ture. Indeed the brethren of Brook Farm
should have held themselves slighted rather than misrepresented, and
have regretted that the admirable genius who for a while was numbered
among them should have treated their institution mainly as a perch for
starting upon an imaginative flight. But when all is said about a
certain want of substance and cohesion in the latter portions of _The
Blithedale Romance_, the book is still a delightful and beautiful one.
Zenobia and Hollingsworth live in the memory, and even Priscilla and
Coverdale, who linger there less importunately, have a great deal that
touches us and that we believe in. I said just now that Priscilla was
infelicitous; but immediately afterwards I open the volume at a page
in which the author describes some of the out-of-door amusements at
Blithedale, and speaks of a foot-race across the grass, in which some
of the slim young girls of the society joined. "Priscilla's peculiar
charm in a foot-race was the weakness and irregularity with which she
ran. Growing up without exercise, except to her poor little fingers,
she had never yet acquired the perfect use of her legs. Setting
buoyantly forth therefore, as if no rival less swift than Atalanta
could compete with her, she ran falteringly, and often tumbled on the
grass. Such an incident--though it seems too slight to think of--was a
thing to laugh at, but which brought the water into one's eyes, and
lingered in the memory after far greater joys and sorrows were wept
out of it, as antiquated trash. Priscilla's life, as I beheld it, was
full of trifles that affected me in just this way." That seems to me
exquisite, and the book is full of touches as deep and delicate.

After writing it, Hawthorne went back to live in Concord, where he had
bought a small house in which, apparently, he expected to spend a
large portion of his future. This was in fact the dwelling in which he
passed that part of the rest of his days that he spent in his own
country. He established himself there before going to Europe, in 1853,
and he returned to the Wayside, as he called his house, on coming back
to the United States seven years later. Though he actually occupied
the place no long time, he had made it his property, and it was more
his own home than any of his numerous provisional abodes. I may
therefore quote a little account of the house which he wrote to a
distinguished friend, Mr. George Curtis.

"As for my old house, you will unders