The Project Gutenberg EBook of James Fenimore Cooper, by Mary E. Phillips
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Title: James Fenimore Cooper
Author: Mary E. Phillips
Release Date: August 10, 2004 [EBook #13155]
Language: English
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[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
JAMES
FENIMORE COOPER
by
MARY E. PHILLIPS
[Illustration: LEATHERSTOCKING.]
New York: John Lane Company
London: John Lane: The Bodley Head
Toronto: Bell and Cockburn
MCMXIII
Copyright, 1912
By Mary E. Phillips
The University Press, Cambridge, U.S.A.
Dedicated To The Young Of
All Ages From The Years Of Ten
To Ten Times Ten
PREFACE
The intention of this simply told _personal_ life of James Fenimore
Cooper, the creator of American romance, is to have all material
_authentic_. The pictures of men, women, places and things are, as
nearly as possible, of Cooper's association with them to reproduce a
background of his time and to make the _man_--not the author--its
central foreground figure. From every available source since the
earliest mention of the author's name, both in print and out, material
for these pages has been collected. In this wide gleaning in the field
of letters--a rich harvest from able and brilliant pens--the gleaner
hereby expresses grateful appreciation of these transplanted values.
Much, precious in worth and attractive in interest, comes into these
pages from the generous and good among the relatives, friends, and
admirers of Fenimore Cooper. And more than all others, the author's
grand-nephew, the late Mr. George Pomeroy Keese, of Cooperstown, New
York, has paid rich and rare tribute to the memory of his uncle, with
whom when a boy he came in living touch. Appeals to Cooper's grandson,
James Fenimore Cooper, Esq., of Albany, New York, and also to his
publishers have been met in a spirit so gracious and their giving has
been so generous as to command the grateful service of the writer.
For rare values, in service and material, special credits are due to Mr.
George Pomeroy Keese, Cooperstown, N.Y.; James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.,
Albany, N.Y.; Mr. Francis Whiting Halsey, New York City; Mr. Edwin
Tenney Stiger, Watertown, Mass.; General James Grant Wilson, New York
City; Mr. Horace G. Wadlin, Librarian, Messrs. Otto Fleischner,
Assistant Librarian, O.A. Bierstadt, F.C. Blaisdell, and others, of the
Boston Public Library; Miss Alice Bailey Keese, Cooperstown, N.Y.; Mrs.
T. Henry Dewey, Paris, France; Mrs. Edward Emerson Waters, New York
City; and Miss Mary C. Sheridan, Boston, Mass.
Mary E. Phillips.
INTRODUCTION
A life of Cooper, written with some particular reference to the
picturesque village among the Otsego hills, where he so long lived and
in whose soil he, for some sixty years or more, has slept, has long been
needed. That such a book should have become a labor of love in the hands
of Miss Phillips is not more interesting than it is fortunate that the
task should have been accomplished so conspicuously well. Miss Phillips
has borne testimony to the resourcefulness and rare devotion with which
the late Mr. Keese assisted her in researches extending over many years.
None knew so well as he the personal side of Cooper's whole life story;
none so assiduously and so lovingly, during a long life spent in
Cooperstown, gathered and tried to preserve in their integrity every
significant and interesting detail of it.
The turning point in Cooper's life was reached when he went to
Cooperstown, although he was little more than a child in arms. Most
curious is it that his going should have resulted from the foreclosure
of a mortgage. This mortgage had been given in the late Colonial period
by George Croghan, and covered a vast tract of native forest lands in
Otsego. In these lands, through the foreclosure, Cooper's father, soon
after the Revolution, acquired a large interest, which led him to
abandon his home of ease and refinement in Burlington, New Jersey, and
found a new, and, as it proved to be, a permanent one in the unpeopled
wilderness at the foot of Otsego Lake. Except for this accident of
fortune, Leatherstocking and his companions of the forest never could
have been created by the pen of Cooper.
[Illustration: signature 'Francis W. Italsey']
ILLUSTRATIONS
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From Appleton portrait. By permission of owner,
James Fenimore Cooper, Esq., of Albany, N.Y. _Frontispiece_
THE ENGLISH FYNAMORE COUNTRY AND FAMILY ARMS.
COOPER'S BIRTHPLACE. Burlington, N.J. From a photograph by George W.
Tichnor
THE FENIMORE BOX. (Of light and dark woods, size 12-1/2 X 6-3/4 inches.)
From photograph by permission of owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.,
Albany, N.Y.
THE SUSQUEHANNA. By W.H. Bartlett
CHINGACHGOOK ON COUNCIL ROCK. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
COUNCIL ROCK. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
THE MANOR. From outline on _first_ map of Cooperstown, 1788-1790. By
permission of owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
ORIGINAL OTSEGO HALL. From outline on 1800-1808 map of Cooperstown. By
permission of owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
JUDGE WILLIAM COOPER. By Gilbert Stuart. By permission of owner, James
Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
GENERAL WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON. From a portrait by Woods, 1812
WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON, 1800. From "St. Memim's Gallery of Portraits"
TALLEYRAND. From a portrait by F. Gérard
POINT JUDITH. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
"EDGEWATER." By courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
MR. AND MRS. GEORGE POMEROY. By the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
THE OLD STONE HOUSE. By the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
COOPERSTOWN PRIOR TO 1835. From _The Family Magazine_, 1836-1837
DR. THOMAS ELLISON. By the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
ST. PETER'S CHURCH, ALBANY, N.Y. By the courtesy of Dr. Joseph Hooper,
Durham, Conn.
STATE STREET, ALBANY, N.Y., 1802. By the courtesy of Dr. Joseph Hooper
"NEAR SHORES" OF NEW HAVEN. From an old print
DR. TIMOTHY DWIGHT. From an old print
YALE COLLEGE, 1806. By the courtesy of Professor John C. Schwab, Ph.D.,
Librarian, Yale University
WILLIAM JAY IN YOUTH. By Vanderlyn. From Bayard Tuckerman's "William
Jay," etc. By courtesy of author and publishers, Dodd, Mead & Co., N.Y.
JUDGE WILLIAM JAY. From a crayon by Martin. Dodd, Mead & Co., N.Y.
SILHOUETTE OF JAMES COOPER WHEN A STUDENT AT YALE. By the courtesy of
Professor John C. Schwab, Ph.D.
OUTWARD BOUND.
GIBRALTAR. From "_Le Monde Illustré_"
SAILOR'S SNUG HARBOR. From _Frank Leslie's Weekly_, Vol. I
OTSEGO HALL GATES. By courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
BUFFALO BURNT. From an old woodcut in Spear's "United States Navy"
THE "VESUVIUS." From "Life of Fulton," by J.F. Reigart, 1856
ONTARIO FORESTS. By W.H. Bartlett
THE THOUSAND ISLANDS. By W.H. Bartlett
THE PORT OF BUFFALO. From an old print
CAPTAIN M.T. WOOLSEY. From Spear's "United States Navy"
THE PATHFINDER. By F.O.C. Darley
A BUBBLE OF A BOAT. By F.O.C. Darley
CAPTAIN LAWRENCE. From a portrait by Chappel
THE "WASP." From an old print
FRAUNCES TAVERN. By the courtesy of Dr. Joseph Hooper, Durham, Conn.
LIEUT. GOV. JAMES DE LANCEY'S SEAL. From Vol. I, M.J. Lamb's "History of
New York City"
HEATHCOTE ARMS. From an old print
HON. CALEB HEATHCOTE. From print by V. Belch
FRAUNCES TAVERN LONG-ROOM. From "History of New York," by Mary L. Booth,
1857 BURN'S COFFEE HOUSE. From an old print
HEATHCOTE HILL. By the courtesy of J.W. Clapp, editor _Richbell Press_,
Mamaroneck, N.Y.
TANDEM. From a rare old color-print. By the courtesy of George Samuel
Tucker, Peterboro, N.H.
COOPER'S FENIMORE FARM HOUSE. By the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy
Keese
ELIZABETH FENIMORE COOPER IN THE OLD HALL HOME. By the courtesy of
Elizabeth Cooper Keese
COOPER'S ANGEVINE FARM HOME. From "Homes of American Authors." G.L.
Putnam Sons, 1853
MAMARONECK CREEK SLOOPS. From Bryant's "History of the United States"
JUDGE JOHN JAY. From print of Trumbull portrait
BEDFORD HOUSE. From an old print
BEDFORD HOUSE LIBRARY. From Vol. II, Lamb's "History of New York City"
HARVEY BIRCH'S CAVE. By courtesy of Arthur B. Maurice, author of "New
York in Fiction"
THE LOCUSTS OF COOPER'S TIME. From Lossing's "Field-Book of the War of
1812"
THE LOCUSTS OF TO-DAY. By courtesy of the owner, Lawrence Durham, Esq.
TITLE-PAGE OF THE FIRST EDITION OF "THE SPY."
ENOCH CROSBY. From "History of Westchester County, N.Y." By Spooner and
Shenard
LAFAYETTE THEATRE. From _New York Mirror_, Vol. V.
COOPER'S HEROINES. By courtesy of Rev. Ralph Birdsall and Miss Catherine
N. Duyckinck
WINDHURST'S NOOK, UNDER THE PARK THEATRE. From "History of New York
City," by Mary L. Booth, 1859
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER, 1822. From a photograph of the J.W. Jarvis
portrait. By permission of the owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.,
Albany, N.Y.
FITZ-GREENE HALLECK. From print of Inman portrait. By permission of
owner, Gen. James Grant Wilson
JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE, From "Poems"
CRO' NEST. From "Poems," by Joseph Rodman Drake
SAMUEL WOODWORTH. From a rare lithograph
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET. By F.S. Agate
CITY HOTEL AND WASHINGTON HALL. From Vol. II, "History of New York
City," by M.J. Lamb, and from "Valentine's Manual"
EARLY BROADWAY. Old prints
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. By B. Whitechurch
COOPER'S NEW YORK CITY HOME IN BEACH STREET. By the courtesy of General
James Grant Wilson
ST. JOHN'S CHAPEL. From _The York Mirror_
OLD LEATHERSTOCKING. From "The Pioneers"
NATTY'S CAVE. From an old print
GENERAL JAMES CLINTON. From an old print
CLINTON DAM. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
"TALES FOR FIFTEEN, OR IMAGINATION AND HEART." By permission of the
owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
CHARLES WILKES. From portrait by Thos. Sully
JOHN PAUL JONES. From portrait by C.W. Peale
LONG TOM COFFIN. F.O.C. Darley
BRYANT, WEBSTER AND IRVING. From sketch by Daniel Huntington by the
courtesy of owner, Mr. Day, Boston
THE LANDING OF LAFAYETTE, 1824. From "Complete History of Lafayette,"
1825 edition
LAFAYETTE. Portrait by Sully
LAFAYETTE'S BRANDYWINE VASE. From an old print
JOB PRAY. By F.O.C. Darley
THE BURNING OF CHARLESTOWN. From an old print
WHIPPLE HOUSE, AT PROVIDENCE, R.I. From an old print
MRS. JAMES MONROE. By the courtesy of General James Grant Wilson
PRESIDENT'S HOUSE, WASHINGTON, D.C., 1825. From an old print
SUNRISE AT SOUTH MOUNTAIN. Drawn by Harry Fenn for D. Appleton and Co.,
N.Y.
GLENS FALL'S CAVERNS. From "The Hudson," by Lossing
HONORABLE MR. STANLEY. Portrait by G. Harlow, 1833
GLENS FALL. By W.H. Bartlett
LAKE GEORGE, OR "THE HORICAN." By W.H. Bartlett
THE WAGER SEAL (1 X 1-1/8 inches). By permission of the owner, James
Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
BRYANT. Portrait by Barrett
"NATTY, THE TRAPPER." By F.O.C. Darley
HENRY CLAY. From a daguerreotype, engraved by Buttre
CHANCELLOR KENT. Portrait by Chappel
THE U.S.S. "HUDSON." By W.J. Bennett
WHITEHALL WHARF, 1826. From "Valentine's Manual"
KEEP OF CARISBROOK. By J. and F. Harwood, London, 1841
HAVRE, BY NIGHT. From "Meyer's Universum"
WINDMILLS OF MONTMARTRE. From an old French print
THE CONVENT ST. MAUR.
HOTEL DE JUMIÈGES. Found, verified and photographed for this Life of
Cooper by kindness of Mrs. T. Henry Dewey of Paris, France
SIR WALTER SCOTT. Portrait by G.S. Newton, 1824
MISS ANNE SCOTT. Portrait by W. Nicholson
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. After portrait by Madame de Mirbel, 1830
PIERRE JEAN DAVID D'ANGERS. Portrait by D'Aubrey. By courtesy of General
George T. Cruft
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From a photograph of the bust by David d'Angers,
Paris, 1828. By permission of the owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
MRS. JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From a photograph of a drawing made at
Paris, 1890. By permission of James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From a photograph of a drawing made at Paris,
1827. By permission of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
PROF. GEORGE WASHINGTON GREEN. By special permission of Mr. William Dean
Howells and Harper & Brothers
P.T. DE BÉRANGER. From a rare old print
TALLEYRAND. From an old engraving
DUCHESSE DE BERRI. From Soule photograph
CHARLES X of FRANCE. From Soule photograph
COOPER'S SUMMER HOME, ST. OUEN, 1827. Found, verified and photographed
by the kindness of Mrs. T. Henry Dewey, Paris, France
COOPER'S ST. OUEN TERRACE STUDY. Found, verified and photographed by the
kindness of Mrs. T. Henry Dewey, Paris, France
OLD MILL AT NEWPORT. From an old print
THE STRUGGLE. By F.O.C. Darley
THE NEWPORT BOX. By permission of the owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART. By Pickersgill
NATTY'S LAST CALL. From an old print
THE PRINCESS BARBARA VASSILIEWNA GALITZIN From print of portrait by Hein
Friedr. Füger
LA GRANGE, COUNTRY HOME OF LAFAYETTE. From an old print
LA GRANGE ARCHWAY ENTRANCE. From "Complete History of Lafayette"
HÔTEL DESSEIN, CALAIS, FRANCE. From a rare old print
CLIFFS OF DOVER. By C. Stanfield
CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL CHOIR. From Soule photograph
GREEN GATE, CANTERBURY. From _Port Folio_, 1814
ST. JAMES PLACE, LONDON. From Thornbury's "Old and New London"
SIR FRANCIS CHANTREY. From _European Magazine_, 1822
SAMUEL ROGERS. Portrait by Thomas Lawrence
ROGERS' LONDON HOME. From "Bohn's Handbook of London"
ROGERS' BREAKFAST-ROOM. From _Illustrated London News_, 1857
CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE. From an old print
SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH. Portrait by Thomas Lawrence
HOLLAND HOUSE. By Stockdale
LIBRARY OF HOLLAND HOUSE. By Charles R. Leslie. Used by permission of
the British Museum. From left to right, portrait of Addison, Lord
Holland, Lady Holland, Dr. John Allen, Librarian Doggett
GILT CHAMBER OF HOLLAND HOUSE. From lithograph by Richardson
ROGERS' SEAT. From Leichenstein's "Holland House"
LORD GREY. From a portrait by Thomas Lawrence
MRS. JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART. From a portrait by W. Nicholson
JOANNA BAILLIE. From "Life and Works of J. Baillie"
SIR THOMAS LAWRENCE. From the Academy sketch, 1829
HOUSE OF THE GILLMAN'S, HIGHGATE, LONDON. From Hall's "Book of Memories"
BOOM KEY AT ROTTERDAM. From an old etching
MT. BLANC. By J.M.W. Turner
LA LORRAINE VIEW OF BERNESE ALPS. From Swiss print
NAHL'S MEMORIAL TO MADAME LANGHAN. From _European Magazine_, 1786
NARRA-MATTAH. By F.O.C. Darley
CONNECTICUT EMIGRANTS. From an old print
FALL OF THE STAUBBACH. From an old water color
THE DEVIL'S BRIDGE. By W.H. Bartlett, 1836
FERNEY, VOLTAIRE'S LAKE LEMAN HOME. From _European Magazine_, 1786
THE SIMPLON PASS. By Lory
FLORENCE, ITALY. From an old print
PALAZZO RICASOLI, FLORENCE, ITALY. From special drawing by G. Amightti.
By courtesy of Signor Agusto Ticci, Florence
HORATIO GREENOUGH. From portrait in Boston Athenaeum. By courtesy of Mr.
Charles K. Bolton, Librarian
BUST OF JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. By Horatio Greenough, in Boston Public
Library. By courtesy of the Librarian, Mr. Horace G. Wadlin, and
photographed by Arthur Pierce Truette
CHANTING CHERUBS. Detail from Raphael's Madonna del Trono
LEOPOLD II, GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY. From Ballou's "Pictorial," Vol. XVII
PITTI PALACE, FLORENCE, 1828. From water color, 1830
COUNT ST. LEU. From "_La Jeunesse de Napoleon III_" by Stefane-Pol
LETIZIA BOUNAPARTE. From color print by de Delpech
MADAME MÈRE. From print of drawing by Princess Charlotte, in Vol. XX,
_L'lllustration_
CHURCH OF ST. ILLARIO AND NARROW LANE. From photograph obtained by Sig.
Agusto Ticci, Florence, Italy
VILLA, ST. ILLARIO. From special photograph obtained by Mrs. T. Henry
Dewey, Paris, France
CHARIOT RACES, FLORENCE. From an old print
GENOA. By Vocher
LEGHORN. From an old etching
NAPLES. From an old water color
CASA TASSO AT SORRENTO. From _"Vita di Torquato Tasso_" by Angelo
Solerti
CASA TASSO TERRACE-STUDY. From _"Vita di Torquato Tasso_," by Angelo
Solerti
ST. PETER'S, EXTERIOR, ROME. From an old print
ST. PETER'S, INTERIOR. From an old print
ADAM MICKIEOWICZ. From the "Life of the Poet"
PORTA RIPETTA. From an old etching
ROMAN FORUM. By Sargent
PORTA DEL POPOLO. From an old print
FALLS OF MARMORA AT TERNI. From an old print
ANCONA. By S. Prout
LORETO. From an old print
SCALLA MINELLI, VENICE. From an old print
VENICE. By J.B. Pyne
PIAZZA SAN MARCO. By Chilone
PALACE OF THE DOGE. From an old print
TASSO'S WELL. Special photograph by Marjorie Elizabeth Parks
THE BRAVO. By F.O.C. Darley
GLORY OF THE ASSUMPTION. By Titian
ABSOLUTION OF ANTONIO. By F.O.C. Darley
ALT MARKET, DRESDEN. From 1830 print by permission of owner, Mayor of
Dresden, and courtesy of Herr Rudolf Drescher, Hanau-on-Main, Germany
LAFAYETTE'S PARIS HOME, RUE D'ANJOU. From special photograph obtained by
Mrs. T. Henry Dewey, Paris, France
LAFAYETTE'S BED-ROOM. From "Complete History of Lafayette"
LOUIS PHILIPPE. From "_Galerie Napoléon_"
GENERAL LAFAYETTE. From lithograph by Delpech
QUEEN MARIE AMÉLIE. From an old print
S.F.B. MORSE. From _L'Illustration,_ Vols. XXXI and XXXII
N.P. WILLIS. By S. Lawrence
TUILERIES GARDENS. From an old print
TENIER'S WIFE. Portrait by Tenier. From photograph of original by
permission of the owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
MRS. JAMES FENIMORE COOPER AND HER SON PAUL. From a photograph of a
painting done at Paris, 1831. By permission of owner, James Fenimore
Cooper, Esq.
THE CHILDREN OF MR. AND MRS. JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From a photograph
(given by Mr. George Pomeroy Keese) of a drawing made in Paris by Miss
Susan Cooper. By permission of owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq. From
left to right, Caroline Martha (Mrs. H.F. Phinney), Susan [unreadable]
Fenimore, Anne Charlotte, Maria Frances [unreadable] Cooper
THE ANGELUS. By J.F. Millet
EUGÈNE-JOSEPH VERBOECKHOVEN. From a print
PETER PAUL RUBENS. Portrait by the artist
RUBENS' COLOGNE HOME. From Fairholt's "Homes and Haunts of Artists"
CONVENT OF NUNNENWORTH. By Tombleson
WATCH TOWER ON THE RHINE. From _The Art Journal_, 1880
HEIDELBERG AND CASTLE. From 1840 print
VEVAY SHORES OF LAKE LEMAN. From _New England Magazine_
FÉTE DES VIGNERONS. By courtesy of Mrs. Rufus A. Kingman
NOAH'S ARK VEVAY. 1833 By courtesy of Mrs. Rufus A. Kingman
HOSPICE ST. BERNARD. By Major Cockburn
BAY OF NAPLES. By James Hakywill
NEW YORK HARBOR. By W.H. Bartlett
COOPER'S OTSEGO HALL HOME. By courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
COPY OF COOPER'S GARDEN SEAT. From photograph by A.J. Telfer
COOPER'S LIBRARY AT OTSEGO HALL. From drawing by Mr. George Pomeroy
Keese
JUDGE NELSON. From photograph by A.J. Telfer
WILD ROSE POINT OR THREE MILE POINT. From a photograph by the courtesy
of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
COOPER'S NEW YORK CITY HOME, ST. MARK'S PLACE. From a print by the
courtesy of owner, General James Grant Wilson
HORACE GREELEY. From a portrait by J.C. Buttre
PARK BENJAMIN. From a portrait by J.C. Buttre
THURLOW WEED. From a portrait by C.B. Hall
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From a daguerreotype by Brady. By permission of
owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
COLONEL JOHN TRUMBULL. From portrait by Waldo and Jewett.
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. From a Paris print
COLUMBUS' FLEET. From an old print
THE GLIMMERGLASS. From photograph by courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
OTSEGO LAKE. Inset, Leatherstocking Falls and Natty Bumppo's Cave, from
photographs by A.J. Telfer, Cooperstown, N.Y.
JESSE D. ELLIOTT'S LAKE ERIE MEDAL. From Spear's "History of the United
States Navy"
MEDAL GIVEN TO JAMES FENIMORE COOPER BY JESSE D. ELLIOTT. From
photograph by the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
ISLAND OF ELBA. From an old print
ELBA HOME OF NAPOLEON. From Abbott's "Napoleon"
BATTLE OF LAKE ERIE. From painting by W.H. Powell
COOPER'S DIAGRAM OF THE BATTLE OF LAKE ERIE.
COOPER'S DIAGRAM OF THE BATTLE OF "BON HOMME RICHARD" AND THE "SERAPIS."
BATTLE OF THE "BON HOMME RICHARD" AND THE "SERAPIS" By J. Rogers
STUMP EXTRACTOR. From "The Hudson," by B.J. Lossing
THE CHÂLET FARM. From photograph by the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy
Keese
THE ESCAPE. From "Wyandotte." By F.O.C. Darley
MISS CAROLINE ADRIANCE FOOTE, AGE 13. From a daguerreotype by the
courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
MISS ALICE TRUMBULL WORTHINGTON. From a daguerreotype by the courtesy of
owner, Mrs. Alice Worthington Synnott
LIEUT. ALEXANDER SLIDELL MACKENZIE. From Duyckwick's "Cyclopedia of
American Literature"
HELL GATE. From "Pages and Pictures," by Susan Augusta Cooper
NIAGARA FALLS. By W.H. Bartlett
JUDGE BAZIL HARRISON OF KALAMAZOO, MICHIGAN. From _Hearth and Home_,
1870
HON. GERRIT SMITH. From an old print
WILLIAM BRANDFORD SHUBRICK. From Lossing's "Field-Book of the War of
1812"
CHARLES MATHEWS. From "Memorials of Charles Mathew" by Mrs. Mathews
JAMES H. HACKETT. From "Modern Standard Drama"
STEWART'S MARBLE PALACE. From an old print
MISS SUSAN AUGUSTA COOPER, ABOUT 1850. From a daguerreotype. By
permission of the owner, James Fenimore Cooper, Esq.
OTSEGO LAKE PARTY IN 1840. By J.L. Pease
JOE TOM. From a photograph by the courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
NATTY'S CAVE. From an old print
OTSEGO HALL--BACK VIEW. From "Pages and Pictures," by Susan Augusta
Cooper
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER. From a daguerrotype by Brady. By permission of
the owner, [unreadable] Cooper, Esq., Albany, N.Y.
THE SWEDISH NIGHTINGALE (JENNY LIND). Portrait by J.W. Orr From Soule
photograph
JENNY LIND AT CASTLE GARDEN, NEW YORK CITY, 1850. From an old print
DR. JOHN WAKEFIELD FRANCIS. From portrait by J. Goldbruam
DR. FRANCIS' HOME IN NEW YORK CITY. By Richardson
CHRIST'S CHURCH, COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
FENIMORE COOPER'S SCREEN GIFT. From a print by courtesy of Miss Alice
Bailey Keese
BISHOP WILLIAM HEATHCOTE DE LANCEY. From Scharf's "History of
Westchester County, NY"
DE LANCEY COAT OF ARMS. From "A God-Child of Washington," by Katherine
Schuyler Baxter
THE NEW HOME AND THE OLD HOME.
INDIAN HUNTER. By J.Q.A. Ward
COOPER GROUNDS. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
THE CHILDREN'S TRIBUTE. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
LAKE OTSEGO. From a photograph by A.J. Telfer
LEATHERSTOCKING FIGURE OF COOPER MEMORIAL. From a photograph by A.J.
Telfer
LEATHERSTOCKING MONUMENT. By R.E. Launitz, N.A. From a photograph by
A.J. Telfer
GEORGE POMEROY KEESE. From a photograph by permission of Mrs. George
Pomeroy Keese
BERRY POMEROY CASTLE. By courtesy of Mr. George Pomeroy Keese
Acknowledgment is due The F.A. Ringler Company of New York City and
Messrs. John Andrew and Son of Boston, Mass., for the care and interest
they have shown in making the cuts used in this volume.
[Illustration: THE ENGLISH FYNAMORE COUNTRY AND FAMILY ARMS.]
JAMES FENIMORE COOPER
[Illustration: COOPER'S BIRTHPLACE, Burlington, N.J.]
The light of this world fell on James Fenimore Cooper September 15,
1789. The founder of American romance was born in a quaint, two-storied
house of stuccoed brick which now numbers 457 Main St., Burlington, New
Jersey. It was then "the last house but one as you go into the country"
and among the best of the town. In a like house next door lived the
father of the naval hero, Capt. James Lawrence. These two houses opened
directly on the street and their slanting roofs were shaded by tall
trees rooted at the curbstones. This outline of Fenimore Cooper's
birthplace is from the text-picture in "Literary Rambles," by Theodore
F. Wolfe, M.D., Ph.D. The first of his father's family in this new
country was James Cooper, who came from Stratford-on-Avon, England, in
1679. He and his wife were Quakers, and with Quaker thrift bought wide
tracts of land in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Seventy-five years after
James Cooper stepped on American soil his great-grandson William was
born, December 2, 1754, in Byberry township, Pennsylvania.
On December 12, 1775, at Burlington, New Jersey, William Cooper married
Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Fenimore, whose family came from
Oxfordshire of Old England, and, at intervals, held office in her
provinces. James, the future author and named for his grandfather
Cooper, was the eleventh of twelve children. About 1807 Cooper, by
request of his mother, said he would adopt the name of Fenimore as there
were no men of her family to continue it. The change was delayed by the
untimely death of Judge Cooper, and also to make less difficult the
settlement of his large estate. But in 1826 James Cooper applied to the
legislature for his change of name to James Cooper _Fenimore_. This
request was not granted, but the change to "James Fenimore Cooper" was
made. Cooper's comment on this outcome is a graphic record and
"suggests," says an authority, that "the legislature would do well to
assume that a petitioner, in such a case, knew better than they did what
he wanted." The hyphen, at first used, was soon dropped. And so it was
for his mother's sake that he made world-wide his fame by the name of
James _Fenimore_ Cooper.
[Illustration: THE FENIMORE BOX.]
"The Fenimore Box" is an "English measure box, curious, and centuries
old, brought over by the first of the name." It descended to Cooper from
his mother, Elizabeth Fenimore, and is now treasured as a family
heirloom by his grandson, James Fenimore Cooper of Albany, New York.
[Illustration: THE SUSQUEHANNA.]
As the first James Cooper and his wife were Quakers, perchance the same
Quaker thrift influenced William Cooper to follow the lead of George
Washington, who, two years before, in order to find out the inland
waterways of our country, came from the Mohawk Valley to the headwaters
of the Susquehanna--this stream which Fenimore Cooper called "the
crooked river to which the Atlantic herself extended an arm of welcome."
Lake Otsego--the "Glimmerglass"--William Cooper saw first in the autumn
of 1785. "Mt. Vision" was covered with a forest growth so dense that he
had to "climb a tree in order to get a view of the lake, and while up
the tree" he saw a deer come down "from the thickets and quietly drink
of its waters near Otsego Rock." "Just where the Susquehanna leaves the
Lake on its long journey to the sea" this famous Council Rock "still
shows its chin above the water and marks the spot where Deerslayer met
Chingachgook the Great Serpent of the Delawares." Now "its lake margin
belongs to a grandson of the author, who also bears his name," is a
record found in Dr. Wolfe's "Literary Haunts and Homes." In the red
man's tongue Otsego means "a place of friendly meeting" of Indian
warriors. The author of "Deerslayer" has immortalized that
lake-country in the opening chapter of this book.
[Illustration: CHINGACHGOOK ON THE COUNCIL ROCK.]
Of this visit to his future home and lands William Cooper has written:
"In 1785 I visited the rough and hilly country of Otsego. I was alone,
three hundred miles from home, without food of any kind. I caught trout
in the brook and roasted them in the ashes. My horse fed on the grass
that grew by the edge of the waters. I laid me down to sleep in my
watch-coat, nothing but the wilderness about me. In this way I explored
the country and formed my plans of future settlement. May, 1786, I
opened a sale of forty thousand acres of land, which in sixteen days
were all taken up by the poorest order of men." Here William Cooper laid
out the site of Cooperstown, which, until 1791, when it became the
county-town, was at times also called "Foot-of-the-Lake." He built a
store for his sturdy pioneers, giving credit for their simple needs of
life, and traded settlement products for them. His tenants put up log
houses, and paid rent in butter, wheat, corn, oats, maple-sugar, and
finally in pork;--so much that rentals known as "pork leases" were sold
like farms. Money was scarce in those days,--when one John Miller, and
his father, coming to the Lakeland's point of the river, felled a pine,
over which they crossed to the Cooperstown site. Its stump was marked
with white paint and called the "bridge-tree" by Fenimore Cooper. His
sister Nancy's grandson, Mr. George Pomeroy Keese, from whom much will
appear in these pages, has all there is left of that stump.
[Illustration: COUNCIL ROCK.]
In a few years the town's growth gave such promise that William Cooper
began to build his own home. It was generally known as "The Manor," but
the patent of Cooperstown was not according to law a manor. It was
finished in 1788, when a few streets were laid out and the town's first
map was made. And October 10, 1790, he brought his family and servants,
some fifteen persons, and their belongings, from Burlington New Jersey,
to this early pioneer home. Mr. Keese says that "The Manor" was of wood
with outside boarding, unplaned; that it was two stories high, had two
wings and a back building added in 1791. It first stood facing Main St.
and Otsego Lake and directly in front of the later Otsego Hall, now
marked by the Indian Hunter. In 1799 it was moved down the street, and
was burned down in 1812. In its time it was the most stately private
house for miles around. The second home, Otsego Hall, built in 1798, was
of bricks which were made at the outlet of the lake. It had seventy feet
of frontage by fifty-six of depth, and had two stories with attic and
basement. The main hall measured twenty-four by forty-eight feet and the
rooms on either side were twenty feet wide. Otsego Hall is said to have
been of the exact, generous proportions of the Van Rensselaer Manor
House at Albany, New York, where Judge Cooper was a frequent visitor.
His own Hall home on Otsego's southern shore ever had "the air and
capacity of a mansion and a history of hospitality well deserved."
[Illustration: THE MANOR.]
[Illustration: ORIGINAL OTSEGO HALL.]
[Illustration: JUDGE WILLIAM COOPER.]
To a friend William Cooper wrote: "I began life with a small capital
and a large family, and yet I have already settled more acres than any
man in America; and I trust no one can justly impute to me any act of
oppression. Your good sense and knowledge will excuse this seeming
boast." He elsewhere said that he owed his success to "a steady mind, a
sober judgment, fortitude, perseverance, and above all, common sense."
And here he lived as a wise and kind landlord among his people. For nine
years he was First Judge of the County Court of Common Pleas, and he
served two terms in Congress. Of Judge William Cooper there are three
portraits,--Gilbert Stuart's of 1797-98, Trumbull's of 1806, and one by
an unknown artist. His kindly gray eye, robust figure, and firm
expression bear out the story of his life as told by these portraits.
James Fenimore Cooper, in a letter to his wife, dated Canajoharie, 1834,
wrote of his father: "I have been up to the ravine to the old Frey
house. It recalled my noble-looking, warmhearted, witty father, with his
deep laugh, sweet voice, and fine, rich eye, as he used to light the way
with his anecdotes and fun. Old Frey, with his little black peepers,
pipe, hearty laugh, broken English, and warm welcome, was in the
background. I went to the very spot where one of the old man's slaves
amused Sam and myself with an imitation of a turkey that no artist has
ever yet been able to supplant in my memory." This Heindrick Frey was a
noted character of the Mohawk Valley over one hundred years ago.
It was, however, to the first home on Otsego's shore that the future
creator of American romance was brought when a babe some thirteen months
old. Here, in the heart of the wilderness, his infancy was passed.
Otsego Hall sheltered his budding boyhood and young manhood. Grace and
refinement dwelt within the household; without, voices of the forest
awakened and nurtured his naturally active mind, which later on was not
less influenced by the mysteries of the sea. The Six Nations were yet a
power in the Mohawk Valley, then the highway to the land of the setting
sun beyond. And they are now remembered in the names of the principal
lakes and streams of the country that once was theirs. The boy was
face-to-face with the "grim warriors, braves, and chieftains that the
man, Fenimore Cooper, translated into his pages, with a touch true to
the red man's life," his instinct in trading, his friendly and hostile
intent. Here Nature was his first and unforgettable teacher. From "Pages
and Pictures," by his daughter, Susan Fenimore Cooper, much will be
given in this book. Miss Cooper has drawn some pretty pen-pictures of
her father's child-life. She writes: "From the first bow and arrow, kite
and ball, to later feats in fishing, riding, shooting, and skating, all
were connected with his highland home." He was "healthy and active; a
brave, blithe-hearted, impetuous, most generous and upright boy." Of his
childhood another record is: "A gray-eyed, light-haired, ruddy boy,
nimble as a deer and gay as a bird; on the lake, plying his oar lustily
or trimming his sail to the mountain breeze; and whenever he found a
wave high enough to lift his little boat, his veins would thrill with a
strange delight, and he would ask himself whether this was like those
ocean waves of which he had heard such wonders." The little lad's next
step in learning was taken under the gentle rule of his elder sister,
Hannah, who had her schooling in New York City, and afterwards improved
her leisure by extensive reading. She was a model of domestic virtues
and was greatly beloved, especially by the poor, to whom she was ever an
angel of mercy. She often went with her father on his official visits to
the seat of government, and when, in 1800, at the age of twenty-three
years, she lost her life by a fall from her horse, her early death was
widely and deeply mourned. Her memory was always cherished with peculiar
tenderness by her brother James, the special charge of her loving care.
[Illustration: GENERAL WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON.]
A letter, written by him in 1841 to his old "messmate," Commodore
Shubrick, reveals no wane of Cooper's love for and pride in this sister,
and his letter's "political discovery" reveals that Miss Cooper's
attractions were as fully appreciated by the eminent of her own country
as by those of foreign shores. So comes into these pages a youthful,
slender romance of the later hero of Tippecanoe and still later
President of the United States.
[Illustration: WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON, 1800.]
OTSEGO HALL, COOPERSTOWN, February, 28, 1841.
I have made a great political discovery lately, which must not go
any further than Mrs. Shubrick and Mary. In 1799, when Congress sat
in Philadelphia, my father was a member, as was also General
Harrison. You know I had a sister killed by a fall from a horse in
1800. This sister passed the Winter in Philadelphia with my
father. Miss Anne Cooper [the author's daughter] was lately in
Philadelphia, where she met Mr. Thomas Biddle, who asked if our
family were not Harrison men. The reason of so singular a question
was asked, and Mr. Biddle answered that in 1799 Mr. Harrison was
dying with love for Miss Cooper, that he (Mr. Biddle) was his
confidant, and that he _thinks_ but does not _know_ that he was
refused. If not refused it was because he was not encouraged to
propose, so you see I stand on high grounds and am ready to serve
you on occasion. Don't let this go any further, however. I confess
to think all the better of the General for this discovery, for it
shows that he had forty years ago both taste and judgment in a
matter in which men so often fail. Mary will open her eyes at this
somewhat wider than ever, but she must not open her mouth until she
gives her allegiance to him who will know all her thoughts. With
best regards
_Yours as ever_,
J. FENIMORE COOPER.
NOTE.--Later light on the subject reveals Mr. Harrison's "dying of
love" as a hearty admiration and esteem for the rare grace and
charm of character, mind, and person possessed by Judge Cooper's
young daughter.
[Illustration: TALLEYRAND.]
During 1795 many distinguished exiles came to this new-country home, and
among those who found their way to Otsego Hall was the Marquis de
Talleyrand, who was pleased to write an acrostic on Miss Cooper, then
seventeen. The famous Frenchman's record, in part, of this visit was
"_Otsego n'est pas gai_." Compared to the France of Talleyrand's day
this record was true. The _Otsego Herald's_ motto of that time was
Historic truth our _Herald_ shall proclaim, The Law our guide, the
public good our aim.
In its issue of October 2, 1795, appeared the celebrated diplomat's
Acrostic.
Aimable philosophe au printemps de son âge,
Ni les temps, ni les lieus n'altèrent son esprit;
Ne cèdent qu' à ses goûts simples et son étalage,
Au milieu des deserts, elle lit, pense, écrit.
Cultivez, belle Anna, votre goût pour l'étude;
On ne saurait ici mieux employer son temps;
Otsego n'est pas gai--mais, tout est habitude;
Paris vous déplairait fort au premier moment;
Et qui jouit de soi dans une solitude,
Rentrant au monde, est sur d'en faire I'ornement.
In affectionate remembrance of Miss Cooper the hill just northwest of
Cooperstown was named for her, and "Hannah's Hill" commands one of the
town's finest views. In the quiet shades of Christ's Church yard "belle
Anna" rests beneath a slab bearing some lines by her father, but not her
name.
The August before this sad event Judge Cooper gave the first of the many
"lake parties" that floated over Otsego--"which no waters can rival." In
the fairness of her youth Miss Hannah was there with her little sister,
later Mrs. Pomeroy; and also, among the gay "five and twenty friends
from Philadelphia," were their brothers. Indian canoes and flat-bottomed
skiffs conveyed them to the eastern shore, where, at Two-Mile Point, a
frightened fawn, startled from its forest home by the dogs of Shipman
the hunter,--who later outlined "Leatherstocking,"--darted from the
leafy thicket and plunged into the lake. At once all were in motion to
rescue the little creature now swimming for life. It was successfully
brought to land and became a great pet with Judge Cooper's children; but
one day, frightened by strange, fierce dogs, it bounded into the forest
depths for refuge, and never returned.
The centennial anniversary of this first picnic was celebrated by the
third and fourth generation of Judge Cooper's descendants, who met at
Point Judith to honor the occasion. Of the verses written by Mr. George
Pomeroy Keese concerning this event two are:
[Illustration: POINT JUDITH.]
And one hundred years have come and gone
Since our country then was new,
And now we keep in memory dear
Our love for the good and true.
To one who came to his forest home
And gave to our village its name;
To the son, the touch of whose magic pen
Has lifted to world-wide fame.
In this summer of 1800 Richard, Judge Cooper's eldest son, built his
house of frame on "Apple Hill." It was the second villa-like home in the
village. Its site, now known as "Fernleigh," is the country-seat of
Stephen Clark, Esq. "Edgewater," overlooking Lake Otsego, is the land
that, after Judge Cooper's death in 1809, fell to his son Isaac. Here,
the following year, Isaac Cooper built his home of brick. Later, it
changed in form, use, and ownership, but again became a family
possession through the marriage of Mr. Theodore Keese with the daughter
of George Pomeroy and Ann Cooper. Renewing in all ways the charm and
grace of its early days, "Edgewater," as the home of Mr. George Pomeroy
Keese, the grandson of Fenimore Cooper's youngest sister Ann, commands
at the foot of the lake its length, breadth, beauty, and inspiration.
[Illustration: "EDGEWATER."]
The old stone house, known as the "Deacon Pomeroy's place," that stood
at the corner of Main and River streets, gives--in a quaint gable--an
enduring record of romance in this sister Ann's young-life. It was
built of stone in the peculiar herring-bone style by Judge William
Cooper for a wedding gift to his only living daughter, Ann, when she
married George Pomeroy, grandson of Gen. Seth Pomeroy and lineal
descendant of that Sir Ralph de Pomeroy who came to England with William
the Conqueror. In this quaint gable appear the intertwined letters
G.A.P.C.--the initials of the bridegroom and bride,--with the date 1804
beneath.
[Illustration: MR. AND MRS. GEORGE POMEROY.]
The Cooper room of this old stone house, now the home of Mrs. Benedict,
a granddaughter, shelters family portraits from William Cooper's time
down to the present day--five generations. What stories might it not
tell of the attractive originals? Many were the letters that Fenimore
Cooper wrote from Europe to this sister, Mrs. George Pomeroy, of the
old stone house.
Mrs. Benedict has also placed there many souvenirs of her sister,
Constance Fenimore Woolson, gathered during-her long residence in
Europe, including the author's writing-table and her chair.
[Illustration: THE OLD STONE HOUSE.]
"Master Oliver Cory kept the village school" in those child-days of
Fenimore Cooper, and long after. "He was well qualified for that post;
laborious, upright, firm, yet patient and kindly by nature. His
training of the boys was excellent. Saturdays were given to religious
lessons, and he paid careful but quiet attention to their morals and
manners." From his sister Hannah's teaching Judge Cooper's youngest son
went to Master Cory's school. It was kept in "one of those tasteless
buildings that afflict all new countries," and here was called the
"Academy." It served Cooperstown in timely ways for religious and
political meetings; public courts were held here, and a ball was given
now and then under its roof. As to the school, time and incident brought
out a taste for music in the pupils of Master Cory. It seems that Judge
Cooper had brought from Philadelphia a large upright organ of imposing
appearance and power, which he placed in his manor-house hall. Its
arrival in the village made a summer's sensation. When put up and
adjusted, a rehearsal of country dances, reels, and more serious music
came floating through the broad door and ample windows of Otsego Hall
into Master Cory's domain, the Academy, which stood in the adjoining
street. As, with magic effect the strains of "Hail Columbia" poured into
the schoolroom, Master Cory skilfully met a moment of open rebellion
with these words: "Boys, that organ is a remarkable instrument. You
never heard the like of it before. I give you half an hour's
intermission. Go into the street and listen to the music!"
[Illustration: COOPERSTOWN PRIOR TO 1835.]
These "Academy boys" were ambitious; each annual exhibition was crowded,
to listen to the speeches "of Coriolanus, Iago, Brutus, and Cassius" by
"raw lads from the village and adjoining farms," in all the bravery of
local militia uniform--blue coats "faced with red, matross swords, and
hats of '76." On such an occasion James Cooper, then a child of eight
years, became the pride and admiration of Master Cory for his moving
recitation of the "Beggar's Petition"--acting the part of an old man
wrapped in a faded cloak and leaning over his staff. It is recorded that
James had the fine, healthy pie-appetite usual to his age, for, says the
record, when his eldest brother "was showing the sights of New York to
the youngest, he took him to a pasty-shop, and, after watching the boy
eat pasty after pasty, said to him: 'Jim, eat all you want, but remember
that each one costs the old man a lot.'" Pasty then outbalanced property
for "Jim."
In due time the lad outgrew the Academy's instruction, but from boy
to-man he never outgrew Master Cory's affection, nor his own for the
dear home scenes on the shores of the "Haunted Lake," which he was so
soon to leave for his first important schooling. The books he wrote
later tell how he never forgot the howl of the wolf across the icy field
of Otsego on cold winter nights, the peculiar wail of the sharp-toothed
panther in the quiet wood roads, nor the familiar springs where the deer
lingered latest. One autumn day, while still a pupil under Master Cory's
charge, the future author of "The Pioneers" was at play in his father's
garden, when suddenly he was surprised by a deer which came leaping over
the fence from the street, almost brushing his face as it bounded away
into the pine woods at the back of the house. This incident he often
related to his children.
It was not long before this youngest son was sent from home. The
eventful journey to Albany was made in the care of a near and worthy
farmer, "who was carrying toward the Hudson a load of wheat from the
fields of Otsego." They went over the fine turnpike,--the great highway
of that day,--"just finished from the Hudson to Cherry Valley." The
child had heard much of this wonder of roads from the gentlemen at his
father's table who were interested in it, and he was eager to see its
toll-gates and stone bridges. After leaving "the corduroy tracks"
leading to it from Cooperstown, the famous turnpike burst upon the
gratified schoolboy's vision. As they trotted slowly along the farmer
pointed out, among-other marvels of the way, "a tavern for every mile"
of the sixty between Albany and Lake Otsego. A long-train of farmers'
wagons, filled with the precious wheat, was slowly rolling eastward,
passing-emigrant wagons of "growing families" and household gear moving
westward to the great lake countries. All this delighted the boy of
nine, who was finally set down at the door of St. Peter's Rectory at
Albany, New York. Here for four years he became one of the four young
pupils of the Rev. Thomas Ellison, rector of the church. Dr. Ellison was
an Englishman and a graduate of Oxford--a rare scholar and a king's man.
From him came Cooper's strong preference for English church government
and equally strong feeling against the Puritans of Old and New England.
While the Puritan's character was not pleasing to Cooper, he himself
was called a "Puritan of Puritans," and it was to them he referred in
the following: "Whatever else I may think of the Yankees,--a calmer,
firmer, braver people do not walk this earth." Of this sentiment "The
Wept of Wish-ton-Wish," published in 1829, gives ample proof.
[Illustration: DR. THOMAS ELLISON.]
The Rev. Joseph Hooper, author of the "History of St. Peter's Church,
Albany, N.Y.," related an incident of Cooper's old Rectory school days
there. The story came to Dr. Hooper from Mr. Edward Floyd de Lancy, son
of Bishop de Lancy of Western New York, and is as follows:
It was the custom of the Rev. Thomas Ellison when he became too feeble
to personally direct his workmen, to sit upon the stoop of the Rectory
and watch the removal of the sandbank which covered the chosen site for
the new church, corner of State and Lodge streets. Hundreds of loads had
to be carted away before the foundation could be laid, and some of the
carter's pay tickets on quartered playing-cards are preserved in St.
Peter's archives. But the great hole in the ground had a great
attraction for the boys of Albany, and they would leap into it to play
tag and leap-frog until the stern voice of the Dominie called them to
order, when they would scamper away or hide in some corner out of sight
of the piercing eyes of Dr. Ellison. Sometimes they would answer him
mockingly, to his great annoyance. He could not pursue them, but he
could, when his own pupils joined with the other boys, as they often
did, give them stern and severe lectures upon their conduct, for they
were playing on ground to be used for a sacred purpose. Even the rod of
correction was used without curing them of this habit. Young Cooper was
often a ringleader, and their pranks would often continue until darkness
concealed them from the watchful and angry Rector, to whom,
nevertheless, they gave due honor and respect.
[Illustration: ST. PETER'S CHURCH, ALBANY, N.Y.]
[Illustration: STATE STREET, ALBANY, N.Y., 1802.]
From one of his "Sketches of England," written to William, Judge John
Jay's second son, comes, in part, Cooper's graphic description of Dr.
Ellison: "Thirty-six years ago you and I were school fellows and
classmates in the home of a clergyman of the true English school. This
man entertained a most profound reverence for the King and the nobility;
was not backward in expressing his contempt for all classes of
dissenters and all ungentlemanly sects; was particularly severe on the
immoralities of the French Revolution, and, though eating our bread, was
not especially lenient to our own; compelled you and me to begin Virgil
with the eclogues, and Cicero with the knotty phrases that open the
oration in favor of the poet Archias, because these writers would not
have placed them first in the books if they did not intend people to
read them first; spent his money freely and sometimes that of other
people; was particularly tenacious of the ritual and of all decencies of
the Church; detested a democrat as he did the devil; cracked his jokes
daily about Mr. Jefferson, never failing to place his libertinism in
strong relief against the approved morals of George III., of several
passages in whose history it is charitable to suppose he was ignorant;
prayed fervently on Sunday; decried all morals, institutions, churches,
manners but those of England from Monday to Saturday."
The lad from Otsego soon became a prime favorite with his tutor, who
took pleasure in teaching him. The old-fashioned, heroic romances were a
rare delight to him,--a taste which was thought to come from his mother,
who was very fond of such reading. One vacation, at about the age of
eleven, he and a playmate lost themselves in the exciting interest of
such a tale; "Don Belianus of Greece" made so deep an impression on
Cooper that after reading it he said seriously to his playfellow that he
would write a book himself, and would "begin it at once." And, like "Don
Belianus of Greece," this story was to have "knights, and squires, and
horses, and ladies, and castles and banners." With the glory of his
story in mind, the boy had utterly forgotten his hearty dislike of
pen-work at school. But his active brain soon put to flight this
hobgoblin; he thought of the bit of a blue newspaper--the _Otsego
Herald_--printed in Cooperstown by the father of his comrade. So they
planned to use the resting-time of the press for the printing of this
new book, of which, however, only a few chapters were put in type. The
new author soon wearied of his work; but none the less it was the first
step in his future literary career.
During 1801 a man near fifty, cleanly clad in sailor's gear but without
stockings or neckcloth, appeared before Judge Cooper and asked if the
lot between Fenimore and the village was for sale. The answer was, "Yes,
but the price is high," and naming it, the stranger requested that a
deed be made out at once; he counted down the amount in gold, and gave
his name as Esaias Hausman. He had built for himself a small rude house
on this lot and lived alone in it for years. The secrets of his former
life, his wide learning (once found teaching a college president
Hebrew), and disappearance at times, were never solved. Only his death
revealed a purse of gold worn between his shoulder-blades. There was no
will, so to public sale went the little hut and its lake-shore lot. This
man of mystery made a deep impression on Cooper's boy-mind, and later,
in 1838, was the subject of several pages of the author's "Chronicles of
Cooperstown." Then there was James Allen,--a Scotch master-mason,--who
came his way from the "Land o' Cakes" in 1801, and found, as an
employee of Judge Cooper, an opening for his trade, and soon became a
great favorite with the Cooper boys. This master-mason took great pride
in exact work, with which no trifling was permitted. No stone could be
moved but his true eye would detect it in a flash, and wild was the fury
with which his fiery trowel flew for the culprit, and with such
convincing force that it was wise to avoid further meddling with the
"gude mon's" work. Of "Jamie Allen," master-mason and staunch _auld
kirke mon_, many an amusing story is told in Fenimore Cooper's
"Wyandotté, or the Hutted Knoll," written in 1843. These men among
others marked the unusual in Cooper's vacations from Dr. Ellison's
school-rule at Albany. Later in life he wrote a lively memory-sketch of
his tutor, the rector of St. Peter's Church. But the death in 1802 of
this accomplished gentleman sent his pupil--then a stripling of
thirteen--to Yale. He entered the freshman 1802-3 January-term class,
and, "excepting the poet Hillhouse, two weeks his junior, James Cooper
was the youngest student in college." There "his progress in his studies
is said to have been honorable to his talents." And "in the ancient
languages he had no superior in his class."
[Illustration: "NEAR SHORES" OF NEW HAVEN.]
Cooper owned to having learned little at college. When left to his own
bent, his early love for out-of-door life drew him to roam the hills and
explore near shores, and to his first view of the grand old ocean, which
later claimed his tribute of service. For a boyish frolic in his junior
year the lad left Yale, and this incident ended his college career. It
is of record that Judge Cooper took the boy's part against the faculty
version and brought his son home. Yet something from his books James
Cooper must have gleaned, for there is a story of a young sailor who, in
some public place in the streets of an English port, attracted the
curiosity of the crowd by explaining to his companions the meaning of a
Latin motto.
[Illustration: DR. TIMOTHY DWIGHT.]
[Illustration: YALE COLLEGE, 1806.]
[Illustration: WILLIAM JAY IN YOUTH.]
The Albany, school-boy days of William Jay and James Cooper were renewed
at Yale where was welded their strong life-friendship. On the college
roll of their time appear amongst other names that of John C. Calhoun of
South Carolina, and the scholarly poet Hillhouse of New Haven. In the
Dodd, Mead & Company's 1892 issue of "William Jay and the Constitutional
Movement for the Abolition of Slavery," by Bayard Tuckerman, with a
preface, by John Jay, appears a letter dating 1852, written by Judge
William Jay to his grandson. This letter gives graphic glimpses of
Yale College life during the student days there of its writer and James
Cooper: "The resident graduates were denominated 'Sirs'; their place in
Chapel was called 'the Sirs pew'; and when spoken of in college 'Sir'
was always placed before their names. At that time the freshmen
occupied, in part, the place of sizers in the English universities, and
they were required to run errands for the seniors. My room-mate was Sir
Holly (Dr. Horace Holly). As a mere freshman, I looked up to my
room-mate with great respect, and treated him accordingly. About half
past five in winter, the bell summoned us from our beds,--I rose,
generally, before six,--made the fire, and then went, pitcher in hand,
often wading through snow, for water for Sir Holly and myself. Of the
college bell," the letter continues: "at six it called us to prayers in
the chapel. We next repaired to the recitation-rooms and recited, by
candlelight, the lessons we had studied the preceding evening. At eight
we had breakfast,--our meals were taken in a large hall with a kitchen
opening into it. The students were arranged at tables according to their
classes. All sat on wooden benches, not excepting the tutors; the
latter had a table to themselves on an elevated platform whence they
had a view of the whole company. But it was rather difficult for them to
attend to their plates and to watch two hundred boys at the same time.
Salt beef once a day, and dry cod were perhaps the most usual dishes. On
Sunday mornings, during the winter, our breakfast-tables were graced
with large tin milk-cans filled with stewed oysters; at the proper
season we were occasionally treated with green peas. As you may suppose,
a goodly number of waiters were needed in the hall. These were all
students, and many of them among the best and most esteemed scholars. At
nine the bell warned us to our rooms. At twelve it called us to a
recitation or a lecture. After dinner we recommenced our studies for the
third time, at four o'clock. During study hours the tutors would
frequently go the rounds, looking into our rooms to see that we were not
playing truant. Before supper, we all attended prayers in the chapel."
[Illustration: SILHOUETTE OF JAMES COOPER WHEN A STUDENT AT YALE.]
Although, from the necessity of his times, Chief-Justice John Jay was a
slave owner, his son, William--refined, benevolent, pleasing in manner,
but with a temper easily aroused by injustice--became an early, alert,
and strong advocate of the anti-slavery cause. This eminent jurist who
built his life upon the plan of his words, "Duties are ours and
consequences are God's" (as did also Cooper), was graphically addressed
and described by Cooper as "Thou most pugnacious man of peace."
[Illustration: OUTWARD BOUND.]
Leaving Yale to the more studious, no doubt the young man enjoyed this
brief period of home-life and the distinguished guests drawn by its
hospitality to Otsego Hall. Yet even this could not for long hold him
there. Perhaps he was influenced by what he heard from them of the great
outside world, and he, too, wished to see what it was like. As a
stepping-stone to a commission in the navy, Judge Cooper secured a berth
for his son, who shipped as a sailor before-the-mast in the _Stirling_,
of Wiscasset, Maine, John Johnston master and part owner. In the care of
a merchant, young Cooper went down to the docks to look about the ship
and sign the articles, and the next day he returned in his sailor's
garb. The _Stirling_ was taken into the stream, and his new comrades, a
mixture of nations,--four Americans, a Portuguese, a Spaniard, a
Prussian, a Dane, an Englishman, a Scotch boy, and a Canadian,--tumbled
aboard, not quite themselves; but by night they were in working trim.
The young commander was described as "kind and considerate of all
hands," and the ship as "carrying a motley crew." When "all hands" were
called to get the _Stirling_ under way, Cooper, with another boy, was
sent aloft to loose the foretopsail. With eager will he tugged stoutly
at "the robbins," when the second mate appeared just in time to prevent
him from dropping his part of the sail into the top. The good-hearted
mate had a kindly mind for the "new hand," and the men were too busy to
notice small failures aloft. Young Cooper soon found an old salt who
taught him to knot and splice with the best of them, and old Barnstable
was repaid for these lessons by the merry times they had together when
they got ashore. However, with her cargo of flour, the _Stirling_ sailed
from New York in the autumn of 1806 for the English market at Cowes, and
therefore when Cooper should have been taking his class degree at Yale,
he was outward bound on the sea's highway. Being to the manor born did
not admit the sailor before-the-mast to the captain's cabin, but no
doubt the long, rough voyage of forty stormy days did make of the young
man a jolly tar. Through her usual veil of fog came Cooper's first view
of Old England when threatened with Napoleon's invasion. Forty-odd sail
of warships were sighted by the night-watch when the _Stirling_ passed
the straits of Dover at daybreak. They gave the young man an
object-lesson that he never forgot, in the watchfulness and naval power
of Great Britain. The _Stirling_ had but dropped anchor in English
waters when she was boarded by a British man-of-war's boat-crew, and one
of her best hands was forced into the English navy service, and another
sailor barely escaped, he having satisfactory papers. At London a third
hand was lost, and Captain Johnston himself was seized by a press-gang.
[Illustration: GIBRALTAR.]
Finally, in round-jacket and tarpaulin, the future guest of Samuel
Rogers and Holland House, planted his feet on British soil. At London he
saw about everything a gay young fellow of seventeen in sailor's gear
could, of that wonderful city,--or so thought Ned Myers, one of his
shipmates, who was with him most of the time. Concerning these jaunts
Myers says: "I had one or two cruises of a Sunday in the tow of Cooper,
who soon became a branch pilot in those waters about the parks and the
West End, the Monument, St. Paul's and the lions; Cooper took a look at
the arsenal, jewels, and armory [Tower of London]. He had a rum time of
it in his sailor's rig; hoisted in a wonderful lot of gibberish." And
with his fine stories of each day's sights in old London town, the young
sailor would make merry evenings for his forecastle comrades, of whom
it is recorded his strength could lay flat on their backs in two
minutes.
In January the _Stirling_ spread her sails for another stormy
passage,--to the straits of Gibraltar. On running out, the ship was
boarded by a gun-boat officer, who tried to press a Swede; whereupon,
young Cooper thinking it an insult to our flag, began high words with
the Englishman, but was soon silenced by Captain Johnston. The
_Stirling_ met with various stirring adventures, being chased by a
Bay-of-Biscay pirate and rescued by the timely appearance of a British
cruiser. It was thick westerly weather when they ran into the straits,
and as the English fleet was off Cape Trafalgar, Captain Johnston
realized the danger of being run down in the night, and came on deck
during the middle watch for a sharp lookout on the forecastle. Night
orders were given when came the warning, "Sail ho!" and through the
mists and shadows was seen dimly a two-decker bearing directly clown
upon them. The Captain ordered the helm "hard up!" and called Cooper to
"bring a light." With a leap he rushed to the cabin, seized the light,
and in half a minute it was swinging from the mizzen rigging, his
promptness saving the ship. So near were the two vessels that the deck
officer's voice was distinctly heard calling his quarter-master to "port
the helm." As the great mass swept by them she seemed about to crush
their railing with the muzzle of her guns.
While the _Stirling_ was lying off the old Moorish town of Almaria,
Cooper and others were sent ashore in a jolly-boat to boil pitch. To
return to the ship they put off in a heavy sea, knowing it would be
difficult to work through the surf; but orders were orders, and delay
would not help. So off they plunged, when suddenly a breaker "took the
bow of the boat, and lifting her almost on end, turned her keel
uppermost." All hands got safely ashore--how, none could tell. A second
launching resulted as the first, but with a third they succeeded in
forging their way out, and boarded the ship. Later they ran short of
provisions. But the _Stirling's_ return cargo was brought back safely to
London, where the ship lay at anchor for two months or more, and then
sailed in July for America. After a voyage of fifty-two days she dropped
anchor at Philadelphia, September 18, 1807. So much for this good ship
named for Stirling Castle of Bonnie Scotland.
Such were the lessons young Cooper learned in this rough but manly
school. A brother officer who knew him well said, "He was active,
prompt, and efficient, a pleasant shipmate, always ready to do his duty,
and rigorous too in exacting it of others." Of Cooper's "Naval History"
was added, "It is the noblest tribute ever paid to a noble profession."
Aboard the _Stirling_ on these several cruises Cooper learned much that
afterwards appeared in his sea tales. It was of this sea-service that he
wrote, "I have been myself one of eleven hands, officers included, to
navigate a ship of three hundred tons across the Atlantic Ocean; and,
what is more, we often reefed topsails with the watch." Of the
_Stirling_ he wrote, "The ship was on a bow-line most of the time"; and
he thought her "one of the wettest ships that ever floated when heading
tip against the sea." A lively account of this eleven months' service is
found in Cooper's story of "Ned Myers." This life of his shipmate aboard
the _Stirling_ was written in 1843. The old salt was a battered hulk in
the "Sailor's Snug Harbor" when Cooper was on the crest of the wave of
his literary fame, and the old sailor, wondering if this Cooper could be
the comrade of his youth in the _Stirling_ days of yore, wrote, after
the twenty-five years of separation, to inquire. The answer was, "I am
your old shipmate, Ned." Later, "Ned" was invited to visit the Hall.
Many remember the interesting two in 1843. "Hardly a day passed that
they were not seen, as the heavy Hall gates swung open at eleven
o'clock, coming out for a morning walk or a sail on the lake;--Cooper's
portly form, and by his side a shriveled figure with halting step,
leaning heavily on a crooked stick which served for a cane. They were as
strong in contrast as it was possible for men to be." It was during this
visit that the old sailor spun his life-yarn in his own way and Cooper
wove it into his book, "Ned Myers."
[Illustration: SAILOR'S SNUG HARBOR.]
Perhaps the following interesting Cooperstown story of Cooper's youth
is of the time of his return from his _Stirling_ voyage. One day a merry
group of young men proposed a footrace, the course to be around the
square--a distance of about one hundred yards. James Cooper was named as
one of the runners, and his rival was soon chosen. According to custom,
the village boys, girls, men, and women were spectators. Like a
mettlesome steed in curb young Cooper looked at the wager,--a basket of
fruit,--then at his race-mate, and accepted the challenge, but not on
even terms. It was not enough for a sailor simply to outrun a landsman;
he could do more. A little girl stood near, her bright face eager with
watching for the fray. Cooper turned quickly and caught her up in his
arms, and with the pride and muscle of an athlete exclaimed, "I'll carry
her with me and beat you!" Away they flew, Cooper with his laughing
burden upon his shoulders; one corner was turned, and the excited crowd
saw with surprise James Cooper with his small rider keeping pace with
the other flying youth. Another, and the other corners were soon passed;
both sprang like race-horses near the end of the course, but Cooper,
with his little black-eyed girl aloft and the perspiration pouring down
his manly brow and cheeks, was the first to reach the mark, and amidst
such cheers and hurrahs as only pioneers can freely give, and as freely
enjoy. The fruit he had won, but soon it was shared by all around. That
little girl, later the wife of Captain William Wilson, often told the
story of her ride on pleasant James Cooper's shoulders.
[Illustration: OTSEGO HALL GATES.]
While never a rhymester, Cooper, in his early manhood and at rare times
after, did write occasional sentimental and comic verses that betokened
both clever imagination and other merit. Into the _Otsego Herald_
printing-office a poor epileptic ballad-singer came one day to ask help
from a group of gentlemen A purse was made up for him, but he, looking
among them, said if one of them would write for him "a few
verses--something new"--they would be worth more than the silver given
him. Young Cooper offered to try, and asked on what subject he should
write "There's nothing sells like ballads," was the reply. So the ballad
was promised; and some thirty or more pathetic verses were written at
once, about the small frontier village recently burnt by troops under
Colonel Murray during the close of the last war with England. This
ballad bore the high-sounding title of "Buffalo Burnt, or the Dreadful
Conflagration." It won such success among the farm-house gentry that
the singer returned for another ballad and obtained it. Some years later
Mr. Cooper was invited to a tea-party in a near village, when a young
lady, led to the piano for music, began to sing, much to the author's
disturbing amazement, "Buffalo Burnt, or the Dreadful Conflagration."
[Illustration: BUFFALO BURNT.]
So passed the pleasant vacation days of our young sailor, whose training
before-the-mast enabled his father to obtain for him a midshipman's
commission in the United States Navy, for which James Cooper reported
for duty at New York City, January 12, 1808. At the age of nineteen he
first served aboard the _Vesuvius._ Thence he was ordered to Oswego, New
York, to build the brig _Oneida_ for Lake Ontario service, and which the
spring of 1809 saw launched.
[Illustration: THE "VESUVIUS."]
[Illustration: ONTARIO FORESTS.]
While the war flurries which called for the building of the vessel were
tethered, Cooper had learned his lesson in ship-building, ship-yard
duties, and water-border life; and these served him more than thirty
years later in his matchless Indian story, "The Pathfinder." Miss Susan
Cooper has left some interesting pages of this period of her father's
naval service; in part they read: "In 1808 several young officers under
Lieutenant Woolsey were ordered to the shores of Lake Ontario for
building a small vessel of war. Among them was Mr. Cooper, then a
midshipman in the service. Their road lay for many a mile through the
forest to the mouth of the Oswego River,--their destination,--where the
_Oneida_, a brig mounting sixteen guns, was built and launched. They
enjoyed the wild coloring of frontier life They roamed the forests and
explored the shores in leisure hours. Cruises among the Thousand Islands
were frequent; many were the fine fish caught and good chowders eaten.
The picturesque beauties of the region, the countless islands, were
greatly enjoyed and never forgotten by the young midshipman." The
youthful officers were ordered to Buffalo, and stopping for the night at
a rude frontier inn, it was Cooper's duty to inquire what they might
have for supper. "Mine host shook his head ruefully; he could promise
very little. 'Give us what you eat yourself; you must have food of some
kind,' said Cooper. Mine host looked melancholy; on his honor he assured
the young officers he had absolutely nothing to set before them but
game, steak, and brook-trout; and, maybe his wife could find cranberries
for a tart! A month earlier they should have had a dish of fried pork
fit for the President, with a pumpkin pie after it. 'Game's plenty, but
nothin' else!' added the publican with a sigh. Mine host was pining for
pork! On this expedition Mr. Cooper saw Niagara for the first time. He
was struck with the grandeur of the cataract, but felt its sublime
character far more deeply on a later visit--after his return from
Europe."
[Illustration: THE THOUSAND ISLANDS.]
[Illustration: THE PORT OF BUFFALO.]
When the _Oneida_ was launched the gallant young officers resolved to
celebrate the event by giving a ball. "This was an enterprise of a
desperate character;--building a brig hundreds of miles from a ship-yard
was a trifle to giving a ball in the wilderness. True, one fiddle and
half a dozen officers were something; refreshments and a military
ball-room might be hoped for; but where, pray, were the ladies to come
from?" They would not think of dancing with each other, and ladies must
be found. Vigorous efforts were made by sending boats in some directions
and carts miles in others, to invite the ladies; and they accepted. As
the hour drew near a very delicate point came up for decision--the
honors due different fair claimants. After a council of war, Lieutenant
Woolsey gave to his master-of-ceremonies these orders: "All ladies, sir,
provided with shoes and stockings are to be led to the head of the
Virginia reel; ladies with shoes, and without stockings, are considered
in the second rank; ladies without shoes or stockings you will lead,
gentlemen, to the foot of the country dance!" Such was a grand military
ball in Oswego County in 1808-9.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN M.T. WOOLSEY.]
About this time occurred an amusing incident of their raw young
mess-servant, fresh from Ireland: "A table-cloth had taken fire and was
in full blaze; Paddy was at the moment filling a teapot from an ample
kettle in his hand. 'Pour the water on the table!' called out one of the
officers. 'Sure, the wather is _hot_, your honor!' exclaimed Paddy, in
great dismay, holding the kettle at a very safe distance from the
blazing cloth, and his face such a picture of helpless despair as to
make Mr. Cooper heartily laugh at every after-thought of it."
The passing of thirty or more years made of this light-hearted young
midshipman a well-known writer, with the purpose that his next book
should tell of this unforgettable region of the great lakes. He wished
to-bring into it the sailors and Indians as, by coming in close contact
with them, "he knew their personalities and characteristics." Then,
forest scenes without "Natty Bumppo" could scarce come from his pen
after the drawings of old "Leatherstocking" of "The Pioneers," "Hawkeye"
of "The Mohicans," and the "aged trapper" of "The Prairie." So it came
about that "Natty, the lover," stepped into these pages--Natty, "so
simple, so tender, so noble and true--what shall be said of him? We must
all needs love him; it is not with words but with tears that we wring
his hand and part from him on the lake shore" as "The Pathfinder."
Glowing and brave proved his Mabel, as "the bubble of a boat floated on
the very crest of a foaming breaker,"--yet not for him. But the ripple
of the lake's waves and rustling of forest leaves are as unforgettable
as the low, sweet tones of "Dew-of-June." Of "The Pathfinder" and Cooper
Balzac wrote: "Its interest is tremendous. He surely owed us this
masterpiece after the last two or three raphsodies he has given us."
[Illustration: THE PATHFINDER.]
[Illustration: A BUBBLE OF A BOAT.]
In the year 1809 Cooper was attached to a gun-boat serving on Lake
Champlain, and on November 13 following, he was ordered to the _Wasp_,
under Capt. James Lawrence, of Burlington--a personal friend, and also
the heroic commander of the _Chesapeake_ in her action with the
_Shannon_, in which his last words were, "Don't give up the ship!" It
was aboard the _Wasp_ that Cooper's lifelong friendship with Commodore
Shubrick of South Carolina began, who, like himself, and a year younger,
was a midshipman. To this friend the author dedicated "The Pilot," "Red
Rover," and other stories.
[Illustration: CAPTAIN LAWRENCE.]
[Illustration: THE "WASP."]
Political feeling ran high in those early days of 1809, and prominent
persons did not escape from their opponents with hitter feeling only. So
it came about that in December of that year, Judge Cooper, on leaving a
hot convention, met his death,--the result of a blow on the head, as he
was coming down the steps of the State capitol at Albany, New York. No
one of his day who was engaged in the work of large buying and selling
of land made so deep an impression as did Judge Cooper on his times, and
on his author son, whose land books disclose to posterity with historic
exactness the hardships and values of the pioneers of our country.
After Judge Cooper's death Richard Fenimore, his eldest son, became the
head of the family, and it was to him that James wrote from
New York, May 18th, 1810
I wrote you yesterday, a letter in a great hurry, as its contents
are of some importance. I employ the leisure time offered today, to
inform you more fully of my views.
When you were in the City, I hinted to you, my intention of
resigning at the end of this session of Congress, should nothing be
done for the Navy--my only reason at that time was the blasted
prospects of the service. I accordingly wrote my resignation and as
usual offer'd it to Capt. Lawrence, for his inspection--he very
warmly recommended to me to give the service the trial of another
year or two--at the same time offering to procure me a furlough
which would leave me perfect master of my actions in the
interval--I thought it wisest to accept this proposition--at the
end of this year I have it in my power to resign, should the
situation of the Country warrant it.
Like all the rest of the sons of Adam, I have bowed to the
influence of the claims of a fair damsel of eighteen. I loved her
like a man and told her of it like a sailor. The peculiarity of my
situation occasion'd me to act with something like precipitancy. I
am perfectly confident, however, I shall never have cause to repent
of it--. As you are _cooly_ to decide, I will as _cooly_ give you
the qualities of my mistress. Susan De Lancey is the daughter of a
man of very respectable connections and a handsome
fortune--amiable, sweet-tempered and happy in her disposition.--She
has been educated in the country, occasionally trying the
temperature of the City--to rub off the rust--but hold a moment, it
is enough she pleases _me_ in the qualities of her _person_ and
_mind_--. Like a true quixotic lover, I made proposals to her
father--he has answered them in the most gentlemanly manner--. You
have my consent to address my daughter if you will gain the
approbation of your mother--He also informs me that his daughter
has an estate in the County of Westchester in reversion, secured to
her by a deed in trust to him--. I write all this for _you_--you
know _I_ am indifferent to anything of this nature. Now I have to
request--you will take your hat and go to mother, the boys, girls,
and say to them have you any objection that James Cooper shall
marry at a future day, Susan De Lancey. If any of them forbid the
bans may the Lord have forgiven them--for I never will--. Then take
your pen and write to Mr. De Lancey stating the _happiness_ and
_pleasure_ it will give all the family to have this connection
completed--all this I wish you to do immediately, as I am deprived
of the pleasure of visiting my flame until this is done, by that
confounded _bore_, delicacy--be so good as to inclose the letter in
one to me, at the same time don't forget to inclose a handsome sum
to square the yards here and bring me to Cooperstown.
I wish not to interrupt you in your attempt to clear the estate--my
expenditure shall be as small as possible.
_Your brother,_ James Cooper.
The de Lanceys were Huguenots and their loyalty to England during the
Revolution made several of them British officers. Although Cooper was
ever a staunch American, this incident, with several others in his
later life, seemed unfavorable to some few who were only too willing to
question his loyalty.
[Illustration: FRAUNCES TAVERN.]
[Illustration: GOV. JAMES DE LANCEY'S SEAL.]
[Illustration: HEATHCOTE ARMS.]
Miss de Lancey's great grandfather, Stephen, was the first of this
aristocratic Westchester-County family on American soil. He fled
from Normandy on the revocation of the edict of Nantes, and in
1686 came to New York. Here his son James became chief-justice and
lieutenant-governor, and married Ann, eldest daughter of the Hon. Caleb
Heathcote, lord of the manor of Scarsdale, Westchester, and whose manor
house was Heathcote Hill, which their fourth son, John Peter de Lancey,
Cooper's father-in-law, inherited from his mother. One of a number of
services the old-world Derbyshire Heathcote-Hill family rendered to its
country was giving to the Bank of England its first president. The de
Lancey name still clings to the new-world history in Fraunces Tavern,
built by Stephen de Lancey in 1700, for his home. Sixty-two years later
it became the tavern of Samuel Fraunces. In 1776 and 1783 it was the
headquarters of General Washington, and in its famous _Long Room_ "The
Father of his Country" made his farewell address, and bid adieu to his
generals. Number 130 Broadway was the de Lancey home of 1730, and here
was given the first inauguration ball of our nation. On this site was
built "Burn's Coffee House," which teemed with interesting events. The
City Hotel took its place in 1806. John Peter de Lancey married
Elizabeth, daughter of Col. Richard Floyd, and in 1789 came to
Heathcote Hill, Westchester County, which he rebuilt on the site of the
old manor house, burned down. In this home he lived out his days. Here
his son, William Heathcote, Bishop of Western New York, was born; and
also his lovely daughter, Susan Augusta; here she was wooed and won by
the handsome young naval officer, and on New Year's day, 1811, became
Mrs. James Cooper. In 1899 Dr. Theodore F. Wolfe writes of Cooper and
Heathcote Hill--that some of the great trees which waved their green
leafage above him lingering here with sweetheart or bride yet shade the
grounds, but the household that welcomed him and gave him a beloved
daughter lie in a little grass-grown cemetery near to this old home.
Mrs. Cooper had a sweet, gracious way of guiding by affection her
husband, and he gave her his heart's devotion through the forty years
of their happily mated life. Cooper and his young bride began life by
playing a game of chess between the ceremony and supper. Then, he
driving two horses tandem, they made their wedding journey to
Cooperstown in a gig. His furlough ended a few months later, and to
please his wife, he resigned in May from the navy. Long afterwards he
wrote, "She confesses she would never have done for Lady Collingwood."
For a year or more Cooper and his wife lived with her father at
Heathcote Hill, Mamaroneck, New York, and afterwards in a near-by
cottage on the "Neck," which Cooper named "Closet Hall" because it was
so small, and he described it as the home of the Littlepage family in
"Satanstoe." Only two old willows remain of the group that almost
concealed Cooper's wee house, now entirely rebuilt, and they named the
place as the home of Alice B. Havens, who wrote here some of her poems
and stories--so Dr. Wolfe writes of Closet Hall. After some brief
housekeeping in this "wee home," the young people again made a part of
the family at Heathcote Hill, where they lived until 1814. Then, with
the two little girls born to them, they went for a short time to
Cooperstown, and thence to their Fenimore farm of some one hundred and
fifty acres along Otsego's southwestern shores. "On a rising knoll
overlooking lake and village a handsome stone house was begun for their
life home." The near-by hill, called Mount Ovis, pastured the Merino
sheep which he brought into the country. He loved his gardening, and
was active for the public good, serving as secretary of the county
Agricultural Society, and also of the Otsego County Bible Society. In
the full flush of youth and its pleasures there were the pleasant
diversions of driving, riding, and rowing. So lived flute-playing
Cooper, brave and handsome, at twenty-five.
[Illustration: HON. CALEB HEATHCOTE.]
[Illustration: FRAUNCES TAVERN.]
[Illustration: BURN'S COFFEE HOUSE.]
[Illustration: HEATHCOTE HILL.]
[Illustration: TANDEM.]
[Illustration: COOPER'S FENIMORE FARM HOUSE.]
Cooper's mother was then living with her older sons at Otsego Hall, and
it is recorded that "she took great delight in flowers, and the end of
the long hall was like a green-house, in her time"; that "she was a
great reader of romances; a marvelous housekeeper, and beautifully nice
and neat in her arrangements: her flower-garden at the south of the
house was considered something wonderful in variety of flowers." Between
her Old-Hall home and the families of her children,--Richard's on "Apple
Hill," Isaac's at "Edgewater," Nancy's at the "Old Stone House," and
James's at "Fenimore,"--these years were full of charm and interest for
them all, which later became sweet and enduring memories. Sadness crept
in, through the loss of James's daughter Elizabeth; but two more came to
lift this shadow in the Fenimore home.
In 1817 Cooper and his young family started for a few month's visit to
Heathcote Hill, and later in this year he lost his mother. As the stone
house, then building at Fenimore, burned down in 1823, the land was sold
later, and the few months' expected absence grew into seventeen years.
Perhaps it was this thread of loss added to his wife's wishes that led
Cooper to build a country home on the Scarsdale farm,--a portion of the
de Lancey estate, which came to Mrs. Cooper after her marriage. Here he
built the picturesque home in which his literary career began. "Nothing
that Cooper knew remains excepting the superb land and water view,"
which drew him to place this home of his there, and he has pictured
mile upon mile of the shimmering, sail-dotted Sound in scenes of his
"Water Witch." It is of record that the windows of the room in which he
wrote "Precaution," "The Spy," and "The Pioneers" overlooked this
enchanting vista which then and later claimed place in his books. It was
four miles from Mamaroneck and some twenty-five from New York City. The
height on which the new house stood was called Angevine, from a former
Huguenot tenant. It gave a glorious view over miles of fine wooded
country, with a broad reach of Long Island Sound beyond, over which were
moving white, glittering sails "a sailor's eye loves to follow." Of
active habits and vigorous health, Cooper threw himself with almost
boyish eagerness into the improvement and beautifying of this
homestead,--planning the barn, building the then new zigzag, ha-ha
fence, watching the growth of shrubs and trees that he had transplanted,
and with cheering talk lightening the labors of his workmen.
[Illustration: ELIZABETH FENIMORE COOPER IN THE OLD HALL HOME.]
[Illustration: COOPER'S ANGEVINE FARM HOME.]
[Illustration: MAMARONECK CREEK SLOOPS.]
"In 1818 Cooper was made paymaster, and in the next year quartermaster
in the Fourth Division of Infantry, New York State Militia. As Governor
Clinton's aid, in blue and buff uniform, cocked hat, and sword, and
title of colonel, he would go to reviews on his favorite horse,
'Bull-head.'"
At that time each village on the Sound had its sloop which carried the
farmer's produce thrice a week through the perils of Hell Gate to Fulton
market, and brought back tea, sugar, cloth, calicoes, and silks, and,
perchance, some volume fresh from the London press,--a bit of Byron's
brilliance, a romance from the unknown author of "Waverley," one of Miss
Edgeworth's charming tales, or the more serious religious work of
Wilberforce--which had "arrived by packet-ship from England"--the next
day's papers would announce. Lucky was thought the household that could
first cut the pages of the new print.
Reading, which always enters so naturally into country life, made
pleasant their evening hours and rainy days at Angevine. Mr. Cooper was
a fine reader. His voice was deep, clear, and expressive, and during
those quiet country evenings he often read aloud to one "who listened
with affectionate interest through a long life," and he read to her with
special pleasure. For Shakespeare he was always ready. Pope, Thompson,
and Gray were also in favor, but not more than a page or two at a time
of Milton. He thought that Shakespeare should have written "Paradise
Lost." "He took the greatest delight in the 'Waverley' novels, and never
doubted they were written by Walter Scott, the poet. On one occasion a
new novel chanced to lie on the table and he was asked to read it. The
title and look of the book were not to his taste; he opened it, however,
and began. Suddenly, after reading through a few pages, it was thrown
aside in disgust: 'I can write a better book than that myself!' was his
exclamation." Mrs. Cooper laughed at the absurd idea that he, who
disliked writing even a letter, should write a book, and playfully
challenged him to make good his word; and when urged to begin, he at
once outlined a tale of English high-life. As the story grew, the writer
became interested, and before long the first pages of Cooper's first
book, "Precaution, or Prevention is Better than Cure," were written.
When finished, much to his amazement, Mrs. Cooper further urged him to
publish it; so, with the manuscript, they set out in their gig to seek
counsel of the Jays at Bedford, and other friends, who approved. "One
lady, not in the secret, felt sure she had read it before." It was
published, without the author's name, August 25, 1820, and was credited
to an English woman. A.T. Goodrich, the publisher, surprised the public
by declaring it the work of an American gentleman of New York. It was
soon republished in England, and claimed the attention usually accorded
that style of book in its day. Whatever of its worth, the work had
awakened Cooper's powers; and its modest success in a field new to him
led his friends to urge him to write on subjects that were in near touch
with his daily life. None knew better than he the frontier and
sea-faring life of his own and earlier times. So, then, for
home-country subjects, and thinking it would be his last attempt, he
exclaimed, "I will write another book!" and soon decided on patriotism
as its _motif_. At this period many were the visits to Judge Jay's
Westchester home at Bedford. The house, part of wood and part of stone,
had a spacious, comfortable piazza along its front. The interior had
more of cheerfulness than of elegance, but a great air of abundance, and
was a peaceful shelter for the waning days of that eminent statesman and
patriot. Of this household Cooper wrote later: "I scarcely remember to
have mingled with any family where there was a more happy union of quiet
decorum and high courtesy than I met with beneath the roof of Mr. Jay."
To no place more fitting than his wistaria-covered library could Cooper
have gone for patriotic inspiration. The venerable Judge, as he smoked
his long clay pipe, used to delight in telling anecdotes of the
Revolution, "the truth of which," he said, "never had been and never
would be written."
[Illustration: JUDGE JOHN JAY.]
[Illustration: BEDFORD HOUSE.]
[Illustration: BEDFORD HOUSE LIBRARY.]
One summer afternoon, while sitting on his broad piazza under the
lindens, Cooper, with others, listened to the Judge's recital of the
story of a spy's great struggles and unselfish loyalty while serving his
country in the American Revolution, and the story gave Cooper an idea
for his "Harvey Birch." The fact that strolling peddlers, staff in hand
and pack on back, were common visitors then at country houses, became
another aid. "It was after such a visit of a Yankee peddler of the old
sort, to the cottage at Angevine, that Harvey's lot in life was
decided--he was to be a spy and a peddler." It was something to the
author's after regret that he drew the dignity of George Washington into
the "Harper" of this story.
[Illustration: HARVEY BIRCH'S CAVE.]
"The entire country between the Americans on the skirts of the Highlands
and the British on Manhattan--or 'the Neutral Ground'--suffered more in
harried skirmishes, pillage, violence, fire, and the taking of life
itself, than any of its extent during this strife." Scarsdale and
Mamaroneck were in this region, with White Plains close by. Fort
Washington was on a near height, and Dobb's Ferry a few miles off. "The
Coopers' daily drive from Angevine discovered a pretty thicket, some
swampy land, and a cave in which to hide the loyal, to be fed by
friendly hands at night until escape was possible. There were also at
hand the gloomy horrors of a haunted wood where gliding ghosts fought
midnight battles"--all of this the farmers _knew_ and could tell of,
too. One of them, "Uncle John," lived just below the home hill in a wee
cot of four walls, each of a different color--red, yellow, brown, and
white. He frequently came up the Angevine-home hill to tell, between his
apples, nuts, and glasses of cider, tales of what he, too, _knew_, to a
good listener,--the master of the house. Then there was "Major Brom B.,
a hero of the great war, with his twenty-seven martial spirits, all
uniformed in silver gray, his negro Bonny and his gun, 'the Bucanneer,'
had not its fellow on the continent." These were all aids, and sources
of unfailing interest about the many Westchester chimney firesides of
that day. In his "Literary Haunts and Homes," Dr. Theodore F. Wolfe
tells of a fine, old-time home, beyond the valley below Cooper's
Angevine farm, where he placed many an exciting scene of this coming
tale. In 1899 Dr. Wolfe notes the house as changed, only by a piazza
across its front, from the days when Cooper knew it well, and that it
was pleasantly shaded by many of the fine, tall trees that gave it the
name of "The Locusts," which it kept in his story as the home of the
Whartons. The descendants of the family he used to visit still live
there, and one of them showed Dr. Wolfe all that was left of "The Four
Corners," Betty Flanigan's hotel, whence Harvey Birch, Cooper's hero,
escaped in Betty's petticoats. Cooper made these familiar scenes of
southern New York the background of his second book, "The Spy, a Tale of
the Neutral Ground," which also was published, without the author's
name, December 22, 1821. Its success called for a new edition the
following March, and its translation into many foreign tongues. Of
Cooper's "Betty Flanigan" Miss Edgeworth declared, "An Irish pen could
not have drawn her better." Except Irving's "Sketch Book," his
"Knickerbocker's History of New York," and Bryant's thin volume of eight
poems, there were few books by native writers when "The Spy" appeared;
and "then it was that the new world awakened to the surprising discovery
of her first _American_ novelist. The glory that Cooper justly won was
reflected on his country, of whose literary independence he was the
pioneer. 'The Spy' had the charm of reality; it tasted of the soil."
While the American press was slow to admit the merit of "The Spy," a
cordial welcome was given the book in "The Port Folio." It was written
by Mrs. Sarah Hall, mother of the editor, and author of "Conversations
on the Bible." This act of timely kindness Cooper never forgot. June 30,
1822, Washington Irving, from London, wrote Mr. John E. Hall, the
editor: "'The Spy' is extremely well spoken of by the best circles,--not
a bit better than it deserves, for it does the author great credit."
[Illustration: THE LOCUSTS OF COOPER'S TIME.]
[Illustration: TITLE-PAGE OF THE FIRST EDITION OF "THE SPY."]
[Illustration: ENOCH CROSBY.]
In 1826, when "The Spy" was before the footlights in Lafayette Theatre,
on Broadway, near Canal Street, Enoch Crosby, the supposed original spy,
appeared in a box with friends, and "was given thunders of applause."
From "Portraits of Cooper's Heroines," by the Rev. Ralph Birdsall of
Cooperstown, is gleaned: On the walls of the Newport home of the Rev.
John Cornell hang two old portraits that have close connection with the
inner history of "The Spy." To their present owner they came from the
New York home of his mother, the late Mrs. Isaac Cornell, and to her
they came from the Somerville, New Jersey, home of her father, Mr.
Richard Bancker Duyckinck, who in his turn received them from his aunt,
Mrs. Peter Jay,--the subject of one of these portraits and at one time
mistress of the Jay mansion at Rye. Over one hundred years ago it was
that, from the walls of this rare old home at Rye, Westchester County,
the grace of these ladies on canvas caught James Cooper's thought to use
them, by description, in his coming book, "The Spy." Chapter XIII
describes closely the personal appearance and style of dress of these
portraits. "Jeanette Peyton," the maiden aunt of Cooper's story, owes
her mature charm to the portrait of Mary Duyckinck, wife of Peter Jay.
From the "cap of exquisite lawn and lace," her gown of rich silk, short
sleeves and "large ruffles" of lace which with "the experience of forty
years," also veiled her shoulders, to the triple row of large pearls
about her throat,--all these details are found in Cooper's text-picture
of Jeanette Peyton. His "Sarah Wharton" no less closely follows the
portrait of Mrs. Jay's older sister, Sarah Duyckinck, who became Mrs.
Richard Bancker. Her name Sarah may have been given purposely to Sarah
Wharton of Cooper's story. Cooper was thirty-two when it was written,
and it is not unlikely that Mrs. Jay, then eighty-five years of age, was
pleased with this delicate tribute the young novelist paid to the beauty
of her own and her sister's youth.
[Illustration: LAFAYETTE THEATRE.]
[Illustration: COOPER'S HEROINES.]
Four daughters and a son now shared the author's home life, and in order
to place his little girls in a school and be near his publishers, Cooper
rented a modest brick house on Broadway, across the street from Niblo's
Garden, near No. 585, Astor's home, which was a grand resort of
Halleck and Irving, who wrote there a part of his "Life of Washington."
Cooper's house was just above Prince Street--then almost out of town.
[Illustration: WINDHURST'S NOOK, UNDER THE PARK THEATRE.]
The modern club being then unknown, the brilliant men of the day met in
taverns, and there talked of "everything under the starry scope of
heaven." In the 1820's there was Edward Windhurst's famous nook under
the sidewalk below Park Theatre, where Edmund Kean, Junius Brutus Booth,
Cooper, Morris, Willis, and Halleck made gay and brilliant talk.
In the "Life and Letters of Fitz-greene Halleck," by General James Grant
Wilson, it appears that Cooper was warmly attached to Halleck since
1815, when they first met. Fitz-greene Halleck is credited with taking
Cooper's earliest books to Europe in 1822 and finding a London publisher
for them. The novelist called his friend "The Admirable Croaker," on
account of a series of amusing and satirical verses written by Halleck
and Drake and published over the signature of "Croaker and Co.," in the
public press of that day. Into this atmosphere of charm came delightful
and delighting Joseph Rodman Drake, with his "six feet two" of splendid
youth; he was thought by some "the handsomest man in New York." From out
this brilliant group comes the record that "'Culprit Fay,' written in
August, 1816," says Halleck, "came from Cooper, Drake, DeKay, and
Halleck, speaking of Scottish streams and their inspiration for poetry.
Cooper and Halleck thought our American rivers could claim no such
tribute of expression. Drake differed from his friends and made good his
stand by producing in three days 'The Culprit Fay' from the Highlands of
the Hudson; but," is added, "the Sound from Hunt's Point, his familiar
haunt of _salt_ water, made his inspiration."
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER, 1822.]
[Illustration: FITZ-GREENE HALLECK.]
[Illustration: JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE.]
[Illustration: CRO' NEST.]
To the City Hotel came Morris again with Dana, Cooper, and his friend,
Samuel Woodworth, author of "The Old Oaken Bucket"--to plan "The
Mirror," in 1823.
[Illustration: SAMUEL WOODWORTH.]
[Illustration: THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET.]
The story of the old song's writing is: At noon on a summer's day in
1817 Woodworth, whose pen-name was "Selim," walked home to dinner from
his office at the foot of Wall Street. Being very warm, he drank a glass
of water from his pump, and after drinking it said, "How much more
refreshing would be a draught from the old bucket that hung in my
father's well!" Then his wife--whom the poet called his
inspiration--exclaimed, "Why, Selim, wouldn't that be a pretty subject
for a poem?" Thus urged, he began writing at once, and in an hour's time
finished the heart-stirring song so well known as "The Old Oaken
Bucket."
At this City Hotel Cooper himself in 1824 founded "The Bread and Cheese
Club"--so named because membership was voted _for_ with bits of bread,
and _against_ with bits of cheese. He called it the "Lunch." Later on,
the "Lunch, or Cooper's Club," met in Washington Hall, corner of
Broadway and Chambers Street. Among its distinguished members were
Chancellor Kent, DeKay, naturalist, King, later president of Columbia
College, the authors Verplanck, Bryant, and Halleck, Morse the inventor,
the artists Durand and Jarvis, and Wiley the publisher. They met
Thursday evenings, each member in turn caring for the supper, always
cooked to perfection by Abigail Jones--an artist of color, in that line.
It was at one of these repasts that Bryant "was struck with Cooper's
rapid, lively talk, keen observation, knowledge, and accurate memory of
details." Said he: "I remember, too, being somewhat startled, coming as
I did from the seclusion of a country life, with a certain emphatic
frankness of manner, which, however, I came at last to like and admire."
Many an attractive page might be written of these talks with Mathews,
rambles with DeKay, and daily chats with his old messmates of the sea,
and this "Bread and Cheese Club." Cooper was scarcely in France before
he sent frequent missives to his friends at the club to be read at their
weekly meetings; but it "missed its founder, went into a decline, and
not long afterward quietly expired." General Wilson says that it was at
Wiley's, corner of Wall and New Streets, in a small back room christened
by Cooper "The Den"--which appeared over the door--that he first met
"The Idle Man," R.H. Dana. Here Cooper was in the habit of holding
forth to an admiring audience, much as did Christopher North about the
same time in "Blackwood's" back parlor in George Street, Edinburgh.
John Bartlett's Bookshop, too,--"a veritable treasury of literary
secrets,"--in the new Astor House, became a haunt for the bookmen of its
times. Cooper was fond of the society of literary men when he could meet
them as _men_, and not as lions. He once said: "You learn nothing about
a man when you meet him at a show dinner and he sits up to talk _for_
you instead of talking _with_ you. When I was in London Wordsworth came
to town, and I was asked to meet him at one of those displays; but I
would not go." Then Mrs. Cooper said: "But you met him afterwards, my
dear, and was very much pleased with him." To this Cooper replied: "Yes,
at Rogers', and _was_ very much pleased with him; but it was because I
met him in a place where he felt at home, and he let himself out
freely."
[Illustration: CITY HOTEL AND WASHINGTON HALL.]
[Illustration: EARLY BROADWAY.]
[Illustration: WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.]
[Illustration: COOPER'S NEW YORK CITY HOME IN BEACH STREET.]
[Illustration: ST. JOHN'S CHAPEL.]
After some stay on Broadway, Cooper moved his family to their Beach
Street abode. Some twenty paces from Hudson it stood,--a brick house of
many attractions in the wrought iron railings, marble steps, arched
doorway, high ceilings, with heavy, ornate mouldings, massive oaken
doors, and Venetian blinds of the deep windows. Spacious and inviting
was this city home during the 1820's, in the fashionable district of
St. John's. In April, 1823, while living here, Cooper was made a member
of the Philadelphia Philosophical Society. August of this year he lost
his first son,--the youngest child,--Fenimore; and he himself went
through a serious illness, brought on by an accident: "On returning
from a New Bedford visit his carriage broke down, and always glad to be
afloat, he took passage in a sloop for New York. Being anxious to reach
home, when the wind began to fail, and to make the most of the tide, he
took the helm and steered the little craft himself through Hell Gate.
The day was very stormy, and the trying heat brought on a sudden
sun-stroke-like fever." February 3, 1824, his second son, Paul, was
born.
"The Spy" finished and the glow of success upon its author, he again
resolved "to try one more book." For this work his thoughts turned in
love to the home of his childhood, so closely associated with the little
"Lake of the Fields." "Green-belted with great forest trees was this
'smile of God'--from Mount Vision dreaming at its feet, to the densely
wooded 'sleeping lion' guarding its head, nine miles to the north." Of
the new book Cooper frankly said: "'The Pioneers' is written exclusively
to please myself." Herein Leatherstocking makes his first appearance,
and for all time, as Natty Bumppo, "with his silent footfall stepped
from beneath the shadows of the old pines into the winter sunlight."
[Illustration: OLD LEATHERSTOCKING.]
An old hunter--Shipman by name--often came with his rifle and dogs
during the early years of the new colony, to offer his game at William
Cooper's door, and was a great attraction for the lads of Otsego Hall. A
dim memory of Shipman served as an outline only for Cooper's creation,
"Natty," as in strength and beauty of character he came from the
writer's pen, to live through the five "Leatherstocking Tales," as "the
ever familiar friend of boys." While Cooper placed no real character
from life in this book, Judge Temple is accepted as a sketch of his
father. The aim was to create a character from the class to which each
belonged. Thus served brave old Indian John as "Chingachgook"; Mr.
Grant, the missionary; and "Monsieur Le Quoi," the Frenchman. In
"Chronicles of Cooperstown" it appears that a real "Mr. Le Quoy excited
much interest in the place, in being superior to his occupation as a
country grocer." One day a Mr. Renouard, a seaman, entered his shop for
some tobacco, and returned in a few minutes agitated and pale, excitedly
asking, "Who is the man that sold me this tobacco?" At the answer, "Mr.
Le Quoy," he replied, "Yes, Mr. Le Quoy de Mesereau. When I went to
Martinique to be port-captain of St. Pierre, this man was civil governor
of the island, and refused to confirm my appointment." It was learned
later that the French Revolution drove Mr. Le Quoy with little money to
a New York friend,--a Mr. Murray,--who also knew well Judge Cooper, and
they both advised this country store until peaceful France could and
did invite its owner to return to his island home.
[Illustration: NATTY'S CAVE.]
An Indian alarm of the early-village period of 1794 formed the opening
chapter of the new book, but the incidents were mainly creations of
Cooper's fancy. Yet the pigeon-flights, Natty's cave, which sheltered
Elizabeth Temple from the forest fire, and each charming picture of the
Glimmerglass country, are true to life. The academy, court-house, jail,
inn; the "'Cricket'--that famous old cannon which sent its thunders
thousands of times over the Otsego hills on days of rejoicing--are
fairly given." The old gun was found when digging the cellar of Judge
Cooper's first house, and was said to have been buried by troops under
Gen. James Clinton, who marched from Albany against the Indians in 1779.
They cut their way through forests, brought their boats to Lake Otsego,
and their headquarters were in a log house built on the future site of
the first Hall. The place where was the old Clinton Dam is now marked by
the Daughters of the American Revolution as the _one_ Cooperstown,
connecting link with the War of Independence.
[Illustration: GENERAL JAMES CLINTON.]
[Illustration: CLINTON DAM.]
The outward appearance of the old Hall is fairly given by Cooper's pen,
but once within, all is a faithful record, "even to the severed nose of
Wolfe, and the urn that held the ashes of Queen Dido." The tale was of a
great landlord living among his settlers on property bearing his name.
The book was "The Pioneers, or, Sources of the Susquehanna," and
"thirty-five hundred copies sold before noon of the day it was
published."
It was of "The Pioneers" that Bryant wrote: "It dazzled the world by the
splendor of its novelty."
An interesting incident of Cooper's kindness of heart is of this date
and some ten years later came to light as follows: After his return from
Europe in 1833 he one day gave to his eldest daughter "a small book
bound in boards." It was entitled "Tales for Fifteen, or, Imagination
and Heart" by Jane Morgan. He said to her: "Dearie, here is a little
book that I wrote for Wiley," adding that he had bought it at a news
stand on his way home. It appears "when Wiley failed a number of his
patrons wrote stories and gave them to him." These two--one called
"Heart" and the other "Imagination" were written by Cooper, but
"curiously enough,"--were published under the pen-name of "Jane Morgan."
The book is very rare; only two copies are known to be in existence.
The thought of writing a romance of the sea first came to Mr. Cooper
while dining at Mr. Charles Wilkes', where the table-talk turned on "The
Pirate," just issued by the author of "Waverley." When his marine
touches were highly praised for their accuracy, Cooper held they were
not satisfactory to the nautical reader. His friends thought more
accuracy might better please seamen but would prove dull reading for the
general public. With his usual spirit, Cooper refused to be convinced,
and on his way home that evening "the outlines of a nautical romance
were vaguely sketched in his mind"; but he never dreamed it would
become one of a series of sea-stories. "I must write one more book--a
sea tale--" he said, "to show what can be done in this way by a sailor!"
The stirring struggles of the American Revolution again enlisted the
author's loyal pen-service in the character of that bold adventurer,
John Paul Jones, and his cruise in _The Ranger_, when he made his daring
descent upon Whitehaven and St. Mary's Isle, which suggested to Cooper
his plot for "The Pilot." Two ships, a frigate and the schooner _Ariel_,
were drawn for the tale. During its writing the author had many doubts
of its success. Friends thought the sea tame when calm, and unpleasant
in storms; and as to ladies--the reading of storms would surely make
them seasick. His first encouragement came from an Englishman of taste,
though a doubter of American talent. To Cooper's surprise, this
authority pronounced his sea tale good. Then came the favorable opinion
of Commodore Shubrick, of which the author wrote: "Anxious to know what
the effect would be on the public, I read a chapter to S----, now
captain, which contained an account of a ship working off-shore in a
gale. My listener betrayed interest as we proceeded, until he could no
longer keep his seat. He paced the room furiously until I got through,
and just as I laid down the paper he exclaimed: 'It is all very well,
but you have let your jib stand too long, my fine fellow!' I blew it out
of the bolt-rope in pure spite!" And thus it was that when the author
"came beating out of the 'Devil's Grip,'" this old messmate jumped from
his seat and paced the floor with strides, not letting a detail escape
him. Cooper was fully satisfied and accepted the criticism, and the
tale, alive with spirited description of sea-action, won the day. It was
written with all the author's power and accuracy of detail. In "Mr.
Gray" appeared John Paul Jones, while "Long Tom Coffin" was said to be
Mr. Irish, the mate of the _Stirling_, in which the lad "Cooper made his
voyage before-the-mast." Of this mate and the Yankees the author wrote:
"He too was from Nantucket, and was a prime fellow, and fit to command a
ship." Prof. Brander Matthews calls this simple-hearted cockswain and
Natty Bumppo "co-heirs of time." The famous fifth chapter of "The Pilot"
was the first fiction to show that "a master of the sea tale had come
into the world, and it has never been surpassed in literature of the
sea." This, the third of Cooper's novels, won for him his greatest
popularity. It was dedicated to William Branford Shubrick, United States
Navy--the author's loyal friend since their days together on the _Wasp_,
in 1809. Its inscription reads in part: "My Dear Shubrick--by your old
Messmate, the Author." A few days after "The Pilot" was issued, January,
1824, Cooper wrote this friend: "I found Wiley had the book in the hands
of his five printers--on my return--for reprint. So much for our joint
efforts." Concerning "The Pilot" and its author, this appeared in the
_Edinburgh Review_: "The empire of the sea is conceded to him by
acclamation."
[Illustration: "TALES FOR FIFTEEN, OR IMAGINATION AND HEART."]
[Illustration: CHARLES WILKES.]
[Illustration: JOHN PAUL JONES.]
Meeting Cooper at dinner three months later, Bryant wrote his wife that
"he seemed a little giddy with the great success his works have met."
Another said: "What wonder that the hearty, breezy author of 'The Spy,'
'The Pioneers,' and 'The Pilot,' should, by a certain 'emphatic
frankness of manner,' have somewhat startled the shy, retiring, country
poet who had not yet found his place on _The Evening Post!"_ Later, in
1824, to Richard Henry Dana's newsy letter about Cooper's foreign
standing, Bryant replies: "What you tell me of the success of our
countryman, Cooper, in England, is an omen of good things. I hope it is
the breaking of a bright day for American literature." Bryant's memorial
address after Cooper's death remains a splendid record of their
unclouded friendship, based on mutual respect. It was delivered at
Metropolitan Hall, in New York City, February 25, 1852. The occasion was
honored by the presence of the most brilliant men of the time. Daniel
Webster presided, assisted by William Cullen Bryant, and Washington
Irving. At that time these three men were made the subjects of a pencil
sketch by Daniel Huntington.
[Illustration: LONG TOM COFFIN.]
Mr. George Palmer Putnam thus describes a meeting between Irving and
Cooper, after the latter's return from Europe: "One day Mr. Irving was
sitting at my desk, with his back to the door, when Mr. Cooper came in
(a little bustling as usual) and stood at the office entrance, talking.
Mr. Irving did not turn (for obvious reasons), and Cooper did not see
him. I had acquired caution as to introductions without mutual consent,
but with brief thought--sort of instinct--I stoutly obeyed the impulse
of the moment, and simply said, 'Mr. Cooper, here is Mr. Irving.' The
latter turned, Cooper held out his hand cordially, dashed at once into
an animated conversation, took a chair, and, to my surprise and delight,
the two authors sat for an hour, chatting in their best manner about
almost every topic of the day and former days; and Mr. Irving
afterwards frequently alluded to the incident as being a very great
gratification to him. Not many months afterwards, he sat on the platform
and joined in Bryant's tribute to the genius of the departed novelist."
[Illustration: BRYANT, WEBSTER AND IRVING.]
September 18, 1851, Irving wrote: "The death of Fenimore Cooper is an
event of deep and public concern. To me it comes with a shock; for it
seems but the other day that I saw him at Putnam's, in the full vigor of
mind and body, 'a very castle of a man.' He left a space in our
literature which will not be easily supplied. I shall not fail to
attend the proposed meeting."
It is recorded that "Yale never, in later years, saw fit to honor
herself by giving Cooper his degree, but Columbia, in this instance more
intelligent than either Harvard or Yale, in 1824, conferred on the
author the honorary degree of A.M."
When, in 1824, General Lafayette, as the Nation's guest, landed from the
_Cadmus_ at Castle Garden, Mr. Cooper made one of the active committee
of welcome and entertainment. Of his part in the Castle-Garden ball, and
his enthusiasm, a friend wrote: "After working hard all day in
preparations and all night in carrying them out, towards dawn he went to
the office of his friend Charles King and wrote out a full and accurate
report, which appeared in Mr. King's paper the next day." Concerning
this famous Castle-Garden ball, Cooper himself wrote: "A tall spar was
raised in the center, a vast awning of sail-cloth covered the whole,
which was concealed by flags that gave a soft, airy finish--all flooded
by lights. Music of the national air hailed Lafayette's arrival. The
brilliant throngs and gay dancers over the floor fell into line like a
charm, forming a lane, through which the old man passed, giving and
receiving warm and affectionate salutations at every step to the small
marquee in the midst, prepared for the 'Guest of the Nation.' He was
like a father among his children." In various other ways Cooper paid
tributes of courtesy to General Lafayette during this visit to America.
[Illustration: THE LANDING OF LAFAYETTE, 1824.]
As the three successful books which the author had now written dealt
with the strength and struggles of liberty-loving Americans for their
new country, his wide sense of justice suggested writing on loyalty from
the other point of view--the Mother Country's--as held by men of birth
and honor. This loyalty to England Cooper made the subject of his next
book. It was a dangerous venture, and a time too near the dearly-bought
laurels of our young republic in its separation from England. But the
author made every effort for accuracy on all points; he was tireless in
his study of history, state papers, official reports, almanacs, and
weather-records. A journey "to Yankee Land" familiarized him with every
locality he so faithfully described in the pages of "Lionel Lincoln." "A
Legend of the Thirteen Republics" was an added title to the first
edition only (1825) of "Lionel Lincoln," for Cooper's intention to write
a story of each of the thirteen states was given up later, and the title
"A Narrative of 1775" took its place. The author himself was not
satisfied with this work, nor with the character of "Lionel Lincoln,"
whose lack of commanding interest makes "Job," his poor half-witted
brother and son of "Abigail,"--a tenant of the old warehouse,--the
_real_ hero of the book. Of its author, Bancroft the historian wrote:
"He has described the battle of Bunker's Hill better than it has ever
been described in any other work." Another high authority says:
"'Lionel Lincoln' certainly gives spirited battlepieces--notably the
battle of Bunker's Hill, which is a masterpiece." Rhode Island people
may care to know that a part of this book was written in Providence, in
the home of Mr. John Whipple, which stands on the verge of the old elm
trees of College Street. Here, too, Cooper may have studied on the
opening scenes of "The Red Rover."
[Illustration: LAFAYETTE.]
[Illustration: LAFAYETTE'S BRANDYWINE VASE.]
[Illustration: JOB PRAY.]
[Illustration: THE BURNING OF CHARLESTOWN.]
Early spring of 1825 found Fenimore Cooper in Washington, whence he
wrote: "I have just witnessed one of the most imposing ceremonies of
this government; I allude to the inauguration of the President of the
United States." It was that of John Quincy Adams, who succeeded James
Monroe. Elsewhere one learns that Cooper had dined at the White House;
he gave a description of Mrs. Monroe as first lady of the land.
[Illustration: WHIPPLE HOUSE, AT PROVIDENCE, R.I.]
[Illustration: MRS. JAMES MONROE.]
[Illustration: PRESIDENT'S HOUSE, WASHINGTON, D.C., 1825.]
Up to this year the author had signed his name "James Cooper"; then, in
remembrance of his mother's wish, he changed it, and by the April,
1826, act of Legislature the family name became Fenimore Cooper.
During the summer of 1825 Mr. Cooper made one of a party of young
men,--which included also the Hon. Mr. Stanley, afterwards Lord Derby,
Prime Minister of England, and the Hon. Wortley Montagu, later Lord
Wharncliffe, in an excursion to Saratoga and the Lake George country.
They went slowly up the Hudson, paid a brief visit to West Point, thence
to Catskill, where, like Leatherstocking, they saw "Creation!"--as Natty
said, dropping the end of his rod into the water, and sweeping one hand
around him in a circle--"all creation, lad." In the hills they saw the
two small ponds, and the merry stream crooking and winding through the
valley to the rocks; and the "Leap" in its first plunge of two hundred
feet: "It's a drop for the old Hudson," added Natty. The Shakers were
called upon in their beautiful valley and neat village at Lebanon; good
dinners were eaten at friendly tables in Albany; and gay were the times
they had in Ballston and Saratoga. Thence to the Lake George region, its
wooded heights, islands, crystal lakes, silent shores. For a while they
lingered with delight, then turned back for the dark, still caverns in
the heart of Glens Fall. These caverns were, Natty said, "Two little
holes for us to hide in." He added, "Falls on two sides of us, and the
river above and below!--it would be worth the trouble to step up on the
height of this rock and look at the pervarcity of the water. It falls by
no rule at all." Within the shadows and silence of these caverns Mr.
Stanley suggested to Cooper that "here was the very scene for a
romance," and the author promised his friend that a book should be
written in which these caves would play an important part. A story of
strong Indian make-up first came then to the author's mind. Before
leaving, these caverns and the surrounding country were closely examined
for future use.
[Illustration: SUNRISE AT SOUTH MOUNTAIN.]
[Illustration: GLEN'S FALL'S CAVERNS.]
[Illustration: HONORABLE MR. STANLEY.]
Besides his youthful and Lake Ontario experiences with Indians, Cooper
followed parties of them from Albany to New York, and several times to
Washington, for the purpose of closely studying their natures and
habits; all authorities in print were consulted. On his return home the
book was begun and rapidly written. "Planned beneath the summer leaves,
on the far shore of picturesque Hell Gate, above smiling fields and
bowering orchards of his Angevine home, those leaves had scarcely fallen
when the story was told--'the most uniformly exciting and powerful of
his fictions'--'The Last of the Mohicans,' and Natty and Chingachgook
were left in the wilderness beside the rude grave of Uncas." Again they
came into the shadow of the unbroken forest, as called for by the _one_
friend he now constantly consulted,--his faithful, loving life-mate. At
the time of its writing Cooper had a serious illness, during which his
mind was filled with ideas for this book. Suddenly rousing himself one
of these autumn afternoons, he called for pen and paper, but too ill to
use them, asked Mrs. Cooper, watching anxiously by his side, to write
for him. Fearing delirium, she wrote, thinking it would relieve him. A
page of notes was rapidly dictated, which seemed to his alarmed nurse
but the wild fancies of a fevered brain. It proved to be a clear account
of a lively struggle between "Magua" and "Chingachgook," and made the
twelfth chapter of the book. Why the author called Lake George by
another name is thus explained: "Looking over an ancient map, he found
that a tribe of Indians the French called _Les Honcans_ lived by this
beautiful sheet of water, and thinking the English name too commonplace
and the Indian name too hard to pronounce, he chose the 'Horican' as
better suiting simple Natty." This book, "The Last of the Mohicans,"
proved, perhaps, to be the most popular of all his works up to 1826.
[Illustration: GLENS FALL.]
[Illustration: LAKE GEORGE, OR "THE HORICAN."]
A present-day man-of-letters writes of Cooper: "He paints Indians and
Indian scenes with a glow of our sunset skies and the crimson of our
autumn maples, and makes them alive with brilliant color. Rifles crack,
tomahawks gleam, and arrows dart like sunbeams through the air. Indians
fleet of foot and full of graceful movement are these dusky Apollo's
Uncas. Cooper's readers never yawn over these tales of the forest or the
sea. He is the swan on the lake, the eagle in the air, the deer in the
wood, and the wind on the sea." So writes Prof. Brander Matthews. That
life-student of the American Indian, Francis Parkman, wrote: "It is easy
to find fault with 'The Last of the Mohicans,' but it is far from easy
to rival or even approach its excellence." It is said that "Magua," of
this book, "is the best-drawn Indian in fiction; from scalp-lock to
moccasin tingling with life" and the tension of the canoe-chase on the
Horican.
During this Lake George excursion a question came up between the Hon.
Mr. Stanley, the Hon. Wortley Montagu, and Mr. Cooper as to who was the
"Premier Baron of England." Cooper named Lord Henry William Fitzgerald
(3rd son of James, 1st Duke of Leinster) 22nd Baron de Ros [b. 1761--d.
1829] as his man; whose title came from Henry I., to Peter, Lord of
Holderness called Ros. Each of his two friends claimed another as the
"Premier Baron of England." All were so confident that a wager was
laid, and later inquiry proved Cooper right. In due time the debt
was paid with a large gold, silver-filled seal. On its stone--a
chrysoprase--appeared a baron's coronet and the old Scottish proverb:
"He that will to Cupar maun to Cupar!" The incident serves to affirm
Cooper's wide information and accurate memory.
[Illustration: THE WAGER SEAL.]
This winter of 1825-26 Cooper and his family made their home at 345
Greenwich Street, not many steps from 92 Hudson Street, where lived the
poet William Cullen Bryant, who often went around the corner for a walk
with his friend.
[Illustration: BRYANT.]
General Wilson wrote: "Soon after Bryant went to New York he met Cooper,
who, a few days later, said: 'Come and dine with me tomorrow; I live at
No. 345 Greenwich Street.' 'Please put that down for me,' said Bryant,
'or I shall forget the place.' 'Can't you remember three-four-five?'
replied Cooper bluntly. Bryant did remember 'three-four-five,' not only
for that day, but ever afterward."
During this spring Cooper followed a deputation of Pawnee and Sioux
Indians from New York to Washington, in order to make a close study of
them for future use. He was much interested in the chiefs' stories of
their wild powers, dignity, endurance, grace, cunning wiles, and fierce
passions. The great buffalo hunts across the prairies he had never seen;
the fights of mounted tribes and the sweeping fires over those boundless
plains all claimed his eager interest and sympathy, with the resulting
desire to place "these mounted tribes" and their desert plains beyond
the Mississippi in another Indian story. One of the chiefs of this
party--a very fine specimen of a warrior, a remarkable man in every
way--is credited with being the original of "Hard-Heart" of "The
Prairie," which an authority gives as Cooper's favorite book. On a
knoll, and within the glory of a western sunset, stood Natty, born of
the author's mind and heart, as he first appeared in this book. "The
aged trapper--a nobly pathetic figure contrasted with the
squatter"--looms up, colossal, against the gleaming radiance of
departing day; and full well he knows his own leaving for the long-home
is not far off--for the remarkable life of wondrous Leatherstocking
closes within these pages. Of other characters and the author Prof.
Matthews says: "He was above all things a creator of character.--He can
draw women.--The wife of Ishmael Bush, the squatter, mother of seven
stalwart sons and sister of a murderous rascal, is an unforgotten
portrait, solidly painted by a master." "The Prairie" was begun in the
winter of 1826, in the New York, Greenwich-Street home, while Cooper was
under the weather from the old fever effects. The closing of his
father's estate, and debts contracted against him by those whom he had
helped, emptied his purse and left him a poor man. To meet these calls
of honor and his own needs, he wrote when not able to do so, and for a
short and only time in his life called in the aid of coffee for his
work. Wine he drank daily at dinner only, and he never smoked.
[Illustration: "NATTY, THE TRAPPER."]
[Illustration: HENRY CLAY.]
[Illustration: CHANCELLOR KENT.]
When Cooper followed the Sioux and Pawnee Indians to Washington, in
1826, Henry Clay, Secretary of State, offered him the appointment of
United States Minister to Sweden. It was declined in favor of the
consulship to Lyons, France, which latter would allow him more freedom
and protect his family in case of foreign troubles. With this trip to
Europe in view his family busily studied French and Spanish. Returning
to New York, Cooper's club gave him a farewell dinner, at which the
author said he intended to write a history of the United States Navy. At
this dinner he was toasted by Chancellor Kent as "the genius which has
rendered our native soil classic ground, and given to our early history
the enchantment of fiction."
[Illustration: THE U.S.S. "HUDSON."]
May 1 the town house was given up for a month of hotel life, and on June
1, at eleven o'clock, Mr. and Mrs. Cooper and their children boarded the
_Hudson_ at Whitehall Wharf for Europe. They left a land-squall--their
maid Abigail--ashore and found some rough weather ahead before June 30.
"A fine clear day brought in plain sight ninety-seven sail, which had
come into the Channel, like ourselves, during the thick weather. The
blue waters were glittering with canvas." A little later Cooper wrote:
"There is a cry of 'Land!' and I must hasten on deck to revel in the
cheerful sight." The _Hudson_ brought up at Cowes, Isle of Wight, July
2, 1826; "after a passage of thirty-one days we first put foot in
Europe," wrote Cooper. In this "toy-town" they found rooms at the
"Fountain," where the windows gave them pretty vistas, and evening
brought the first old-country meal, also the first taste of the famous
Isle-of-Wight butter, which, however, without salt they thought
"tasteless." As eager newcomers to strange lands, they made several
sight-seeing ventures, among which was enjoyed the ivy-clad ruin of
Carisbrook, the one-time prison of Charles I. A few days later they
landed on the pier at Southampton, which town is recorded as being
"noted for long passages, bow-windows, and old maids." Here they found
pleasant lodgings, friends, and a sister of Mrs. Cooper's whereby time
was pleasantly passed by the family while Cooper went up to London to
see his publishers. On his return they were soon aboard the _Camilla_,
"shorn of one wing" (one of her two boilers was out of order), and on
their way to France. At midnight they were on deck for their first sight
of France; "Land!--of ghostly hue in the bright moonlight, and other
lights glittering from the two towers on the headlands near by." Landing
at the small port of Havre, they had some weary hours of search before
finding shelter in _Hotel d'Angleterre_. By a "skirted wonder" of the
port their luggage soon passed the customs next morning and they were
started for Paris. They were charmed with the dark old sombre,
mysterious towers and fantastic roofs of Rouen, where Cooper bought a
large traveling carriage, in which they safely passed the "ugly dragons"
that "thrust out their grinning heads from the Normandy towns" on the
way to the heart of France. From the windmills of Montmartre they took
in the whole vast capital at a glance. A short stay was made at a small
hotel, where soon after their arrival they engaged "a governess for the
girls." She proved to be "a furious royalist," teaching the children
that "Washington was a rebel, Lafayette a monster, and Louis XVI a
martyr." Under the rule of returned royalists was attempted the
exclusion of even the _name_ of Bonaparte from French history. "My
girls," Cooper wrote, "have shown me the history of France--officially
prepared for schools, in which there is no sort of allusion to him."
Their next venture was Hotel de Jumièges in a small garden, far from
the Faubourg St. Germain, where they had an apartment of six rooms.
Cooper wrote: "The two lower floors were occupied as a girls'
boarding-school;--the reason for dwelling in it, our own daughters were
in the school; on the second floor there was nothing but our own
apartment." And here, next door to their nun-neighbors of the convent
St. Maur, Cooper wrote the last pages of "The Prairie." It was published
in the autumn of 1826, by Lea and Carey, of Philadelphia.
[Illustration: WHITEWALL WHARF, 1826.]
[Illustration: KEEP OF CARISBROOK.]
[Illustration: HAVRE, BY NIGHT.]
[Illustration: WINDMILLS OF MONTMARTRE.]
[Illustration: THE CONVENT ST. MAUR.]
[Illustration: HOTEL DE JUMIÈGES.]
Cooper was very fond of walking, and to get a general idea of Paris he
and Captain Chauncey--an old messmate and officer in the navy--made the
circuit of the city walls, a distance of nineteen miles, in four hours.
For two hours the captain had Cooper "a little on his quarter." "By this
time," Cooper wrote, "I ranged up abeam,"--to find a pinching boot on
his friend's foot. Near the finish the mate of this "pinching boot"
became "too large," and the captain "fell fairly astern." But without
stopping, eating, or drinking, they made the distance in four hours to a
minute.
Washington Irving wrote from Madrid the following spring: "I left Paris
before the arrival of Cooper, and regret extremely that I missed him. I
have a great desire to make his acquaintance, for I am delighted with
his novels. His naval scenes and characters in 'The Pilot' are
admirable." Cooper soon became known in France by his presence at a
dinner given by the U.S. Minister to Canning then in Paris.
In "Bryant and His Friends" General James Grant Wilson says: "Scott and
Cooper met at the Princess Galitzin's, in Paris, November, 1826; and,
says Scott's diary, 'so the Scotch and American Lions took the field
together.'" In Miss Cooper's "Pages and Pictures" appears her father's
first interview with the author of "Waverley," of which Cooper wrote in
part: "Ten days after the arrival of Sir Walter Scott I ordered a
carriage one morning. I had got as far as the lower flight to the door
when another carriage-steps rattled, and presently a large, heavy man
appeared in the door of the hotel. He was gray, limped a little, walking
with a cane. We passed on the stairs, bowing. I was about to enter the
carriage when I fancied the face and form were known to me, and it
flashed on my mind that the visit might be to myself. The stranger went
up the large stone steps, with one hand on the railing and the other on
his cane. He was on the first landing as I stopped, and, turning, our
eyes met. He asked in French, 'Is it Mr. Cooper that I have the honor to
see?' 'I am, sir.' 'Oh, well then, I am Walter Scott.' I ran up, shook
the hand he stood holding out to me cordially, and expressed my sense of
the honor he was conferring. He told me the Princess Galitzin had been
as good as her word and given him my address,--and cutting short
ceremony he had driven from his hotel to my lodgings." Realizing all at
once that he was speaking French to Cooper's English, he said: "Well, I
have been _parlez-vousing_ in a way to surprise you. These Frenchmen
have my tongue so set to their lingo I have half forgotten my own
language,' he continued in English, and accepted my arm up the next
flight of stairs." They had some copyright and other talk, and Sir
Walter "spoke of his works with frankness and simplicity"; and as to
proof-reading, he said he "would as soon see his dinner after a hearty
meal" as to read one of his own tales--"when fairly rid of it." When he
rose to go Cooper begged he might have the gratification of presenting
his wife. Sir Walter good-naturedly assented. When Mrs. Cooper and their
nephew William Cooper were introduced, he sat some little time relating
in Scotch dialect some anecdotes. Then his hostess remarked that the
chair he sat in had been twice honored that day, as General Lafayette
had not left it more than an hour before. Sir Walter was surprised,
thinking Lafayette had gone to America to live, and observed, "He is a
great man." Two days later Sir Walter had Cooper to breakfast, where the
Scotch bard appeared in a newly-bought silk gown, trying "as hard as he
could to make a Frenchman of himself." Among others present was Miss
Anne Scott, who was her father's traveling companion. "She was in half
mourning, and with her black eyes and jet-black hair might very well
have passed for a French woman." Of Scott Cooper wrote: "During the time
the conversation was not led down to business, he manifested a strong
propensity to humor." In naming their common publisher in Paris "he
quaintly termed him, with a sort of malicious fun, 'our gosling' (his
name was Goselin), adding that he hoped at least he 'laid golden eggs.'"
Mr. Cooper was warmly interested in aiding Sir Walter's "Waverley"
copyrights in America, and concerning their author he later wrote: "In
Auld Reekie, and among the right set, warmed, perhaps, by a glass of
'mountain dew,' Sir Walter Scott, in his peculiar way, is one of the
pleasantest companions the world holds." About 1830, when Cooper was
sitting for his portrait by Madame de Mirbel, that artist--for its
pose--asked him to look at the picture of a distinguished statesman.
Cooper said: "No, if I must look at any, it shall be at my master," and
lifting his eyes higher they rested on a portrait of Sir Walter Scott.
[Illustration: SIR WALTER SCOTT.]
[Illustration: MISS ANNE SCOTT.]
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
[Illustration: PIERRE JEAN DAVID D'ANGERS.]
One of Cooper's steadfast friends exclaimed of him:--"What a love he
cherished for superior talents in every ennobling pursuit in life!" This
characteristic no doubt led him into that day life of Pierre Jean David
d'Angers, whose brave soul had battled its way to artistic recognition.
In M. Henry Jouin's "David d'Angers et ses Relations Littéraires,"
Paris, 1890, appear two letter records of this master-sculptor as to
Cooper. In that of David to Victor Pavie, November, 1826, is: "Next week
I am to dine with Cooper; I shall make his bust. If you have not yet
read his works, read them, you will find the characters vigorously
traced." A note adds that the sculptor kept his word, and this bust of
Cooper appeared in the "Salon of 1827." Paris, March 30, 1828, David
again writes of Cooper to Victor Pavie:--"Dear friend, in speaking of
the sea, I think of 'The Red Rover' of my good friend Cooper. Have you
read it? It interests me much." A note adds: "Without doubt the author
had presented his new book to the sculptor," who gave to Cooper this
bust, modeled in 1826. Mrs. Cooper thought the bust and the Jarvis
portrait of her husband were "perfect likenesses." Later on David's
genius again found expression in a bronze medallion of his "good friend
Cooper." David has given the striking intellectual of Cooper's head of
which an authority of that time wrote: "Nature moulded it in majesty,
yet denied it not the gentler graces that should ever adorn greatness."
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
[Illustration: MRS. JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
"In Paris Cooper's style of living gave his ideas of the duties and
position of an American gentleman. In a part of the handsome Hotel de
Jumièges he lived, keeping his carriage and service required by a modest
establishment; and his doors were always open to every American who had
claims on his society. Meanwhile nothing was allowed to break in upon
his literary duties, for which a part of each day was set aside." So
wrote one who became a friend staunch and true at this time in Paris. Of
their meeting he wrote: "I shall never forget the first day I saw
Cooper. He was at good old General Lafayette's, in the little apartment
of the rue d'Anjou,--the scene of many hallowed memories." Lafayette's
kind heart had granted an interview to some Indians by whom a reckless
white man was filling his purse in parading through Europe. With winning
smile the great, good man told these visitors to return to their home
while yet they could. Mr. G. continued: "As I was gazing at this scene I
saw a gentleman enter whose appearance called off the General's
attention. He was in the prime of life (thirty-five), and of that vigor
which air and manly exercise give. I had seen the heads of great men,
and there were some close to me, but none with such a full, expansive
forehead, such strong features, a mouth firm without harshness, and an
eye whose clear gray seemed to read you at a glance while it fears not
to let you read him in turn. 'Who is he?' I whispered to a
grand-daughter of the General near me. 'Mr. Cooper; do you not know Mr.
Cooper? Let me introduce you to him.' 'Cooper,' said I to myself; 'can
it be that I am within five paces, and that there, too, are the feeble
of the race around which his genius has shed a halo like that of Homer's
own heros?' I was fresh from 'The Mohicans,' and my hand trembled as it
met the cordial grasp of the man to whom I owed so many pleasing hours.
I asked about the Indians. 'They are poor specimens,' said he;
'fourth-rate at best in their own woods, and ten-times worse for the
lives they are leading here.'" Later, Mr. G. met the author in
Lafayette's bed-room, and saw how warmly he was welcomed by the great
poet Béranger. Still later Mr. G. and Cooper met in Florence, where they
had much fine talking and walking "on calm summer evenings." Of the
Bard-of-Avon it is noted that Cooper said: "Shakespeare is my traveling
library. To a novel-writer he is invaluable. Publishers will have
mottoes for every chapter; I never yet turned over Shakespeare without
hitting upon just what I wanted I like to take them, whenever I can,
from our own poets. It is a compliment they have a right to, and I am
glad when I can pay it." Concerning the author's habits, this friend
concludes: "When Cooper left his desk he left his pen on it. He came out
into the world to hear and see what other men were doing. If they wanted
to hear him, there he was, perfectly ready to express opinions of men or
things. It was delightful to hear him talk about his own works, he did
it with such a frank, fresh, manly feeling."
[Illustration: PROF. GEORGE WASHINGTON GREEN ("MR. G.")]
[Illustration: P.T. DE BÉRANGER.]
[Illustration: TALLEYRAND.]
[Illustration: DUCHESSE DE BERRI.]
[Illustration: CHARLES X of FRANCE.]
Among the great again was seen the ever-favored yet not "gai"
Talleyrand. Of the incident Cooper noted: "It is etiquette for the kings
of France to dine in public on January 14 and on the monarch's
fête-day." Wishing to see this ceremony, Mr. and Mrs. Cooper were sent
the better of the two permissions granted for the occasion. Cooper
describes the ceremony--the _entrée_ of Charles X: _"Le Roi_, tall,
decidedly graceful; the Dauphin to his right, the Dauphine to his left,
and to her right the Duchess of Berri." Passing Cooper, he continues:
"Near a little gate was an old man in strictly court-dress. The long
white hair that hung down his face, the _cordon bleu_, the lame foot,
and the unearthly aspect made me suspect the truth, it was M. de
Talleyrand as grand chamberlin, to officiate at the dinner of his
master"; whereby proving his own words: "It is not enough to be some
one,--it is needful to do something." A near Abbé whispered of
Talleyrand to Cooper: "But, sir, he is a cat, that always falls on its
feet." Yet of Talleyrand another's record is: "But if Charles Maurice
was lame of leg--his wit was keener and more nimble than that of any man
in Europe." Brushing past the gorgeous state-table to Mrs. Cooper, the
author adds: "She laughed, and said 'it was all very magnificent and
amusing,' but some one had stolen her shawl!"
[Illustration: COOPER'S SUMMER HOME, ST. OUEN, 1827.]
Cooper was ever a home-lover. Wherever he might be in foreign lands, he
contrived to have his own roof-tree when possible. Therefore, the summer
of 1827 sent them from rue St. Maur to the village of St. Ouen, on the
banks of the Seine and a league from the gates of Paris. The village
itself was not attractive, but pleasant was the home, next to a small
château where Madame de Staël lived when her father, M. Necker, was in
power. Some twenty-two spacious, well-furnished rooms this summer home
had, in which once lived the Prince de Soubise when _grand veneur_ of
Louis XV, who went there at times to eat his dinner--"in what served us
for a drawing-room," Cooper wrote. The beautiful garden of shade-trees,
shrubbery, and flowers, within gray walls fourteen feet high, was a
blooming paradise; and for it all--horses, cabriolet, grand
associations--was paid two hundred dollars per month for the season of
five.
"The Red Rover" was written in these three or four summer months in St.
Ouen on the Seine, whence the author's letters tell of watching the
moving life on the river, the merry washerwomen as they chatter, joke,
and splash beneath his terrace; how he tried punting, and left it to
"honest Pierre," who never failed to charge him double fare, and of whom
he tells a pretty story; how they all enjoyed the village _fêtes_, with
whirligigs and flying-horses, whereby the French contrive to make and
spend a few _sous_ pleasantly. "I enjoy all this greatly," wrote Cooper.
Excursions were made,--one to Montmorenci, in plain view of Paris; and
the author explains that the Montmorenci claim to being "the first
Christian baron" is of the Crusade War-Cry date and origin. His wife
and he took all the pretty drives in their cabriolet, but later he took
to the saddle for the out-of-field paths, where pleasant salutations
were exchanged with kindly-hearted peasants. Of these rambles Cooper
wrote: "One of my rides is ascending Montmartre by its rear, to the
windmills that night and day are whirling their rugged arms over the
capital of France." Montmartre, he said, gave him a view "like a glimpse
into the pages of history." He often met royalty dashing to and from
Paris. The king with his carriage-and-eight, attended by a dozen mounted
men, made a royal progress truly magnificent.
[Illustration: COOPER'S TERRACE STUDY, ST. OUEN.]
[Illustration: OLD MILL AT NEWPORT.]
[Illustration: THE STRUGGLE.]
Overhanging the river at the garden side was a broad terrace which ended
in a pleasant summer-house, and here many pages of the author's next
book--"The Red Rover"--were written. After he left the navy, and while
he was living in Angevine, Cooper became part owner in a
whaling-ship,--_The Union_, of Sag Harbor. She made trips to different
parts of the coast, and several times, for the pleasure of it, Cooper
played skipper. Under his direction she once carried him to Newport,
with which he was greatly pleased. He explored the old ruin there, but
no fancy could ever persuade him to see more than a windmill in it; but
the charm of Newport's situation, harbor, and shore lines lingered in
his mind and served him for the opening and closing scenes of this work.
After its publication he received from some Newport gentlemen the gift
of a little box made from the keel of the _Endeavor_, Cook's famous
exploring ship, which wound up its world-circling voyage in Newport
harbor. On the lid of the box was a silver-plate engraving. In Cooper's
story the "Red Rover" appears on this Newport scene in the height of his
career,--an outlaw in spirit, a corsair in deed. In early life he was of
quick mind, strong will, with culture and social position, but wildly
passionate and wayward; and smarting under official injustice, in an
evil hour he casts his lawlessness loose on the storm-tide of life. The
voice of an elder sister, who had given something of a mother's deep
love and tenderness to the wayward youth, falls upon his ear. Old
memories are awakened; home feeling revives; conscience is aroused, and
in the very hour of its greatest triumph the proud spirit bows in
penitence,--the Rover surrenders his captives. A like change of heart
came, through a mutual love of the birds of heaven, to a real pirate who
chanced upon a cabin in the forest's solitude and here confessed his
life to its inmate, Audubon, who left this "striking incident" a record
in his works. However, "Dick Fid, that arrant old foretop man, and his
comrade, Negro Sip, are the true lovers of the narrative;--the last,
indeed, is a noble creature, a hero under the skin of Congo." "The Red
Rover" is all a book of the sea. In Sir Walter Scott's journal, January,
1828, appears: "I have read Cooper's new novel, 'The Red Rover.' The
current of it rolls entirely on the ocean. Something too much of
nautical language. It is very clever, though." Its author "has often
been idly compared to the author of 'Waverley,' but to no such heritage
as Scott's was ever Cooper born. Alone he penetrated the literary
wilderness, blazing paths for those who should come after him
there";--and a Columbus of letters for others to follow on the sea's
highway was he.
[Illustration: THE NEWPORT BOX.]
[Illustration: JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART.]
A misprint in Lockhart's "Life of Scott" made his comment on Cooper most
unfortunate by an "s" added to the word manner. Sir Walter's journal
reads: "This man who has shown so much genius has a good deal of manner,
or want of manner, peculiar to his countrymen." Cooper, hurt to the
quick for himself and his country at being rated "a rude boor from the
bookless wilds," by one he had called his "sovereign" in past cordial
relations, resented this expression in his review of Lockhart's work
for the _Knickerbocker Magazine_, 1838, and for so doing he was harshly
criticised in England. October, 1864, the literary editor of _The
Illustrated London News_ wrote: "I am almost inclined to agree with
Thackeray in liking Hawkeye 'better than any of Scott's lot.' What noble
stories those five are in which the hero is described from youth to
age!" From "Thackeray in the United States," by General James Grant
Wilson, comes: "At an American dinner table" (the talk was of Cooper and
his writings) "Thackeray pronounced Leatherstocking the greatest
character created in fiction since the Don Quixote of Cervantes"; and he
thought the death scene in "The Prairie," where the old trapper said
"Here!" surpassing anything he had "met in English literature."
[Illustration: NATTY'S LAST CALL.]
Of Natty's answer to the Spirit Land call Cooper's own words are: "The
trapper was placed on a rude seat, which had been made, with studied
care, to support his frame in an upright and easy attitude--so as to let
the light of the setting sun fall full upon the solemn features. His
head was bare, the long, thin locks of gray fluttering lightly in the
evening breeze. The first glance of the eye told his former friends
that the old man was at length called upon to pay the last tribute of
nature. The trapper had remained nearly motionless for an hour. His eyes
alone had occasionally opened and shut. When opened, his gaze seemed
fastened on the clouds which hung around the western horizon, reflecting
the bright colors, and giving form and loveliness to the glorious tints
of an American sunset. The hour--the calm beauty of the season--the
occasion, all conspired to fill the spectators with solemn awe.
Suddenly, while musing on the remarkable position in which he was
placed, Middleton felt the hand which he held grasp his own with
incredible power, and the old man, supported on either side by his
friends, rose upright to his feet. For a moment he looked about him, as
if to invite all in presence to listen (the lingering remnant of human
frailty), and then, with a fine military elevation of the head, and with
a voice that might be heard in every part of that numerous assembly, he
pronounced the word--'Here!'
"When Middleton and Hard Heart, each of whom had involuntarily extended
a hand to support the form of the old man, turned to him again, they
found that the subject of their interest was removed forever beyond the
necessity of their care."
Concerning social life Cooper wrote: "Taking into consideration our
tastes and my health, the question has been, not how to get into, but
how to keep out of, the great world." But for the happy chance of
inquiry at the gate of a friend, the author would "have dined with the
French Lord-High-Chancellor, without the smallest suspicion of who he
was!" Of French women Cooper adds: "The highest style of French beauty
is classical. I cannot recall a more lovely picture than the Duchess
de----[this title and blank are said to veil the identity of the
Princess Galitzin] in full dress at a carnival ball, where she shone
peerless among hundreds of the _élite_ of Europe. And yet this woman was
a grandmother!"
[Illustration: THE PRINCESS BARBARA VASSILIEWNA GALITZIN.]
In a letter dated Paris, November 28, 1826, written by Mrs. Cooper to
her sister, appears of Mr. Cooper:--"They make quite a Lion of him and
Princesses write to him and he has invitations from Lords and Ladies. He
has so many notes from the Princess Galitzin I should be absolutely
jealous were it not that she is a Grandmother. We were at a Soirée there
the other evening among Dutchesses, Princesses, Countesses, etc."
[Illustration: LA GRANGE, COUNTRY HOME OF LAFAYETTE.]
[Illustration: LA GRANGE ARCHWAY ENTRANCE.]
Once with and twice without Mrs. Cooper, the author visited La Grange,
the country home of General Lafayette, some twenty-seven miles from
Paris and near Rosay. He tells us that La Grange means barn, granary, or
farm, and that the château came to Lafayette through his wife; that it
had some five hundred acres of wood, pasture, meadow, and cultivated
land; that the house is of hewn stone, good grayish color, with its five
plain, round towers and their high, pyramidal slate roofs making a part
of the walls; that the end towers are buried in ivy planted by Charles
Fox. He tells how small, irregular windows open beautifully through the
thick foliage for the blooming faces of children, in their home-part of
La Grange. He gives rare pictures of the great stairway, the General's
bed-room, cabinet, and library in the tower-angle overlooking the
willow-shaded moat. Beneath this library was the author's own bed-room.
Then came the array of drawing-rooms and innumerable other rooms, where
hospitality seemed to know no limit. Lafayette's cabinet contained
many portraits,--one of Madame de Staël, and one of his own father. Of
this room, and the library, and his grand old host Cooper wrote: "I
passed much of our visit alone with him in these two rooms. No one can
be pleasanter in private, and he is full of historical anecdotes that he
tells with great simplicity and frequently with great humor." The
château stands on three sides of an irregular square, and is one of the
most picturesque structures in the country. The winding road enters a
thicket of evergreens, crosses a bridge, and passes beneath an arch to
the paved court. Together, Cooper and his host had many walks and drives
thereabouts, and, all in all, the author fell under the spell of
Lafayette's personal charm and his simple integrity of character.
Between Lafayette's richness of years and Talleyrand's old age there was
a gulf,--one had attained nearly everything worth striving for; the
other had lost the same.
[Illustration: HÔTEL DESSEIN, CALAIS, FRANCE.]
Cooper and his family entered France July, 1826, and February, 1828,
they thought the time had come to change the scene, and proceeded to
England. "I drove around to the rue d'Anjou to take my leave of General
Lafayette," wrote Cooper. To Calais they had rain and chill and darkness
most of the way. Passing through the gate, they drove to the inn
immortalized by Lawrence Sterne and Beau Brummel, where they found
English comfort with French cooking and French taste. One of February's
fine days they left the Hotel Dessein to embark for England. After a
two-hours' run the cliffs of Dover appeared on each side of that
port,--the nearest to the continent,--making these chalk cliffs seem,
Cooper says, "a magnificent gateway to a great nation." Leaving the
fishing-boats of the French coast, "the lofty canvas of countless ships
and several Indiamen rose from the sea," as they shot towards the
English shore, many "bound to that focus of coal-smoke, London." Quietly
landing at Dover-haven, they went to Wright's tavern, where they missed
the French manner, mirrors, and table-service, but "got in their place a
good deal of solid, unpretending comfort." In due time Mr. Wright put
them and their luggage into a comfortable post-coach, and on the road he
called "quite rotten, sir," to London. To Americans, at that date, the
road proved good, and also the horses that made the sixteen miles to
Canterbury in an hour and a half, where they drove to another Mr.
Wright's; going to four of the name between Dover and London, Cooper
concluded with an apology that "it was literally all Wright on this
road." The visit to Canterbury cathedral was made during "morning
vespers in the choir. It sounded odd to hear our own beautiful service
in our own tongue, in such a place, after the _Latin_ chants of canons;
and we stood listening with reverence without the screen." London met
them "several miles in the suburbs down the river," but they suddenly
burst out onto Waterloo bridge, over which they were whirled into the
Strand and set down at Wright's hotel, Adam Street, Adelphi; "and,"
wrote Cooper, "we were soon refreshing ourselves with some of worthy
Mrs. Wright's excellent tea."
[Illustration: CLIFFS OF DOVER.]
[Illustration: CANTERBURY CATHEDRAL CHOIR.]
[Illustration: GREEN GATE, CANTERBURY.]
The second night in London Cooper, stretched out on a sofa, was reading,
when some street musicians began to play beneath his window several
tunes without success; "finally," he wrote, "the rogues contrived, after
all, to abstract half a crown from my pocket by suddenly striking up
'Yankee Doodle!'" After some hunting they took a small house in St.
James Place, which gave them "a tiny drawing-room, a dining-room, three
bed-rooms, offices, and house-service for a guinea per day." A guinea
more weekly was added for their three fires, and their own maid and man
gave personal service during this London season. Of his man-servant
Cooper wrote: "The English footman I engaged is a steady, little, old
man, with a red face and a powdered poll, who appears in black breeches
and coat, but who says himself that his size has marred his fortune. He
is cockney born, about fifty; quality and splendor act forcibly on his
imagination, and he is much condemned in the houses where I visit on
account of his dwarfish stature"; and we are told that the English favor
pretty faces for their maids and fine figures for their footmen.
[Illustration: ST. JAMES PLACE, LONDON.]
To a Mr. Spencer whom Cooper met in France was due the visit soon paid
him by his near neighbor, the author of the "Pleasures of Memory." Of
Samuel Rogers Cooper wrote: "He very kindly sought me out"; and, "few
men have a more pleasant way of saying pleasant things." His visit was
followed by an invitation to breakfast the next morning. Cooper
continues: "It was but a step from my door, and you may be certain I was
punctual." He found the poet's home perfection for a bachelor's needs;
only eighteen feet front, but the drawing-room and dining-room were
lined with old masters. And in the bow-window stood the "Chantrey Vase,"
placed by its maker when artist workman in the room where he later
dined as Chantrey the sculptor and Rogers' honored guest. The library
was filled with valuable books and curiosities in history, literature,
and art. Of this poet's dream-home Cooper wrote: "Neither he nor any one
else has a right to live in so exquisite a house and expect everybody to
hold their tongues about it. Taking the house, the host, the mental
treats he dispenses, the company, and the tone, it is not easy to
conceive of anything better in their way. Commend me in every respect to
the delicious breakfasts of St. James Place!" On one occasion, "Rogers,
talking of Washington Irving's 'Columbus,' said, 'in his airy,
significant way,' as Moore called it, 'It's rather long.' Cooper turned
round on him and said sharply, 'That's a short criticism.'" This
banker-poet could be severe on his English friends too, as it appears
"Lady Holland was always lamenting that she had nothing to do. One day,
complaining worse than ever that she did not know 'what to be at,'" said
Rogers, "I could not resist recommending her to try a novelty--try and
do a little good."
[Illustration: SIR FRANCIS CHANTREY.]
[Illustration: SAMUEL ROGERS.]
[Illustration: ROGERS' LONDON HOME.]
[Illustration: ROGERS' BREAKFAST ROOM.]
Through Samuel Rogers Cooper was soon dining at Holland House, in the
much-carved and gilded room where Sully and embassy supped in 1603. By a
word to the porter, Sir James Mackintosh had planned a pleasant
half-hour for his American friend in the gardens, where was Rogers'
seat, and then in the library on the second floor, where he saw its
each-end tables. The generous space between is said to have been paced
by "Addison when composing," and his inspiration quickened by kindly
"bottles placed on them for that purpose." The artist Charles Robert
Leslie caught a rare glimpse on canvas of this library, in which appear
his friends Lord and Lady Holland, who were also the host and hostess of
Fenimore Cooper. We are told by him that the dining-table was square;
that the host had one corner and the hostess the centre; and the
American author, "as the stranger, had the honor of a seat next to Lady
Holland." When talking, he was offered by her a plate of herring, of
which he frankly avowed he "ought to have eaten one, even to the fins
and tail"; but little dreaming of their international worth just then,
the herring were declined. With good humor his hostess said: "You do not
know what you say; they are _Dutch_." With some vigor of look and tone
Cooper repeated--"Dutch!" The reply was: "Yes, Dutch; we can only get
them _through an ambassador_." Then Cooper rose to the occasion by
replying: "There are too many good things of native production to
require a voyage to Holland on my account." Of their host Rogers' record
was: "Lord Holland always comes down to breakfast like a man upon whom
sudden good fortune had just fallen--his was the smile that spoke the
mind at ease." And after his death were found on Lord Holland's
dressing-table, and in his handwriting, these lines on himself:
Nephew of Fox and friend of Gay,
Enough my meed of fame
If those who deighn'd to observe me say
I injured neither name.
[Illustration: ROGERS' SEAT.]
"Here Rogers sat, and here forever dwell
With me, those Pleasures that he sang so well."
After dining at Lord Grey's Cooper wrote of him: "He on all occasions
acted as if he never thought of national differences"; and the author
thought him "the man of most character in his set." We are told that
England is the country of the wealthy, and that the king is seldom seen,
although the royal start from St. James for Windsor was seen and
described as going off "at a slapping pace."
[Illustration: CHARLES ROBERT LESLIE.]
[Illustration: SIR JAMES MACKINTOSH.]
[Illustration: HOLLAND HOUSE.]
[Illustration: LIBRARY OF HOLLAND HOUSE.]
[Illustration: GILT CHAMBER OF HOLLAND HOUSE.]
[Illustration: LORD GREY.]
[Illustration: MRS. JOHN GIBSON LOCKHART.]
But it was in that dreamland of Rogers' that Cooper's heart found its
greatest joy. There he met the artists,--Sir Thomas Lawrence, handsome
and well-mannered; Leslie, mild, caring little for aught save his tastes
and affections; and Newton, who "thinks himself" English. Here, dining,
he meets again Sir Walter Scott, his son-in-law and later biographer,
Mr. Lockhart, Sir Walter's daughters, Mrs. Lockhart and Miss Anne Scott.
He says Mrs. Lockhart "is just the woman to have success in Paris, by
her sweet, simple manners." He had a stately chat with Mrs. Siddons, and
Sir James Mackintosh he called "the best talker I have ever seen; the
only man I have yet met in England who appears to have any clear or
definite notions of us." Rare indeed were these flash-lights of genius
that Samuel Rogers charmed to his "feasts of reason and flow of soul."
[Illustration: JOANNA BAILLIE.]
[Illustration: SIR THOMAS LAWRENCE.]
With Mr. Southby Cooper went to see Coleridge at Highgate, where, he
says, "our reception was frank and friendly, the poet coming out to meet
us in his morning-gown. I rose to take a nearer view of a little
picture, when Mr. Coleridge told me it was by his friend Allston." From
the bard of Highgate they went to see Miss Joanna Baillie at Hampstead,
and found her "a little, quiet woman, a deeply-seated earnestness about
her that bespoke the higher impulses within; no one would have thought
her little person contained the elements of a tragedy."
[Illustration: HOUSE OF THE GILLMAN'S, HIGHGATE, LONDON.]
An Amsterdam engagement for early June called Cooper and his family from
London before the end of the season, and prompted him to say, "The
force of things has moved heavier bodies." Quitting England was by no
means easy, but "the weather was fine and the North Sea smooth as a
dish." They paddled the whole night long in their "solid good vessel,
but slow of foot." With morning "a low spit of land hove in sight, and a
tree or a church tower" rose out of the water,--this was Holland. At
Rotterdam "the boat was soon alongside the Boom Key." With some
fluttering about the dykes and windmills of Dutchland, a flight through
Belgium soon brought them once more to Paris.
[Illustration: BOOM KEY AT ROTTERDAM.]
Cooper was a keen observer and a calm critic of both home and foreign
folk. That he was stirred to strong words by unpleasing comments on his
country appears in his "Notions of Americans: Picked up by a Traveling
Bachelor." This book of facts, showing wide and accurate knowledge, was
intended to enlighten and clear away mistakes. Instead of this, it drew
upon its writer critical fire both at home and abroad, and was the first
of the many shadows of his after life. His stories of our new country
taught Europe more about America than Europe had ever learned before.
His love for, and faith in, his own country were strong. Abroad he was a
staunch defender of her free institutions, and foreigners deemed him
more proud of his American birth than of his literary birthright of
genius; and yet, at home he was voted "an enemy of all that the fathers
of the Republic fought for." However, the opinion of those who knew
Cooper best was given by his Bread and Cheese Club friend, Dr. John
Wakefield Francis, as,--"He was an American inside and out--a thorough
patriot." It was said that as an aristocratic American he never
presented letters of introduction. Yet in foreign lands his society was
sought by the most distinguished men of his time. However of this, the
rare pleasure of these London days he ever held in warm remembrance.
Flying from the summer heat of Paris, the family soon left for
Switzerland with a team of sturdy Norman horses, a postilion riding the
near beast. It slipped and fell, rolled over and caught its rider's leg
beneath, but was saved its breaking by the make of his old-fashioned
boot, "so with a wry face and a few _sacr-r-r-es,_ he limped back to his
saddle."
In their salon of the inn at Avallon were curious emblem pictures of
different nationalities: one a _belle_ of fair hair; another a _belle_
of raven locks; a third a _belle_ of brown ringlets;--all these for
Europe; but for the United States was "a _wench_ as black as coal!" So
thought Switzerland of us in the days of 1828. One lovely day Cooper
"persuaded A. to share" his seat on the carriage-box. Rounding a ruin
height "she exclaimed, 'What a beautiful cloud!' In the direction of her
finger I saw," wrote Cooper, "a mass that resembled the highest wreath
of a cloud; its whiteness greatly surpassed the brilliancy of vapor. I
called to the postilion and pointed out the object. '_Mont Blanc,_
Monsieur!' It was an inspiration when seventy miles by an air line from
it. This first view of the hoary Alps always makes a thrilling moment."
[Illustration: MONT BLANC.]
Later came morning rides and evening strolls. The modest stone
country-house which they took for economy and the author's love of quiet
home-life was _La Lorraine_, and belonged to the Count de Portales of
Neufchâtel. There was a high field near, where, one day, when Mr. Cooper
was teaching his little son Paul the "mysteries of flying a kite," they
caught the rare fleeting glimpse of a glittering glacier. _La Lorraine,_
only half a mile from Berne, is noted as "one of the pretty little
retired villas that dot the landscape," with "the sinuous Aar glancing
between" it and the town. The trim little garden and half-ruined
fountain were well shaded by trees, and the adjoining farmhouse and
barn-yard, all Swiss, made a fine playground for the children's summer
holiday. The house and its furniture they found "faultlessly neat."
There was a near-by common where hoops, rope-jumping, and kites could be
enjoyed. From this point and the cottage windows "was a very beautiful
view of the Alps--an unfailing source of delight, especially during the
evening hours." Cooper has given some fine descriptions of their life in
the glow of this Alpine country; of harvest-time and mountain gleaners.
He tells of a visit to Hindelbank to see the sculptor Nahl's wondrous
idealism in stone, which represents a young mother, the pastor's wife,
and her babe. The infant lies in passive innocence on its mother's
bosom, while her face is radiant with the light of a holy joy on the
resurrection morn. Her hand is slightly raised in reverent greeting of
her Redeemer. Of this work Cooper writes: "I take it to be the most
sublime production of its kind in the world." And they found it in "one
of the very smallest, humblest churches in Europe."
[Illustration: LA LORRAINE VIEW OF BERNESE ALPS.]
[Illustration: NAHL'S MEMORIAL TO MADAME LANGHAN.]
In the small, uncarpeted study of _La Lorraine_ a new book was planned
and begun. For the story's setting the author's mind turned to the
far-away, new home-country, and early frontier life in Connecticut.
There he brought the transatlantic Puritan and the North American Indian
together--the strong, stern Puritan family affection in close contact
with the red-man's savage cruelty, dignity, and his adoption of a white
child. A fair-haired little girl is torn from her mother and cared for
by a young Indian chief, once a captive in the white settlement. Years
pass over the bereaved family, when an Indian outbreak restores the lost
child to her parents' roof as "Narra-Mattah," the devoted wife of a
Narraganset warrior-chief, and the young mother of his little son. This
book draws a strong picture of pure family devotion; even the old
grandfather's heart, beneath his stiff Puritan garb, beats an
unforgettable part. Sorrow for the lost child gave the story its
name--"The Wept of Wish-ton-Wish" (then thought to mean in the Indian
language, "Place of the Whip-poor-will")and it has been said to
describe the settlement of the Fenimore family in America.
[Illustration: NARRA-MATTAH.]
Many and interesting were their excursions. One was to Interlachen, with
its glimpse of the Jungfrau, and the Lauterbrunnen valleys "full of
wonder and delight." At Lauterbrunnen they walked to the famous Falls of
_Staubbach_, which Cooper describes and explains as meaning "Torrents of
Dust."
[Illustration: CONNECTICUT EMIGRANTS.]
As the summer had fled autumn winds began to whistle through the lindens
of _La Lorraine_, and the snow began to fall upon its pretty garden,
warning the author to fly south with his fledglings and their mother
before the Alpine passes were closed by real winter. Cooper resigned
the consulate at Lyons, which was given him solely "to avoid the
appearance of going over to the enemy" while abroad. A carriage and two
servitors were engaged. One of these, Caspar, had his soldiering under
the first Napoleon, and many were the camp tales he had to tell in a way
to please his employers. At the old town of Alstetten, with painted
wooden houses at the foot of the Am Stoss, they arrived, more than ready
for breakfast, which was somewhat delayed because, said Cooper, "our
German was by no means classical; and English, Italian, and French were
all Hebrew to the good people of the inn." It was "easy to make the
hostess understand that we _wished_ to eat,--but _what_ would we eat? In
this crisis I bethought me of a long-neglected art, and crowed like a
cock. The shrill strain hardly reached the ear of the good woman before
it was answered by such laughter as none but village lungs could raise.
William--an admirable mimic--began to cackle like a hen. In due time we
had a broiled fowl, an _omelette_, and boiled eggs." At another place
where they stopped for mid-day luncheon Cooper writes: "We asked for a
fruit-tart, and--odors and nosegays!--they gave us one made of onions,
which they thought very good fruit in its way, and we ate exactly as
much as we wished."
[Illustration: FALL OF THE STAUBBACH.]
"The baths of Pfäffer," he wrote "in my own unworthy person have wrought
a sudden and wondrous cure"; and of his visit to the Devil's Bridge over
the Reuss: "We entered a gorge between frightful rocks, where the river
was fretting and struggling to get in before us." From the yawning mouth
of a gloomy cave came the tinkling bells of pack-horses to Italy by the
St. Gothard. To the roar of the river and the rushing of winds without
they plunged through this dark "Hole of Uri," which brought them to a
rugged rock-rift pass with but a thread of heaven's blue far above them;
and here "a slight, narrow bridge of a single arch spanned the gorge
with a hardihood that caused one to shudder." Its slender, unrailed,
fifteen feet of width was eighty of span, and one hundred above the
boiling torrent that fell on broken rocks below, and over it; wrote
Cooper: "The wind blew so furiously that I really wished for a rope to
hold on by. This was the far-famed Devil's Bridge; other bridges may
have been built by imps, but Beëlzebub himself had a hand in this."
[Illustration: THE DEVIL'S BRIDGE.]
[Illustration: FERNEY, VOLTAIRE'S LAZE LEMAN HOME.]
They enjoyed the beauty of Lake Geneva, and were charmed by the
attractions of "Ferney," Voltaire's home on Leman's shore, and enjoyed
the solemn gorge-valley of the Rhone, and through the Simplon passed
into fair Italy. As they "drew near a small chapel in a rock Casper
flourished his whip, calling out the word 'Italia!' I pulled off my hat
in reverence," wrote the author. Down the steep mountains, over bridged
torrents, past the hill-towns and valley-lands, they came to the City of
the Lily,--fair Florence of the Arno. "As early as 1829," Cooper
thought, "the unification of Italy was irresistible."
[Illustration: THE SIMPLON PASS.]
[Illustration: FLORENCE, ITALY.]
[Illustration: PALAZZO RICASOLI, FLORENCE, ITALY.]
In Florence a home was soon found in the Palazzo Ricasoli, Via del
Cocomero. Lofty of ceiling--twenty feet--was their apartment, in which
they enjoyed "two noble bed-rooms, several smaller ones, a large
drawing-room, dining-room, baths, a small court and garden within the
iron gates, and all for the modest sum of sixty dollars per month." The
oil burned in their lamps the home-folk "would be happy to use on their
salads." Here, around the cheering glow of great wood-fires, the
American author would gather his friends, old and new. From Otsego days
a blazing hearth-stone ever rejoiced his cheery nature, and his way of
laying the wood and nursing the flames horrified his Italian servants as
waste of fuel. The chill of the _tra montana_ brought into this circle
of warmth and light many eminent foreigners; and of home-country folk,
that true American, Horatio Greenough, often basked in the bright glow
of the author's wood-fires at Florence.
Later Greenough wrote: "Fenimore Cooper saved me from despair after my
return to Italy. He employed me as I wish to be employed; and up to this
moment has been a father to me." Greenough's last work was a bust of his
illustrious friend, the American novelist, which he proposed to cast in
bronze, at his own expense, and place in the field where stands the Old
Mill in Newport, and where the opening scene of "The Red Rover" is laid.
He took counsel with Cooper's friends as to a monument to the author,
and among his papers was found an elaborate design for the work.
[Illustration: HORATIO GREENOUGH.]
Cooper loved to encourage rising talent in young artists. He gave them
orders, and also his cheering sympathy. One of these wrote that Cooper
gave him a free letter-of-credit on his banker in Paris, and added: "I
had occasion to use it more than once, and my drafts were always
cheerfully accepted. Since then I have paid him, though he never would
have asked for the money; nobody but he and I ever knew of the
transaction." A Boston man writes of his visit to the Florence studio of
Greenough: "My eye fell upon a bust which awakened sea and forest
pictures,--the spars of an elegant craft, the lofty figure of a hunter,
the dignified bearing of a mysterious pilot." It was the bust of
Fenimore Cooper. Of the sculptor it was noted that "he always referred
with emotion to the gleam of sunshine which encouraged him at this
crisis, in the friendship of our late renowned novelist, Cooper."
[Illustration: BUST OF JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
In the Pitti one day they passed before Raphael's _Madonna del Trono_,
and the sculptor pointed out to his companion the fine drawing in the
two little angel figures of the foreground, in the act of singing.
Cooper asked if the subject would not lend itself to sculpture;
afterwards one of his daughters copied the figures, and the result of
the mutual interest in the design was an order from Cooper for a group
which in a few months Greenough executed in marble. It was exhibited in
America under the title of "The Chanting Cherubs." It was Cooper's
"Chanting Cherubs"--the first group of its kind from an American chisel
--that led to Greenough's order for the statue of Washington, and
inspired the pen of Richard Henry Dana to write:
Whence came ye, cherubs? from the moon?
Or from some shining star?
Ye, sure, are sent a blessed boon,
From kinder worlds afar;
For while I look my heart is all delight:
Earth hath no creatures half so pure and bright.
[Illustration: CHANTING CHERUBS.]
Later on Greenough came to them "all booted and bearded beyond
recognition" save in "his walk and his talk."
During Cooper's later American press troubles his close friend,
Greenough, wrote him: "You lose your hold on the American public with
rubbing down their skins with brick-bats." And yet, during Greenough's
dark days, he said: "What is the use of blowing up bladders for
posterity to jump upon for the mere pleasure of hearing them crack?" The
author's keen delight in architecture, sculpture, and painting then gave
him daily pleasure in the churches, palaces, and art-galleries of _Bella
Firenzi_. Familiar from youth with his father's engravings of antique
sculpture subjects, he writes of his first glimpses of the originals in
the Pitti: "I stood, hat in hand, involuntarily bowing to the circle of
marble figures that surrounded me."
[Illustration: LEOPOLD II, GRAND DUKE OF TUSCANY.]
[Illustration: PITTI PALACE, FLORENCE, ITALY, 1828.]
Attired in "a black coat, breeches, and vest with steel buttons, lace
frills and ruff, a sword and a dress-hat," our author was presented at
the brilliant Tuscan Court. Grand Duke Leopold II left on Cooper's mind
a strong impression of integrity of character; his simplicity and
justice were borne out in his greeting: "They tell me you are the
author of many books, but as it has never been my good fortune to meet
with them, I can say no more on this subject than that I have heard them
well spoken of by those who have." Cooper was asked "a hundred questions
as to America," and assured of the prince's pleasure in seeing him at
court and his being in Tuscany. When leaving Florence Cooper paid his
parting respects at the Pitti in an hour's pleasant converse, and then
presented the Grand Duke with a copy of "The Wept of Wish-ton-Wish,"
printed in his city of the Arno. Here Cooper and his family had some gay
carnival days with their various friends. Among them was the Count St.
Leu, son of Queen Hortense and King Louis of Holland, and the author's
sometimes host, and "one of the handsomest men of his age" that Cooper
ever met. We are told of the Count: "He lived in good style, having a
fine villa where I dined lately, and a palace in town." By those nearest
him he was addressed "your Majesty," and held some "little show" of
royalty. Princess Charlotte, his wife, and daughter of Joseph Bonaparte,
the author also knew. He met Madame Mère, who is described as "a slight
old lady, with little remains of beauty except fine black eyes." She was
quiet, simple; in short, motherly, when seen by Cooper the winter of
1828-29.
[Illustration: COUNT ST. LEU.]
[Illustration: LETIZIA BOUNAPARTE.]
[Illustration: MADAME MÈRE.]
Longing for the open country came with the early Italian spring, and a
hillside villa just outside the walls of Florence was secured. A narrow
lane ran between this villa _St. Illario_ and its rustic church of the
same name. The villa had two projecting wings with belvederes and roofed
terraces, one of which connected with the author's study. Herein he
wrote of "the witchery of Italy"--the land he loved next to his own. His
letters give glorious glimpses of the Arno, their strolls to
Bellosguardo's heights, the churches, monasteries, costumes, and songs
of the peasants--all attuned to poesy. Frequent were the exchanges of
civility between the author's study and the good old _curato_ across the
lane. Cooper wrote of him: "The man has some excellent figs, and our
cook, having discovered it, lays his trees under contribution." He
continues: "One small, green-coated, fresh fig is the precise point of
felicity. But the good _curato_, besides his figs, has a pair of uneasy
bells in his church-tower that are exactly forty-three feet from my
ears, which ring in pairs six or eight times daily. There are matins,
noontide, vespers, to say nothing of christenings, weddings, and
funerals."
Then follows a rare account of a night funeral service ending beneath
his study walls.
[Illustration: CHURCH OF ST. ILLARIO AND NARROW LANE.]
[Illustration: VILLA, ST. ILLARIO.]
During the great Florentine _fête_ of St. John, the patron saint of the
city,--from the Count St. Leu's windows on the Arno,--the author and his
family saw the display of gala-boats decked with thousands of
colored-paper lanterns.
[Illustration: CHARIOT RACES, FLORENCE.]
They enjoyed the chariot races in the wide Piazza Santa Maria Novella,
where the small obelisks point the start and finish of the races. These
were followed by the _corso dei barberi_--barbed horse-races without
riders--down the longest street of the town. Then followed the French
Minister's masked ball, amusing as well as splendid, readers of Cooper's
"Italy" will find. But more than all, on their return to Villa St.
Illario, were they charmed with the brilliant illumination of the noble
cathedral dome, which against the dark skies "looked like a line
engraving of fire." So closed this festa of Florence in the grand-ducal
days, bright in gay gear and alive with everybody, from prince to
_contadini_. Then he came in happy touch with the impulsive, laughing,
singing, dark-haired Italians, and to the finer aspects of their nature
he was partial. They were in sharp contrast to the Puritan band in the
valley of the Connecticut, which his pen pictured in the finishing
touches of "The Wept of Wish-ton-Wish," when in his study at _Casa
Ricasoli._
[Illustration: GENOA.]
Press censorship and no English printing-house in Florence forced Cooper
to leave his family and go to Marseilles. His letters give some pretty
pictures which passed his carriage windows on the way. Of Genoa: "The
seaward prospect was glorious." The islands "were borrowed by Leonardo,"
and a circuit of the city walls was made on horseback. Full of charm
and interest was the road "on the margin of the sea"--from Genoa to
Nice. In his "Excursions in Italy" appears of Genoa: "I looked back with
longing-eyes at _Genoa la Superba_ and thought it well deserved the
title." "The whole of this coast," he wrote, "is as picturesque and
glorious as the imagination can picture it." He tells of feluccas and
other water-craft that claimed a sailor's eye; and the landward views of
Mentone, Santa Monica, the heights, arches, and passes, and the
wasp-like Villa Franca, perched on its ledge up two hundred feet--for
fear of "the bears" said the guide. In Marseilles an English printer was
secured and brought back to Florence. Besides being deaf and dumb his
name--Richard Heavysides--bore out the burden of an unfortunate temper
to the necessity of sending this printer back to Marseilles. Finally, by
the kindness of the grand duke's librarian, a small edition of "The Wept
of Wish-ton-Wish" was printed, and early sheets sent to publishers in
Paris, London, and Philadelphia. In England the book was called "The
Borderers," being based on the story of Eunice Williams of Deerfield,
Mass., but it was more highly valued in England and France than in
America.
[Illustration: LEGHORN.]
The Mediterranean blue on Cooper's journey to Marseilles allured him
into conceiving another sea tale. Its writing, however, was delayed by a
mild return of the old fever that was induced by the summer sun of
Italy. Longing, therefore, for the water breezes, mid-summer found him
within "sight and sound" of the sea waves. He writes "July 29 the whole
family went to Leghorn, where the salt air was grateful, and I snuffed
the odor of this delightful sea with a feeling that was 'redolent of joy
and youth.' We feasted our eyes on the picturesque rigs and barks of
those poetical waters, and met several men from the Levant,--an
Algerian Rais calmly smoking his chibouque on the deck of his poleacre,
many Sardinians, Tuscans, Jews, and three Russians. Rowing under the
bows of a Yankee, I found one seated on the windlass playing on the
flute,--as cool a piece of impudence as can well be imagined for a
Massachusetts man to practice in Italy! The delicious odors of the
seaport were inhaled with a delight no language can describe."
[Illustration: NAPLES.]
At Leghorn Cooper engaged a Genovese felucca, "_La Bella Genovese_,--a
craft of thirty tons, beautiful mould, lateen-rigged, carrying two of
that sail and a jib, and ten men for her crew." Aboard this small vessel
the author and his family spent six days of pure pleasure, yet "somewhat
bitten by fleas." They touched at Elba and other islands, and skirted
the coasts of Tuscany, the Roman States, and so on to Naples, of which
Cooper wrote: "Oh Napoli! glorious, sunny, balmy Napoli!" This cruising
along the western coast of Italy in the _Bella Genovese_ suggested to
the author one of his favorite stories, "Wing-and-Wing," which was
published twelve years later. In Naples several weeks were passed at a
hotel; thence to a short-time home of their own on the cliffs of
Sorrento. The very air of Italy was a delight to this sunny-hearted
sailor, who so deeply felt the charm of all Italian nature. "The house
we have taken," he wrote, "is said to be the one in which Tasso was
born. It stands on the brow of the cliffs, within the walls of the town,
and in plain sight of every object of interest on the bay. We occupy the
principal floor only, though I have taken the entire house. There is a
chapel beneath the grand _sala_, and kitchens and offices somewhere in
those lower regions. We enter by a porte-cochère into a court which has
a well with a handsome marble curb and a flight of broad, marble steps
fit for a palace." Seaward several rooms led to the _sala_, fifty feet
long, and facing the water. Cooper tells of its tiled floor, gilded
couches, chairs, and marble busts. The great charm of the house was its
terrace, fifty feet long by twenty-five wide, and protected by a stone
balustrade, massive and carved, hanging over the blue Mediterranean, and
giving to view Vesuvius, Ischia, and all the coast of glorious sea.
Hearing an outcry from his son Paul one day, his father found the boy
with his head fast between two of these great spindles--"in a way that
frightened me as well as the youngster himself. It was like being
imbedded in a rock. Below the terrace runs a narrow beach, where our
children delight to play, picking up shells and more than
shells,--ancient mosaics. There is a little room off from the terrace I
use for writing," and where he could watch the beauty of the sea. Much
of "The Water Witch" was rapidly written in this study on the inspiring
terrace of _Casa Tasso_, Vesuvius in sight. Daily excursions were made.
When four-of-the-clock threw the rock shadows far over the water, they
went a-boating. On land they made "donkey" and "non-donkey" jaunts.
_Capo di Monti_, overlooking the town landing-place, was also a favorite
resting-place, and gave some bright pictures of native life. By an
amusing practice of giving their king--a fine old mendicant with a lame
leg--and his daily-growing train a _grano_ a day at the gate, Cooper and
his family on their excursions were freed from an army of beggars. All
were grateful, and wished the American _admiral_ "a thousand
years,"--save one poor creature, who blundered into "a hundred," upon
which his angered fellows cudgeled him with blows and words into
shouting, "A thousand years, and long ones." Donkeys and boats were
taken for Amalfi with her convent-crowned cliffs above the sea. Not
until the chill _tra montana_ and the snow-powdered mountain-tops
reminded them that but one fire could be kindled in their vast Sorrento
home did they leave it one morning, with ninety-six of their well-wisher
beggars in the court to bid them good-speed on their way to the Eternal
City.
[Illustration: CASA TASSO AT SORRENTO.]
[Illustration: CASA TASSO TERRACE-STUDY.]
In the autumn of 1830 Cooper and his family entered Rome through the
gate of St. John, and drove across the city to the Hotel de Paris, just
below the Pincio and near the _Porta del Popolo_. After dinner, with
still an hour of daylight, and eager to see what Rome was like, Cooper
called a guide, and, holding Paul by the hand, sallied forth through the
narrow, crooking streets over the bridge of the angels to St. Peters.
"Pushing aside the door, I found myself in the nave of the noblest
temple in which any religious rites were ever celebrated. To me there
was no disappointment, and as I stood gazing at the glorious pile, the
tears forced themselves from my eyes. Even little Paul was oppressed
with the vastness of the place, for he clung close to my side and kept
murmuring, 'What is this? What is this? Is this a church?' I turned away
impressed with the truth that if ever the hand of man had raised a
structure to the Deity in the least worthy of His Majesty, it was this!"
[Illustration: ST. PETER'S, EXTERIOR, ROME.]
[Illustration: ST. PETERS, INTERIOR.]
[Illustration: ADAM MICKIEOWICZ.]
The usual roof-tree was soon found in the via Ripetta, where their back
windows overlooked the tawny Tiber and gave them views of Castle St.
Angelo and St. Peter's dome glorified by each day's setting sun, and
here was passed their winter in old Rome. The Eternal City's ruins were
most interesting to Cooper; it was his special delight to ride for hours
with some friend over the Campagna, lingering among fragments of
structures or statues of ancient days. Perhaps none who rode with him
gave him more pleasure than the famous Polish poet, Adam Mickieowicz,--a
man full of originality, genius, and sadness for the fate of his lost
country. All of this won Cooper's sympathy and help in zealous writing
and speaking for the suffering Poles; and one, Count Truskalaskie
Wuskalaskia, later on found a welcome at Otsego Hall.
[Illustration: PORTA RIPETTA, WHERE COOPER LIVED IN ROME.]
Our author also saw something of social Rome, as is noted: He "was at a
grand ball--faultless as to taste and style"--given by a prince to a
prince near to the royal family of England. Of compatriots he writes:
"_We_ have had a dinner, too, in honor of Washington, at which _I_ had
the honor to preside. You will be surprised to hear that we sat down
near seventy Yankees in the Eternal City!"
[Illustration: ROMAN FORUM.]
"The Water Witch," now nearly finished, required printing, which some
kind Italian friends nearly brought about in Rome; but the book
contained this sentence: "Rome itself is only to be traced by fallen
temples and buried columns," which gave offense where none was intended
and barred the work's issue there. The story was finished and laid aside
until spring, when, after five delightful months in Rome and a few days
at Tivoli, Cooper and his family reluctantly drove through the _Porto
del Popolo_. In their own carriage, with four white horses, and their
servitors in another with four brown ones, they passed up the Adriatic
coast to Venice.
[Illustration: PORTA DEL POPOLO.]
Miss Cooper's "Pages and Pictures" gives her father's graphic account of
this interesting journey,--how, in a wild mountain-road they fell in
with pilgrims neither way-worn nor solemn, but most willing to talk.
They seemed moving pictures with their staffs, scrip, and scallop-shell
capes, returning from Rome. Then came Terni and its famous waterfall--a
mile away, they knew, for they walked there. Man-made were those falls,
by the turning of a pretty stream many hundred years ago.
[Illustration: FALLS OF MARMORA AT TERNI.]
High bridges and hermit nooks were passed, and then a long aqueduct with
_Gothic_ arches, called _Roman_ in the guide-books; an old temple turned
into a church, and but a trifle larger than a Yankee corn-crib. Then
over the fine road beyond Foligno, and the hill Fiorito, and they rolled
easily down into the Ancona country, where they found the shrine of
Loreto.
[Illustration: ANCONA.]
[Illustration: LORETO.]
Ancona gave them their first sight of the Adriatic--less beautiful in
hue than the Mediterranean blue, it seemed to our travelers. But with a
sailor's joy in rope, pitch, and tar, Cooper hurried with his usual
boyish eagerness to the port, and with a lively interest examined its
several rusty-looking craft. The next day found them again on the way,
of which he writes: "Walking ahead of the carriage this morning, we
amused ourselves on the beach, the children gathering shells on the
shores of the Adriatic." Short stops were made in Bologna and Ferrara,
then northward to the coast. Afloat and a pull for an hour brought them
to Venice. Through the Grand Canal and under the Rialto they glided to
the opening port beyond. They left their craft at the _Leone Bianco_, or
white lion. Entering, they found "a large paved hall" a few steps above
the water. From their windows they could see the gliding gondolas;
beyond the splashing of an oar no sound came from their movement.
"Everything was strange," wrote Cooper. "Though a sailor and accustomed
to water, I had never seen a city a-float. It was now evening; but a
fine moon shedding its light on the scene rendered it fairy-like." That
night a friend showed him the other ways than the water-ways of Venice.
Through lane-like, shop-lined ways, over bridges, and through the
Giant's Clock-tower he passed into the great square of St. Mark, with
"much surprise and pleasure." By its glittering lamps, and over it all
the moonlight, he felt as if "transported to a scene in the Arabian
Nights."
[Illustration: SCALLA MINELLA, VENICE.]
[Illustration: VENICE.]
Later he writes: "I have set up my own gondola and we have been looking
at the sights." For weeks their easy gondola--which in form and
lightness reminded him so much of the Indian bark-canoe--"went gliding
along the noiseless canals," and Cooper studied his Venice for a
purpose. He became interested in the details of its singular government
and read many books about it. The heartless trifling with sacred
personal rights in order to glorify the ruling powers of _San Marco_, as
shown by the life of crime in its secret councils, seemed terrible to
him. And so came about the thought of writing a book in which both views
of the subject, as clear and just as his pen could draw them, should be
given. And whoever has read "The Bravo" will know that it faithfully
pictures Venetian life. The great Piazza, the splendid church, the
towering belfry,--rebuilt,--the small Piazza and its columns; the Palace
of the Doge, with its court, well, giant's stairway, lions' mouths,
dungeons and roof prisons, and the Bridge-of-Sighs, leading to its
neighbor, the Prison Building--all are here, with beautiful _Venetia_
in the pride of her most glorious days near their waning. These and much
more make up the fearful picture of Venice's cold cruelty, as revealed
to the author of "The Bravo" in authentic historical records. Gelsomina,
the jailer's daughter, a sweet and delicately-drawn character, got her
name and general character from real life. Miss Cooper writes that when
their "family was living on the cliffs of Sorrento a young peasant girl
became one of the household,--half nurse, half playfellow to the
children. She bore the sweet name of Gelsomina. Simple, innocent, and
childlike, yet faithful to duty, Gelsomina was soon in high favor with
great and small, and, in charge of the young flock, made one of every
family party about the bay." At such times "she was always in gay
costume,--light-blue silk jacket with gold lace; a flowing skirt; her
dark hair well garnished with long golden pins and bodkins; a gold chain
of manifold strands encircled her throat, and drops long and heavy hung
from her ears. One afternoon, after playing with her young charges,
Gelsomina went for water to that picturesque marble well in the court.
While bending over the curbstone and drawing up the bucket, like
Zara-of-Moriah fame, she dropped one of her long, heavy ear-rings into
the water. Great was the lamentation of the simple creature! Warm was
the sympathy of the household." But the old well was far too deep to
give up this heirloom and family treasure, which was gone beyond
Gelsomina's tears to recover. Gelsomina would have followed her American
friends north, but a portly, stately, dignified aunt "would not trust
her so far from the orange-groves of Sorrento." When the hour of parting
came, pretty Gelsomina received from her mistress a fine pair of new
ear-rings, and tears of gratitude fell upon the trinkets as she kissed
the hand of the giver. Her name and something of her sweet innocence and
fidelity were given to the jailer's daughter of "The Bravo."
"The well is deep--far down they lie,
beneath the cold, blue water!
My ear-rings! my ear-rings!"
[Illustration: PIAZZA SAN MARCO.]
[Illustration: PALACE OF THE DOGE.]
[Illustration: TASSO'S WELL.]
This book, one of Cooper's favorite works, was an artist's picture of
Venice, and was written to martial music in Paris, in 1830, where Cooper
arrived on the eve of a revolution, for a stay of three years. It was
published by Lea and Carey, Philadelphia, in 1834, and did not find
favor in America, but was much liked in Germany and France. Prof.
Brander Matthews writes:--"The scene in which Antonio, the old
fisherman, is shrived by the Carmelite monk, in his boat, under the
midnight moon upon the lagoon, is one of the finest in the whole range
of literature in fiction."
[Illustration: THE BRAVO.]
Concerning the carrying off of the art treasures of Venice by the
French, Cooper wrote: "One great picture escaped them; it stood in a
dark chapel completely covered with dust and smoke. Within a few years
some artist had the curiosity to examine this then unknown altarpiece.
The picture was taken down, and being thoroughly cleaned, proved to be
'The Assumption'"--Titian's masterpiece, some think. It is now in the
Academy of Fine Arts in Venice. Cooper tells of a monument Canova had
"designed for Titian, beautifully chiseled out of spotless marble." The
author found it "beneath the gloomy arches of the church," and thought
it "singularly dramatic and startling"; but it had been erected to the
honor of Canova himself instead of to the painter!
[Illustration: GLORY OF THE ASSUMPTION.]
[Illustration: ABSOLUTION OF ANTONIO.]
[Illustration: ALT MARKET, DRESDEN.]
From Venice Cooper and family went by way of Tyrol to Munich, where he
much admired the king of Bavaria's art collections. After this brief
visit they moved on to Dresden, passing here some pleasant months in a
cheerful apartment overlooking the Alt Market. The quaint and busy show
of homely German life, the town, gardens, river, bridge, and fine
gallery "worthy of Italy," were enjoyed. _The Water Witch_, "wrecked on
the Tiber, was now safely launched on the broader waters of the Elbe."
It was issued by Lea and Carey, Philadelphia, in 1830.
Comparing national traits became at times an unfortunate habit with
Cooper. He was provoked by a Dresden schoolmaster's surprise that his
children were not black; and, again, because he could not convince an
English scholar that in Boston "to gouge" did not mean the cruel
practice "to squeeze out a man's eyes with the thumb." This English
scholar was Sir James Mackintosh.
On the return to Paris from Germany several places were tried before
finding a short distance across the Seine, No. 59 rue St. Dominique,--an
off-and-on home for three years. Here the salon was thirty feet long and
lofty--to a sailor's delight, seventeen feet; above the doors were
paintings in gilded frames; and there were four large mirrors, and vast
windows reaching to the floor. The dining-room, even larger, opened on
the garden. After this manner the doctor of the Duke of Orleans built
his home for himself--and this American tenant. The turmoil in this
city of light at once attracted him in the near view of the Revolution
of July. Having known General Lafayette since 1824, these two fine men
were brought in close touch on Cooper's second visit to Paris. In 1831
the Marquis Lafayette was the center of American life here, and
consequently he and our author were constantly and intimately thrown
together.
[Illustration: LAFAYETTE'S PARIS HOME, RUE D'ANJOU.]
Lafayette's neat, simple apartment in a hotel of some pretension was in
the rue d'Anjou. There were a large antechamber, two salons, and an
inner room, where he wrote, and finally had his bed. His town servants
were his German valet, Bastien, who served during the last visit to
America, a footman, and a coachman. Cooper wrote: "When I show myself at
the door Bastien makes a signal of assent, intimates that the general
is at dinner; but I am at once ushered into the bed-room. Here I find
Lafayette at table--so small as to be covered with a napkin, his little
white dog his only companion." It was understood that the guest had
dined, so he takes a seat in the chimney-corner, and as they talk the
dinner goes on to its finish of dates, which are shared by the visitor.
The last of these pleasant visits grew from the usual half hour to
almost two, as they chatted of the great and small and all in their fine
way. Lafayette thought Louis Philippe "the falsest man" he ever met. Of
Charles X he "spoke kindly," giving him "an exactly opposite character,"
and Marie Antoinette he believed "an injured woman."
[Illustration: GENERAL LAFAYETTE'S BED-ROOM.]
[Illustration: LOUIS PHILIPPE.]
[Illustration: GENERAL LAFAYETTE.]
When Mr. McLane, our minister to England, made a flight to Paris in
1830, Lafayette strongly urged Cooper to give him the pleasure of
presenting him with Mr. McLane to Louis Philippe at a Palais Royal
"evening." Concerning the event Cooper noted: "Though such a visit was
contrary to my quiet habits, I could do nothing but comply." His book on
France relates the event and concludes with: "We all got invitations to
dine at the palace in a day or two." But Cooper "never had any faith in
the republican king," and thought "General Lafayette had been the dupe
of his own good faith and kind feelings." Queen Marie Amélie, who was
the daughter of Ferdinand I of the two Sicilies, asked Cooper which he
most preferred of all the lands he had visited. His quick and strictly
truthful reply was: "That in which your majesty was born for its nature,
and that in which your majesty reigns for its society." As the "evening"
was for men Cooper noticed that "the queen and her ladies wore
bonnets."
[Illustration: QUEEN MARIE AMÉLIE.]
December 8, 1830 the Americans in Paris gave General Lafayette a dinner
over which Cooper presided. And, says Professor Lounsbury, "in a speech
of marked fervor and ability, he had dwelt upon the debt due from the
United States to the gallant Frenchman, who had ventured fortune and
life to aid a nation struggling against great odds to be free." As "It
was not in his [Cooper's] nature to have his deeds give lie to his
words," he was fairly caught in a public controversy that brought upon
him the following unpleasant results.
During this period a public dispute arose on the comparative expenses of
American and French government, which Lafayette was called upon to
settle, and he appealed to Cooper as an American authority. In his
spirited defense of the gallant Marquis, our author was caught in a
maelstrom of harsh criticism. It ended in his victory abroad, but
brought upon him uncalled-for comment from the American press for
"attacking the authorities of a friendly country"--as that press
unjustly termed it.
At Paris in 1831, by the request of an English friend, Cooper wrote of
"The Great Eclipse" which he saw June 16, 1806, at his Cooperstown home.
This account was found after his death and appeared in _Putnam's
Magazine_ of 1869. It included a thrilling tragedy and closed as
follows: "I have passed a varied and eventful life--but never have I
beheld any spectacle which so plainly manifested the majesty of the
Creator, or so forcibly taught the lesson of humility to man as the
total eclipse of the sun."
From Paris, in 1832, Cooper wrote: "I care nothing for criticism, but I
am not indifferent to slander. If these attacks on my character should
be kept up five years after my return to America, I shall resort to the
New York courts for protection." Cooper gave the press the full period,
then, said Bryant,--himself an editor,--"he put a hook in the nose of
this huge monster of the inky pool, dragged him to land, and made him
tractable." After these five years had passed Cooper noted, February,
1843: "I have, beaten every man I have sued who has not retracted his
libels."
[Illustration: N.P. WILLIS.]
In Paris, in 1832, our author was meeting many foreigners of note, and
among the Americans was N.P. Willis, then sketching his "Pencillings by
the Way," and breakfasting with Cooper, and strolling with him through
the Tuileries gardens.
[Illustration: S.F.B. MORSE.]
Samuel F.B. Morse, who was later to chain electricity for future use,
was then a young artist painting in the Louvre, and helping Cooper to
buy pictures. Of one purchase is noted: "Shortly after the revolution
of 1830, passing through the Carousel, he bought a portrait, covered
with dust but of apparent rare beauty, from a dealer in antiques, who
said it was a Teniers. This painting was shown to Morse and to
Archbishop Luscomb of Paris, also an art critic of his day, both of whom
verified the dealer's statement. Catalogues and prints of originals of
Tenier's wife later proved the picture to be her portrait painted round
in form by that artist and afterwards cut to the square."
[Illustration: TUILERIES GARDENS.]
[Illustration: TENIER'S WIFE.]
Some twenty years later Morse wrote: "We were in daily, almost hourly,
intercourse during the years 1832-33. I never met a more sincere,
warm-hearted, constant friend." Their relations were ever warm and
close. Cooper himself was winning, in the heart of France, a welcome for
"the beloved _Bas-de-cuir_ with _la longe carabine,_--that magic rifle
of his that so seldom missed its mark and never got out of repair."
Surely his life and pursuits conformed to his motto: "Loyalty to truth
at any price." Those who best knew him best loved him. The charm of his
family life during these pleasant days has found attractive expression
in the portraits of his children drawn about this time by his daughter
Susan, as shown on the opposite page.
[Illustration: MRS. JAMES FENIMORE COOPER AND HER SON PAUL.]
[Illustration: THE CHILDREN OF MR. AND MRS. JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
During the dreadful siege of cholera in Paris, Cooper and his family
remained in the stricken city, fearing to fare worse with country
discomforts. In contrast to many instances of heroic devotion were
artists' funny pictures of the scourge. The Tuileries gardens were
deserted, and Paul missed his apple-women friends of the corners between
rue St. Dominique and Pont Royal; and the flight through the city of Mr.
Van Buren and other friends were a few personal incidents of this
awesome time.
July 18 Cooper and his family left Paris for the Rhine country. They
enjoyed Brussels, and old Antwerp's Dutch art and its beautiful
cathedral-tower that Napoleon thought should be kept under glass. They
found Liège "alive with people" to greet their arrival at the _Golden
Sun_, where they were mistaken for the expected and almost new king,
Leopold, and his fine-looking brother. Sad truth brought cold looks and
back views among other shadows of neglect. Cooper noted: The "_Golden
Sun_ veiled its face from us; we quit the great square to seek more
humble lodgings at the _Black Eagle_, a clean, good house." In Liège
were seen the venerable, interesting churches, which caused Cooper to
think, "I sometimes wish I had been educated a Catholic in order to
unite the poetry of religion with its higher principles." He called _The
Angelus_ "the open prayer of the fields," and wrote of it: "I remember
with pleasure the effect produced by the bell of the village church as
it sent its warning voice on such occasions across the plains and over
the hills, while we were dwellers in French or Italian hamlets."
[Illustration: THE ANGELUS.]
In the "Life of Samuel F.B. Morse" by Samuel Irenaeus Prime appears
Cooper's letter from "Spa, July 31, 1832," to
My Dear Morse: I have had a great compliment paid me, Master
Samuel,--You must know there is a great painter in Bruxelles of the
name of Verboeckhoven, (which means a _bull and a book baked in an
oven!_) who is another Paul Potter. He out does all other men in
drawing cattle,--Well, sir, this artist did me the favor to call at
Bruxelles with the request that I would let him sketch my face. He
came after the horses were ordered, and knowing the difficulty of
the task, I thanked him, but was compelled to refuse. On our
arrival at Liège, we were told that a messenger from the governor
had been to inquire for us, and I began to bethink me of my
sins,--however,--it proved Mr. Bull-and-book-baked had come [by
dilligence] to Liège (sixty-three miles) and got the governor to
give him notice, by means of my passport, when we came. Of course I
sat,--the likeness--like all other pictures you have seen of my
chameleon face--has a vastly live-like look,--the compliment is
none the less, and, provided the artist does not mean to serve me
up as a specimen of American wild beasts, I shall thank him for it.
To be followed twelve posts by a first-rate artist, who is in favor
with the King, is so unusual, that I probed him a little. I found
him well skilled in his art,--his gusto for natural subjects,
strong,--and his favorite among all my books is "The Prairie,"
which you know is filled with wild beasts. Here the secret is
out.--He sent me a beautiful pencil sketch of a Belgian hind as a
memorial of our achievement.
[Illustration: EUGÈNE-JOSEPH VERBOECKHOVEN.]
Cooper and his family spent some days drinking the waters at Spa, with
best effects for Mrs. Cooper--not over-strong since the Paris days. They
left its grass of "ghostly green" when the "dog-star raged with all its
fury," and "came on old Aix-la-Chapelle, well-cloaked and carriage
windows closed." In compliment to the republic of letters the postman
called on Cooper here, and like tribute was also paid two posts farther
on, where he was asked if he "was the man who wrote books!" That day was
well spent when they reached the terrace above the Rhine and got their
first view of the towers of Cologne. In "fine, lofty rooms" overlooking
a garden, they here enjoyed a night's rest, a breakfast, and then a
pilgrimage to "the unfinished cathedral, that wonder of Gothic
architecture." A visit was paid to the house in which Rubens was born,
it is said, and the very room which sheltered the last moments of Mary
of Medicis, wife of Henry IV and mother of Louis XIII of France. Cooper
thought it "a better sort of burgher home," and saw it as "a public
house."
[Illustration: RUBENS' COLOGNE HOME.]
Again on the wing, they passed the student-town of Bonn, Rhine ruins of
charming legend on the near and far banks of the river, until on an
island in the Rhine they found rest and refreshment at a convent-inn.
The host, wife, child, cook, and soldiers three, quartered there, gave
them welcome and good cheer. Their parlor was that of the lady abbess,
and her bedchamber fell to Mrs. Cooper. "The girls were put into cells,
where girls ought never to be put," wrote their father. _He_ "sallied
forth alone, in quest of sensation," and got it in the muttering of
thunder, and the flashing of lightning over the "pitchy darkness of the
seven mountains." And he and the fiercely howling winds from the trees
had a chase through the gloomy cloisters, whence he saw, in the vast,
cavern-like kitchen, the honest islanders eating with relish his surplus
supper.
[Illustration: CONVENT OF NUNNENWORTH.]
As the storm grew in strength Cooper went to the corridor above, leading
past their rooms To-and-fro he paced until a bright flash revealed the
far, end door to which he went, opened, and entered into utter darkness.
Taking a few steps he paused--"for the whole seemed filled by a clatter,
as of ten thousand bat-wings against glass." His hand rested on
something--he knew not what--when by another vivid flash he saw that he
was in an open gallery of the convent chapel. The bat-wings were small,
broken panes of the high arched windows, rattling in the gale. Yet by
the chasing flashes of angry light he saw beneath him grim figures in
the shadowy motions of troubled spirits. They wore upon his nerves,
until he caught himself shouting: "'Ship ahoy; ship ahoy! What cheer,
what cheer?' in a voice as loud as the winds." He was about to speak
when his gallery door opened and the withered face of an old crone
appeared by a flash; then came thunder, and the face vanished. After a
pause the door opened again, and on the same uncomely face, when,
without thought, our author gave a loud, deep groan. The door slammed on
the time-stricken form, and he was again alone with the storm-demons who
now soon grew drowsy and went to sleep, and he himself went to
bed,--and, wrote he, "slept like a postillion in a cock-loft, or a
midshipman in the middle-watch." But regret came in the morning when
Mrs. Cooper told her husband how a poor old soul, frightened by the
storm, had stolen into the chapel to pray, where, on hearing strange
groans, she dropped her candle and fled in fear to Madam's maid, who
gave her bed-shelter for the night. An after-breakfast look at the
storm-ridden chapel disclosed other good reasons than the groans for the
poor creature's flight. A peace offering made sweet her next night's
sleep, when the travelers had gone on their way, diving here and there
into lore and legend of the mighty Rhine-stream.
[Illustration: WATCH TOWER ON THE RHINE.]
Near the Prussian frontier was "a castle that stood beetling on a crag
above the road," where smoke actually arose from a beacon-grate that
thrust itself out "from a far-front tower." Such attractions were not
to be passed, and up the winding way over two hundred feet they went,
and over the small drawbridge, guarded by one groom and the Dutch growl
of a ferocious mastiff. In walls, towers, queer gap terraces,--giving
lovely glimpses of the Rhine,--court, outside stairways of iron, fine
old Knights' Hall--its huge fire-place, and its center droplights of
lamps fitted into buckhorns--and curious armor, Cooper found additional
material for his prolific pen.
During the year 1832 Cooper gave "The Heidenmauer, a Rhine Legend," to
the world. While the book itself is full of mediaeval, Rhine-country
charm, of brilliant charge and countercharge, of church and state power,
unfortunately for its author in its "Introduction" was this sentence:
"Each hour, as life advances, am I made to see how capricious and vulgar
is the immortality conferred by a newspaper." This brought upon its
writer a whirlwind of caustic criticism in the American papers, and soon
became a challenge of battle by one who was to prove himself brave,
able, fearless, and _right_ through coming years of hot and bitter
strife. By one of the leading editors the glove was taken up in these
words: "The press has built him up; the press shall pull him down."
Posterity has forgotten the stirring conflict, but Cooper's books will
never fail to fire the heart and brain of every mother's son for all
time.
In a skiff, spreading a sprit sail, they crossed the Rhine at Bingen by
that postmaster's assurance of "Certainly, as good a ferry as there is
in Germany.--_Ja_--_Ja_--we do it often." Through the Duchy of Nassau
they tested its wines from Johannesberg to Wiesbaden. Then up the Main
to Frankfort, on to Darmstadt, and thence to Heidelberg. It was quite
dark when they "crossed the bridge of the Neckar," but "Notwithstanding
the obscurity" wrote Cooper, "we got a glimpse of the proud old ruin
overhanging the place, looking grand and sombre in the gloom of night."
He thought the ruins by daylight "vast, rather than fine" though parts
had "the charm of quaintness." The "picturesque tower" was noted, adding
"but the finest thing certainly is the view from the garden-terrace
above." Below it, unrolls miles of the beautiful Neckar valley country,
through which they drove to Ludwigsburg and on to Stuttgart. Beyond,
appeared a distant view of "a noble ruin" crowning a conical eminence.
This was the Castle of Hohenzollern, "the cradle of the House of
Brandenburg" to which a thunderstorm prevented their intended visit.
[Illustration: HEIDELBERG AND CASTLE.]
Returning to a vale of Wurtemberg they saw "a little rivulet" which
began the mighty Danube stream on its way to the Black Sea, and drove up
to the inn at Tuttlingen, of which point Cooper wrote: "This is the
Black Forest,--The wood was chiefly of larches, whence I presume its
name." Warned by their host-postmaster of a long climb of mountain
separating the Rhine and Danube rivers, in a coach and six they left
him for Schaffhausen and the Rhine Falls. The mountain crest gave them a
sweeping view of Lake Constance when its waters looked "dark and wild"
wrote Cooper, adding, "we suddenly plunged down to the banks of the
Rhine and found ourselves once more before an inn-door, in Switzerland."
So in the late summer of this year their second visit was made to the
land of Lake Leman, whose waters are overshadowed by noble mountains;
and its surface broad, tranquil, and blue. Enchanting distance made a
fairy air-castle of a tiny château on a little grassy knoll washed by
the lake, but a near view decided the family "to take refuge in a
furnished house, _Mon Repose_," in a retired corner quite near the
shore at Vevay.
[Illustration: VEVAY SHORES OF LAKE LEMAN.]
A boat, with honest John Descloux and his two crooked oars, was soon
secured, and many an hour was spent listening to his lore of Leman, as
they floated their several hours a day over its waters, under fair skies
and foul.
[Illustration: FÉTE DES VIGNERONS, 1833.]
During this Switzerland vacation Cooper's fancy was strongly attracted
by Vevay's celebration of an old-time festival, _abbaye des Vignerons_,
or great holiday of the vine-dressers. It was "a gay and motley scene,
blending the harvest-home with a dash of the carnival spirit." Shepherds
and shepherdesses in holiday attire and garlands, tripping the measures
of rustic song and dance. Aproned gardeners with rake and spade, their
sweethearts with bread-baskets of fruit and flowers, uniting in the
dance _à la ronde_, as they came to a certain point in the procession;
and so went the reapers, mowers, gleaners, herdsmen, and dairy-maids in
Alpine costume, timing their steps to horn and cow-bell, and singing the
heart-stirring chorus _Ranz des Vachs_, or the "Cowherds of the Alps,"
the wild notes coming back in many an Alpine echo. The festival
concluded with a rustic wedding, the bride being dowered down to the
broom and spindle by the lady of the manor.
[Illustration: NOAH'S ARK, VEVAY, 1833.]
Such a holiday on the shores of Lake Leman, and the Pass of St. Bernard,
Cooper placed as a background for his plot based on the hard old
feudal-times law--that (in the canton of Berne) the odious office of
executioner or headsman was made a family inheritance. The efforts of
the unhappy father and mother to save their son from such a fate make up
the pathetic interest of "The Headsman," issued in 1833. The Hospice of
St. Bernard so well described in this book was visited by the author
the previous year.
[Illustration: HOSPICE ST. BERNARD.]
When the power to write first dawned on Cooper's mind there came also
and grew with it the desire to serve his native land in the field of
letters. Love of country and countrymen guided his ardent, generous pen
in "The Spy," "The Pioneers," "The Last of the Mohicans," and "The
Prairie," written before he went to Europe. European society he entered,
and was courted as literary men of reputation are courted there, but
always with the honest pride of being an American. Under these pleasant
conditions "The Red Rover," "The Traveling Bachelor," "The Wept of
Wish-ton-Wish," and "The Water Witch" were written. But "The Bravo" was
followed by such "a series of abuse in the public press" at home that
when Cooper returned, November 5, 1833, these onsets greatly surprised
him. His nature was roused by attack; but "never was he known to quail,"
wrote a famous English critic of him, and added: "Cooper writes like a
hero!" He believed the public press to be a power for life or death to a
nation, and held _personal_ rights as sacred; and challenged on these
lines he became a lion at bay. Excepting from his fine old personal
friends, staunch and true, he had a chilling reception. For saying, at
an evening party a few days after landing, that he had been sadly jolted
by the bad pavement and was surprised that the town was so poorly
lighted, he was seriously warned by these warm friends: "By the shade of
Washington! and the memory of Jay! to be more prudent; not a syllable of
pavements or a word of lamps could be uttered." Because he thought the
bay of Naples of more classic interest than the bay of New York, he was
voted "devoid of taste and patriotism." So hurt was he by public
distrust that he thought seriously of writing no more; its injustice led
him to criticise harshly many changes which had occurred during his
absence. The Indian trail had made way for canal-boats, connecting the
ocean with the inland seas; the railroads had come, with other active
commercial interests, to stay.
[Illustration: THE BAY OF NAPLES.]
[Illustration: NEW YORK HARBOR.]
After their return from Europe Cooper and his family passed some winters
in New York City--those of 1833-34 and 1835-36 in Bleecker Street near
Thompson. There he "first erected his household gods, French gods these,
for the house throughout was equipped with furniture from France, and
ministered solely by French servitors," writes Doctor Wolfe. But love
for the old Hall on the shores of Otsego grew strong beyond resistance.
It was vacant and of forlorn appearance when the author returned to it
in 1834. From a simple, roomy, comfortable house it was made over into a
picturesque country-seat, from designs, English in style, drawn by
Professor Morse, who was at Cooperstown during alterations. Some of
these, without thought of the cold Otsego winters--ice and snow on the
battlemented roof--made leaks frequent and disturbing.
[Illustration: OTSEGO HALL AFTER THE RECONSTRUCTION OF 1834.]
In 1835 Cooper wrote of this home: "The Hall is composite enough, Heaven
knows, being a mongrel of the Grecian and Gothic orders; my hall,
however, is the admiration of all the mountaineers--nearly fifty feet
long, twenty-four wide, and fifteen feet high. I have raised the ceiling
three feet, and regret it had not been ten. I have aversion to a room
under jurymasts."
[Illustration: COOPER'S LIBRARY AT OTSEGO HALL.]
The library was a well-shaped room of twenty by twenty-four feet, the
ceiling twelve feet above. Its deep, dark oak windows opened on the
thick shade-trees of the quiet southwest; the walls, well-lined with
books of value, could show no complete set of his own. In one corner of
this room was a large folding screen on which were pasted print-pictures
of places they had visited during their seven years' tour of Europe; a
like screen was in the hall. In this library was the author's plain,
shining, English walnut writing-table and chair, whose first owner was
Richard Fenimore, Cooper's maternal grandfather, of Rancocus, New
Jersey; many of Cooper's works were written upon it. On the opposite
side of the hall was the author's bedchamber. It is interesting to learn
from Mr. Keese that the large north bed-rooms, so cold in winter, were
known as "Siberia" and "Greenland," while those on the south, and warm
in summer, were called "Florida" and "Italy." We are told the grounds
were changed by winding walks and the setting out of trees--not a few
with Cooper's own hands. And under these fine trees, in their southwest
favored corner, shadows and sunlight play hide and seek about a copy of
Mr. and Mrs. Cooper's favorite garden seat. Great gates were made for
the garden entrance, as heavy and hard to move as those of "The Hutted
Knoll" in the author's story of "Wyandotté." It was indeed an attractive
home, made more so by its attractive inmates. Concerning these Mr. Keese
writes: "Noting Cooper's fondness for animals, the family brought from
Paris a magnificent 'tiger' cat weighing fifteen pounds--'Coquelicot' by
name. He lived at the Hall until the day of his death, and occupied the
most comfortable chair in the parlor and was rarely disturbed." Finally
the old Hall became their only home, and here, in his stronghold at the
foot of the Glimmerglass, Cooper kept open house for his friends.
[Illustration: COPY OF COOPER'S GARDEN SEAT.]
During the summer months he took a lively interest in his garden. From
his daughter we learn: "It was his delight to watch the growth of
different plants day by day. His hot-beds were of the earliest, and he
was the first to grow egg-plant, Brussels sprouts, and other unusual
vegetables and fruits." The first and choicest of fruit or vegetable was
gathered by himself as a little offering to Mrs. Cooper, and placed by
him at her plate at table. And he took great pleasure in carrying with
his own hands baskets of choice fruit and vegetables to different
friends and neighbors. Many were these that the author and his old
shipmate Ned Myers carried about the village to different homes.
[Illustration: JUDGE NELSON.]
Many also were the talks that Cooper and his friend and constant
companion, Judge Nelson, of the Supreme Court, had on garden affairs, as
well as on legal and political questions of the day; many were their
visits to the hot-beds and melon hills. "Ah, those muskmelons! Carefully
were they watched." This penman was frankly proud of his melons, their
early growth and flavor. But for all his care this melon-pride met its
Waterloo one spring in a special box of superior seed, started in a
favored place for light and warmth, and to be early transplanted. Soon
the tiny green blades appeared, duly became leaflets, to the joy of the
Judge and the planter. "Those two venerable heads bending together in
close scrutiny over the young plants was a pleasant sight, in the
author's eager interest and genial sympathy of the Judge." But alas!
neither jurist nor novelist was a botanist, and the triumphantly
expected melon vines basely proved after a few more days of tender
nursing to be the leaves of "that vagabond weed, the wild-cucumber
vine." Here too he gathered material for future books, and did much
writing. Evening twilight often found him pacing the large hall, his
hands behind him, his head doing active duty in decisive nods of _yea_
and _nay_, and words spoken aloud for putting on paper in his library
next morning. Some of this writing was to his profit and pleasure, and
some, alas! to his sad disturbance--as was "A Letter to his Countrymen,"
published in 1834.
A picture of this Otsego-Hall home life would prove a sorry failure with
"Pumpkin" left out. Therefore appears Pumpkin, the family horse, who
earned his name by drawing a load of pumpkins for Seraphina, the cow, to
eat. It is of note that his horseship carried "a very light whisp of a
tail, and had a gait all his own in going at times on three legs and, at
times, kicking up both hind ones in a way more amusing than alarming, by
leaving an interesting doubt as to fore or aft movement, in the mind of
his driver."
Of Cooper's daily active life Mr. Keese notes: "He rose early, did much
writing before breakfasting at nine, and afterwards until eleven
o'clock. Then Pumpkin, hitched to his yellow buggy, was brought to the
door"; and when her health would allow, Mrs. Cooper often went with her
husband to their _châlet_ farm. Sometimes it was his author-daughter who
went with her father; and again, some friend was hailed from the street
for the trip. These several active hours would give him a fine appetite
for their three o'clock dinner, on his return. "The late afternoon and
evening were given to friends at home, or to visiting, and often to his
favorite game of chess with Mrs. Cooper."
Some two years after Cooper's return from abroad, a friend about to sail
for Europe met him walking leisurely along Broadway with his coat open
and a great string of onions in his hand. Seeing several persons turn to
look at him, then speak to each other, the friend too turned--"and
behold, it was Cooper!" After greetings he raised his bunch of onions
and said: "I have turned farmer, but am obliged to come to town now and
then, as you see." Kind remembrances were sent to Greenough; and of
Italy he added: "There is no place where mere living is such a luxury."
Fenimore Cooper had a keen sense of the ridiculous. His table-talk by
his own fireside was full of cheery life, fun, and glowing merriment.
"Severe and stern his fine face could be when touching on serious
subjects," but his relish of the ludicrous and comical was very strongly
marked, and when such came his way in reading, it was carried at once to
the family circle and read by him with zest, and a laugh so hearty it
brought the tears rolling down his cheeks. While in Europe he outlined a
satirical tale in which the men's parts should be seriously assumed by
monkeys. An English baronet, Sir John Goldencalf, and a Yankee skipper,
Captain Noah Poke, were made to travel together through the different
parts of Monkeyland, called Leaphigh, Leaplow, and Leapthrough,
representing England, America, and France. This tale was hastily written
in his New York home on Bleecker Street near Thompson. Of these
countries, their people, and that time, the story was a strong, clever,
and ludicrous picture, which in this day would be accepted as such, and
be equally helpful and amusing to writers and readers. It was called
"The Monikins," and was published in 1835.
Delight in the scenery of Switzerland led Cooper to put in book form his
notes on his visits to that small country of many interests and
magnificent views. Under the name of "Sketches in Switzerland," it was
published in 1836. The France and England part of his "Gleanings in
Europe" went to print the next year. Concerning his book on old England,
Cooper, in the autumn of 1837, writes: "They tell me it has made a stir
in London, where I get abused and read _à la Trollope_. It ought to do
them good, but whether it does or not depends upon Divine grace." This
effort has been called keen, clever, but untimely, tending rather to set
people by their ears than to save them from their sins.
In the summer of 1837 Cooper found himself facing the disputed ownership
of "Three-Mile Point" of Lake Otsego. On his return from Europe he found
that his townspeople regarded this point--Myrtle Grove--as belonging to
them. But Judge Cooper's will left it to all his heirs until 1850, when
it was to go to the youngest bearing his name. While willing to allow
the villagers picnic privileges, Cooper insisted on his clear title to
this pretty shore point; but Cooperstown Solons hotly fought what they
called "the arrogant claims of one J. Fenimore Cooper," who, however,
finally proved his title by winning the case at law. But he lost much
of the good-will of his townsmen, whom he thought "progressive in
killing the red-man and chopping down trees."
[Illustration: WILD-ROSE POINT OR THREE-MILE POINT.]
The beauty of this Wild-Rose Point claimed Cooper's earliest love. He
made it the scene where Deerslayer and Chingachgook rescued Wah-ta-Wah.
Its flatiron-shaped pebble-beach jutted out from the lake's west shore
and was covered with fine old forest trees garlanded with vines; and
from their graveled rootage there gurgled a limpid spring of sweet
waters. Then a wild brook came brawling down the hills to find its
gentle outlet on the beach. Azalias and wild roses made its shrubbery,
while pitcher-plant, moccasin-flower, gentians blue and white, with
brilliant lobelias, were among the native blossoms that charmed the
author's childhood and made this Three-Mile Point especially dear to
him.
[Illustration: COOPER'S NEW YORK CITY HOME, ST. MARK'S PLACE.]
The Italian part of Cooper's "Gleanings in Europe" was brought to print
in 1838, and later in this year appeared "The American Democrat." Then
"Homeward Bound," its sequel, "Home as Found," and the "Chronicles of
Cooperstown"--all came in hot haste from the author's modest three-story
brick home in St. Mark's Place near Third Avenue in New York City. In
these books Cooper told his side of foreign and town troubles, and it
was said that not ten places or persons could complain in truth that
they had been overlooked. Thereby New York society and the American
press became greatly excited. Cooper was ever a frank friend or an open
enemy. A critic wrote of him and this time: "He had the courage to defy
the majority and confound the press, from a heavy sense of duty, with
ungrateful truths. With his manly, strong sense of right and wrong he
had a high regard for courage in men and purity in women, but, with his
keen sense of justice, he was not always judicious. Abroad he defended
his country with vigor, and was fearless in warning and advising her,
when needful, at home. While he never mistook 'her geese for swans,' he
was a patriot to the very core of his heart." However, this
over-critical writing soon became newspaper gossip, and began for Cooper
six long years of tedious lawsuits, finally settled in his favor in
1843. With such able men as Horace Greeley, Park Benjamin, and Thurlow
Weed among others in battle-array against him, Cooper closed this strife
himself by making a clear, brilliant, and convincing six-hour address
before the court during a profound silence. Well may it be said: "It was
a good fight he fought and an honorable victory he won" when he silenced
the press as to publishing private or personal affairs. His speech was
received with bursts of applause, and of his closing argument an eminent
lawyer said: "I have heard nothing like it since the days of Emmet." "It
was clear, skilful, persuasive, and splendidly eloquent," is another's
record. At the Globe Hotel the author wrote his wife the outcome, and
added: "I tell you this, my love, because I know it will give you
pleasure." In "American Bookmen," by M.A. De Wolfe Howe, it appears that
when going to one of his Cooper trials Mr. Weed picked up a new book to
shorten the journey. It proved to be "The Two Admirals," and says Weed:
"I commenced reading it in the cars, and became so charmed that I took
it into the court-room and occupied every interval that my attention
could be withdrawn from the trial with its perusal." Mr. Howe adds:
"Plaintiff and defendant have rarely faced each other under stranger
conditions."
[Illustration: HORACE GREELEY.]
[Illustration: PARK BENJAMIN.]
[Illustration: THURLOW WEED.]
While in the St. Mark's-Place home the family found Frisk, described by
Mr. Keese as "a little black mongrel of no breed whatever, rescued from
under a butcher's cart in St. Mark's Place, with a fractured leg, and
tenderly cared for until recovery. He was taken to Cooperstown, where
he died of old age after the author himself. Mr. Cooper was rarely seen
on the street without Frisk."
The shores of Otsego, "the Susquehanna's utmost spring," Cooper made the
scenic part of "Home as Found," but high authority asserts the
characters to be creatures of the author's fancy, all save one,--"a
venerable figure, tall and upright, to be seen for some three-score
years moving to and fro over its waters; still ready to give, still
ready to serve; still gladly noting all of good; but it was with the
feeling that no longer looked for sympathy." It was of "Home as Found"
that Morse wrote to Cooper: "I will use the frankness to say I wish you
had not written it. But whenever am I to see you?"
The effect of this conflict with the press so cut the sale of Cooper's
books that in 1843 he wrote: "I know many of the New York booksellers
are afraid to touch my works on account of the press of that righteous
and enlightened city." Of these disturbing conditions Balzac's opinion
was: "Undoubtedly Cooper's renown is not due to his countrymen nor to
the English: he owes it mainly to the ardent appreciation of France."
Cooper's income, from England, suffered on account of an act of
Parliament change, in 18381 of the copy-right law. But his London
publisher, Bentley, was credited with usually giving the author about
$1500 each for his later stories. Report gave him about $5000 each for
his prior works.
May 10, 1839, Cooper published his "History of the United States Navy."
It was first favored and then, severely criticised at home and abroad;
but the author was fourteen years in gathering his material, and his
close contact with navy officers and familiarity with sea life made him
well qualified for the work. He had not yet convinced the press that an
author's and editor's right to criticise was mutual; that each might
handle the other's public work as roughly as he pleased, but neither
might touch on the other's private affairs. However, the "Naval History"
sold well and has borne the test of time, and still remains an authority
on subjects treated. There are many officers who well remember their
delight on first reading those accounts of the battles of long-ago, of
which Admiral Du Pont said that any lieutenant "should be ashamed not to
know by heart." One well qualified to judge called Cooper's "Naval
History" "one of the noblest tributes ever paid to a noble profession."
When "The Pathfinder" came later from the author's pen critics were
startled from the press-estimate of his character by "the novel beauty
of that glorious work--I must so call it," said Bryant. Natty's goodness
a dangerous gift might prove for popular success, but its appeal to
Washington Irving won this record: "They may say what they will of
Cooper; the man who wrote this book is not only a great man, but a good
man." Balzac held it to be "_un beau livre_" and thought Cooper owed his
high place in modern literature to painting of the sea and seamen, and
idealizing the magnificent landscapes of America. It was of Cooper and
his works that Balzac wrote: "With what amazing power has he painted
nature! How all his pages glow with creative fire!"
[Illustration: J.W. TRUMBULL.]
Concerning Cooper's innate love for his home-country scenery, Dr.
Francis gives this incident: "It was a gratifying spectacle to see
Cooper with old Colonel Trumbull, the historical painter, discanting on
Cole's pencil in delineating American forest-scenery--a theme richest in
the world for Cooper. The venerable Colonel with his patrician
dignity, and Cooper with his aristocratic bearing, yet democratic
sentiment. Trumbull was one of the many old men I knew who delighted in
Cooper's writings, and in conversation dwelt upon his captivating
genius."
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
Personally, Mr. Cooper was a noble type of our race. He was of massive,
compact form, a face of strong intelligence and glowing with masculine
beauty, in his prime. His portraits, though imposing, by no means do
justice to the impressive and vivacious presence of the man. This pen
picture is by one who knew the author well.
[Illustration: CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS.]
[Illustration: COLUMBUS' FLEET.]
On July 8, of this year, Cooper was made a member of the Georgia
Historical Society, and the following autumn "Mercedes of Castile" came
from his pen. It relates the first voyage of Columbus, and "with
special knowledge of a seaman, the accuracy of an historian, and with
something of the fervor of a poet."
Gleaning Miss Cooper's "Pages and Pictures," one reads, as to "The
Deerslayer": "One pleasant summer evening the author of 'The
Pathfinder,' driving along the shady lake shore, was, as usual, singing;
not, however, a burst of Burns's 'Scots wha ha' wi' Wallace bled!' or
Moore's 'Love's Young Dream,'--his favorites,--but this time a political
song of the party opposing his own. Suddenly he paused as a woods'
opening revealed to his spirited gray eye an inspiring view of Otsego's
poetical waters." When the spell was broken he turned to his beloved
daughter and exclaimed: "I must write one more book, dearie, about our
little lake!" Another far-seeing look was taken, to people this
beautiful scene with the creatures of his fancy, followed by a moment of
silence, then cracking his whip, he resumed his song with some careless
chat, and drove home. A few days later the first pages of the new book
were written. When the touch of Time was frosting his own head, he leads
Natty, as a youth, over the first warpath of his hero. And so the
"Glimmerglass" and its "Mt. Vision" country grew into the story of "The
Deerslayer"; it is "the very soul of the little lake overflowing with
youthful freshness and vivid with stirring adventure."
[Illustration: THE GLIMMERGLASS.]
On the bosom of its waters is anchored "Muskrat Castle," and over it, to
and fro, move the "Ark of Floating Tom" and the Indian canoes, which
gave a strange, wild interest to the story. Afloat and ashore come those
unlike sisters,--proud Judith, handsome but designing, and
simple-hearted Hetty, gentle, innocent, and artless; both so real and
feminine, and yet so far removed from their supposed father, the
buccaneer. Then comes this Uncas of the eagle air, swooping with lithe
movement to his rocky trysting-place. And Uncas is in strong contrast
with "The Pathfinder's" "Arrowhead," who was a wonder-sketch of the
red-man's treachery and vengeance, while his sweet girl-wife,
"Dew-of-June," shows, true to life, an Indian woman's unfaltering
devotion to her savage lord. Over all its pages broods the commanding
spirit of "The Deerslayer,"--the forest's young Bayard who has yet to
learn what the taking of human life is like. So, in "The Deerslayer,"
printed in 1841, the "Little Lake" (Otsego), with its picturesque
shores, capes, and forest-crowned heights, was made classic soil. Just
back of "The Five-Mile Point."--where Deerslayer gave himself up to
merciless Indian justice at the Huron Camp, and later was rescued by
British regulars--is the rocky gorge, Mohican Glen, through which a
purling brook ripples by its stone-rift banks thatched with great clumps
of rose and fern. From the gravel-strewn shore of Hutter's Point beyond,
the eyes of Leatherstocking first fell upon the Glimmerglass, and
impressed by its wonder and beauty he exclaimed: "This is grand! 't is
solemn! 't is an edication of itself." Leaning on his rifle and gazing
in every direction, he added: "Not a tree disturbed, but everything left
to the ordering of the Lord, to live and die, to His designs and laws!
This is a sight to warm the heart."
[Illustration: OTSEGO LAKE.]
The tribes, hunters, and trappers had their "own way of calling
things," and "seeing the whole basin, often fringed with pines, would
throw back the hills that hung over it," they "got to calling the place
the 'Glimmerglass.'" At Gravelly Point opposite, Deerslayer killed his
first Indian, and above are the tree-tops where rose the star that timed
Hist's meeting with her lover. Some distance to the north is the
spot--now known as the "Sunken Islands"--which marks the site of Muskrat
Castle, and is near the last resting-place of Hetty Hutter and her
mother. And far to the southwest lies a long, low, curving beach jutting
sickle-shape into the lake. As a favored haunt of muskrats, it was once
called Muskrat Cove, and now Blackbird Bay. Just beyond lies Fenimore,
the home of Cooper's early married life.
In the author's pages on England, published in 1837, was expressed a
wish to write a story on "the teeming and glorious naval history of that
land." Our own country at that time had no fleet, but Cooper's interest
in his youthful profession made quite fitting to himself the words of
his old shipmate, Ned Myers: "I can say conscientiously that if my life
were to be passed over again it would he passed in the navy--God bless
the flag!" Out of England's long naval records Cooper made "The Two
Admirals," an old-time, attractive story of the evolution of fleets, and
the warm friendship between two strong-hearted men in a navy full of
such, and at a time before the days of steam. "Cooper's ships live," so
says Captain Mahan; and continues: "They are handled as ships then were,
and act as ships still would act under the circumstances." This naval
historian thought "the water a noble field for the story-teller." "The
Two Admirals" first appeared in _Graham's Magazine,_ for which Cooper
was regularly engaged to write in 1842. On June 16 of this year a
decision was rendered in the "Naval History" dispute. One of the
questions was whether Cooper's account of the battle of Lake Erie was
accurate and fair and did justice to the officers in command, and
whether he was right in asserting that Elliott, second in command, whom
Perry at first warmly commended and later preferred charges against, did
his duty in that action. Cooper maintained that while Perry's victory in
1813 had won for himself, "as all the world knows, deathless glory,"
injustice had been done to Elliott. Three arbitrators chosen by the
parties to the dispute decided that Cooper had fulfilled his duty as an
historian; that "the narrative of his battle of Lake Erie was true; that
it was impartial"; and that his critics' "review was untrue, not
impartial"; and that they "should publish this decision in New York,
Washington, and Albany papers." Later Commodore Elliott presented Cooper
with a bronze medal for this able and disinterested "defense of his
brother-sailor."
[Illustration: JESSE D. ELLIOTT'S LAKE ERIE MEDAL.]
[Illustration: MEDAL GIVEN TO JAMES FENIMORE COOPER BY JESSE D.
ELLIOTT.]
Professor Lounsbury's summary of Cooper's "Naval History" is: "It is
safe to say, that for the period which it covers it is little likely to
be superseded as the standard history of the American navy. Later
investigation may show some of the author's assertions to be erroneous.
Some of his conclusions may turn out as mistaken as have his prophecies
about the use of steam in war vessels. But such defects, assuming that
they exist, are more than counterbalanced by advantages which make it a
final authority on points that can never again be so fully considered.
Many sources of information which were then accessible no longer exist.
The men who shared in the scenes described, and who communicated
information directly to Cooper, have all passed away. These are losses
that can never be replaced, even were it reasonable to expect that the
same practical knowledge, the same judicial spirit and the same power of
graphic description could be found united again in the same person."
Most amusing was Cooper's own story of a disputing man who being told:
"Why, that is as plain as two and two make four," replied: "But I
dispute that too, for two and two make twenty-two."
Cooper called the Mediterranean, its shores and countries, "a sort of a
world apart, that is replete with charms which not only fascinate the
beholder, but linger in the memories of the absent like visions of a
glorious past." And so his cruise in 1830, in the _Bella Genovese_,
entered into the pages of "Wing-and-Wing." The idea was to bring
together sailors of all nations--English, French, Italian, and
Yankee--on the Mediterranean and aboard a French water-craft of peculiar
Italian rig--the lateen sail. These sails spread like the great white
wings of birds, and the craft glides among the islands and hovers about
every gulf and bay and rocky coast of that beautiful sea. Under her
dashing young French captain, Raoul Yvard, _Le Fen Follet_
(Jack-o'-Lantern or fire-fly, as you will) glides like a water-sprite
here, there, and everywhere, guided by Cooper's sea phrases,--for which
he had an unfailing instinct,--that meant something "even to the
land-lubber who does not know the lingo." It is said many down-east
fishermen never tire of Cooper, but despise many of his followers
because of their misuse of sea terms. But more of "Wing-and-Wing": there
was lovely Ghita, so sweet and brave, and anxious for her daring young
lover Raoul, and stricken by the tragedies that befell her in the wake
of Lord Nelson's fleet. The brown mountains of Porta Farrajo, "a small,
crowded town with little forts and a wall," Cooper had seen.
[Illustration: ISLAND OF ELBA.]
He had tested its best inn, _The Four Nations_, by a good dinner in its
dining-room of seven mirrors and a broken tile floor, and had some talk
with its host as to their late ruler,--he said Napoleon came that
evening, sent at once for Elba's oldest flag, which was run up on the
forts as a sign of independence.
[Illustration: ELBA HOME OF NAPOLEON.]
Cooper saw Napoleon's Elba home,--"a low, small house and two wings,
with ten windows in its ninety feet of front." He also saw the more
comfortable one-story home of Napoleon's mother. Other isles and shores
seen then--during his cruise in the _Bella Genovese_--found place in
"Wing-and-Wing," published in 1842. The knowledge thus obtained of
localities and the Italians led Cooper to say: "Sooner or later Italy
will, inevitably, become a single state; this is a result that I hold to
be certain, though the means by which it is to be effected are still
hidden."
[Illustration: THE BATTLE OF LAKE ERIE.]
[Illustration: COOPER'S DIAGRAM OF THE BATTLE OF LAKE ERIE.]
During 1843 appeared in _Graham's Magazine_ Cooper's "Life-Sketch of
Perry," "The Battle of Lake Erie," and "The Autobiography of a
Pocket-handkerchief," or "Social Life in New York." This volume of
_Graham's Magazine_ also included the life of "John Paul Jones," wherein
appeared Cooper's masterful description of the celebrated battle of the
_Bon Homme Richard_--one of the most remarkable in the brief annals of
that time of American naval warfare.
[Illustration: THE BATTLE OF BON HOMME RICHARD AND THE SERAPIS.]
[Illustration: COOPER'S DIAGRAM OF THE BATTLE OF "BON HOMME RICHARD" AND
THE "SERAPIS."]
Of John Paul Jones himself Cooper wrote:
"In battle, Paul Jones was brave; in enterprise, hardy and original; in
victory, mild and generous; in motives, much disposed to
disinterestedness, though ambitious of renown and covetous of
distinction; in pecuniary relations, liberal; in his affections, natural
and sincere; and in his temper, except in those cases which assailed his
reputation, just and forgiving."
Fenimore Cooper was a veritable pioneer in spirit. He delighted in the
details of American "clearing,"--from the first opening of the forest to
sunlight, by the felling of trees and stump-extractor, to the neat drain
and finished stonewall. On the mountain slope of Otsego's shore, and
less than two miles from Cooperstown, lay his small farm belted with
woodland, from which he had filched it in true pioneer fashion.
Concerning Cooper's "costly contest with the soil," Mr. Keese tells us:
"The inspiring beauty of its commanding views caught Cooper's fancy for
buying it far more than any meager money returns its two hundred acres
could promise."
[Illustration: STUMP EXTRACTOR.]
After ten years of devoted care the author is on record as saying with
some humor: "for this year the farm would actually pay expenses." But
full returns came in charming views over field, wood, and lake, where
his fancy built "Muskrat Castle" and the "Ark of Floating Tom." Besides,
its pork and butter were the sweetest, its eggs the whitest and
freshest; its new peas and green corn "fit for the pot" were the first
in the country. When the morning writing hours were over at the Hall, it
was to the Châlet, as he called this farm, that he drove, to look after
his horses, cows, pigs, and chickens.
[Illustration: THE CHÂLET FARM.]
The dumb creatures soon learned to know and love him. They would gather
about him and frequently follow him "in a mixed procession often not a
little comical. He had a most kindly feeling for all domestic animals,"
and "was partial to cats as well as dogs; the pet half-breed Angora
often perched on his shoulders while he sat writing in the library."
Then there were the workmen to direct, for whom he always had a kindly
word. One of these said: "We never had to call on him a second time for
a bill; he brought us the check. When I knocked at his library door it
was surprising how quickly I heard the energetic 'Come in.' When I met
him in the street in winter he often said: 'Well, Thomas, what are you
driving at?' If work was dull he would try to think of something to set
me about." Of Cooper's activity was added: "When the masons were
repairing his home, in 1839, he, at fifty, and then quite stout, went up
their steep, narrow ladder to the topmost scaffold on the gable end and
walked the ridge of the house when the chimney was on fire." The Châlet
brought to the author's mind "Wyandotté," or "The Hutted Knoll," a tale
of border-life during the colonial period. A family of that time forces
from the wilderness an affluent frontier home and settlement for its
successors. In "Sassy Dick" the idle and fallen Indian is pathetically
portrayed: Dick's return to the dignity of Wyandotté, the Indian chief,
by reason of the red-man's fierce instincts, is a pen-picture strong in
contrasts, illustrating how "he never forgot a favor nor forgave an
injury." This story and that of Ned Myers were published in 1843.
[Illustration: THE ESCAPE--FROM "WYANDOTTE"]
Of these years there are records of Cooper's kindly love for little
folk. Miss Caroline A. Foot, a schoolgirl of thirteen and a frequent
visitor at Otsego Hall, had always a warm welcome from Mr. Cooper and
his family. When she was about to leave her Cooperstown home for another
elsewhere, "she made bold to enter his sanctum, carrying her album in
her hand and asking him to write a verse or two in the same." Those
verses have been treasured many years by that little girl, who became
Mrs. George Pomeroy Keese. Two of her treasured verses are:
TO CAROLINE A. FOOT
But now, dear Cally, comes the hour
When triumph crowns thy will,
Submissive to thy winning power
I seize the recreant quill:
Indite these lines to bless thy days
And sing my peans in thy praise.
In after life when thou shalt grow
To womanhood, and learn to feel
The tenderness the aged know
To guide their children's weal,
Then wilt thou bless with bended knee
Some smiling child as I bless thee.
J. FENIMORE COOPER.
Otsego Hall, August, 1843.
[Illustration: Miss CAROLINE ADRIANCE FOOT, AGE 13.]
The delight of the winsome little lady was great, not only for the
loving sentiment but also for the autograph, which is now both rare and
valuable. Not long after the capture of her verses a copy of them was
sent to her friend Julia Bryant, daughter of Mr. Cooper's friend, the
poet. Miss Julia wrote at once in reply that she never would be happy
until she too had some lines over the same autograph. An immediate
request was made of Mr. Cooper at his desk in the old Hall library, and
with "dear Cally" by his side, he wrote:
Charming young lady, Miss Julia by name,
Your friend, little Cally, your wishes proclaim;
Read this and you'll soon learn to know it,
I'm not your papa the great lyric poet.
J. FENIMORE COOPER.
On page 155 of "The Cooperstown Centennial" there appears "A new
glimpse of Cooper"--caught and kept by yet another little girl who
firmly believed the author to be "a genuine lover of children." She
writes that to meet him on the street "was always a pleasure. His eye
twinkled, his face beamed, and his cane pointed at you with a smile and
a greeting of some forthcoming humor. When I happened to be passing the
gates of the old Hall, and he and Mrs. Cooper were driving home from his
farm, I often ran to open the gate for him, which trifling act he always
acknowledged with old-time courtesy. His fine garden joined my father's,
and once, being in the vicinity of the fence, he tossed me several
muskmelons to catch, which at that time were quite rare." In 1844 Mr.
Cooper sent this youthful miss a picture-book, "The Young American's
Library." "The Primer" came with a note "written on large paper, with a
large seal." It was a reprint from an English copy, and kept for sixty
years, it is still thought "delightful reading." In part the
accompanying note reads: "Hall, Cooperstown, April 22, 1844. Mr.
Fenimore Cooper begs Miss Alice Worthington will do him the favor to
accept the accompanying book (which was written expressly for Princess
Alice of Great Britain).
"Mr. Cooper felt quite distressed for Miss Worthington's muff during the
late hot weather, and begs to offer her the use of his new ice-house
should the muff complain." Miss Alice and her cousin were out walking a
very warm April day, with their "precious muffs, which gave him the
merry thought about the ice-house."
[Illustration: Miss ALICE TRUMBULL WORTHINGTON.]
Four years later Miss Worthington received another letter from Mr.
Cooper, in acknowledgment of her sending to him a newspaper clipping
about one of his books. Of this letter is noted: "His handwriting was
fine, beautifully clear, and very distinguished." The note reads:
OTSEGO HALL, COOPERSTOWN, Feb. 12, 1848.
MY DEAR MISS ALICE WORTHINGTON,--I have received your letter with
the most profound sentiments of gratitude. The compliments from the
newspapers did not make half the impression that was made by your
letter; but the attentions of a young lady of your tender years, to
an old man, who is old enough to be her grandfather, are not so
easily overlooked. Nor must you mistake the value I attach to the
passage cut from the paper, for, even that coming through your
little hands is far sweeter than would have been two candy-horns
filled with sugar-plums.
I hope that you and I and John will have an opportunity of visiting
the blackberry bushes next summer. I now invite you to select your
party--of as many little girls, and boys, too, if you can find
those you like, to go to my farm. It shall be your party, and the
invitations must go out in your name. You can have your school if
you like. I shall ask only one guest myself, and that will be John,
who knows the road.
With highest consideration,
Your most obliged and humble servant,
J. FENIMORE COOPER.
During 1844 Cooper brought to print "Afloat and Ashore" and "Miles
Wallingford"--"which two are one," he wrote, "with a good deal of love
in part second for the delight of the ladies." Adventure is plenty,
however, and the water-craft very much alive. In England "Miles
Wallingford" appeared under the name of its heroine, Lucy Harding; and,
says one: "It is a hard task not to fancy he was drawing, in slight
particulars at least, the picture of his own wife, and telling the story
of his early love." The tale is of the good old times in New York, and
land scenes of her river counties.
Those interested in Cooper's review of the naval court-martial of
Lieutenant Alexander Slidell Mackenzie, for the execution of Spencer,
will find the whole subject and its lesson of fearful retribution in
_Graham's Magazine_ of 1843-44. Alleged "mutiny on the high seas" was
charged to young Spencer. He was the son of Secretary of State John C.
Spencer who, as superintendent of public instruction, rejected with
harsh, short comment Cooper's "Naval History" offered (unknown to the
author) for school use and directed the purchase of Mackenzie's "Life of
Perry." Just as Cooper was putting through the press his severe
criticism of Mackenzie's version of the Battle of Lake Erie, the
_Somers_ returned from her unfortunate cruise. Cooper instantly stopped
his paper at the expense of a round sum to the printer, saying: "The
poor fellow will have enough to do to escape the consequences of his own
weakness. It is no time to be hard on him now."
[Illustration: LIEUT. ALEXANDER SLIDELL MACKENZIE.]
The year 1845 brought from Cooper's pen "Satanstoe"--quaint,
old-fashioned, and the first of his three anti-rent books. Its hero, a
member of the Littlepage family, writes his own life-story. From his
home on one of the necks of Long-Island Sound, in Westchester County, he
visits New York City, catches a glimpse of the pleasant Dutch life in
Albany, and with comrades plunges into the wilderness to examine, work,
and settle his new, large grant of land at Mooseridge. Professor
Lounsbury's able life of Cooper affirms of "Satanstoe": "It is a picture
of colonial life and manners in New York during the eighteenth century,
such as can be found drawn nowhere else so truthfully and vividly." The
title "Satanstoe" was given in a moment of Cooper's "intense disgust" at
the "canting" attempt then made to change the name of the dangerous
passage of Hell Gate, East River, to Hurl Gate.
[Illustration: HELL GATE.]
"The Chainbearer," second of the anti-rent series, was published early
in 1846, and continues the story of "Satanstoe" in the person of the
hero's son, who finds in the squatters on his wilderness inheritance
the first working of the disorderly spirit of anti-rent--the burning
question of New York at that time. Honest Andries Coejemans and his
pretty niece Ursula, the wily Newcome and rude Thousandacres of this
story are each strong types of character.
The key to Cooper's own character is expressed in his words: "The most
expedient thing in existence is to do right." In the hour of danger to
aid in protecting the rights of the people from abuse of these rights by
the evil minded among themselves, he held to be the high duty of every
honest, generous, and wise citizen. With such sentiments in mind, he
wrote "The Redskins"--the third and last of the anti-rent series.
Distinguished jurists of our country have declared "remarkable," the
legal knowledge and skill in this series of books.
Eighteen hundred and forty-six saw also in book form Cooper's "Lives of
Distinguished American Naval Officers," which had already appeared in
_Graham's Magazine_. Many of these eminent men had been the author's
friends and messmates in early life. In 1847 "The Crater, or Vulcan's
Peak--A Tale of the Pacific," came from Cooper's pen. The Introduction
states that the book was written from the journal of a distinguished
member of the Woolston family of Pennsylvania, who "struggled hard to
live more in favor with God than in favor with man," and quotes that
warning text of Scripture: "Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed
lest he fall!" and adds, "we have endeavored to imitate the simplicity
of Captain Woolston in writing this book." The story of "a ship-wrecked
mariner, cast away on a reef not laid down on any chart." This barren
spot the castaway makes to bloom as a rose, then brings immigrants to
his Pacific Eden, which finally vanishes like a dream. The work is said
to be an excellent study of the author's own character.
Full of spirit and vigor at fifty-eight, Mr. Cooper in June, 1847, made
a pleasant few weeks' visit to the middle west, going as far as Detroit.
The country beyond Seneca Lake--the prairies and fine open groves of
Michigan--was new to him. Affluent towns with well-tilled lands between,
full of mid-summer promise, where forty years before he had crossed a
wilderness, gave added interest to the entire way. He was far more
deeply impressed with sublime Niagara than in his earlier years and
before he had seen all the falls of Europe. The idea of weaving its
majesty into an Indian story came to him, but, alas! was never written.
[Illustration: NIAGARA FALLS.]
He was pleased with the growth and promise of Buffalo and Detroit, was
charmed with "the beautiful flowery prairies and natural groves of
Michigan," and wrote of them: "To get an idea of Prairie Round,--imagine
an oval plain of some thirty-thousand acres, of surprising fertility,
without an eminence; a few small cavities, however, are springs of water
the cattle will drink." In the prairie's center was a forest island of
some six hundred acres "of the noblest native trees," and in the heart
of this wood was a small round lake a quarter of a mile across. Into
this scene Cooper called some creatures of his fancy; among them a
bee-hunter, suggested by the following incident.
One morning not long after his return from Europe he was passing, as
usual, his leisure hours at the mountain farm. While overlooking his
workmen he espied a small skiff leaving an opposite shore-point of the
lake and making directly for his own landing. Mr. Cooper thought the
boatman was on an errand to himself. Presently the stranger, tin pail in
hand, made his appearance and inquired of Cooper and his men whether a
large swarm of bees had been seen "somewhere there-abouts." He had lost
a fine swarm early in the morning several days before, and had since
looked in vain for them; but "a near-by farmer's wife had seen them
cross the lake that way." No bees had been seen by the men of Châlet.
One of them said, however, "bees had been very plenty about the blossoms
for a day or two." The farmer began to look about closely, and from the
unusual number of bees coming and going among the flowers on the hill,
he felt sure his honeybees were lodged somewhere near. So, with Mr.
Cooper, much interested, the search for the lost swarm began. A young
grove skirted the cliffs; above were scattered some full, tall, forest
trees,--here and there one charred and lifeless. The farmer seemed very
knowing as to bees, and boasted of having one of the largest bee-sheds
in the county. Rustic jokes at his expense were made by the workmen.
They asked him which of the great tall trees his bees had chosen; they
wished to know, for they would like to see him climb it, as Mr. Cooper
had said that no axe should fell his forest favorites. The farmer nodded
his head and replied that there was no climbing nor chopping for him
that day--the weather was too warm; that he intended to call his bees
down--that was his fashion. Taking up his pail he began moving among the
flowers, and soon found a honey-bee sipping from the cup of a
rose-raspberry. He said he knew at once the face of his own bee, "to say
nothin' of the critter's talk"--meaning its buzzing of wings. A glass
with honey from the tin pail soon captured the bee: uneasy at first, it
was soon sipping the sweets. When quite satisfied it was set free, and
its flight closely followed by the farmer's eye. Another bee was found
on a head of golden-rod; it was served the same way but set free at an
opposite point from the first's release; this second flight was also
closely noted. Some twelve of the tiny creatures from the clover and
daisies were likewise treated, until the general direction of the flight
of all was sure. This "hiving the bees" by the air-line they naturally
took to their new home proved the farmer to be right, for an old,
half-charred oak-stub, some forty feet high and "one limb aloft was
their lighting-place, and there they were buzzing about the old blighted
bough." The farmer then went to his boat and brought back a new hive and
placed it not far from the old oak; he put honey about its tiny doorway
and strewed many flowers around it. With the sunset his bees had taken
possession of their new home, and by moonlight they were rowed across
the lake and placed beside the mother-swarm in the farmer's garden.
[Illustration: JUDGE BAZIL HARRISON OF KALAMAZOO, MICHIGAN.]
The author placed this incident in the "Prairie Round" of "The Oak
Openings." Its Indian Peter shows how Christian influences in time
triumph over revenge--the deadliest passion of the red-man's heart. On
New Year's Day, 1848, "The Oak Openings" was begun, and the following
spring saw it finished. This note appears in the author's diary:
"Saturday, January 1, 1848. Read St. John. No church. Weather very mild,
though snow fell in the night. Walking very bad, and I paid no visits
outside of the family. Had ---- at dinner. A merry evening with the
young people. Played chess with my wife. Wrote a little in 'Oak
Openings' to begin the year with."
Cooper was a born story-teller, and with a born sailor's love of salt
water could not for long keep from spinning tales of the sea. All of
which accounts for spirited and original "Jack Tier," which came from
his pen in 1848. The story was called at first "Rose Budd"--the name of
the young creature who is one of its important characters. But plain,
homely, hard-working "Jack," under a sailor's garb, following her
commonplace, grasping husband the world over, and finding herself in
woman's gear and grief by his side when he made his last voyage of all
without her--it is she who had _earned_ the real heroine's right to the
name "Jack Tier." It is a story of the treacherous reefs off Florida and
the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
All those quiet years in Cooperstown the author kept pace in mind and
interest with the times, and often gave expression to his opinion on
current events. Of General Scott in Mexico he wrote, February 1, 1848:
"Has not Scott achieved marvels! The gun-thunders in the valley of the
Aztecs were heard in echoes across the Atlantic." Years before this the
last chapter of "The Spy" paid tribute to the "bravery of Scott's
gallant brigade" in 1814, at Lundy's Lane, not far from Niagara. That
Cooper strongly condemned Scott's "General Order" is another record of
later years.
Reform--along all lines of service--was Cooper's watchword; his
home-cry, first and last, was to "build up our navy!" And, with his
knowledge of naval affairs and accurate estimate of seamen of all
grades, what an admirable secretary of our navy these qualifications
would have made him! His political instincts seemed clear and unerring.
April 13, 1850, he thought "Congress a prodigious humbug; Calhoun's
attitude another," as was also Webster's answer, which, however, had
"capital faults." From almost a seer and a prophet came in 1850 these
words: "We are on the eve of great events. Every week knocks a link out
of the chain of the Union." This was written to a dear and valued friend
of South Carolina, to whom a few months later he further wrote: "The
Southerns talk of fighting Uncle Sam,--that long-armed, well-knuckled,
hard-fisted old scamp, Uncle Sam." And among the dearest of his
life-long friends stood this "Southern" Commodore, William Branford
Shubrick. Yet in close quarters, "he would rather have died than lied to
him." His standards of honesty were as rock-hewn; and his words on his
friend Lawrence perhaps apply as aptly to himself: "There was no more
dodge in him than there was in the mainmast."
[Illustration: HON. GERRIT SMITH.]
During some years prior to 1850, political party issues on
"Anti-slavery," grew from mild to violent. And famous in the annals of
Cooperstown was the spirited debate, between Mr. Cooper, for
colonization, and his friend, the Hon. Gerrit Smith, for immediate
abolition. This vital question of national interest was given able and
exhaustive treatment by both debaters who spoke several hours while "The
audience listened with riveted attention." At its close the two
gentlemen walked arm in arm to the "Hall," Cooper's home, where they
dined together.
From Mr. Keese comes an anecdote of Commodore Shubrick's visit to his
old shipmate at Cooperstown: "Mr. Cooper had a raw Irishman in his
employ, as a man of all work. Sending him to the post-office one day for
the mail, he told him to ask if there were any letters for Commodore
Shubrick. Pat came to the window and with great confidence called out,
'Is there any letter for Commodore Brickbat?' 'Who?' said the astonished
postmaster. The name was repeated. A villager coming in at that time,
the postmaster asked him if he knew who was visiting Mr. Cooper.
'Commodore Shubrick,' was the reply. 'All, that's the name!' said Pat;
'and sure, didn't I come near it, though!'"
[Illustration: WILLIAM BRANDFORD SHUBRICK.]
Possibly the sailing of Sir John Franklin in 1845 for the frozen country
of the North Star led Fenimore Cooper to write "The Sea Lions," in the
winter of 1849. When the Highlands were white, and its tree-life hoary
with frost, the author could pen best his picture of a voyage to the
ice-bergs, rifts, and snow-drifts, for which his two schooners, both
called _The Sea Lion,_ were launched.
In the early years of his married life Cooper made many visits to the
island home of a relative, by marriage, who, off the eastern shore of
Long Island, led a half-sea life that was full of attraction for the
young sailor. This gentleman only, his family and dependents, lived on
Shelter Island, between which and the mainland all coming and going was
by boat. Here they had shooting, fishing, and cruising a-plenty. The
author's thorough knowledge of these waters was the probable reason for
starting his two sealers from this port in search of valuable
sealing-grounds in the polar seas. The schooners and their captains were
American. One of the sealers was owned by an old, hard-fisted miser of
Puritanic pattern, whose sweet niece Mary, pretty and simply good, makes
the very lovable heroine of this book. Beneath the low porch and within
the thrifty garden and great orchard of her island home, Mary's heart
had been captured by Roswell Gardner, the daring young captain of her
uncle's schooner _The Sea Lion_. In the faith of the Star and the Cross
the young girl worshipped with strong and childlike piety, while her
lover "stood coldly by and erect with covered head,"--a doubter, but
honestly striving to find his balance. Mary prays and hopes while the
young man sails to the far-away ice land, where, shipwrecked and alone
with his Maker, he finds the light of Truth shining for him on the
far-away shores of his frozen hold. Of this sea tale Professor Lounsbury
writes: "'The Sea Lions' is certainly one of the most remarkable
conceptions that it ever entered into the mind of a novelist to create."
And he adds: "It is a powerful story."
"Ways of the Hour" came from Cooper's pen in 1850. The purpose of this
story was to attack trial by jury.
From the time of Cooper's friendship with Charles Mathews in the early
1820's, he had been in touch with the stage, and in June, 1850, he
mentions writing a three-act play in "ridicule of new notions." The
title was "Upside Down; or, Philosophy in Petticoats"--a comedy. Of this
play Cooper's friend Hackett, the American Falstaff of that day, wrote
him: "I was at Burton's its first night and saw the whole of the play.
The first act told well; the second, pretty well, but grew heavy; the
third dragged until the conclusion surprised the attention into _warm
applause_."
[Illustration: JAMES H. HACKETT.]
This clever but not over-successful farce closed the literary career of
James Fenimore Cooper.
[Illustration: CHARLES MATHEWS.]
Of Charles Mathews, the peerless comedy artist of England, and Fenimore
Cooper, his old-time friend, Dr. John Wakefield Francis, wrote:
"During a memorable excursion made to Albany with [the actor] Dunlap,
Mathews, and Mr. Cooper in the spring of 1823, I found him abounding in
dramatic anecdotes as well as associations the striking scenery of the
Hudson brought to mind. 'The Spy' was, however, the leading subject of
Mathews' conversation. Cooper unfolded his intention of writing a series
of works illustrative of his country, revolutionary occurrences, and the
red man of the western world. Mathews expressed in strong terms the
patriotic benefits of such an undertaking, and complimented Cooper on
the specimen already furnished in Harvey Birch. The approbation of
Mathews could never be slightly appreciated. There was little of
flattery in him at any time. He was a sort of 'My Lord Lofty,' who
valued himself in pride of opinion. Such an individual could not but
enlist the feelings of Mr. Cooper. I hardly know whether I have ever
seen Mr. Cooper manifest as much enthusiasm with any other person when
occasion was felicitous, the subject of interest, and the comedian in
his happy vein. Dunlap, were he speaking, might tell you of his
[Cooper's] gratuities to the unfortunate playwright and the dramatic
performer." In 1832 William Dunlap's "History of the American Theatre"
was "Dedicated to James Fenimore Cooper Esq., by his Friend, the
Author."
It was in this year of 1850 that the author's daughter, Susan Augusta,
had her "Rural Hours" about ready to print. And of this book her father
wrote: "It will be out in July. There is elegance, purity, knowledge,
and grace about it. It will make her _the_ Cooper at once. Quite puts
her papa's nose out of joint." More, concerning this book and New York
City of that day, appears in her father's letter to her mother, written
in that city at the Broadway Hotel, September 19, 1850.
BROADWAY HOTEL, September 19, 1850.
MY BELOVED S,--The post office is sadly out of joint. I wrote you
the day I arrived.... Right and left I hear of "Rural Hours." I am
stopped in the street a dozen times a day to congratulate me. The
price of the fine edition is $7.00. It will be the presentation
volume of the season. I can see that Putnam expects to sell some
eight hundred or a thousand of them.... The improvements here are
wonderful. They build chiefly of brown freestone and noble edifices
of five and six stories with a good deal of architectural
pretension.... I sat three times for lithographs yesterday and with
vastly better success than before. The pictures are all very like
and very pleasing. I am to have one which will fall to your lot as
a matter of course. Your letter of Tuesday reached me this morning.
You ought to have had three letters from me by Tuesday evening.
F.'s [the author's daughter Frances] shawl went by "A." I suppose
it is a courting shawl. It is almost the only one of the kind
Stewart had--a little too grave perhaps but scarcely so for the
country. Stewart is making a palace of a store. He takes the whole
front of the block on Broadway with fifteen windows in front--and
all of marble. With the tenderest regards to all, I remain yours
Most affectionately, J.F.C.
[Illustration: STEWART'S MARBLE PALACE.]
[Illustration: MISS SUSAN AUGUSTA COOPER ABOUT 1850.]
Miss Cooper makes alive each season's charms, as they pass over the
Glimmerglass and wane beyond Hannah's Hill. From gentry to
humble-folk, real Cooperstown types appear and disappear among these
pages; and even the "half-a-dozen stores" have place, where "at the same
counter you may buy kid gloves and a spade; a lace veil and a jug of
molasses; a satin dress and a broom," among other things of even greater
variety. She tells how St. Valentine's Day was celebrated in a very
original way as _Vrouwen-Daghe_, or women's day of the old Dutch
colonists.
[Illustration: OTSEGO LAKE PARTY IN 1840.]
She also records that first lake party to Point Judith, given by her
grandfather, Judge Cooper, in August, 1799, but leaves the description
of her father's lake parties to Mr. Keese: "He was fond of picnic
excursions on the lake, generally to the _Three Mile Point_, and often
with a party of gentlemen to Gravelly, where the main treat was a
chowder, which their host made up with great gusto. He could also brew a
bowl of punch for festive occasions, though he himself rarely indulged
beyond a glass of wine for dinner." Concerning these festivities Mr.
Keese adds: "Lake excursions until 1840 were made by a few private boats
or the heavy, flat-bottomed skiff which worthy Dick Case kept moored at
the foot of Fair Street. But Dick's joints were too stiff to row more
than an easy reach from the village; to the Fairy Spring was the usual
measure of his strength. The Three Mile Point was the goal of the best
oarsmen. Dick's successor in the thirties was an ugly horse-boat that in
1840 gave place to the famous scow of Joe Tom and his men, which for
twenty years took picnic parties to the Point. A president of our
country, several governors of the State, and Supreme Court judges were
among these distinguished passengers. Doing such duty the scow is seen
in the 1840 pictures of Cooperstown. No picnic of his day was complete
without famous 'Joe Tom,' who had men to row the scow, clean the fish,
stew potatoes, make coffee, and announce the meal. Rowing back in the
gloaming of a summer's night, he would awake the echoes of Natty
Bumppo's Cave for the pleasure of the company." At times a second echo
would return from Hannah's Hill, and a third from Mt. Vision.
[Illustration: JOE TOM.]
[Illustration: NATTY'S CAVE.]
Between the lines can be read the hearty and cheery author's pleasure in
all this merriment, yet, none the less, life's shadows exacted full
attention, as the following shows: "Cooper took a generous and active
part in sending relief to the starving people of Ireland; for, March 8,
1847, James Fenimore Cooper heads his town committee, and, 'in the name
of charity and in obedience to the commands of God,' he urges an appeal
'from house to house, for _Food_ is wanting that we possess in
abundance.'"
"Cooper would admit of no denial of principle but could be lenient to
offenders. One day he caught a man stealing fruit from his garden.
Instead of flying into a passion, he told him how wrong it was to make
the neighbors think there was no way of getting his fruit but by
stealing it, and bid him the next time to come in at the gate and ask
for it like a true man. Cooper then helped him to fill his basket and
let him go." The author's fine fruit trees must have been tempting!
One day while walking in the garden with some ladies, Mr. Cooper led the
way to a tree well laden with fine apples. Unable to reach them, he
called to a boy in the street, and presenting him to his friends as one
of the best boys in the village,--one who never disturbed his fruit,--he
lifted the little fellow up to the branches to pick apples for the
guests, and then filled his pockets as a reward for his honesty, and
promised him more when he came again. The delighted boy waited for a few
days and then repeated his visit to the tree, but forgetting to ask
permission. Not knowing him from frequent intruders, Mr. Cooper's high
voice from a distance, added to the savage barking of his watch-dog,
frightened the well-meaning forager into a resolve that he would not
forget the easier way next time of first asking before picking.
[Illustration: OTSEGO HALL--BACK VIEW.]
The author's genuine interest in his hometown folk never waned. Among
the many and sincere expressions of his good-will were the free lectures
he gave to the villagers. His descriptions of naval actions were full
of vigor. On the blackboard he presented fleets, changing their
positions, moving ship after ship as the contest went on, at the same
time stating the facts in history and using his cane as a pointer.
[Illustration: JAMES FENIMORE COOPER.]
It is of note that Mr. Cooper's personal appearance in 1850 was
remarkable. He seemed in perfect health and highest energy and activity
of faculties, but the autumn of this year found him in New York City
under mild ailments. His friend, Mr. George Washington Green, regretted
not noting better his last talk with the author about this time, of
which he says: "He excused himself that morning at Putnam's for not
rising to shake hands. 'My feet,' said he, 'are so tender that I do not
like to stand longer than I can help.' Yet when we walked together into
Broadway, I could not help turning now and then to admire his commanding
figure and firm bearing. Sixty years seemed to sit lightly on him. After
a short stroll we went to his room at the _Globe_ and sat down to talk.
I never found him so free upon his own works and literary habits. He
confessed his partiality for Leather stocking. Said he: 'I meant to have
added one more scene and introduced him in the Revolution, but I
thought the public had had enough of him, and never ventured it.'"
[Illustration: THE SWEDISH NIGHTINGALE (JENNY LIND).]
Cooper's enjoyment of the marvelous voice of "The Swedish Nightingale,"
as Jenny Lind was called, the publication of his daughter's "Rural
Hours," and the active progress of his own book sales are noted in his
letter to his beloved wife.
BROADWAY HOTEL, Friday, Nov. 15, 1850.
MY DEAREST W.,--Julia and Miss Thomas came down with me to hear
Jenny Lind. "Have you heard Jenny Lind?" "How do you like Jenny
Lind?" are the questions which supplant "Fine weather to-day" and
other similar comprehensive remarks. I am patiently waiting for the
"Lake Gun" [a magazine article]. I am well and shall commence in
earnest next week. Tell Sue [his daughter] I have seen Putnam, who
will be delighted to publish her new book. "Naval History" is a
little slack for the moment. There are less than a hundred copies
of second edition on hand and the third must be shortly prepared.
The fine edition will be published to-morrow. About two hundred
copies have been sent to the trade and with that issue he will
start. He has had five and twenty copies done up in papier machia
at $9.00. N---- is well. D.Z. is still here. Old Peter is not yet
married, but the affair is postponed until Spring, when the bride
and groom will return to America. They wish to prolong the
delightful delusion of courtship. I hope they may be as happy as we
have been and love each other as much forty--days after their union
as we do forty years.... Yours J.F.C.
[Illustration: JENNY LIND AT CASTLE GARDEN, NEW YORK CITY, 1850.]
At No. 1 Bond Street stood the old-time mansion of Dr. John W. Francis,
where were welcomed many eminent in arts and letters at home and abroad,
and where their host wrote his "Reminiscences of Sixty Years." Here it
was that Cooper, on his last visit to New York, came seeking aid for his
failing health. But with December the author returned to Cooperstown,
whence he wrote a friend: "I have gone into dock with my old hulk, to be
overhauled. Francis says I have congestion, and I must live low,
deplete, and take pills. While I am frozen, my wife tells me my hands,
feet, and body are absolutely warm. The treatment is doing good. You
cannot imagine the old lady's delight at getting me under, in the way of
food. I get no meat, or next to none, and no great matter in
substitutes. This morning being Christmas, I had a blow-out of oysters,
and at dinner it will go hard if I do not get a cut into the turkey. I
have lost pounds, yet I feel strong and clearheaded. I have had a narrow
escape, if I have escaped."
[Illustration: DR JOHN WAKEFIELD FRANCIS.]
[Illustration: DR. FRANCIS'S HOME IN NEW YORK CITY.]
The following spring Cooper again went to New York City, whence he dates
a letter to his wife:
Saturday, March 29, 1851
COLLEGE HOTEL, NEW YORK
Your letter of Thursday has just reached me. I am decidedly
better.--Last night I was actually dissipated. L.---- came for me
in a carriage and carried me off almost by force to Doctor
Bellows, where I met the Sketch Club, some forty people, many of
whom I knew. I stayed until past ten, ate a water ice, talked a
great deal, returned, went to bed fatigued and slept it off.--My
friends are very attentive to me, they all seem glad to see me and
think I am improving, as I certainly am.... I shall come home
shortly--I want to be in my garden and I wish to be in your dear
hands, love, for though you know nothing you do a great deal that
is right. Last evening I passed with Charlotte M.--who wanted to
take me home to nurse me. There is no chance of seeing S.----.
Adieu, my love.... My blessing on the girls--all four of them.
J.F.C.
In April, 1851, the poet Bryant wrote of him "Cooper is in town, in ill
health. When I saw him last he was in high health and excellent
spirits." These spirits were not dashed by the progressing malady that
took him home to Cooperstown. Not realizing what illness meant, he
bravely accepted what it brought,--the need to dictate the later parts
of his "History of the United States Navy," and the "Towns of
Manhattan," when he himself could no longer write. The latter was
planned, partly written, and in press at the time of his death. That
which was printed was burnt, the manuscript in part rescued, and
finished by the pen of one of the family.
It was Fenimore Cooper's happiness to be blessed with a family whose
greatest pleasure was to supply his every needed comfort; and one of his
daughters was ever a companion in his pursuits, the wise and willing
writer of his letters and dictations, and the most loving, never-tiring
nurse of his latter days. Of these last months there is a pretty
child-record by a friend who, "entering without notice," one day saw Mr.
Cooper "lying at full length on the parlor floor, with a basket of
cherries by his side. Upon his chest, vainly trying to bestride the
portly form, sat his little grandson, to whom he passed cherries, and
who, in turn, with childish glee, was dropping them, one by one, into
his grandfather's mouth. The smiles that played over the features of
child and man during this sweet and gentle dalliance were something not
easily forgotten. A few months after this both child and man had passed
beyond 'the smiling'; aye, and 'the weeping,' too."
Letters from Cooperstown led Dr. Francis to go there August 27, 1851, to
see his esteemed friend in his own home. And of Cooper the Doctor
wrote: "I explained to him the nature of his malady--frankly assured him
that within the limits of a week a change was indispensable to lessen
our forebodings of its ungovernable nature. He listened with fixed
attention.--Not a murmur escaped his lips. Never was information of so
grave a cast received by any individual in a calmer spirit."
So passed the summer days of 1851 with the author, near his little lake,
the Glimmerglass, and its Mt. Vision, when one mid-September Sunday
afternoon, with his soul's high standard of right and truth undimmed,
James Fenimore Cooper crossed the bar.
While from youth Cooper was a reverent follower of the Christian faith,
his religious nature deepened with added years. Eternal truth grew in
his heart and mind as he, in time, learned to look above and beyond this
world's sorrows and failures. In July, 1851, he was confirmed in
Christ's Church,--the little parish church just over the way from the
old-Hall home, whose interests he had faithfully and generously served
as sometime warden and as vestryman since 1834.
[Illustration: CHRIST'S CHURCH, COOPERSTOWN, N.Y.]
Of one such service Mr. Keese writes that in 1840 the original Christ's
Church of Cooperstown underwent important alterations. Its entire
interior was removed and replaced by native oak. As vestryman Mr. Cooper
was prime mover and chairman of the committee of change, and hearing of
the chancel screen in the old Johnstown church, first built by Sir
William Johnson, he took a carpenter and went there to have drawings
made of this white-painted pine screen, which at his own expense he had
reproduced with fine, ornamental effect in oak, and made it a gift to
Christ's Church. It was removed from Christ's Church about 1891, badly
broken and abandoned. This so disturbed Cooper's daughters that his
grandson, James Fenimore Cooper of Albany, New York, had the pieces
collected, and stored them for using in his Cooperstown home; but he--by
request of the Reverend Mr. Birdsall--had them made into two screens for
the aisles of the church, where they were erected as a memorial to his
father, Paul Fenimore, and his great-grandfather, Judge William Cooper.
[Illustration: FENIMORE COOPER'S SCREEN GIFT.]
Mr. Keese's words, dating January, 1910, are: "And now comes in a rather
singular discovery made by the writer a few days ago: In looking over a
book in my library, published about ninety years ago, there is an
article on Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire, England, with a steel
engraving of the front of the Abbey, which is almost identical with the
design of the original screen in Christ Church. Who was responsible for
transplanting the same to this country appears to be unknown, but the
fact is interesting in that Newstead Abbey was the home of the Byron
family and that of Lord Byron."
In a letter of April 22, 1840, to H. Bleeker, Esq., Cooper wrote of this
screen: "I have just been revolutionizing Christ's Church, Cooperstown,
not turning out a vestry but converting its pine interior into
oak--_bona fide_ oak, and erecting a screen that I trust, though it may
have no influence on my soul, will carry my name down to posterity. It
is really a pretty thing--pure Gothic, and is the wonder of the country
round."
Of Cooper himself was said: "Thus step by step his feet were guided into
the ways of peace." It was of the Protestant Episcopal church that his
wife's brother, William Heathcote de Lancey--a genius of goodness--was
bishop.
[Illustration: BISHOP WILLIAM HEATHCOTE DE LANCEY.]
A beautiful, tender, and touching tribute to the love of his life was
Fenimore Cooper's will. In part it reads: "I, James Fenimore Cooper,
give and bequeath to my wife, Susan Augusta, all my property, whether
personal or mixed, to be enjoyed by her and her heirs forever. I make my
said wife the executrix of my will."
In a little over four months his wife followed him to the far country.
Of his children, Elizabeth, the first-born, died in infancy; Susan
Augusta, the author, was the second; the third, Caroline Martha, became
Mrs. Henry Frederick Phinney; next came Anne Charlotte, then Maria
Frances, who married Richard Cooper; Fenimore, the first son, they lost
in babyhood, and Paul Fenimore, the youngest, became a member of the bar
in Albany, New York.
[Illustration: THE DE LANCEY ARMS.]
Cooper left his family a competency, but the Hall home soon passed into
other hands; later it was burnt. From rescued brick an attractive house
was built on the west bank of the Susquehanna for his daughters Susan
Augusta and Anne Charlotte, both now resting near father and mother in
Christ's Church yard. Their niece, Miss Susan Augusta Cooper, daughter
of their sister, Maria Frances, Mrs. Richard Cooper, now lives in this
picturesque house, and there she reverently treasures many personal
belongings of her famous grandfather, and also those of her
author-aunt, Susan Augusta Cooper, whose best memorial, however, is the
noble orphanage on the river-bank some ways below. The oaken doors saved
from the flames of the burning Hall served for this new home, which
overlooked the grounds of their old home. The site of the latter is
marked by Ward's "Indian Hunter." Aptly placed, peering through mists of
green toward the author's church-yard grave, he is a most fitting
guardian of the one-time garden of Fenimore Cooper.
[Illustration: THE NEW HOME AND THE OLD HOME.]
[Illustration: INDIAN HUNTER.]
By the generosity of the late Mrs. Henry Codman Potter, this hunter's
domain has been transformed into beautiful "Cooper Grounds"; and here
the red-man of bronze keeps ward and watch over memories that enshrine
the genius of a noble soul whose records of this vanishing race are for
all time.
[Illustration: COOPER GROUNDS.]
A gentleman just from continental Europe in 1851 said of people there:
"They are all reading Cooper." A traveler, returned from Italy about
that time, wrote: "I found all they knew of America--and that was not a
little--they had learned from Cooper's novels." When an eminent
physician who was called to attend some German immigrants asked how they
knew so much of their new-home country, they replied: "We learned it all
from Cooper. We have four translations of his works in German, and we
all read them." February 22, 1852, Charles G. Leland of Philadelphia
wrote of Cooper's works: "There were several translations issued at
Frankfort, Germany, in 1824, in two hundred and fifty parts, a second
large edition in 1834, and a third in 1851. All his works, more than
Scott and Shakespeare, are household words to the German people."
Library records of to-day show no waning of this early popularity of
the "Leatherstocking Tales" and "Sea Stories" of Fenimore Cooper. In
1883 Victor Hugo told General Wilson that excepting the authors of
France, "Cooper was the greatest novelist of the century." It was Balzac
who said: "If Cooper had succeeded in the painting of character to the
same extent that he did in the painting the phenomena of nature, he
would have uttered the last word of our art."
From Hanau-on-Main, Germany, January, 1912, Herr Rudolf Drescher writes:
"Within two years two new translations of Cooper's complete works have
been issued. One at Berlin, the other at Leipsic. 180 pictures by the
artist Max Slevogt held one edition at $192, the other with less
pictures was $60, and both were sold. Cheaper editions without pictures
also met with large sales. I possess an 1826, German copy of 'The
Pioneers.'" Another record is, Cooper's works have been seen "in thirty
different countries, in the languages of Finland, Turkey and Persia, in
Constantinople, in Egypt, at Jerusalem, at Ispahan."
The author's literary cruise, dating back three years before the
launching of "The Pilot" in 1823, was a long one. And no admiral of
mortal fame ever led so sturdy and motley a fleet--from the proud
man-of-war to the light felucca, gondola, and bark-canoe--over ocean and
inland waters. With visions of forests, its moving spirit and skilful
pilot still stands at the helm, the full light of the ages upon "eye,
arm, sail, spar, and flag." Thus is Fenimore Cooper firmly anchored in
the mind and heart of posterity as the creator of American romance.
August, 1907, "Historic Cooperstown" held her Memorial Celebration. Her
founder, Judge William Cooper, his hardy pioneers, and the "memory of
one whose genius had given her Glimmerglass country world-wide fame,"
were honored with world-wide tributes. Among these were addresses,
heartfelt, and able, from the late Bishop Henry Codman Potter, on "The
Religious Future"; Francis Whiting Halsey, on "The Headwaters of the
Susquehanna"; George Pomeroy Keese, on "Early Days of Cooperstown," and
James Fenimore Cooper of Albany, New York, on his great-grandfather
"William Cooper."
From "The Cooperstown Centennial" one learns that at five o'clock on
Wednesday afternoon of August 7 many people were reverently taking part
in solemn services around the grave of James Fenimore Cooper and beneath
the glinting tree-shadows of Christ's Church yard. The service began
with a procession of young girls in white surrounding the author's last
resting-place, where verses on Cooper were recited by Miss Wilkinson;
then the little folk sang the lyric tribute of Mr. Saxton:
0, great magician, may the life
We lead be such a one as thine--
A simple life, transcending art,
A spirit close to Nature's heart,
A soul as strong and clear, and fine.
[Illustration: THE CHILDREN'S TRIBUTE.]
After singing, the children, gathering around, covered the marble slab
with their tributes--the flowers of the season. Some poetic pictures in
blank verse were given of Cooper's works, by the Reverend Dr. W.W.
Battershall of St. Peter's Church in Albany, New York, the present
rector, and successor of Doctor Ellison, Cooper's boyhood instructor.
Then the Rev. Ralph Birdsall, rector of the author's "little parish
church," spoke of Fenimore Cooper's church-yard home: "A marble slab
that bears no praise for fame or virtue; only a simple cross, symbol of
the faith in which he lived and died, and upon which he based his hopes
of immortality." The soldier lying near, brought from the field of
honor; the author's old neighbors, who exchanged with him in life the
friendly nod; hands that were calloused with the axe and shovel, and
Judge Temple's aged slave in narrow home--all sleeping beneath the same
sward and glancing shadows are not less honored now than is the plain,
unpolished slab of stone, bearing two dates,--of birth and entrance into
the life eternal of James Fenimore Cooper.
On his airy height of the "Cooper Memorial," gleaming white through the
lakewood slope of Mt. Vision, wondrous Leatherstocking stands, a rare
tribute to simple, uplifting goodness. Clad in his hunting-shirt,
deerskin cap, and leggings, his powder-horn and bullet-pouch swung over
his shoulder, his dog Hector at his feet, looking up with speaking
expression into the fine, wise, honest face of his master, stands Natty,
gazing over all the lake he loved so well.
[Illustration: LAKE OTSEGO.]
---- o'er no sweeter lake
Shall morning break or noon-cloud sail;
No fairer face than thine shall take
The sunset's golden veil.
J.G. WHITTIER.
"Cooper had no predecessor and no successor in his own field of
fiction; he stood alone,--he was a creator, and his 'Natty' will stand
forever as the most original of pioneer characters," wrote Henry M.
Alden.
[Illustration: LEATHERSTOCKING.]
With Rev. Mr. Birdsall, many think the time has come when the fame of
Fenimore Cooper demands a world-given memorial in Cooperstown. A
lifelike statue from an _artist's_ chisel should show the "'prose poet
of the silent woods and stormy seas' seated, pen in hand, gazing
dreamily for inspiration over the Glimmerglass, where the phantom
creatures of his genius brood." Let it stand, a new-world literary
shrine, in the square fronting the Old-Hall home site, which northward
commands a sweeping view of his "little lake" and a side glimpse of
lofty Leatherstocking of the tree-tops--not far away.
[Illustration: LEATHERSTOCKING MONUMENT.]
And strewn the flowers of memory here.
For one whose fingers, years ago,
Their work well finished, dropped the pen;
Whose master mind from land to sea
Drew forms heroic, long to be
The living types of vanished men.
A.B. SAXTON.
[Illustration: GEORGE POMEROY KEESE.]
IN MEMORIAM
GEORGE POMEROY KEESE
On April 22, 1910, and at the home of his son, Theodore Keese, in New
York City, came the Spirit-Land call to the late George Pomeroy Keese.
It was also in New York City that he was born, on January 14, 1828. His
parents were Theodore Keese and Georgiann Pomeroy, niece of James
Fenimore Cooper. This grand-nephew of the author enjoyed four score and
more of full, active years, mostly spent in Cooperstown, N.Y., and he
gave of them generously in serving the welfare and interests of that
village. There Edgewater, Mr. Keese's attractive home, overlooks, from
the south, the entire length and beauty of Lake Otsego, whose waters and
banks are haunted by Cooper's creations.
From Mr. Keese is quoted:
"George Pomeroy of Northampton, Mass., came to Cooperstown among the
early settlers in 1801. He married the only living sister of Fenimore
Cooper in 1803.
"His ancestry dates back to the coming of William the Conqueror from
Normandy in 1066. At this time Ralph de Pomeroy accompanied the Norman
duke to England and rendered him such valuable assistance that he
received from him no fewer than fifty-eight lordships in Devonshire as a
reward for his services. Selecting a favorable site, not far from the
banks of the river Dart, Ralph de Pomeroy erected thereon the celebrated
stronghold that now bears the family name of Berry-Pomeroy Castle, the
stately ruins of which are still visited as one of the most picturesque
objects of interest in the county of Devon.
"The descendants of the founder of Berry-Pomeroy retained the lands
belonging to their ancestral home until the time of Edward VI, when at
the period of the rebellion of that date they were seized by the crown
and bestowed upon the haughty Lord Protector Somerset in whose family
they still remain."
October 10, 1849, Mr. Keese married Caroline Adriance Foote, daughter of
Surgeon Lyman Foote, U.S.A., who, with seven of their children, survives
her husband. From childhood Mrs. Keese well knew Fenimore Cooper.
From his tender years to the age of twenty-four Mr. Keese lived in close
touch with the author until his death in 1851. Afterwards such near
association, affection and ability made Mr. Keese a veritable stronghold
of authentic values concerning this grand-uncle. After his five years
of patient, careful direction given to the preparation of this
_personal_ life of James Fenimore Cooper, the spirit of George Pomeroy
Keese passed to the Land of Everlasting Light.
As a traveled, scholarly, wise, and gentle man, Mr. Keese kept in live
pace with current events, and he possessed that strong, rare quality of
character which "says little and does much," and compels esteem and
devotion from all human kind.
Amongst Mr. Keese's various writings is "The Historic Records of
Christ's Church, Cooperstown, N.Y." The rector, Reverend Ralph Birdsall,
has written of its author: "At the altar of Christ's Church abides the
secret that made Mr. Keese a man so widely honored and beloved."
MARY E. PHILLIPS.
[Illustration: RUINS OF BERRY-POMEROY CASTLE, 1825.]
INDEX
"Afloat and Ashore," 305
Albany, N.Y., 4, 8, 27-31, 38, 62, 104, 120, 123, 345
Alden, Henry M, 355
Allen, James, 34-35
"American Democrat, The," 272
d'Angers, Pierre Jean David, 144-146
"Autobiography of a Pocket Handkerchief, The," 293
Baillie, Joanna, 183
Balzac, 60, 276, 278, 350
Bancker, Richard, Mrs. (Sarah Duyckinck), 88-89
Bancroft, George, 117
Barnstable, 43
Battershall, W.W., 353
Belgium, 184, 244-247
Bella Genovese, the, 290-293
Benedict, Mrs. Clare, 22-23
Benjamin, Park, 273, 275
Béranger, 151
de Berri, Duchesse, 153
Birdsall, Rev. Ralph, 86, 342, 353-355
Bleeker, H., 343
Bonaparte, Princess Charlotte, 205
Bonaparte, Madame Letizia, 205, 293
Bonaparte, Napoleon I, 44, 137, 192, 244, 292
Bonaparte, Napoleon Louis, Count St Leu, 204-205, 207
Booth, Junius Brutus, 90
Box, Newport, 159
"Bravo, The," 225-229, 259
Bread and Cheese Club, 95-9, 185
Bryant, Julia, 301-302
Bryant, W.C., 84, 105, 110-113, 128, 238, 278, 338
Buffalo, N.Y., 52-56
Burlington, N.J., xii, 1, 2, 8, 60
Canning, George, 139
Case, Dick, 327-328
Cave, Harvey Birch's, 81
"Chainbearer, The," 307-308
Champlain, Lake, 60
Charles X of France, 153, 234
Chauncey, Capt. Isaac, 138
Chauntry, Sir Francis, 174-176
Clay Henry, 131
Clinton, De Witt, 75
Clinton, Gen. James, 104
Cole, Thomas, 278
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 183
Columbus, 281-282
Cooper, Ann, Cooper's sister _See Mrs. Geo. Pomeroy._
Cooper, Anne Charlotte, daughter, 16, 344-345
Cooper, Caroline Martha, 344
Cooper, Elizabeth, daughter, 71-72, 344
Cooper, Elizabeth Fenimore, mother, 2, 3, 64, 71-73
Cooper, Fenimore, son, 88, 100, 345
Cooper, Hannah, sister, 13-19
Cooper, Isaac, brother, 20, 72
Cooper, James, great-great-grandfather, 2.
Cooper, James Fenimore.
Accuracy, 106, 109, 115-118, 123, 127, 277, 282, 288-290;
ancestry, 2-4;
birth, 1;
boyhood, 12, 13, 19, 23-35, 39;
courage, 259, 273, 308;
death, 340;
honors, public, 99, 111-112, 114, 131, 192, 281;
prices of works, 276-277, 350;
industry, 43, 114;
generosity, 57, 105-106, 219, 329, 332;
screen gift, 340-343;
love of art, 198, 203, 239-240;
marriage, 68;
name, change of, 2, 119-120;
naval officer, 53-70;
patriotism, 64, 79, 185, 232, 243, 258-260, 273;
personality, 12, 49, 111-112, 149-152, 259, 267, 269, 280-281.
Portraits:
bust by d'Angers, 145;
bust by Greenough, 198-200;
daguerreotype by Brady, 279, 333;
in oil by Jarvis, 91, 146;
in oil by Madame de Mirbel, 143;
Paris drawing (1827), 148;
Yale silhouette, 39;
sailor, the, 42-48;
translations of works, 350.
Cooper, James Fenimore, grandson, x, 3-5, 342, 351.
Cooper, Maria Frances, daughter, 324, 342-345.
Cooper, Paul Fenimore, son, 100, 214, 216-217, 243, 342, 345.
Cooper, Richard Fenimore, brother, 20, 26, 62, 72.
Cooper, Richard Fenimore, nephew, 344, 345.
Cooper, Susan Augusta, wife, 63-65, 68, 71-72, 77, 98, 124-125, 132,
146-147, 154, 165-166, 247, 250, 264, 268, 314, 323-324, 334-338,
343-344.
Cooper, Susan Augusta, daughter, 13, 54, 71, 139, 142, 220, 243, 265,
268, 282, 314, 323-327, 334-335, 344-345, 347.
Cooper, Susan Augusta, granddaughter, 345, 347.
Cooper, William, father, 2, 4-11, 16, 34, 36, 42, 53, 62, 101, 103, 112,
342, 351.
Cooper, William, nephew, 142, 193.
Cooperstown, N.Y., xi, 15, 33, 69, 71, 274, 296-299, 315, 317, 328, 336,
338-348, 351-354.
Châlet Farm, 296-299, 311-314, 327.
"Chronicles of," 34, 102.
Fenimore Farm home, 71-72.
Manor, The, 8, 9, 103.
Otsego Hall, 8, 9, 16, 100, 261-265, 300, 317, 340, 345-347.
Otsego Lake, 4, 5, 6, 18-21, 27-28, 71, 104, 261, 265, 276, 282-286,
296, 324-328, 340, 356.
Three-Mile Point, 270-272, 327-328.
Cory, Master Oliver, 23-25.
"Crater, The," 308-309.
Croghan, Geo., xii.
Crosby, Enoch, 80, 86.
Dana, Richard Henry, 96, 111, 201.
"Deerslayer, The," 5, 282-286.
DeKay, James E., 93, 95.
Drake, Joseph Rodman, 92-93.
Drescher, Rudolf, 350.
Dunlap, William, 322-323.
Dwight, Timothy, 36, 37.
_Edinburgh Review, The_, 110.
Elba, 291-293.
Elliott, Jesse D., 287-289.
Ellison, Dr. Thomas, 28-33, 35, 353.
England, 2, 44, 111, 115-118, 169-172, 277, 305.
Erie, Lake, Battle of, 293-294, 306.
"Excursions in Italy," 210.
Fenimore, Elizabeth. _See Mrs. Wm. Cooper_.
Fenimore, Richard, 2, 262.
Fenimore box, 3.
Florence, Palazzo Ricasoli, 197-198.
Florence, Villa St. Illario, 206-208.
Floyd, Elizabeth, 67.
Floyd, Col. Richard, 67.
France, 135, 157, 168-169, 228, 237, 243.
Francis, Dr. J.W., 186, 278, 322, 336-337, 339-340.
Frey, Heindrick, 11, 12.
Galitzin, Princess, 139-140, 164-166.
Gelsomina, 226-228.
George, Lake, 120, 125-126.
Germany, 228, 247, 251, 253-255, 349-350.
Gibraltar, 46.
"Gleanings in Europe," 236, 270.
Glens Fall, 122-124.
Goodrich, A.T., 78.
_Graham's Magazine_, 287, 293, 305, 308.
Greeley, Horace, 273, 275.
Green, Geo. Washington, 149-152, 332.
Greenough, Horatio, 198-203, 268.
Grey, Charles, Earl, 181.
Hackett, James H., 321.
Hall, J.E., 84.
Hall, Mrs. Sarah, 84.
Halleck, Fitz-Greene, 90, 92-93, 95.
Halsey, Francis Whiting, 351.
Harrison, Judge Bazil, 313.
Harrison, William Henry, 14-16.
"Headsman, The," 257.
Heathcote, Hon. Caleb, 66.
Heidelberg and Castle, 253-254.
"Heidenmauer, The," 252.
Hell Gate, 100, 124, 176, 307.
Holland, 180, 183-184.
Holland House, 45, 177-180.
Holland, Lady, 176, 180.
Holland, Lord, 178-180.
"Home as Found," 272, 276.
"Homeward Bound," 272.
Hooper, Dr. Joseph, 29.
Howe, M.A. DeWolfe, 274.
Hudson River, The, 93, 120-121.
_Hudson_, The, 132-133.
Hugo, Victor, 350.
Huntington, Daniel, 112-113.
Irish, Mr., 109-110.
Irving, Washington, 84, 90, 112-113, 138-139, 176, 278.
Isle of Wight, 44, 133-134.
Italy, 197-268.
Jarvis, John Wesley, 91-95.
Jay, John, Chief Justice, 32, 41, 77-78, 80, 259.
Jay (Mary Duyckinck), Mrs. Peter, 88-89.
Jay, William, 32, 34, 41.
Johnston, Capt. John, 43-44, 46.
Jones, John Paul, 108-109, 294-295.
Kean, Edmund, 90.
Keese, George Pomeroy Keese, ix, x, xi, 7, 19, 21, 264, 267, 274, 296,
317, 327-328, 340, 342-343, 351, 357.
Keese, Mrs. Geo. Pomeroy Keese, 300-301, 357.
Kent, Chancellor James, 95, 131-132.
King, Charles, 95, 114.
_Knickerbocker Magazine_, 162.
Lafayette, General, 114-116, 137, 142, 149-157, 166-169, 233-237.
de Lancey, Edward Floyd, 29.
de Lancey and his seal, Lieut. Gov. James, 65-66.
de Lancey, John Peter, 63-64, 66-67.
de Lancey, Stephen, 65, 67.
de Lancey, Susan Augusta. _See Mrs. J.F. Cooper_.
de Lancey, Bishop Wm. Heathcote, 68, 343-344.
Lawrence, Capt. James, 1, 60-61, 63, 316.
Lawrence, Sir Thomas, 182.
Leatherstocking, 5, 19, 59, 100-101, 120, 123-130, 162-164, 189-190,
243, 278, 282, 322, 332-384.
Leghorn, 211-212.
Leland, Charles G., 349.
Leopold II of Tuscany, 202-204.
Leslie, Charles Robt., 177-178, 182.
"Letter to his Countrymen, A," 267.
Lind, Jenny, 334-335.
"Lionel Lincoln," 115-118.
Lockhart, John Gibson, 161-162, 182.
Lockhart, Mrs. Sophia Scott, 181-182.
London, 44-45, 47, 134, 170-184, 186, 210.
Louis Philippe, 234-236.
Lounsbury, Thomas R., 237, 288-290, 307, 320.
Luscomb, Archbishop, 240.
McLane, Mr. Louis, 235-236.
Mackenzie, Lieut. Alex. Slidell, 305-306.
Mackintosh, Sir James, 177, 182, 232.
Mahan, Capt. A.T., 287.
Marie Amélie, 236-237.
Mathews, Charles, 320-322.
Matthews, Brander, 110, 126, 130, 229.
"Mercedes of Castile," 281-282.
Mickieowicz, Adam, 218-219.
"Mohicans, The Last of the," 269.
Monroe, Mrs. Elizabeth, 119.
Montague, Wortley, 120, 126.
Morris, Geo. P., 90, 93.
Morse, Samuel F.B., 95, 239, 243, 262.
Myers, Ned, 45, 49, 265, 286, 299.
"Myers, Ned," 48-49.
Naples and Bay, 212-213, 259-260.
"Naval History Dispute," 287-288.
"Naval Officers, Lives of Distinguished," 308.
"Navy, History of the United States," 48, 277-278, 288-290, 305, 338.
Nelson, Judge Samuel, 265, 266.
Newport, R.I., 158-159, 198.
_News, Illustrated London_, 162.
New York City, 67-128, 131-132, 259-269, 323-324.
Burn's Coffee House, 67-68.
Castle Garden, 114-115, 335.
City Hotel, 67, 93, 95.
Fraunces Tavern, 67.
Homes, Cooper's:
Beech St., 98-99.
Bleeker St., 260, 269.
Broadway, 88, 90, 98.
Greenwich St., 128, 130.
St. Mark's Place, 272-276.
Theatres:
Burton's, 321.
Lafayette, 87.
Park, 90.
Washington Hall, 95.
Niagara Falls, 56, 309-310, 315.
North, Christopher, 96, 259.
"Notions of Americans," 185.
"Oak Openings, The," 314.
Oaken Bucket, The Old, 93-95.
_Oneida, The_, 53-54, 56.
Ontario, 54, 123.
Oswego, N.Y., 53.
_Otsego Herald_, 17, 18, 33, 51, 101.
Paris, 136, 137-138, 184, 210, 228, 232-243, 248.
Parkman, Francis, 126.
"Pathfinder, The," 59-60, 278, 282, 283-284.
Perry, Oliver Hazard, 287, 293, 305.
"Pilot, The," 62, 106-111, 351.
"Pioneers, The," 54, 74, 105, 111, 258.
Pomeroy, Mr. and Mrs. George, 18, 21-23.
_Post, The Evening_, 111.
"Prairie, The," 59, 129-130, 138, 162-164, 258.
"Precaution," 74, 77-78.
Putnam, George P., 112-113, 335.
_Putnam's Magazine_, 238.
Quoi de Mesereau, Mon. Le, 102.
"Recollections of Europe," 135, 157, 168.
"Red Rover, The," 62, 98, 118, 146, 156, 158, 160, 198, 238.
"Red Skins, The," 308.
"Rhine, Excursions up the," and Rhine Country, 244, 247-255.
Rogers, Samuel, 45, 174-176, 178, 180-183.
Rome, 216-220.
Home in, 218.
Ruins, 218-220.
St. Peter's, 216-218.
Sailor's Snug Harbor, 48-49.
"Satanstoe," 306-307.
Saxton, A.B., 352-356.
Scott, Miss Anne, 141-142, 182.
Scott, Sir Walter, 76-77, 139-143, 160-162, 182.
Scott, Gen. Winfield, 315.
"Sea Lions, The," 318-320.
Shubrick, Wm. B., 62, 109-110, 316-319.
"Sketches of England," 32, 270, 286.
Smith, Gerrit, 317.
_Somers_, The, 305-306.
Sorrento, 213-215, 227-228.
Southby, William, 183.
Spencer, John C., 305.
"Spy, The," 74, 83-87, 100, 111, 258, 315.
Stanley, Hon. E.G. (Lord Derby), 120, 123, 126, 127.
_Stirling_, The, 43-44, 46-48.
Switzerland, 186-196.
St. Bernard, Hospice and Pass of, 257-258.
Bridge, Devil's, 193-195.
Homes, Cooper's:
_La Lorraine_, Berne, 187, 189, 191.
_Mon Repose_, Vevay, 255.
Cooper's book: "Sketches in Switzerland."
"Switzerland, Sketches in," 269-270.
"Tales for Fifteen," 105-107.
Talleyrand, Charles Maurice de, 16-18, 108, 153-154.
Thackeray, Wm. M., 162.
"Tier Jack," 314-315.
Tom, Joe, 328-329.
End of Project Gutenberg's James Fenimore Cooper, by Mary E. Phillips
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