Nathaniel Hawthorne/Nathaniel Hawthorne.iso/pc/articles/a1/t0033

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                                        Young Goodman Brown

YOUNG Goodman Brown came forth, at sunset, into the street of Salem
village, but put his head back, after crossing the threshold, to exchange a
parting kiss with his young wife. And Faith, as the wife was aptly named,
thrust her own pretty head into the street, letting the wind play with the pink
ribbons of her cap, while she called to Goodman Brown.
     'Dearest heart,' whispered she, softly and rather sadly, when her lips
were close to his ear, 'pr'y thee, put off your journey until sunrise, and
sleep in your own bed to-night. A lone woman is troubled with such dreams
and such thoughts, that she's afeard of herself, sometimes. Pray, tarry
with me this night, dear husband, of all nights in the year!'
     'My love and my Faith,' replied young Goodman Brown, 'of all nights
in the year, this one night must I tarry away from thee. My journey, as thou
callest it, forth and back again, must needs be done 'twixt now and sunrise.
What, my sweet, pretty wife, dost thou doubt me already, and we but three
months married!'
     'Then, God bless you!' said Faith, with the pink ribbons, 'and may you
find all well, when you come back.'
     'Amen!' cried Goodman Brown. 'Say thy prayers, dear Faith, and go to
bed at dusk, and no harm will come to thee.'
     So they parted; and the young man pursued his way, until, being about
to turn the corner by the meeting-house, he looked back, and saw the head
of Faith still peeping after him, with a melancholy air, in spite of her pink
ribbons.
     'Poor little Faith!' thought he, for his heart smote him. 'What a wretch
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    2

am I, to leave her on such an errand! She talks of dreams, too. Methought,
as she spoke, there was trouble in her face, as if a dream had warned her
what work is to be done to-night. But, no, no! 'twould kill her to think it.
Well; she's a blessed angel on earth; and after this one night, I'll cling to her
skirts and follow her to Heaven.'
     With this excellent resolve for the future, Goodman Brown felt himself
justified in making more haste on his present evil purpose. He had taken a
dreary road, darkened by all the gloomiest trees of the forest, which barely
stood aside to let the narrow path creep through, and closed immediately
behind. It was all as lonely as could be; and there is this peculiarity in such a
solitude, that the traveller knows not who may be concealed by the
innumerable trunks and the thick boughs overhead; so that, with lonely
footsteps, he may yet be passing through an unseen multitude.
     'There may be a devilish Indian behind every tree,' said Goodman
Brown, to himself; and he glanced fearfully behind him, as he added, 'What
if the devil himself should be at my very elbow!'
     His head being turned back, he passed a crook of the road, and looking
forward again, beheld the figure of a man, in grave and decent attire, seated
at the foot of an old tree. He arose, at Goodman Brown's approach, and
walked onward, side by side with him.
     'You are late, Goodman Brown,' said he. 'The clock of the Old South
was striking as I came through Boston; and that is full fifteen minutes
agone.'
     'Faith kept me back awhile,' replied the young man, with a tremor in his
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    3

voice, caused by the sudden appearance of his companion, though not
wholly unexpected.
     It was now deep dusk in the forest, and deepest in that part of it where
these two were journeying. As nearly as could be discerned, the second
traveller was about fifty years old, apparently in the same rank of life as
Goodman Brown, and bearing a considerable resemblance to him, though
perhaps more in expression than features. Still, they might have been taken
for father and son. And yet, though the elder person was as simply clad as
the younger, and as simple in manner too, he had an indescribable air of one
who knew the world, and would not have felt abashed at the governor's
dinner-table, or in King William's court, were it possible that his affairs
should call him thither. But the only thing about him, that could be fixed
upon as remarkable, was his staff, which bore the likeness of a great black
snake, so curiously wrought, that it might almost be seen to twist and
wriggle itself, like a living serpent. This, of course, must have been an
ocular deception, assisted by the uncertain light.
     'Come, Goodman Brown!' cried his fellow-traveller, 'this is a dull pace
for the beginning of a journey. Take my staff, if you are so soon weary.'
     'Friend,' said the other, exchanging his slow pace for a full stop,
'having kept covenant by meeting thee here, it is my purpose now to return
whence I came. I have scruples, touching the matter thou wot'st of.'
     'Sayest thou so?' replied he of the serpent, smiling apart. 'Let us walk
on, nevertheless, reasoning as we go, and if I convince thee not, thou shalt
turn back. We are but a little way in the forest, yet.'
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    4

     'Too far, too far!' exclaimed the goodman, unconsciously resuming his
walk. 'My father never went into the woods on such an errand, nor his
father before him. We have been a race of honest men and good Christians,
since the days of the martyrs. And shall I be the first of the name of
Brown, that ever took this path, and kept--'
     'Such company, thou wouldst say,' observed the elder person,
interpreting his pause. 'Well said, Goodman Brown! I have been as well
acquainted with your family as with ever a one among the Puritans; and
that's no trifle to say. I helped your grandfather, the constable, when he
lashed the Quaker woman so smartly through the streets of Salem. And it
was I that brought your father a pitch-pine knot, kindled at my own hearth,
to set fire to an Indian village, in King Philip's war. They were my good
friends, both; and many a pleasant walk have we had along this path, and
returned merrily after midnight. I would fain be friends with you, for their
sake.'
     'If it be as thou sayest,' replied Goodman Brown, 'I marvel they never
spoke of these matters. Or, verily, I marvel not, seeing that the least rumor
of the sort would have driven them from New-England. We are a people of
prayer, and good works, to boot, and abide no such wickedness.'
     'Wickedness or not,' said the traveller with the twisted staff, 'I have a
very general acquaintance here in New-England. The deacons of many a
church have drunk the communion wine with me; the selectmen, of divers
towns, make me their chairman; and a majority of the Great and General
Court are firm supporters of my interest. The governor and I, too--but these
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    5

are state-secrets.'
     'Can this be so!' cried Goodman Brown, with a stare of amazement at
his undisturbed companion. 'Howbeit, I have nothing to do with the
governor and council; they have their own ways, and are no rule for a
simple husbandman, like me. But, were I to go on with thee, how should I
meet the eye of that good old man, our minister, at Salem village? Oh, his
voice would make me tremble, both Sabbath-day and lecture-day!'
     Thus far, the elder traveller had listened with due gravity, but now burst
into a fit of irrepressible mirth, shaking himself so violently, that his snake-
like staff actually seemed to wriggle in sympathy.
     'Ha! ha! ha!' shouted he, again and again; then composing himself,
'Well, go on, Goodman Brown, go on; but pr'y thee, don't kill me with
laughing!'
     'Well, then, to end the matter at once,' said Goodman Brown,
considerably nettled, 'there is my wife, Faith. It would break her dear little
heart; and I'd rather break my own!'
     'Nay, if that be the case,' answered the other, 'e'en go thy ways,
Goodman Brown. I would not, for twenty old women like the one hobbling
before us, that Faith should come to any harm.'
     As he spoke, he pointed his staff at a female figure on the path, in whom
Goodman Brown recognized a very pious and exemplary dame, who had
taught him his catechism, in youth, and was still his moral and spiritual
adviser, jointly with the minister and Deacon Gookin.
     'A marvel, truly, that Goody Cloyse should be so far in the wilderness,
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    6

at night-fall!' said he. 'But, with your leave, friend, I shall take a cut
through the woods, until we have left this Christian woman behind. Being a
stranger to you, she might ask whom I was consorting with, and whither I
was going.'
     'Be it so,' said his fellow-traveller. 'Betake you to the woods, and let me
keep the path.'
     Accordingly, the young man turned aside, but took care to watch his
companion, who advanced softly along the road, until he had come within a
staff's length of the old dame. She, meanwhile, was making the best of her
way, with singular speed for so aged a woman, and mumbling some
indistinct words, a prayer, doubtless, as she went. The traveller put forth
his staff, and touched her withered neck with what seemed the serpent's
tail.
     'The devil!' screamed the pious old lady.
     'Then Goody Cloyse knows her old friend?' observed the traveller,
confronting her, and leaning on his writhing stick.
     'Ah, forsooth, and is it your worship, indeed?' cried the good dame.
'Yea, truly is it, and in the very image of my old gossip, Goodman Brown,
the grandfather of the silly fellow that now is. But--would your worship
believe it?--my broomstick hath strangely disappeared, stolen, as I suspect,
by that unhanged witch, Goody Cory, and that, too, when I was all
anointed with the juice of smallage and cinque-foil and wolf's-bane--'
     'Mingled with fine wheat and the fat of a new-born babe,' said the shape
of old Goodman Brown.
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    7

     'Ah, your worship knows the receipt,' cried the old lady, cackling
aloud. 'So, as I was saying, being all ready for the meeting, and no horse to
ride on, I made up my mind to foot it; for they tell me, there is a nice young
man to be taken into communion to-night. But now your good worship will
lend me your arm, and we shall be there in a twinkling.'
     'That can hardly be,' answered her friend. 'I may not spare you my arm,
Goody Cloyse, but here is my staff, if you will.'
     So saying, he threw it down at her feet, where, perhaps, it assumed life,
being one of the rods which its owner had formerly lent to the Egyptian
Magi. Of this fact, however, Goodman Brown could not take cognizance.
He had cast up his eyes in astonishment, and looking down again, beheld
neither Goody Cloyse nor the serpentine staff, but his fellow-traveller
alone, who waited for him as calmly as if nothing had happened.
     'That old woman taught me my catechism!' said the young man; and
there was a world of meaning in this simple comment.
     They continued to walk onward, while the elder traveller exhorted his
companion to make good speed and persevere in the path, discoursing so
aptly, that his arguments seemed rather to spring up in the bosom of his
auditor, than to be suggested by himself. As they went, he plucked a branch
of maple, to serve for a walking-stick, and began to strip it of the twigs and
little boughs, which were wet with evening dew. The moment his fingers
touched them, they became strangely withered and dried up, as with a
week's sunshine. Thus the pair proceeded, at a good free pace, until
suddenly, in a gloomy hollow of the road, Goodman Brown sat himself
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    8

down on the stump of a tree, and refused to go any farther.
     'Friend,' said he, stubbornly, 'my mind is made up. Not another step
will I budge on this errand. What if a wretched old woman do choose to go
to the devil, when I thought she was going to Heaven! Is that any reason
why I should quit my dear Faith, and go after her?'
     'You will think better of this, by-and-by,' said his acquaintance,
composedly. 'Sit here and rest yourself awhile; and when you feel like
moving again, there is my staff to help you along.'
     Without more words, he threw his companion the maple stick, and was
as speedily out of sight, as if he had vanished into the deepening gloom.
The young man sat a few moments, by the road-side, applauding himself
greatly, and thinking with how clear a conscience he should meet the
minister, in his morning-walk, nor shrink from the eye of good old Deacon
Gookin. And what calm sleep would be his, that very night, which was to
have been spent so wickedly, but purely and sweetly now, in the arms of
Faith! Amidst these pleasant and praiseworthy meditations, Goodman
Brown heard the tramp of horses along the road, and deemed it advisable to
conceal himself within the verge of the forest, conscious of the guilty
purpose that had brought him thither, though now so happily turned from it.
     On came the hoof-tramps and the voices of the riders, two grave old
voices, conversing soberly as they drew near. These mingled sounds
appeared to pass along the road, within a few yards of the young man's
hiding-place; but owing, doubtless, to the depth of the gloom, at that
particular spot, neither the travellers nor their steeds were visible. Though
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                    9

their figures brushed the small boughs by the way-side, it could not be seen
that they intercepted, even for a moment, the faint gleam from the strip of
bright sky, athwart which they must have passed. Goodman Brown
alternately crouched and stood on tip-toe, pulling aside the branches, and
thrusting forth his head as far as he durst, without discerning so much as a
shadow. It vexed him the more, because he could have sworn, were such a
thing possible, that he recognized the voices of the minister and Deacon
Gookin, jogging along quietly, as they were wont to do, when bound to
some ordination or ecclesiastical council. While yet within hearing, one of
the riders stopped to pluck a switch.
     'Of the two, reverend Sir,' said the voice like the deacon's, 'I had rather
miss an ordination-dinner than to-night's meeting. They tell me that some of
our community are to be here from Falmouth and beyond, and others from
Connecticut and Rhode-Island; besides several of the Indian powows, who,
after their fashion, know almost as much deviltry as the best of us.
Moreover, there is a goodly young woman to be taken into communion.'
     'Mighty well, Deacon Gookin!' replied the solemn old tones of the
minister. 'Spur up, or we shall be late. Nothing can be done, you know,
until I get on the ground.'
     The hoofs clattered again, and the voices, talking so strangely in the
empty air, passed on through the forest, where no church had ever been
gathered, nor solitary Christian prayed. Whither, then, could these holy
men be journeying, so deep into the heathen wilderness? Young Goodman
Brown caught hold of a tree, for support, being ready to sink down on the
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   10

ground, faint and overburthened with the heavy sickness of his heart. He
looked up to the sky, doubting whether there really was a Heaven above
him. Yet, there was the blue arch, and the stars brightening in it.
     'With Heaven above, and Faith below, I will yet stand firm against the
devil!' cried Goodman Brown.
     While he still gazed upward, into the deep arch of the firmament, and
had lifted his hands to pray, a cloud, though no wind was stirring, hurried
across the zenith, and hid the brightening stars. The blue sky was still
visible, except directly overhead, where this black mass of cloud was
sweeping swiftly northward. Aloft in the air, as if from the depths of the
cloud, came a confused and doubtful sound of voices. Once, the listener
fancied that he could distinguish the accents of town's-people of his own,
men and women, both pious and ungodly, many of whom he had met at the
communion-table, and had seen others rioting at the tavern. The next
moment, so indistinct were the sounds, he doubted whether he had heard
aught but the murmur of the old forest, whispering without a wind. Then
came a stronger swell of those familiar tones, heard daily in the sunshine, at
Salem village, but never, until now, from a cloud of night. There was one
voice, of a young woman, uttering lamentations, yet with an uncertain
sorrow, and entreating for some favor, which, perhaps, it would grieve her
to obtain. And all the unseen multitude, both saints and sinners, seemed to
encourage her onward.
     'Faith!' shouted Goodman Brown, in a voice of agony and desperation;
and the echoes of the forest mocked him, crying--'Faith! Faith!' as if
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   11

bewildered wretches were seeking her, all through the wilderness.
     The cry of grief, rage, and terror, was yet piercing the night, when the
unhappy husband held his breath for a response. There was a scream,
drowned immediately in a louder murmur of voices, fading into far-off
laughter, as the dark cloud swept away, leaving the clear and silent sky
above Goodman Brown. But something fluttered lightly down through the
air, and caught on the branch of a tree. The young man seized it, and beheld
a pink ribbon.
     'My Faith is gone!' cried he, after one stupefied moment. 'There is no
good on earth; and sin is but a name. Come, devil! for to thee is this world
given.'
     And maddened with despair, so that he laughed loud and long, did
Goodman Brown grasp his staff and set forth again, at such a rate, that he
seemed to fly along the forest-path, rather than to walk or run. The road
grew wilder and drearier, and more faintly traced, and vanished at length,
leaving him in the heart of the dark wilderness, still rushing onward, with
the instinct that guides mortal man to evil. The whole forest was peopled
with frightful sounds; the creaking of the trees, the howling of wild beasts,
and the yell of Indians; while, sometimes, the wind tolled like a distant
church-bell, and sometimes gave a broad roar around the traveller, as if all
Nature were laughing him to scorn. But he was himself the chief horror of
the scene, and shrank not from its other horrors.
     'Ha! ha! ha!' roared Goodman Brown, when the wind laughed at him.
'Let us hear which will laugh loudest! Think not to frighten me with your
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   12

deviltry! Come witch, come wizard, come Indian powow, come devil
himself! and here comes Goodman Brown. You may as well fear him as he
fear you!'
     In truth, all through the haunted forest, there could be nothing more
frightful than the figure of Goodman Brown. On he flew, among the black
pines, brandishing his staff with frenzied gestures, now giving vent to an
inspiration of horrid blasphemy, and now shouting forth such laughter, as
set all the echoes of the forest laughing like demons around him. The fiend
in his own shape is less hideous, than when he rages in the breast of man.
Thus sped the demoniac on his course, until, quivering among the trees, he
saw a red light before him, as when the felled trunks and branches of a
clearing have been set on fire, and throw up their lurid blaze against the sky,
at the hour of midnight. He paused, in a lull of the tempest that had driven
him onward, and heard the swell of what seemed a hymn, rolling solemnly
from a distance, with the weight of many voices. He knew the tune; it was a
familiar one in the choir of the village meeting-house. The verse died
heavily away, and was lengthened by a chorus, not of human voices, but of
all the sounds of the benighted wilderness, pealing in awful harmony
together. Goodman Brown cried out; and his cry was lost to his own ear,
by its unison with the cry of the desert.
     In the interval of silence, he stole forward, until the light glared full upon
his eyes. At one extremity of an open space, hemmed in by the dark wall of
the forest, arose a rock, bearing some rude, natural resemblance either to an
altar or a pulpit, and surrounded by four blazing pines, their tops aflame,
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   13

their stems untouched, like candles at an evening meeting. The mass of
foliage, that had overgrown the summit of the rock, was all on fire, blazing
high into the night, and fitfully illuminating the whole field. Each pendent
twig and leafy festoon was in a blaze. As the red light arose and fell, a
numerous congregation alternately shone forth, then disappeared in
shadow, and again grew, as it were, out of the darkness, peopling the heart
of the solitary woods at once.
     'A grave and dark-clad company!' quoth Goodman Brown.
     In truth, they were such. Among them, quivering to-and-fro, between
gloom and splendor, appeared faces that would be seen, next day, at the
council-board of the province, and others which, Sabbath after Sabbath,
looked devoutly heavenward, and benignantly over the crowded pews,
from the holiest pulpits in the land. Some affirm, that the lady of the
governor was there. At least, there were high dames well known to her, and
wives of honored husbands, and widows, a great multitude, and ancient
maidens, all of excellent repute, and fair young girls, who trembled, lest
their mothers should espy them. Either the sudden gleams of light, flashing
over the obscure field, bedazzled Goodman Brown, or he recognized a
score of the church-members of Salem village, famous for their especial
sanctity. Good old Deacon Gookin had arrived, and waited at the skirts of
that venerable saint, his revered pastor. But, irreverently consorting with
these grave, reputable, and pious people, these elders of the church, these
chaste dames and dewy virgins, there were men of dissolute lives and
women of spotted fame, wretches given over to all mean and filthy vice,
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   14

and suspected even of horrid crimes. It was strange to see, that the good
shrank not from the wicked, nor were the sinners abashed by the saints.
Scattered, also, among their pale-faced enemies, were the Indian priests, or
powows, who had often scared their native forest with more hideous
incantations than any known to English witchcraft.
     'But, where is Faith?' thought Goodman Brown; and, as hope came
into his heart, he trembled.
     Another verse of the hymn arose, a slow and mournful strain, such as
the pious love, but joined to words which expressed all that our nature can
conceive of sin, and darkly hinted at far more. Unfathomable to mere
mortals is the lore of fiends. Verse after verse was sung, and still the
chorus of the desert swelled between, like the deepest tone of a mighty
organ. And, with the final peal of that dreadful anthem, there came a sound,
as if the roaring wind, the rushing streams, the howling beasts, and every
other voice of the uncoverted wilderness, were mingling and according with
the voice of guilty man, in homage to the prince of all. The four blazing
pines threw up a loftier flame, and obscurely discovered shapes and visages
of horror on the smoke-wreaths, above the impious assembly. At the same
moment, the fire on the rock shot redly forth, and formed a glowing arch
above its base, where now appeared a figure. With reverence be it spoken,
the figure bore no slight similitude, both in garb and manner, to some grave
divine of the New-England churches.
     'Bring forth the converts!' cried a voice, that echoed through the field
and rolled into the forest.
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   15

     At the word, Goodman Brown stept forth from the shadow of the trees,
and approached the congregation, with whom he felt a loathful brotherhood,
by the sympathy of all that was wicked in his heart. He could have well
nigh sworn, that the shape of his own dead father beckoned him to advance,
looking downward from a smoke-wreath; while a woman, with dim
features of despair, threw out her hand to warn him back. Was it his
mother? But he had no power to retreat one step, nor to resist, even in
thought, when the minister and good old Deacon Gookin seized his arms,
and led him to the blazing rock. Thither came also the slender form of a
veiled female, led between Goody Cloyse, that pious teacher of the
catechism, and Martha Carrier, who had received the devil's promise to be
queen of hell. A rampant hag was she! And there stood the proselytes,
beneath the canopy of fire.
     'Welcome, my children,' said the dark figure, 'to the communion of
your race! Ye have found, thus young, your nature and your destiny. My
children, look behind you!'
     They turned; and flashing forth, as it were, in a sheet of flame, the fiend-
worshippers were seen; the smile of welcome gleamed darkly on every
visage.
     'There,' resumed the sable form, 'are all whom ye have reverenced from
youth. Ye deemed them holier than yourselves, and shrank from your own
sin, contrasting it with their lives of righteousness, and prayerful aspirations
heavenward. Yet, here are they all, in my worshipping assembly! This night
it shall be granted you to know their secret deeds; how hoary-bearded elders
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   16

of the church have whispered wanton words to the young maids of their
households; how many a woman, eager for widow's weeds, has given her
husband a drink at bed-time, and let him sleep his last sleep in her bosom;
how beardless youths have made haste to inherit their fathers' wealth; and
how fair damsels--blush not, sweet ones!--have dug little graves in the
garden, and bidden me, the sole guest, to an infant's funeral. By the
sympathy of your human hearts for sin, ye shall scent out all the places--
whether in church, bed-chamber, street, field, or forest--where crime has
been committed, and shall exult to behold the whole earth one stain of guilt,
one mighty blood-spot. Far more than this! It shall be yours to penetrate, in
every bosom, the deep mystery of sin, the fountain of all wicked arts, and
which inexhaustibly supplies more evil impulses than human power--than
my power, at its utmost!--can make manifest in deeds. And now, my
children, look upon each other.'
     They did so; and, by the blaze of the hell-kindled torches, the wretched
man beheld his Faith, and the wife her husband, trembling before that
unhallowed altar.
     'Lo! there ye stand, my children,' said the figure, in a deep and solemn
tone, almost sad, with its despairing awfulness, as if his once angelic nature
could yet mourn for our miserable race. 'Depending upon one another's
hearts, ye had still hoped, that virtue were not all a dream. Now are ye
undeceived! Evil is the nature of mankind. Evil must be your only
happiness. Welcome, again, my children, to the communion of your race!'
     'Welcome!' repeated the fiend-worshippers, in one cry of despair and
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   17

triumph.
     And there they stood, the only pair, as it seemed, who were yet
hesitating on the verge of wickedness, in this dark world. A basin was
hollowed, naturally, in the rock. Did it contain water, reddened by the lurid
light? or was it blood? or, perchance, a liquid flame? Herein did the Shape
of Evil dip his hand, and prepare to lay the mark of baptism upon their
foreheads, that they might be partakers of the mystery of sin, more
conscious of the secret guilt of others, both in deed and thought, than they
could now be of their own. The husband cast one look at his pale wife, and
Faith at him. What polluted wretches would the next glance shew them to
each other, shuddering alike at what they disclosed and what they saw!
     'Faith! Faith!' cried the husband. 'Look up to Heaven, and resist the
Wicked One!'
     Whether Faith obeyed, he knew not. Hardly had he spoken, when he
found himself amid calm night and solitude, listening to a roar of the wind,
which died heavily away through the forest. He staggered against the rock
and felt it chill and damp, while a hanging twig, that had been all on fire,
besprinkled his check with the coldest dew.
     The next morning, young Goodman Brown came slowly into the street
of Salem village, staring around him like a bewildered man. The good old
minister was taking a walk along the grave-yard, to get an appetite for
breakfast and meditate his sermon, and bestowed a blessing, as he passed,
on Goodman Brown. He shrank from the venerable saint, as if to avoid an
anathema. Old Deacon Gookin was at domestic worship, and the holy
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   18

words of his prayer were heard through the open window. 'What God doth
the wizard pray to?' quoth Goodman Brown. Goody Cloyse, that excellent
old Christian, stood in the early sunshine, at her own lattice, catechising a
little girl, who had brought her a pint of morning's milk. Goodman Brown
snatched away the child, as from the grasp of the fiend himself. Turning the
corner by the meeting-house, he spied the head of Faith, with the pink
ribbons, gazing anxiously forth, and bursting into such joy at sight of him,
that she skipt along the street, and almost kissed her husband before the
whole village. But, Goodman Brown looked sternly and sadly into her face,
and passed on without a greeting.
     Had Goodman Brown fallen asleep in the forest, and only dreamed a
wild dream of a witch-meeting?
     Be it so, if you will. But, alas! it was a dream of evil omen for young
Goodman Brown. A stern, a sad, a darkly meditative, a distrustful, if not a
desperate man, did he become, from the night of that fearful dream. On the
Sabbath-day, when the congregation were singing a holy psalm, he could
not listen, because an anthem of sin rushed loudly upon his ear, and
drowned all the blessed strain. When the minister spoke from the pulpit,
with power and fervid eloquence, and, with his hand on the open Bible, of
the sacred truths of our religion, and of saint-like lives and triumphant
deaths, and of future bliss or misery unutterable, then did Goodman Brown
turn pale, dreading, lest the roof should thunder down upon the gray
blasphemer and his hearers. Often, awakening suddenly at midnight, he
shrank from the bosom of Faith, and at morning or eventide, when the
                                        Young Goodman Brown                                   19

family knelt down at prayer, he scowled, and muttered to himself, and
gazed sternly at his wife, and turned away. And when he had lived long,
and was borne to his grave, a hoary corpse, followed by Faith, an aged
woman, and children and grand-children, a goodly procession, besides
neighbors, not a few, they carved no hopeful verse upon his tomb-stone;
for his dying hour was gloom.