t from my hand,
and swallow it up forever!"

With these words, she advanced to the margin of the brook, took up the
scarlet letter, and fastened it again into her bosom. Hopefully, but a
moment ago, as Hester had spoken of drowning it in the deep sea, there
was a sense of inevitable doom upon her, as she thus received back
this deadly symbol from the hand of fate. She had flung it into
infinite space!--she had drawn an hour's free breath!--and here again
was the scarlet misery, glittering on the old spot! So it ever is,
whether thus typified or no, that an evil deed invests itself with the
character of doom. Hester next gathered up the heavy tresses of her
hair, and confined them beneath her cap. As if there were a withering
spell in the sad letter, her beauty, the warmth and richness of her
womanhood, departed, like fading sunshine; and a gray shadow seemed to
fall across her.

When the dreary change was wrought, she extended her hand to Pearl.

"Dost thou know thy mother now, child?" asked she, reproachfully, but
with a subdued tone. "Wilt thou come across the brook, and own thy
mother, now that she has her shame upon her,--now that she is sad?"

"Yes; now I will!" answered the child, bounding across the brook, and
clasping Hester in her arms. "Now thou art my mother indeed! And I am
thy little Pearl!"

In a mood of tenderness that was not usual with her, she drew down her
mother's head, and kissed her brow and both her cheeks. But then--by a
kind of necessity that always impelled this child to alloy whatever
comfort she might chance to give with a throb of anguish--Pearl put up
her mouth, and kissed the scarlet letter too!

"That was not kind!" said Hester. "When thou hast shown me a little
love, thou mockest me!"

"Why doth the minister sit yonder?" asked Pearl.

"He waits to welcome thee," replied her mother. "Come thou, and
entreat his blessing! He loves thee, my little Pearl, and loves thy
mother too. Wilt thou not love him? Come! he longs to greet thee!"

"Doth he love us?" said Pearl, looking up, with acute intelligence,
into her mother's face. "Will he go back with us, hand in hand, we
three together, into the town?"

"Not now, dear child," answered Hester. "But in days to come he will
walk hand in hand with us. We will have a home and fireside of our
own; and thou shalt sit upon his knee; and he will teach thee many
things, and love thee dearly. Thou wilt love him; wilt thou not?"

"And will he