hither to help, and sends me
only as a privileged and meet spectator, I pledge
myself to lend these unfortunate beings whatever
aid I can ! "

" I wish you would speak more plainly," cried
Phoebe, perplexed and displeased ; " and, above all,
that you would feel more like a Christian and a
human being ! How is it possible to see people in
distress, without desiring, more than anything else,
to help and comfort them ? You talk as if this old
house were a theatre ; and you seem to look at
Hepzibah's and Clifford's misfortunes, and those of
generations before them, as a tragedy, such as I
have seen acted in the hall of a country hotel, only
the present one appears to be played exclusively for
your amusement. I do not like this. The play costs
the performers too much, and the audience is too
cold-hearted."

"You are severe," said Holgrave, compelled to
recognise a degree of truth in this piquant sketch
of his own mood.

" And then," continued Phcebe, " what can you
mean by your conviction, which you tell me of,
that the end is drawing near? Do you know of any

PHOEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 263

new trouble hang-ing- over my poor relatives ? If so,
tell me at once, and I will not leave them ! "

" Forgive me, Phoebe ! " said the daguerreotypist,
holding- out his hand, to which the girl was con
strained to yield her own. " I am somewhat of a
mystic, it must be confessed. The tendency is in
my blood, together with the faculty of Mesmerism,
which might have brought me to Gallows Hill, in
the good old times of witchcraft. Believe me, if I
were really aware of any secret, the disclosure of
which would benefit your friends — who are my own
friends, likewise — you should learn it before we part.
But I have no such knowledge."

" You hold something back !" said Phoebe.

1 ' Nothing — no secrets but my own," answered
Holgrave. " I can perceive, indeed, that Judge
Pyncheon still keeps his eye on Clifford, in whose
ruin he had so large a share. His motives and
intentions, however, are a mystery to me. He is
a determined and relentless man, with the genuine
character of an inquisitor ; and had he any object
to gain by putting Clifford to the rack, I verily
believe that he would wrench his joints from their
sockets, in order to accomplish it. But, so wealthy
and eminent as he is — so powerful in his own
strength, and in the support of society on all sides —
what can Judge Pyncheon have to hope or fear from
the imbecile, branded, half-torpid Clifford ? "

"Yet," urged Phoebe, "you did speak as if
misfortune were impending ! "

" Oh, that was because I am morbid ! " replied the
artist. " My mind has a twist aside, like almost
everybody's mind, except your own. Moreover, it

264 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

is so strange to find myself an inmate of this old
Pyncheon House, and sitting in this old garden —
(hark, how Maule's Well is murmuring !) — that, were
it only for this one circumstance, I cannot help
fancying that Destiny is arranging its fifth act for
a catastrophe."

4 * There!" cried Phoebe, with renewed vexation;
for she was by nature as hostile to mystery as the
sunshine to a dark corner. "You puzzle me more
than ever ! "

" Then let us part friends ! " said Holgrave, pressing
her hand. " Or, if not friends, let us part before
you entirely hate me. You, who love everybody else
in the world ! "

4 < Good-bye, then," said Phoebe frankly. " I do
not mean to be angry a great while, and should be
sorry to have you think so. There has Cousin
Hepzibah been standing in the shadow of the door
way, this quarter of an hour past ! She thinks I
stay too long in the damp garden. So, good-night,
and good-bye ! "

On the second morning thereafter, Phoebe might
have been seen, in her straw bonnet, with a shawl
on one arm and a little carpet-bag on the other,
bidding adieu to Hepzibah and Cousin Clifford.
She was to take a seat in the next train of cars,
which would transport her to within half a dozen
miles of her country village.

The tears were in Phoebe's eyes ; a smile, dewy with
affectionate regret, was glimmering around her
pleasant mouth. She wondered how it came to
pass, that her life of a few weeks, here in this heavy-
hearted old mansion, had taken such hold of her,

PHOEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 265

and so melted into her associations, as now to seem
a more important centre-point of remembrance than
all which had gone before. How had Hepzibah —
grim, silent, and irresponsive to her overflow of
cordial sentiment — contrived to win so much love ?
And Clifford — in his abortive decay, with the mystery
of fearful crime upon him, and the close, prison
atmosphere yet lurking in his breath — how had he
transformed himself into the simplest child, whom
Phcebe felt bound to watch over, and be, as it were,
the providence of his unconsidered hours ? Every
thing, at that instant of farewell, stood out pro
minently to her view. Look where she would, lay her
hand on what she might, the object responded to her
consciousness, as if a moist human heart were in it.

She peeped from the window into the garden, and
felt herself more regretful at leaving this spot of
black earth, vitiated with such an age-long growth
of weeds, than joyful at the idea of again scenting
her pine-forests and fresh clover-fields. She called
Chanticleer, his two wives, and the venerable chicken,
and threw them some crumbs of bread from the
breakfast-table. These being hastily gobbled up, the
chicken spread its .wings, and alighted close by
Phcebe on the window-sill, where it looked gravely into
her face and vented its emotions in a croak. Phcebe
bade it to be a good old chicken during her absence,
and promised to bring it a little bag of buckwheat.

"Ah, Phcebe!" remarked Hepzibah, "you do not
smile so naturally as when you came to us ! Then
the smile chose to shine out ; now, you choose it
should. It is well that you are going back, for a
little while, into your native air. There has been
H.S.G. 12

266 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

too much weight on your spirits. The house is too
gloomy and lonesome ; the shop is full of vexations ;
and as for me, I have no faculty of making things
look brighter than they are. Dear Clifford has been
your only comfort ! "

" Come hither, Phcebe," suddenly cried her cousin
Clifford, who had said very little, all the morning.
" Close ! — closer ! — and look me in the face ! "

Phoebe put one of her small hands on each elbow of
his chair, and leaned her face towards him, so that
he might peruse it as carefully as he would. It is
probable that the latent emotions of this parting
hour had revived, in some degree, his bedimmed
and enfeebled faculties.

At any rate, Phcebe soon felt that, if not the pro
found insight of a seer, yet a more than feminine
delicacy of appreciation, was making her heart the
subject of its regard. A moment before, she had
known nothing which she would have sought to hide.
Now, as if some secret were hinted to her own
consciousness through the medium of another's per
ception, she was fain to let her eyelids droop beneath
Clifford's gaze. A blush, too — the redder, because
she strove hard to keep it down — ascended higher
and higher, in a tide of fitful progress, until even
her brow was all suffused with it.

" It is enough, Phcebe," said Clifford, with a
melancholy smile. " When I first saw you, you were
the prettiest little maiden in the world ; and now you
have deepened into beauty ! Girlhood has passed
into womanhood ; the bud is a bloom ! Go, now ! —
I feel lonelier than I did."

Phcebe took leave of the desolate couple, and passed

PHOEBE'S GOOD-BYE. 267

through the shop, twinkling her eyelids to shake off
a dewdrop ; for — considering" how brief her absence
was to be, and therefore the folly of being cast down
about it — she would not so far acknowledge her tears
as to dry them with her handkerchief. On the door
step, she met the little urchin whose marvellous feats
of gastronomy have been recorded in the earlier pages
of our narrative. She took from the window some
specimen or other of natural history — her eyes being
too dim with moisture to inform her accurately
whether it was a rabbit or a hippopotamus — put it
into the child's hand, as a parting gift, and went her
way. Old Uncle Venner was just coming out of his
door, with a wood-horse and saw on his shoulder ;
and, trudging along the street, he scrupled not to
keep company with Phcebe, so far as their paths lay
together ; nor, in spite of his patched coat and rusty
beaver, and the curious fashion of his tow-cloth
trousers, could she find it in her heart to outwalk him.
"We shall miss you, next Sabbath afternoon,"
observed the street philosopher. " It is unaccount
able how little while it takes some folks to grow just
as natural to a man as his own breath ; and, begging
your pardon, Miss Phcebe (though there can be no
offence in an old man's saying it), that's just what
you've, grown to me ! My years have been a great
many, and your life is but just beginning ; and yet,
you are somehow as familiar to me as if I had found
you at my mother's door, and you had blossomed,
like a running vine, all along my pathway since.
Come back soon, or I shall be gone to my farm ; for
I begin to find these wood-sawing jobs a little too
rough for my back-ache."

268 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" Very soon, Uncle Venner," replied Phoebe.

4 'And let it be all the sooner, Phoebe, for the sake
of those poor souls yonder," continued her com
panion. "They can never do without you, now —
never, Phcebe, never ! — no more than if one of
God's angels had been living* with them, and making*
their dismal house pleasant and comfortable ! Don't
it seem to you they'd be in a sad case, if, some
pleasant summer morning- like this, the angel should
spread his wing's, and fly to the place he came from ?
Well, just so they feel, now that you're going home
by the railroad ! They can't bear it, Miss Phcebe ;
so be sure to come back ! "

" I am no angel, Uncle Venner," said Phcebe,
smiling, as she offered him her hand at the street-
corner. " But, I suppose, people never feel so much
like angels as when they are doing what little good
they may. So I shall certainly come back ! "

Thus parted the old man and the rosy girl ; and
Phcebe took the wings of the morning, and was soon
flitting almost as rapidly away as if endowed with
the aerial locomotion of the angels to whom Uncle
Venner had so graciously compared her

XV.

THE SCOWL AND SMILE.

SEVERAL days passed over the seven gables, heavily
and drearily enough. In fact (not to attribute the
whole gloom of sky and earth to the one inauspicious
circumstance of Phoebe's departure), an easterly
storm had set in, and indefatigably applied itself to

THE SCOWL AND SMILE 269

the task of making the black roof and walls of the
old house look more cheerless than ever before. Yet
was the outside not half so cheerless as the interior.
Poor Clifford was cut off, at once, from all his scanty
resources of enjoyment. Phoebe was not there ;
nor did the sunshine fall upon the floor. The garden,
with its muddy walks, and the chill, dripping foliage
of its summer-house, was an image to be shuddered
at. Nothing flourished in the cold, moist, pitiless
atmosphere, drifting with the brackish scud of sea-
breezes, except the moss along the joints of the
shingle-roof, and the great bunch of weeds, that
had lately been suffering from drought, in the angle
between the two front gables.

As for Hepzibah, she seemed not merely possessed
with the east wind, but to be, in her very person,
only another phase of this gray and sullen spell of
weather ; the east wind itself, grim and disconsolate,
in a rusty black silk gown, and with a turban of
cloud-wreathes on its head. The custom of the shop
fell off, because a story got abroad that she soured
her small beer and other damageable commodities, by
scowling on them. It is, perhaps, true that the
public had something reasonably to complain of in
her deportment ; but towards Clifford she was neither
ill-tempered nor unkind, nor felt less warmth of heart
than always, had it been possible to make it reach
him. The inutility of her best efforts, however,
palsied the poor old gentlewoman. She could do
little else than sit silently in a corner of the room,
when the wet pear-tree branches, sweeping across
the small windows, created a noonday dusk,
which Hepzibah unconsciously darkened with her

270 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

woebegone aspect. It was no fault of Hepzibah's.
Everything — even the old chairs and tables, that
had known what weather was for three or four such
lifetimes as her own — looked as damp and chill as
if the present were their worst experience. The
picture of the Puritan colonel shivered on the wall.
The house itself shivered, from every attic of its
seven gables, down to the great kitchen fireplace,
which served all the better as an emblem of the
mansion's heart, because, though built for warmth,
it was now so comfortless and empty.

Hepzibah attempted to enliven matters by a fire
in the parlour. But the storm-demon kept watch
above, and, whenever a flame was kindled, drove
the smoke back again, choking the chimney's sooty
throat with its own breath. Nevertheless, during
four days of this miserable storm, Clifford wrapped
himself in an old cloak, and occupied his customary
chair. On the morning of the fifth, when summoned
to breakfast, he responded only by a broken-hearted
murmur, expressive of a determination not to leave
his bed. His sister made no attempt to change his
purpose. In fact, entirely as she loved him,
Hepzibah could hardly have borne any longer the
wretched duty — so impracticable by her few and
rigid faculties — of seeking pastime for a still sensi
tive, but ruined mind, critical and fastidious, without
force or volition. It was, at least, something short
of positive despair, that, to-day, she might sit
shivering alone, and not suffer continually a new
grief, and unreasonable pang of remorse, at every
fitful sigh of her fellow-sufferer.

But Clifford, it seemed, though he did not make

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 271

his appearance below-stairs, had, after all, bestirred
himself in quest of amusement. In the course of
the forenoon, Hepzibah heard a note of music, which
(there being no other tuneful contrivance in the
House of the Seven Gables) she knew must proceed
from Alice Pyncheon's harpsichord. She was aware
that Clifford, in his youth, had possessed a cultivated
taste for music, and a considerable degree of skill
in its practice. It was difficult, however, to con
ceive of his retaining an accomplishment to which
daily exercise is so essential, in the measure indi
cated by the sweet, airy, and delicate, though most
melancholy strain, that now stole upon her ear.
Nor was it less marvellous that the long-silent
instrument should be capable of so much melody.
Hepzibah involuntarily thought of the ghostly
harmonies, prelusive of death in the family, which
were attributed to the legendary Alice. But it was,
perhaps, proof of the agency of other than spiritual
fingers, that, after a few touches, the chords seemed
to snap asunder with their own vibrations, and the
music ceased.

But a harsher sound succeeded to the mysterious
notes ; nor was the easterly day fated to pass
without an event sufficient in itself to poison, for
Hepzibah and Clifford, the balmiest air that ever
brought the humming-birds along with it. The
final echoes of Alice Pyncheon's performance (or
Clifford's, if his we must consider it) were driven
away by no less vulgar a dissonance than the
ringing of the shop-bell. A foot was heard scraping
itself on the threshold, and thence somewhat
ponderously stepping on the floor. Hepzibah

272 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

delayed a moment, while muffling herself in a faded
shawl, which had been her defensive armour in a
forty years' warfare against the east wind. A
characteristic sound, however — neither a cough nor
a hem, but a kind of rumbling and reverberating
spasm in somebody's capacious depth of chest —
impelled her to hurry forward, with that aspect of
fierce faint-heartedness so common to women in
cases of perilous emergency. Few of her sex, on
such occasions, have ever looked so terrible as our
poor scowling Hepzibah. But the visitor quietly
closed the shop-door behind him, stood up his
umbrella against the counter, and turned a visage
of composed benignity, to meet the alarm and anger
which his appearance had excited.

Hepzibah's presentiment had not deceived her. It
was no other than Judge Pyncheon, who, after in
vain trying the front door, had now effected his
entrance into the shop.

" How do you do, Cousin Hepzibah? — and how
does this most inclement weather affect our poor
Clifford ? " began the judge ; and wonderful it
seemed, indeed, that the easterly storm was not put
to shame, or, at any rate, a little mollified, by the
genial benevolence of his smile. " I could not rest
without calling to ask, once more, whether I can
in any manner promote his comfort, or your own."

" You can do nothing," said Hepzibah, controlling
her agitation as well as she could. " I devote
myself to Clifford. He has every comfort which his
situation admits of."

" But, allow me to suggest, dear cousin," rejoined
the judge, "you err in all affection and kindness,

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 273

no doubt, and with the very best intentions — but
you do err, nevertheless, in keeping your brother
so secluded. Why insulate him thus from all
sympathy and kindness ? Clifford, alas ! has had
too much of solitude. Now let him try society —
the society, that is to say, of kindred and old
friends. Let me, for instance, but see Clifford ; and
I will answer for the good effect of the interview."

"You cannot see him," answered Hepzibah.
" Clifford has kept his bed since yesterday."

"What! How! Is he ill?" exclaimed Judge
Pyncheon, starting with what seemed to be angry
alarm ; for the very frown of the old Puritan darkened
through the room as he spoke. "Nay, then, I
must and will see him ! What if he should die ? "

" He is in no danger of death," said Hepzibah ;
and added, with bitterness that she could repress
no longer, "none — unless he shall be persecuted
to death, now, by the same man who long ago
attempted it ! "

44 Cousin Hepzibah," said the judge, with an
impressive earnestness of manner, which grew even
to tearful pathos, as he proceeded, "is it possible
that you do not perceive how unjust, how unkind,
how unchristian, is this constant, this long-continued
bitterness against me, for a part which I was con
strained by duty and conscience, by the force of
law, and at my own peril, to act? What did I do,
in detriment to Clifford, which it was possible to
leave undone ? How could you, his sister — if, for
t your never-ending sorrow, as it has been for mine,
, you had known what I did — have shown greater
tenderness ? And do you think, cousin, that it has

274 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

cost me no pang ? — that it has left no anguish in
my bosom, from that day to this, amidst all the
prosperity with which Heaven has blessed me ? — or
that I do not now rejoice, when it is deemed con
sistent with the dues of public justice and the welfare
of society, that this dear kinsman, this early friend,
this nature so delicately and beautifully constituted —
so unfortunate, let us pronounce him, and forbear
to say, so guilty — that our own Clifford, in fine,
should be given back to life, and its possibilities
of enjoyment ? Ah, you little know me, Cousin
Hepzibah ! You little know this heart ! It now
throbs at the thought of meeting him ! There lives
not the human being (except yourself — and you not
more than I) who has shed so many tears for Clifford's
calamity ! You behold some of them now. There
is none who would so delight to promote his happi
ness ! Try me, Hepzibah ! — try me, cousin ! — try the
man whom you have treated as your enemy and
Clifford's ! — try Jaffrey Pyncheon, and you shall find
him true, to the heart's core ! "

" In the name of Heaven," cried Hepzibah, provoked
only to intenser indignation by this out-gush of the
inestimable tenderness of a stern nature; "in God's
name, Whom you insult, and Whose power I could
almost question, since He hears you utter so many
false words, without palsying your tongue — give over,
I beseech you, this loathsome pretence of affection for
your victim ! You hate him ! Say so, like a man !
You cherish, at this moment, some black purpose
against him, in your heart ! Speak it out, at once ! —
or, if you hope so to promote it better, hide it till you
can triumph in its success ! But never speak again

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 275

of your love for my poor brother ! I cannot bear it !
It will drive me beyond a woman's decency ! It will
drive me mad ! Forbear ! Not another word ! It
will make me spurn you ! "

For once, Hepzibah's wrath had given her courage.
She had spoken. But, after all, was this unconquer
able distrust of Judge Pyncheon's integrity, and this
utter denial, apparently, of his claim to stand in the
ring of human sympathies — were they founded in any
just perception of his character, or merely the offspring
of a woman's unreasonable prejudice, deduced from
nothing ?

The judge, beyond all question, was a man of
eminent respectability. The Church acknowledged it ;
the state acknowledged it. It was denied by nobody.
In all the very extensive sphere of those who knew
him, whether in his public or private capacities, there
was not an individual — except Hepzibah, and some
lawless mystic, like the daguerreotypist, and, possibly,
a few political opponents — who would have dreamed
of seriously disputing his claim to a high and honour
able place in the world's regard. Nor (we must do
him the further justice to say) did Judge Pyncheon
himself, probably, entertain many or very, frequent
doubts, that his enviable reputation accorded with his
deserts. His conscience, therefore, usually considered
the surest witness to a man's integrity — his conscience,
unless it might be for the little space of five minutes
in the twenty-four hours, or, now and then, some
black day in the whole year's circle — his conscience
bore an accordant testimony with the world's laudatory
voice. And yet, strong as this evidence may seem to
be, we should hesitate to peril our own conscience on

276 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the assertion, that the judge and the consenting- world
were right, and that poor Hepzibah, with her solitary
prejudice, was wrong. Hidden from mankind — for
gotten by himself, or buried so deeply under a
sculptured and ornamented pile of ostentatious deeds
that his daily life could take no note of it — there may
have lurked some evil and unsightly thing. Nay, we
could almost venture to say, further, that a daily guilt
might have been acted by him, continually renewed,
and reddening forth afresh, like the miraculous blood
stain of a murder, without his necessarily and at
every moment being aware of it.

Men of strong minds, great force of character, and
a hard texture of the sensibilities, are very capable of
falling into mistakes of this kind. They are ordinarily
men to whom forms are of paramount importance.
Their field of action lies among the external phenomena
of life. They possess vast ability in grasping, and
arranging, and appropriating to themselves, the big,
heavy, solid unrealities, such as gold, landed estate,
offices of trust and emolument, and public honours.
With these materials, and with deeds of goodly aspect,
done in the public eye, an individual of this class
builds up, as it were, a tall and stately edifice, which,
in the view of other people, and ultimately in his own
view, is no other than the man's character, or the
man himself. Behold, therefore, a palace ! Its
splendid halls, and suites of spacious apartments,
are floored with a mosaic-work of costly marbles ; its
windows, the whole height of each room, admit the
sunshine through the most transparent of plate-glass ;
its high cornices are gilded, and its ceilings gorgeously
painted ; and a lofty dome — through which, from the

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 277

central pavement, you may gaze up to the sky, as
with no obstructing" medium between — surmounts the
whole. With what fairer and nobler emblem could
any man desire to shadow forth his character ? Ah !
but in some low and obscure nook — some narrow
closet on the ground-floor, shut, locked, and bolted,
and the key flung away — or beneath the marble pave
ment, in a stagnant water-puddle, with the richest
pattern of mosaic-work above — may lie a corpse, half
decayed, and still decaying, and diffusing its death-
scent all through the palace ! The inhabitant will
not be conscious of it, for it has long been his daily
breath ! Neither will the visitors, for they smell only
the rich odours which the master sedulously scatters
through the palace, and the incense which they bring,
and delight to burn before him ! Now and then,
perchance, comes in a seer, before whose sadly-gifted
eye the whole structure melts into thin air, leaving
only the hidden nook, the bolted closet, with the cob
webs festooned over its forgotten door, or the deadly
hole under the pavement, and the decaying corpse
within. Here, then, we are to seek the true emblem
of the man's character, and of the deed that gives
whatever reality it possesses to his life. And, beneath
the show of a marble palace, that pool of stagnant
water, foul with many impurities, and, perhaps, tinged
with blood — that secret abomination, above which,
possibly, he may say his prayers, without remembering
it — is this man's miserable soul !

To apply this train of remark somewhat more
closely to Judge Pyncheon, we might say (without
in the least imputing crime to a personage of his
eminent respectability) that there was enough of

278 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

splendid rubbish in his life to cover up and paralyse
a more active and subtle conscience than the judge
was ever troubled with. The purity of his judicial
character, while on the bench ; the faithfulness of
his public service in subsequent capacities ; his
devotedness to his party, and the rigid consistency
with which he had adhered to its principles, or, at
all events, kept pace with its organised movements ;
his remarkable zeal as president of a Bible society ;
his unimpeachable integrity as treasurer of a widow's
and orphan's fund ; his benefits to horticulture, by
producing two much-esteemed varieties of the pear,
and to agriculture, through the agency of the famous
Pyncheon bull ; the cleanliness of his moral deport
ment, for a great many years past ; the severity with
which he had frowned upon, and finally cast off, an
expensive and dissipated son, delaying forgiveness
until within the final quarter of an hour of the young
man's life ; his prayers at morning and eventide,
and graces at meal-time ; his efforts in furtherance
of the temperance cause ; his confining himself, since
the last attack of the gout, to five diurnal glasses
of old sherry wine ; the snowy whiteness of his linen,
the polish of his boots, the handsomeness of his
gold-headed cane, the square and roomy fashion of
his coat, and the fineness of its material, and, in
general, the studied propriety of his dress and
equipment ; the scrupulousness with which he paid
public notice, in the street, by a bow, a lifting of
the hat, a nod, or a motion of the hand, to all and
sundry his acquaintances, rich or poor ; the smile of
broad benevolence wherewith he made it a point to
gladden the whole world — what room could possibly

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 279

be found for darker traits, in a portrait made up of
lineaments like these ? This proper face was what
he beheld in the looking-glass. This admirably
arranged life was what he was conscious of, in
the progress of every day. Then, might not he
claim to be its result and sum, and say to himself
and the community, " Behold Judge Pyncheon
there ! "

And, allowing that, many, many years ago, in his
early and reckless youth, he had committed some one
wrong act — or that, even now, the inevitable force
of circumstances should occasionally make him do
one questionable deed, among a thousand praise
worthy, or, at least, blameless ones — would you
characterise the judge by that one necessary deed,
and that half-forgotten act, and let it overshadow
the fair aspect of a lifetime ? What is there so
ponderous in evil, that a thumb's bigness of it should
outweigh the mass of things not evil which were
heaped into the other scale ? This scale and balance
system is a favourite one with people of Judge
Pyncheon's brotherhood. A hard, cold man, thus
unfortunately situated, seldom or never looking
inward, and resolutely taking his idea of himself
from what purports to be his image as reflected in
the mirror of public opinion, can scarcely arrive at
true self-knowledge, except through loss of property
and reputation. Sickness will not always help him
to it ; not always the death-hour !

But our affair now is with Judge Pyncheon as he

stood confronting the fierce outbreak of Hepzibah's

', wrath. Without premeditation, to her own surprise,

and indeed terror, she had given vent, for once, to

28o HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the inveteracy of her resentment, cherished against
this kinsman for thirty years.

Thus far, the judge's countenance had expressed
mild forbearance — grave and almost gentle depreca
tion of his cousin's unbecoming violence — free and
Christian-like forgiveness of the wrong inflicted by
her words. But, when those words were irrevocably
spoken, his look assumed sternness, the sense of
power, and immitigable resolve ; and this with so
natural and imperceptible a change, that it seemed
as if the iron man had stood there from the first,
and the meek man not at all. The effect was as
when the light, vapoury clouds, with their soft
colouring, suddenly vanish from the stony brow of
a precipitous mountain, and leave there the frown
which you at once feel to be eternal. Hepzibah
almost adopted the insane belief that it was her old
Puritan ancestor, and not the modern judge, on
whom she had just been wreaking the bitterness of
her heart. Never did a man show stronger proof
of the lineage attributed to him than Judge Pyncheon,
at this crisis, by his unmistakable resemblance to the
picture in the inner room.

"Cousin Hepzibah," said he, very calmly, "it is
time to have done with this."

"With all my heart!" answered she. "Then,
why do you persecute us any longer ? Leave poor
Clifford and me in peace. Neither of us desires
anything better ! "

"It is my purpose to see Clifford before I leave
this house," continued the judge. " Do not act like
a madwoman, Hepzibah ! I am his only friend, and
an all-powerful one. Has it never occurred to you —

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 281

are you so blind as not to have seen — that, without
not merely my consent, but my efforts, my representa
tions, the exertion of my whole influence, political,
official, personal, Clifford would never have been
what you call free ? Did you think his release a
triumph over me ? Not so, my good cousin ; not so,
by any means ! The furthest possible from that !
No ; but it was the accomplishment of a purpose
long entertained on my part. I set him free ! "

"You!" answered Hepzibah. "I never will
believe it ! He owed his dungeon to you ; his
freedom to God's providence ! "

"I set him free!" reaffirmed Judge Pyncheon,
with the calmest composure. " And I come hither
now to decide whether he shall retain his freedom.
It will depend upon himself. For this purpose, I
must see him."

" Never ! — it would- drive him mad!" exclaimed
Hepzibah, but with an irresoluteness sufficiently
perceptible to the keen eye of the judge ; for, without
the slightest faith in his good intentions, she knew
not whether there was most to dread in yielding or
resistance. "And why should you wish to see this
wretched, broken manj who retains hardly a fraction
of his intellect, and will hide even that from an eye
which has no love in it ? "

" He shall see love enough in mine, if that be
all ! " said the judge, with well-grounded confidence
in the benignity of his aspect. " But, Cousin
Hepzibah, you confess a great deal, and very much
to the purpose. Now, listen, and I will frankly
explain my reasons for insisting on this interview.
At the death, thirty years since, of our uncle Jaffrey,

282 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

it was found — I know not whether the circumstance
ever attracted much of your attention, among the
sadder interests that clustered round that event
— but it was found that his visible estate, of every
kind, fell far short of any estimate ever made of it.
He was supposed to be immensely rich. Nobody
doubted that he stood among1 the weightiest men of
his day. It was one of his eccentricities, however
— and not altogether a folly, neither — to conceal
the amount of his property by making distant and
foreign investments, perhaps under other names
than his own, and by various means, familiar enough
to capitalists, but unnecessary here to be specified.
By Uncle Jaffrey's last will and testament, as you
are aware, his entire property was bequeathed to
me, with the single exception of a life interest to
yourself in this old family mansion, and the strip of
patrimonial estate remaining attached to it."

" And do you seek to deprive us of that? " asked
Hepzibah, unable to restrain her bitter contempt.
" Is this your price for ceasing to persecute poor
Clifford?"

" Certainly not, my dear cousin ! " answered the
/ judge, smiling benevolently. " On the contrary, as
you must do me the justice to own, I have constantly
expressed my readiness to double or treble your
resources, whenever you should make up your
mind to accept any kindness of that nature at the
hands of your kinsman. No, no ! But here lies
the gist of the matter. Of my uncle's unquestionably
great estate, as I have said, not the half — no, not
one-third, as I am fully convinced — was apparent
after his death. Now, I have the best possible

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 283

reasons for believing that your brother Clifford
can give me a clue to the recovery of the
remainder. "

" Clifford! — Clifford know of any hidden wealth?
— Clifford have it in his power to make you rich ? "
cried the old gentlewoman, affected with a sense of
something like ridicule at the idea. " Impossible !
You deceive yourself ! It is really a thing to laugh
at!"

"It is as certain as that I stand here ! " said
Judge Pyncheon, striking his gold-headed cane on
the floor, and at the same time stamping his foot,
as if to express his conviction the more forcibly
by the whole emphasis of his substantial person.
" Clifford told me so himself! "

" No, no ! " exclaimed Hepzibah incredulously.
" You are dreaming, Cousin Jaffrey ! "

" I do not belong to the dreaming class of men,"
said the judge quietly. "Some months before my
uncle's death, Clifford boasted to me of the possession
of the secret of incalculable wealth. His purpose
was to taunt me, and excite my curiosity. I know
it well. But, from a pretty distinct recollection of
the particulars of our conversation, I am thoroughly
convinced that there was truth in what he said.
Clifford, at this moment, if he chooses — and choose
he must ! — can inform me where to find the schedule,
the documents, the evidences, in whatever shape they
exist, of the vast amount of Uncle Jaffrey's missing
property. He has the secret. His boast was no
idle word. It had a directness, an emphasis, a
particularity, that showed a back-bone of solid
meaning within the mystery of his expression."

284 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

"But what could have been Clifford's object,"
asked Hepzibah, "in concealing it so long?"

" It was one of the bad impulses of our fallen
nature," replied the judge, turning up his eyes. " He
looked upon me as his enemy. He considered me
as the cause of his overwhelming disgrace, his
imminent peril of death, his irretrievable ruin. There
was no great probability, therefore, of his volunteering
information, out of his dungeon, that should elevate
me still higher on the ladder of prosperity. But
the moment has now come when he must give up
his secret."

"And what if he should refuse?" inquired
Hepzibah. "Or — as I steadfastly believe — what if
he has no knowledge of this wealth ? "

"My dear cousin," said Judge Pyncheon, with a
quietude which he had the power of making more
formidable than any violence, "since your brother's
return, I have taken the precaution (a highly proper
one in the near kinsman and natural guardian of
an individual so situated) to have his deportment and
habits constantly and carefully overlooked. Your
neighbours have been eye-witnesses to whatever has
passed in the garden. The butcher, the baker, the
fishmonger, some of the customers of your shop,
and many a prying old woman, have told me several
of the secrets of your interior. A still larger circle
— I myself, among the rest — can testify to his
extravagances at the arched window. Thousands
beheld him, a week or two ago, on the point of
flinging himself thence into the street. From all
this testimony, I am led to apprehend — reluctantly,
and with deep grief — that Clifford's misfortunes have

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 285

so affected his intellect, never very strong", that he
cannot safely remain at large. The alternative, you^
must be aware — and its adoption will depend entirely
on the decision which I am now about to make —
the alternative is his confinement, probably for the
remainder of his life, in a public asylum for persons
in his unfortunate state of mind."

" You cannot mean it ! " shrieked Hepzibah.

" Should my cousin Clifford," continued Judge
Pyncheon, wholly undisturbed, "from mere malice,
and hatred of one whose interests ought naturally
to be dear to him — a mode of passion that, as often
as any other, indicates mental disease — should he
refuse me the information so important to myself,
and which he assuredly possesses, I shall consider
it the one needed jot of evidence to satisfy my
mind of his insanity. And, once sure of the course
pointed out by conscience, you know me too well,
Cousin Hepzibah, to entertain a doubt that I shall
pursue it."

"O Jaffrey — Cousin Jaffrey ! " cried Hepzibah,
mournfully, not passionately, "it is you that are
diseased in mind, not Clifford ! You have forgotten
that a woman was your mother ! — that you have
had sisters, brothers, children of your own ! — or that
there ever was affection between man and man, or
pity from one man to another, in this miserable
world ! Else, how could you have dreamed of this ?
You are not young, Cousin Jaffrey ! — no, nor middle-
aged — but already an old man ! The hair is white
upon your head ! How many years have you to
live ? Are you not rich enough for that little time ?
Shall you be hungry — shall you lack clothes, or a

286 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

roof to shelter you — between this point and the
grave ? No ! but, with the half of what you now
possess, you could revel in costly food and wines,
and build a house twice as splendid as you now
inhabit, and make a far greater show to the world—
and yet leave riches to your only son, to make him
bless the hour of your death ! Then, why should
you do this cruel, cruel thing? — so mad a thing,
that I know not whether to call it wicked ! Alas,
Cousin Jaffrey, this hard and grasping spirit has
run in our blood these two hundred years ! You
are but doing over again, in another shape, what
your ancestor before you did, and sending down to
your posterity the curse inherited from him ! "

"Talk sense, Hepzibah, for Heaven's sake!"
exclaimed the judge, with the impatience natural
to a reasonable man, on hearing anything so utterly
absurd as the above, in a discussion about matters
of business. " I have told you my determination.
I am not apt to change. Clifford must give up his
secret, or take the consequences. And let him
decide quickly ; for I have several affairs to attend
to, this morning, and an important dinner engagement
with some political friends."

4 'Clifford has no secret!" answered Hepzibah.
" And God will not let you do the thing you meditate ! "

" We shall see," said the unmoved judge. " Mean
while, choose whether you will summon Clifford, and
allow this business to be amicably settled by an
interview between two kinsmen, or drive me to
harsher measures, which I should be most happy to
feel myself justified in avoiding. The responsibility
is altogether on your part."

THE SCOWL AND SMILE. 287

"You are stronger than I," said Hepzibah, after
a brief consideration ; <l and you have no pity in your
strength ! Clifford is not now insane ; but the inter
view which you insist upon may go far to make him
so. Nevertheless, knowing you as I do, I believe it
to be my best course to allow you to judge for yourself
as to the improbability of his possessing any valuable
secret. I will call Clifford. Be merciful in your
dealings with him ! — be far more merciful than your
heart bids you be ! — for God is looking at you, Jaffrey
Pyncheon ! "

The judge followed his cousin from the shop, where
the foregoing conversation had passed, into the
parlour, and flung himself heavily into the great
ancestral chair. Many a former Pyncheon had found
repose in its capacious arms : rosy children, after
their sports ; young men, dreamy with love ; grown
men, weary with cares ; old men, burthened with
winters ; they had mused, and slumbered, and
departed to a yet profounder sleep. It had been a
long tradition, though a doubtful one, that this was
the very chair, seated in which, the earliest of the
judge's New England forefathers — he whose picture
still hung upon the wall — had given the dead man's
silent a'nd stern reception to the throng of distin
guished guests. From that hour of evil omen,
until the present, it may be — though we know not
tne secret of his heart — but it may be that no wearier
and sadder man had ever sunk into the chair than
this same Judge Pyncheon, whom we have just beheld
so immitigably hard and resolute. Surely, it must
have been at no slight cost that he had thus fortified
his soul with iron. Such calmness is a mightier effort

288 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

than the violence of weaker men. And there was yet
a heavy task for him to do. Was it a little matter —
a trifle to be prepared for in a single moment, and to
be rested from in another moment — that he must now,
after thirty years, encounter a kinsman risen from a
living* tomb, and wrench a secret from him, or else
consign him to a living" tomb again ?

"Did you speak?" asked Hepzibah, looking- in
from the threshold of the parlour ; for she imagined
that the judge had uttered some sound which she
was anxious to interpret as a relenting1 impulse. " I
thought you called me back."

" No, no ! " gruffly answered Judge Pyncheon, with
a harsh frown, while his brow grew almost a black
purple, in the shadow of the room. "Why should I
call you back ? Time flies ! Bid Clifford come to
me ! "

The judge had taken his watch from his vest-pocket,
and now held it in his hand, measuring the interval
which was to ensue before the appearance of Clifford,

XVI

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER.

NEVER had the old house appeared so dismal to
poor Hepzibah as wrhen she departed on that
wretched errand. There was a strange aspect in it.
As she trod along the foot-worn passages, and
opened one crazy door after another, and ascended
the creaking staircase, she gazed wistfully and fear
fully around. It would have been no marvel, to her
excited mind, if, behind or beside her, there had been

e-s-G- "She leaned slightly towards him."

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER. 289

the rustle of dead people's garments, or pale visages
awaiting her on the landing-place above. H-er nerves
were set all ajar by the scene of passion and terror
through which she had just struggled. Her colloquy
with Judge Pyncheon, who so perfectly represented
the person and attributes of the founder of the family,
had called back the dreary past. It weighed upon
her heart. Whatever she had heard, from legendary
aunts and grandmothers, concerning the good or
evil fortunes of the Pyncheons — stories which had
heretofore been kept warm in her remembrance by the
chimney-corner glow that was associated with them
— now recurred to her, sombre, ghastly, cold, like
most passages of family history, when brooded over
in melancholy mood. The whole seemed little else
but a series of calamity, reproducing itself in suc
cessive generations, with one general hue, and
varying in little, save the outline. But Hepzibah now
felt as if the judge, and Clifford, and herself — they
three together — were on the point of adding another
incident to the annals of the house, with a bolder
relief of wrong and sorrow, which would cause it to
stand out from all the rest. Thus it is that grief of
the passing moment takes upon itself an individuality,
and a character of climax, which it is destined to lose,
after a while, and to fade into the dark gray tissue
common to the grave or glad events of many years
ago. It is but for a moment, comparatively, that
anything looks strange or startling ; a truth that
has the bitter and the sweet in it.

But Hepzibah could not rid herself of the sense
of something unprecedented at that instant passing,
and soon to be accomplished. Her nerves were in a
H.S.G. K

290 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

shake. Instinctively she paused before the arched
window, 'and looked out upon the street, in order
to seize its permanent objects with her mental grasp,
and thus to steady herself from the reel and vibra
tion which affected her more immediate sphere. It
brought her up, as we may say, with a kind of shock,
when she beheld everything under the same appear
ance as the day before, and numberless preceding
days, except for the difference between sunshine and
sullen storm. Her eyes travelled along the street,
from door-step to door-step, noting the wet sidewalks,
with here and there a puddle in hollows that had been
imperceptible until filled with water. She screwed
her dim optics to their acutest point, in the hope of
making out, with greater distinctness, a certain
window, where she half saw, half guessed, that a
tailor's seamstress was sitting at her work. Hepzibah
flung herself upon that unknown woman's companion
ship, even thus far off. Then she was attracted by
a chaise rapidly passing, and watched its moist and
glistening top, and its splashing wheels, until it had
turned the corner, and refused to carry any further
her idly trifling — because appalled and overburthened
— mind. When the vehicle had disappeared, she
allowed herself still another loitering moment ; for
the patched figure of good Uncle Venner was now
visible, coming slowly from the head of the street
downward, with a rheumatic limp, because the east
wind had got into his joints. Hepzibah wished that
he would pass yet more slowly, and befriend her
shivering solitude a little longer. Anything that
would take her out of the grievous present, and
interpose human beings betwixt herself and what

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER. v 291

was nearest to her — whatever would defer, for an
instant, the inevitable errand on which she was bound
— all such impediments were welcome. Next to the
lightest heart, the heaviest is apt to be most playful.

Hepzibah had little hardihood for her own proper
pain, and far less for what she must inflict on
Clifford. Of so slight a nature, and so shattered
by his previous calamities, it could not well be
short of utter ruin to bring him face to face with
the hard, relentless man, who had been his evil
destiny through life. Even had there been no bitter
recollections, nor any hostile interest now at stake
between them, the mere natural repugnance of the
more sensitive system to the massive, weighty,
and unimpressible one, must, in itself, have been
disastrous to the former. It would be like flinging
a porcelain vase, with already a crack in it, against
a granite column. Never before had Hepzibah so
adequately estimated the powerful character of her
cousin Jaffrey — powerful by intellect, energy of will,
the long habit of acting among men, and, as she
believed, by his unscrupulous pursuit of selfish ends
through evil means. It did but increase the diffi
culty, that Judg'e Pyncheon was under a delusion
as to the secret which he supposed Clifford to
possess. Men of his strength of purpose, and
customary sagacity, if they chance to adopt a
mistaken opinion in practical matters, so wedge it
and fasten it among things known to be true, that
to wrench it out of their minds is hardly less
difficult than pulling up an oak. Thus, as the
judge required an impossibility of Clifford, the
latter, as he could not perform it, must needs

292 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

perish. For what, in the grasp of a man like this,
was to become of Clifford's soft, poetic nature,
that never should have had a task more stubborn
than to set a life of beautiful enjoyment to the
flow and rhythm of musical cadences ! Indeed,
what had become of it already ? Broken ! Blighted !
All but annihilated ! Soon to be wholly so !

For a moment, the thought crossed Hepzibah's
mind, whether Clifford might not really have such
knowledge of their deceased uncle's vanished estate
as the judge imputed to him. She remembered
some vague intimations, on her brother's part,
which — if the supposition were not essentially pre
posterous — might have been so interpreted. There
had been schemes of travel and residence abroad,
day-dreams of brilliant life at home, and splendid
castles in the air, which it would have required
boundless wealth to build and realise. Had this
wealth been in her power, how gladly would
Hepzibah have bestowed it all upon her iron-
hearted kinsman, to buy for Clifford the freedom
and seclusion of the desolate old house ! But she
believed that her brother's schemes were as destitute
of actual substance and purpose as a child's pictures
of its future life, while sitting in a little chair by
its mother's knee. Clifford had none but shadowy
gold at his command ; and it was not the stuff to
satisfy Judge Pyncheon !

Was there no help, in their extremity ? It seemed
strange that there should be none, with a city round
about her. It would be so easy to throw up the
window, and send forth a shriek, at the strange
agony of which everybody would come hastening

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER 293

to the rescue, well understanding it to be the cry
of a human soul, at some dreadful crisis ! But
how wild, how almost laughable, the fatality — and
yet how continually it comes to pass, thought
Hepzibah, in this dull delirium of a world — that
whosoever, and with however kindly a purpose,
should come to help, they would be sure to
help the strongest side ! Might and wrong com
bined, like iron magnetised, are endowed with
irresistible attraction. There would be Judge
Pyncheon — a person eminent in the public view,
of high station and great wealth, a philanthropist,
a member of congress and of the Church, and
intimately associated with whatever else bestows
good name — so imposing, in these advantageous
lights, that Hepzibah herself could hardly help
shrinking from her own conclusions as to his hollow
integrity. The judge, on one side ! And who, on
the other ? The guilty Clifford ! Once a byword !
Now, an indistinctly remembered ignominy !

Nevertheless, in spite of this perception that the
judge would draw all human aid to his own behalf,
Hepzibah was so unaccustomed to act for herself,
that the least word of counsel would have swayed
her to any mode of action. Little Phoebe Pyncheon
would at once have lighted up the whole scene, if
not by any available suggestion, yet simply by the
warm vivacity of her character. The idea of the
artist occurred to Hepzibah. Young and unknown,
mere vagrant adventurer as he was, she had been
conscious of a force in Holgrave which might well
adapt him to be the champion of a crisis. With
this thought in her mind, she unbolted a door,

294 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

cobwebbed and long disused, but which had served
as a former medium of communication between her
own part of the house and the gable where the
wandering daguerreotypist had now established his
temporary home. He was not there. A book, face
downward, on the table, a roll of manuscript, a
half-written sheet, a newspaper, some tools of his
present occupation, and several rejected daguerro-
types, conveyed an impression as if he were close
at hand. But, at this period of the day, as Hepzibah
might have anticipated, the artist was at his public
rooms. With an impulse of idle curiosity, that
flickered among her heavy thoughts, she looked
at one of the daguerreotypes, and beheld Judge
Pyncheon frowning at her ! Fate stared her in the
face ! She turned back from her fruitless quest,
with a heart-sinking sense of disappointment. In
all her years of seclusion, she had never felt, as
now, what it was to be alone. It seemed as if the
house stood in a desert, or, by some spell, was
made invisible to those who dwelt around, or passed
beside it ; so that any mode of misfortune, miserable
accident, or crime, might happen in it, without the
possibility of aid. In her grief and wounded pride,
Hepzibah had spent her life in divesting herself of
friends — she had wilfully cast off the support which
God has ordained his creatures to need from one
another — and it was now her punishment, that
Clifford and herself would fall the easier victims to
their kindred enemy.

Returning to the arched window, she lifted her
eyes — scowling, poor, dim-sighted Hepzibah, in the
face of Heaven ! — and strove hard to send up a

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER. 295

prayer through the dense gray pavement of clouds.
Those mists had gathered, as if to symbolise a
great, brooding mass of human trouble, doubt,
confusion, and chill indifference, between earth and
the better regions. Her faith was too weak ; the
prayer too heavy to be thus uplifted. It fell back,
a lump of lead, upon her heart. It smote her with
the wretched conviction that Providence intermeddled
not in these petty wrongs of one individual to his
fellow, nor had any balm for these little agonies of
a solitary soul ; but shed its justice, and its mercy,
in a broad, sun-like sweep, over half the universe at
once. Its vastness made it nothing. But Hepzibah
did not see that, just as there comes a warm
sunbeam into every cottage window, so comes a
love-bearn of God's care and pity, for every separate
need.

At last, finding no other pretext for deferring the
torture that she was to inflict on Clifford — her
reluctance to which was the true cause of her
loitering at the window, her search for the artist,
and even her abortive prayer — dreading, also, to
hear the stern voice of Judge Pyncheon from below-
stairs, chiding her delay — she crept slowly — a pale,
grief-stricken figure, a dismal shape of woman,
with almost torpid limbs — slowly to her brother's
door, and knocked !

There was no reply !

And how should there have been? Her hand,
tremulous with the shrinking purpose which directed
it, had smitten so feebly against the door that the
sound could hardly have gone inward. She knocked
again. Still, no response ! Nor was it to be

296 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

wondered at. She had struck with the entire force
of her heart's vibration, communicating, by some
subtle magnetism, her own terror to the summons.
Clifford would turn his face to the pillow, and cover
his head beneath the bed-clothes, like a startled
child at midnight. She knocked a third time, three
regular strokes, gentle, but perfectly distinct, and
with meaning in them ; for, modulate it with what
cautious art we will, the hand cannot help playing
some tune of what we feel, upon the senseless wood.

Clifford returned no answer.

" Clifford ! dear brother ! " said Heozibah. " Shall
I come in ? "

A silence.

Two or three times, and more, Hepzibah repeated
his name, without result ; till, thinking her brother's
sleep unwontedly profound, she undid the door, and
entering, found the chamber vacant. How could
he have come forth, and when, without her
knowledge? Was it possible that, in spite of the
stormy day, and worn out with the irksomeness
within doors, he had betaken himself to his
customary haunt in the garden, and was now
shivering under the cheerless shelter of the summer-
house ? She hastily threw up a window, thrust
forth her turbaned head and the half of her gaunt
figure, and searched the whole garden through, as
completely as her dim vision would allow. She
could see the interior of the summer-house, and its
circular seat, kept moist by the droppings of the roof.
It had no occupant. Clifford was not thereabouts ;
unless, indeed, he had crept for concealment — as,
for a moment, Hepzibah fancied might be the case

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER. 297

— into a great wet mass of tangled and broad-leaved
shadow, where the squash vines were clambering
tumultuously upon an old wooden frame-work, set
casually aslant against the fence. This could not
be, however ; he was not there ; for, while Hepzibah
was looking, a strange grimalkin stole forth from
the very spot, and picked his way across the garden.
Twice he paused to snuff the air, and then anew
directed his course towards the parlour-window.
Whether it was only on account of the stealthy,
prying manner common to the race, or that this
cat seemed to have more than ordinary mischief in
his thoughts, the old gentlewoman, in spite of her
much perplexity, felt an impulse to drive the animal
away, and accordingly flung down a window-stick.
The cat stared up at her, like a detected thief or
murderer, and, the next instant, took to flight. No
other living creature was visible in the garden.
Chanticleer and his family had either not left their
roost, disheartened by the interminable rain, or had
done the next wisest thing, by seasonably returning
to it. Hepzibah closed the window.

But where was Clifford ? Could it be, that, aware
of the presence of his evil destiny, he had crept
silently down the staircase, while the judge and
Hepzibah stood talking in the shop, and had softly
undid the fastening of the outer door, and made his
escape into the street? With that thought, she
seemed to behold his gray, wrinkled, yet childlike
aspect, in the old-fashioned garments which he wore
about the house ; a figure such as one sometimes
imagines himself to be, with the world's eye upon
him, in a troubled dream. This figure of her

H.S.G. K2

298 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

wretched brother would go wandering1 through the
city, attracting all eyes, and everybody's wonder
and repugnance, like a ghost, the more to be
shuddered at because visible at noontide. To incur
the ridicule of the younger crowd, that knew him
not — the harsher scorn and indignation of a few
old men, who might recall his once familiar features !
To be the sport of boys, who, when old enough to
run about the streets, have no more reverence for
what is beautiful and holy, nor pity for what is sad —
no more sense of sacred misery, sanctifying the
human shape in which it embodies itself — than if
Satan were the father of them all ! Goaded by their
taunts, their loud, shrill cries, and cruel laughter —
insulted by the filth of the public ways, which they
would fling upon him — or, as it might well be*
distracted by the mere strangeness of his situation,
though nobody should affttct him with so much as a
thoughtless word — what wonder if Clifford were to
break into some wild extravagance, which was certain
to be interpreted as lunacy ? Thus Judge Pyncheon's
fiendish scheme would be ready accomplished to his
hands ! ,

Then Hepzibah reflected that the town was almost
completely water-girdled. The wharves stretched
out towards the centre of the harbour, and, in this
inclement weather, were deserted by the ordinary
throng of merchants, labourers, and seafaring men ;
each wharf a solitude, with the vessels moored stem
and stern, along its misty length. Should her
brother's aimless footsteps stray thitherward, and
he but bend, one moment, over the deep, black tide ;
would he not bethink himself that here was the sure

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER. 299

refuge within his reach, and that, with a single step,
or the slightest overbalance of his body, he might be
for ever beyond his kinsman's gripe ? Oh, the tempta
tion ! To make of his ponderous sorrow a security !
To sink, with its leaden weight upon him, and never
rise again !

The horror of this last conception was too much
for Hepzibah. Even Jaffrey Pyncheon must help her
now ! She hastened down the staircase, shrieking as
she went.

"Clifford is gone!" she cried. " I cannot find
my brother ! Help, Jaffrey Pyncheon ! Some harm
will happen to him ! "

She threw open the parlour-door. But, what with
the shade of branches across the windows, and the
smoke blackened ceiling, and the dark oak-panelling
of the walls, there was hardly so much daylight
in the room that Hepzibah's imperfect sig'ht could
accurately distinguish the judge's figure. She was
certain, however, that she saw him sitting in the
ancestral arm-chair, near the centre of the floor,
with his face somewhat averted, and looking towards
a window. So firm and quiet is the nervous system
of such men as Judge Pyncheon, that he had perhaps
stirred not more than once since her departure, but,
in the hard composure of his temperament, retained
the position into which accident had thrown him.

"I tell you, Jaffrey," cried Hepzibah impatiently,
as she turned from the parlour-door to search other
rooms, "my brother is not in his chamber! You
must help me seek him ! "

But Judge Pyncheon was not the man to let
himself be startled from an easy-chair with haste

3oo HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

ill-fitting either the dignity of his character or his
broad personal basis, by the alarm of a hysteric
woman. Yet, considering his own interest in the
matter, he might have bestirred himself with a little
more alacrity.

" Do you hear me, Jaffrey Pyncheon ? " screamed
Hepzibah, as she again approached the parlour-door,
after an ineffectual search elsewhere. " Clifford is
gone ! "

At this instant, on the threshold of the parlour,
emerging from within, appeared Clifford himself!
His face was preternaturally pale ; so deadly white,
indeed, that, through all the glimmering indistinctness
of the passage-way, Hepzibah could discern his
features, as if a light fell on them alone. Their
vivid and wild expression seemed likewise sufficient
to illuminate them ; it was an expression of scorn
and mockery, coinciding with the emotions indicated
by his gesture. As Clifford stood on the threshold,
partly turning back, he pointed his finger within
the parlour, and shook it slowly, as though he would
have summoned, not Hepzibah alone, but the whole
world, to gaze at some object inconceivably ridicu
lous. This action, so ill-timed and extravagant —
accompanied, too, with a look that showed more
like joy than any other kind of excitement — compelled
Hepzibah to dread that her stern kinsman's ominous
visit had driven her poor brother to absolute insanity.
Nor could she otherwise account for the judge's
quiescent mood than by supposing him craftily on
the watch, while Clifford developed these symptoms
of a distracted mind.

" Be quiet, Clifford ! " whispered his sister, raising

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER. 301

her hand, to impress caution. " Oh, for Heaven's
sake, be quiet ! "

"Let him be quiet! What can he do better ?"
answered Clifford, with a still wilder gesture,
pointing into the room which he had just quitted.
"As for us, Hepzibah, we can dance now ! — we can
sing, laugh, play, do what we will ! The weight
is gone, Hepzibah ! it is gone off this weary old
world ; and we may be as light-hearted as little
Phoebe herself!"

And, in accordance with his words, he began to
laugh, still pointing his finger at the object, invisible
to Hepzibah, within the parlour. She was seized
with a sudden intuition of some horrible thing.
She thrust herself past Clifford, and disappeared
into the room ; but almost immediately returned,
with a cry choking in her throat. Gazing at her
brother, with an affrighted glance of inquiry, she
beheld him all in a tremor and a quake, from head
to foot, while, amid these commoted elements of
passion or alarm, still flickered his gusty mirth.

"My God! what is to become of us?" gasped
Hepzibah.

" Come ! " said Clifford, in a tone of brief decision,
most unlike what was usual with him. " We stay
here too long ! Let us leave the old house to our
cousin Jaffrey ! He will take good care of it ! "

Hepzibah now noticed that Clifford had on a cloak
— a garment of long ago — in which he had constantly
muffled himself during these days of easterly storm.
He beckoned with his hand, and intimated, so far
as she could comprehend him, his purpose that
they should go together from the house. There

302 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

are chaotic, blind, or drunken moments, in the lives
of persons who lack real force of character — moments
of test, in which courage would most assert itself —
but where these individuals, if left to themselves,
stagger aimlessly along, or follow implicitly what
ever guidance may befall them, even if it be a child's.
No matter how preposterous or insane, a purpose
is a Godsend to them. Hepzibah had reached this
point. Unaccustomed to action or responsibility-
full of horror at what she had seen, and afraid to
inquire, or almost to imagine, how it had come to
pass — affrighted at the fatality wrhich seemed to
pursue her brother — stupefied by the dim, thick,
stifling atmosphere of dread, which filled the house
as with a death-smell, and obliterated all definiteness
of thought — she yielded without a question, and on
the instant, to the will which Clifford expressed.
For herself, she was like a person in a dream, when
the will always sleeps. Clifford, ordinarily so
destitute of this faculty, had found it in the tension
of the crisis.

"Why do you delay so?" cried he sharply.
" Put on your cloak and hood, or whatever it
pleases you to wear ! No matter what ; you
cannot look beautiful nor brilliant, my poor
Hepzibah ! Take your purse, with money in it,
and come along ! "

Hepzibah obeyed these instructions, as if nothing
else were to be done or thought of. She began to
wonder, it is true, why she did not wake up, and
at what still more intolerable pitch of dizzy trouble
her spirit would struggle out of the maze, and make
her conscious that nothing of all this had actually

CLIFFORD'S CHAMBER.

303

happened. Of course, it was not real ; no such
black, easterly day as this had yet begun to be ;
Judge Pyncheon had not talked with her ; Clifford
had not laughed, pointed, beckoned her away with
him ; but she had merely been afflicted — as lonely
sleepers often are — with a great deal of unreasonable
misery, in a morning dream !

"Now — now — I shall certainly awake!" thought
Hepzibah, as she went to and fro, making her little
preparations. "I can bear it no longer! I must
wake up now ! "

But it came not, that awakening moment ! It came
not, even when, just before they left the house,
Clifford stole to the parlour-door, and made a parting
obeisance to the sole occupant of the room,

" What an absurd figure the old fellow cuts now ! "
whispered he to Hepzibah. "Just when he fancied
he had me completely under his thumb ! Come,
come ; make haste ! or he will start up, like Giant
Despair in pursuit of Christian and Hopeful, and
catch us yet ! "

As they passed into the street, Clifford directed
Hepzibah's attention to something on one of the posts
of the front door. It was merely the initials of his
own name, which, with somewhat of his characteristic
grace about the forms of the letters, he had cut there,
when a boy. The brother and sister departed, and
left Judge Pyncheon sitting in the old home of his
forefathers, all by himself; so heavy and lumpish that
we can liken him to nothing better than a defunct
nightmare, which had perished in the midst of its
wickedness, and left its flabby corpse on the breast of
the tormented one, to be gotten rid of as it might !

304 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

XVII.

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS.

SUMMER as it was, the east wind set poor Hepzibah's
few remaining teeth chattering in her head, as she
and Clifford faced it, on their way up Pyncheon Street,
and towards the centre of the town. Not merely was
it the shiver which this pitiless blast brought to her
frame (although her feet and hands, especially, had
never seemed so death-a-cold as now), but there was
a moral sensation, mingling itself with the physical
chill, and causing her to shake more in spirit than
in body. The world's broad, bleak atmosphere was
all so comfortless ! Such, indeed, is the impression
which it makes on every new adventurer, even if he
plunge into it while the warmest tide of life is
bubbling through his veins. What, then, must it
have been to Hepzibah and Clifford — so time-stricken
as they were, yet so like children in their experience
— as they left the door-step, and passed from beneath
the wide shelter of the Pyncheon elm ? They were
wandering all abroad, on precisely such a pilgrimage
as a child often meditates, to the world's end, with
perhaps a sixpence and a biscuit in his pocket. In
Hepzibah's mind, there was the wretched conscious
ness of being adrift. She had lost the faculty of
self-guidance ; but, in view of the difficulties around
her, felt it hardly worth an effort to regain it, and
was, moreover, incapable of making one.

As they proceeded on their strange expedition, she
now and then cast a look sidelong at Clifford, and

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 305

could not but observe that he was possessed and
swayed by a powerful excitement. It was this,
indeed, that gave him the control which he had at
once, and so irresistibly, established over his move
ments. It not a little resembled the exhilaration of
wine. Or, it might more fancifully be compared to
a joyous piece of music, played with wild vivacity,
but upon a disordered instrument. As the cracked
jarring note might always be heard, and as it jarred
loudest amid the loftiest exultation of the melody,
so was there a continual quake through Clifford,
causing him most to quiver while he wore a triumphant
smile, and seemed almost under a neccessity to skip
in his gait.

They met few people abroad, even on passing from
the retired neighbourhood of the House of the Seven
Gables into what was ordinarily the more thronged
and busier portion of the town. Glistening sidewalks,
with little pools of rain, here and there, along their
unequal surface ; umbrellas displayed ostentatiously
in the shop-windows, as if the life of trade had con
centred itself in that one article ; wet leaves of the
horse-chestnut or elm trees, torn off untimely by the
blast, and scattered, along the public way ; an un
sightly accumulation of mud in the middle of the
street, which perversely grew the more unclean for
its long and laborious washing — these were the
definable points of a very sombre picture. In the
way of movement, and human life, there was the
hasty rattle of a cab or coach, its driver protected
by a waterproof cap over his head and shoulders ;
the forlorn figure of an old man, who seemed to
have crept out of some subterranean sewer, and

306 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

was stooping1 along the kennel, and poking the
wet rubbish with a stick, in quest of rusty nails ;
a merchant or two, at the door of the post-office,
together with an editor, and a miscellaneous poli
tician, awaiting a dilatory mail ; a few visages of
retired sea-captains at the window of an insurance
office, looking out vacantly at the vacant street,
blaspheming at the weather, and fretting at the
dearth as well of public news as local gossip. What
a treasure-trove to these venerable quidnuncs, could
they have guessed the secret which Hepzibah and
Clifford were carrying along with them ! But their
two figures attracted hardly so much notice as that
of a young girl, who passed at the same instant, and
happened to raise her skirt a trifle too high above
her ankles. Had it been a sunny and cheerful day,
they could hardly have gone through the streets
without making themselves obnoxious to remark.
Now, probably, they were felt to be in keeping with
the dismal and bitter weather, and therefore did not
stand out in strong relief, as if the sun were shining
on them, but melted into the gray gloom, and were
forgotten as soon as gone.

Poor Hepzibah ! Could she have understood this
fact, it would have brought her some little comfort ;
for, to all her other troubles — strange to say ! — there
was added the womanish and old-maiden-like misery
arising from a sense of unseemliness in her attire.
Thus, she was fain to shrink deeper into herself,
as it were, as if in the hope of making people suppose
that here was only a cloak and hood, threadbare and
woefully faded, taking an airing in the midst of the
storm, without any wearer !

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 307

As they went on, the feeling of indistinctness and
unreality kept dimly hovering* round about her, and
so diffusing itself into her system that one of her
hands was hardly palpable to the touch of the other.
Any certainty would have been preferable to this.
She whispered to herself, again and ag-ain, "Am I
awake? — Am I awake?" and sometimes exposed
her face to the chill spatter of the wind, for the sake
of its rude assurance that she was. Whether it was
Clifford's purpose, or only chance, had led them
thither, they now found themselves passing beneath
the arched entrance of a large structure of gray stone.
Within, there was a spacious breadth, and an airy
height from floor to roof, now partially filled with
smoke and steam, which eddied voluminously upward,
and formed a mimic cloud-region over their heads.
A train of cars was just ready for a start ; the loco
motive was fretting and fuming, like a steed impatient
for a headlong rush ; and the bell rang out its hasty
peal, so well expressing the brief summons which
life vouchsafes to us, in its hurried career. Without
question or delay — with the irresistible decision, if
not rather to be called recklessness, which had so
strangely taken possession of him, and through him
of Hepzibah — Clifford impelled her towards the cars,
and assisted her to enter. The signal was given ;
the engine puffed forth its short, quick breaths ; the
train began its movement ; and, along with a hundred
other passengers, these two unwonted travellers sped
onward like the wind.

At last, therefore, and after so long estrangement
from everything that the world acted or enjoyed,
they had been drawn into the great current of

308 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

human life, and were swept away with it, as by
the suction of fate itself.

Still haunted with the idea that not one of the
past incidents, inclusive of Judge Pyncheon's visit,
could be real, the recluse of the seven gables
murmured in her brother's ear —

" Clifford ! Clifford ! Is not this a dream ? "

"A dream, Hepzibah ! " repeated he, almost
laughing in her face. " On the contrary, I have
never been awake before ! "

Meanwhile, looking from the window, they could
see the world racing past them. At one moment,
they were rattling through a solitude ; the next, a
village had grown up around them ; a few breaths
more, and it had vanished, as if swallowed by an
earthquake. The spires of meeting-houses seemed
set adrift from their foundations ; the broad-based
hills glided away. Everything was unfixed from
its age-long rest, and moving at whirlwind speed
in a direction opposite to their own.

Within the car, there was the usual interior life
of the railroad, offering little to the observation of
other passengers, but full of novelty for this pair
of strangely enfranchised prisoners. It was novelty
enough, indeed, that there were fifty human beings
in close relation with them, under one long and
narrow roof, and drawn onward by the same mighty
influence that had taken their two selves into its
grasp. It seemed marvellous how all these people
could remain so quietly in their seats, while so
much noisy strength was at work in their behalf.
Some, with tickets in their hats (long travellers
these, before whom lay a hundred miles of railroad),

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 309

had plunged into the English scenery and adventures
of pamphlet novels, and were keeping company with
dukes and earls. Others, whose briefer span for
bade their devoting themselves to studies so abtruse,
beguiled the little tedium of the way with penny-
papers. A party of girls, and one young man, on
opposite sides of the car, found huge amusement
in a game of ball. They tossed it to and fro, with
peals of laughter that might be measured by mile-
lengths ; for, faster than the nimble ball could fly,
the merry players fled unconsciously along, leaving
the trail of their mirth afar behind, and ending
their game under another sky than had witnessed
its commencement. Boys, with apples, cakes,
candy, and rolls of variously tinctured lozenges —
merchandise that reminded Hepzibah of her deserted
shop — appeared at each momentary stopping-place,
doing up their business in a hurry, or breaking it
short off, lest the market should ravish them away
with it. New people continually entered. Old
acquaintances — for such they soon grew to be, in
this rapid current of affairs — continually departed.
Here and there, amid the rumble and the tumult,
sat one asleep. Sleep ; sport ; business ; graver or
lighter study ; and the common and inevitable
movement onward ! It was life itself !

Clifford's naturally poignant sympathies were all
aroused. He caught the colour of what was passing
about him, and threw it back more vividly than he
received it, but mixed, nevertheless, with a lurid
and portentous hue. Hepzibah, on the other hand,
felt herself more apart from human kind than even
in the seclusion which she had just quitted.

310 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

" You are not happy, Hepzibah ! " said Clifford
apart, in a tone of reproach. "You are thinking
of that dismal old house, and of Cousin Jaffrey "-
here came the quake through him — " and of Cousin
Jaffrey sitting there, all by himself ! Take my advice
— follow my example — and let such things slip aside.
Here we are, in the world, Hepzibah ! — in the midst
of life ! — in the throng of our fellow-beings ! Let
you and I be happy ! As happy as that youth, and
those pretty girls, at their game of ball ! "

" Happy!" thought Hepzibah, bitterly conscious,
at the word, of her dull and heavy heart, with the
frozen pain in it. " Happy ! He is mad already;
and, if I could once feel myself broad awake, I
should go mad too ! "

If a fixed idea be madness, she was, perhaps, not
remote from it. Fast and far as they had rattled
and clattered along the iron track, they might just
as well, as regarded Hepzibah's mental images, have
been passing up and down Pyncheon Street. With
miles and miles of varied scenery between, there was
no scene for her, save the seven old gable-peaks,
with their moss, and the tuft of weeds in one of
the angles, and the shop-window, and a customer
shaking the door, and compelling the little bell to
jingle fiercely, but without disturbing Judge Pyncheon !
This one old house was everywhere ! It transported
its great, lumbering bulk, with more than railroad
speed, and set itself phlegmatically down on what
ever spot she glanced at. The quality of Hepzibah's
mind was too unmalleable to take new impressions so
readily as Clifford's. He had a winged nature ; she
was rather of the vegetable kind, and could hardly

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 311

be kept long alive, if drawn up by the roots. Thus
it happened that the relation heretofore existing
between her brother and herself was changed. At
home, she was his guardian ; here, Clifford had
become hers, and seemed to comprehend whatever
belonged to their new position with a singular
rapidity of intelligence. He had been startled into
manhood and intellectual vigour ; or, at least, into
a condition that resembled them, though it might
be both diseased and transitory.

The conductor now applied for their tickets ; and
Clifford, who had made himself the purse-bearer,
put a banknote into his hand, as he had observed
others do.

" For the lady and yourself? " asked the conductor.
"And how far?"

" As far as that will carry us," said Clifford. " It
is no great matter. We are riding for pleasure,
merely ! "

" You choose a strange day for it, sir ! " remarked
a gimlet-eyed old gentleman, on the other side of
the car, looking at Clifford and his companion, as
if curious to make them out. " The best chance of
pleasure, in an easterly rain, I take it, is in a man's
own house, with a nice little fire in the chimney."
h "I cannot precisely agree with you," said Clifford,
courteously bowing to the old gentleman, and at
once taking up the clue of conversation which the
latter had proffered. " It had just occurred to me,
on the contrary, that this admirable invention of
the railroad — with the vast and inevitable improve
ments to be looked for, both as to speed and con
venience — is destined to do away with those stale

3i2 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

ideas of home and fireside, and substitute something
better."

" In the name of common sense," asked the old
gentleman, rather testily, "what can be better for a
man than his own parlour and chimney-corner? "

"These things have not the merit which many
good people attribute to them,1* replied Clifford.
"They may be said, in few and pithy words, to have
ill-served a poor purpose. My impression is, that
our wonderfully increased and still increasing facilities
of locomotion are destined to bring us round again
to the nomadic state. You are aware, my dear sir —
you must have observed it, in your own experience —
that all human progress is in a circle ; or, to use a
more accurate and beautiful figure, in an ascending
spiral curve. While we fancy ourselves going
straight forward, and attaining, at every step, an
entirely new position of affairs, we do actually return
to something long ago tried and abandoned, but
which we now find etherealised, refined, and perfected
to its ideal. The past is but a coarse and sensual
prophecy of the present and the future. To apply
this truth to the topic now under discussion. — In
the early epochs of our race, men dwelt in temporary
huts, of bowers of branches, as easily constructed
as a bird's nest, and which they built — if it should
be called building, when such sweet homes of a
summer solstice rather grew than were made with
hands — which Nature, we will say, assisted them to
rear, where fruit abounded, where fish and game
were plentiful, or, most especially, where the sense
of beauty was to be gratified by a lovelier shade than
elsewhere, and a more exquisite arrangement of lake,

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 313

wood, and hill. This life possessed a charm which,
ever since man quitted it, has vanished from existence.
And it typified something better than itself. It had
its drawbacks ; such as hunger and thirst, inclement
weather, hot sunshine, and weary and foot-blistering
marches over barren and ugly tracts, that lay between
the sites desirable for their fertility and beauty. But,
in our ascending spiral, we escape all this. These
railroads — could but the whistle be made musical,
and the rumble and the jar got rid of — are positively
the greatest blessing that the ages have wrought out
for us. They give us wings ; they annihilate the
toil and dust cf pilgrimage ; they spiritualise travel !
Transition being so facile, what can be any man's
inducement to tarry in one spot? Why, therefore,
should he build a more cumbrous habitation than can
readily be carried off with him ? Why should he
make himself a prisoner for life in brick, and stone,
and old worm-eaten timber, when he may just as
easily dwell, in one sense, nowhere— in a better sense,
wherever the fit and beautiful shall offer him a
home? "

Clifford's countenance glowed as he divulged this
theory ; a youthful character shone out from within,
converting the wrinkles and pallid duskiness of age
into an almost transparent mask. The merry girls
let their ball drop upon the floor, and gazed at him.
They said to themselves, perhaps, that, before his
hair was gray and the crow's feet tracked his temples,
this now decaying man must have stamped the impress
of his features on many a woman's heart. But,
alas ! no woman's eye had seen his face while it was
beautiful !

3i4 HOUSE OF, THE SEVEN GABLES.

"I should scarcely call it an improved state of
things," observed Clifford's new acquaintance, " to
live everywhere and nowhere ! "

" Would you not ? "exclaimed Clifford, with singular
energy. " It is as clear to me as sunshine — were
there any in the sky — that the greatest possible
stumbling-blocks in the path of human happiness and
improvement are these heaps of bricks and stones,
consolidated with mortar, or hewn timber, fastened
together with spike-nails, which men painfully con
trive for their own torment, and call them house and
home ! The soul needs air ; a wide sweep and
frequent change of it. Morbid influences, in a
thousandfold variety, gather about hearths, and
pollute the life of households. There is no such
unwholesome atmosphere as that of an old home,
rendered poisonous by one's defunct forefathers and
relatives. I * speak of what I know. There is a
certain house within my familiar recollection — one of
those peaked-gable (there are seven of them), project-
ing-storeyed edifices, such as you occasionally see, in
our elder towns — a rusty, crazy, creaky, dry-rotted,
damp-rotted, dingy, dark, and miserable old dungeon,
with an arched window over the porch, and a. little
shop-door on one side, and a great melancholy elm
before it ! Now, sir, whenever my thoughts recur
to this seven-gabled mansion — the fact is so very
curious that I must needs mention it — immediately
I have a vision or image of an elderly man, of re
markably stern countenance, sitting in an oaken
elbow-chair, dead, stone-dead, with an ugly flow
of blood upon his shirt-bosom ! Dead, but with
open eyes ! He taints the whole house, as I

JHE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 315

remember it. I could never flourish there, nor be
happy, nor do nor enjoy what God meant me to do
and enjoy ! "

His face darkened, and seemed to contract, and
shrivel itself up, and wither into age.

" Never, sir ! " he repeated. " I could never draw
cheerful breath there ! "

" I should think not," said the old gentleman,
eyeing Clifford earnestly, and rather apprehensively.
"I should conceive not, sir, with that notion in
your head ! "

" Surely not," continued Clifford; "and it were
a relief to me if that house could be torn down,
or burned up, and so the earth be rid of it, and
grass be sown abundantly over its foundation. Not
that I should ever visit its site again ! for, sir, the
farther I get away from it, the more does the joy,
the lightsome freshness, the heart-leap, the in
tellectual dance, the youth, in short — yes, my youth,
my youth ! — the more does it come back to me.
No longer ago than this morning, I was old. I
remember looking in the glass, and wondering at
my own gray hair, and the wrinkles, many and
deep, right across my brow, and the furrows down
my cheeks, and the prodigious trampling of crow's
feet about my temples ! It was too soon ! I could
not bear it ! Age had no right to corne ! I had
not lived ! But now do I look old ? If so, my
aspect belies me strangely ; for— a great weight
being off my mind — I feel in the very heyday of my
youth, with the world and my best days before me ! "

" I trust you may find it so," said the old
gentleman, who seemed rather embarrassed, and

316 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

desirous of avoiding* the observation which Clifford's
wild talk drew on them both. "You have my best
wishes for it."

" For Heaven's sake, dear Clifford, be quiet!"
whispered his sister. " They think you mad."

44 Be quiet yourself, Hepzibah ! " returned her
brother. "No matter what they think! I am not
mad. For the first time in thirty years, my thoughts
gush up and find words ready for them. I must
talk, and I will ! "

He turned again towards the old gentleman, and
renewed the conversation.

"Yes, my dear sir," said he, "it is my firm belief
and hope, that these terms of roof and hearth-stone,
which have so long been held to embody something
sacred, are soon to pass out of men's daily use,
and be forgotten. Just imagine, for a moment,
how much of human evil will crumble away, with
this one change ! What we call real estate — the
solid ground to build a house on — is the broad
foundation on which nearly all the guilt of this
world rests. A man will commit almost any wrong,
— he will heap up an immense pile of wickedness,
as hard as granite, and which will weigh as heavily
upon his soul, to eternal ages — only to build a
great, gloomy, dark-chambered mansion, for himself
to die in, and for his posterity to be miserable in.
He lays his own dead corpse beneath the under
pinning, as one may say, and hangs his frowning
picture on the wall, and, after thus converting himself
into an evil destiny, expects his remotest great
grandchildren to be happy there ! I do not speak
wildly. I have just such a house in my mind's eye ! "

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 317

"Then, sir/' said the old gentleman, getting
anxious to drop the subject, "you are not to blame for
leaving it."

"Within the lifetime of the child already born,"
Clifford went on, "all this will be done away. The
world is growing too ethereal and spiritual to bear
these enormities a great while longer. To me —
though, for a considerable period of time, I have lived
chiefly in retirement, and know less of such things
than most men — even to me, the harbingers of a
better era are unmistakable. Mesmerism, now !
Will that effect nothing, think you, towards purging
away the grossness out of human life ? "

" All a humbug ! " growled the old gentleman.

" These rapping spirits, that little Phoebe told us of,
the other day," said Clifford, " what are these but
the messengers of the spiritual world, knocking at
the door of substance ? And it shall be flung wide
open ! "

"A humbug, again!" cried the old gentleman,
growing more and more testy, at these glimpses of
Clifford's metaphysics. " I should like to rap with
a good stick on the empty pates of the dolts who
circulate such nonsense ! "

" Then there is electricity — the demon, the angel,
the mighty physical power, the all-pervading intelli
gence !" exclaimed Clifford. "Is that a humbug,
too ? Is it a fact — or have I dreamed it — that, by
means of electricity, the world of matter has become
a great nerve, vibrating thousands of miles in a
breathless point of time ? Rather, the round globe is
a vast head, a brain, instinct with intelligence ! Or,
shall we say, it is itself a thought, nothing but

3-i 8 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

thought, and no longer the substance which we
deemed it ! "

" If you mean the telegraph," said the old gentle
man, glancing- his eye toward its wire, alongside the
rail-track, "it is an excellent thing; that is, of
course, if the speculators in cotton and politics don't
get possession of it. A great thing, indeed, sir ;
particularly as regards the detection of bank-robbers
and murderers."

" I don't quite like it, in that point of view," replied
Clifford. " A bank-robber, and what you call a
murderer, likewise, has his rights, which men of
enlightened humanity and conscience should regard
in so much the more liberal spirit, because the bulk
of society is prone to controvert their existence. An
almost spiritual medium, like the electric telegraph,
should be consecrated to high, deep, joyful, and holy
missions. Lovers, day by day — hour by hour, if so
often moved to do it — might send their heart-throbs
from Maine to Florida, with some such words as these,
* I love you for ever ! ' — * My heart runs over with
love ! ' — * I love you more than I can ! * — and, again,
at the next message — ' I have lived an hour longer,
and love you twice as much ! ' Or, when a good
man has departed, his distant friend should be
conscious of an electric thrill, as from the world of
happy spirits, telling him, - Your dear friend is in
bliss ! ' Or, to an absent husband, should come
tidings thus : ' An immortal being, of whom you are
fhe father, has this moment come from God ! ' and
immediately its little voice would seem to have reached
so far, and to be echoing in his heart. But for these
poor rogues, the bank-robbers — who, after all, are

THE FLIGHT OF TWO OWLS. 319

about as honest as nine people in ten, except that
they disregard certain formalities, and prefer to
transact business at midnight, rather than 'Change-
hours — and for these murderers, as you phrase it,
who are often excusable in the motives of their deed,
and deserve to be ranked among public benefactors, if
we consider only its result — for unfortunate individuals
like these, I really cannot applaud the enlistment of
an immaterial and miraculous power in the universal
world-hunt at their heels ! "

" You can't, hey? " cried the old gentleman, with a
hard look.

" Positively, no ! " answered Clifford. " It puts
them too miserably at disadvantage. For example,
sir, in a dark, low, cross-beamed, panelled room
of an old house, let us suppose a dead man, sitting
in an arm-chair, with a blood-stain on his shirt-
bosom — and let us add to our hypothesis another
man, issuing from the house, which he feels to
be over-filled with the dead man's presence — and
let us lastly imagine him fleeing, Heaven knows
whither, at the speed of a hurricane, by railroad !
Now, sir, if the fugitive alight in some distant town,
and find all the people babbling about that self
same dead man, whom he has fled so far to avoid
the sight and thought of, will you not allow that
his natural rights have been infringed ? He has
been deprived of his city of refuge, and, in my
humble opinion, has suffered infinite wrong ! "

"You are a strange man, sir!" said the old
gentleman, bringing his gimlet-eye to a point on
Clifford, as if determined to bore right into him.
" I can't see through you ! "

320 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

"No, I'll be bound you can't!" cried Clifford,
laughing. "And yet, my dear sir, I am as trans
parent as the water of Maule's Well ! But come,
Hepzibah ! We have flown far enough for once.
Let us alight, as the birds do, and perch ourselves
on the nearest twig, and consult whither we shall
fly next ! "

Just then, as it happened, the train reached a
solitary way-station. Taking advantage of the
brief pause, Clifford left the car, and drew Hepzibah
along with him. A moment afterwards, the train —
with all the life of its interior, amid which Clifford
had made himself so conspicuous an object — was
gliding away in the distance, and rapidly lessening
to a point, which, in another moment, vanished.
The world had fled away from these two
wanderers. They gazed drearily about them. At
a little distance stood a wooden church, black with
age, and in a dismal state of ruin and decay, with
broken windows, a great rift through the main
body of the edifice, and a rafter dangling from the
top of the square tower. Farther off was a farm
house, in the old style, as venerably black as the
church, with a roof sloping downward from the
three-storey peak, to within a man's height of the
ground. It seemed uninhabited. There were the
relics of a wood-pile, indeed, near the door, but
with grass sprouting up among the chips and
scattered logs. The small raindrops came down
aslant ; the wind was not turbulent, but sullen, and
full of chilly moisture.

Clifford shivered from head to foot. The wild
effervescence of his mood — which had so readily

H.S.G. «Stin p0inting his finger at the object." paae3Q1-

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 321

supplied thoughts, fantasies, and a strange aptitude
of words, and impelled him to talk from the mere
necessity of giving vent to this bubbling-up gush
of ideas — had entirely subsided. A powerful excite
ment had given him energy and vivacity. Its
operation over, he forthwith began to sink.

4 'You must take the lead now, Hepzibah ! "
murmured he, with a torpid and reluctant utterance.
" Do with me as you will ! "

She knelt down upon the platform where they
were standing, and lifted her clasped hands to the
sky. The dull, gray weight of clouds made it
invisible ; but it was no hour for disbelief — no
juncture this, to question that there was a sky
above, and an Almighty Father looking down
from it !

"O God!" ejaculated poor, gaunt Hepzibah,
then paused a moment, to consider what her prayer
should be — "O God — our Father — are we not Thy
children ? Have mercy on us ! "

XVIII.

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON.

JUDGE PYNCHEON, while his two relatives have fled
away with such ill-considered haste, still sits in the
old parlour, keeping house, as the familiar phrase is,
in the absence of its ordinary occupants. To him,
and to the venerable House of the Seven Gables,
does our story now betake itself, like an owl,
bewildered in the daylight, and hastening back to
his hollow tree.

H.S.G. L

322 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

The judge has not shifted his position for a long
while now. He has not stirred hand or foot, nor
withdrawn his eyes so much as a hair's-breadth
from their fixed gaze towards the corner of the room,
since .the footsteps of Hepzibah and Clifford creaked
along the passage, and the outer door was closed
cautiously behind their exit. He holds his watch in
his left hand, but clutched in such a manner that you
cannot see the dial-plate. How profound a fit of
meditation ! Or, supposing him asleep, how infantile
a quietude of conscience, and what wholesome order
in the gastric region, are betokened by slumber so
entirely undisturbed with starts, cramp, twitches,
muttered dream-talk, trumpet-blasts through the
.nasal organ, or any the slightest irregularity of
breath ! You must hold your own breath, to satisfy
yourself whether he breathes at all. It is quite
inaudible. You hear the ticking of his watch ; his
breath you do not hear. A most refreshing slumber,
doubtless ! And yet, the judge cannot be asleep.
His eyes are open ! A veteran politician, such as
he, would never fall asleep with wide-open eyes, lest
some enemy or mischief-maker, taking him thus at
unawares, should peep through these windows into
his consciousness, and make strange discoveries
among the reminiscences, projects, hopes, appre
hensions, weaknesses, and strong points, which he
has heretofore shared with nobody. A cautious man
is proverbially said to sleep with one eye open. That
may be wisdom. But not with both ; for this were
heedlessness ! No, no ! Judge Pyncheon cannot be
asleep.

It is odd, however, that a gentleman so burthened

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 323

with engagements — and noted, too, for punctuality —
should linger thus in an old, lonely mansion, which
he has never seemed very fond of visiting. The
oaken chair, to be sure, may tempt, him with its
roominess. It is, indeed, a spacious, and, allowing
for the rude age that fashioned it, a moderately easy
seat, with capacity enough, at all events, and offering
no restraint to the judge's breadth of beam, A
bigger man might find ample accommodation in it.
His ancestor, now pictured upon the wall, with all
his English beef about him, used hardly to present
a front extending from elbow to elbow of this chair,
or a base that would cover its whole cushion.
But there- are better chairs than this — mahogany,
black-walnut, rosewood, spring-seated and damask-
cushioned, with varied slopes, and innumerable
artifices to make them easy, and obviate the irksome-
ness of too tame an ease — a score of such might be
at Judge Pyncheon's service. Yes ! in a score of
drawing-rooms he would be more than welcome.
Mamma would advance to meet him, with outstretched
hand ; the virgin daughter, elderly as he has now got
to be — an old widower, as he smilingly describes him
self — would shake up the cushion for the judge, and
do her pretty little utmost to make him comfortable.
For the judge is a prosperous man. He cherishes
his schemes, moreover, like other people, and reason
ably brighter than most others ; or did so, at least,
as he lay abed, this morning, in an agreeable half-
drowse, planning the business of the day, and
speculating on the probabilities of the next fifteen
years. With his firm health, and the little inroad
that aq:e has made upon him, fifteen years or twenty

324 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

— yes, or, perhaps, five-and-twenty ! — are no mere
than he may fairly call his own. Five-and-twenty
years for the enjoyment of his real estate in town
and country, his railroad, bank, and insurance shares,
his United States stock — his wealth, in short, however
invested, now in possession, or soon to be acquired ;
together with the public honours that have fallen
upon him, and the weightier ones that are yet to
fall ! It is good ! It is excellent ! It is enough !

Still lingering in the old chair ! If the judge has
a little time to throw away, why does not he visit
the insurance office, as is his frequent custom, and
sit a while in one of their leathern-cushioned arm
chairs, listening to the gossip of the day, and dropping
some deeply-designed chance-word, which will be
certain to become the gossip of to-morrow ! And
have not the bank directors a meeting, at which it
was the judge's purpose to be present, and his
office to preside ? Indeed they have ; and the hour
is noted on a card, which is, or ought to be, in
Judge Pyncheon's right vest-pocket. Let him go
thither, and loll at ease upon his money-bags ! He
has lounged long enough in the old chair !

This was to have been such a busy day ! In the
/first place, the interview with Clifford. Half an
hour, by the judge's reckoning, was to suffice for
that ; it would probably be less, but — taking into
consideration that Hepzibah was first to be dealt
with, and that these women are apt to make many
words where a few would do much better — it might
be safest to allow half an hour. Half an hour ?
Why, judge, it is already two hours, by your own
undeviatingly accurate chronometer ! Glance your

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 325

eye down at it, and see ! Ah ! he will not give
himself the trouble either to bend his head, or
elevate his hand, so as to bring the faithful time
keeper within his range of vision ! Time, all at
once, appears to have become a matter of no-7
moment with the judge !

And has he forgotten all the other items of his
memoranda? Clifford's affair arranged, he was to
meet a State Street broker, who had undertaken
to procure a heavy percentage, and the best of
paper, for a few loose thousands which the judge
happens to have by him, uninvested. The wrinkled
note-shaver will have taken his railroad trip in
vain. Half an hour later, in the street next to this,
there was to be an auction of real estate, including
a portion of the old Pyncheon property, originally
belonging to Maule's garden-ground. It has been
alienated from the Pyncheons these fourscore years ;
but the judge had kept it in his eye, and had set
his heart on reannexing it to the small demesne
still left around the seven gables ; and now, during
this odd fit of oblivion, the fatal hammer must have
fallen, and transferred our ancient patrimony to
some alien possessof ! Possibly, indeed, the sale
may have been postponed till fairer weather. If
so, will the judge make it convenient to be present,
and favour the auctioneer with his bid, on the
proximate occasion ?

The next affair was to buy a horse for his own
driving. The one heretofore his favourite stumbled,
this very morning, on the road to town, and must
be at once discarded. Judge Pyncheon's neck is
too precious to be risked on such a contingency as

326 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

a stumbling steed. Should all the above business
be seasonably got through with, he might attend
the meeting of a charitable society ; the very name
of which, however, in the multiplicity of his benevo
lence, is quite forgotten ; so that this engagement
may pass unfulfilled, and no great harm done. And
if he have time, amid the press of more urgent
matter, he must take measures for the renewal of
Mrs. Pyncheon's tombstone, which, the sexton tells
him, has fallen on its marble face, and is cracked
quite in twain. She was a praiseworthy woman
enough, thinks the judge, in spite of her nervousness,
and the tears that she was so oozy with, and her
foolish behaviour about the coffee ; and, as she took
her departure so seasonably, he will not grudge the
second tombstone. It is better, at least, than if she
had never needed any ! The next item on his list
was to give orders for some fruit-trees, of a rare
variety, to be deliverable at his country-seat, in the
ensuing autumn. Yes, buy them, by all means ;
and may the peaches be luscious in your mouth,
Judge Pyncheon ! After this comes something more
important. A committee of his political party has
besought him for a hundred or two of dollars, in
addition to his previous disbursements, towards
carrying on the fall campaign. The judge is a
patriot ; the fate of the country is staked on the
November election ; and besides, as will be shadowed
forth in another paragraph, he has no trifling stake
of his own in the same great game. He will do
what the committee asks ; nay, he will be liberal
beyond their expectations ; they shall have a check
for five hundred dollars, and more anon, if it be

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 327

needed. What next? A decayed widow, whose
husband was Judge Pyncheon's early friend, has
laid her case of destitution before him, in a very
moving- letter. She and her fair daughter have
scarcely bread to eat. He partly intends to call on
her, to-day — perhaps so — perhaps not — accordingly
as he may happen to have leisure, and a small
bank-note.

Another business, which, however, he puts no
great weight on — it is well, you know, to be heedful,
but not over anxious, as respects one's personal
health — another business, then, was to consult his
family physician. About what, for Heaven's sake?
Why, it is rather difficult to describe the symptoms.
A mere dimness of sight and dizziness of brain, was
it ? — or a disagreeable choking, or stifling, or
gurgling, or bubbling, in the region of the thorax,
as the anatomists say ? — or was it a pretty severe
throbbing and kicking of the heart, rather creditable
to him than otherwise, as showing that the organ
had not been left out of the judge's physical con
trivance? No matter what it was. The doctor,
probably, would smile at the statement of such
trifles to his professional ear ; the judge would smile,
in his turn ; and meeting one another's eyes, they
would enjoy a hearty laugh together ! But a fig
for medical advice ! The judge will never need it.

Pray, pray, Judge Pyncheon, look at your watch ,
now! What — not a glance! It is within ten
minutes of the dinner-hour ! It surely cannot have
slipped your memory that the dinner of to-day is
to be the most important, in its consequences, of
all the dinners you ever ate. Yes, precisely the

328 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

most important ; although, in the course of your
somewhat eminent career, you have been placed
high towards the head of the table, at splendid
banquets, and have poured out your festive eloquence
to ears yet echoing" with Webster's mighty organ-
tones. No public dinner this, however. It is merely
a gathering of some dozen or so of friends from
several districts of the state ; men of distinguished
character and influence, assembling, almost casually,
at the house of a common friend, likewise dis
tinguished, who will make them welcome to a
little better than his ordinary fare. Nothing in the
way of French cookery, but an excellent dinner,
nevertheless ! Real turtle, we understand, and
salmon, tautog, canvas-backs, pig, English mutton,
good roast beef, or dainties of that serious kind, fit
for substantial country gentlemen, as these honour
able persons mostly are. The delicacies of the
season, in short, and flavoured by a brand of old
Madeira which has been the pride of many seasons.
It is the Juno brand ; a glorious wine, fragrant, and
full of gentle might ; a bottled-up happiness, put by
for use ; a golden liquid, worth more than liquid
gold ; so rare and admirable, that veteran wine-
bibbers count it among their epochs to have tasted
it ! It drives away the heart-ache, and substitutes
no headache ! Could the judge but quaff a glass, it
might enable him to shake off the unaccountable
lethargy which — for the ten intervening minutes,
and five to boot, are already past — has made him
such a laggard at this momentous dinner. It would
all but revive a dead man ! Would you like to sip
it now, Judge Pyncheon ?

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 329

Alas, this dinner ! Have you really forgotten its
true object ? Then let us whisper it, that you may
start at once out of the oaken chair, which really
seems to be enchanted, like the one in Comus, or
that in which Moll Pitcher imprisoned your own
grandfather. But ambition is a talisman more
powerful than witchcraft. Start up, then, and,
hurrying through the streets, burst in upon the
company, that they may begin before the fish is
spoiled ! They wait for you ; and it is little for
your interest that they should wait. These gentle
men — need you be told it? — have assembled, not
without purpose, from every quarter of the state.
They are practised politicians, every man of them,
and skilled to adjust those preliminary measures
which steal from the people, without its knowledge,
the power of choosing its own rulers. The popular
voice, at the next gubernatorial election, though
loud as thunder, will be really but an echo of what
these gentlemen shall speak, under their breath,
at your friend's festive board. They meet to decide
upon their candidate. This little knot of subtle
schemers will control the convention, and, through
it, dictate to the -party. And what worthier
candidate — more wise and learned, more noted
for philanthropic liberality, truer to safe principles,
tried oftener by public trusts, more spotless in private
character, with a larger stake in the common
welfare, and deeper grounded, by hereditary descent,
in the faith and practice of the Puritans — what man
can be presented for the suffrage of the people,
so eminently combining all these claims to the chief-
rulership as Judge Pyncheon here before us ?

L2

330 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

Make haste, then ! Do your part ! The meed
for which you have toiled, and fought, and climbed,
and crept, is ready for your grasp ! Be present at
this dinner ! drink a glass or two of that noble
wine! make your pledges in as low a whisper as
you will ! and you rise up from table virtually
governor of the glorious old state ! Governor
Pyncheon, of Massachusetts !

And is there no potent and exhilarating cordial in
a certainty like this ? It has been the grand purpose
of half your lifetime to obtain it. Now, when there
needs little more than to signify your acceptance,
why do you sit so lumpishly in your great-great
grandfather's oaken chair, as if preferring it to
the gubernatorial one ? We have all heard of
King Log ; but, in these jostling times, one of that
royal kindred will hardly win the race for an elective
chief-magistracy.

Well ! it is absolutely too late for dinner ! Turtle,
salmon, tautog, woodcock, boiled turkey, South-
Down mutton, pig, roast beef, have vanished, or
exist only in fragments, with lukewarm potatoes,
and gravies crusted over with cold fat. The judge,
had he done nothing else, would have achieved
wonders with his knife and fork. It was he,
you know, of whom it used to be said, in
reference to his ogre-like appetite, that his Creator
made him a great animal, but that the dinner-hour
made him a great beast. Persons of his large
sensual endowments must claim indulgence, at
their feeding-time. But, for once, the judge is
entirely too late for dinner ! Too late, we fear,
even to join the party at their wine. The guests

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 331

are warm and merry ; they have given up the
judge ; and, concluding that the free-soilers have
him, they will fix upon another candidate. Were
our friend now to stalk in among them, with that
wide-open stare, at once wild and stolid, his
ungenial presence would be apt to change their
cheer, Neither would it be seemly in Judge
Pyncheon, generally so scrupulous in his attire,
to show himself at a dinner-table, with that crimson
stain upon his shirt bosom. By the bye, how came
it there ? It is an ugly sig'ht, at any rate ; and the
wisest way for the judge is to button his coat
closely over his breast, and, taking his horse and
chaise from the livery stable, to make all speed to
his own house. There, after a glass of brandy and
water, and a mutton-chop, a beef-steak, a broiled
fowl, or some such hasty little dinner and supper
all in one, he had better spend the evening by the
fireside. He must toast his slippers a long while,
in order to get rid of the chilliness which the air
of this vile old house has sent curdling through
his veins.

Up, therefore, Judge Pyncheon, up ! You have
lost -a day. But to-morrow will be here anon. Will
you rise, betimes, and make the most of it ? To
morrow ! To-morrow ! To-morrow ! We, that are
alive, may rise betimes to-morrow. As for him
that has died to-day, his morrow will be the
resurrection morn.

Meanwhile, the twilight is glooming upward out
of the corners of the room. The shadows of the
tall furniture grow deeper, and at first become
more definite ; then, spreading wider, they lose

332 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

their distinctness of outline in the dark gray tide
of oblivion, as it were, that creeps slowly over the
various objects, and the one human figure sitting
in the midst of them. The gloom has not entered
from without ; it has brooded here all day, and
now, taking its own inevitable time, will possess
itself of everything. The judge's face, indeed, rigid,
and singularly white, refuses to melt into this
universal solvent. Fainter and fainter grows the
light. It is as* if another double-handful of dark
ness had been scattered through the air. Now it
is no longer gray, but sable. There is still a faint
appearance at the window ; neither a glow, nor a
gleam, nor a glimmer — any phase of light would
express something far brighter than this doubtful
perception, or sense, rather, that there is a window
there. Has it yet vanished? No! — yes! — not
quite ! And there is still the swarthy whiteness —
we shall venture to marry these ill-agreeing words —
the swarthy whiteness of Judge Pyncheon's face.
The features are all gone ; there is only the paleness
of them left. And how looks it now? There is
no window ! There is no face ! An infinite, in
scrutable blackness has annihilated sight ! Where
is our universe ? All crumbled away from us ; and
we, adrift in chaos, may hearken to the gusts of
homeless wind, that go sighing and murmuring
about, in quest of what was once a world !

Is there no other sound ? One other, and a
fearful one. It is the ticking of the judge's watch,
which, ever since Hepzibah left the room in search
of Clifford, he has been holding in his hand. Be the
cause what it may, this little, quiet, never-ceasing

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 333

throb of Time's pulse, repeating its small strokes
with such busy regularity, in Judge Pyncheon's motion
less hand, has an effect of terror, which we do not
find in any other accompaniment of the scene.

But, listen ! That puff of the breeze was louder ;
it had a tone unlike the dreary and sullen one
which has bemoaned itself, and afflicted all mankind
with miserable sympathy, for five days past. The
wind has veered about ! It now comes boisterously
from the north-west, and, taking hold of the aged
framework of the seven gables, gives it a shake,
like a wrestler that would try strength with his
antagonist. Another and another sturdy tussle with
the blast ! The old house creaks again, and makes
a vociferous but somewhat unintelligible bellowing
in its sooty throat — the big flue, we mean, of its
wide chimney — partly in complaint at the rude
wind, but rather, as befits their century and a half
of hostile intimacy, in tough defiance. A rumbling
kind of a bluster roars behind the fireboard. A
door has been slammed above-stairs. A window,
perhaps, has been left open, or else is driven in
by an unruly gust. It is not to be conceived,
beforehand, what wonderful wind-instruments are
these old timber mansions, and how haunted with
the strangest noises, which immediately begin to
sing, and sigh, and sob, and shriek — and to smite
with sledge-hammers, airy, but ponderous, in some
distant chamber — and to tread along the entries as
with stately footsteps, and rustle up and down the
staircase, as with silks miraculously stiff — whenever
the gale catches the house, with a window open,
and gets fairly into it. Would that we were not

334 HOUSE. OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

an attendant spirit here ! It is too awful ! This
clamour of the wind through the lonely house ; the
judge's quietude, as he sits invisible ; and that
pertinacious ticking of his watch !

As regards Judge Pyncheon's invisibility, however,
that matter will soon be remedied. The north-west
wind has swept the sky clear. The window is dis
tinctly seen. Through its panes, moreover, we dimly
catch the sweep of the dark, clustering foliage
outside, fluttering with a constant irregularity of
movement, and letting in a peep of starlight, now
here, now there. Oftener than any other object,
these glimpses illuminate the judge's face. But
here comes more effectual light. Observe that
silvery dance upon the upper branches of the pear-
tree, and now a little lower, and now on the whole
mass of boughs, while, through their shifting in
tricacies, the moonbeams fall aslant into the room.
They play over the judge's figure, and show that
he has not stirred throughout the hours of darkness.
They follow the shadows, in changeful sport, across
his unchanging features. They gleam upon his
watch. His grasp conceals the dial-plate ; but we
know that the faithful hands have met ; for one of
the city clocks tells midnight.

A man of sturdy understanding, like Judge
Pyncheon, cares no more for twelve o'clock at
night than for the corresponding hour of noon.
However just the parallel drawn, in some of the
preceding pages, between his Puritan ancestor and
himself, it fails in this point. The Pyncheon of
two centuries ago, in common with most of his
contemporaries, professed his full belief in spiritual

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 335

ministrations, although reckoning them chiefly of a
malignant character. The Pyncheon of to-night,
who sits in yonder arm-chair, believes in no such
nonsense. Such, at least, was his creed, some few
hours since. His hair will not bristle, therefore, at
the stories which— in times when chimney-corners
had benches in them, where old people sat poking
into the ashes of the past, and raking out traditions
like live coals — used to be told about this very
room of his ancestral house. In fact, these tales
are too absurd to bristle even childhood's hair.
What sense, meaning, or moral, for example, such
as even ghost-stories should be susceptible of, can
be traced in the ridiculous legend, that, at midnight,
all the dead Pyncheons are bound to assemble in
this parlour? And, pray, for what ? Why, to see
whether the portrait of their ancestor still keeps its
place upon the wall, in compliance with his testa
mentary directions ! Is it worth while to come out
of their graves for that ?

We are tempted to make a little sport with
the idea. Ghost-stories are hardly to be treated
seriously, any longer. The family party of the
defunct Pyncheons, we presume, goes off in this
wise.

First comes the ancestor himself, in his black
cloak, steeple-hat, and trunk-breeches, girt about
the waist with a leathern belt, in which hangs his
steel-hilted sword ; he has a long staff in his hand,
such as gentlemen in advanced life used to carry,
as much for the dignity of the thing as for the
support to be derived from it. He looks up at the
portrait ; a thing of no substance, gazing at its

336 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

own painted image ! All is safe. The picture is
still there. The purpose of his brain has been kept
sacred thus long after the man himself has sprouted
up in graveyard grass. See ! he lifts his ineffectual
hand, and tries the frame. All safe ! But is that
a smile? — is it not, rather, a frown of deadly import,
that darkens over the shadow of his features ? The
stout colonel is dissatisfied ! So decided is his look
of discontent as to impart additional distinctness
to his features ; through which, nevertheless, the
moonlight passes, and flickers on the wall beyond.
Something has strangely vexed the ancestor ! With
a grim shake of the head, he turns away. Here
come other Pyncheons, the whole tribe, in their
half a dozen generations, jostling and elbowing one
another, to reach the picture. We behold aged
men and grandames, a clergyman with the Puritanic
stiffness still in his garb and mien, and a red-
coated officer of the old French war ; and there
comes the shopkeeping Pyncheon of a century ago,
with the ruffles turned back from his wrists ; and
there the periwigged and brocaded gentleman of the
artist's legend, with the beautiful and pensive Alice,
who brings no pride out of her virgin grave. All
try the picture-frame. What do these ghostly people
seek ? A mother lifts her child, that his little hands
may touch it ! There is evidently a mystery about
the picture, that perplexes these poor Pyncheons,
when they ought to be at rest. In a corner, mean
while, stands the figure of an elderly man, in a
leather jerkin and breeches, with a carpenter's
rule sticking out of his side-pocket ; he points his
finger at the bearded colonel and his descendants,

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 337

nodding-, jeering, mocking, and finally bursting into
obstreperous, though inaudible laughter.

Indulging our fancy in this freak, we have partly
lost j the power of restraint and guidance. We dis
tinguish an unlooked-for figure in our visionary
scene. Among those ancestral people there is a
young man, dressed in the very fashion of to-day ;
he wears a dark frock-coat, almost destitute of
skirts, gray pantaloons, gaiter boots of patent
leather, and has a finely-wrought gold chain across
his breast, and a little silver-headed whalebone
stick in his hand. Were we to meet this figure at
noonday, we should greet him as young Jaffrey
Pyncheon, the judge's only surviving child, who has
been spending the last two years in foreign travel.
If still in life, how comes his shadow hither ? If
dead, what a misfortune ! The old Pyncheon pro
perty, together with the great estate acquired by
the young man's father, would devolve on whom ?
On poor, foolish Clifford, gaunt Hepzibah, and
rustic little Phcebe ! But another and a greater
marvel greets us ! Can we believe our eyes ? A
stout, elderly gentleman has made his appearance ;
he has an aspect of eminent respectability, wears a
black coat and pantaloons, of roomy width, and
might be pronounced scrupulously neat in his attire,
but for a broad crimson stain across his snowy
neckcloth and down his shirt-bosom. Is it the
judge, or no? How can it be Judge Pyncheon?
We discern his figure, as plainly as the flickering
moonbeams can show us anything, still seated in
the oaken chair ! Be the apparition whose it may,
it advances to the picture, seems to seize the frame,

338 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

tries to peep behind it, and turns away, with a
frown as black as the ancestral one.

The fantastic scene just hinted at must by no
means be considered as forming- an actual portion
of our story. We were betrayed into this brief
extravagance by the quiver of the moonbeams ;
they dance hand in hand with shadows, and are
reflected in the looking-glass, which, you are aware,
is always a kind of window or doorway into the
spiritual world. We needed relief, moreover, from
our too long and exclusive contemplation of that
figure in the chair. This wild wind, too, has tossed
our thoughts into strange confusion, but without
tearing- them away from their one determined centre.
Yonder leaden judge sits immovably upon our soul.
Will he never stir again? We shall go mad, unless
he stirs ! You may the better estimate his quietude
by the fearlessness of a little mouse, which sits
on its hind legs, in a streak of moonlight, close by
Judge Pyncheon's foot, and seems to meditate a
journey of exploration over this great black bulk.
Ha ! what has startled the nimble little mouse ? It
is the visage of Grimalkin, outside of the window,
where he appears to have posted himself for a
deliberate watch. This Grimalkin has a very ugly
look. Is it a cat watching for a mouse, or the
devil for a human soul ? Would we could scare
him from the window !

Thank Heaven, the night is well-nigh past ! The
moonbeams have no longer so silvery a gleam, nor
contrast so strongly with the blackness of the
shadows among which they fall. They are paler,
now ; the shadows look gray, not black. The

GOVERNOR PYNCHEON. 339

boisterous wind is hushed. What is the hour?
Ah ! the watch has at last ceased to tick ; for the
judge's forgetful fingers neglected to wind it up,
as usual, at ten o'clock, being half an hour, or so,
before his ordinary bed-time; and it has run down,
for the first time in five years. But the great world-
clock of Time still keeps its beat. The dreary night,
— for, oh, how dreary seems its haunted waste,
behind us !• — gives place to a fresh, transparent,
cloudless morn. Blessed, blessed radiance! The
daybeam — even what little of it finds its way into
this always dusky parlour — seem part of the universal
benediction, annulling evil,, and rendering all good
ness possible, and happiness attainable. Will Judge
Pyncheon now rise up from his chair? Will he go
forth, and receive the early sunbeams on his brow?
Will he begin this new day — which God has smiled
upon, and blessed, and given to mankind — will he
begin it with better purposes than the many that
have been spent amiss ? Or are all the deep-laid
schemes of yesterday as stubborn in his heart, and
as busy in his brain, as ever ?

In this latter case, there is much to do. Will
the judge still insist with Hepzibah on the interview
with Clifford ? Will he buy a safe, elderly gentle
man's horse ? Will he persuade the purchaser of
the old Pyncheon property to relinquish the bargain,
in his favour ? Will he see his family physician,
and obtain a medicine that shall preserve him, to
be an honour and blessing to his race, until the
utmost term of patriarchal longevity ? Will Judge
Pyncheon, above all, make due apologies to that
company of honourable friends, and satisfy them

340 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

that his absence from the festive board was un
avoidable, and so fully retrieve himself in their
good opinion that he shall yet be Governor of
Massachusetts ? And, all these great purposes
accomplished, will he walk the streets again, with
that dog-day smile of elaborate benevolence, sultry
enough to tempt flies to come and buzz in it? Or
will he, after the tomb-like seclusion of the past
day and night, go forth a humbled and repentant
man, sorrowful, gentle, seeking no profit, shrinking
from worldly honour, hardly daring to love God,
but bold to love his fellow-man, and to do him what
good he may? Will he bear about with him — no
odious grin of feigned benignity, insolent in its
pretence, and loathsome in its falsehood — but the
tender sadness of a contrite heart, broken, at last,
beneath its own weight of sin ? For it is our belief,
whatever show of honour he may have piled upon
it, that there was heavy sin at the base of this man's
being.

Rise up, Judge Pyncheon ! The morning sunshine
glimmers through the foliage, and, beautiful and
holy as it is, shuns not to kindle up your face.
Rise up, thou subtle, worldly, selfish, iron-hearted
hypocrite, and make thy choice whether still to be
subtle, worldly, selfish, iron-hearted, and hypocritical,
or to tear these sins out of thy nature, though they
bring the life-blood with them ! The Avenger is
upon thee ! Rise up, before it be too late !

What ! Thou art not stirred by this last appeal ?
No, not a jot ! And there we see a fly — one of
your common house-flies, such as are always buzz
ing on the window-pane — which has smelled out

ALICE'S POSIES. 341

Governor Pyncheon, and alights, now on his fore
head, now on his chin, and now, Heaven help us !
is creeping- over the bridge of his nose, towards
the would-be chief -magistrate's wide-open eyes !
Canst thou not brush the fly away ? Art thou too
sluggish ? Thou man, that hadst so many busy
projects, yesterday ! Art thou too weak, that wast
so powerful ? Not brush away a fly ! Nay, then,
we give thee up !

And, hark ! the shop-bell rings. After hours like
these latter ones, through which we have borne
our heavy tale, it is good to be made sensible that
there is a living world, and that even this old, lonely
mansion retains some manner of connection with it.
We breathe more freely, emerging from Judge
Pyncheon's presence into the street before the seven
gables.

XIX.

ALICE'S POSIES.

UNCLE VENNER, trundling a wheel-barrow, was the
earliest person stirring in the neighbourhood, the
day after the storm.

Pyncheon Street, in front of the House of the
Seven Gables, was a far pleasanter scene than a
bylane, confined by shabby fences, and bordered
with wooden dwellings of the meaner class, could
reasonably be expected to present. Nature made
sweet amends, that morning, for the five unkindly
days which had preceded it. It would have been
enough to live for, merely to look up at the wide
benediction of the sky, or as much of it as was

342 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

visible between the houses, genial once more with
sunshine. Every object was agreeable, whether to
be gazed at in the breadth, or examined more
minutely. Such, for example, were the well-washed
pebbles and gravel of the sidewalk ; even the sky-
reflecting pools in the centre of the street ; and the
grass, now freshly verdant, that crept along the
base of the fences, on the other side of which, if
one peeped over, was seen the multifarious growth
of gardens. Vegetable productions, of whatever
kind, seemed more than negatively happy, in the
juicy warmth and abundance of their life. The
Pyncheon elm, throughout its great circumference,
was all alive, and full of the morning sun and a
sweetly-tempered little breeze, which lingered within
this verdant sphere, and set a thousand leafy
tongues a-whispering all at once. This aged tree
appeared to have suffered nothing from the gale. It
had kept its boughs unshattered, and its full com
plement of leaves ; and the whole in perfect verdure
except a single branch, that, by the earlier change
with which the elm-tree sometimes prophesies the
autumn, had been transmuted to bright gold. It
was like the golden branch that gained ^Eneas and
the Sibyl admittance into Hades.

This one mystic branch hung down before the
main entrance of the seven gables, so nigh the
ground that any passer-by might have stood on
tiptoe and plucked it off. Presented at the door,
it would have been a symbol of his right to enter,
and be made acquainted with all the secrets of the
house. So little faith is due to external appearance,
that there was really an inviting aspect over the

ALICE'S POSIES. 343

venerable edifice, conveying an idea that its history
must be a decorous and happy one, and such as
would be delightful for a fireside tale. Its windows
gleamed cheerfully in the slanting sunlight. The
lines and tufts of green moss, here and there, seemed
pledges of familiarity and sisterhood with Nature ;
as if this human dwelling-place, being ,of such old
date, had established its prescriptive title among
primeval oaks, and whatever other objects, by virtue
of their long continuance, have acquired a gracious
right to be. A person of imaginative temperament,
while passing by the house, would turn, once and
again, and peruse it well : its many peaks, con
senting together in the clustered chimney ; the deep
projection over its basement - storey ; the arched
window, imparting a look, if not of grandeur, yet
of antique gentility, to the broken portal over which
it opened ; the luxuriance of gigantic burdocks,
near the threshold — he would note all those
characteristics, and be conscious of something
deeper than he saw. He would conceive the
mansion to have been the residence of the stubborn
old Puritan, Integrity, who, dying in some forgotten
generation, had left. a blessing in all its rooms and
chambers, the efficacy of which was to be seen
in the religion, honesty, moderate competence, or
upright poverty and solid happiness, of its descendants,
to this day.

One object, above all others, would take root in
the imaginative observer's memory. It was the
great tuft of flowers— weeds, you would have called
them, only a week ago— the tuft of crimson-spotted
flowers, in the angle between the two front gables.

344 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

The old people used to give them the name of
Alice's posies, in remembrance of fair Alice Pyncheon,
who was believed to have brought their seeds from
Italy. They were flaunting in rich beauty and full
bloom to-day, and seemed, as it were, a mystic
expression that something within the house was
consummated.

It was but little after sunrise, when Uncle Venner
made his appearance, as aforesaid, impelling a
wheel-barrow along the street. He was going his
matutinal rounds to collect cabbage-leaves, turnip-
tops, potato-skins, and the miscellaneous refuse of
the dinner-pot, which the thrifty housewives of the
neighbourhood were accustomed to put aside, as
fit only to feed a pig. Uncle Venner's pig was fed
entirely, and kept in prime order, on these
eleemosynary contributions ; insomuch that the
patched philosopher used to promise that, before
retiring to his farm, he would make a feast of the
portly grunter, and invite all his neighbours to
partake of the joints and spare-ribs which they had
helped to fatten. Miss Hepzibah Pyncheon's house
keeping had so greatly improved, since Clifford
became a member of the family, that her share of
the banquet would have been no lean one ; and
Uncle Venner, accordingly, was a good deal
disappointed not to find the large earthen-pan, full
of fragmentary eatables, that ordinarily awaited
his coming, at the back door-step of the seven
gables.

** I never knew Miss Hepzibah so forgetful before,"
said the patriarch to himself. "She must have
had a dinner yesterday — no question of that ! She

ALICE'S POSIES. 345

always has one, nowadays. So where's the pot-
liquor and potato-skins, I ask? Shall I knock,
and see if she's stirring yet? No, no — 't won't do !
If little Phoebe was about the house, I should not
mind knocking ; but Miss Hepzibah, likely as not,
would scowl down at me, out of the window, and
look cross, even if she felt pleasantly. So I'll come
back at noon."

With these reflections, the old man was shutting
the gate of the little back-yard. Creaking on its
hinges, however, like every other gate and door
about the premises, the sound reached the ears of
the occupant of the northern gable, one of the
windows of which had a side-view towards the
gate.

" Good - morning, Uncle Venner ! " said the
daguerreotypist, leaning out of the window. "Do
you hear nobody stirring ? "

44 Not a soul," said the man of patches. "But
that's no wonder. 'Tis barely half an hour past
sunrise, yet. But I am really glad to See you,
Mr. Holgrave ! There's a strange, lonesome look
about this side of the house ; so that my heart
misgave me, somehow or other, and I felt as if
there was nobody alive in it. The front of the
house looks a good deal cheerier ; and Alice's posies
are blooming there beautifully ; and if I were a
young man, Mr. Holgrave, my sweetheart should
have one of those flowers in her bosom, though I
risked my neck climbing for it ! — Well ! and did the
wind keep you awake last night?"

" It did, indeed ! " answered the artist, smiling.
" If I were a believer in ghosts — and I don't quite

346 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

know whether I am or not — I should have concluded
that all the old Pyncheons were running- riot in the
lower rooms, especially id Miss Hepzibah's part of
the house. But it is very quiet now."

"Yes, Miss Hepzibah will be apt to oversleep
herself, after being* disturbed, all night, with the
racket/' said Uncle Venner. " But it would be
odd, now, wouldn't it, if the judge had taken both
his cousins into the country along with him? I saw
him go into the shop yesterday."

" At what hour? " inquired Holgrave.

"Oh, along in the forenoon," said the old man.
"Well, well! I must go my rounds, and so must
my wheel-barrow. But I'll be back Jbere at dinner
time ; for my pig likes a dinner as well as a
breakfast. No meal-time, and no sort of victuals
ever seems to come amiss to my pig. Good-morning
to you ! And, Mr. Holgrave, if I were a young
man, like you, I'd get one of Alice's posies, and
keep it in water till Phoebe comes back."

"I h^ve heard," said the daguerreotypist, as he
drew in his head, "that the water of Maule's Well
suits those flowers best."

Here the conversation ceased, and Uncle Venner
went on his way. For half an hour longer, nothing
disturbed the repose of the seven gables ; nor was
there any visitor, except a carrier-boy, who, as he
passed the front door-step, threw down one of his
newspapers ; for Hepzibah, of late, had regularly
taken it in. After a while, there came a fat woman,
making prodigious speed, and stumbling as she
ran up the steps of the shop-door. Her face glowed
with fire-heat, and, it being a pretty warm morning,

ALICE'S POSIES. 347

she bubbled and hissed, as it were, as if all a- fry
with chimney-warmth, and summer-warmth, and
the warmth of her own corpulent velocity. She
tried the shop-door ; it was fast. She tried it
again, with so angry a jar that the bell tinkled
angrily back at her.

4 'The deuce take Old Maid Pyncheon ! " muttered
the irascible housewife. " Think of her pretending
to set up a cent-shop, and then lying abed till noon !
These are what she calls gentlefolk's airs, I suppose !
But I'll either start her ladyship, or break the door
down!" *

She shook it accordingly, and the bell, having a
spiteful little temper of its own, rang obstreperously,
making its remonstrances heard — not, indeed, by
the ears for which they were intended — but by a
good lady on the other side of the street. She
opened her window, and addressed the impatient
applicant.

4 < You'll find nobody there, Mrs. Gubbins."

" But I must and will find somebody here ! " cried
Mrs. Gubbins, inflicting another outrage on the bell.
" I want a half-pound of pork, to fry some first-rate
flounders, for Mr. Gubbin's breakfast ; and, lady or
not, Old Maid Pyncheon shall get up and serve me
with it ! "

" But do hear reason, Mrs. Gubbins !" responded
the lady opposite. " She, and her brother, too,
have both gone to their cousin, Judge Pyncheon's,
at his country-seat. There's not a soul in the house,
but that young daguerreotype man, that sleeps in
the north gable. I saw old Hepzibah and Clifford
go away yesterday ; and a queer couple of ducks

348 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

they were, paddling through the mud -puddles !
They're gone, I'll assure you."

" And how do you know they're gone to the
judge's?" asked Mrs. Gubbins. " He's a rich man ;
and there's been a quarrel between him and Hepzibah,
this many a day, because he won't give her a
living. That's the main reason of her setting up
a cent-shop."

" 1 know that well enough," said the neighbour.
"But they're gone — that's one thing certain. And
who but a blood-relation, that couldn't help himself,
I ask you, would take in that awful-tenfpered old
maid, and that dreadful Clifford ? That's it, you
may be sure."

Mrs. Gubbins took her departure, still brimming
over with hot wrath against the absent Hepzibah.
For another half-hour, or, perhaps, considerably
more, there was almost as much quiet on the
outside of the house as within. The elm, however,
made a pleasant, cheerful, sunny sigh, responsive
to the breeze that was elsewhere imperceptible ; a
swarm of insects buzzed merrily under its drooping
shadow, and became specks of light, whenever they
darted into the sunshine ; a locust sang, once or
twice, in some inscrutable seclusion of the tree ; and
a solitary little bird, with plumage of pale gold, came
and hovered about Alice's posies.

At last, our small acquaintance, Ned Wiggins,
trudged up the street, on his way to school ; and
happening, for the first time in a fortnight, to be
the possessor of a cent, he could by no means get
past the shop-door of the seven gables. But it would
not open. Again and again, however, and half a

ALICE'S POSIES. 349

dozen other agains, with the inexorable pertinacity
of a child intent upon some object important to
itself, did he renew his efforts for admittance. He
had, doubtless, set his heart upon an elephant ; or,
possibly, with Hamlet, he meant to eat a crocodile.
In response to his more violent attacks, the bell
gave, now and then, a moderate tinkle, but could
not be stirred into clamour by any exertion of the
little fellow's childish and tiptoe strength. Holding
by the door-handle, he peeped through a crevice of
the curtain, and saw that the inner door, com
municating with the passage towards the parlour,
was closed.

' * Miss Pyncheon ! " screamed the child, rapping
on the window-pane, u I want an elephant ! "

There being no answer to several repetitions of
the summons, Ned began to grow impatient ; and
his little pot of passion quickly boiling over, he
picked up a stone, with a naughty purpose to fling
it through the window ; at the same time blubbering
and sputtering with wrath. A man — one of two who
happened to be passing by caught the urchin's arm.

" What's the trouble, old gentleman ? " he asked.

4< I want old Hepzibah, or Phcebe, or any of
them ! " answered Ned, sobbing. " They won't open
the door ; and I can't get my elephant ! "

"Go to school, you little scamp!" said the man.
' ' There's another cent-shop round the corner. Tis
very strange, Dixey," added he to his companion,
" what's become of all these Pyncheons ! Smith, the
livery-stable keeper, tells me Judge Pyncheon put
his horse up yesterday, to stand till after dinner,
and has not taken him away yet. And one of the

350 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

judge's hired men has been in, this morning", to make
inquiry about him. He's a kind of person, they say,
that seldom breaks his habits, or stays out o' nights."

"Oh, he'll turn up safe enough!" said Dixey.
" And as for Old Maid Pyncheon, take my word
for it, she has run in debt, and gone off from
her creditors. I foretold, you remember, the first
morning she set up shop, that her devilish scowl would
frighten away customers. They couldn't stand it ! "

"I never thought she'd make it go," remarked
his friend. "This business of cent-shops is over
done among the women-folks. My wife tried it, and
lost five dollars on her outlay ! "

u Poor business!" said Dixey, shaking his head.
" Poor business ! "

In the course of the morning, there were various
other attempts to open a communication with the
supposed inhabitants of this silent and impenetrable
mansion. The man of root-beer came, in his neatly-
painted wagon, with a couple of dozen full bottles,
to be exchanged for empty ones ; the baker, with a
lot of crackers which Hepzibah had ordered for her
retail custom ; the butcher, with a nice titbit which
he fancied she would be eager to secure for Clifford.
Had any observer of these proceedings been aware
of the fearful secret hidden within the house, it would
have affected him with a singular shape and modifica
tion of horror, to see the current of human life
making this small eddy hereabouts ; whirling sticks,
straws, and all such trifles, round and round, right
over the black depth where a dead corpse lay unseen !

The butcher was so much in earnest with his
sweetbread of lamb, or whatever the dainty might

ALICE'S POSIES. 351

be, that he tried every accessible door of the seven
gables, and at length came round again to the shop,
where he ordinarily found admittance.

" It's a nice article, and I know the old lady would
jump at it," said he to himself. " She can't be gone
away ! In fifteen years that I have driven my cart
through Pyncheon Street, I've never known her to
be away from home ; though often enough, to be
sure, a man might knock all day without bringing
her to the door. But that was when she'd only
herself to provide for."

Peeping through the same crevice of the curtain
where, only a little while before, the urchin of
elephantine appetite had peeped, the butcher beheld
the inner door, not closed, as the child had seen it,
but ajar, and almost wide open. However it might
have happened, it was the fact. Through the
passage-way there was a dark vista into the lighter
but still obscure Interior of the parlour. It appeared
to the butcher that he could pretty clearly discern
what seemed to be the stalwart legs, clad in black
pantaloons, of a man sitting in a large oaken chair,
the back of which concealed all the remainder of
his figure. This contemptuous tranquillity on the
part of an occupant of the house, in response to the
butcher's indefatigable efforts to attract notice, so
piqued the man of flesh that he determined to
withdraw.

" So," thought he, " there sits Old Maid Pyncheon's
bloody brother, while I've been giving myself all this
trouble .! Why, if a hog hadn't more manners, I'd
stick him ! I call it demeaning a man's business to
trade with such people ; and from this time forth,

352 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

if they want a sausage or an ounce of liver, they shall
run after the cart for it ! "

He tossed the titbit angrily into his cart, and drove
off in a pet.

Not a great while afterwards, there was a sound
of music turning the corner, and approaching down
the street, with several intervals of silence, and then
a renewed and nearer outbreak of brisk melody. A
mob of children was seen moving onward, or stop
ping, in unison with the sound, which appeared to
proceed from the centre of the throng ; so that they
were loosely bound together by slender strains of
harmony, and drawn along captive ; with ever and
anon an accession of some little fellow in an apron
and straw-hat, capering forth from door or gateway.
Arriving under the shadow of the Pyncheon elm, it
proved to be the Italian boy, who, with his monkey
and show of puppets, had once before played his
hurdy-gurdy beneath the arched window. The
pleasant face of Phcebe — and doubtless, too, the
liberal recompense which she had flung him — still
dwelt in his remembrance. His expressive features
kindled up, as he recognised the spot where this
trifling incident of his erratic life had chanced. He
entered the neglected yard (now wilder than ever,
with its growth of hog-weed and burdock), stationed
himself on the door-step of the main entrance, and,
opening his show-box, began to play. Each in
dividual of the automatic community forthwith set
to work, according to his or her proper vocation ;
the monkey, taking off his Highland bonnet, bowed
and scraped to the bystanders most obsequiously,
with ever an observant eye to pick up a stray cent ;

ALICE'S POSIES. 353

and the young foreigner himself, as he turned the
crank of his machine, glanced upward to the arched
window, expectant of a presence that would make
his music the livelier and sweeter. The throng of
children stood near ; some on the sidewalk ; some
within the yard ; two or three establishing themselves
on the very door-step ; and one squatting on the
threshold. Meanwhile, the locust kept singing in
the great old Pyncheon elm.

" I don't hear anybody in the house," said one of
the children to another. " The monkey won't pick
up anything here."

" There is somebody at home," affirmed the urchin
on the threshold. " I heard a step ! "

Still the young Italian's eye turned sidelong
upward ; and it really seemed as if the touch of
genuine, though slight and almost playful emotion,
communicated a juicier sweetness to the dry,
mechanical process of his minstrelsy. These
wanderers are readily responsive to any natural
kindness — be it no more than a smile, or a word,
itself not understood, but only a warmth in it — which
befalls them on the roadside of life. They remember
these things because 'they are the little enchantments
which, for the instant — for the space that reflects a
landscape in a soap-bubble — build up a home about
them. Therefore, the Italian boy would not be dis
couraged by the heavy silence with which the old
house seemed resolute to clog the vivacity of his
instrument. He persisted in his melodious appeals ;
he still looked upward, trusting that his dark, alien
countenance would soon be brightened by Phoebe's
sunny aspect. Neither could he be willing to depart
H.S.G M

354 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

without again beholding- Clifford, whose sensibility,
like Phoebe's smile, had talked a kind of heart's
language to the foreigner. He repeated all his music,
over and over again, until his auditors were getting
weary. So were the little wooden people in his
show-box, and the monkey most of all. There was
no response, save the singing of the locust.

" No children live in this house," said a schoolboy,
at last. " Nobody lives here but an old maid and
an old man. You'll get nothing here ! Why don't
you go along ? "

" You fool, you, why do you tell him?" whispered
a shrewd little Yankee, caring nothing for the music,
but a good deal for the cheap rate at which it was
had. " Let him play as long as he likes ! If there's
nobody to pay him that's his own look-out ! "

Once more, however, the Italian ran over his
round of melodies. To the common observer — who
could understand nothing of the case, except the
music and the sunshine on the hither side of the
door — it might have been amusing to watch the
pertinacity of the street-performer. Will he succeed
at last ? Will that stubborn door be suddenly flung
open ? Will a group of joyous children, the young
ones of the house, come dancing, shouting, laughing,
into the open air, and cluster round the show-box,
looking with eager merriment at the puppets, and
tossing each a copper for long-tailed Mammon, the
monkey, to pick up ?

But, to us, who know the inner heart of the seven
gables, as well as its exterior face, there is a ghastly
effect in this repetition of light, popular tunes at its
door-steo. It would be an ugly business, indeed,

ALICE'S POSIES. 355

if Judge Pyncheon (who would not have cared a
fig for Paganini's fiddle, in his most harmonious
mood) should make his appearance at the door,
with a bloody shirt-bosom, and a grim frown on
his swarthily-white visage, and motion the foreign
vagabond away ! Was ever before such a grinding
out of jigs and waltzes, where nobody was in the
cue to dance ? Yes, very often. This contrast,
or intermingling of tragedy with mirth, happens
daily, hourly, momently. The gloomy and desolate
old house, deserted of life, and with awful Death
sitting sternly in its solitude, was the emblem of
many a human heart, which, nevertheless, is com
pelled to hear the trill and echo of the world's
gaiety around it.

Before the conclusion of the Italian's performance,
a couple of men happened to be passing, on their
way to dinner.

" I say, you young French fellow!" called out
one of them, "come away from that door-step, and
go somewhere else with your nonsense ! The
Pyncheon family live there ; and they are in great
trouble, just about this time. They don't feel
musical to-day. It is reported, all over town, that
Judge Pyncheon, who owns the house, has been
murdered ; and the city marshal is going to look
into the matter. So be off with you, at once ! "

As the Italian shouldered his hurdy-gurdy, he
saw on the door-step a card, which had been covered,
all the morning, by the newspaper that the carrier
had flung upon it, but was now shuffled into sight.
He picked it up, and perceiving something written
in pencil, gave it to the man to read. In fact, it

356 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

was an engraved card of Judge Pyncheon's, with
certain pencilled memoranda on the back, referring1
to various businesses, which it had been his
purpose to transact during- the preceding- day.
It formed a prospective epitome of the day's history ;
only that affairs had not turned out altogether in
accordance with the programme. The card must
have been lost from the judge's vest-pocket, in his
preliminary attempt to gain access by the main
entrance of the house. Though well soaked with
rain, it was still partially legible.

44 Look here, Dixey ! " cried the man. " This
has something to do with Judge Pyncheon. See ! —
here's his name printed on it ; and here, I suppose,
is some of his handwriting."

" Let's go to the city marshal with it ! " said
Dixey. " It may give him just the clue he wants.
After all," whispered he in his companion's ear,
"it would be no wonder if the judge has gone
into that door, and never come out again ! A
certain cousin of his may have been at his old
tricks. And Old Maid Pyncheon having got herself
in debt by the cent-shop — and the judge's pocket-
book being well filled — and bad blood amongst
them already ! Put all these things together, and
see what they make ! "

" Hush, hush ! " whispered the other. " It seems
like a sin to be the first to speak of such a thing.
But I think, with you, that we had better go to
the city marshal."

"Yes, yes !" said Dixey. "Well ! — I always said
there was something devilish in that woman's
scowl ! "

ALICE'S POSIES. 357

The men wheeled about, accordingly, and retraced
their steps up the street. The Italian, also, made the
best of his way off, with a parting- glance up at the
arched window. As for the children, they took to
their heels, with one accord, and scampered as if
some giant or ogre were in pursuit, until, at a good
distance from the house, they stopped as suddenly
and simultaneously as they had set out. Their
susceptible nerves took an indefinite alarm from
what they had overheard. Looking back at the
grotesque peaks and shadowy angles of the old
mansion, they fancied a gloom diffused about it,
which no brightness of the sunshine could dispel.
An imaginary Hepzibah scowled and shook her
finger at them, from several windows at the same
moment. An imaginary Clifford — for (and it would
have deeply wounded him to know it) he had always
been a horror to these small people — stood behind
the unreal Hepzibah, making awful gestures, in a
faded dressing-gown. Children are even more apt,
if possible, than grown people, to catch the contagion
of a panic-terror. For the rest of the day, the more
timid went whole streets about, for the sake of
avoiding the seven gables ; while the bolder signalised
their hardihood by challenging their comrades to
race past the mansion at full speed.

It could not have been more than half an hour
after the disappearance of the Italian boy, with his
unseasonable melodies, when a cab drove down the
street. It stopped beneath the Pyncheon elm ; the
cabman took a trunk, a canvas-bag, and a hand-box
from the top of his vehicle, and deposited them on
the door-step of the old house ; a straw bonnet,

358 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and then the pretty figure of a young girl, came into
view from the interior of the cab. It was Phoebe !
Though not altogether so blooming as when she
first tripped into our story — for, in the few intervening
weeks, her experiences had made her graver, more
womanly, and deeper-eyed, in token of a heart that
had begun to suspect its depth — still there was the
quiet glow of natural sunshine over her. Neither had
she forfeited her proper gift of making things look
real, rather than fantastic, within her sphere. Yet
we feel it to be a questionable venture, even for
Phcebe, at this juncture, to cross the threshold of
the seven gables. Is her healthful presence potent
enough to chase away the crowd of pale, hideous,
and sinful phantoms, that have gained admittance
there since her departure ? Or will she, likewise,
fade, sicken, sadden, and grow into deformity, and
be only another pallid phantom, to glide noiselessly up
and down the stairs, and affright children, as she
pauses at the window ?

At least, we would gladly forewarn the unsuspecting
girl that there is nothing in human shape or substance
to receive her, unless it be the figure of Judge
Pyncheon, who — wretched spectacle that he is, and
frightful in our remembrance, since our night-long
vigil with him ! — still keeps his place in the oaken
chair.

Phcebe first tried the shop-door. It did not yield
to her hand ; and the white curtain, drawn across the
window which formed the upper section of the door,
struck her quick perceptive faculty as something
unusual. Without making another effort to enter
here, she betook herself to the great portal, under

ALICE'S POSIES. 359

the arched window. Finding it fastened, she
knocked. A reverberation came from the emptiness
within. She knocked again, and a third time ; and
listening- intently, fancied that the floor creaked, as
if Hepzibah were coming, with her ordinary tiptoe
movement, to admit her. But so dead a silence
ensued upon this imaginary sound, that she began
to question whether she might not have mistaken
the house, familiar as she thought herself with its
exterior.

Her notice was now attracted by a child's voice,
at some distance. It appeared to call her name.
Looking in the direction whence it proceeded, Phcebe
saw little Ned Wiggins, a good way down the
street, stamping, shaking his head violently, making
deprecatory gestures with both hands, and shouting
to her at mouth-wide screech.

" No, no, Phcebe!" he screamed. "Don't you
go in ! There's something wicked there ! Don't —
don't — don't go in ! "

But as the little personage could not be induced
to approach near enough to explain himself, Phoebe
concluded that he had been frightened, on some of
his visits to the shop, by her cousin Hepzibah ; for
the good lady's manifestations, in truth, ran about
an equal chance of scaring children out of their
wits, or compelling them to unseemly laughter.
Still, she felt the more, for this incident, how
unaccountably silent and impenetrable the house
had become. As her next resort, Phoebe made her
way into the garden, where, on so warm and bright
a day as the present, she had little doubt of finding
Clifford, and perhaps Hepzibah also, idling away the

360 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

noontide in the shadow of the arbour. Immediately
on her entering the garden gate, the family of hens
half ran, half flew, to meet her ; while a strange
Grimalkin, which was prowling under the parlour-
window, took to his heels, clambered hastily over
the fence, and vanished. The arbour was vacant,
and its floor, table, and circular bench were still
damp, and bestrewn with twigs, and the disarray
of the past storm. The growth of the garden
seemed to have got quite out of bounds ; the weeds
had taken advantage of Phoebe's absence, and the
long-continued rain to run rampant over the flowers
and kitchen-vegetables. Maule's Well had over
flowed its stone border, and made a pool of formidable
breadth, in that corner of the garden.

The impression of the whole scene was that of
a spot where no human foot had left its print for
many preceding days — probably not since Phoebe's
departure — for she saw a side-comb of her own
under the table of the arbour, where it must have
fallen on the last afternoon when she and Clifford
sat there.

The girl knew that her two relatives were capable
of far greater oddities than that of shutting themselves
up in their old house, as they appeared now to
have done. Nevertheless, with indistinct misgivings
of something amiss, and apprehensions to which
she could not give shape, she approached the door
that formed the customary communication between
the house and garden. It was secured within, like
the two which she had already tried. She knocked,
however ; and immediately, as if the application
had been expected, the door was drawn open, by a

THE FLOWER OF EDEN. 361

considerable exertion of some unseen person's strength,
not widely, but far enough to afford her a sidelong-
entrance. As Hepzibah, in order not to expose
herself to inspection from without, invariably opened
a door in this manner, Phcebe necessarily concluded
that it was her cousin who now admitted her.

Without hesitation, therefore, she stepped across
the threshold, and had no sooner entered than the
door closed behind her.

XX.

THE FLOWER OF EDEN.

PHCEBE, coming1 so suddenly from the sunny day
light, was altogether bedimmed in such density of
shadow as lurked in most of the passages of the
old house. She was not at first aware by whom
she had been admitted. Before her eyes had adapted
themselves to the obscurity, a hand grasped her
own, with a firm but gentle and warm pressure,
thus imparting a welcome which caused her heart
to leap and thrill with an indefinable shiver of
enjoyment. She felt herself drawn along, not
towards the parlour, but into a large and un
occupied apartment, which had formerly been the
grand reception-room of the seven gables. The
sunshine came freely into all the uncurtained
windows of this room, and fell upon the dusty
floor ; so that Phcebe now clearly saw — what, in
deed, had been no secret, after the encounter of
a warm hand with hers — that it was not Hepzibah
nor Clifford, but Holgrave, to whom she owed her

H.S.G. M2

362 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

reception. The subtle, intuitive communication, or,
rather, the vague and formless impression of some
thing- to be told, had made her yield unresistingly
to his impulse. Without taking away her hand,
she looked eagerly in his face, not quick to fore
bode evil, but unavoidably conscious that the state
of the family had changed since her departure, and
therefore anxious for an explanation.

The artist looked paler than ordinary ; there was
a thoughtful and severe contraction of his forehead,
tracing a deep vertical line between the eyebrows.
His smile, however, was full of genuine warmth,
and had in it a joy, by far the most vivid expression
that Phcebe had ever witnessed, shining out of the
New England reserve with which Holgrave habitu
ally masked whatever lay near his heart. It was
the look wherewith a man, brooding alone over
some fearful object, in a dreary forest or illimitable
desert, would recognise the familiar aspect of his
dearest friend, bringing up all the peaceful ideas
that belong to home, and the gentle current of
everyday affairs. And yet, as he felt the necessity
of responding to her look of inquiry, the smile
disappeared.

" I ought not to rejoice that you have come,
Phoebe," said he. " We meet at a strange moment ! "

<4 What has happened?" she exclaimed. "Why
is the house so deserted ? Where are Hepzibah and
Clifford ? "

"Gone! I cannot imagine where they are!"j
answered Holgrave. "We are alone in the house!"

"Hepzibah and Clifford gone?" cried Phoebe.]
"It is not possible ! And why have you brought

THE FLOWER OF EDEN. 363

me into this room, instead of the parlour ? Ah,
something terrible has happened ! I must run and
see ! "

"No, no, Phoebe!" said Holgrave, holding her
back. " It is as I have told you. They are gone,
and I know not whither. A terrible event has,
indeed, happened, but not to them, nor, as I un-
doubtingly believe, through any agency of theirs.
If I read your character rightly, Phoebe," he con
tinued, fixing his eyes on hers, with stern anxiety,
intermixed with tenderness, "gentle as you are,
and seeming to have your sphere among common
things, you yet possess remarkable strength. You
have wonderful poise, and a faculty which, when
tested, will prove itself capable of dealing with
matters that fall far out of the ordinary rule."

"Oh, no, I am very weak!" replied Phcebe,
trembling. " But tell me what has happened ! "

"You are strong!" persisted Holgrave. "You
must be both strong and wise ; for I am all astray,
and need your counsel. It may be you can suggest
the one right thing to do ! "

" Tell me ! — tell me ! " said Phcebe, all in a tremble.
"It oppresses — it terrifies me — this mystery! Any
thing else I can bear ! "

The artist hesitated. Notwithstanding what he
had just said, and most sincerely, in regard to the
self-balancing power with which Phcebe impressed
him, it still seemed almost wicked to bring the
awful secret of yesterday to her knowledge. It was
like dragging a hideous shape of death into the
cleanly and cheerful space before a household fire,
where it would present all the uglier aspect, amid

364 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

the decorousness of everything* about it. Yet it
could not be concealed from her : she must needs
know it.

" Phoebe," said he, " do you remember this ? "

He put into her hand a daguerreotype ; the same
that he had shown her at their first interview, in
the garden, and which so strikingly brought out
the hard and relentless traits of the orginal.

u What has this to do with Hepzibah and
Clifford ? " asked Phoebe, with impatient surprise
that Holgrave should so trifle with her, at such a
moment. " It is Judge Pyncheon ! You have shown
it to me before ! "

" But here is the same face, taken within this
half-hour," said the artist, presenting her with
another miniature. " I had just finished it, when
I heard you at the door."

"This is death ! ". shuddered Phoebe, turning very
pale. " Judge Pyncheon dead ! "

" Such as there represented," said Holgrave, "he
sits in the next room. The judge is dead, and
Clifford and Hepzibah have vanished ! I know no
more. All beyond is conjecture. On returning to
my solitary chamber, last evening, I noticed no
light, either in the parlour, or Hepzibah's room,
or Clifford's ; no stir nor footstep about the house.
This morning there was the same death-like quiet.
From my window, I overheard the testimony of a
neighbour, that your relatives were seen leaving
the house, in the midst of yesterday's storm. A
rumour reached me, too, of Judge Pyncheon being
missed. A feeling which I cannot describe —
an indefinite sense of some catastrophe, or

THE FLOWER OF EDEN. 365

consummation — impelled me to make my way into this
part of the house, where I discovered what you see.
As a point of evidence that may be useful to Clifford,
and also as a memorial valuable to myself — for,
Phoebe, there are hereditary reasons that connect
me strangely with that man's fate — I used the
means at my disposal to preserve this pictorial
record of Judge Pyncheon's death. "

Even in her agitation, Phoebe could not help
remarking the calmness of Holgrave's demeanour.
He appeared, it is true, to feel the whole awfulness
of the judge's death, yet had received the fact into
his mind without any mixture of surprise, but as
an event pre-ordained, happening inevitably, and so
fitting itself into past occurrences that it could
almost have been prophesied.

"Why have you not thrown open the doors, and
called in witnesses?" inquired she, with a painful
shudder. " It is terrible to be here alone ! "

"But Clifford!" suggested the artist. "Clifford
and Hepzibah ! We must consider what is best
to be done in their behalf. It is a wretched fatality,
that they should have disappeared ! Their flight
will throw the worst colouring over this event of
which it is susceptible. Yet how easy is the ex
planation, to those who know them ! Bewildered
and terror-stricken by the similarity of this death
to a former one, which was attended with such
disastrous consequences to Clifford, they have had
no idea but of removing themselves from the scene.
How miserably unfortunate ! Had Hepzibah but
shrieked aloud — had Clifford flung wide the door,
and proclaimed Judge Pyncheon's death — it would

366 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

have been, however awful in itself, an event fruitful
of good consequences to them. As I view it, it
would have gone far towards obliterating the black
stain on Clifford's character."

"And how," asked Phcebe, "could any good
come from what is so very dreadful ? "

" Because," said the artist, "if the matter can
be fairly considered, and candidly interpreted, it
must be evident that Judge Pyncheon could not
have come unfairly to his end. This mode of death
has been an idiosyncracy with his family for genera
tions past ; not often occurring, indeed, but, when
it does occur, usually attacking individuals about
the judge's time of life, and generally in the tension
of some mental crisis, or, perhaps, in an access of
wrath. Old Maule's prophecy was probably founded
on a knowledge of this physical predisposition in
the Pyncheon race. Now, there is a minute and
almost exact similarity in the appearances connected
with the death that occurred yesterday and those
recorded of the death of Clifford's uncle, thirty
years ago. It is true, there was a certain - arrange
ment of circumstances, unnecessary to be recounted,
which made it possible — nay, as men look at these
things, probable, or even certain — that old Jaffrey
Pyncheon came to a violent death, and by Clifford's
hands."

"Whence came those circumstances?" exclaimed
Phcebe; "he being innocent, as we know him
to be ! "

" They were arranged," said Holgrave — "at least,
such has long been my conviction — they were
arranged, after the uncle's death, and before it was

THE FLOWER OF EDEN. 367

made public, by the man who sits in yonder parlour.
His own death, so like that former one, yet attended
with none of those suspicious circumstances, seems
the stroke of God upon him, at once a punishment
for his wickedness, and making plain the innocence
of Clifford. But this flight — it distorts everything !
He may be in concealment, near at hand. Could
we but bring him back before the discovery of the
judge's death, the evil might be rectified."

" We must not hide this thing a moment longer ! "
said Phcebe. "It is dreadful to keep it so closely
in our hearts. Clifford is innocent. God will make
it manifest ! Let us throw open the doors, and call
all the neighbourhood to see the truth ! "

" You are right, Phcebe," rejoined Holgrave.
" Doubtless you are right."

Yet the artist did not feel the horror, which was
proper to Phoebe's sweet and order-loving character,
at thus finding herself at issue with society, and
brought in contact with an event that transcended
ordinary rules. Neither was he in haste, like her,
to betake himself within the precincts of common
life. On the contrary, he gathered a wild enjoyment
— as it were, a flower of strange beauty, growing
in a desolate spot, and blossoming in the wind —
such a flower of momentary happiness he gathered
from his present position. It separated Phcebe
and himself from the world, and bound them to
each other, by their exclusive knowledge of Judge
Pyncheon's mysterious death, and the counsel which
they were forced to hold respecting it. The secret,
so long as it should continue such, kept them within
the circle of a spell, a solitude in the midst of men,

368 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

a remoteness as entire as that of an island in
mid-ocean ; once divulged, the ocean would flow
betwixt them, standing- on its widely-sundered shores.
Meanwhile, all the circumstances of their situation
seemed to draw them together ; they were like two
children who go hand in hand, pressing closely
to one another's side, through a shadow-haunted
passage. The image of awful Death, which filled
the house, held them united by his stiffened grasp.

These influences hastened the development of
emotions that might not otherwise have flowered so
soon. Possibly, indeed, it had been Holgrave's
purpose to let them die in their undeveloped germs.

1 'Why do we delay so?" asked Phoebe. "This
secret takes away my breath ! Let us throw open
the doors ! "

" In all our lives, there can never come another
moment like this!" said Holgrave. "Phoebe, is it
all terror ? — nothing but terror ? Are you conscious
of no joy, as I am, that has made this the only
point of life worth living for ? "

"It seems a sin," replied Phcebe, trembling, "to
think of joy at such a time ! "

"Could you but know, Phcebe, how it was with
me, the hour before you came ! " exclaimed the
artist. "A dark, cold, miserable hour! The
presence of yonder dead man threw a great black
shadow over everything ; he made the universe,
so far as my perception could reach, a scene of
guilt, and of retribution more dreadful than the
guilt. The sense of it took away my youth. I
never hoped to feel young again ! The world
looked strange, wild, evil, hostile ; my past life, so

THE FLOWER OF EDEN. 369

lonesome and dreary ; my future, a shapeless gloom,
which I must mould into gloomy shapes ! But,
Phoebe, you crossed the threshold ; and hope,
warmth, and joy, came in with you ! The black
moment became at once a blissful one. It must
not pass without the spoken word. I love you ! "

" How can you love a simple girl like me?"
asked Phoebe, compelled by his earnestness to speak.
4 'You have many, many thoughts, with which I
should try in vain to sympathise. And I — I, too —
I have tendencies with which you would sympathise
as little. That is less matter. But I have not
scope e*ough to make you happy."

''You are my only possibility of happiness!"
answered Holgrave. " I have no faith in it, except
as you bestow it on me ! "

"And then I am afraid!" continued Phoebe,
shrinking towards Holgrave, even while she told
him so frankly the doubts with which he affected
her. " You will lead me out of my own quiet path.
You will make me strive to follow you, where it
is pathless. I cannot do so. It is not my nature.
I shall sink down and perish ! "

"Ah, Phoebe!" exclaimed Holgrave, with almost
a sig-h, and a smile that was burthened with thought.
" It will be far otherwise than as you forebode.
The world owes all its onward impulses to men
ill at ease. The happy man inevitably confines
himself within ancient limits. I have a presentiment
that, hereafter, it will be my lot to set out trees,
to make fences — perhaps, even, in due time, to build
a house for another generation — in a word, to conform
myself to laws, and the peaceful practice of society.

370 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

Your poise will be more powerful than any oscillating
tendency of mine. "

" I would not have it so ! " said Phoebe earnestly.

"Do you love me?" asked Holgrave. "If we
love one another, the moment has room for nothing-
more. Let us pause upon it, and be satisfied. Do
you love me, Phcebe ? "

"You look into my heart," said she, letting her
/eyes drop. " You know I love you ! "

And it was in this hour, so full of doubt and awe,
that the one miracle was wrought, without which
every human existence is a blank. The bliss, which
makes all things true, beautiful, and hol}^ shone
around this youth and maiden. They were conscious
of nothing sad nor old. They transfigured the earth,
and made it Eden again, and themselves the two
first dwellers in it. The dead man, so close beside
them, was forgotten. At such a crisis, there is
\ no death ; for immortality is revealed anew, and
embraces everything in its hallowed atmosphere.

But how soon the heavy earth-dream settled down
again !

"Hark!" whispered Phcebe. "Somebody is at
the street door ! "

"Now let us meet the world !". said Holgrave.
" No doubt, the rumour of Judge Pyncheon's visit
to this house, and the flight of Hepzibah and Clifford,
is about to lead to the investigation of the premises.
We have no way but to meet it. Let us open the
door at once."

But, to their surprise, before they could reach the
street door — even before they quitted the room in
which the foregoing interview had passed — they

THE FLOWER OF EDEN. 371

heard footsteps in the further passage. The door,
therefore, which they supposed to be securely locked
— which Holgrave, indeed, had seen to be so, and
at which Phoebe had vainly tried to enter— must
have been opened from without. The sound of
footsteps was not harsh, bold, decided, and intrusive,
as the gait of strangers would naturally be, making
authoritative entrance into a dwelling where they
knew themselves unwelcome. It was feeble, as of
persons either weak or weary ; there was the mingled
murmur of two voices, familiar to both the listeners.

" Can it be ? " whispered Holgrave.

" It is they ! " answered Phoebe. " Thank God !—
thank God ! "

And then, as if in sympathy with Phoebe's
whispered ejaculation, they heard Hepzibah's voice
more distinctly.

" Thank God, my brother, we are at home ! "

" Well !— Yes !— thank God ! " responded Clifford.
"A dreary home, Hepzibah ! But you have done
well to bring me hither ! Stay ! That parlour-door
is open. I cannot pass by it ! Let me go and
rest me in the arbour, where I used — oh, very long
ago, it seems to me, after what has befallen us —
where I used to be so happy with little Phoebe ! "

But the house was not altogether so dreary as
Clifford imagined it. They had not made many
steps — in truth they were lingering in the entry,
with the listlessness of an accomplished purpose,
uncertain what to do next — when Phcebe ran to
meet them. On beholding her, Hepzibah burst
into tears. With all her might, she had
staggered onward beneath the burden of grief and

372 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

responsibility, until now that it was safe to fling" it
down. Indeed, she had not energy to fling" it down,
but had ceased to uphold it, and suffered it to press
her to the earth. Clifford appeared the stronger of
the two.

" It is our own little Phoebe ! — Ah ! and Holgrave
with her," exclaimed he, with a glance of keen and
delicate insight, and a smile, beautiful, kind, but
melancholy. " I thought of you both, as we came
down the street, and beheld Alice's posies in full
bloom. And so the flower of Eden has bloomed,
likewise, in this old, darksome house, to-day ! "

XXI.

THE DEPARTURE.

THE sudden death of so prominent a member of
the social world as the Honourable Judge Jaffrey
Pyncheon created a sensation (at least, in the
circles more immediately connected with the
deceased) which had hardly quite subsided in a
fortnight.

It may be remarked, however, that, of all the
events which constitute a person's biography, there
is scarcely one — none, certainly, of anything like
a similar importance — to which the world so easily
reconciles itself as to his death. In most other
cases and contingencies, the individual is present
among us, mixed up with the daily revolution of
affairs, and affording a definite point for observation.
At his decease, there is only a vacancy, and a
momentary eddy — very small, as compared with

THE DEPARTURE. 373

the apparent magnitude of the ingurgitated object —
and a bubble or two, ascending out of the black
depth and bursting at the surface. As regarded
Judge Pyncheon, it seemed probable, at first blush,
that the mode of his final departure might give him
a larger and longer posthumous vogue than ordinarily
attends the memory of a distinguished man. But
when it came to be understood, on the highest
professional authority, that the event was a natural,
and — except for some unimportant particulars, de
noting a slight idiosyncrasy — by no means an un
usual form of death, the public, with its customary
alacrity, proceeded to forget that he had ever lived.
In short, the honourable judge was beginning to
be a stale subject, before half the county newspapers
had found time to put their columns in mourning,
and publish his exceedingly eulogistic obituary.

Nevertheless, creeping darkly through the places
which this excellent person had haunted in his
lifetime, there was a hidden stream of private talk,
such as it would have shocked all decency to speak
loudly at the street corners. It is very singular,'
how the fact of a man's death often seems to give
people a truer idea of his character, whether for
good or evil, than they have ever possessed while
he was living and acting among them. Death is
so genuine a fact that it excludes falsehood, or
betrays its emptiness ; it is a touchstone that proves
the gold, and dishonours the baser metal. Could the
departed, whoever he may be, return in a week
after his decease, he would almost invariably find
himself at a higher or lower point than he had
formerly occupied, on the scale of public appreciation.

374 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

But the talk, or scandal, to which we now allude,
had reference to matters of no less old a date
than the supposed murder, thirty or forty years
ago, of the late Judge Pyncheon's uncle. The
medical opinion, with regard to his own recent and
regretted decease, had almost entirely obviated the
idea that a murder was committed, in the former
case. Yet, as the record showed, there were cir
cumstances irrefragably indicating that some person
had gained access to old Jaffrey Pyncheon's private
apartments, at or near the moment of his death.
His desk and private drawers, in a room contiguous
to his bedchamber, had been ransacked ; money
and valuable articles were missing ; there was a
bloody hand-print on the old man's linen ; and, by
a powerfully welded chain of deductive evidence,
the guilt of the robbery and apparent murder had
been fixed on Clifford, then residing with his uncle
in the House of the Seven Gables.

Whencesoever originating, there now arose a
theory that undertook so to account for these cir
cumstances as to exclude the idea of Clifford's
agency. Many persons affirmed that the history
and elucidation of the facts, long so mysterious,
had been obtained by the daguerreotypist from one
of those mesmerical seers, who, nowadays, so
strangely perplex the aspect of human affairs, and
put everybody's natural vision to the blush, by the
marvels which they see with their eyes shut.

According to this version of the story, Judge
Pyncheon, exemplary as we have portrayed him
in our narrative, was, in his youth, an apparently
irreclaimable scapegrace. The brutish, the animal

THE DEPARTURE. 375

instincts, as is often the case, had been developed
earlier than the intellectual qualities, and the force
of character, for which he was afterwards remark
able. He had shown himself wild, dissipated,
addicted to low pleasures, little short of ruffianly
in his propensities, and recklessly expensive, with
no other resources than the bounty of his uncle.
This course of conduct had alienated the old
bachelor's affection, once strongly fixed upon him.
Now, it is averred — but whether on authority avail
able in a court of justice, we do not pretend to
have investigated — that the young man was tempted
by the devil, one night, to search his uncle's private
drawers, to which he had unsuspected means of
access. While thus criminally occupied, he was
startled by the opening of the chamber-door. There
stood old Jaffray Pyncheon, in his night-clothes !
The surprise of such a discovery, his agitation,
alarm, and horror, brought on the crisis of a dis
order to which the old bachelor had an hereditary
liability ; he seemed to choke with blood, and fell
upon the floor, striking his temple a heavy blow
against the corner of a table. What was to be
done ? The old man was surely dead ! Assistance
would come too late ! What a misfortune, indeed,
should it come too soon, since his reviving con
sciousness would bring the recollection of the
ignominious offence which he had beheld his nephew
in the very act of committing !

But he never did revive. With the cool hardi
hood that always pertained to him, the young man
continued his search of the drawers, and found a
will, of recent date, in favour of Clifford — which

376 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

he destroyed — and an older one, in his own favour,
which he suffered to remain. But, before retiring",
Jaffrey bethought himself of the evidence, in these
ransacked drawers, that some one had visited trie
chamber with sinister purposes. Suspicion, unless
averted, might fix upon the real offender. In the
very presence of the dead man, therefore, he laid
a scheme, that should free himself at the expense
of Clifford, his rival, for whose character he had
at once a contempt and a repugnance. It is not
probable, be it said, that he acted with any set
purpose of involving" Clifford in a charge of murder.
Knowing1 that his uncle did not die by violence, it
may not have occurred to him, in the hurry of the
crisis, that such an inference might be drawn.
But, when the affair took this darker aspect,
Jaffrey's previous steps had already pledged him
to those which remained. So craftily had he
arranged the circumstances, that, at Clifford's trial,
his cousin hardly found it necessary to swear to
anything false, but only to withhold the one
decisive explanation, by refraining1 to state what
he had himself done and witnessed.

Thus Jaffrey Pyncheon's inward criminality, as
regarded Clifford, was, indeed, black and damnable ;
while its mere outward show and positive com
mission was the smallest that could possibly consist
with so great a sin. This is just the sort of guilt
that a man of eminent respectability finds it easiest
to dispose of. It was suffered to fade out of sight,
or be reckoned a venial matter, in the Honourable
Judge Pyncheon's long subsequent survey of his
own life. He shuffled it aside, among the forgotten

THE DEPARTURE. 377

and forgiven frailties of his youth, and seldom
thought of it again.

We leave the judge to his repose. He could not x
be styled fortunate, at the hour of death. Un
knowingly, he was a childless man, while striving
to add more wealth to his only child's inheritance.
Hardly a week after his decease, one of the Cunard
steamers brought intelligence of the death, by
cholera, of Judge Pyncheon's son, just at the point
of embarkation for his native land. By this mis
fortune, Clifford became rich ; so did Hepzibah ; so
did our little village-maiden, and, through her, that
sworn foe of wealth and all manner of conservatism
— the wild reformer — Holgrave !

It was now far too late in Clifford's life for the
good opinion of society to be worthy the trouble
and anguish of a formal vindication. What he
needed was the love of a very few ; not the
admiration, or even the respect, of the unknown
many. The latter might probably have been won
for him, had those on whom the guardianship of
his welfare had fallen deemed it advisable to expose
Clifford to a miserable resuscitation of past ideas,
when the condition of whatever comfort he might
expect lay in the calm of forgetfulness. After such
wrong as he had suffered, there is no reparation.
The pitiable mockery of it, which the world might
have been ready enough to offer, coming so long
after the agony had done its utmost work, would
have been fit only to provoke bitterer laughter than
poor Clifford was ever capable of. It is a truth
(and it would be a very sad one, but for the
higher hopes which it suggests) that no great

378 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

mistake, whether acted or endured, in our mortal
sphere, is ever really set right. Time, the continual
vicissitude of circumstances, and the invariable
inopportunity of death, render it impossible. If, after
long- lapse of years, the right seems to be in our
power, we find no niche to set it in. The better
remedy is for the sufferer ,to pass on, and leave what
he once thought his irreparable ruin far behind him.

The shock of Judge Pyncheon's death had a
permanently invigorating and ultimately beneficial
effect on Clifford. That strong and ponderous
man had been Clifford's nightmare. There was
no free breath to be drawn, within the sphere of so
malevolent an influence. The first effect of freedom,
as we have witnessed in Clifford's aimless flight,
was a tremulous exhilaration. Subsiding from it,
he did not sink into his former intellectual apathy.
He never, it is true, attained to nearly the full
measure of what might have been his faculties.
But he recovered enough of them partially to light
up his character, to display some outline of the
marvellous grace that was abortive in it, and to
make him the object of no less deep, although less
melancholy interest than heretofore. He was
evidently happy. Could we pause to give another
picture of his daily life, with all the appliances
now at command to gratify his instinct for the
Beautiful, the garden scenes, that seemed so sweet
to him, would look mean and trivial in comparison.

Very soon after their change of fortune, Clifford,
Hepzibah, and little Phoebe, with the approval of
the artist, concluded to remove from the dismal
old House of the Seven Gables, and take up their

THE DEPARTURE. 379

abode, for the present, at the elegant country-seat
of the late Judge Pyncheon. Chanticleer and his
family had already been transported thither, where
the two hens had forthwith begun an indefatigable
process of egg-laying, with an evident design, as
a matter of duty and conscience, to continue their
illustrious breed under better auspices than for a
century past. On the day set for their departure,
the principal personages of our story, including
good Uncle Venner, were assembled in the parlour.

" The country-house is certainly a very fine one,
so far as the plan goes," observed Holgrave, as the
party were discussing their future arrangements.
"But I wonder that the late judge — being so
opulent, and with a reasonable prospect of trans
mitting his wealth to descendants of his own —
should not have felt the propriety of embodying so
excellent a piece of domestic architecture in stone,
rather than in wood. Then, every generation of
the family might have altered the interior, to suit
his own taste and convenience ; while the exterior,
through the lapse of years, might have been adding
venerableness to its original beauty, and thus giving
that impression of permanence which I consider
essential to the happiness of any one moment."

44 Why," cried Phoebe, gazing into the artist's
face with infinite amazement, " how wonderfully
your ideas are changed ! A house of stone, indeed !
It is but two or three weeks ago, that you seemed
to wish people to live in something as fragile and
temporary as a bird's nest."

"Ah, Phoebe, I told you how it would be!" said
the artist, with a half-melancholy laugh. " You

380 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

find me a conservative already ! Little did I think
ever to become one. It is especially unpardonable
in this dwelling of so much hereditary misfortune,
and under the eye of yonder portrait of a model
conservative, who in that very character, rendered
himself so long the evil destiny of his race."

"That picture!" said Clifford, seeming to shrink
from its stern glance. " Whenever I look at it, there
is an old, dreamy recollection haunting me, but
keeping just beyond the grasp of my mind. Wealth
it seems to say ! — boundless wealth ! — unimaginable
wealth ! I could fancy that, when I was a child,
or a youth, that portrait had spoken, and told me
a rich secret, or had held forth its hand, with the
written record of hidden opulence. But those old
matters are so dim with me, nowadays ! What
could this dream have been ? "

"Perhaps I can recall it," answered Holgrave.
" See ! There are a hundred chances to one, that
no person, unacquainted with the secret, would ever
touch this spring."

• " A secret spring ! " cried Clifford. " Ah, I remem
ber now ! I did discover it, one summer afternoon,
when I was idling and dreaming about the house,
long, long ago. But the mystery escapes me."

The artist put his finger on the contrivance to
which he had referred. In former days, the effect
would probably have been to cause the picture to
start forward. But, in so long a period of conceal
ment, the machinery had been eaten through with
rust ; so that, at Holgrave's pressure, the portrait,
frame, and all, tumbled suddenly from its position,
and lay face downward on the floor. A recess in

THE DEPARTURE. 381

the wall was thus brought to light, in which lay
an object so covered with a century's dust that it
could not immediately be recognised as a folded
sheet of parchment. Holgrave opened it, and
displayed an ancient deed, signed with the
hieroglyphics of several Indian sagamores, and
conveying to Colonel Pyncheon and his heirs, for
ever, a vast extent of territory at the eastward.

" This is the very parchment the attempt to
recover which cost the beautiful Alice Pyncheon
her happiness and life," said the artist, alluding to
his legend. " It is what the Pyncheons sought
in vain, while it was valuable ; and now that they
find the treasure, it has long been worthless."

"Poor Cousin Jaffrey ! This is what deceived
him," exclaimed Hepzibah. "When they were
young together, Clifford probably made a kind of
fairy-tale of this discovery. He was always dream
ing hither and thither about the house, and lighting
up its dark corners with beautiful stories. And poor
Jaffrey, who took hold of everything as it were
real, thought my brother had found out his uncle's
wealth. He died with this delusion in his mind ! "

"But," said Phoebe, apart to Holgrave, "how
came you to know the secret ? "

"My dearest Phoebe," said Holgrave, "how will
it please you to assume the name of Maule ? As
for the secret, it is the only inheritance that has
come down to me from my ancestors. You should
have known sooner (only that I was afraid of
frightening you away), that, in this long drama of
wrong and retribution, I represent the old wizard,
and am probably as much of a wizard as ever he

382 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

was. The son of the executed Matthew Maule,
while building this house, took the opportunity
to construct that recess, and hide away the Indian
deed, on which depended the immense land-claim of
the Pyncheons. Thus they bartered their eastern
territory for Maule's garden-ground."

"And now," said Uncle Venner, "I suppose their
whole claim is not worth one man's share in my farm
yonder ! "

"Uncle Venner," cried Phcebe, taking the patched
philosopher's hand, "you must never talk any more
about your farm ! You shall never go there, as long
as you live ! There is a cottage in our new garden —
the prettiest little yellowish-brown cottage you ever
saw ; and the sweetest-looking place, for it looks
just as if it were made of gingerbread — and we are
going to fit it up and furnish it, on purpose for you.
And you shall do nothing but what you choose,
and shall be as happy as the day is long, and shall
keep Cousin Clifford in spirits with the wisdom
and pleasantness which is always dropping from
your lips ! "

"Ah! my dear child," quoth good Uncle Venner,
quite overcome, " if you were to speak to a young
man as you do to an old one, his chance of keeping
his heart another minute would not be worth one
of the buttons on my waistcoat ! And — soul alive ! —
that great sigh, which you made me heave, has
burst off the very last of them ! But never mind !
It was the happiest sigh I ever did heave : and it
seems as if I must have drawn in a gulp of heavenly
breath, to make it with. Well, well, Miss Phcebe !
They'll miss me in the gardens, hereabouts, and
round by the back-doors ; and Pyncheon Street, I'm
afraid, will hardly look the same without old Uncle
Venner, who remembers it with a mowing field on
one side, and the garden of the seven gables on
the other. But either I must go to your country-seat,

THE DEPARTURE. 383

or you must come to my farm — that's one of two
things certain ; and I leave you to choose which ! "

" Oh, come with us, by all means, Uncle Venner ! "
said Clifford, who had a remarkable enjoyment of
the old man's mellow, quiet, and simple spirit. " I
want you always to be within five minutes' saunter
of my chair. You are the only philosopher I ever
knew of, whose wisdom has not a drop of bitter
essence at the bottom ! "

" Dear me ! " cried Uncle Venner, beginning- partly
to realise what manner of man he was. "And yet
folks used to set me down among the simple ones,
in my younger days ! But I suppose I am like a
Roxbury russet — a great deal the better, the longer
I can be kept. Yes ; and my words of wisdom, that
you and Phoebe tell me of, are like the golden
dandelions, which never grow in the hot months,
but may be seen glistening among the withered
grass, and under the dry leaves, sometimes as late
as December. And you are welcome, friends, to
my mess of dandelions, if there were twice as
many ! "

A plain, but handsome, dark-green barouche had
now drawn up in front of the ruinous portal of the
old mansion-house. The party came forth, and
(with the exception of good Uncle Venner, who was
to follow in a few days) proceeded to take their places.
They were chatting and laughing very pleasantly
together ; and — as proves to be often the case, at
moments when we ought to palpitate with sensibility
— Clifford and Hepzibah bade a final farewell to
the abode of their forefathers, with hardly more
emotion than if they had made it their arrangement
to return thither at tea-time. Several children were
drawn to the spot by so unusual a spectacle as the
barouche and pair of gray horses. Recognising little
Ned Wiggins among them, Hepzibah put her hand
into her pocket, and presented the urchin, her earliest

384 HOUSE OF THE SEVEN GABLES.

and staunches! customer, with silver enough to people
the Domdaniel cavern of his interior with as various
a procession of quadrupeds as passed into the ark.

Two men were passing just as the barouche
drove off.

4 ' Well, Dixey," said one of them, "what do you
think of this ? My wife kept a cent-shop three
months, and lost five dollars on her outlay. Old
Maid Pyncheon has been in trade just about as long,
and rides off in her carriage with a couple of hundred
thousand — reckoning her share, and Clifford's, and
Phoebe's — and some say twice as much ! If you
choose to call it luck, it is all very well ; but if we
are to take it as the will of Providence, why, I can't
exactly fathom it ! "

"Pretty good business!" quoth the sagacious
Dixey. " Pretty good business ! "

Maule's Well, all this time, though left in
solitude, was throwing up a succession of kaleido
scopic pictures, in which a gifted eye might have
seen foreshadowed the coming fortunes of Hepzibah
and Clifford, and the descendant of the legendary
wizard, and the village-maiden, over whom he had
thrown Love's web of sorcery. The Pyncheon elm,
moreover, with what foliage the September gale
had spared to it, whispered unintelligible prophecies.
And wise Uncle Venner, passing slowly from the
ruinous porch, seemed to hear a strain of music,
and fancied that sweet Alice Pyncheon — after witness
ing these deeds, this bygone woe, and this present
happiness, of her kindred mortals — had given one
farewell touch of a spirit's joy upon her harpsichord,
as she floated heavenward from the HOUSE OF THE
SEVEN GABLES !

COLLINS' CLEAR-TYPE PRESS, LONDON AND GLASGOW.

i

o

9

g

5

70

r>

c

o

z
a

m

m

Z

U.C. BERKELEY LIBRARIES

m