1836
TWICE-TOLD TALES
THE MINISTER'S BLACK VEIL
A PARABLE
by Nathaniel Hawthorne
THE SEXTON stood in the porch of Milford meeting-house, pulling
busily at the bell-rope. The old people of the village came stooping
along the street. Children, with bright faces, tripped merrily
beside their parents, or mimicked a graver gait, in the conscious
dignity of their Sunday clothes. Spruce bachelors looked sidelong at
the pretty maidens, and fancied that the Sabbath sunshine made them
prettier than on week days. When the throng had mostly streamed into
the porch, the sexton began to toll the bell, keeping his eye on the
Reverend Mr. Hooper's door. The first glimpse of the clergyman's
figure was the signal for the bell to cease its summons.
"But what has good Parson Hooper got upon his face?" cried the
sexton in astonishment.
All within hearing immediately turned about, and beheld the
semblance of Mr. Hooper, pacing slowly his meditative way towards
the meeting-house. With one accord they started, expressing more
wonder than if some strange minister were coming to dust the
cushions of Mr. Hooper's pulpit.
"Are you sure it is our parson?" inquired Goodman Gray of the
sexton.
"Of a certainty it is good Mr. Hooper," replied the sexton. "He was
to have exchanged pulpits with Parson Shute, of Westbury; but Parson
Shute sent to excuse himself yesterday, being to preach a funeral
sermon."
The cause of so much amazement may appear sufficiently slight.
Mr. Hooper, a gentlemanly person, of about thirty, though still a
bachelor, was dressed with due clerical neatness, as if a careful wife
had starched his band, and brushed the weekly dust from his Sunday's
garb. There was but one thing remarkable in his appearance. Swathed
about his forehead, and hanging down over his face, so low as to be
shaken by his breath, Mr. Hooper had on a black veil. On a nearer view
it seemed to consist of two folds of crape, which entirely concealed
his features, except the mouth and chin, but probably did not
intercept his sight, further than to give a darkened aspect to all
living and inanimate things. With this gloomy shade before him, good
Mr. Hooper walked onward, at a slow and quiet pace, stooping somewhat,
and looking on the ground, as is customary with abstracted men, yet
nodding kindly to those of his parishioners who still waited on the
meeting-house steps. But so wonder-struck were they that his
greeting hardly met with a return.
"I can't really feel as if good Mr. Hooper's face was behind that
piece of crape," said the sexton.
"I don't like it," muttered an old woman, as she hobbled into the
meeting-house. "He has changed himself into something awful, only by
hiding his face."
"Our parson has gone mad!" cried Goodman Gray, following him across
the threshold.
A rumor of some unaccountable phenomenon had preceded Mr. Hooper
into the meeting-house, and set all the congregation astir. Few
could refrain from twisting their heads towards the door; many stood
upright, and turned directly about; while several little boys
clambered upon the seats, and came down again with a terrible
racket. There was a general bustle, a rustling of the women's gowns
and shuffling of the men's feet, greatly at variance with that
hushed repose which should attend the entrance of the minister. But
Mr. Hooper appeared not to notice the perturbation of his people. He
entered with an almost noiseless step, bent his head mildly to the
pews on each side, and bowed as he passed his oldest parishioner, a
white-haired great-grandsire, who occupied an arm-chair in the
centre of the aisle. It was strange to observe how slowly this
venerable man became conscious of something singular in the appearance
of his pastor. He seemed not fully to partake of the prevailing
wonder, till Mr. Hooper had ascended the stairs, and showed himself in
the pulpit, face to face with his congregation, except for the black
veil. That mysterious emblem was never once withdrawn. It shook with
his measured breath, as he gave out the psalm; it threw its
obscurity between him and the holy page, as he read the Scriptures;
and while he prayed, the veil lay heavily on his uplifted countenance.
Did he seek to hide it from the dread Being whom he was addressing?
Such was the effect of this simple piece of crape, that more than
one woman of delicate nerves was forced to leave the meeting-house.
Yet perhaps the pale-faced congregation was almost as fearful a
sight to the minister, as his black veil to them.
Mr. Hooper had the reputation of a good preacher, but not an
energetic one: he strove to win his people heavenward by mild,
persuasive influences, rather than to drive them thither by the
thunders of the Word. The sermon which he now delivered was marked
by the same characteristics of style and manner as the general
series of his pulpit oratory. But there was something, either in the
sentiment of the discourse itself, or in the imagination of the
auditors, which made it greatly the most powerful effort that they had
ever heard from their pastor's lips. It was tinged, rather more darkly
than usual, with the gentle gloom of Mr. Hooper's temperament. The
subject had reference to secret sin, and those sad mysteries which
we hide from our nearest and dearest, and would fain conceal from
our own consciousness, even forgetting that the Omniscient can
detect them. A subtle power was breathed into his words. Each member
of the congregation, the most innocent girl, and the man of hardened
breast, felt as if the preacher had crept upon them, behind his
awful veil, and discovered their hoarded iniquity of deed or
thought. Many spread their clasped hands on their bosoms. There was
nothing terrible in what Mr. Hooper said, at least, no violence; and
yet, with every tremor of his melancholy voice, the hearers quaked. An
unsought pathos came hand in hand with awe. So sensible were the
audience of some unwonted attribute in their minister, that they
longed for a breath of wind to blow aside the veil, almost believing
that a stranger's visage would be discovered, though the form,
gesture, and voice were those of Mr. Hooper.
At the close of the services, the people hurried out with
indecorous confusion, eager to communicate their pent-up amazement,
and conscious of lighter spirits the moment they lost sight of the
black veil. Some gathered in little circles, huddled closely together,
with their mouths all whispering in the centre; some went homeward
the Sabbath day with ostentatious laughter. A few shook their
sagacious heads, intimating that they could penetrate the mystery;
while one or two affirmed that there was no mystery at all, but only
that Mr. Hooper's eyes were so weakened by the midnight lamp, as to
require a shade. After a brief interval, forth came good Mr. Hooper
also, in the rear of his flock. Turning his veiled face from one group
to another, he paid due reverence to the hoary heads, saluted the
middle aged with kind dignity as their friend and spiritual guide,
greeted the young with mingled authority and love, and laid his
hands on the little children's heads to bless them. Such was always
his custom on the Sabbath day. Strange and bewildered looks repaid him
for his courtesy. None, as on former occasions, aspired to the honor
of walking by their pastor's side. Old Squire Saunders, doubtless by
an accidental lapse of memory, neglected to invite Mr. Hooper to his
table, where the good clergyman had been wont to bless the food,
almost every Sunday since his settlement. He returned, therefore, to
the parsonage, and, at the moment of closing the door, was observed to
look back upon the people, all of whom had their eyes fixed upon the
minister. A sad smile gleamed faintly from beneath the black veil, and
flickered about his mouth, glimmering as he disappeared.
"How strange," said a lady, "that a simple black veil, such as
any woman might wear on her bonnet, should become such a terrible
thing on Mr. Hooper's face!"
"Something must surely be amiss with Mr. Hooper's intellects,"
observed her husband, the physician of the village. "But the strangest
part of the affair is the effect of this vagary, even on a
sober-minded man like myself. The black veil, though it covers only
our pastor's face, throws its influence over his whole person, and
makes him ghostlike from head to foot. Do you not feel it so?"
"Truly do I," replied the lady; "and I would not be alone with
him for the world. I wonder he is not afraid to be alone with
himself!"
"Men sometimes are so," said her husband.
The afternoon service was attended with similar circumstances. At
its conclusion, the bell tolled for the funeral of a young lady. The
relatives and friends were assembled in the house, and the more
distant acquaintances stood about the door, speaking of the good
qualities of the deceased, when their talk was interrupted by the
appearance of Mr. Hooper, still covered with his black veil. It was
now an appropriate emblem. The clergyman stepped into the room where
the corpse was laid, and bent over the coffin, to take a last farewell
of his deceased parishioner. As he stooped, the veil hung straight
down from his forehead, so that, if her eyelids had not been closed
forever, the dead maiden might have seen his face. Could Mr. Hooper be
fearful of her glance, that he so hastily caught back the black
veil? A person who watched the interview between the dead and
living, scrupled not to affirm, that, at the instant when the
clergyman's features were disclosed, the corpse had slightly
shuddered, rustling the shroud and muslin cap, though the
countenance retained the composure of death. A superstitious old woman
was the only witness of this prodigy. From the coffin Mr. Hooper
passed into the chamber of the mourners, and thence to the head of the
staircase, to make the funeral prayer. It was a tender and
heart-dissolving prayer, full of sorrow, yet so imbued with
celestial hopes, that the music of a heavenly harp, swept by the
fingers of the dead, seemed faintly to be heard among the saddest
accents of the minister. The people trembled, though they but darkly
understood him when he prayed that they, and himself, and all of
mortal race, might be ready, as he trusted this young maiden had been,
for the dreadful hour that should snatch the veil from their faces.
The bearers went heavily forth, and the mourners followed, saddening
all the street, with the dead before them, and Mr. Hooper in his black
veil behind.
"Why do you look back?" said one in the procession to his partner.
I had a fancy," replied she, "that the minister and the maiden's
spirit were walking hand in hand."
"And so had I, at the same moment," said the other.
That night, the handsomest couple in Milford village were to be
joined in wedlock. Though reckoned a melancholy man, Mr. Hooper had
a placid cheerfulness for such occasions, which often excited a
sympathetic smile where livelier merriment would have been thrown
away. There was no quality of his disposition which made him more
beloved than this. The company at the wedding awaited his arrival with
impatience, trusting that the strange awe, which had gathered over him
throughout the day, would now be dispelled. But such was not the
result. When Mr. Hooper came, the first thing that their eyes rested
on was the same horrible black veil, which had added deeper gloom to
the funeral, and could portend nothing but evil to the wedding. Such
was its immediate effect on the guests that a cloud seemed to have
rolled duskily from beneath the black crape, and dimmed the light of
the candles. The bridal pair stood up before the minister. But the
bride's cold fingers quivered in the tremulous hand of the bridegroom,
and her deathlike paleness caused a whisper that the maiden who had
been buried a few hours before was come from her grave to be
married. If ever another wedding were so dismal, it was that famous
one where they tolled the wedding knell. After performing the
ceremony, Mr. Hooper raised a glass of wine to his lips, wishing
happiness to the new-married couple in a strain of mild pleasantry
that ought to have brightened the features of the guests, like a
cheerful gleam from the hearth. At that instant, catching a glimpse of
his figure in the looking-glass, the black veil involved his own
spirit in the horror with which it overwhelmed all others. His frame
shuddered, his lips grew white, he spilt the untasted wine upon the
carpet, and rushed forth into the darkness. For the Earth, too, had on
her Black Veil.
The next day, the whole village of Milford talked of little else
than Parson Hooper's black veil. That, and the mystery concealed
behind it, supplied a topic for discussion between acquaintances
meeting in the street, and good women gossiping at their open windows.
It was the first item of news that the tavern-keeper told to his
guests. The children babbled of it on their way to school. One
imitative little imp covered his face with an old black
handkerchief, thereby so affrighting his playmates that the panic
seized himself, and he well-nigh lost his wits by his own waggery.
It was remarkable that of all the busybodies and impertinent people
in the parish, not one ventured to put the plain question to Mr.
Hooper, wherefore he did this thing. Hitherto, whenever there appeared
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br /> the slightest call for such interference, he had never lacked
advisers, nor shown himself adverse to be guided by their judgment. If
he erred at all, it was by so painful a degree of self-distrust,
that even the mildest censure would lead him to consider an
indifferent action as a crime. Yet, though so well acquainted with
this amiable weakness, no individual among his parishioners chose to
make the black veil a subject of friendly remonstrance. There was a
feeling of dread, neither plainly confessed nor carefully concealed,
which caused each to shift the responsibility upon another, till at
length it was found expedient to send a deputation of the church, in
order to deal with Mr. Hooper about the mystery, before it should grow
into a scandal. Never did an embassy so ill discharge its duties.
The minister received them with friendly courtesy, but became
silent, after they were seated, leaving to his visitors the whole
burden of introducing their important business. The topic, it might be
supposed, was obvious enough. There was the black veil swathed round
Mr. Hooper's forehead, and concealing every feature above his placid
mouth, on which, at times, they could perceive the glimmering of a
melancholy smile. But that piece of crape, to their imagination,
seemed to hang down before his heart, the symbol of a fearful secret
between him and them. Were the veil but cast aside, they might speak
freely of it, but not till then. Thus they sat a considerable time,
speechless, confused, and shrinking uneasily from Mr. Hooper's eye,
which they felt to be fixed upon them with an invisible glance.
Finally, the deputies returned abashed to their constituents,
pronouncing the matter too weighty to be handled, except by a
council of the churches, if, indeed, it might not require a general
synod.
But there was one person in the village unappalled by the awe
with which the black veil had impressed all beside herself. When the
deputies returned without an explanation, or even venturing to
demand one, she, with the calm energy of her character, determined
to chase away the strange cloud that appeared to be settling round Mr.
Hooper, every moment more darkly than before. As his plighted wife, it
should be her privilege to know what the black veil concealed. At
the minister's first visit, therefore, she entered upon the subject
with a direct simplicity, which made the task easier both for him
and her. After he had seated himself, she fixed her eyes steadfastly
upon the veil, but could discern nothing of the dreadful gloom that
had so overawed the multitude: it was but a double fold of crape,
hanging down from his forehead to his mouth, and slightly stirring
with his breath.
"No," said she aloud, and smiling, "there is nothing terrible in
this piece of crape, except that it hides a face which I am always
glad to look upon. Come, good sir, let the sun shine from behind the
cloud. First lay aside your black veil: then tell me why you put it
on."
Mr. Hooper's smile glimmered faintly.
"There is an hour to come," said he, "when all of us shall cast
aside our veils. Take it not amiss, beloved friend, if I wear this
piece of crape till then."
"Your words are a mystery, too," returned the young lady. "Take
away the veil from them, at least."
"Elizabeth, I will," said he, "so far as my vow may suffer me.
Know, then, this veil is a type and a symbol, and I am bound to wear
it ever, both in light and darkness, in solitude and before the gaze
of multitudes, and as with strangers, so with my familiar friends.
No mortal eye will see it withdrawn. This dismal shade must separate
me from the world: even you, Elizabeth, can never come behind it!"
"What grievous affliction hath befallen you," she earnestly
inquired, "that you should thus darken your eyes forever?"
"If it be a sign of mourning," replied Mr. Hooper, "I, perhaps,
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