the action of a demonic child. Pearl can *POEST, 4*sense almost any emotion an adult might feel just by observing a particular person’s body language and facial expression. She expresses her thanks and gratitude towards her father. The forest is full of companionship for Pearl and her mother. In the forest Pearl can run and play freely and her mother can freely let down her hair, feel like a woman again, and throw away her Scarlet Letter. Pearl is at home when she is in the forest. Even when Pearl is in the dark forest and the sun some how finds its way to Pearl. The sun that shines on Pearl is God’s approval and desire for guilt free happiness. Pearl runs and grabs the sunshine. Her mother tries to grab the sunshine but the sun will fade away. Pearl explains to her mother “the sunshine does not love you. It runs and hides itself, because it is afraid of something on your bosom” (146). The brook that runs though the forest has so much in common with Pearl. The brook like Pearl is from an unknown source and it travels through gloom. Pearl feels she can understand the brook. “inasmuch as the current of her life gushed from a well-spring as mysterious, and had flowed through scenes shadowed as heavily with gloom” (149). Hester believes Pearl cannot understand the brook and its sorrows until she has sorrows and troubles of her own. Pearl’s actions at the brook side are directed to belittle her mother, but it affects Dismmedale. Pearl demands the truth. Her mother and Dismmedale are on one side of the brook and little Pearl is on the other. Her mother shouts at Pearl “thou canst leap, like a young deer” (164). Pearl extends her finger indicating to her mother that she will not take the leap that a creature of nature would take until her mother replaces the scarlet letter that lies on the forest’s floor. Pearl wants her mother to accept and face her sin. Pearl k...
