What should he say, Pearl," answered Hester, "save that it was no
time to kiss, and that kisses are not to be given in the market-place?
Well for thee, foolish child, that thou didst not speak to him!"

Another shade of the same sentiment, in reference to Mr. Dimmesdale,
was expressed by a person whose eccentricities--or insanity, as we
should term it--led her to do what few of the towns-people would have
ventured on; to begin a conversation with the wearer of the scarlet
letter, in public. It was Mistress Hibbins, who, arrayed in great
magnificence, with a triple ruff, a broidered stomacher, a gown of
rich velvet, and a gold-headed cane, had come forth to see the
procession. As this ancient lady had the renown (which subsequently
cost her no less a price than her life) of being a principal actor in
all the works of necromancy that were continually going forward, the
crowd gave way before her, and seemed to fear the touch of her
garment, as if it carried the plague among its gorgeous folds. Seen in
conjunction with Hester Prynne,--kindly as so many now felt towards
the latter,--the dread inspired by Mistress Hibbins was doubled, and
caused a general movement from that part of the market-place in which
the two women stood.

"Now, what mortal imagination could conceive it!" whispered the old
lady, confidentially, to Hester. "Yonder divine man! That saint on
earth, as the people uphold him to be, and as--I must needs say--he
really looks! Who, now, that saw him pass in the procession, would
think how little while it is since he went forth out of his
study,--chewing a Hebrew text of Scripture in his mouth, I
warrant,--to take an airing in the forest! Aha! we know what that
means, Hester Prynne! But, truly, forsooth, I find it hard to believe
him the same man. Many a church-member saw I, walking behind the
music, that has danced in the same measure with me, when Somebody was
fiddler, and, it might be, an Indian powwow or a Lapland wizard
changing hands with us! That is but a trifle, when a woman knows the
world. But this minister! Couldst thou surely tell, Hester, whether he
was the same man that encountered thee on the forest-path?"

"Madam, I know not of what you speak," answered Hester Prynne, feeling
Mistress Hibbins to be of infirm mind; yet strangely startled and
awe-stricken by the confidence with which she affirmed a personal
connection between so many persons (herself among them) and the Evil
One. "It is not for