IV THE SUPPER-TABLE

The Blithedale Romance

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

IV THE SUPPER-TABLE, THE BLITHEDALE ROMANCE by Nathaniel Hawthorne

The pleasant firelight! I must still keep harping on it. The kitchen
hearth had an old-fashioned breadth, depth, and spaciousness, far within
which lay what seemed the butt of a good-sized oak-tree, with the
moisture bubbling merrily out at both ends. It was now half an hour
beyond dusk. The blaze from an armful of substantial sticks, rendered
more combustible by brushwood and pine, flickered powerfully on the
smoke-blackened walls, and so cheered our spirits that we cared not what
inclemency might rage and roar on the other side of our illuminated
windows. A yet sultrier warmth was bestowed by a goodly quantity of peat,
which was crumbling to white ashes among the burning brands, and
incensed the kitchen with its not ungrateful fragrance. The exuberance
of this household fire would alone have sufficed to bespeak us no true
farmers; for the New England yeoman, if he have the misfortune to dwell
within practicable distance of a wood-market, is as niggardly of each
stick as if it were a bar of California gold.

But it was fortunate for us, on that wintry eve of our untried life, to
enjoy the warm and radiant luxury of a somewhat too abundant fire. If it
served no other purpose, it made the men look so full of youth, warm
blood, and hope, and the women--such of them, at least, as were anywise
convertible by its magic--so very beautiful, that I would cheerfully have
spent my last dollar to prolong the blaze. As for Zenobia, there was a
glow in her cheeks that made me think of Pandora, fresh from Vulcan's
workshop, and full of the celestial warmth by dint of which he had
tempered and moulded her.

"Take your places, my dear friends all," cried she; "seat yourselves
without ceremony, and you shall be made happy with such tea as not many
of the world's working-people, except yourselves, will find in their cups
to-night. After this one supper, you may drink buttermilk, if you please.
To-night we will quaff this nectar, which, I assure you, could not be
bought with gold."

We all sat down,--grizzly Silas Foster, his rotund helpmate, and the two
bouncing handmaidens, included,--and looked at one another in a friendly
but rather awkward way. It was the first practical trial of our theories
of equal brotherhood and sisterhood; and we people of superior
cultivation and refinement (for as such, I presume, we unhesitatingly
reckoned ourselves) felt as if something were already, accomplished
towards the millennium of love. The truth is, however, that the laboring
oar was with our unpolished companions; it being far easier to condescend
than to accept of condescension. Neither did I refrain from questioning,
in secret, whether some of us--and Zenobia among the rest--would so
quietly have taken our places among these good people, save for the
cherished consciousness that it was not by necessity but choice. Though
we saw fit to drink our tea out of earthen cups to-night, and in earthen
company, it was at our own option to use pictured porcelain and handle
silver forks again to-morrow. This same salvo, as to the power of
regaining our former position, contributed much, I fear, to the
equanimity with which we subsequently bore many of the hardships and
humiliations of a life of toil. If ever I have deserved (which has not
often been the case, and, I think, never), but if ever I did deserve to
be soundly cuffed by a fellow mortal, for secretly putting weight upon
some imaginary social advantage, it must have been while I was striving
to prove myself ostentatiously his equal and no more. It was while I sat
beside him on his cobbler's bench, or clinked my hoe against his own in
the cornfield, or broke the same crust of bread, my earth-grimed hand to
his, at our noontide lunch. The poor, proud man should look at both
sides of sympathy like this.

The silence which followed upon our sitting down to table grew rather
oppressive; indeed, it was hardly broken by a word, during the first
round of Zenobia's fragrant tea.

"I hope," said I, at last, "that our blazing windows will be visible a
great way off. There is nothing so pleasant and encouraging to a
solitary traveller, on a stormy night, as a flood of firelight seen amid
the gloom. These ruddy window panes cannot fail to cheer the hearts of
all that look at them. Are they not warm with the beacon-fire which we
have kindled for humanity?"

"The blaze of that brushwood will only last a minute or two longer,"
observed Silas Foster; but whether he meant to insinuate that our moral
illumination would have as brief a term, I cannot say.

"Meantime," said Zenobia, "it may serve to guide some wayfarer to a
shelter."

And, just as she said this, there came a knock at the house door.

"There is one of the world's wayfarers," said I. "Ay, ay, just so!"
quoth Silas Foster. "Our firelight will draw stragglers, just as a
candle draws dorbugs on a summer night."

Whether to enjoy a dramatic suspense, or that we were selfishly
contrasting our own comfort with the chill and dreary situation of the
unknown person at the threshold, or that some of us city folk felt a
little startled at the knock which came so unseasonably, through night
and storm, to the door of the lonely farmhouse,--so it happened that
nobody, for an instant or two, arose to answer the summons. Pretty soon
there came another knock. The first had been moderately loud; the second
was smitten so forcibly that the knuckles of the applicant must have left
their mark in the door panel.

"He knocks as if he had a right to come in," said Zenobia, laughing.
"And what are we thinking of?--It must be Mr. Hollingsworth!"

Hereupon I went to the door, unbolted, and flung it wide open. There,
sure enough, stood Hollingsworth, his shaggy greatcoat all covered with
snow, so that he looked quite as much like a polar bear as a modern
philanthropist.

"Sluggish hospitality this!" said he, in those deep tones of his, which
seemed to come out of a chest as capacious as a barrel. "It would have
served you right if I had lain down and spent the night on the doorstep,
just for the sake of putting you to shame. But here is a guest who will
need a warmer and softer bed."

And, stepping back to the wagon in which he had journeyed hither,
Hollingsworth received into his arms and deposited on the doorstep a
figure enveloped in a cloak. It was evidently a woman; or, rather,
--judging from the ease with which he lifted her, and the little space
which she seemed to fill in his arms, a slim and unsubstantial girl. As
she showed some hesitation about entering the door, Hollingsworth, with
his usual directness and lack of ceremony, urged her forward not merely
within the entry, but into the warm and strongly lighted kitchen.

"Who is this?" whispered I, remaining behind with him, while he was
taking off his greatcoat.

"Who? Really, I don't know," answered Hollingsworth, looking at me with
some surprise. "It is a young person who belongs here, however; and no
doubt she had been expected. Zenobia, or some of the women folks, can
tell you all about it."

"I think not," said I, glancing towards the new-comer and the other
occupants of the kitchen. "Nobody seems to welcome her. I should hardly
judge that she was an expected guest."

"Well, well," said Hollingsworth quietly, "We'll make it right."

The stranger, or whatever she were, remained standing precisely on that
spot of the kitchen floor to which Hollingsworth's kindly hand had
impelled her. The cloak falling partly off, she was seen to be a very
young woman dressed in a poor but decent gown, made high in the neck, and
without any regard to fashion or smartness. Her brown hair fell down
from beneath a hood, not in curls but with only a slight wave; her face
was of a wan, almost sickly hue, betokening habitual seclusion from the
sun and free atmosphere, like a flower-shrub that had done its best to
blossom in too scanty light. To complete the pitiableness of her aspect,
she shivered either with cold, or fear, or nervous excitement, so that
you might have beheld her shadow vibrating on the fire-lighted wall. In
short, there has seldom been seen so depressed and sad a figure as this
young girl's; and it was hardly possible to help being angry with her,
from mere despair of doing anything for her comfort. The fantasy occurred
to me that she was some desolate kind of a creature, doomed to wander
about in snowstorms; and that, though the ruddiness of our window panes
had tempted her into a human dwelling, she would not remain long enough
to melt the icicles out of her hair. Another conjecture likewise came
into my mind. Recollecting Hollingsworth's sphere of philanthropic
action, I deemed it possible that he might have brought one of his guilty
patients, to be wrought upon and restored to spiritual health by the pure
influences which our mode of life would create.

As yet the girl had not stirred. She stood near the door, fixing a pair
of large, brown, melancholy eyes upon Zenobia--only upon Zenobia!--she
evidently saw nothing else in the room save that bright, fair, rosy,
beautiful woman. It was the strangest look I ever witnessed; long a
mystery to me, and forever a memory. Once she seemed about to move
forward and greet her,--I know not with what warmth or with what words,
--but, finally, instead of doing so, she dropped down upon her knees,
clasped her hands, and gazed piteously into Zenobia's face. Meeting no
kindly reception, her head fell on her bosom.

I never thoroughly forgave Zenobia for her conduct on this occasion. But
women are always more cautious in their casual hospitalities than men.

"What does the girl mean?" cried she in rather a sharp tone. "Is she
crazy? Has she no tongue?"

And here Hollingsworth stepped forward.

"No wonder if the poor child's tongue is frozen in her mouth," said he;
and I think he positively frowned at Zenobia. "The very heart will be
frozen in her bosom, unless you women can warm it, among you, with the
warmth that ought to be in your own!"

Hollingsworth's appearance was very striking at this moment. He was then
about thirty years old, but looked several years older, with his great
shaggy head, his heavy brow, his dark complexion, his abundant beard, and
the rude strength with which his features seemed to have been hammered
out of iron, rather than chiselled or moulded from any finer or softer
material. His figure was not tall, but massive and brawny, and well
befitting his original occupation; which as the reader probably
knows--was that of a blacksmith. As for external polish, or mere
courtesy of manner, he never possessed more than a tolerably educated
bear; although, in his gentler moods, there was a tenderness in his voice,
eyes, mouth, in his gesture, and in every indescribable manifestation,
which few men could resist and no woman. But he now looked stern and
reproachful; and it was with that inauspicious meaning in his glance that
Hollingsworth first met Zenobia's eyes, and began his influence upon her
life.

To my surprise, Zenobia--of whose haughty spirit I had been told so many
examples--absolutely changed color, and seemed mortified and confused.

"You do not quite do me justice, Mr. Hollingsworth," said she almost
humbly. "I am willing to be kind to the poor girl. Is she a protegee of
yours? What can I do for her?"

"Have you anything to ask of this lady?" said Hollingsworth kindly to the
girl. "I remember you mentioned her name before we left town."

"Only that she will shelter me," replied the girl tremulously. "Only
that she will let me be always near her."

"Well, indeed," exclaimed Zenobia, recovering herself and laughing, "this
is an adventure, and well-worthy to be the first incident in our life of
love and free-heartedness! But I accept it, for the present, without
further question, only," added she, "it would be a convenience if we knew
your name."

"Priscilla," said the girl; and it appeared to me that she hesitated
whether to add anything more, and decided in the negative. "Pray do not
ask me my other name,--at least not yet,--if you will be so kind to a
forlorn creature."

Priscilla!--Priscilla! I repeated the name to myself three or four times;
and in that little space, this quaint and prim cognomen had so
amalgamated itself with my idea of the girl, that it seemed as if no
other name could have adhered to her for a moment. Heretofore the poor
thing had not shed any tears; but now that she found herself received,
and at least temporarily established, the big drops began to ooze out
from beneath her eyelids as if she were full of them. Perhaps it showed
the iron substance of my heart, that I could not help smiling at this odd
scene of unknown and unaccountable calamity, into which our cheerful
party had been entrapped without the liberty of choosing whether to
sympathize or no. Hollingsworth's behavior was certainly a great deal
more creditable than mine.

"Let us not pry further into her secrets," he said to Zenobia and the
rest of us, apart; and his dark, shaggy face looked really beautiful with
its expression of thoughtful benevolence. "Let us conclude that
Providence has sent her to us, as the first-fruits of the world, which we
have undertaken to make happier than we find it. Let us warm her poor,
shivering body with this good fire, and her poor, shivering heart with
our best kindness. Let us feed her, and make her one of us. As we do by
this friendless girl, so shall we prosper. And, in good time, whatever
is desirable for us to know will be melted out of her, as inevitably as
those tears which we see now."

"At least," remarked I, "you may tell us how and where you met with her."

"An old man brought her to my lodgings," answered Hollingsworth, "and
begged me to convey her to Blithedale, where--so I understood him--she
had friends; and this is positively all I know about the matter."

Grim Silas Foster, all this while, had been busy at the supper-table,
pouring out his own tea and gulping it down with no more sense of its
exquisiteness than if it were a decoction of catnip; helping himself to
pieces of dipt toast on the flat of his knife blade, and dropping half of
it on the table-cloth; using the same serviceable implement to cut slice
after slice of ham; perpetrating terrible enormities with the butterplate;
and in all other respects behaving less like a civilized Christian than
the worst kind of an ogre. Being by this time fully gorged, he crowned
his amiable exploits with a draught from the water pitcher, and then
favored us with his opinion about the business in hand. And, certainly,
though they proceeded out of an unwiped mouth, his expressions did him
honor.

"Give the girl a hot cup of tea and a thick slice of this first-rate
bacon," said Silas, like a sensible man as he was. "That's what she
wants. Let her stay with us as long as she likes, and help in the
kitchen, and take the cow-breath at milking time; and, in a week or two,
she'll begin to look like a creature of this world."

So we sat down again to supper, and Priscilla along with us.