The study was on the third floor of the house, secluded from the
turmoil of earth, so far as anything could be in a city street. No one
was supposed to intrude upon him there; but such suppositions are
ineffectual against children. From time to time the adamantine gates
fell ajar, and in we slipped. It seemed a heavenly place, tenanted by
a being possessed of every attribute that our imaginations could
ascribe to an angel. The room and its tenant glimmer before me as I
write, luminous with the sunshine of more than fifty years ago. Both
were equipped for business rather than for beauty; furniture and
garments were simple in those Salem days. A homely old paper covered
the walls, a brownish old carpet the floor. There was an old
rocking-chair, its black paint much worn and defaced; another chair
was drawn up to the table, which stood to the left of the eastern
window; and on the table was a mahogany desk, concerning which I must
enter into some particulars. It was then, and for years afterwards,
an object of my most earnest scrutiny. Such desks are not made
nowadays.
When closed, it was an oblong mahogany box, two feet long by half that
width, and perhaps nine inches high. It had brass corners, and a brass
plate on the top, inscribed with the name, "N. Hawthorne." At one end
was a drawer, with a brass handle playing on a hinge and fitting into
a groove or socket when down; there was a corresponding handle at the
other end, but that was for symmetry only; the one drawer went clear
through the desk.
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