XXIII.
THE REVELATION OF THE SCARLET LETTER.
The eloquent voice, on which the souls of the listening audience hadbeen borne aloft as on the swelling waves of the sea, at length cameto a pause. There was a momentary silence, profound as what shouldfollow the utterance of oracles. Then ensued a murmur and half-hushedtumult; as if the auditors, released from the high spell that hadtransported them into the region of another's mind, were returninginto themselves, with all their awe and wonder still heavy on them. Ina moment more, the crowd began to gush forth from the doors of thechurch. Now that there was an end, they needed other breath, more fitto support the gross and earthly life into which they relapsed, thanthat atmosphere which the preacher had converted into words of flame,and had burdened with the rich fragrance of his thought.
In the open air their rapture broke into speech. The street and themarket-place absolutely babbled, from side to side, with applauses ofthe minister. His hearers could not rest until they had told oneanother of what each knew better than he could tell or hear. Accordingto their united testimony, never had man spoken in so wise, so high,and so holy a spirit, as he that spake this day; nor had inspirationever breathed through mortal lips more evidently than it did throughhis. Its influence could be seen, as it were, descending upon him, andpossessing him, and continually lifting him out of the writtendiscourse that lay before him, and filling him with ideas that musthave been as marvellous to himself as to his audience. His subject, itappeared, had been the relation between the Deity and the communitiesof mankind, with a special reference to the New England which theywere here planting in the wilderness. And, as he drew towards theclose, a spirit as of prophecy had come upon him, constraining him toits purpose as mightily as the old prophets of Israel wereconstrained; only with this difference, that, whereas the Jewish seershad denounced judgments and ruin on their country, it was his missionto foretell a high and glorious destiny for the newly gathered peopleof the Lord. But, throughout it all, and through the whole discourse,there had been a certain deep, sad undertone of pathos, which couldnot be interpreted otherwise than as the natural regret of one soon topass away. Yes; their minister whom they so loved--and who so lovedthem all, that he could not depart heavenward without a sigh--had theforeboding of untimely death upon him, and would soon leave them intheir tears! This idea of his transitory stay on earth gave the lastemphasis to the effect which the preacher had produced; it was as ifan angel, in his passage to the skies, had shaken his bright wingsover the people for an instant,--at once a shadow and asplendor,--and had shed down a shower of golden truths upon them.
Thus, there had come to the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale--as to most men,in their various spheres, though seldom recognized until they see itfar behind them--an epoch of life more brilliant and full of triumphthan any previous one, or than any which could hereafter be. He stood,at this moment, on the very proudest eminence of superiority, to whichthe gifts of intellect, rich lore, prevailing eloquence, and areputation of whitest sanctity, could exalt a clergyman in NewEngland's earliest days, when the professional character was of itselfa lofty pedestal. Such was the position which the minister occupied,as he bowed his head forward on the cushions of the pulpit, at theclose of his Election Sermon. Meanwhile Hester Prynne was standingbeside the scaffold of the pillory, with the scarlet letter stillburning on her breast!
Now was heard again the clangor of the music, and the measured trampof the military escort, issuing from the church-door. The processionwas to be marshalled thence to the town-hall, where a solemn banquetwould complete the ceremonies of the day.
Once more, therefore, the train of venerable and majestic fathers wasseen moving through a broad pathway of the people, who drew backreverently, on either side, as the Governor and magistrates, the oldand wise men, the holy ministers, and all that were eminent andrenowned, advanced into the midst of them. When they were fairly inthe market-place, their presence was greeted by a shout. This--thoughdoubtless it might acquire additional force and volume from thechildlike loyalty which the age awarded to its rulers--was felt to bean irrepressible outburst of enthusiasm kindled in the auditors bythat high strain of eloquence which was yet reverberating in theirears. Each felt the impulse in himself, and, in the same breath,caught it from his neighbor. Within the church, it had hardly beenkept down; beneath the sky, it pealed upward to the zenith. There werehuman beings enough, and enough of highly wrought and symphoniousfeeling, to produce that more impressive sound than the organ tones ofthe blast, or the thunder, or the roar of the sea; even that mightyswell of many voices, blended into one great voice by the universalimpulse which makes likewise one vast heart out of the many. Never,from the soil of New England, had gone up such a shout! Never, on NewEngland soil, had stood the man so honored by his mortal brethren asthe preacher!
How fared it with him then? Were there not the brilliant particles ofa halo in the air about his head? So etherealized by spirit as he was,and so apotheosized by worshipping admirers, did his footsteps, in theprocession, really tread upon the dust of earth?
As the ranks of military men and civil fathers moved onward, all eyeswere turned towards the point where the minister was seen to approachamong them. The shout died into a murmur, as one portion of the crowdafter another obtained a glimpse of him. How feeble and pale helooked, amid all his triumph! The energy--or say, rather, theinspiration which had held him up, until he should have delivered thesacred message that brought its own strength along with it fromheaven--was withdrawn, now that it had so faithfully performed itsoffice. The glow, which they had just before beheld burning on hischeek, was extinguished, like a flame that sinks down hopelesslyamong the late-decaying embers. It seemed hardly the face of a manalive, with such a death-like hue; it was hardly a man with life inhim, that tottered on his path so nervelessly, yet tottered, and didnot fall!
One of his clerical brethren,--it was the venerable JohnWilson,--observing the state in which Mr. Dimmesdale was left by theretiring wave of intellect and sensibility, stepped forward hastily tooffer his support. The minister tremulously, but decidedly, repelledthe old man's arm. He still walked onward, if that movement could beso described, which rather resembled the wavering effort of an infant,with its mother's arms in view, outstretched to tempt him forward. Andnow, almost imperceptible as were the latter steps of his progress, hehad come opposite the well-remembered and weather-darkened scaffold,where, long since, with all that dreary lapse of time between, HesterPrynne had encountered the world's ignominious stare. There stoodHester, holding little Pearl by the hand! And there was the scarletletter on her breast! The minister here made a pause; although themusic still played the stately and rejoicing march to which theprocession moved. It summoned him onward,--onward to thefestival!--but here he made a pause.
Bellingham, for the last few moments, had kept an anxious eye uponhim. He now left his own place in the procession, and advanced to giveassistance; judging, from Mr. Dimmesdale's aspect, that he mustotherwise inevitably fall. But there was something in the latter'sexpression that warned back the magistrate, although a man not readilyobeying the vague intimations that pass from one spirit to another.The crowd, meanwhile, looked on with awe and wonder. This earthlyfaintness was, in their view, only another phase of the minister'scelestial strength; nor would it have seemed a miracle too high to bewrought for one so holy, had he ascended before their eyes, waxingdimmer and brighter, and fading at last into the light of heaven.
He turned towards the scaffold, and stretched forth his arms.
"Hester," said he, "come hither! Come, my little Pearl!"
It was a ghastly look with which he regarded them; but there wassomething at once tender and strangely triumphant in it. The child,with the bird-like motion which was one of her characteristics, flewto him, and clasped her arms about his knees. Hester Prynne--slowly,as if impelled by inevitable fate, and against her strongestwill--likewise dre
w near, but paused before she reached him. At thisinstant, old Roger Chillingworth thrust himself through thecrowd,--or, perhaps, so dark, disturbed, and evil, was his look, herose up out of some nether region,--to snatch back his victim fromwhat he sought to do! Be that as it might, the old man rushed forward,and caught the minister by the arm.
"Madman, hold! what is your purpose?" whispered he. "Wave back thatwoman! Cast off this child! All shall be well! Do not blacken yourfame, and perish in dishonor! I can yet save you! Would you bringinfamy on your sacred profession?"
"Ha, tempter! Methinks thou art too late!" answered the minister,encountering his eye, fearfully, but firmly. "Thy power is not what itwas! With God's help, I shall escape thee now!"
He again extended his hand to the woman of the scarlet letter.
"Hester Prynne," cried he, with a piercing earnestness, "in the nameof Him, so terrible and so merciful, who gives me grace, at this lastmoment, to do what--for my own heavy sin and miserable agony--Iwithheld myself from doing seven years ago, come hither now, and twinethy strength about me! Thy strength, Hester; but let it be guided bythe will which God hath granted me! This wretched and wronged old manis opposing it with all his might!--with all his own might, and thefiend's! Come, Hester, come! Support me up yonder scaffold!"
The crowd was in a tumult. The men of rank and dignity, who stood moreimmediately around the clergyman, were so taken by surprise, and soperplexed as to the purport of what they saw,--unable to receive theexplanation which most readily presented itself, or to imagine anyother,--that they remained silent and inactive spectators of thejudgment which Providence seemed about to work. They beheld theminister, leaning on Hester's shoulder, and supported by her armaround him, approach the scaffold, and ascend its steps; while stillthe little hand of the sin-born child was clasped in his. Old RogerChillingworth followed, as one intimately connected with the drama ofguilt and sorrow in which they had all been actors, and well entitled,therefore, to be present at its closing scene.
"Hadst thou sought the whole earth over," said he, looking darkly atthe clergyman, "there was no one place so secret,--no high place norlowly place, where thou couldst have escaped me,--save on this veryscaffold!"
"Thanks be to Him who hath led me hither!" answered the minister.
Yet he trembled, and turned to Hester with an expression of doubt andanxiety in his eyes, not the less evidently betrayed, that there was afeeble smile upon his lips.
"Is not this better," murmured he, "than what we dreamed of in theforest?"
"I know not! I know not!" she hurriedly replied. "Better? Yea; so wemay both die, and little Pearl die with us!"
"For thee and Pearl, be it as God shall order," said the minister;"and God is merciful! Let me now do the will which he hath made plainbefore my sight. For, Hester, I am a dying man. So let me make hasteto take my shame upon me!"
Partly supported by Hester Prynne, and holding one hand of littlePearl's, the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale turned to the dignified andvenerable rulers; to the holy ministers, who were his brethren; to thepeople, whose great heart was thoroughly appalled, yet overflowingwith tearful sympathy, as knowing that some deep life-matter--which,if full of sin, was full of anguish and repentance likewise--was nowto be laid open to them. The sun, but little past its meridian, shonedown upon the clergyman, and gave a distinctness to his figure, as hestood out from all the earth, to put in his plea of guilty at the barof Eternal Justice.
"People of New England!" cried he, with a voice that rose over them,high, solemn, and majestic,--yet had always a tremor through it, andsometimes a shriek, struggling up out of a fathomless depth of remorseand woe,--"ye, that have loved me!--ye, that have deemed meholy!--behold me here, the one sinner of the world! At last!--atlast!--I stand upon the spot where, seven years since, I should havestood; here, with this woman, whose arm, more than the little strengthwherewith I have crept hitherward, sustains me, at this dreadfulmoment, from grovelling down upon my face! Lo, the scarlet letterwhich Hester wears! Ye have all shuddered at it! Wherever her walkhath been,--wherever, so miserably burdened, she may have hoped tofind repose,--it hath cast a lurid gleam of awe and horriblerepugnance round about her. But there stood one in the midst of you,at whose brand of sin and infamy ye have not shuddered!"
It seemed, at this point, as if the minister must leave the remainderof his secret undisclosed. But he fought back the bodilyweakness,--and, still more, the faintness of heart,--that was strivingfor the mastery with him. He threw off all assistance, and steppedpassionately forward a pace before the woman and the child.
"It was on him!" he continued, with a kind of fierceness; sodetermined was he to speak out the whole. "God's eye beheld it! Theangels were forever pointing at it! The Devil knew it well, andfretted it continually with the touch of his burning finger! But hehid it cunningly from men, and walked among you with the mien of aspirit, mournful, because so pure in a sinful world!--and sad, becausehe missed his heavenly kindred! Now, at the death-hour, he stands upbefore you! He bids you look again at Hester's scarlet letter! Hetells you, that, with all its mysterious horror, it is but the shadowof what he bears on his own breast, and that even this, his own redstigma, is no more than the type of what has seared his inmost heart!Stand any here that question God's judgment on a sinner? Behold!Behold a dreadful witness of it!"
"Shall we not meet again?"]
With a convulsive motion, he tore away the ministerial band frombefore his breast. It was revealed! But it were irreverent to describethat revelation. For an instant, the gaze of the horror-strickenmultitude was concentred on the ghastly miracle; while the ministerstood, with a flush of triumph in his face, as one who, in thecrisis of acutest pain, had won a victory. Then, down he sank upon thescaffold! Hester partly raised him, and supported his head against herbosom. Old Roger Chillingworth knelt down beside him, with a blank,dull countenance, out of which the life seemed to have departed.
"Thou hast escaped me!" he repeated more than once. "Thou hast escapedme!"
"May God forgive thee!" said the minister. "Thou, too, hast deeplysinned!"
He withdrew his dying eyes from the old man, and fixed them on thewoman and the child.
"My little Pearl," said he, feebly,--and there was a sweet and gentlesmile over his face, as of a spirit sinking into deep repose; nay, nowthat the burden was removed, it seemed almost as if he would besportive with the child,--"dear little Pearl, wilt thou kiss me now?Thou wouldst not, yonder, in the forest! But now thou wilt?"
Pearl kissed his lips. A spell was broken. The great scene of grief,in which the wild infant bore a part, had developed all hersympathies; and as her tears fell upon her father's cheek, they werethe pledge that she would grow up amid human joy and sorrow, norforever do battle with the world, but be a woman in it. Towards hermother, too, Pearl's errand as a messenger of anguish was allfulfilled.
"Hester," said the clergyman, "farewell!"
"Shall we not meet again?" whispered she, bending her face down closeto his. "Shall we not spend our immortal life together? Surely,surely, we have ransomed one another, with all this woe! Thou lookestfar into eternity, with those bright dying eyes! Then tell me whatthou seest?"
"Hush, Hester, hush!" said he, with tremulous solemnity. "The law webroke!--the sin here so awfully revealed!--let these alone be in thythoughts! I fear! I fear! It may be, that, when we forgot ourGod,--when we violated our reverence each for the other's soul,--itwas thenceforth vain to hope that we could meet hereafter, in aneverlasting and pure reunion. God knows; and He is merciful! He hathproved his mercy, most of all, in my afflictions. By giving me thisburning torture to bear upon my breast! By sending yonder dark andterrible old man, to keep the torture always at red-heat! By bringingme hither, to die this death of triumphant ignominy before the people!Had either of these agonies been wanting, I had been lost forever!Praised be his name! His will be done! Farewell!"
That final word came forth with the minister's expiring breath. Themultitude, silent till then, broke out
in a strange, deep voice of aweand wonder, which could not as yet find utterance, save in this murmurthat rolled so heavily after the departed spirit.
XXIV.
CONCLUSION.
After many days, when time sufficed for the people to arrange theirthoughts in reference to the foregoing scene, there was more than oneaccount of what had been witnessed on the scaffold.
Most of the spectators testified to having seen, on the breast of theunhappy minister, a SCARLET LETTER--the very semblance of that worn byHester Prynne--imprinted in the flesh. As regarded its origin, therewere various explanations, all of which must necessarily have beenconjectural. Some affirmed that the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale, on thevery day when Hester Prynne first wore her ignominious badge, hadbegun a course of penance,--which he afterwards, in so many futilemethods, followed out,--by inflicting a hideous torture on himself.Others contended that the stigma had not been produced until a longtime subsequent, when old Roger Chillingworth, being a potentnecromancer, had caused it to appear, through the agency of magic andpoisonous drugs. Others, again,--and those best able to appreciatethe minister's peculiar sensibility, and the wonderful operation ofhis spirit upon the body,--whispered their belief, that the awfulsymbol was the effect of the ever-active tooth of remorse, gnawingfrom the inmost heart outwardly, and at last manifesting Heaven'sdreadful judgment by the visible presence of the letter. The readermay choose among these theories. We have thrown all the light we couldacquire upon the portent, and would gladly, now that it has done itsoffice, erase its deep print out of our own brain; where longmeditation has fixed it in very undesirable distinctness.
It is singular, nevertheless, that certain persons, who werespectators of the whole scene, and professed never once to haveremoved their eyes from the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale, denied that therewas any mark whatever on his breast, more than on a new-born infant's.Neither, by their report, had his dying words acknowledged, nor evenremotely implied, any, the slightest connection, on his part, with theguilt for which Hester Prynne had so long worn the scarlet letter.According to these highly respectable witnesses, the minister,conscious that he was dying,--conscious, also, that the reverence ofthe multitude placed him already among saints and angels,--haddesired, by yielding up his breath in the arms of that fallen woman,to express to the world how utterly nugatory is the choicest of man'sown righteousness. After exhausting life in his efforts for mankind'sspiritual good, he had made the manner of his death a parable, inorder to impress on his admirers the mighty and mournful lesson, that,in the view of Infinite Purity, we are sinners all alike. It was toteach them, that the holiest among us has but attained so far abovehis fellows as to discern more clearly the Mercy which looks down,and repudiate more utterly the phantom of human merit, which wouldlook aspiringly upward. Without disputing a truth so momentous, wemust be allowed to consider this version of Mr. Dimmesdale's story asonly an instance of that stubborn fidelity with which a man'sfriends--and especially a clergyman's--will sometimes uphold hischaracter, when proofs, clear as the mid-day sunshine on the scarletletter, establish him a false and sin-stained creature of the dust.
The authority which we have chiefly followed,--a manuscript of olddate, drawn up from the verbal testimony of individuals, some of whomhad known Hester Prynne, while others had heard the tale fromcontemporary witnesses,--fully confirms the view taken in theforegoing pages. Among many morals which press upon us from the poorminister's miserable experience, we put only this into asentence:--"Be true! Be true! Be true! Show freely to the world, ifnot your worst, yet some trait whereby the worst may be inferred!"
Nothing was more remarkable than the change which took place, almostimmediately after Mr. Dimmesdale's death, in the appearance anddemeanor of the old man known as Roger Chillingworth. All his strengthand energy--all his vital and intellectual force--seemed at once todesert him; insomuch that he positively withered up, shrivelled away,and almost vanished from mortal sight, like an uprooted weed that lieswilting in the sun. This unhappy man had made the very principle ofhis life to consist in the pursuit and systematic exercise of revenge;and when, by its completest triumph and consummation, that evilprinciple was left with no further material to support it, when, inshort, there was no more Devil's work on earth for him to do, it onlyremained for the unhumanized mortal to betake himself whither hisMaster would find him tasks enough, and pay him his wages duly. But,to all these shadowy beings, so long our near acquaintances,--as wellRoger Chillingworth as his companions,--we would fain be merciful. Itis a curious subject of observation and inquiry, whether hatred andlove be not the same thing at bottom. Each, in its utmost development,supposes a high degree of intimacy and heart-knowledge; each rendersone individual dependent for the food of his affections and spirituallife upon another; each leaves the passionate lover, or the no lesspassionate hater, forlorn and desolate by the withdrawal of hissubject. Philosophically considered, therefore, the two passions seemessentially the same, except that one happens to be seen in acelestial radiance, and the other in a dusky and lurid glow. In thespiritual world, the old physician and the minister--mutual victims asthey have been--may, unawares, have found their earthly stock ofhatred and antipathy transmuted into golden love.
Leaving this discussion apart, we have a matter of business tocommunicate to the reader. At old Roger Chillingworth's decease,(which took place within the year,) and by his last will andtestament, of which Governor Bellingham and the Reverend Mr. Wilsonwere executors, he bequeathed a very considerable amount of property,both here and in England, to little Pearl, the daughter of HesterPrynne.
So Pearl--the elf-child,--the demon offspring, as some people, up tothat epoch, persisted in considering her,--became the richest heiressof her day, in the New World. Not improbably, this circumstancewrought a very material change in the public estimation; and, had themother and child remained here, little Pearl, at a marriageable periodof life, might have mingled her wild blood with the lineage of thedevoutest Puritan among them all. But, in no long time after thephysician's death, the wearer of the scarlet letter disappeared, andPearl along with her. For many years, though a vague report would nowand then find its way across the sea,--like a shapeless piece ofdrift-wood tost ashore, with the initials of a name upon it,--yet notidings of them unquestionably authentic were received. The story ofthe scarlet letter grew into a legend. Its spell, however, was stillpotent, and kept the scaffold awful where the poor minister had died,and likewise the cottage by the sea-shore, where Hester Prynne haddwelt. Near this latter spot, one afternoon, some children were atplay, when they beheld a tall woman, in a gray robe, approach thecottage-door. In all those years it had never once been opened; buteither she unlocked it, or the decaying wood and iron yielded to herhand, or she glided shadow-like through these impediments,--and, atall events, went in.
On the threshold she paused,--turned partly round,--for, perchance,the idea of entering all alone, and all so changed, the home of sointense a former life, was more dreary and desolate than even shecould bear. But her hesitation was only for an instant, though longenough to display a scarlet letter on her breast.
Hester's Return]
And Hester Prynne had returned, and taken up her long-forsaken shame!But where was little Pearl? If still alive, she must now have been inthe flush and bloom of early womanhood. None knew--nor ever learned,with the fulness of perfect certainty--whether the elf-child had gonethus untimely to a maiden grave; or whether her wild, rich nature hadbeen softened and subdued, and made capable of a woman's gentlehappiness. But, through the remainder of Hester's life, there wereindications that the recluse of the scarlet letter was the object oflove and interest with some inhabitant of another land. Letters came,with armorial seals upon them, though of bearings unknown to Englishheraldry. In the cottage there were articles of comfort and luxurysuch as Hester never cared to use, but which only wealth could havepurchased, and affection have imagine
d for her. There were trifles,too, little ornaments, beautiful tokens of a continual remembrance,that must have been wrought by delicate fingers, at the impulse of afond heart. And, once, Hester was seen embroidering a baby-garment,with such a lavish richness of golden fancy as would have raised apublic tumult, had any infant, thus apparelled, been shown to oursober-hued community.
In fine, the gossips of that day believed,--and Mr. Surveyor Pue, whomade investigations a century later, believed,--and one of his recentsuccessors in office, moreover, faithfully believes,--that Pearl wasnot only alive, but married, and happy, and mindful of her mother, andthat she would most joyfully have entertained that sad and lonelymother at her fireside.
But there was a more real life for Hester Prynne here, in New England,than in that unknown region where Pearl had found a home. Here hadbeen her sin; here, her sorrow; and here was yet to be her penitence.She had returned, therefore, and resumed,--of her own free will, fornot the sternest magistrate of that iron period would have imposedit,--resumed the symbol of which we have related so dark a tale. Neverafterwards did it quit her bosom. But, in the lapse of the toilsome,thoughtful, and self-devoted years that made up Hester's life, thescarlet letter ceased to be a stigma which attracted the world's scornand bitterness, and became a type of something to be sorrowed over,and looked upon with awe, yet with reverence too. And, as HesterPrynne had no selfish ends, nor lived in any measure for her ownprofit and enjoyment, people brought all their sorrows andperplexities, and besought her counsel, as one who had herself gonethrough a mighty trouble. Women, more especially,--in the continuallyrecurring trials of wounded, wasted, wronged, misplaced, or erring andsinful passion,--or with the dreary burden of a heart unyielded,because unvalued and unsought,--came to Hester's cottage, demandingwhy they were so wretched, and what the remedy! Hester comforted andcounselled them as best she might. She assured them, too, of her firmbelief, that, at some brighter period, when the world should havegrown ripe for it, in Heaven's own time, a new truth would berevealed, in order to establish the whole relation between man andwoman on a surer ground of mutual happiness. Earlier in life, Hesterhad vainly imagined that she herself might be the destined prophetess,but had long since recognized the impossibility that any mission ofdivine and mysterious truth should be confided to a woman stained withsin, bowed down with shame, or even burdened with a life-long sorrow.The angel and apostle of the coming revelation must be a woman,indeed, but lofty, pure, and beautiful; and wise, moreover, notthrough dusky grief, but the ethereal medium of joy; and showing howsacred love should make us happy, by the truest test of a lifesuccessful to such an end!
So said Hester Prynne, and glanced her sad eyes downward at thescarlet letter. And, after many, many years, a new grave was delved,near an old and sunken one, in that burial-ground beside which King'sChapel has since been built. It was near that old and sunken grave,yet with a space between, as if the dust of the two sleepers had noright to mingle. Yet one tombstone served for both. All around, therewere monuments carved with armorial bearings; and on this simple slabof slate--as the curious investigator may still discern, and perplexhimself with the purport--there appeared the semblance of an engravedescutcheon. It bore a device, a herald's wording of which might servefor a motto and brief description of our now concluded legend; sosombre is it, and relieved only by one ever-glowing point of lightgloomier than the shadow:--
"ON A FIELD, SABLE, THE LETTER A, GULES."
Cambridge: Electrotyped and Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co.
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
Obvious printer's errors have been corrected; for the details, seebelow. Most illustrations have been linked to the larger versions; tosee the larger version, click on the illustration.
Typos fixed:
page 072--spelling normalized: changed 'midday' to 'mid-day' page 132--inserted a missing closing quote after 'a child of her age' page 137--spelling normalized: changed 'careworn' to 'care-worn' page 147--typo fixed: changed 'physican' to 'physician' page 171--typo fixed: changed 'vocies' to 'voices' page 262--removed an extra closing quote after 'scarlet letter too!' page 291--spelling normalized: changed 'birdlike' to 'bird-like' page 300--typo fixed: changed 'intruments' to 'instruments' page 306--spelling normalized: changed 'deathlike' to 'death-like'
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