Pearl saw, and gazed intently,
but never sought to make acquaintance. If spoken to, she would
not speak again. If the children gathered about her, as they
sometimes did, Pearl would grow positively terrible in her puny
wrath, snatching up stones to fling at them, with shrill,
incoherent exclamations, that made her mother tremble, because
they had so much the sound of a witch's anathemas in some
unknown tongue.
The truth was, that the little Puritans, being of the most
intolerant brood that ever lived, had got a vague idea of
something outlandish, unearthly, or at variance with ordinary
fashions, in the mother and child, and therefore scorned them in
their hearts, and not unfrequently reviled them with their
tongues. Pearl felt the sentiment, and requited it with the
bitterest hatred that can be supposed to rankle in a childish
bosom. These outbreaks of a fierce temper had a kind of value,
and even comfort for the mother; because there was at least an
intelligible earnestness in the mood, instead of the fitful
caprice that so often thwarted her in the child's
manifestations. It appalled her, nevertheless, to discern here,
again, a shadowy reflection of the evil that had existed in
herself.
Pages:
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152