THE DARK LADY
379
The part of the male evildoer in
The Marble Faun
is taken by
Donatello, the innocent, faun-like, quasi-mythical Italian who is
drawn by Miriam to commit a crime and is this brought within
the confines of "sinful, sorowful mentality." It is the story, of
course, of the fall of man, with the dark lady cast in the dual role
of Eve and the serpent. Hilda and the sculptor Kenyon are the
onlookers and commentators on the action. Presented as models
of virtue, they are actually an insufferable pair of prigs, especially
Hilda, who is in fact one of the grimmest figures in Hawthorne,
despite all the proper talk about her dove-like nature. Symboli–
cally enough, this militant virgin dwells in a tower which is con–
tinually referred to as the "young girl's eyerie," and from this
high vantage-point she surveys the conduct of mankind with the
self-assurance of a moral millionaire. The sculptor, to be sure,
tends to sympathize with Miriam, but Hilda never fails to pull
him up short. The whole issue is summed up perfectly in the
following dialogue between them:
"Ah, Hilda," said Kenyon, "you do not know, for you could
never learn it from your own heart, which is all purity and recti–
tude, what a mixture of good and evil there may be in things
evil; and how the greatest criminal,
if
you look at his conduct
from his own point of view, or from any side-point, may seem
not so unquestionably guilty, after all. So with Miriam, so with
Donatello. They are, perhaps, partners in what we must call
awful guilt; and yet, I will own to you,-when I think of the
original cause, the
~otives,
the feelings, the sudden concurrence
of .circumstances thrusting them onward, the urgency of the
moment, and the sublime unselfishness on either part,-! know
not well how to distinguish it from much that the world calls
heroism. Might we not render some such verdict as this?–
'Worthy of Death, but not unworthy of Love!' "
"Never!" answered Hilda, looking at the matter through the
clear crystal medium of her own integrity. "This thing, as regards
its causes, is all a mystery to me, and must remain so. But there
is, I believe, only one right and only one wrong; and I do not
understand, and may God keep me from understanding, how two
things so totally unlike can be mistaken for one another; nor
how two mortal foes, such as Right and Wrong surely are, can
work together in the same deed...."
"Alas for human nature, then!'' said Kenyon, sadly.... "I
have always felt you, my dear friend, a terribly severe judge,
and have been perplexed to conceive how such tender sympathy
could coexist with the remorselessness of a steel blade. You need
no mercy, and therefore know not how to show any."
