all of us. After this extemporaneous jollity, we dined together at Mr.
Dudley Field's in Stockbridge, and Hawthorne rayed out in a sparkling
and unwonted manner. I remember the conversation at table chiefly ran on
the physical differences between the present American and English men,
Hawthorne stoutly taking part in favor of the American. This 5th of
August was a happy day throughout, and I never saw Hawthorne in better
spirits.

Often and often I have seen him sitting in the chair I am now occupying
by the window, looking out into the twilight. He liked to watch the
vessels dropping down the stream, and nothing pleased him more than to
go on board a newly arrived bark from Down East, as she was just moored
at the wharf. One night we made the acquaintance of a cabin-boy on board
a brig, whom we found off duty and reading a large subscription volume,
which proved, on inquiry, to be a Commentary on the Bible. When
Hawthorne questioned him why he was reading, then and there, that
particular book, he replied with a knowing wink at both of us, "There's
consider'ble her'sy in our place, and I'm a studying up for 'em." He
liked on Sunday to mouse about among the books, and there are few
volumes in this room that he has not handled or read. He knew he could
have unmolested habitation here, whenever he chose to come, and he was
never allowed to be annoyed by intrusion of any kind. He always slept in
the same room,--the one looking on the water; and many a night I have
heard his solemn footsteps over my head, long after the rest of the
house had gone to sleep. Like many other nervous men of genius, he was a
light sleeper, and he liked to be up and about early; but it was only
for a ramble among the books again. One summer morning I found him as
early as four o'clock reading a favorite poem, on Solitude, a piece he
very much admired. That morning I shall not soon forget, for he was in
the vein for autobiographical talk, and he gave me a most interesting