The head was deep--a great distance between the base of the ear and
the wing of the nostril--and was well filled out behind. Above the
blue of the shaven beard the complexion showed clear white and red,
announcing a strong heart and good digestion. My father shaved himself
daily; I was not permitted to see the operation, but I knew he
lathered, and wondered why. He was naturally athletic;
broad-shouldered and deep in the chest, lean about the loins, weighing
never over one hundred and eighty pounds; his height was five feet ten
and three-quarter inches; his legs and feet were slender and graceful,
his gait long and springy, and he could stand and leap as high as his
shoulder. In the house he wore slippers, which seemed always old and
down-at-heel.

In the house, also, he wore a writing-gown, made for him some years
before by my mother; it reached nearly to his heels, and had been a
gorgeous affair, though now much defaced. The groundwork was purple,
covered all over with conventional palm-leaf in old-gold color; the
lining was red. This lining, under the left-hand skirt of the gown,
was blackened with ink over a space as large as your hand; for the
author was in the habit of wiping his pen thereon; but my mother
finally parried this attack by sewing in the centre of the place a
penwiper in the shape of a butterfly.

While story-writing, the door of the study was locked against all the
world; but after noon he became approachable, except during The
Scarlet Letter period, when he wrote till evening. He did not mind my
seeing him write letters; he would sit with his right shoulder and
head inclined towards the desk; the quill squeaked softly over the
smooth paper, with frequent quick dips into the ink-bottle; a few
words would be written swiftly; then a pause, with suspended pen,