The Scarlet Letter

From this intense consciousness of being the object of severe

and universal observation, the wearer of the scarlet letter was

at length relieved, by discerning, on the outskirts of the

crowd, a figure which irresistibly took possession of her

thoughts. An Indian in his native garb was standing there; but

the red men were not so infrequent visitors of the English

settlements that one of them would have attracted any notice

from Hester Prynne at such a time; much less would he have

excluded all other objects and ideas from her mind. By the

Indian's side, and evidently sustaining a companionship with

him, stood a white man, clad in a strange disarray of civilized

and savage costume.

He was small in stature, with a furrowed visage, which as yet

could hardly be termed aged. There was a remarkable intelligence

in his features, as of a person who had so cultivated his mental

part that it could not fail to mould the physical to itself and

become manifest by unmistakable tokens. Although, by a seemingly

careless arrangement of his heterogeneous garb, he had

endeavoured to conceal or abate the peculiarity, it was

sufficiently evident to Hester Prynne that one of this man's

shoulders rose higher than the other. Again, at the first

instant of perceiving that thin visage, and the slight deformity

of the figure, she pressed her infant to her bosom with so

convulsive a force that the poor babe uttered another cry of

pain. But the mother did not seem to hear it.

At his arrival in the market-place, and some time before she saw

him, the stranger had bent his eyes on Hester Prynne. It was

carelessly at first, like a man chiefly accustomed to look

inward, and to whom external matters are of little value and

import, unless they bear relation to something within his mind.

Very soon, however, his look became keen and penetrative. A

writhing horror twisted itself across his features, like a snake

gliding swiftly over them, and making one little pause, with all

its wreathed intervolutions in open sight. His face darkened

with some powerful emotion, which, nevertheless, he so

instantaneously controlled by an effort of his will, that, save

at a single moment, its expression might have passed for

calmness. After a brief space, the convulsion grew almost

imperceptible, and finally subsided into the depths of his

nature. When he found the eyes of Hester Prynne fastened on his

own, and saw that she appeared to recognize him, he slowly and

calmly raised his finger, made a gesture with it in the air, and

laid it on his lips.

Then touching the shoulder of a townsman who stood near to him,

he addressed him in a formal and courteous manner: "I pray you, good Sir," said he, "who is this woman?--and

wherefore is she here set up to public shame?"