As the minister departed, in advance of Hester Prynne and littlePearl, he threw a backward glance, half expecting that he shoulddiscover only some faintly traced features or outline of themother and the child, slowly fading into the twilight of thewoods. So great a vicissitude in his life could not at once bereceived as real. But there was Hester, clad in her gray robe,still standing beside the tree-trunk, which some blast hadoverthrown a long antiquity ago, and which time had ever sincebeen covering with moss, so that these two fated ones, withearth's heaviest burden on them, might there sit down together,and find a single hour's rest and solace. And there was Pearl,too, lightly dancing from the margin of the brook--now that theintrusive third person was gone--and taking her old place by hermother's side. So the minister had not fallen asleep anddreamed!

In order to free his mind from this indistinctness and duplicityof impression, which vexed it with a strange disquietude, herecalled and more thoroughly defined the plans which Hester andhimself had sketched for their departure. It had been determinedbetween them that the Old World, with its crowds and cities,offered them a more eligible shelter and concealment than thewilds of New England or all America, with its alternatives of anIndian wigwam, or the few settlements of Europeans scatteredthinly along the sea-board. Not to speak of the clergyman'shealth, so inadequate to sustain the hardships of a forest life,his native gifts, his culture, and his entire development wouldsecure him a home only in the midst of civilization andrefinement; the higher the state the more delicately adapted toit the man. In furtherance of this choice, it so happened that aship lay in the harbour; one of those unquestionable cruisers,frequent at that day, which, without being absolutely outlaws ofthe deep, yet roamed over its surface with a remarkableirresponsibility of character. This vessel had recently arrivedfrom the Spanish Main, and within three days' time would sailfor Bristol. Hester Prynne--whose vocation, as a self-enlistedSister of Charity, had brought her acquainted with the captainand crew--could take upon herself to secure the passage of twoindividuals and a child with all the secrecy which circumstancesrendered more than desirable.

The minister had inquired of Hester, with no little interest,the precise time at which the vessel might be expected todepart. It would probably be on the fourth day from the present."This is most fortunate!" he had then said to himself. Now, whythe Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale considered it so very fortunate wehesitate to reveal. Nevertheless--to hold nothing back from thereader--it was because, on the third day from the present, hewas to preach the Election Sermon; and, as such an occasionformed an honourable epoch in the life of a New EnglandClergyman, he could not have chanced upon a more suitable modeand time of terminating his professional career. "At least, theyshall say of me," thought this exemplary man, "that I leave nopublic duty unperformed or ill-performed!" Sad, indeed, that anintrospection so profound and acute as this poor minister'sshould be so miserably deceived! We have had, and may stillhave, worse things to tell of him; but none, we apprehend, sopitiably weak; no evidence, at once so slight and irrefragable,of a subtle disease that had long since begun to eat into thereal substance of his character. No man, for any considerableperiod, can wear one face to himself and another to themultitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may bethe true.

The excitement of Mr. Dimmesdale's feelings as he returned fromhis interview with Hester, lent him unaccustomed physicalenergy, and hurried him townward at a rapid pace. The pathwayamong the woods seemed wilder, more uncouth with its rudenatural obstacles, and less trodden by the foot of man, than heremembered it on his outward journey. But he leaped across theplashy places, thrust himself through the clinging underbrush,climbed the ascent, plunged into the hollow, and overcame, inshort, all the difficulties of the track, with an unweariableactivity that astonished him. He could not but recall howfeebly, and with what frequent pauses for breath he had toiledover the same ground, only two days before. As he drew near thetown, he took an impression of change from the series offamiliar objects that presented themselves. It seemed notyesterday, not one, not two, but many days, or even years ago,since he had quitted them. There, indeed, was each former traceof the street, as he remembered it, and all the peculiarities ofthe houses, with the due multitude of gable-peaks, and aweather-cock at every point where his memory suggested one. Notthe less, however, came this importunately obtrusive sense ofchange. The same was true as regarded the acquaintances whom hemet, and all the well-known shapes of human life, about thelittle town. They looked neither older nor younger now; thebeards of the aged were no whiter, nor could the creeping babeof yesterday walk on his feet to-day; it was impossible todescribe in what respect they differed from the individuals onwhom he had so recently bestowed a parting glance; and yet theminister's deepest sense seemed to inform him of theirmutability. A similar impression struck him most remarkably ashe passed under the walls of his own church. The edifice had sovery strange, and yet so familiar an aspect, that Mr.Dimmesdale's mind vibrated between two ideas; either that he hadseen it only in a dream hitherto, or that he was merely dreamingabout it now.

This phenomenon, in the various shapes which it assumed,indicated no external change, but so sudden and important achange in the spectator of the familiar scene, that theintervening space of a single day had operated on hisconsciousness like the lapse of years. The minister's own will,and Hester's will, and the fate that grew between them, hadwrought this transformation. It was the same town as heretofore,but the same minister returned not from the forest. He mighthave said to the friends who greeted him--"I am not the man forwhom you take me! I left him yonder in the forest, withdrawninto a secret dell, by a mossy tree trunk, and near a melancholybrook! Go, seek your minister, and see if his emaciated figure,his thin cheek, his white, heavy, pain-wrinkled brow, be notflung down there, like a cast-off garment!" His friends, nodoubt, would still have insisted with him--"Thou art thyself theman!" but the error would have been their own, not his.

Before Mr. Dimmesdale reached home, his inner man gave him otherevidences of a revolution in the sphere of thought and feeling.In truth, nothing short of a total change of dynasty and moralcode, in that interior kingdom, was adequate to account for theimpulses now communicated to the unfortunate and startledminister. At every step he was incited to do some strange, wild,wicked thing or other, with a sense that it would be at onceinvoluntary and intentional, in spite of himself, yet growingout of a profounder self than that which opposed the impulse.For instance, he met one of his own deacons. The good old manaddressed him with the paternal affection and patriarchalprivilege which his venerable age, his upright and holycharacter, and his station in the church, entitled him to useand, conjoined with this, the deep, almost worshipping respect,which the minister's professional and private claims alikedemanded. Never was there a more beautiful example of how themajesty of age and wisdom may comport with the obeisance andrespect enjoined upon it, as from a lower social rank, andinferior order of endowment, towards a higher. Now, during aconversation of some two or three moments between the ReverendMr. Dimmesdale and this excellent and hoary-bearded deacon, itwas only by the most careful self-control that the former couldrefrain from uttering certain blasphemous suggestions that roseinto his mind, respecting the communion-supper. He absolutelytrembled and turned pale as ashes, lest his tongue should wagitself in utterance of these horrible matters, and plead his ownconsent for so doing, without his having fairly given it. And,even with this terror in his heart, he could hardly avoidlaughing, to imagine how the sanctified old patriarchal deaconwould have been petrified by his minister's impiety.

Again, another incident of the same nature. Hurrying along thestreet, the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale encountered the eldestfemale member of his church, a most pious and exemplary olddame, poor, widowed, lonely, and with a heart as full ofreminiscences about her dead husband and children, and her deadfriends of long ago, as a burial-ground is full of storiedgravestones. Yet all this, which would else have been such heavysorrow, was made almost a solemn joy to her devout old soul, byreligious consolations and the truths of Scripture, wherewithshe had fed herself continually for more than thirty years. Andsince Mr. Dimmesdale had taken her in charge, the good grandam'schief earthly comfort--which, unless it had been likewise aheavenly comfort, could have been none at all--was to meet herpastor, whether casually, or of set purpose, and be refreshedwith a word of warm, fragrant, heaven-breathing Gospel truth,from his beloved lips, into her dulled, but rapturouslyattentive ear. But, on this occasion, up to the moment ofputting his lips to the old woman's ear, Mr. Dimmesdale, as thegreat enemy of souls would have it, could recall no text ofScripture, nor aught else, except a brief, pithy, and, as itthen appeared to him, unanswerable argument against theimmortality of the human soul. The instilment thereof into hermind would probably have caused this aged sister to drop downdead, at once, as by the effect of an intensely poisonousinfusion. What he really did whisper, the minister could neverafterwards recollect. There was, perhaps, a fortunate disorderin his utterance, which failed to impart any distinct idea tothe good widows comprehension, or which Providence interpretedafter a method of its own. Assuredly, as the minister lookedback, he beheld an expression of divine gratitude and ecstasythat seemed like the shine of the celestial city on her face, sowrinkled and ashy pale.

Again, a third instance. After parting from the old churchmember, he met the youngest sister of them all. It was a maidennewly-won--and won by the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale's own sermon,on the Sabbath after his vigil--to barter the transitorypleasures of the world for the heavenly hope that was to assumebrighter substance as life grew dark around her, and which wouldgild the utter gloom with final glory. She was fair and pure asa lily that had bloomed in Paradise. The minister knew well thathe was himself enshrined within the stainless sanctity of herheart, which hung its snowy curtains about his image, impartingto religion the warmth of love, and to love a religious purity.Satan, that afternoon, had surely led the poor young girl awayfrom her mother's side, and thrown her into the pathway of thissorely tempted, or--shall we not rather say?--this lost anddesperate man. As she drew nigh, the arch-fiend whispered him tocondense into small compass, and drop into her tender bosom agerm of evil that would be sure to blossom darkly soon, and bearblack fruit betimes. Such was his sense of power over thisvirgin soul, trusting him as she did, that the minister feltpotent to blight all the field of innocence with but one wickedlook, and develop all its opposite with but a word. So--with amightier struggle than he had yet sustained--he held his Genevacloak before his face, and hurried onward, making no sign ofrecognition, and leaving the young sister to digest his rudenessas she might. She ransacked her conscience--which was full ofharmless little matters, like her pocket or her work-bag--andtook herself to task, poor thing! for a thousand imaginaryfaults, and went about her household duties with swollen eyelidsthe next morning.

Before the minister had time to celebrate his victory over thislast temptation, he was conscious of another impulse, moreludicrous, and almost as horrible. It was--we blush to tellit--it was to stop short in the road, and teach some very wickedwords to a knot of little Puritan children who were playingthere, and had but just begun to talk. Denying himself thisfreak, as unworthy of his cloth, he met a drunken seaman, one ofthe ship's crew from the Spanish Main. And here, since he had sovaliantly forborne all other wickedness, poor Mr. Dimmesdalelonged at least to shake hands with the tarry black-guard, andrecreate himself with a few improper jests, such as dissolutesailors so abound with, and a volley of good, round, solid,satisfactory, and heaven-defying oaths! It was not so much abetter principle, as partly his natural good taste, and stillmore his buckramed habit of clerical decorum, that carried himsafely through the latter crisis.

"What is it that haunts and tempts me thus?" cried the ministerto himself, at length, pausing in the street, and striking hishand against his forehead.

"Am I mad? or am I given over utterly to the fiend? Did I makea contract with him in the forest, and sign it with my blood?And does he now summon me to its fulfilment, by suggesting theperformance of every wickedness which his most foul imaginationcan conceive?"

At the moment when the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale thus communedwith himself, and struck his forehead with his hand, oldMistress Hibbins, the reputed witch-lady, is said to have beenpassing by. She made a very grand appearance, having on a highhead-dress, a rich gown of velvet, and a ruff done up with thefamous yellow starch, of which Anne Turner, her especial friend,had taught her the secret, before this last good lady had beenhanged for Sir Thomas Overbury's murder. Whether the witch hadread the minister's thoughts or no, she came to a full stop,looked shrewdly into his face, smiled craftily, and--thoughlittle given to converse with clergymen--began a conversation.

"So, reverend sir, you have made a visit into the forest,"observed the witch-lady, nodding her high head-dress at him."The next time I pray you to allow me only a fair warning, and Ishall be proud to bear you company. Without taking overmuch uponmyself my good word will go far towards gaining any strangegentleman a fair reception from yonder potentate you wot of."

"I profess, madam," answered the clergyman, with a graveobeisance, such as the lady's rank demanded, and his own goodbreeding made imperative--"I profess, on my conscience andcharacter, that I am utterly bewildered as touching the purportof your words! I went not into the forest to seek a potentate,neither do I, at any future time, design a visit thither, with aview to gaining the favour of such personage. My one sufficientobject was to greet that pious friend of mine, the ApostleEliot, and rejoice with him over the many precious souls he hathwon from heathendom!"

"Ha, ha, ha!" cackled the old witch-lady, still nodding her highhead-dress at the minister. "Well, well! we must needs talk thusin the daytime! You carry it off like an old hand! But atmidnight, and in the forest, we shall have other talk together!"

She passed on with her aged stateliness, but often turning backher head and smiling at him, like one willing to recognise asecret intimacy of connexion.

"Have I then sold myself," thought the minister, "to the fiendwhom, if men say true, this yellow-starched and velveted old haghas chosen for her prince and master?"

The wretched minister! He had made a bargain very like it!Tempted by a dream of happiness, he had yielded himself withdeliberate choice, as he had never done before, to what he knewwas deadly sin. And the infectious poison of that sin had beenthus rapidly diffused throughout his moral system. It hadstupefied all blessed impulses, and awakened into vivid life thewhole brotherhood of bad ones. Scorn, bitterness, unprovokedmalignity, gratuitous desire of ill, ridicule of whatever wasgood and holy, all awoke to tempt, even while they frightenedhim. And his encounter with old Mistress Hibbins, if it were areal incident, did but show its sympathy and fellowship withwicked mortals, and the world of perverted spirits.

He had by this time reached his dwelling on the edge of theburial ground, and, hastening up the stairs, took refuge in hisstudy. The minister was glad to have reached this shelter,without first betraying himself to the world by any of thosestrange and wicked eccentricities to which he had beencontinually impelled while passing through the streets. Heentered the accustomed room, and looked around him on its books,its windows, its fireplace, and the tapestried comfort of thewalls, with the same perception of strangeness that had hauntedhim throughout his walk from the forest dell into the town andthitherward. Here he had studied and written; here gone throughfast and vigil, and come forth half alive; here striven to pray;here borne a hundred thousand agonies! There was the Bible, inits rich old Hebrew, with Moses and the Prophets speaking tohim, and God's voice through all.

There on the table, with the inky pen beside it, was anunfinished sermon, with a sentence broken in the midst, wherehis thoughts had ceased to gush out upon the page two daysbefore. He knew that it was himself, the thin and white-cheekedminister, who had done and suffered these things, and writtenthus far into the Election Sermon! But he seemed to stand apart,and eye this former self with scornful pitying, but half-enviouscuriosity. That self was gone. Another man had returned out ofthe forest--a wiser one--with a knowledge of hidden mysterieswhich the simplicity of the former never could have reached. Abitter kind of knowledge that!

While occupied with these reflections, a knock came at the doorof the study, and the minister said, "Come in!"--not whollydevoid of an idea that he might behold an evil spirit. And so hedid! It was old Roger Chillingworth that entered. The ministerstood white and speechless, with one hand on the HebrewScriptures, and the other spread upon his breast.

"Welcome home, reverend sir," said the physician "And how foundyou that godly man, the Apostle Eliot? But methinks, dear sir,you look pale, as if the travel through the wilderness had beentoo sore for you. Will not my aid be requisite to put you inheart and strength to preach your Election Sermon?"

"Nay, I think not so," rejoined the Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale. "Myjourney, and the sight of the holy Apostle yonder, and the freeair which I have breathed have done me good, after so longconfinement in my study. I think to need no more of your drugs,my kind physician, good though they be, and administered by afriendly hand."

All this time Roger Chillingworth was looking at the ministerwith the grave and intent regard of a physician towards hispatient. But, in spite of this outward show, the latter wasalmost convinced of the old man's knowledge, or, at least, hisconfident suspicion, with respect to his own interview withHester Prynne. The physician knew then that in the minister'sregard he was no longer a trusted friend, but his bitterestenemy. So much being known, it would appear natural that a partof it should be expressed. It is singular, however, how long atime often passes before words embody things; and with whatsecurity two persons, who choose to avoid a certain subject, mayapproach its very verge, and retire without disturbing it. Thusthe minister felt no apprehension that Roger Chillingworth wouldtouch, in express words, upon the real position which theysustained towards one another. Yet did the physician, in hisdark way, creep frightfully near the secret.

"Were it not better," said he, "that you use my poor skilltonight? Verily, dear sir, we must take pains to make you strongand vigorous for this occasion of the Election discourse. Thepeople look for great things from you, apprehending that anotheryear may come about and find their pastor gone."

"Yes, to another world," replied the minister with piousresignation. "Heaven grant it be a better one; for, in goodsooth, I hardly think to tarry with my flock through theflitting seasons of another year! But touching your medicine,kind sir, in my present frame of body I need it not."

"I joy to hear it," answered the physician. "It may be that myremedies, so long administered in vain, begin now to take dueeffect. Happy man were I, and well deserving of New England'sgratitude, could I achieve this cure!"

"I thank you from my heart, most watchful friend," said theReverend Mr. Dimmesdale with a solemn smile. "I thank you, andcan but requite your good deeds with my prayers."

"A good man's prayers are golden recompense!" rejoined old RogerChillingworth, as he took his leave. "Yea, they are the currentgold coin of the New Jerusalem, with the King's own mint mark onthem!"

Left alone, the minister summoned a servant of the house, andrequested food, which, being set before him, he ate withravenous appetite. Then flinging the already written pages ofthe Election Sermon into the fire, he forthwith began another,which he wrote with such an impulsive flow of thought andemotion, that he fancied himself inspired; and only wonderedthat Heaven should see fit to transmit the grand and solemnmusic of its oracles through so foul an organ pipe as he.However, leaving that mystery to solve itself, or go unsolvedfor ever, he drove his task onward with earnest haste andecstasy.

Thus the night fled away, as if it were a winged steed, and hecareering on it; morning came, and peeped, blushing, through thecurtains; and at last sunrise threw a golden beam into thestudy, and laid it right across the minister's bedazzled eyes.There he was, with the pen still between his fingers, and avast, immeasurable tract of written space behind him!