y man. Few, however, dreamed that they
were the work of the pale recluse of Salem, for he led a life of such
strict seclusion that not even the members of his own family could tell
with certainty what he did. His days were passed in his chamber, and at
night he took long walks alone on the sea-shore or into the woods. He
shunned all society, and seemed to find companionship only in nature,
and in the creations of his fancy. Yet he was not a morose or unhappy
man. On the contrary, he seems to have been a very happy one, full of
generous and kindly feelings, and finding only a strange pleasure where
others would have found bitterness and cynicism. Like the melancholy
Jacques, he might have said of his pensive shyness, "It is a melancholy
of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many
objects; ... which, by often rumination, wraps me in a most humorous
sadness."

In 1837 he collected his published tales, which, while they had charmed
a few cultivated readers, had scarcely been noticed by the masses, and
published them in a volume to which he gave the name of "Twice-Told
Tales." The book was well received by the public, but its circulation
was limited, although Mr. Longfellow warmly welcomed it in the "North
American Review," and pronounced it the "work of a man of genius and a
true poet." Still it was neglected by the masses, and Hawthorne says
himself that he was at that time "the most unknown author in America."
There was more truth in this assertion than lies on its face, for the
people who read the book supposed that the name of Nathaniel Hawthorne
was merely a pseudonyme, and declared that as Nathaniel was evidently
selected by the author because of the fondness of the old-time Puritans
for Scripture names, so Hawthorne was chosen by him as expressive of one
of the most beautiful features of the New England landscape. The merits
of the book were too genuine, however, for it to lack admirers, and the
small class which greeted its first appearance with delight gradually
increased, and finally the demand for the book became so great that in
1842 Hawthorne ventured to issue a second series of "Twice-Told Tales,"
the most of which had appeared in the "Democratic Review," then edited
by his friend O'Sullivan. Of these volumes, Mr. George William Curtis
says: "They are full of glancing wit, of tender satire, of exquisite
natural description, of subtle and strange analysis of human life,
darkly passionate and we