Chapter 22: The Procession

-The Election Day procession begins with music playing. The soldiers are the first to enter the marketplace, followed by the governors, and finally Reverend Dimmesdale. Dimmesdale changed significantly; Pearl and Hester hardly recognize him. He has his health, energy, and strength back.
~“He saw nothing, heard nothing, knew nothing, of what was around him; but the spiritual element took up the feeble frame, and carried it along, unconscious of the burden, and converting it to spirit like itself” (214).
~“Her spirit sank with the idea that all must have been a delusion, and that, vividly as she had dreamed it, there could be no real bond betwixt the clergyman and herself” (214).

-Mistress Hibbins speaks with Hester and Pearl. She tells them it is easy for her to recognize a sinner and Dimmesdale’s sin will soon be clear to everyone.
~“When the Black Man sees one of his own servants, signed and sealed, so shy of owning to the bond as is Reverend Mr. Dimmesdale, he hath a way of ordering matters so that the mark shall be disclosed in open daylight to the eyes of all the world! ( 217)

-As Hester listens to Dimmesdale’s sermon Pearl wanders off. As she walks among the crowd, she is stopped by the ship’s captain. He asks her to give her mother a message:
~“Then tell her that I spake again with the black-a-visage, hump-shouldered old doctor, and he engages to bring his friend, the gentleman she wots of, aboard with him. So let thy mother take no though, save for herself and thee” ( 220).

-After Hester hears this, she realizes everyone including the Native Americans, the sailors, and the citizens are staring at her. The looks she noticed on the scaffold were the same as seven years ago when she first received her punishment.
~“At the final hour, when she was so soon to fling aside the burning letter, it had strangely become the centre of more remark and excitement, and was thus made to sear her breast more painfully, than at any time since the first day she put it on” (221).