San Antonio Daily Light. (San Antonio, Tex.), Vol. 12, No. 127, Ed. 1 Wednesday, June 15, 1892 Page: 6 of 8
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WEDNESDAY JUNE 15 1882.
THE SCAULET LETTOL
By NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE.
“Wherefore dost thou desire it?"in-
quired Hester shrinking she hardly
knew why from this secret bond. “Why
not announce thyself openly and cast
me off at once?"
“It may be” he replied '‘because 1
will not encounter the dishonor that be-
smirches the husband of a faithless
woman. It may be for other reasons.
Enough it is my purpose to Jive and die
unknown. Let therefore thy.husband
be to the world as one already dead and
of whom no tidings shall evercome.
Recognize me not by word by aign by
look! Breathe not the secret above all
to the man thou wottest of. Bhouldst
thou fail me in this beware! His fame
his position his life will be in my.hands.
Beware!”
wf will keep thy secret as I have his”
said Hester.
“Swear it!” rejoined he.
And she took the oath.
“And now. Mistress Prynne” Kudcdd
Roger Chillingworth as he was hereaf-
ter to be named “I leave thee akme—-
alone with thy infant and the scarlet
letter! How is it Hester? Doth thy
sentence bind thee to wear the token in
thy sleep? Art thou not afraid of night-
mares and hideous dreams?”
“Why dost thou smile so at me?” in-
quired Hester troubled at.the expression
of his eyes. “Art thou like the Black
Man that haunts the forest round about
us? Hast thou enticed me into a bond
that will prove the ruin of my soul?”
“Not thy soul” he answered with
another smile. “No not thine!”
CHAPTER IV.
HESTER AT HER NEEDLE.
Hester Prynne’s term of confinement
• was now at an end. Her prison door
was thrown open and she came forth into
the sunshine which falling on all alike
seemed to her sick and morbid heart as
if meant for no other purpose than to
reveal the scarlet letter on her breast.
Perhaps there was a more real torture
in her first unattended footsteps from
the threshold of the prison than even in
the procession and spectacle that have
been described where she was made the
common infamy at which all mankind
was summoned to point its finger. Then
she was supported by an unnatural ten-
sion of the nerves and by all the com-
bative energy of her character which
enabled her to convert the scene into a
kind of lurid triumph.
It was moreover a separate and in-
sulated event to occur but once in her
lifetime and to meet which therefore
reckless of economy she might call uj
the vital strength that would have suf-
ficed for many quiet years. The very
law that condemned her—a giant of
stern features but with vigor to sup-
port as well as to annihilate in his iron
arm—had held her up through the ter-
rible ordeal of her ignominy. But now
with this .unattended walk from her
prison door began the daily custom;
and she must either sustain and carry it
forward by the ordinary resources of
her nature or sink beneath it. She
could no longer borrow from the future
to help her through the present grief.
Tomorrow would bring its own trial
with it; so would the next day and so
would the next; each its own trial and
yet the very same that was now so un-
utterably grievous to be borne.
The days of the far off future would
toil onward still with the same burden
for her to take up and bear along with
her but never to fling down for the ac-
cumulating days and added years would
pile up their misery upon the heap of
shame. Throughout them all giving up
her individuality she would become the
general symbol at which the preacher
and moralist might point and in which
they might vivify and embody their im-
ages of woman's frailty and sinful pas-
sion. Thus the young and pure would
be taught to look at her with the scarlet
letter flaming on her breast—at her the
child of honorable parents; at her the
mother of a babe that would hereafter
be a woman; at her who had once been
innocent—as the figure the body the
reality of sin. AmJ over her grave the
infamy that she must carry thither
would be her only monument.
It may seem marvelous that with the
world before her—kept by no restrictive
clause of her condemnation within the
limits of the Puritan settlement so re-
mote and so obscure—free to return to
her birthplace or to any other European
land and there hide her character and
identity under a new exterior as com-
pletely as if emerging into another state
of being and having also the passes of
the dark inscrutable forest open to her
where the wildness of her nature might
assimilate itself with a people whose
customs and life were alien from the
law that had condemned her—it may
* seem marvelous that this woman should
still call that place her home where
and where only she must needs be the
type of shame. But there is a fatality
a feeling so irresistible and inevitable
that it has the force of doom which al-
most invariably compels human beings
to linger around and haunt ghostlike
the spot where some great and marked
event has given the color to their life-
-1 ’ ” and still the more irresistibly the
Oarßur tne (luge mat saaaens it.’
Her sin her ignominy were the roots
wtueh she had struck into the soil. It
was as if a new birth with stronger
assimilations than the first had con-
verted the forest land still so uncon-
genial to every other pilgrim and
wanderer into Hester Prynue’s wild
and dreary but lifelong home. All other
scenes of earth—even that village of
rural England where happy infancy
aud stainless maidenhood seemed yet to
be in her mother's keeping like gar-
ments put off long ago—were foreign to
her in comparison. The chain that
bound her here was of iron links and
galling to her inmost soul but could
never be broken.
It might be too —doubtless it was so
although «he liid the secret from her-
self and grew pale whenever it strug-
gled out of her heart like a seqpent
from its bote—it might be that another
feeling kept her within the scene And
pathway that had been so fatal. There
dwelt there trod the feet of one with
whom she deemed herself connected in
a union that unrecognized on earth
• would bring them together before the
bar of final judgment and make that
their marriage altar for a joint futurity
.of endless retribution. Over and over
. again the tempter of souls had thrust
this idea upon Hester's contemplation
4ind laughed at the passionate and des-
yperate joy with which she seized and
.then strove to cast it from her. She
barely looked the idea in the face and
.hastened to bar it in its dungeon. What
she compelled herself to believe—what
finally she reasoned upon as her motive
for continuing a resident of New Eng-
land—was half a truth and half a self
delusion. Here she said to herself had
been the scene of her guilt and here
should be the scene of her earthly pun-
ishment; and so perchance the torture
of her daily shame would at length
purge her soul and work out another
purity than that which she had lost—-
more saintlike because the result of
martyrdom.
Hester Prynne therefore did not flee.
On the outskirts of the town within the
verge of the peninsula but not in close
vicinity to any other habitation there
was a small thatched cottage. It had
been built by an earlier settler and aban-
doned because the soil about it was too
sterile for cultivation while its com-
parative remoteness put it out of the
sphere of that social activity which al-
ready marked the habits of the emi-
grants. It stood on the shore looking
across a basin of the sea at the forest
covered hills toward tte west. A clump
of scrubby trees such as alone grew on
the peninsula did not so much conceal
the cottage from view as seem to denote
that here was some object which would
fain have been or at least ought to be
concealed. In this little lonesome dwell-
ing with some slender means that she
possessed and by the license of the mag-
istrates who still kept an inquisitorial
watch over her Hester established her-
self with her infant child. A mystic
shadow of suspicion immediately at-
tached itself to the spot. Children too
young to comprehend wherefore this
woman should be set out from the sphere
of human charities would creep nigh
enough to behold her plying her needle
at the cottage window or standing in
the doorway or laboring in her little
garden or coming forth along the path-
way that led townward; and discerning
the scarlet letter ou her breast would
scamper off with a strange contagious
fear.
Lonely as was Hester’s situation and
without a friend on earth who dared to
show himself she however incurred no
risk of want. She possessed an art that
sufficed even in a land that afforded
comparatively little scope for its exer-
'cise to supply food for her thriving in-
fant and herself. It was the art —then as
now almost the only one within a wom-
an's grasp—of needlework. She bore on
her breast in the curiously embroid-
ered letter a specimen of her delicate
and imaginative skill of which the
dames of a court might gladly have
availed themselves to add the richer
and more spiritual adornment of human
ingenuity to their fabrics of silk and
gold. * * *
By degrees nor very slowly her
handiwork became what would now be
termed the fashion. Whether from com-
miseration for a woman of so miserable
a destiny or from the morbid curiosity
that gives a fictitious value even to com-
mon or worthless things or by what-
ever other intangible circumstance was
then as now sufficient to bestow on some
persons what others might seek in vain
or because Hester really filled a gap
which must otherwise have remained
vacant it is certain that she had ready
and fairly requited employment for as
many hours as she saw fit to occupy
with her needle. Vanity it may be
chose to mortify itself by putting on for
ceremonials of pomp and state the gar-
ments that had been wrought by her
sinful hands. Her needlework was seen
on the ruff of the governor; military
men wore it on their scarfs and
the minister on his band; it decked
the baby’s little cap; it was shut
up to be mildewed and molder away
in the coffins of the dead. But it
is not recorded that in a single instance
was her skill called in to embroider the
white veil which was to cover the pure
blushes of a bride. The exception indi-
cated the ever relentless rigor with
which society frowned upon her sin.
Hester sought not to acquire anything
beyond a subsistence of the plainest
and most ascetic description for herself
and a simple abundance for her child.
tier owmffK-ss wak or tne coarsest mate-
rials and.the most somber hue with only
that one •ornament —the scarlet letter—-
which it'.was her doom to wear. The
•child’s attire on the other hand was
distinguished by a fanciful or we might
rather say a fantastic ingenuity which
served indeed to heighten the airy charm
that early began to develop itself in the
little girl but which appeared to have
Also a deeper meaning. We may speak
further of it hereafter. Except for that
small expenditure in the decoration of
her infant Hester bestowed all her su-
perfluous means in charity on wretches
less miserable than herself and who not
unfrequently insulted the hand that fed
them. Much of the time which she
might readily have applied to the better
efforts of her art she employed in mak-
ing coarse garments for the poor.
It is probable that there was an idea
of penance in this mode of occupation
and .that she offered up a real sacrifice
of enjoyment in devoting so many
hours to such rude handiwork. She had
in her nature a rich voluptuous ori-
ental characteristic—a taste for the
gorgeously beautiful which save in the
exquisite productions of her needle
found nothing else in all the possibili-
ties of her life to exercise itself upon.
Women derive a pleasure incompre-
hensible to the other sex from the deli-
cate toil of fhe needle. To Hester
Prynne it might have been a mode of
expressing and therefore soothing the
passion of her life. Like all other joys
she rejected it as sin. This morbid
meddling of conscience with an imma-
terial matter betokened it is to be
feared no genuine and steadfast peni-
tence but something doubtful some-
thing that might be deeply wrong be-
neath. • * *
Her imagination was somewhat af-
fected and liad she been of a softer
moral and intellectual fiber would have
been still more so by the strange and
solitary anguish of her life. Walking
to and fro with those lonely footsteps
in the little world with which she was
outwardly connected it now aud then
appeared to Hester—if altogether fancy
it was nevertheless too potent to be re-
sisted—she felt or fancied then that
the scarlet letter had endowed her with
a new sense. She shuddered to believe
yet could not help believing that it gave
her a sympathetic knowledge of the hid-
den sin in other hearts. She was terror
stricken by the revelations that were
thus made. What were they? Could
they be other than the insidious whis-
pers of the bad angel who would fain
have persuaded the struggling woman
as yet only half his victim that the out-
ward guise of purity was but a lie and
that if truth were everywhere to be
shown a scarlet letter would blaze
forth on many a bosom besides Hester
Prynne’s? Or must she receive those in-
timations so obscure yet so distinct as
truth?
In all her miserable experience there
was nothing else so awful and so loath-
some as this sense. It perplexed as
well as shocked her by the irreverent
inopportuneness of the occasions that
brought it into vivid action. Sometimes
the red infamy upon her breast would
give a sympathetic throb as she passed
near a venerable minister or magistrate
the model of piety and justice to whom
that age of antique reverence looked up.
as to a moral man in fellowship with
angels. “What evil thing is at hand?”
would Hester say to herself. Lifting
her reluctant eyes there would be noth-
ing human within the scope of view
save the form of this earthly saint!
Again a mystic sisterhood would con-
tumaciously assert itself as she met the
sanctified frown of some matron who
according to the rumor of all tongues
had kept cold snow within her bosom
throughout life.
That unsunned snow in the matron’s
bosom and the burning shame on Hester
Prynne’s—what had the two in com-
mon? Or once more the electric thrill
would give her warning—“Behold Hes-
ter here is a companion!”—‘and looking
up she would detect the eyes of a young
maiden glancing at the scarlet letter
shyly and aside and quickly averted
with a faint chill crimson inhercheeks
as if her purity were somewhat sullied
by that momentary glance. O fiend
whose talisman was that fatal symbol
wouldst thou leave nothing whether in
youth or age for this poor sinner to re-
vere? Such loss of faith is ever one of the
saddest results of sin. Be it accepted as
a proof that all was not corrupt in this
poor victim of her own frailty and man’s
hard law that Hester Prynne yet strug-
gled to believe that no fellow mortal
was guilty like herself.
The vulgar who in those dreary old
times were always contributing a gro-
tesque horror to what interested their
imaginations had a story about the scar-
let letter which we might readily work
up into a terrific legend. They averred
that the symbol was not mere scarlet
cloth tinged in an earthly dye pot but
was red hot with infernal tire and could
be seen glowing all alight whenever
Hester Prynne walked abroad in the
night time. And we must needs say it
seared Hester's bosom so deeply that
perhaps there was more truth in the
rumor than our modern incredulity may
be inclined to admit.
CHAPTER V.
PEARL.
We have as yet hardly spoken of the
infant that little creature whose inno
cent life had sprung by the inscrutable
decree of Providence a lovely and im-
mortal flower out of the rank luxuriance
BARGAINS IN PROPERTY-
FOR BALE.
Five houses consisting of two business
houses and three tenement houses near
Sunset depot paying 11 per cent interest
on investment.
Three houses on Austin street suitable
for business purposes
Large corner lot on Austin street at a
reasonable figure.
Large lot on Burnet street near Austin
street.
Vacant lot on Burnet street 50 by 125
feet.
House of six rooms lot 70 by 180 feet
southern exposure on Burnet street.
Two fine lots on Ciuouj street d2)< by
187 feet each.
Five lots on Palmetto srieet. Govern-
ment hill fronting east 22% by 43 varas
each.
Also lots on Carso- an< Mason streets
Government hill.
Two tine lots near River Avenue on
Grayson street
Two very neat cottages of 6 rooms each
on River avenue.
Two large lots on Mesquite street near
Sunset shops.
House of 7 rooms fronting on Mavecrik
park with all modern improvements.
Fine property on Avenue C can be
bought at a bargain.
Large lot on Sixth street suitable for
building a nice house.
Fine two-story house on Avenue B with
large lot; all modern improvements.
House 7 rooms with large lot running
back to river nearly 2 acres of ground in
the enclosure on Ninth street.
Cottage of 6 rooms large corner lot on
Oakland street.
Two story frame house with lot 68 by
160 feet centrally located good neigh-
borhood. all modern improvements
southeastern exposure.
Cottage of 7 rooms with two large lots
on Tobin Hili.
Two lots 20 by 60 varas each on Tobin
Hill corner lots.
Lot on Ogden street 20 by 60 varas.
Block of 24 lots near West End street
railway at a bargain.
‘I wo nouses b rooms eacn Jot 20 by 75
varaq back to ditch on East Commerce
street.
House 5 rooms and hall large lot on
Presa street.
A number of fine lots on Tobin Hill
ranging in price from $6OO to $lOOO.
Two story Mansard roof brick dwelling
with all modern Improvements large lot.
Two story brick dwelling' with all
modern Improvements near street car
line.
IsLarge house and corner lot on Presa
reet on car line.
Two story house large lot with alley in
rear on Goliad street.
Two story fiame house centrally lo-
cated in first class neighborhood corner
lot.
Two story frame house 2 lots 1 block
from San Pedro avenue car line.
Frame cottage of 6 rooms lot 55% by
300 feet on san Pedro avenue.
Two story frame house on San Pedro
avenue near water works office.
Two story brick house on Main avenue
a most desirable.house.
House 5 rooms large lot stable on 811 -
street. .
House. 6 rooms hall bath lot 70 by 160
feet on Marshall street.
124 by 160 feet on Franklin square a
bargain.
Vacant ots [on West Houston and West
Commerce streets.
Two-story frame house 2 large corner
lots on Prospect hill 1 block from car
line.
Four lots near I. & G. N. depot on
Medina street.
Rock house. 6 rooms large corner lot
on Garden street.
Rock house. 7 rooms lot 96 by 160 feet
centrally located.
Cottage 5 rooms and hall on Sycamore
street.
Reck and brick house. 7 rooms bath.
Lot 134x208 feet; good stable cowshed
chicken house; on one of the highest
points'around the city; southern exposure.
Two corner lots near Dreiss residence
on Powder House hill.
Frame cottage 5 rooms on Dacota
street 2 large lots.
These are only a few of the many bar-
gains that we have and before purchas-
ing it would be we’d to call upon
John T Hambleton & Co.
No. 4 East Commerce street.
No. 4748
’IUEASURY DU’HnMKNT. OFFICE OF 1
Comptroller of the Currency. >
Was unoton June 21893. )
Whereas evidence presented to the
undersigned it lias been made to appear
that the Fifth National Rank of San An-
tonio. in the City of San Antonio in the
County of i ? exar and State of Texas has
complied with all the provisions of the
statutes of the United States required to
be complied with before an association
shall lie authorized to commence the busi-
ness of banking. Now therefore I Ro-
bert M. Nixon Deputy and Acting Comp-
troller of the Currency do hereby certify
that The Fifth National Bank of San
Antonio In the city of San Antonio in
the County of Bexar and Slate of Texas
is authorized to commence the business
of banking as provided in Section Fifty-
one hundred and sixty nine of the re-
vised Statutes of the United States
In testimony whereof witness
[l. s.l my hand and seal of office this
2d day of June 1892.
(Signed) R. M. Nixon
Deputy and Acting Comptroller of the
Currency.
Garden Blocks.
Forty-five ten acre garden blocks
three and one half mile southeast of
the post office for sale. Plenty of
artesian water to irrigate with and
fine loamy sandy soil splendid for
fruits vegetables and berries; and
graded streets to within a short dis-
tance of property Special induce-
ments offered to practical gardners
so now is your chance if you mean
business and want to get rich. Ap-
ply for further particulars to A. J.
May. over Texas National Bank. 14c
HOUSE FOR RENT
Comfortable residence corner N. Flores
and Belvin streets. Apply or address Jas.
P. Newcomb S. A. Light office. 5 25 6t
THE SALOONS
The "MACKEY'
Restaurant and Cafe
The Delmonico of
the South.
•
The Cafe is supplied with the Finest
brands of Imported and
Domestic
Wines Liquors. Cigars.
Polite attention and courteous treat-'
ment extended to all.
Your patronage solicited.
The MACKEY BLOCK
Houston Street
J. A. BRYANT • • PROPRIETOR
JAMES. T. BRADY’S
OPPOSITE SOOTHE I N HOTET.
OFFICE BAR!
Is headquarters for
Stockman and Other Gentlemen .
Who know where to get something’good
All kinds of liquid refreshments
Drop in on Brady’s once and you will
be sure to call again. 8-i2-tf
~~
Tf You warn a Drink of
the Fine Old
Woodland of 1882
Drop in at The
Silver King Saloon
Corner of Flores and West Commerce
streets on east side of Military Plaza.
H.E. TUTTLE Proprietor
Also the finest brands of imported and
domestic wines liquors and 910
WHEN DOWN TH S WAY
“DROP IN AND SEE US.”
CRYSTAL SALOON
Berliner. Tommins & Simms
Proprietors.
307 Main Plaza -1 San Antonio Texas.
Where you can get the very best re-
freshments and the finest cigars "and
courteous treatment at all times.
•
Cooley’s -:- Register
—: FINEST ’
Imported Wines. Liqnors\Ciiiars.
23 Alamo Plaza Sin Antonio.
JOE COOLEYJ- IPROPRiETon.
Headquarters for Commercial Meu.
L. HUTH & SON
THE OLD STAND
Hardware. Paint and Seed
STORE.
226228 and 230 Market St. San Antonio
Hearquut* rs For: —D. Landreth & Son’s
Garden Field and Flower Seeds. Agents for
Harri on Bn s and Co. Towt Country’’
R< ady Fixed Psints andCc.ors Brinly'sBteel
and Cart Iron Hows. Planet Jr. Horse Hoe
and Cultivator’s Combined Hand Drills Plows
wilder* Ha dware. Etc. Just received: Car
load Suga' (lane Mitlet Alfalfa Clover.
Missouri Seed Corn etc
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San Antonio Daily Light. (San Antonio, Tex.), Vol. 12, No. 127, Ed. 1 Wednesday, June 15, 1892, newspaper, June 15, 1892; San Antonio, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1681747/m1/6/?rotate=0: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; .