Scarlet Letter 10

1.) "The shipmaster...was so smitten with Pearl's aspect, that he attempted to lay hands on her, with purpose to snatch a kiss...he took from his hat the gold chain that was twisted about it, and threw it to the child. Pearl immediately twined it around her neck and waist, with such happy skill, that, once seen there, it became a part of her, and it was difficult to imagine her without it" (Hawthorne 219).

Pearl's encounter with the seafarers is analogous to Hester's story. Pearl enters a throng of sailors, and they are so enthralled by her beauty that one of the sailors tries to kiss her. That sailor was the head of the ship, the shipmaster. Unable to catch Pearl, the shipmaster threw a golden chain about to her. Pearl took that chain and wore it on her figure so beautifully that she was not herself without it. The same can be said for Hester. she was one of the most beautiful women of Boston, if not the most beautiful. Dimmesdale, a figure of great power and popularity, a veritable shipmaster of Boston, loved her and slept with her. Hester's gold chain was the Scarlet Letter. She made it elegant and marvellous, brilliantly weaving it into a work of art, and wore it as such. When she wore it, the letter became a part of her, so much so that you could not imagine her without it. The only difference between Pearl's instance and her mother's story is that Pearl was able to evade the sailors, bu Hester gave in to her love for Dimmesdale. This is echoed later in the book, when it shows that Pearl would not succumb to sin as her mother did.

2.) "Pearl kissed his[Dimmesdale's] lips. A spell was broken. The great scene of grief, in which the wild infant bore a part, had developed all her sympathies; and as her tears fell upon her father's cheek, they were the pledge that she would grow up amid human joy and sorrow, nor forever do battle with the world, but be a woman in it. Towards her mother, too, Pearl's errand as a messenger of anguish was all fulfilled" (229).

It is interesting that, at the story's end, Hawthorne ends with the beginning. Throughout the story, Pearl has been likened to a rose. She is always in red, and even says she was plucked from the rose bush, than born of her mother. She is the embodiment of the Scarlet Letter, always reminding her mother of her sin, but what of her father? What does Pearl do for her father? In the beginning of the novel, Hawthorne gives us a hint, in the form of a rose: "It[a rose] may serve, let us hope, to symbolize some sweet moral blossom, that may be found along the track, or relieve the darkening close of a tale of human frailty and sorrow" (46). For the entire story so far, Pearl has been Hester's moral blossom. She has kept her mother on the right track, and draws out the pure and saintly aspect of Hester through her wild actions. Pearl's role is complete when Dimmesdale confesses. The last thing he asks for as he is dying is that Pearl, the girl who would not kiss him and would not let him kiss her, kiss him. She would not in the forest, but he hopes she will now. When she does, she changes. She is no longer her wild, impish self, but instead will grow up to be a woman of joy and happiness. Dimmesdale's life ends with Pearl's kiss. Thus, Pearl has fulfilled her role in the novel. She has guided her mother, and now she is the end to her father's, Dimmesdale's, story of frailty and sorrow.