Chapter Nineteen
Entry Fifty-One
Hester realizes that the only way to calm her daughter is to put back on the scarlet letter. She asks Pearl to pick it up from the other side of the stream to bring it to her, but Pearl answers:
“Come thou and take it up!”She doesn't react like a child in that moment. She lectures her mother that taking off the "A" is not the right way and therefore wants her to pick it up herself. Pearl wants Hester to vouch for her mistake. And it works: Hester comes to see that it wouldn't be good if she already took off the letter. She will wait until they fled from Boston. Like some pages earlier, it is mentioned that the forest can't hide the "A" but the big ocean between America and England "will swallow it up for ever" (just like the little stream in the forest). When Hester Prynne puts back the letter on her bosom and hides her hair again under the cap, the sunlight seems to disappear. The spell the "A" once had put on her has returned.
Yes - Pearl's lecture here. How do you interpret it? Is it just a child taking to scold a mother and act adult-like, or is the voice from a higher power?
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