the son's affection for her as of the
deepest and tenderest nature, and they remember that when she died his
grief was almost insupportable. The anguish he suffered from her loss is
distinctly recalled by many persons still living, who visited the family
at that time in Salem.

I first saw Hawthorne when he was about thirty-five years old. He had
then published a collection of his sketches, the now famous "Twice-Told
Tales." Longfellow, ever alert for what is excellent, and eager to do a
brother author opportune and substantial service, at once came before
the public with a generous estimate of the work in the North American
Review; but the choice little volume, the most promising addition to
American literature that had appeared for many years, made little
impression on the public mind. Discerning readers, however, recognized
the supreme beauty in this new writer, and they never afterwards lost
sight of him.

In 1828 Hawthorne published a short anonymous romance called Fanshawe. I
once asked him about this disowned publication, and he spoke of it with
great disgust, and afterwards he thus referred to the subject in a
letter written to me in 1851: "You make an inquiry about some supposed
former publication of mine. I cannot be sworn to make correct answers as
to all the literary or other follies of my nonage; and I earnestly
recommend you not to brush away the dust that may have gathered over
them. Whatever might do me credit you may be pretty sure I should be
ready enough to bring forward. Anything else it is our mutual interest
to conceal; and so far from assisting your researches in that direction,
I especially enjoin it on you, my dear friend, not to read any
unacknowledged page that you may suppose to be mine."

When Mr. George Bancroft, then Collector of the Port of Boston,
appointed Hawthorne weigher and gauger in the custom-house, he did a
wise thing, for no public officer ever performed his disagreeable duties
better than our romancer. Here is a tattered little official document
signed by Hawthorne when he was watching over the interests of the
country: it certifies his attendance at the unlading of a brig, then
lying at Long Wharf in Boston. I keep this precious relic side by side
with one of a similar custom-house character, signed _Robert Burns_.

I came to know Hawthorne very intimately after the Whigs displaced the
Democratic romancer from office. In my ardent desire to have him
retained in the public