EL 266: CH. 1-6 Pearl's eye
"Once, this freakish, elfish cast came into the child's eyes, while Hester was looking at her own image in them, as mothers are fond of doing; and, suddenly, -for women in solitude, and with troubled hearts, are pestered with unaccountable delusions,-that she beheld, not on her own minature portrait, but another face, in the small black mirror of Pearl's eye." (Hawthorne)p.89
Hester saw within her child a person as herself. Hester could never break the stigma that has ousted her from society. Her child now suffering the same. Innocense overcome by sin.
The eyes are the window to one's soul:Looking into Pearl's eyes saddened her mother. Pearl now has to endure all that her mother has, due to her shame. But was it shame? Maybe in a society where adultery is deemed unacceptable. In the eyes of the church.
Hawthorne makes the connection of Hester's adultery to her daughter-Pearl.
She bore the baby out of wedlock, which Hawthorne makes obvious. The blame seems to be put on Pearl. Hawthorne then has a way of placing innocense on Hester. In a Puritan driven colony, there is no forgiveness. Chapter 6 Pearl really puts this in perspective.