Love Letters of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Volume 1 of 2

Little Dove, why did you shed tears the other day, when you supposed that your husband thought you to blame for regretting the irrevocable past? Dearest, I never think you to blame; for you positively have no faults. Not that you always act wisely, or judge wisely, or feel precisely what it would be wise to feel, in relation to this present world and state of being; but it is because you are too delicately and exquisitely wrought in heart, mind, and frame, to dwell in such a world – because, in short, you are fitter to be in Paradise than here. You needed, therefore, an interpreter between the world and yourself – one who should sometimes set you right, not in the abstract (for there you are never wrong) but relatively to human and earthly matters; – and such an interpreter is your husband, who can sympathise, though inadequately, with his wife's heavenly nature, and has likewise a portion of shrewd earthly sense, enough to guide us both through the labyrinths of time. Now, dearest, when I criticise any act, word, thought, or feeling of yours, you must not understand it as a reproof, or as imputing anything wrong, wherewith you are to burthen your conscience. Were an angel, however holy and wise, to come and dwell with mortals, he would need the guidance and instruction of some mortal; and so will you, my Dove, need mine – and precisely the same sort of guidance that the angel would. Then do not grieve, nor grieve your husband's spirit, when he essays to do his office; but remember that he does it reverently, and in the devout belief that you are, in immortal reality, both wiser and better than himself, though sometimes he may chance to interpret the flitting shadows around us more accurately than you. Hear what I say, dearest, in a cheerful spirit, and act upon it with cheerful strength. And do not give an undue weight to my judgment, nor imagine that there is no appeal from it, and that its decrees are not to be questioned. Rather, make it a rule always to question them and be satisfied of their correctness; – and so shall my Dove be improved and perfected in the gift of a human understanding, till she become even earthly-wiselier than her sagacious husband. Undine's husband gave her an immortal soul; my beloved wife must be content with an humbler gift from me, being already provided with as high and pure a soul as ever was created.

God bless you, belovedest. I bestow three kisses on the air – they are intended for your eyelids and brow, to drive away the head-ache.

Your Ownest.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody,

Care of Dr. N. Peabody,

Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY Custom-House, Novr. 30th [1839]

Mine own Dove,

You will have received my letter, dearest, ere now, and I trust that it will have conveyed the peace of my own heart into yours; for my heart is too calm and peaceful in the sense of our mutual love, to be disturbed even by my sweetest wife's disquietude. Belovedest and blessedest, I cannot feel anything but comfort in you. Rest quietly on my deep, deep, deepest affection. You deserve it all, and infinitely more than all, were it only for the happiness you give me. I apprehended that this cup could not pass from you, without your tasting bitterness among its dregs. You have been too calm, my beloved – you have exhausted your strength. Let your soul lean upon my love, till we meet again – then all your troubles shall be hushed.

Your ownest, happiest,Deodatus.

How does Sophie Hawthorne do? Expect a letter on Tuesday. God bless my dearest.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody,

Care of Dr. N. Peabody,

Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY Boston, December 1st, 1839 – 6 or 7 P.M.

My Dearest,

The day must not pass without my speaking a word or two to my belovedest wife, of whom I have thought, with tender anxieties mingled with comfortable hopes, all day long. Dearest, is your heart at peace now? God grant it – and I have faith that He will communicate the peace of my heart to yours. Mine own wife, always when there is trouble within you, let your husband know of it. Strive to fling your burthen upon me; for there is strength enough in me to bear it all, and love enough to make me happy in bearing it. I will not give up any of my conjugal rights – and least of all this most precious right of ministering to you in all sorrow. My bosom was made, among other purposes, for mine ownest wife to shed tears upon. This I have known, ever since we were married – and I had yearnings to be your support and comforter, even before I knew that God was uniting our spirits in immortal wedlock. I used to think that it would be happiness enough, food enough for my heart, it I could be the life-long, familiar friend of your family, and be allowed to see yourself every evening, and to watch around you to keep harm away – though you might never know what an interest I felt in you. And how infinitely more than this has been granted me! Oh, never dream, blessedest wife, that you can be other than a comfort to your husband – or that he can be disappointed in you. Mine own Dove, I hardly know how it is, but nothing that you do or say ever surprises or disappoints me; it must be that my spirit is so thoroughly and intimately conscious of you, that there exists latent within me a prophetic knowledge of all your vicissitudes of joy or sorrow; so that, though I cannot foretell them before-hand, yet I recognize them when they come. Nothing disturbs the preconceived idea of you in my mind. Whether in bliss or agony, still you are mine own Dove – still my blessing – still my peace. Belovedest, since the foregoing sentence, I have been interrupted; so I will leave the rest of the sheet till tomorrow evening. Good night, and in writing these words my soul has flown through the air to give you a fondest kiss. Did you not feel it?

Decr. 2d. – Your letter came to me at the Custom-House, very dearest, at about eleven o'clock; and I opened it with an assured hope of finding good news about my Dove; for I had trusted very much in Sophie Hawthorne's assistance. Well, I am afraid I shall never find in my heart to call that excellent little person "Naughty" again – no; and I have even serious thoughts of giving up all further designs upon her nose, since she hates so much to have it kissed. Yet the poor little nose! – would it not be quite depressed (I do not mean flattened) by my neglect, after becoming accustomed to such marked attention? And besides, I have a particular affection for that nose, insomuch that I intend, one of these days, to offer it an oblation of rich and delicate odours. But I suppose Sophie Hawthorne would apply her handkerchief, so that the poor nose should reap no pleasure nor profit from my incense. Naughty Sophie Hawthorne! There – I have called her "naughty" already – and on a mere supposition, too.

Half a page of nonsense about Sophie Hawthorne's nose! And now have I anything to say to my little Dove? Yes – a reproof. My Dove is to understand, that she entirely exceeds her jurisdiction, in presuming to sit in judgment upon herself, and pass such severe censure as she did upon her Friday's letter – or indeed any censure at all. It was her bounden duty to write that letter; for it was the cry of her heart, which ought and must have reached her husband's ears, wherever in the world he might be. And yet you call it wicked. Was it Sophie Hawthorne or the Dove that called it so? Naughty Sophie Hawthorne – naughty Dove – for I believe they are both partakers of this naughtiness.

Dearest, I have never had the good luck to profit much, or indeed any, by attending lectures; so that I think the ticket had better be bestowed on somebody who can listen to Mr. Emerson more worthily. My evenings are very precious to me; and some of them are unavoidably thrown away in paying or receiving visits, or in writing letters of business; and therefore I prize the rest as if the sands of the hour-glass were gold or diamond dust. I have no other time to sit in my parlor (let me call it ours) and be happy by our own fireside – happy in reveries about a certain little wife of mine, who would fain have me spend my evenings in hearing lectures, lest I should incommode her with too frequent epistles.

Good bye, dearest. I suppose I have left a dozen questions in your letter unanswered; but you shall ask them again when we meet. Do not you long to see me? Mercy on us, – what a pen! It looks as if I had laid a strong emphasis on that sentence. God bless my Dove, and Sophie Hawthorne too. – So prays their ownest husband.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody,

Care of Dr. N. Peabody,

Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY Boston, Decr. 5th, 1839 – 5 P.M.

Dearest wife,

I do wish that you would evince the power of your spirit over its outward manifestations, in some other way than by raising an inflammation over your eye. Do, belovedest, work another miracle forthwith, and cause this mountain – for I fancy it as of really mountainous bulk – cause it to be cast into the sea, or anywhere else; so that both eyes may greet your husband, when he comes home. Otherwise, I know not but my eyes will have an inflammation too; – they certainly smarted in a very unwonted manner, last evening. "The naughty swelling!" as my Dove (or Sophie Hawthorne) said of the swollen cheek that afflicted me last summer. Will kisses have any efficacy? No; I am afraid not, for if they were medicinal, my Dove's eyelids have been so imbued with them that no ill would have come there. Nevertheless, though not a preventive, a kiss may chance to be a remedy. Can Sophie Hawthorne be prevailed upon to let me try it?

I went to see my wife's (and of course my own) sister Mary, on Tuesday evening. She appeared very well; and we had a great deal of good talk, wherein my Dove was not utterly forgotten – (now will Sophie Hawthorne, thinking the Dove slighted, pout her lip at that expression) – well then, my Dove was directly or indirectly concerned in all my thoughts, and most of my words. Mrs. Park was not there, being gone, I believe, to some lecture. Mary and your husband talked with the utmost hopefulness and faith of my Dove's future health and well-being. Dearest, you are well (all but the naughty swelling) and you always will be well. I love Mary because she loves you so much; – our affections meet in you, and so we become kindred. But everybody loves my Dove – everybody that knows her – and those that know her not love her also, though unconsciously, whenever they image to themselves something sweeter, and tenderer, and nobler, than they can meet with on earth. It is the likeness of my Dove that has haunted the dreams of poets, ever since the world began. Happy me, to whom that dream has become the reality of all realities – whose bosom has been warmed, and is forever warmed, with the close embrace of her who has flitted shadowlike away from all other mortals! Dearest, I wish your husband had the gift of making rhymes; for methinks there is poetry in his head and heart, since he has been in love with you. You are a Poem, my Dove. Of what sort, then? Epic? – Mercy on me, – no! A sonnet? – no; for that is too labored and artificial. My Dove is a sort of sweet, simple, gay, pathetic ballad, which Nature is singing, sometimes with tears, sometimes with smiles, and sometimes with intermingled smiles and tears.

I was invited to dine at Mr. Bancroft's yesterday with Miss Margaret Fuller; but Providence had given me some business to do; for which I was very thankful. When my Dove and Sophie Hawthorne can go with me, I shall not be afraid to accept invitations to meet literary lions and lionesses, because then I shall put the above-said redoubtable little personage in the front of the battle. What do you think, Dearest, of the expediency of my making a caucus speech? A great many people are very desirous of listening to your husband's eloquence; and that is considered the best method of making my debut. Now, probably, will Sophie Hawthorne utterly refuse to be kissed, unless I give up all notion of speechifying at a caucus. Silly little Sophie! – I would not do it, even if thou thyself besought it of me.

Belovedest, I wish, before declining your ticket to Mr. Emerson's lectures, that I had asked whether you wished me to attend them; for if you do, I should have more pleasure in going, than if the wish were originally my own.

Dearest wife, nobody can come within the circle of my loneliness, save you; – you are my only companion in the world; – at least, when I compare other intercourse with our intimate communion, it seems as [if] other people were the world's width asunder. And yet I love all the world better for my Dove's sake.

Good bye, belovedest. Drive away that "naughty swelling."

Your Ownest Husband.

Do not expect me till seven o'clock on Saturday – as I shall not leave Boston till sunset.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody,

Care of Dr. N. Peabody,

Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY Boston, Decr. 11th, 1839 – 7 P.M.

Belovedest,

I am afraid you will expect a letter tomorrow – afraid, because I feel very sure that I shall not be able to fill this sheet tonight. I am well, and happy, and I love you dearly, sweetest wife; – nevertheless, it is next to impossibility for me to put ideas into words. Even in writing these two or three lines, I have fallen into several long fits of musing. I wish there was something in the intellectual world analogous to the Daguerrotype (is that the name of it?) in the visible – something which should print off our deepest, and subtlest, and delicatest thoughts and feelings as minutely and accurately as the above-mentioned instrument paints the various aspects of Nature. Then might my Dove and I interchange our reveries – but my Dove would get only lead in exchange for gold. Dearest, your last letter brought the warmth of your very heart to your husband – Belovedest, I cannot possibly write one word more, to-night.

This striving to talk on paper does but remove you farther from me. It seems as if Sophie Hawthorne fled away into infinite space the moment I try to fix her image before me in order to inspire my pen; – whereas, no sooner do I give myself up to reverie, than here she is again, smiling lightsomely by my side. There will be no writing of letters in Heaven; at least, I shall write none then, though I think it would add considerably to my bliss to receive them from my Dove. Never was I so stupid as to-night; – and yet it is not exactly stupidity, either, for my fancy is bright enough, only it has, just at this time, no command of external symbols. Good night, dearest wife. Love your husband, and dream of him.

Decr. 12th – 6 P.M. Blessedest – Dove-ward and Sophie Hawthorne-ward doth your husband acknowledge himself "very reprehensible," for leaving his poor wife destitute of news from him such an interminable time – one, two, three, four days tomorrow noon. After seven years' absence, without communication, a marriage, if I mistake not, is deemed to be legally dissolved. Does it not appear at least seven years to my Dove, since we parted? It does to me. And will my Dove, or naughty Sophie Hawthorne, choose to take advantage of the law, and declare our marriage null and void? Oh, naughty, naughty, naughtiest Sophie Hawthorne, to suffer such an idea to come into your head! The Dove, I am sure, would not disown her husband, but would keep her heart warm with faith and love for a million of years; so that when he returned to her (as he surely would, at some period of Eternity, to spend the rest of eternal existence with her) he would seem to find in her bosom the warmth which his parting embrace had left there.

Very dearest, I do wish you would come to see me, this evening. If we could be together in this very parlour of ours, I think you, and both of us, would feel more completely at home than we ever have before in all our lives. Your chamber is but a room in your mother's house, where my Dove cannot claim an independent and separate right; she has a right, to be sure, but it is as a daughter. As a wife, it might be a question whether she has a right. Now this pleasant little room, where I sit, together with the bed-room in which I intend to dream tonight of my Dove, is my dwelling, my castle, mine own place wherein to be, which I have bought, for the time being, with the profits of mine own labor. Then is it not our home?

(Rest of letter missing)TO MISS PEABODY Boston, Decr. 18th, 1839 – nearly 7 P.M.

Belovedest,

I wish you could see our parlour to-night – how bright and cheerful it looks, with the blaze of the coal-fire throwing a ruddy tinge over the walls, in spite of the yellow gleam of two lamps. Now if my Dove were sitting in the easiest of our two easy chairs – (for sometimes I should choose to have her sit in a separate chair, in order to realise our individuality, as well as our unity) – then would the included space of these four walls, together with the little contiguous bed-room, seem indeed like home. – But the soul of home is wanting now. Oh, naughtiest, why are you not here to welcome your husband when he comes in at eventide, chilled with his wintry day's toil? Why does he not find the table placed cosily in front of the fire, and a cup of tea steaming fragrantly – or else a bowl of warm bread and milk, such as his Dove feeds upon? A much-to-be-pitied husband am I, naughty wife – a homeless man – a wanderer in the desert of this great city; picking up a precarious subsistence wherever I happen to find a restaurateur or an oyster-shop – and returning at night to a lonely fireside. Dearest, have I brought the tears into your eyes? What an unwise little person is my Dove, to let the tears gather in her eyes for such nonsensical pathos as this! Yet not nonsensical either, inasmuch as it is a sore trial to your husband to be estranged from that which makes life a reality to him, and to be compelled to spend so many God-given days in a dream – in an outward show, which has nothing to satisfy the soul that has become acquainted with truth. But, mine own wife, if you had not taught me what happiness is, I should not have known that there is anything lacking to me now. I am dissatisfied – not because, at any former period of my life, I was ever a thousandth part so happy as now – but because Hope feeds and grows strong on the happiness within me. Good night, belovedest wife. I have a note to write to Mr. Capen, who torments me every now-and-then about a book which he wants me to manufacture. Hereafter, I intend that my Dove shall manage all my correspondence: – indeed, it is my purpose to throw all sorts of trouble upon my Dove's shoulders. Good night now, dearest. —

December 20th – 7 P.M. Blessedest wife – has not Sophie Hawthorne been very impatient for this letter, one half of which yet remains undeveloped in my brain and heart? Would that she could enter those inward regions, and read the letter there – together with so much that never can be expressed in written or spoken words. And can she not do this? The Dove can do it, even if Sophie Hawthorne fail. Dearest, would it be unreasonable for me to ask you to manage my share of the correspondence, as well as your own? – to throw yourself into my heart, and make it gush out with more warmth and freedom than my own pen can avail to do? How I should delight to see an epistle from myself to Sophie Hawthorne, written by my Dove! – or to my Dove, Sophie Hawthorne being the amanuensis! I doubt not, that truths would then be spoken, which my heart would recognise as existing within its depths, yet which can never be clothed in words of my own. You know that we are one another's consciousness – then it is not poss – My dearest, George Hillard has come in upon me, in the midst of the foregoing sentence, and I have utterly forgotten what I meant to say. But it is not much matter. Even if I could convince you of the expediency of your writing my letters as well as your own, still, when you attempted to take the pen out of my hand, I believe I should resist very strenuously. For, belovedest, though not an epistolarian by nature, yet the instinct of communicating myself to you makes it a necessity and a joy to write.

Your husband has received an invitation, through Mr. Collector Bancroft, to go to Dr. Channing's to-night. What is to be done? Anything, rather than to go. I never will venture into company, unless I can put myself under the protection of Sophie Hawthorne. She, I am sure, will take care that no harm comes to me. Or my Dove might take me "under her wing."

Dearest, you must not expect me too fervently on Christmas eve, because it is very uncertain whether Providence will bring us together then. If not, I shall take care to advise you thereof by letter – which, however, may chance not to come to hand till three o'clock on Christmas day. And there will be my Dove, making herself nervous with waiting for me. Dearest, I wish I could be the source of nothing but happiness to you – and that disquietude, hope deferred, and disappointment, might not ever have aught to do with your affection. Does the joy compensate for the pain? Naughty Sophie Hawthorne – silly Dove – will you let that foolish question bring tears into your eyes?

My Dove's letter was duly received.

Your lovingestHusband.

Miss Sophia A. Peabody,

Care of Dr. N. Peabody,

Salem, Mass.

TO MISS PEABODY Boston, December 24th, 1839. 6 or 7 P.M.

My very dearest,

While I sit down disconsolately to write this letter, at this very moment is my Dove expecting to hear her husband's footstep upon the threshold. She fully believes, that, within the limits of the hour which is now passing, she will be clasped to my bosom. Belovedest, I cannot bear to have you yearn for me so intensely. By and bye, when you find that I do not come, our head will begin to ache; – but still, being the "hopingest little person" in the world, you will not give me up, perhaps till eight o'clock. But soon it will be bed-time – it will be deep night – and not a spoken word, not a written line, will have come to your heart from your naughtiest of all husbands. Sophie Hawthorne, at least, will deem him the naughtiest of husbands; but my Dove will keep her faith in him just as firmly and fervently, as if she were acquainted with the particular impossibilities which keep him from her. Dearest wife, I did hope, till this afternoon, that I should be able to disburthen myself of the cargo of salt which has been resting on my weary shoulders for a week past; but it does seem as if Heaven's mercy were not meant for us miserable Custom-House officers. The holiest of holydays – the day that brought ransom to all other sinners – leaves us in slavery still.

Nevertheless, dearest, if I did not feel two disappointments in one – your own and mine – I should feel much more comfortable and resigned than I do. If I could have come to you to-night, I must inevitably have returned hither tomorrow evening. But now, in requital of my present heaviness of spirit, I am resolved that my next visit shall be at least one day longer than I could otherwise have ventured to make it. We cannot spend this Christmas eve together, mine own wife; but I have faith that you will see me on the eve of the New Year. Will not you be glad when I come home to spend three whole days, that I was kept away from you for a few brief hours on Christmas eve? For if I went now, I could not be with you then.

My blessedest, write and let me know that you have not been very much disturbed by my non-appearance. I pray you to have the feelings of a wife towards me, dearest – that is, you must feel that my whole life is yours, a life-time of long days, and therefore it is no irreparable nor very grievous loss, though sometimes a few of those days are wasted away from you. A wife should be calm and quiet, in the settled certainty of possessing her husband. Above all, dearest, bear these crosses with philosophy for my sake; for it makes me anxious and depressed, to imagine your anxiety and depression. Oh, that you could be very joyful when I come, and yet not sad when I fail to come! Is that impossible, my sweetest Dove? – is it impossible, my naughtiest Sophie Hawthorne?

TO MISS PEABODY Boston, Jany. 1st, 1840. 6 o'clock P.M.

Belovedest wife,

Your husband's heart was exceedingly touched by that little backhanded note, and likewise by the bundle of allumettes – half a dozen of which I have just been kissing with great affection. Would that I might kiss that poor dear finger of mine! Kiss it for my sake, sweetest Dove – and tell naughty Sophie Hawthorne to kiss it too. Nurse it well, dearest; for no small part of my comfort and cheeriness of heart depends upon that beloved finger. If it be not well enough to bear its part in writing me a letter within a few days, do not be surprised if I send down the best surgeon in Boston to effect a speedy cure. Nevertheless, darlingest wife, restrain the good little finger, if it show any inclination to recommence its labors too soon. If your finger be pained in writing, your husband's heart ought to (and I hope would) feel every twinge.