The Nathaniel Hawthorne Library

The Dolliver Romance and Other Pieces Section IX - A Book of Autographs

In which a faded book of Revolutionary autographs becomes a little necromancer’s volume, calling forth the hands, tempers, and half-hidden souls of patriots from their yellowed paper. Through those frail relics, the past steals near in a grave, domestic twilight, where public greatness is softened by ink-blots, signatures, and the mortal touch of the pen.

The Dolliver Romance and Other Pieces Section X - An Old Woman's Tale

In which an old fireside chronicler bequeaths to childhood a village legend of moonlight, ancestral shadows, and a mysterious slumber that steals over the living. Beneath its quaint marvel lies a tender meditation on memory, inheritance, and the uneasy traffic between the homely world and the ghostly one.

The Dolliver Romance and Other Pieces Section VIII - Dr - Bullivant

In which an old Boston apothecary, famed alike for his phials and his pleasantries, moves through a little world where wit, loyalty, and public favor are perilously mingled. Over his quaint figure hangs that sober twilight in which colonial mirth and civic hazard become one moral emblem.

The Dolliver Romance and Other Pieces Section VII - Graves and Goblins

In which a ghostly narrator muses upon the nature of spirits and their lingering presence about graves, revealing a profound affection for a secluded resting place chosen in youth and reflecting on the varied fates of souls that haunt the night. Amongst tales of remorseful misers, tormented murderers, and noble patriots, he finds solace in the purity of a recently departed maiden whose ascent to the heavenly realms stirs hope for his own eventual release from earthbound shadows.

The Dolliver Romance and Other Pieces Section VI - The Antique Ring

In which a young literary aspirant is challenged by his beloved to weave a touching legend around an antique diamond ring, leading him to recount the troubled history of a talisman once gifted by Queen Elizabeth to the Earl of Essex and the dark fortunes it has borne through the centuries. This narrative gently unfolds amid a contemporary New England setting, where the ring’s sinister past is mysteriously softened by an act of humble charity, symbolising hope and faithful love.