considerate of the respect which is due in such matters from a woman to
a man.

There were not a few persons whom she offended by too much "bounce." To
a reverend gentleman who asked her, as they were parting at the house of
a mutual friend, where her office was in Boston, she replied, "Oh! look
in the directory for it"; instead of politely giving him the street and
number. Thus she lost a pleasant acquaintance and a subscriber to "The
Dial." Hawthorne and his wife had not been four days in Concord before
she came to them with a proposition that they should take Ellery
Channing and his wife, who was her own sister, into their family as
boarders. One cannot help some astonishment at this proceeding, for it
is an instinct with all women to know that a newly married couple do not
like to be interfered with. No word has ever been published from which
we can infer how the grievance between them originated, but it is
morally certain that there was a grievance of some kind, and as
Hawthorne was the most inoffensive of men, it is not likely that he was
responsible for it.

Now in regard to what follows, it is well to carry in mind two important
points. In the first place, a writer of fiction acquires a habit, very
naturally, of dealing with all tales and anecdotes as if they were
subjects for his art, and is not therefore so accurate a judge of their
veracity as a lawyer or a critic might be. Whatever holds together as a
story is to him as good as true. The second point is that although
Hawthorne understood human nature better than the rest of us, it is
nevertheless with certain limitations. His romance characters are of a
rare sort and are well sustained, but they form a group by themselves.
He has not the range of Scott, Thackeray, or Goethe. There is not the
slightest evidence that he appreciated the character of Emerson; and if