e the hill, had changed the firmament into
a vast rose! On every side, east, west, north, and south, every
point blushed roses. I ran to the study and the meadow sea also
was a rose, the reflection of that above. And there was my
husband, careering about, glorified by the light. Such is
Paradise.

"In the evening we are gathered together beneath our luminous star
in the study, for we have a large hanging astral lamp, which
beautifully illumines the room, with its walls of pale yellow
paper, its Holy Mother over the fireplace, and pleasant books, and
its pretty bronze vase on one of the secretaries, filled with
ferns. Except once, Mr. Emerson, no one hunts us out in the
evening. Then Mr. Hawthorne reads to me. At present we can only
get along with the old English writers, and we find that they are
the hive from which all modern honey is stolen. They are thick-set
with thought, instead of one thought serving for a whole book.
Shakespeare is pre-eminent; Spencer is music. We dare to dislike
Milton when he goes to heaven. We do not recognize God in his
picture of Him. There is something so penetrating and clear in Mr.
Hawthorne's intellect, that now I am acquainted with it, merely
thinking of him as I read winnows the chaff from the wheat at
once. And when he reads to me, it is the acutest criticism. Such a
voice, too,--such sweet thunder! Whatever is not worth much shows
sadly, coming through such a medium, fit only for noblest ideas.
From reading his books you can have some idea of what it is to
dwell with Mr. Hawthorne. But only a shadow of him is found in his
books. The half is not told there."

Just a letter, the outpouring of a loving young heart, written
with no thought of print and strange eye, slumbering for more than
fifty years to come to light at last;--just one of many, all of
them well worth reading.

The three great men of Concord were happy in their wives. Mrs.
Hawthorne and Mrs. Alcott were not only great wives and mothers,
but they could express their prayers, meditations, fancies, and
emotions in clear and exquisite English.

It was after the prosperous days of the Liverpool Consulate that
Hawthorne returned to Concord to spend the remainder of his all
too short life.

He made many changes in "The Wayside" and surrounding grounds. He
enlarged the house and added the striking but quite unpicturesque
tower which rises from the centre of the main part; here he had
his study and point of observation;