of this author’s genius.  A few rods to the north runs a little mill-stream, its sloping bank once covered with grass, now so worn and washed by the rains as to show but little except yellow sand.  Less than half a mile to the west, this stream empties into an arm of Sebago Lake.  Doubtless, at the time the house was built, the forest was so much cut away in that direction as to bring into view the waters of the lake, for a mill was built upon the brook about half-way down the valley, and it is reasonable to suppose that a clearing was made from the mill to the landing upon the shore of the pond; but the pines have so far regained their old dominion as completely to shut out the whole prospect in that direction.  Indeed, the site affords but a limited survey, except to the northwest.  Across a narrow valley in that direction lie open fields and dark pine-covered slopes.  Beyond these rise long ranges of forest-crowned hills, while in the far distance every hue of rock and tree, of field and grove, melts into the soft blue of Mount Washington.  The spot must ever have had the utter loneliness of the pine forests upon the borders of our northern lakes.  The deep silence and dark shadows of the old woods must have filled the imagination of a youth possessing Hawthorne’s sensibility with images which later years could not dispel.

“To this place came the widowed mother of Hawthorne in company with her brother, an original proprietor and one of the early settlers of the town of Raymond.  This house was built for her, and here she lived with her son for several years in the most complete seclusion.  Perhaps she strove to conceal here a grief which she could not forget.  In what way, and to what extent, the surroundings of his boyhood operated in moulding the character and developing the genius of that gifted author, I leave to the reader to determine.  I have tried simply to draw a faithful picture of his early home.”

On the 15th of December Hawthorne wrote to me:—­

“I have not yet had courage to read the Dolliver proof-sheet, but will set about it soon, though with terrible reluctance, such as I never felt before....  I am most grateful to you for protecting me from that visitation of the elephant and his cub.  If you happen to see Mr. ——­ of L——­, a young man who was here last summer, pray tell him anything that your conscience will let you, to induce him to spare me another visit, which I know he intended.  I really am not well and cannot be disturbed by strangers without more suffering than it is worth while to endure.  I thank Mrs. P——­ and yourself for your kind hospitality, past and prospective.  I never come to see you without feeling the better for it, but I must not test so precious a remedy too often.”

The new year found him incapacitated from writing much on the Romance.  On the 17th of January, 1864, he says:—­