is
youth, and his white-bearded father, with a saint-like frown, and his
mother, turning her face away as she passed by. Ghost of a
mother,--thinnest fantasy of a mother,--methinks she might yet have
thrown a pitying glance towards her son! And now, through the chamber
which these spectral thoughts had made so ghastly, glided Hester
Prynne, leading along little Pearl, in her scarlet garb, and pointing
her forefinger, first at the scarlet letter on her bosom, and then at
the clergyman's own breast.

None of these visions ever quite deluded him. At any moment, by an
effort of his will, he could discern substances through their misty
lack of substance, and convince himself that they were not solid in
their nature, like yonder table of carved oak, or that big, square,
leathern-bound and brazen-clasped volume of divinity. But, for all
that, they were, in one sense, the truest and most substantial things
which the poor minister now dealt with. It is the unspeakable misery
of a life so false as his, that it steals the pith and substance out
of whatever realities there are around us, and which were meant by
Heaven to be the spirit's joy and nutriment. To the untrue man, the
whole universe is false,--it is impalpable,--it shrinks to nothing
within his grasp. And he himself, in so far as he shows himself in a
false light, becomes a shadow, or, indeed, ceases to exist. The only
truth that continued to give Mr. Dimmesdale a real existence on this
earth, was the anguish in his inmost soul, and the undissembled
expression of it in his aspect. Had he once found power to smile, and
wear a face of gayety, there would have been no such man!

On one of those ugly nights, which we have faintly hinted at, but
forborne to picture forth, the minister started from his chair. A new
thought had struck him. There might be a moment's peace in it.
Attiring himself with as much care as if it had been for public
worship, and precisely in the same manner, he stole softly down the
staircase, undid the door, and issued forth.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

XII.

THE MINISTER'S VIGIL.

Walking in the shadow of a dream, as it were, and perhaps actually
under the influence of a species of somnambulism, Mr. Dimmesdale
reached the spot where, now so long since, Hester Prynne had lived
through her first hours of public ignominy. The same platform or
scaff