<Text id=HawScar>
<Author>Hawthorne, Nathaniel</Author>
<Title>The Scarlet Letter, A Romance</Title>
<Edition>Novels. Library of America. New York: Literary Classics of the U.S., 1983</Edition>
<Date>1849-1850</Date>
<body>
<loc><locdoc>HawScar119</locdoc><milestone n=119>
<div0 type=chapter n=Preface>
<i>Preface</i>
TO THE SECOND EDITION
<p>Much to the author's surprise, and (if he may say
so without additional offence) considerably to his
amusement, he finds that his sketch of official life,
introductory to THE SCARLET LETTER, has created an
unprecedented excitement in the respectable community
immediately around him. It could hardly have been more
violent, indeed, had he burned down the Custom-House, and
quenched its last smoking ember in the blood of a certain
venerable personage, against whom he is supposed to cherish
a peculiar malevolence. As the public disapprobation would
weigh very heavily on him, were he cons . . .
