Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1897-10-08
HAwTnoaSe's soyHooD.
Mr.. 3. !. Pickasd Supplies Charming Bio
graphical Chapter.

most TOO tlreleS0 COLLABORATION OF I'll
materials left concerning the life OF
their illustrious father. have missed a
priceless biographical chapter which Is
supplied by Mr.. Samuel T. Pickard In
the little book entitled Hawthorne
First Dairy" which comes soon from
the Riverside Press. From advance
pages we are enabled to offer charming
glance into the mind and habits of the
Iyoung genius Of romance in those for
native days Of, boyhood. which all
| psychologists now recognize with in
creasing clearness as most delicately
and permanently important in the de-
velopment Of human faculty. Imagi-
native literature about childhood has
been increasingly plentiful Of late;
there has been a deepening apprecia-
ton of beauty In the youth of the soul
in this body Of mortal life.
| Hawthorne lived during almost the
whole of the period Of his teens Tin
a little hamlet in a peculiarly isolated
| region in Maine, surrounded by
primeval forests and in a lake country
| then little known to the outside world.
He has himself said that he came to
the shore of Lake Sebago when only
| eight or nine years old. He certainly
| had there home, one Of his homes,
| until he was about twenty-one. His
| fitting for college necessitated his COM
| ing out Of this seclusion, and he prose-
cuted his preliminary studies for the
most part in Salem, his native city.
But during his vacations he came back
every year." says Mr. Pickard. "to his
home in the wilderness. He went back
hot Col nd
mond from 1913 to 1925, when he grad
| uated at Bowdoin college,"
Raymond. the little wilderness ham,
let where nature was 'cherishing
| mother of the boy Hawthorne, Is in the
same Maine county with Bowdoin. his
other alma mater. He has himself told
of his delight In the woods in summer
or in winter, when he was accustomed
| to skate all alone ION Sebago lake.
with the deep shadows OF icy hills on
either hand. and when weary would
sometimes take refuge in a log cabin
where half a tree would be burning on
the broad hearth" There the boy
Hawthorne would sit in the ample
| chimney and look at the stars through
the great aperture through which the
flames went roaring up
The First Diary of Hawthorne, de-
scribed in Mr.. Pickard's book, is the
lost one which came into the possession
of William Symmes. the mullato play
mate of his boyhood. who copied pages
from ii and sent them over his initials
to Mr.. Pickard's paper, the Portland
Transcript. Symmes's battling of the
pursuit of information as to his identi
ty was kept up until he died. and led
many persons (among them the not al
ways too discriminating and penetra-
tive son of HAWTHORNE to believe the
whole affair an attempt to perpetrate
a literary hoax. The account of SYM
mess detective service and his possess
sion Of the early Hawthorne diary is
of very great interest.
Mr.. Pickard's book must be read in all
precious Representatives. to understand
and Of personallai must hope for the re-
covery of the rest of the diary. One rea-
son for Symmes's jealous guarding OF the
original of the boy Hawthorne's diary
affection of the mulatto boy for the only
human being In the world except his
playmate William Pitt Fessenden, who
never by word or look offended him in the
matter of his color. The mulatto was the
son of the Maine lawyer. William
Symmes. and a man of superior mind and
fair education. az
But Infinitely greater than the curious
interest in his personality is that which |
Mr. Pickards S, book affords of the boy for
whom Mats Rock" on Thomas pond |
was named. Here is an extract from the |
diary, Kept at the request of Hawthorne's |
uncle, Robert Manning of Salem. who !
paid for his education. After day on |
Sebago the boy wrote:
we landed on one of the small islands |
that Captain Dingley cleared for sheep |
ncfr ~ -pav, I1xaR ~sS
Mr.. Ring said he had to do it to keep his |
sheep from bears and wolves. A growth |
of trees has started on the island. and |
makes a grove so fine and pleasant that |
I almost wish that our house was there |
On the way from the island to the Images |
(high pictured rocks painted by the In |
dians) Mr.. Ring caught black spotted |
trout that was almost a whale. and |
weighed before 1t was cut open. after We |
got back to Uncle Richards store. 1Sls |
pounds. The men said that If it had been |
weighed as soon as 1t came out of the |
waller it would have been nineteen
pounds. This trout had a droll-looking |
hooked nose, and they tried to make me
believe that If the line had been in my |
hands should have been obliged to let go |
or have been pulled out of the boat. They |
were men and had a right to say so. I |
am a boy and have right to think differ |
emily. We landed at the Images when / |
crept into the cave and got a drink of |
cool water. In coming home we sailed |
where Mr. White has at some time let |
down line four hundred feet without |
finding bottom. This seems strange. for |
he told us. too, that his boat as it boated |
was only $50 feet higher than the boats in
Portland harbor, and that if the Great |
Pond were pumped dry. a man standing |
on its bottom just under where we then |
were would be more than $50 feet lower |
than the surface of the water at the
Portland wharves. Coming up the Ding |
ley bay, we had good view of Rattle |
snake mountain. and it seemed to me
wonderfully beautiful. as the almost set
ting sun threw over it's western crags
streams of fiery light. If the Indians |
were very fond of this part of the coun-
try. it is easy to see why. Beavers, OF
tiers and the finest fish were abundant
and the hills and streams furnished con-
slant variety. 1 should have made a good |
Indian If l had been born in wigwam." |
Here is a charming sentence from an
other date: II can from my chamber |
window look across into Aunt Mannings |
garden this morning and see little Betsey |
Tarbox fitting among the rose-bushes |
and in and out of the arbor like tiny |
WITCH" There is nothing in a boys coun- |
try play or glimpses of his first little |
sweetheart (aged five, and unforgotten in |
m nbnn1l y.