lved, and shall take early occasion to bury him under
a heavy article, carefully summing up his merits (such as they were)
and his demerits, what few of them can be touched upon in our
limited space'; or, 'We shall commence the publication of Mr.
Hawthorne's Romance as soon as that gentleman chooses to forward it.
We are quite at a loss how to account for this delay in the
fulfilment of his contract; especially as he has already been most
liberally paid for the first number.' Say anything you like, in
short, though I really don't believe that the public will care what
you say or whether you say anything. If you choose, you may publish
the first chapter as an insulated fragment, and charge me with the
overpayment. I cannot finish it unless a great change comes over me;
and if I make too great an effort to do so, it will be my death; not
that I should care much for that, if I could fight the battle
through and win it, thus ending a life of much smoulder and scanty
fire in a blaze of glory. But I should smother myself in mud of my
own making. I mean to come to Boston soon, not for a week but for a
single day, and then I can talk about my sanitary prospects more
freely than I choose to write. I am not low-spirited, nor fanciful,
nor freakish, but look what seem to be realities in the face, and am
ready to take whatever may come. If I could but go to England now, I
think that the sea voyage and the 'Old Home' might set me all right.

"This letter is for your own eye, and I wish especially that no echo
of it may come back in your notes to me.

"P.S. Give my kindest regards to Mrs. F----, and tell her that one
of my choicest ideal places is her drawing-room, and therefore I
seldom visit it."

On Monday, the 28th of March, Hawthorne came to town and made my house
his first station on a journey to the South for health. I was greatly
shocked at his invalid appearance, and he seemed quite deaf. The light
in his eye was beautiful as ever, but his limbs seemed shrunken and his
usual stalwart vigor utterly gone. He said to me with a pathetic voice,
"Why does Nature treat us like little children! I think we could bear it
all if we knew our fate; at least it would not make much difference to
me now what became of me." Toward night he brightened up a little, and
his delicious wit flashed out, at intervals, as of old; but he was
evid