supplied him with many subtle suggestions for his later writings on
sin and crime, for in almost all of his productions his imagination is
tinged with, this old Puritanic philosophy and theology.

He entered Bowdoin College in 1821 and graduated from this institution
in 1825. He had as classmates Longfellow, and Franklin Pierce, who
afterward became president of the United States. After his graduation
Hawthorne returned to Salem, where he lived with his mother and
sisters in almost absolute seclusion for fourteen years. During this
period he wrote daily, and spent his nights in burning what he had
written in the daytime.

He was clerk of the Boston Custom House from 1839 to 1841, when the
Whig party removed him for being ultra-partisan in behalf of the
Democrats. At this time Hawthorne wrote: "As to the Salem people, I
really thought I had been exceedingly good-natured in my treatment of
them. They certainly do not deserve good usage at my hands, after
permitting me to be deliberately lied down, not merely once, but at
two separate attacks, and on two false indictments, without hardly a
voice being raised in my behalf." He married Sophia Peabody, July 9,
1842. From 1842 until 1846 they lived in Concord in the house formerly
occupied by Emerson. These were the happiest years of his life. In
1846 he returned to Salem as surveyor in the Salem Custom House. He
retired from this office in 1850 and lived in Lenox, Massachusetts,
for two years. In 1852 he settled in Concord. President Pierce
appointed him consul at Liverpool in 1853, and he served in this
position until 1857.

After leaving Liverpool he travelled three years in England and on the
continent. He returned to Concord in 1860. He died in the White