# The Scarlet Letter: A Romance - Section 01 - The Custom-House, Introductory to "The Scarlet Letter"

An episode of [The Scarlet Letter: A Romance - Audiobook by Nathaniel Hawthorne](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1771236763), 7 Sep 2024, 23 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/61321458/scarletletter_00a_hawthorne_64kb.mp3



## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Dream Audio Books presents section two of the Scarlet Letter
[0:04] Speaker 1: by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The Custom House continued, I doubt greatly,
[0:13] Speaker 1: or rather I do not doubt at all, whether any
[0:15] Speaker 1: public functionary of the United States, either in the civil
[0:19] Speaker 1: or military line, has ever had such a patriarchal body
[0:23] Speaker 1: of veterans under his orders as myself. The whereabouts of
[0:27] Speaker 1: the oldest inhabitant was at once settled when I looked
[0:30] Speaker 1: at them. For upwards of twenty years before this epoch,
[0:35] Speaker 1: the independent position of the collector had kept the Salem
[0:38] Speaker 1: Custom House out of the whirlpool of political vicissitude, which
[0:42] Speaker 1: makes the tenure of office generally so fragile. A soldier
[0:48] Speaker 1: New England's most distinguished soldier, he stood firmly on the
[0:51] Speaker 1: pedestal of his gallant services, and himself secure in the
[0:56] Speaker 1: wise liberality of the successive administrations through which he had
[1:00] Speaker 1: held office. He had been the safety of his subordinates
[1:04] Speaker 1: in many an hour of danger and heart quake. General
[1:09] Speaker 1: Miller was radically conservative, a man over whose kindly nature
[1:13] Speaker 1: habit had no slight influence, attaching himself strongly to familiar faces,
[1:19] Speaker 1: and with difficulty moved to change even when change might
[1:23] Speaker 1: have brought unquestionable improvement. Thus, on taking charge of my department,
[1:29] Speaker 1: I found few but aged men. They were but ancient
[1:33] Speaker 1: sea captains, for the most part, who, after being tossed
[1:37] Speaker 1: on every sea and standing up sturdily against life's tempestuous blast,
[1:42] Speaker 1: had finally drifted into this quiet nook, where, with little
[1:46] Speaker 1: to disturb them except the periodical terrors of a presidential election,
[1:51] Speaker 1: they one and all acquired a new lease of existence.
[1:55] Speaker 1: Though by no means less liable than their fellow men
[1:58] Speaker 1: to age and infirmity, they had evidently some talisman or
[2:02] Speaker 1: other that kept death at bay. Two or three of
[2:06] Speaker 1: their number, as I was assured, being gouty and rheumatic,
[2:10] Speaker 1: or perhaps bedridden, never dreamed of making their appearance of
[2:13] Speaker 1: the custom house during a large part of the year,
[2:16] Speaker 1: But after a torpid winter, would creep out into the
[2:20] Speaker 1: warm sunshine of may or June, go lazily about what
[2:24] Speaker 1: they termed duty, and at their own leisure and convenience,
[2:29] Speaker 1: betake themselves to bed. Again. I must plead guilty to
[2:33] Speaker 1: the charge of abbreviating the official breath of more than
[2:36] Speaker 1: one of these venerable servants of the Republic. They were allowed,
[2:41] Speaker 1: on my representation, to rest from their arduous labors, and
[2:45] Speaker 1: soon afterwards, as if their sole principle of life had
[2:49] Speaker 1: been zeal for their country's service, as I verily believe
[2:52] Speaker 1: it was, withdrew to a better world. It is a
[2:57] Speaker 1: pious consolation to me that through my interference a sufficient
[3:01] Speaker 1: space was allowed them for repentance of the evil and
[3:04] Speaker 1: corrupt practices into which, as a matter of course, every
[3:08] Speaker 1: custom house officer must be supposed to fall. Neither the
[3:12] Speaker 1: front nor the back entrance of the custom house opens
[3:15] Speaker 1: on the road to paradise. The greater part of my
[3:20] Speaker 1: officers were Whigs. It was well for their venerable brotherhood
[3:24] Speaker 1: that the new Surveyor was not a politician, and though
[3:27] Speaker 1: a faithful Democrat in principle, neither received nor held his
[3:31] Speaker 1: office with any reference to political services. Had it been otherwise,
[3:37] Speaker 1: had an active politician been put into this influential post
[3:41] Speaker 1: to assume the easy task of making head against a
[3:43] Speaker 1: Whig collector whose infirmities withheld him from the personal administration
[3:48] Speaker 1: of his office, hardly a man of the old corps
[3:51] Speaker 1: would have drawn the breath of official life. Within a
[3:54] Speaker 1: month after the exterminating angel had come up the custom
[3:57] Speaker 1: house steps to the received code. In such matters it
[4:02] Speaker 1: would have been nothing short of duty in a politician
[4:06] Speaker 1: to bring every one of those white heads under the
[4:08] Speaker 1: axe of the guillotine. It was plain enough to discern
[4:12] Speaker 1: that the old fellows dreaded some such discourtesy at my hands.
[4:17] Speaker 1: It pained and at the same time amused me to
[4:21] Speaker 1: behold the terrors that attended my advent, to see a
[4:24] Speaker 1: furrowed cheek, weather beaten by half a century of storm,
[4:28] Speaker 1: turn ashy pale at the glance of so harmless an
[4:31] Speaker 1: individual as myself to detect as one or another addressed
[4:36] Speaker 1: me the tremor of a voice which in long past
[4:41] Speaker 1: days had been wont to bellow through a speaking trumpet,
[4:44] Speaker 1: hoarsely enough to frighten Boius himself to silence. They knew,
[4:50] Speaker 1: these excellent old persons, that by all established rule, and
[4:55] Speaker 1: as regarded some of them, weighed by their own lack
[4:58] Speaker 1: of efficiency for business, they ought to have given place
[5:02] Speaker 1: to younger men, more orthodox in politics, and altogether fitter
[5:06] Speaker 1: than themselves, to serve our common uncle. I knew it too,
[5:11] Speaker 1: but could never quite find in my heart to act
[5:14] Speaker 1: upon the knowledge. Much and deservedly to my own discredit. Therefore,
[5:19] Speaker 1: and considerably to the detriment of my official conscience, they
[5:23] Speaker 1: continued during my incumbency to creep about the wharves and
[5:27] Speaker 1: loiter up and down the custom house steps. They spent
[5:31] Speaker 1: a good deal of time also asleep in their accustomed corners,
[5:36] Speaker 1: with their chairs tilted back against the walls, awaking, however,
[5:40] Speaker 1: once or twice in the forenoon, to bore one another
[5:43] Speaker 1: with the several thousandth repetition of old sea stories and
[5:46] Speaker 1: moldy jokes that had grown to be passwords and countersigns
[5:50] Speaker 1: among them. The discovery was soon made. I imagine that
[5:55] Speaker 1: the new surveyor had no great harm in him. So,
[5:59] Speaker 1: with lights, some hearts, and the happy consciousness of being
[6:02] Speaker 1: usefully employed in their own behalf, at least, if not
[6:05] Speaker 1: for our beloved country, these good old gentlemen went through
[6:09] Speaker 1: the various formalities of office. Sagaciously under their spectacles did
[6:14] Speaker 1: they peep into the holds of vessels. Mighty was there
[6:18] Speaker 1: fuss about little matters and marvelous sometimes the obtuseness that
[6:23] Speaker 1: allowed greater ones to slip between their fingers. Whenever such
[6:28] Speaker 1: a mischance occurred when a wagon load of valuable merchandise
[6:32] Speaker 1: had been smuggled ashore at noonday, perhaps and directly beneath
[6:36] Speaker 1: their unsuspicious noses. Nothing could exceed the vigilance and alacrity
[6:41] Speaker 1: with which they proceeded to lock and double lock, and
[6:44] Speaker 1: secure with tape and sealing wax all the avenues of
[6:48] Speaker 1: the delinquent vessel. Instead of a reprimand for their previous negligence,
[6:54] Speaker 1: the case seemed rather to require a eulogium on their
[6:57] Speaker 1: praiseworthy caution after the mischief had occurred, a grateful recognition
[7:01] Speaker 1: of the promptitude of their zeal, the moment that there
[7:04] Speaker 1: was no longer any remedy. Unless people are more than
[7:08] Speaker 1: commonly disagreeable, it is my foolish habit to contract a
[7:12] Speaker 1: kindness for them. The better part of my companion's character,
[7:16] Speaker 1: if it have a better part, is that which usually
[7:19] Speaker 1: comes upmost in my regard, and forms the type whereby
[7:23] Speaker 1: I recognize the man. As most of these old custom
[7:27] Speaker 1: house officers had good trades, and as my position in
[7:30] Speaker 1: reference to them, being paternal and protective, was favorable to
[7:35] Speaker 1: the growth of friendly sentiments, I soon grew to like
[7:38] Speaker 1: them all. It was pleasant in the summer forenoons, when
[7:42] Speaker 1: the fervent heat that almost liquefied the rest of the
[7:46] Speaker 1: human family merely communicated a genial warmth to their half
[7:50] Speaker 1: torpid systems. It was pleasant to hear them chatting in
[7:54] Speaker 1: the back entry, a row of them, all tipped against
[7:57] Speaker 1: the wall as usual, while the frozen witnesses of past
[8:00] Speaker 1: generations were thawed out and came bubbling with laughter from
[8:04] Speaker 1: their lips. Externally, the jollity of aged men has much
[8:09] Speaker 1: in common with the mirth of children. The intellect, any
[8:13] Speaker 1: more than a deep sense of humor, has little to
[8:16] Speaker 1: do with the matter. It is with both a gleam
[8:20] Speaker 1: that plays upon the surface and imparts a sunny and
[8:23] Speaker 1: cheery aspect, alike to the green branch and gray moldering trunk.
[8:29] Speaker 1: In one case, however, it is real sunshine. In the other,
[8:33] Speaker 1: it more resembles the phosphorescent glow of decaying wood. It
[8:38] Speaker 1: would be sad in justice the reader must understand, to
[8:42] Speaker 1: represent all my excellent old friends as in their dotage.
[8:46] Speaker 1: In the first place, my coadjutors were not invariably old.
[8:50] Speaker 1: There were men among them in their strength and prime,
[8:53] Speaker 1: of marked ability and energy, and altogether superior to the
[8:57] Speaker 1: sluggish and dependent mode of life on which their evil
[9:00] Speaker 1: stars had cast them. Then moreover, the white locks of
[9:05] Speaker 1: age were sometimes found to be the thatch of an
[9:08] Speaker 1: intellectual tenement in good repair. But as respects the majority
[9:14] Speaker 1: of my core of veterans, there will be no wrong
[9:16] Speaker 1: done if I characterize them generally as a set of
[9:20] Speaker 1: wearisome old souls who had gathered nothing worth preservation from
[9:24] Speaker 1: their varied experience of life. They seemed to have flung
[9:28] Speaker 1: away all the golden grain of practical wisdom which they
[9:32] Speaker 1: had enjoyed so many opportunities of harvesting, and most carefully
[9:36] Speaker 1: to have stored their memory with the husks. They spoke
[9:40] Speaker 1: with far more interest and unction of their morning's breakfast,
[9:44] Speaker 1: or yesterday's to day's or tomorrow's dinner, than of the
[9:47] Speaker 1: shipwreck of forty or fifty years ago, and all the
[9:51] Speaker 1: world's wonders which they had witnessed with their youthful eyes.
[9:56] Speaker 1: The father of the custom house, the patriarch not only
[9:59] Speaker 1: of this life squad of officials, but I am bold
[10:02] Speaker 1: to say of the respectable body of tide waiters all
[10:06] Speaker 1: over the United States, was a certain permanent inspector. He
[10:11] Speaker 1: might truly be termed a legitimate son of the revenue system,
[10:14] Speaker 1: died in the wall, or rather born in the purple,
[10:18] Speaker 1: since his sire, a revolutionary colonel and formerly collector of
[10:22] Speaker 1: the port, had created an office for him and appointed
[10:25] Speaker 1: him to fill it at a period of the early
[10:28] Speaker 1: ages which few living men can now remember. This inspector,
[10:33] Speaker 1: when I first knew him, was a man of fourscore
[10:36] Speaker 1: years or thereabouts, and certainly one of the most wonderful
[10:39] Speaker 1: specimens of winter green that you would be likely to
[10:41] Speaker 1: discover in a lifetime search. With his florid cheek, his
[10:47] Speaker 1: compact figure, smartly arrayed in a bright buttoned blue coat,
[10:51] Speaker 1: his brisk and vigorous step, and his hail and hearty
[10:54] Speaker 1: aspect altogether, he seemed not young, indeed, but a kind
[10:59] Speaker 1: of new contrivance of Mother Nature, in the shape of
[11:02] Speaker 1: man whom age and infirmity had no business to touch.
[11:07] Speaker 1: His voice and laugh, which perpetually re echoed through the
[11:11] Speaker 1: custom house, had nothing of the tremulous quaver and cackle
[11:15] Speaker 1: of an old man's utterance. There came strutting out of
[11:18] Speaker 1: his lungs like the crow of a cock or the
[11:21] Speaker 1: blast of a clarion. Looking at him merely as an animal,
[11:26] Speaker 1: and there was very little else to look at. He
[11:29] Speaker 1: was a most satisfactory object from the thorough healthfulness and
[11:33] Speaker 1: wholesomeness of his system, and his capacity, at that extreme age,
[11:38] Speaker 1: to enjoy all, or nearly all the delights which he
[11:42] Speaker 1: had ever aimed at or conceived of. The careless security
[11:47] Speaker 1: of his life in the custom house, on a regular income,
[11:50] Speaker 1: and with but slight and infrequent apprehensions of removal, had
[11:55] Speaker 1: no doubt contributed to make time pass lightly over him.
[12:00] Speaker 1: Original and more potent causes, however, lay in the rare
[12:03] Speaker 1: perfection of his animal nature, the moderate proportion of intellect,
[12:08] Speaker 1: and the very trifling admixture of moral and spiritual ingredients,
[12:13] Speaker 1: these latter qualities indeed being in barely enough measure to
[12:16] Speaker 1: keep the old gentleman from walking on all fours. He
[12:19] Speaker 1: possessed no power of thought, no depth of feeling, no
[12:23] Speaker 1: troublesome sensibilities, nothing, in short, but a few commonplace instincts, which,
[12:30] Speaker 1: aided by the cheerful temper which grew inevitably out of
[12:33] Speaker 1: his physical well being, did duty very respectably and general
[12:38] Speaker 1: acceptance in lieu of a heart. He had been the
[12:42] Speaker 1: husband of three wives all long since dead, the father
[12:46] Speaker 1: of twenty children, most of whom, at every age of
[12:49] Speaker 1: childhood or maturity, had likewise returned to dust. Here, one
[12:55] Speaker 1: would suppose, might have been sorrow enough to imbue the
[12:58] Speaker 1: sunniest disposition through and through with a sable tinge. Not
[13:03] Speaker 1: so with our old inspector. One brief sigh sufficed to
[13:08] Speaker 1: carry off the entire burden of these dismal reminiscences the
[13:13] Speaker 1: next moment. He was as ready for sport as any
[13:15] Speaker 1: unbreached infant, far readier than the collector's junior clerk, who
[13:20] Speaker 1: at nineteen years was much the elder and grave man
[13:24] Speaker 1: of the two. I used to watch and study this
[13:28] Speaker 1: patriarchal personage with I think livelier curiosity than any other
[13:33] Speaker 1: form of humanity there presented to my notice. He was,
[13:38] Speaker 1: in truth a rare phenomenon, so perfect in one point
[13:42] Speaker 1: of view, so shallow, so delusive, so impalpable, such an
[13:48] Speaker 1: absolute nonentity in every other. My conclusion was that he
[13:54] Speaker 1: had no soul, no heart, no mind, nothing, as I
[13:58] Speaker 1: have already said, but instincts. And yet withal so cunningly
[14:04] Speaker 1: had the few materials of his character been put together,
[14:07] Speaker 1: that there was no painful perception of deficiency, but on
[14:11] Speaker 1: my part an entire contentment with what I found in him.
[14:16] Speaker 1: It might be difficult, and it was so to conceive
[14:19] Speaker 1: how he should exist hereafter, so earthly and sensuous did
[14:24] Speaker 1: he seem. But surely his existence here, admitting that it
[14:29] Speaker 1: was to terminate with his last breath, had been not
[14:32] Speaker 1: unkindly given with no higher moral responsibilities than the beasts
[14:36] Speaker 1: of the field, but with a larger scope of enjoyment
[14:39] Speaker 1: than theirs, and with all their blessed immunity from the
[14:43] Speaker 1: dreariness and duskiness of age. One point in which he
[14:48] Speaker 1: had vastly the advantage over his four footed brethren was
[14:52] Speaker 1: his ability to recollect the good dinners, which it had
[14:55] Speaker 1: made no small portion of the happiness of his life.
[14:58] Speaker 1: To eat s gormandism was a highly agreeable trait, and
[15:03] Speaker 1: to hear him talk of roast meat was as appetizing
[15:06] Speaker 1: as a pickle or an oyster. As he possessed no
[15:10] Speaker 1: higher attribute, and neither sacrificed nor vitiated any spiritual endowment.
[15:15] Speaker 1: By devoting all his energies and ingenuities to subserve the
[15:19] Speaker 1: delight and profit of his more, it always pleased and
[15:22] Speaker 1: satisfied me to hear him expatiate on fish, poultry, and
[15:27] Speaker 1: butcher's meat, and the most eligible methods of preparing them
[15:31] Speaker 1: for the table. His reminiscences of good cheer, however ancient
[15:36] Speaker 1: the date of the actual banquet, seemed to bring the
[15:39] Speaker 1: savor of pig or turkey under one's very nostrils. There
[15:44] Speaker 1: were flavors on his pallet that had lingered there not
[15:46] Speaker 1: less than sixty or seventy years, and were still apparently
[15:50] Speaker 1: as fresh as that of the mutton chop which he
[15:53] Speaker 1: had just devoured for his breakfast. I have heard him
[15:57] Speaker 1: smack his lips over dinners every guest at will, which
[16:00] Speaker 1: except himself, had long been food for worms. It was
[16:05] Speaker 1: marvelous to observe how the ghosts of bygone meals were
[16:09] Speaker 1: continually rising up before him, not in anger or retribution,
[16:14] Speaker 1: but as if grateful for his former appreciation, and seeking
[16:18] Speaker 1: to repudiate an endless series of enjoyment, at once shadowy
[16:22] Speaker 1: and sensual. A tender loin of beef, a hind quarter
[16:27] Speaker 1: of veal, a spare rib of pork, a particular chicken,
[16:31] Speaker 1: or a remarkably praiseworthy turkey, which had perhaps adorned his
[16:35] Speaker 1: board in the days of the elder Adams would be remembered,
[16:39] Speaker 1: while all the subsequent experience of our race, and all
[16:43] Speaker 1: the events that brightened or darkened his individual career, had
[16:47] Speaker 1: gone over him with as little permanent effect as the
[16:50] Speaker 1: passing breeze. The chief tragic event of the old man's life,
[16:56] Speaker 1: so far as I could judge, was his mishap with
[16:58] Speaker 1: a certain goose, which lived and died some twenty or
[17:02] Speaker 1: forty years ago, a goose of most promising figure, but
[17:07] Speaker 1: which at table proved so inveterately tough that the carving
[17:11] Speaker 1: knife would make no impression on its carcass, and it
[17:14] Speaker 1: could only be divided with an axe and hand saw.
[17:18] Speaker 1: But it is time to quit this sketch, on which, however,
[17:22] Speaker 1: I should be glad to dwell at considerably more length,
[17:26] Speaker 1: because of all men whom I have ever known, this
[17:29] Speaker 1: individual was fittest to be a custom house officer. Most persons,
[17:34] Speaker 1: owing to causes which I may not have space to
[17:37] Speaker 1: hint at, suffer moral detriment from this peculiar mode of life.
[17:42] Speaker 1: The old Inspector was incapable of it, and were he
[17:46] Speaker 1: to continue in office to the end of time, would
[17:49] Speaker 1: be just as good as he was then, and sit
[17:52] Speaker 1: down to dinner with just as good an appetite. There
[17:56] Speaker 1: is one likeness without which my gallery of custom house
[17:59] Speaker 1: ports traits would be strangely incomplete, but which my comparatively
[18:03] Speaker 1: few opportunities for observation enabled me to sketch only in
[18:07] Speaker 1: the merest outline. It is that of the collector, our
[18:12] Speaker 1: gallant old general, who, after his brilliant military service subsequently
[18:17] Speaker 1: to which he had ruled over a wild western territory,
[18:21] Speaker 1: had come hither twenty years before to spend the decline
[18:25] Speaker 1: of his varied and honorable life. The brave soldier had
[18:29] Speaker 1: already numbered nearly or quite his threescore years and ten,
[18:34] Speaker 1: and was pursuing the remainder of his earthly march, burdened
[18:38] Speaker 1: with infirmities which even the martial music of his own spirit,
[18:41] Speaker 1: stirring recollections, could do little towards lightning. The step was
[18:46] Speaker 1: Paal's eat. Now, that had been foremost in the charge.
[18:50] Speaker 1: It was only with the assistance of a servant, and
[18:53] Speaker 1: by leaning his hand heavily on the iron balustrade, that
[18:56] Speaker 1: he could slowly and painfully ascend the custom house steps,
[19:00] Speaker 1: and with a toilsome progress across the floor attain his
[19:04] Speaker 1: customary chair by the fireplace. There he used to sit,
[19:10] Speaker 1: gazing with a somewhat dim serenity of aspect at the
[19:13] Speaker 1: figures that came and went amid the rustle of papers,
[19:17] Speaker 1: the administering of oaths, the discussion of business, and the
[19:20] Speaker 1: casual talk of the office, all which sounds and circumstances
[19:25] Speaker 1: seemed but indistinctly to impress his senses, and hardly to
[19:29] Speaker 1: make their way into his inner sphere of contemplation. His
[19:33] Speaker 1: countenance in this repose was mild and kindly. If his
[19:38] Speaker 1: notice was sought, an expression of courtesy and interest gleamed
[19:42] Speaker 1: out upon his features, proving that there was light within him,
[19:46] Speaker 1: and that it was only the outward medium of the
[19:48] Speaker 1: intellectual lamp that obstructed the rays in their passage. The
[19:53] Speaker 1: closer you penetrated to the substance of his mind, the
[19:56] Speaker 1: sounder it appeared. When no longer called upon speak or listen,
[20:01] Speaker 1: either of which operations cost him an evident effort, his
[20:05] Speaker 1: face would briefly subside into its former, not uncheerful quietude.
[20:10] Speaker 1: It was not painful to behold this look, for though dim,
[20:15] Speaker 1: it had not the imbecility of decaying age. The framework
[20:19] Speaker 1: of his nature, originally strong and massive, was not yet
[20:23] Speaker 1: crumpled into ruin. To observe and define his character, however,
[20:29] Speaker 1: under such disadvantages, was as difficult a task as to
[20:32] Speaker 1: trace out and build up anew in imagination an old
[20:36] Speaker 1: fortress like Taekwonderoga from a view of its gray and
[20:40] Speaker 1: broken ruins. Here and there, perchance the walls may remain
[20:45] Speaker 1: almost complete, but elsewhere may be only a shapeless mound,
[20:49] Speaker 1: cumbrous with its very strength, and overgrown through long years
[20:53] Speaker 1: of peace and neglect, with grass and alien weeds. Nevertheless,
[20:59] Speaker 1: looking at the old warrior with affection for slight as
[21:03] Speaker 1: was the communication between us, my feeling towards him, like
[21:07] Speaker 1: that of all bipeds and quadrupeds who knew him, might
[21:10] Speaker 1: not improperly be termed. So I could discern the main
[21:13] Speaker 1: points of his portrait. It was marked with the noble
[21:18] Speaker 1: and heroic qualities, which showed it to be not a
[21:21] Speaker 1: mere accident, but of good right, that he had won
[21:24] Speaker 1: a distinguished name. His spirit could never, I conceive, have
[21:29] Speaker 1: been characterized by an uneasy activity. It must, at any
[21:33] Speaker 1: period of his life have required an impulse to set
[21:36] Speaker 1: him in motion. But once stirred up, with obstacles to
[21:41] Speaker 1: overcome and an adequate object to be attained, it was
[21:44] Speaker 1: not in the man to give out or fail. The
[21:48] Speaker 1: heat that had formerly pervaded his nature, and which was
[21:51] Speaker 1: not yet extinct, was never of the kind that flashes
[21:55] Speaker 1: and flickers in a blaze, but rather a deep red glow,
[21:59] Speaker 1: as of iron and ans furnace, weight, solidity, firmness. This
[22:06] Speaker 1: was the expression of his repose, even in such decay
[22:09] Speaker 1: as had crept untimely over him at the period of
[22:13] Speaker 1: which I speak. But I could imagine even then that
[22:18] Speaker 1: under some excitement which should go deeply into his consciousness,
[22:22] Speaker 1: roused by a trumpet's peal loud enough to awaken all
[22:26] Speaker 1: of his energies that were not dead but only slumbering,
[22:30] Speaker 1: he was yet capable of flinging off his infirmities like
[22:33] Speaker 1: a sick man's gown, dropping the staff of age to
[22:36] Speaker 1: seize a battle sword, and starting up once more a warrior.
[22:42] Speaker 1: And in so intense a moment, his demeanor would have
[22:45] Speaker 1: still been calm. Such an exhibition, however, was but to
[22:51] Speaker 1: be pictured in fancy, not to be anticipated nor desired.
[22:56] Speaker 1: What I saw in him as evidently as the indestructible
[22:59] Speaker 1: ramparts of old Taekwonderoga already cited as the most appropriate simile,
[23:05] Speaker 1: was the features of stubborn and ponderous endurance, which might
[23:09] Speaker 1: well have amounted to obstinacy in his earlier days of integrity, that,
[23:15] Speaker 1: like most of his other endowments, lay in a somewhat
[23:18] Speaker 1: heavy mass, and was just as unmaleable or unmanageable as
[23:22] Speaker 1: a ton of iron ore and of benevolence, which, fiercely
[23:27] Speaker 1: as he led the bayonet's honor to Chipewar or Fortieri,
[23:31] Speaker 1: I take to be of quite as genuine a stamp
[23:33] Speaker 1: as what actuates any or all of the polemical philanthropists
[23:37] Speaker 1: of the age. He had slain men with his own hand. Fraught,
[23:42] Speaker 1: I know, certainly they had fallen like blades of grass
[23:45] Speaker 1: at the sweep of the scythe before the charge to
[23:47] Speaker 1: which his spirit imparted its triumphant energy. But be that
[23:52] Speaker 1: as it might, there was never in his heart so
[23:55] Speaker 1: much cruelty as would have brushed the down off a
[23:57] Speaker 1: butterfly's wing. I have not known the man to whose
[24:01] Speaker 1: innate kindliness I would more confidently make an appeal many characteristics,
[24:08] Speaker 1: and those two which contribute not the least forcibly to
[24:11] Speaker 1: impart resemblance in a sketch must have vanished or been
[24:15] Speaker 1: obscured before I met the general. All merely graceful attributes
[24:21] Speaker 1: are usually the most evanescent. Nor does nature adorn the
[24:24] Speaker 1: human ruin with blossoms of new beauty that have their
[24:28] Speaker 1: roots and proper nutriment only in the chinks and crevices
[24:31] Speaker 1: of decay, as she sows wall flowers over the ruined
[24:34] Speaker 1: fortress of Techonderoga. Still, even in respect of grace and beauty, though,
[24:41] Speaker 1: were points well worth noting. A ray of humor now
[24:46] Speaker 1: and then would make its way through the veil of
[24:48] Speaker 1: dim obstruction and glimmer pleasantly upon our faces. A trait
[24:54] Speaker 1: of native elegance, seldom seen in the masculine character after
[24:58] Speaker 1: childhood or early youth, was shown in the general's fondness
[25:02] Speaker 1: for the sight and fragrance of flowers. An old soldier
[25:06] Speaker 1: might be supposed prize only the bloody laurel on his brow,
[25:10] Speaker 1: but here was one who seemed to have a young
[25:12] Speaker 1: girl's appreciation of the floral tribe. There Beside the fireplace,
[25:19] Speaker 1: the brave old general used to sit while the surveyor,
[25:23] Speaker 1: though seldom when it could be avoided, taking upon himself
[25:27] Speaker 1: the difficult task of engaging him in conversation, was fond
[25:31] Speaker 1: of standing at a distance and watching his quiet and
[25:34] Speaker 1: almost slumbrous countenance. He seemed away from us, although we
[25:39] Speaker 1: saw him but a few yards off, remote, though he
[25:43] Speaker 1: passed close beside his chair, unattainable, though we might have
[25:48] Speaker 1: stretched forth our hands and touched his own. It might
[25:52] Speaker 1: be that he lived a more real life within his
[25:55] Speaker 1: thoughts than amid the unappropriate environment of the collector's office.
[26:00] Speaker 1: The evolutions of the parade, the tumult of the battle,
[26:03] Speaker 1: the flourish of old heroic music heard thirty years before.
[26:08] Speaker 1: Such scenes and sounds perhaps were all alive before his
[26:12] Speaker 1: intellectual sense. Meanwhile, the merchants and shipmasters, the spruce clerks,
[26:19] Speaker 1: and uncouth sailors entered and departed. The bustle of this
[26:24] Speaker 1: commercial and custom house life kept up its little murmur
[26:28] Speaker 1: round about him, And neither with the men nor their
[26:31] Speaker 1: affairs did the general appear to sustain the most distant relation.
[26:37] Speaker 1: He was as much out of place as an old sword,
[26:40] Speaker 1: now rusty, but which had flashed once in the battle's
[26:43] Speaker 1: front and showed still a bright gleam along its blade
[26:47] Speaker 1: would have been among the inkstands, paper folders and mahogany
[26:51] Speaker 1: rulers on the Deputy Collector's desk. There was one thing
[26:55] Speaker 1: that March aided me and renewing and recreating the stalwart
[26:59] Speaker 1: soldier of the night Agrafrontier, the man of true and
[27:02] Speaker 1: simple energy. It was the recollection of those memorable words
[27:07] Speaker 1: of his I'll try, sir, spoken on the very verge
[27:11] Speaker 1: of a desperate and heroic enterprise, and breathing the soul
[27:15] Speaker 1: and the spirit of New England hardihood, comprehending all perils
[27:19] Speaker 1: and encountering all if in our country valor were rewarded
[27:25] Speaker 1: by heraldic honor. This phrase, which it seems so easy
[27:30] Speaker 1: to speak, but which only he with such a task
[27:33] Speaker 1: of danger and glory before him, has ever spoken, would
[27:37] Speaker 1: be the best and fittest of all mottoes for the
[27:40] Speaker 1: General's shield of arms. It contributes greatly towards a man's
[27:45] Speaker 1: moral and intellectual health to be brought into habits of
[27:49] Speaker 1: companionship with individuals unlike himself, who care little for his pursuits,
[27:54] Speaker 1: and whose sphere and abilities he must go out of
[27:57] Speaker 1: himself to appreciate the evidence of my life have often
[28:01] Speaker 1: afforded me this advantage, but never with more fullness and
[28:05] Speaker 1: variety than during my continuance in office. There was one man,
[28:10] Speaker 1: especially the observation of whose character gave me a new
[28:14] Speaker 1: idea of talent. His gifts were emphatically those of a
[28:18] Speaker 1: man of business, prompt, acute, clear minded, with an eye
[28:22] Speaker 1: that saw through all perplexities, and a faculty of arrangement
[28:26] Speaker 1: that made them vanish, as if by the waving of
[28:28] Speaker 1: an enchanter's wand bred up from boyhood in the custom house,
[28:33] Speaker 1: it was his proper field of activity, and the many
[28:36] Speaker 1: intricacies of business so harassing to the interloper, presented themselves
[28:41] Speaker 1: before him with the regularity of a perfectly comprehended system.
[28:46] Speaker 1: In my contemplation, he stood as the ideal of his class.
[28:51] Speaker 1: He was, indeed the custom house in himself, or at
[28:55] Speaker 1: all events, the mainspring that kept its variously revolving wheels
[28:59] Speaker 1: in For in an institution like this, where its officers
[29:04] Speaker 1: are appointed to subserve their own profit and convenience, and
[29:08] Speaker 1: seldom with a leading reference to their fitness for the
[29:11] Speaker 1: duty to be performed, they must perforce seek elsewhere the
[29:14] Speaker 1: dexterity which is not in them. Thus, by an inevitable necessity,
[29:20] Speaker 1: as a magnet attracts steel filings, so did our man
[29:24] Speaker 1: of business draw to himself the difficulties which everybody met
[29:27] Speaker 1: with with an easy condescension and kind forbearance towards our stupidity,
[29:34] Speaker 1: which to his order of mind must have seemed little
[29:37] Speaker 1: short of crime. Would he, forthwith, by the merest touch
[29:41] Speaker 1: of his finger, make the incomprehensible as clear as daylight.
[29:47] Speaker 1: The merchants valued him not less than we, his esoteric friends.
[29:51] Speaker 1: His integrity was perfect. It was a law of nature
[29:55] Speaker 1: with him, rather than a choice or a principle. Nor
[29:58] Speaker 1: can it be otherwise than the main condition of an
[30:01] Speaker 1: intellect so remarkably clear and accurate as his, to be
[30:05] Speaker 1: honest and regular in the administration of affairs. A stain
[30:10] Speaker 1: on his conscience as to anything that came within the
[30:13] Speaker 1: range of his vacation, would trouble such a man very much,
[30:16] Speaker 1: in the same way, though to a far greater degree
[30:20] Speaker 1: than an error in the balance of an account, or
[30:23] Speaker 1: an ink blot on the fair page of a book
[30:25] Speaker 1: of record. Here in a word, and it is a
[30:29] Speaker 1: rare instance in my life, I had met with a
[30:32] Speaker 1: person thoroughly adapted to the situation which he held. End
[30:38] Speaker 1: of Section two, Dream Audio Books hopes you have enjoyed
[30:42] Speaker 1: this program

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