THE DOLIVER ROMANCE AND OTHER PIECES

 TALES AND SKETCHES

 By Nathaniel Hawthorne

 AN OLD WOMAN'S TALE

In the house where I was born, there used to be an old woman crouchingall day long over the kitchen fire, with her elbows on her knees and herfeet in the ashes. Once in a while she took a turn at the spit, and shenever lacked a coarse gray stocking in her lap, the foot about halffinished; it tapered away with her own waning life, and she knit thetoe-stitch on the day of her death. She made it her serious businessand sole amusement to tell me stories at any time from morning tillnight, in a mumbling, toothless voice, as I sat on a log of wood, grasping her cheek-apron in both my hands. Her personal memory includedthe better part of a hundred years, and she had strangely jumbled herown experience and observation with those of many old people who died inher young days; so that she might have been taken for a contemporary ofQueen Elizabeth, or of John Rogers in the Primer. There are a thousandof her traditions lurking in the corners and by-places of my mind, somemore marvellous than what is to follow, some less so, and a few notmarvellous in the least, all of which I should like to repeat, if I wereas happy as she in having a listener. But I am humble enough to own, that I do not deserve a listener half so well as that old toothlesswoman, whose narratives possessed an excellence attributable neither toherself, nor to any single individual. Her ground-plots, seldom withinthe widest scope of probability, were filled up with homely and naturalincidents, the gradual accretions of a long course of years, and fictionhid its grotesque extravagance in this garb of truth, like the Devil (anappropriate simile, for the old woman supplies it) disguising himself, cloven-foot and all, in mortal attire. These tales generally referredto her birthplace, a village in, the valley of the Connecticut, theaspect of which she impressed with great vividness on my fancy. Thehouses in that tract of country, long a wild and dangerous frontier, were rendered defensible by a strength of architecture that haspreserved many of them till our own times, and I cannot describe thesort of pleasure with which, two summers since, I rode through thelittle town in question, while one object after another rose familiarlyto my eye, like successive portions of a dream becoming realized. Amongother things equally probable, she was wont to assert that all theinhabitants of this village (at certain intervals, but whether oftwenty-five or fifty years, or a whole century, remained a disputablepoint) were subject to a simultaneous slumber, continuing one hour'sspace. When that mysterious time arrived, the parson snored over hishalf-written sermon, though it were Saturday night and no provision madefor the morrow, --the mother's eyelids closed as she bent over herinfant, and no childish cry awakened, --the watcher at the bed of mortalsickness slumbered upon the death-pillow, and the dying man anticipatedhis sleep of ages by one as deep and dreamless. To speak emphatically, there was a soporific influence throughout the village, stronger than ifevery mother's son and daughter were reading a dull story;notwithstanding which the old woman professed to hold the substance ofthe ensuing account from one of those principally concerned in it. 

One moonlight summer evening, a young man and a girl sat down togetherin the open air. They were distant relatives, sprung from a stock oncewealthy, but of late years so poverty-stricken, that David had not apenny to pay the marriage fee, if Esther should consent to wed. Theseat they had chosen was in an open grove of elm and walnut trees, at aright angle of the road; a spring of diamond water just bubbled into themoonlight beside them, and then whimpered away through the bushes andlong grass, in search of a neighboring millstream. The nearest house(situate within twenty yards of them, and the residence of their great-grandfather in his lifetime) was a venerable old edifice, crowned withmany high and narrow peaks, all overrun by innumerable creeping plants, which hung curling about the roof like a nice young wig on an elderlygentleman's head. Opposite to this establishment was a tavern, with awell and horse-trough before it, and a low green bank running along theleft side of the door. Thence, the road went onward, curving scarceperceptibly, through the village, divided in the midst by a narrowlane of verdure, and bounded on each side by a grassy strip of twice itsown breadth. The houses had generally an odd look. Here, the moonlighttried to get a glimpse of one, a rough old heap of ponderous timber, which, ashamed of its dilapidated aspect, was hiding behind a greatthick tree; the lower story of the next had sunk almost under ground, asif the poor little house were a-weary of the world, and retiring intothe seclusion of its own cellar; farther on stood one of the few recentstructures, thrusting its painted face conspicuously into the street, with an evident idea that it was the fairest thing there. About midwayin the village was a grist-mill, partly concealed by the descent of theground towards the stream which turned its wheel. At the southernextremity, just so far distant that the window-paces dazzled into eachother, rose the meeting-house, a dingy old barn-like building, with anenormously disproportioned steeple sticking up straight into heaven, ashigh as the Tower of Babel, and the cause of nearly as much confusion inits day. This steeple, it must be understood, was an afterthought, andits addition to the main edifice, when the latter had already begun todecay, had excited a vehement quarrel, and almost a schism in thechurch, some fifty years before. Here the road wound down a hill andwas seen no more, the remotest object in view being the graveyard gate, beyond the meetinghouse. The youthful pair sat hand in hand beneath thetrees, and for several moments they had not spoken, because the breezewas hushed, the brook scarce tinkled, the leaves had ceased theirrustling, and everything lay motionless and silent as if Nature werecomposing herself to slumber. 

"What a beautiful night it is, Esther!" remarked David, somewhatdrowsily. 

"Very beautiful, " answered the girl, in the same tone. 

"But how still!" continued David. 

"Ah, too still!" said Esther, with a faint shudder, like a modest leafwhen the wind kisses it. 

Perhaps they fell asleep together, and, united as their spirits were byclose and tender sympathies, the same strange dream might have wrappedthem in its shadowy arms. But they conceived, at the time, that theystill remained wakeful by the spring of bubbling water, looking downthrough the village, and all along the moonlighted road, and at thequeer old houses, and at the trees which thrust their great twistedbranches almost into the windows. There was only a sort of mistinessover their minds like the smoky air of an early autumn night. Atlength, without any vivid astonishment, they became conscious that agreat many people were either entering the village or already in thestreet, but whether they came from the meeting-house, or from a littlebeyond it, or where the devil they came from, was more than could bedetermined. Certainly, a crowd of people seemed to be there, men, women, and children, all of whom were yawning and rubbing their eyes, stretching their limbs, and staggering from side to side of the road, asif but partially awakened from a sound slumber. Sometimes they stoodstock-still, with their hands over their brows to shade their sight fromthe moonbeams. As they drew near, most of their countenances appearedfamiliar to Esther and David, possessing the peculiar features offamilies in the village, and that general air and aspect by which aperson would recognize his own townsmen in the remotest ends of theearth. But though the whole multitude might have been taken, in themass, for neighbors and acquaintances, there was not a single individualwhose exact likeness they had ever before seen. It was a noticeablecircumstance, also, that the newest fashioned garment on the backs ofthese people might have been worn by the great-grandparents of theexisting generation. There was one figure behind all the rest, and notyet near enough to be perfectly distinguished. 

"Where on earth, David, do all these odd people come from?" said Esther, with a lazy inclination to laugh. 

"Nowhere on earth, Esther, " replied David, unknowing why he said so. 

As they spoke, the strangers showed some symptoms of disquietude, andlooked towards the fountain for an instant, but immediately appeared toassume their own trains of thought and previous purposes. They nowseparated to different parts of the village, with a readiness thatimplied intimate local knowledge, and it may be worthy of remark, that, though they were evidently loquacious among themselves, neither theirfootsteps nor their voices reached the ears of the beholders. Whereverthere was a venerable old house, of fifty years' standing and upwards, surrounded by its elm or walnut trees, with its dark and weather-beatenbarn, its well, its orchard and stone-walls, all ancient and all in goodrepair around it, there a little group of these people assembled. Suchparties were mostly composed of an aged man and woman, with the youngermembers of a family; their faces were full of joy, so deep that itassumed the shade of melancholy; they pointed to each other the minutestobjects about the homesteads, things in their hearts, and were nowcomparing them with the originals. But where hollow places by thewayside, grass-grown and uneven, with unsightly chimneys rising ruinousin the midst, gave indications of a fallen dwelling and of hearths longcold, there did a few of the strangers sit them down on the moulderingbeams, and on the yellow moss that had overspread the door-stone. Themen folded their arms, sad and speechless; the women wrung their handswith a more vivid expression of grief; and the little children totteredto their knees, shrinking away from the open grave of domestic love. And wherever a recent edifice reared its white and flashy front on thefoundation of an old one, there a gray-haired man might be seen to shakehis staff in anger at it, while his aged dame and their offspringappeared to join in their maledictions, forming a fearful picture in theghostly moon light. While these scenes were passing, the one figure inthe rear of all the rest was descending the hollow towards the mill, andthe eyes of David and Esther were drawn thence to a pair with whom theycould fully sympathize. It was a youth in a sailor's dress and a paleslender maiden, who met each other with a sweet embrace in the middle ofthe street. 

"How long it must be since they parted, " observed David. 

"Fifty years at least, " said Esther. 

They continued to gaze with unwondering calmness and quiet interest, asthe dream (if such it were) unrolled its quaint and motley semblancebefore them, and their notice was now attracted by several little knotsof people apparently engaged in conversation. Of these one of theearliest collected and most characteristic was near the tavern, thepersons who composed it being seated on the low green bank along theleft side of the door. A conspicuous figure here was a fine corpulentold fellow in his shirt-sleeves and flame-colored breeches, and with astained white apron over his paunch, beneath which he held his hands andwherewith at times be wiped his ruddy face. The stately decrepitude ofone of his companions, the scar of an Indian tomahawk on his crown, andespecially his worn buff coat, were appropriate marks of a veteranbelonging to an old Provincial garrison, now deaf to the roll-call. Another showed his rough face under a tarry hat and wore a pair of widetrousers, like an ancient mariner who bad tossed away his youth upon thesea, and was returned, hoary and weather-beaten, to his inland home. There was also a thin young man, carelessly dressed, who ever and anoncast a sad look towards the pale maiden above mentioned. With thesethere sat a hunter, and one or two others, and they were soon joined bya miller, who came upward from the dusty mill, his coat as white as ifbesprinkled with powdered starlight. All these (by the aid of jests, which might indeed be old, but had not been recently repeated) waxedvery merry, and it was rather strange, that just as their sides shookwith the heartiest laughter, they appeared greatly like a group ofshadows flickering in the moonshine. Four personages, very differentfrom these, stood in front of the large house with its periwig ofcreeping plants. One was a little elderly figure, distinguished by thegold on his three-cornered bat and sky-blue coat, and by the seal ofarms annexed to his great gold watch-chain; his air and aspect befitteda Justice of Peace and County Major, and all earth's pride and pompositywere squeezed into this small gentleman of five feet high. The next inimportance was a grave person of sixty or seventy years, whose blacksuit and hand sufficiently indicated his character, and the polishedbaldness of whose head was worthy of a famous preacher in the village, half a century before, who had made wigs a subject of pulpitdenunciation. The two other figures, both clad in dark gray, showed thesobriety of Deacons; one was ridiculously tall and thin, like a man ofordinary bulk infinitely produced, as the mathematicians say; while thebrevity and thickness of his colleague seemed a compression of the sameman. These four talked with great earnestness, and their gesturesintimated that they had revived the ancient dispute about the meeting-house steeple. The grave person in black spoke with composed solemnity, as if he were addressing a Synod; the short deacon grunted outoccasional sentences, as brief as himself; his tall brother drew thelong thread of his argument through the whole discussion, and (reasoningfrom analogy) his voice must indubitably have been small and squeaking. But the little old man in gold-lace was evidently scorched by his ownred-hot eloquence; he bounced from one to another, shook his cane at thesteeple, at the two deacons, and almost in the parson's face, stampingwith his foot fiercely enough to break a hole through the very earth;though, indeed, it could not exactly be said that the green grass bentbeneath him. The figure, noticed as coming behind all the rest, had nowsurmounted the ascent from the mill, and proved to be an elderly ladywith something in her hand. 

"Why does she walk so slow?" asked David. 

"Don't you see she is lame?" said Esther. 

This gentlewoman, whose infirmity had kept her so far in the rear of thecrowd, now came hobbling on, glided unobserved by the polemic group, andpaused on the left brink of the fountain, within a few feet of the twospectators. She was a magnificent old dame, as ever mortal eye beheld. Her spangled shoes and gold-clocked stockings shone gloriously within thespacious circle of a red hoop-petticoat, which swelled to the very pointof explosion, and was bedecked all over with embroidery a littletarnished. Above the petticoat, and parting in front so as to displayit to the best advantage, was a figured blue damask gown. A wide andstiff ruff encircled her neck, a cap of the finest muslin, though ratherdingy, covered her head; and her nose was bestridden by a pair of gold-bowed spectacles with enormous glasses. But the old lady's face waspinched, sharp and sallow, wearing a niggardly and avariciousexpression, and forming an odd contrast to the splendor of her attire, as did likewise the implement which she held in her hand. It was a sortof iron shovel (by housewives termed a "slice"), such as is used inclearing the oven, and with this, selecting a spot between a walnut-treeand the fountain, the good dame made an earnest attempt to dig. Thetender sods, however, possessed a strange impenetrability. Theyresisted her efforts like a quarry of living granite, and losing herbreath, she cast down the shovel and seemed to bemoan herself mostpiteously, gnashing her teeth (what few she had) and wringing her thinyellow hands. Then, apparently with new hope, she resumed her toil, which still had the same result, --a circumstance the less surprising toDavid and Esther, because at times they would catch the moonlightshining through the old woman, and dancing in the fountain beyond. Thelittle man in goldlace now happened to see her, and made his approach ontiptoe. 

"How hard this elderly lady works!" remarked David. 

"Go and help her, David, " said Esther, compassionately. 

As their drowsy void spoke, both the old woman and the pompous littlefigure behind her lifted their eyes, and for a moment they regarded theyouth and damsel with something like kindness and affection; which, however, were dim and uncertain, and passed away almost immediately. The old woman again betook herself to the shovel, but was startled by ahand suddenly laid upon her shoulder; she turned round in greattrepidation, and beheld the dignitary in the blue coat; then followed anembrace of such closeness as would indicate no remoter connection thanmatrimony between these two decorous persons. The gentleman nextpointed to the shovel, appearing to inquire the purpose of his lady'soccupation; while she as evidently parried his interrogatories, maintaining a demure and sanctified visage as every good woman ought, insimilar cases. Howbeit, she could not forbear looking askew, behind herspectacles, towards the spot of stubborn turf. All the while, theirfigures had a strangeness in them, and it seemed as if some cunningjeweller had made their golden ornaments of the yellowest of the settingsunbeams, and that the blue of their garments was brought from the darksky near the moon, and that the gentleman's silk waistcoat was thebright side of a fiery cloud, and the lady's scarlet petticoat a remnantof the blush of morning, --and that they both were two unrealities ofcolored air. But now there was a sudden movement throughout themultitude. The Squire drew forth a watch as large as the dial on thefamous steeple, looked at the warning hands and got him gone, nor couldhis lady tarry; the party at the tavern door took to their heels, headedby the fat man in the flaming breeches; the tall deacon stalked awayimmediately, and the short deacon waddled after, making four steps tothe yard; the mothers called their children about them and set forth, with a gentle and sad glance behind. Like cloudy fantasies that hurryby a viewless impulse from the sky, they all were fled, and the windrose up and followed them with a strange moaning down the lonely street. Now whither these people went, is more than may be told; only David andEsther seemed to see the shadowy splendor of the ancient dame, as shelingered in the moonshine at the graveyard gate, gazing backward to thefountain. 

"O Esther! I have had such a dream!" cried David, starting up, andrubbing his eyes. 

"And I such another!" answered Esther, gaping till her pretty red lipsformed a circle. 

"About an old woman with gold-bowed spectacles, " continued David. 

"And a scarlet hoop-petticoat, " added Esther. They now stared in eachother's eyes, with great astonishment and some little fear. After athoughtful moment or two, David drew a long breath and stood upright. 

"If I live till to-morrow morning, " said he, "I'll see what may beburied between that tree and the spring of water. "

"And why not to-night, David?" asked Esther; for she was a sensiblelittle girl, and bethought herself that the matter might as well be donein secrecy. 

David felt the propriety of the remark and looked round for the means offollowing her advice. The moon shone brightly on something that restedagainst the side of the old house, and, on a nearer view, it proved tobe an iron shovel, bearing a singular resemblance to that which they hadseen in their dreams. He used it with better success than the oldwoman, the soil giving way so freely to his efforts, that he had soonscooped a hole as large as the basin of the spring. Suddenly, he pokedhis head down to the very bottom of this cavity. "Oho!--what have wehere?" cried David.