San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1892-07-02
THE SCARLET LETTER
By NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

OuL vi our HNtlsDTiiit, 'WDeTe long Uleul
tation has fixed it invery undesirable
distinctness.
tits singular, nevertheless, that certain
persons. who werespectators of the whole
scene and professed never once to have
removed their 'eyesfrom the Reverend
Mr.. Dimmesdale. denied that there was
any mark whatever on his breast more
than on a newborn infants. Neither
by their report, had his dying words ac-
knowledged nor even remotely implied
any, the slightest, connection on his part
with the guilt for which Hester Prynne
had so long worn the scarlet letter
According to these highly respectable
witnesses, the minister, conscious that
he was dying-conscions also that the
reverence OF the multitude placed him
already among saints and angels-had
desired, by yielding up his breath in the
arms of that fallen woman, to express tC
the world how utterly nugatory is the
choicest of mans own Righteousness.
After, exhausting life in his efforts for
mankind's spiritual good, he had made
the manner of his death parable, in
order to impress on his admirers the
mighty and mournful lesson that. in
the view of infinite purity we are sin
ners all alike. 1t was to teach them
that the hottest among us has, but at
tanned so far above his fellows as to dis.
Germ more clearly the mercyswhich looks
down and repudiate more utterly the
phantom Of human merit, which would
look aspiringly upward. Without dis.
putting truth so momeRtous, we must
be allowed to consider this version OF
Mr.. Dimmesdales story as only an in.
stance of that stubborn fidelity with
which a mans friends-and especially a
., clergymans-will sometimes uphold his
character, when proofs, clear as the
midday sunshine on the scarlet letter
establish him a false and sin stained
creature of the dust.
The authority which we have chiefly
followed--a manuscript of old date,
drawn up from the verbal testimony OF
individuals, some of whom had known
Hester Prynne, while others had heard
the tale from contemporary witnesses
fully confirms the view taken in the
foregoing pages. Among many morals
which press upon US from the poor min
listers miserable experience we put only
this into a sentence: BE true! Be
true! Be true! Show freely to the
world, if not your worst, yet some trait
whereby the worst may be inferred"
At old Roger Chillingworth's decease
(Which took place within the Year,, and
by his last will and testament, of which
Governor Bellingham and the Reverend
Mr.. Wilson were executors, he be-
queathed very considerable amount Of
property, both here and in England, to
little Pearl. the daughter of Hester
Prynne.
So Pearl-the elf child, the demon off
spring, as some people up to that epoch
persisted in considering her-became the
richest heiress of her day in the New
World. Not improbably this circum-
stance wrought very material change
in the public estimation, and had the
mother and child remained here little,
Pearl, at manageable period of life,
might have mingled her wild blood with
the lineage of the deVoutest Puritan
among them all. But in no long time
after the physicians death the wearer
of the scarlet letter disappeared, and
Pearl along with her.
For many years, though a vague re-
port would now and then find its way
across the sea-like shapeless piece of
driftwood tossed ashore with the initials
O. of a name upon it-yet no tidings of
them unquestiOnably authentic were re-
ceived. The story of the scarlet letter
grew into legend. Its spell, however,
was still potent and kept the scaffold
awful were the poor minister had died,
and likewise the cottage by the seashore,
where Hester Prynne had dwelt Near
this latter spot one afternoon some chill
dren were at play, when they beheld a
tall woman N gray robe approach the
cottage door In all those years it had
never once been opened; but either she
unlocked it or the decaying wood and
iron yielded to her hand, or she glided
shadowlike through these impediments
and. at all events, went in.
On the threshold she paused-turned
partly around-for perchance the idea
of entering all alone and all so changed
the home of so intense former life was
more dreary and desolate than even she
could bear. But her hesitation was only
for m instant, though long enough to
display scarlet letter on her breast.
And Hester Prynne had returned and
taken up her long forsaken shamel But
where was little Pearl? If still alive.
she must now have been in the flush
and bloom of early womanhood. None
knew-nor ever learned, with the full.
49,. LII. L.