I will insert here some letters that relate to this time, though written in 1884:—
PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND, September 15.
DEAR MRS. LATHROP, . . . That matter of the memorial fountain, or monument [in honor of "The Town Pump ">[, which the death of Mrs. Brooks prevented our going on with, I trust may yet in the fullness of time be accomplished. I have a plan which may fructify, although some years may intervene before any decided steps can be taken. Perhaps it will be just as well to wait, after all, until some of those wretches who delight in vilifying your father perish from the face of the earth. Let us have patience. They are fast becoming superannuated, and the "venom of their spleen" will perish with them. They comprehend him not, and are willfully blind and deaf. Dr. Wheatland estimates that less than a score of these strange malignants are now to be met with on the streets of Salem. But he has not like me
"Unaware,
Ranging the woods to start a hare,
Come to the mouth of the dark lair,
Where growling low, a fierce old bear,
Lies amid bones and blood."
By the bye, I found once that Miss Savage had wholly forgotten Hawthorne's reference to the Town Pump which closes his Custom House chapter, and so I put "The Scarlet Letter" into my valise (she having lost her copy), and two or three weeks ago I called at her house and read her the passage. Afterwards, I dropped in to see Mullet, and I left the book with him, as he had not read it for many years. I think you will like to see a note he has written me, so I inclose it.
Faithfully yours,
GEORGE H. HOLDEN.
February 5.
MY DEAR MRS. LATHROP,—Rummaging among my papers, last evening, I ran across another letter from our "bright-eyed" and noble-hearted friend Mullet, which I think you will be glad to read, because Mullet wrote it. I therefore inclose the letter. Mullet is very hard of hearing, and on that account goes out but little. During the twelve years that I lived in Salem I am sure I never once met him on the street. In fact, I think I never heard of him, even, till after I moved to Providence. I heard of him one day at the "Gazette" office, and forthwith dug him out. He is a great reader. The Harpers have sent me all of Rolfe's Shakespeare, and I found that I have duplicate copies of three or four of the Plays. These duplicates I shall ask Mullet to oblige me by accepting. Mullet is not the chap who bored your father so fearfully by endless talk about Shakespeare and Napoleon, but he is a prodigious admirer of the great dramatist. He has the Plays in one huge, unwieldy volume, and for that reason reads them less than he would if they were in a more handy form. Mullet is a great reader of the old English poets (I don't mean so far back as Chaucer and Spenser), and I suppose he can repeat from memory thousands of lines. I have found no chance to call upon him since I fruitlessly rang his doorbell, as stated in his letter.
Please remind me to tell you about an African fetich which Mullet gave me one day, and a reminiscence of your father linked therewith. Ever faithfully,