"I was to go to see his sister Elizabeth that afternoon, and he had heard about it. He asked if I could go, and said he should have waited for me to come if he had not supposed the east wind would prevent me. I said that it would. He wanted to know if I would come the next day. I meant to call Mary, but he prevented me by saying he could not stay long enough. . . . [He seldom stayed unless he found Sophia alone.] "Last evening Mr. Hawthorne came for Mary to go with him to Miss Burley's [to a club which met every week]. Mary could not go. It seemed a shame to refuse him. I came down to catch a glimpse of him. He has a celestial expression which I do not like to lose. . . . "The children have just come in, and brought me a host of odorous violets. I made George a visit in the afternoon, in the midst of my battle with headache, and to my question of 'How dost?' he replied, for the first time, 'Pretty fair,' instead of the unvarying 'Middling.' Skeptics surely cannot disbelieve in one thing that is invisible, and that is Pain." May, 1838. After my siesta I went down to Herbert Street with the book I wished to leave, and when I opened the gate [of the Hawthornes' house] the old woman with her hood on [an aunt of the Hawthornes] was stooping over a flower-bed, planting seeds. She lifted her smiling face, which must have been very pretty in her youth, and said, "How do you do, Miss Peabody?" Yet I never saw her in my life before. She begged me to walk in, but I refused, and gave her my message of thanks for the book. Ever thine wholly, SOPHIECHEN. May 14, 1838. To-day I was tempted to trot about the room and arrange all my vases, and give an air to the various knickknacks. I am much more easily tired than ever before. My walk to Castle Hill before February did not make me feel so hopelessly tired as it now does to walk as far as the Hawthornes'. Mr. Hawthorne had declined to come to dine with you on your arrival, but was to be here directly after dinner. When he came I happened to be the only one ready to go down. His first question was, "Where is Elizabeth?" He was not at all inclined to bear the disappointment of your not being here, after all. He thought it "too bad," "insufferable," "not fair," and wondered what could be the reason. I told him your excuse, and that there was a letter for him, which Mary soon brought. He put it into his pocket without breaking the seal. He looked very handsome, and was full of smiles. I assured him the morning was the best time to do creative work. He said he believed he would go and take a walk in South Salem. "Won't you go?" he asked of me. But the wind was east.