confess I am somewhat disposed to cherish. The Tappan Sea, in front of
the Roost, is about three miles wide, bordered by a lofty line of waving
and rocky hills. Often, in the still twilight of a summer evening, when
the sea is like glass, with the opposite hills throwing their purple
shadows half across it, a low sound is heard, as of the steady, vigorous
pull of oars, far out in the middle of the stream, though not a boat
is to be descried. This I should have been apt to ascribe to some boat
rowed along under the shadows of the western shore, for sounds are
conveyed to a great distance by water, at such quiet hours, and I can
distinctly hear the baying of the watch-dogs at night, from the farms on
the sides of the opposite mountains. The ancient traditionists of the
neighborhood, however, religiously ascribed these sounds to a judgment
upon one Rumbout Van Dam, of Spiting Devil, who danced and drank late
one Saturday night, at a Dutch quilting frolic, at Kakiat, and set off
alone for home in his boat, on the verge of Sunday morning; swearing he
would not land till he reached Spiting Devil, if it took him a month of
Sundays. He was never seen afterward, but is often heard plying his oars
across the Tappan Sea, a Flying Dutchman on a small scale, suited to
the size of his cruising-ground; being doomed to ply between Kakiat and
Spiting Devil till the day of judgment, but never to reach the land.
There is one room in the mansion which almost overhangs the river, and
is reputed to be haunted by the ghost of a young lady who died of love
and green apples. I have been awakened at night by the sound of oars and
the tinkling of guitars beneath the window; and seeing a boat loitering
in the moonlight, have been tempted to believe it the Flying Dutchman of
Spiting Devil, and to try whether a silver bullet might not put an end
to his unhappy cruisings; but, happening to recollect that there was a
living young lady in the haunted room, who might be terrified by the
report of fire-arms, I have refrained from pulling trigger.
As to the enchanted fountain, said to have been gifted by the wizard
sachem with supernatural powers, it still wells up at the foot of the
bank, on the margin of the river, and goes by the name of the Indian
spring; but I have my doubts as to its rejuvenating powers, for though
I have drank oft and copiously of it, I cannot boast that I find myself
growing younger.
GEOFFREY CRAYON.
* * * * *
SLEEPY HOLLOW.
BY GEOFFREY CRAYON, GENT.
HAVING pitched my tent, probably for the remainder of my days, in the
neighborhood of Sleepy Hollow, I am tempted to give some few particulars
concerning that spell-bound region; especially as it has risen to
historic importance under the pen of my revered friend and master, the
sage historian of the New Netherlands. Beside, I find the very existence
of the place has been held in question by many; who, judging from its
odd name and from the odd stories current among the vulgar concerning
it, have rashly deemed the whole to be a fanciful creation, like the
Lubber Land of mariners. I must confess there is some apparent cause for
doubt, in consequence of the coloring given by the worthy Diedrich to
his descriptions of the Hollow; who, in this instance, has departed
a little from his usually sober if not severe style; beguiled, very
probably, by his predilection for the haunts of his youth, and by a
certain lurking taint of romance whenever any thing connected with the
Dutch was to be described. I shall endeavor to make up for this amiable
error on the part of my venerable and venerated friend by presenting the
reader with a more precise and statistical account of the Hollow; though
I am not sure that I shall not be prone to lapse in the end into the
very error I am speaking of, so potent is the witchery of the theme.
I believe it was the very peculiarity of its name and the idea of
something mystic and dreamy connected with it that first led me in my
boyish ramblings into Sleepy Hollow. The character of the valley seemed
to answer to the name; the slumber of past ages apparently reigned over
it; it had not awakened to the stir of improvement which had put all the
rest of the world in a bustle. Here reigned good, old long-forgotten
fashions; the men were in home-spun garbs, evidently the product of
their own farms and the manufacture of their own wives; the women were
in primitive short gowns and petticoats, with the venerable sun-bonnets
of Holland origin. The lower part of the valley was cut up into small
farms, each consisting of a little meadow and corn-field; an orchard
of sprawling, gnarled apple-trees, and a garden, where the rose, the
marigold, and the hollyhock were permitted to skirt the domains of the
capacious cabbage, the aspiring pea, and the portly pumpkin. Each had
its prolific little mansion teeming with children; with an old hat
nailed against the wall for the housekeeping wren; a motherly hen, under
a coop on the grass-plot, clucking to keep around her a brood of vagrant
chickens; a cool, stone well, with the moss-covered bucket suspended
to the long balancing-pole, according to the antediluvian idea of
hydraulics; and its spinning-wheel humming within doors, the patriarchal
music of home manufacture.
The Hollow at that time was inhabited by families which had existed
there from the earliest times, and which, by frequent intermarriage, had
become so interwoven, as to make a kind of natural commonwealth. As
the families had grown larger the farms had grown smaller; every new
generation requiring a new subdivision, and few thinking of swarming
from the native hive. In this way that happy golden mean had been
produced, so much extolled by the poets, in which there was no gold and
very little silver. One thing which doubtless contributed to keep up
this amiable mean was a general repugnance to sordid labor. The sage
inhabitants of Sleepy Hollow had read in their Bible, which was the only
book they studied, that labor was originally inflicted upon man as a
punishment of sin; they regarded it, therefore, with pious abhorrence,
and never humiliated themselves to it but in cases of extremity. There
seemed, in fact, to be a league and covenant against it throughout
the Hollow as against a common enemy. Was any one compelled by dire
necessity to repair his house, mend his fences, build a barn, or get in
a harvest, he considered it a great evil that entitled him to call in
the assistance or his friend? He accordingly proclaimed a 'bee' or
rustic gathering, whereupon all his neighbors hurried to his aid like
faithful allies; attacked the task with the desperate energy of lazy men
eager to overcome a job; and, when it was accomplished, fell to eating
and drinking, fiddling and dancing for very joy that so great an amount
of labor had been vanquished with so little sweating of the brow.
Yet, let it not be supposed that this worthy community was without its
periods of arduous activity. Let but a flock of wild pigeons fly across
the valley and all Sleepy Hollow was wide awake in an instant.
The pigeon season had arrived. Every gun and net was forthwith in
requisition. The flail was thrown down on the barn floor; the spade
rusted in the garden; the plough stood idle in the furrow; every one was
to the hillside and stubble-field at daybreak to shoot or entrap the
pigeons in their periodical migrations.
So, likewise, let but the word be given that the shad were ascending the
Hudson, and the worthies of the Hollow were to be seen launched in boats
upon the river setting great stakes, and stretching their nets like
gigantic spider-webs half across the stream to the great annoyance
of navigators. Such are the wise provisions of Nature, by which she
equalizes rural affairs. A laggard at the plough is often extremely
industrious with the fowling-piece and fishing-net; and, whenever a man
is an indifferent farmer, he is apt to be a first-rate sportsman. For
catching shad and wild pigeons there were none throughout the country to
compare with the lads of Sleepy Hollow.
As I have observed, it was the dreamy nature of the name that first
beguiled me in the holiday rovings of boyhood into this sequestered
region. I shunned, however, the populous parts of the Hollow, and sought
its retired haunts far in the foldings of the hills, where the Pocantico
"winds its wizard stream" sometimes silently and darkly through solemn
woodlands; sometimes sparkling between grassy borders in fresh, green
meadows; sometimes stealing along the feet of rugged heights under
the balancing sprays of beech and chestnut trees. A thousand crystal
springs, with which this neighborhood abounds, sent down from the
hill-sides their whimpering rills, as if to pay tribute to the
Pocantico. In this stream I first essayed my unskilful hand at angling.
I loved to loiter along it with rod in hand, watching my float as it
whirled amid the eddies or drifted into dark holes under twisted roots
and sunken logs, where the largest fish are apt to lurk. I delighted
to follow it into the brown accesses of the woods; to throw by my
fishing-gear and sit upon rocks beneath towering oaks and clambering
grape-vines; bathe my feet in the cool current, and listen to the summer
breeze playing among the tree-tops. My boyish fancy clothed all nature
around me with ideal charms, and peopled it with the fairy beings I
had read of in poetry and fable. Here it was I gave full scope to my
incipient habit of day dreaming, and to a certain propensity, to weave
up and tint sober realities with my own whims and imaginings, which has
sometimes made life a little too much like an Arabian tale to me, and
this "working-day world" rather like a region of romance.
The great gathering-place of Sleepy Hollow in those days was the church.
It stood outside of the Hollow, near the great highway, on a green bank
shaded by trees, with the Pocantico sweeping round it and emptying
itself into a spacious mill-pond. At that time the Sleepy Hollow
church was the only place of worship for a wide neighborhood. It was
a venerable edifice, partly of stone and partly of brick, the latter
having been brought from Holland in the early days of the province,
before the arts in the New Netherlands could aspire to such a
fabrication. On a stone above the porch were inscribed the names of the
founders, Frederick Filipsen, a mighty patroon of the olden time, who
reigned over a wide extent of this neighborhood and held his seat of
power at Yonkers; and his wife, Katrina Van Courtlandt, of the no less
potent line of the Van Courtlandts of Croton, who lorded it over a great
part of the Highlands.
The capacious pulpit, with its wide-spreading sounding-board, were
likewise early importations from Holland; as also the communion-table,
of massive form and curious fabric. The same might be said of a
weather-cock perched on top of the belfry, and which was considered
orthodox in all windy matters, until a small pragmatical rival was set
up on the other end of the church above the chancel. This latter bore,
and still bears, the initials of Frederick Filipsen, and assumed great
airs in consequence. The usual contradiction ensued that always exists
among church weather-cocks, which can never be brought to agree as to
the point from which the wind blows, having doubtless acquired, from
their position, the Christian propensity to schism and controversy.
Behind the church, and sloping up a gentle acclivity, was its capacious
burying-ground, in which slept the earliest fathers of this rural
neighborhood. Here were tombstones of the rudest sculpture; on which
were inscribed, in Dutch, the names and virtues of many of the first
settlers, with their portraitures curiously carved in similitude of
cherubs. Long rows of grave-stones, side by side, of similar names,
but various dates, showed that generation after generation of the same
families had followed each other and been garnered together in this last
gathering-place of kindred.
Let me speak of this quiet grave-yard with all due reverence, for I owe
it amends for the heedlessness of my boyish days. I blush to acknowledge
the thoughtless frolic with which, in company with other whipsters, I
have sported within its sacred bounds during the intervals of worship;
chasing butterflies, plucking wild flowers, or vying with each other
who could leap over the tallest tomb-stones, until checked by the stern
voice of the sexton.
The congregation was, in those days, of a really rural character. City
fashions were as yet unknown, or unregarded, by the country people
of the neighborhood. Steam-boats had not as yet confounded town with
country. A weekly market-boat from Tarry town, the "Farmers' Daughter,"
navigated by the worthy Gabriel Requa, was the only communication
between all these parts and the metropolis. A rustic belle in those days
considered a visit to the city in much the same light as one of our
modern fashionable ladies regards a visit to Europe; an event that may
possibly take place once in the course of a lifetime, but to be hoped
for, rather than expected. Hence the array of the congregation was
chiefly after the primitive fashions existing in Sleepy Hollow; or if,
by chance, there was a departure from the Dutch sun-bonnet, or the
apparition of a bright gown of flowered calico, it caused quite a
sensation throughout the church. As the dominie generally preached by
the hour, a bucket of water was providently placed on a bench near the
door, in summer, with a tin cup beside it, for the solace of those who
might be athirst, either from the heat of the weather, or the drouth of
the sermon.
Around the pulpit, and behind the communion-table, sat the elders of the
church, reverend, gray-headed, leathern-visaged men, whom I regarded
with awe, as so many apostles. They were stern in their sanctity, kept
a vigilant eye upon my giggling companions and myself, and shook a
rebuking finger at any boyish device to relieve the tediousness of
compulsory devotion. Vain, however, were all their efforts at vigilance.
Scarcely had the preacher held forth for half an hour, on one of his
interminable sermons, than it seemed as if the drowsy influence of
Sleepy Hollow breathed into the place; one by one the congregation sank
into slumber; the sanctified elders leaned back in their pews, spreading
their handkerchiefs over their faces, as if to keep off the flies; while
the locusts in the neighboring trees would spin out their sultry summer
notes, as if in imitation of the sleep-provoking tones of the dominie.
I have thus endeavored to give an idea of Sleepy Hollow and its church,
as I recollect them to have been in the days of my boyhood. It was in
my stripling days, when a few years had passed over my head, that I
revisited them, in company with the venerable Diedrich. I shall never
forget the antiquarian reverence with which that sage and excellent man
contemplated the church. It seemed as if all his pious enthusiasm for
the ancient Dutch dynasty swelled within his bosom at the sight.
The tears stood in his eyes, as he regarded the pulpit and the
communion-table; even the very bricks that had come from the mother
country, seemed to touch a filial chord within his bosom. He almost
bowed in deference to the stone above the porch, containing the names
of Frederick Filipsen and Katrina Van Courtlandt, regarding it as the
linking together of those patronymic names, once so famous along the
banks of the Hudson; or rather as a key-stone, binding that mighty Dutch
family connexion of yore, one foot of which rested on Yonkers, and the
other on the Groton. Nor did he forbear to notice with admiration, the
windy contest which had been carried on, since time immemorial, and with
real Dutch perseverance, between the two weather-cocks; though I could
easily perceive he coincided with the one which had come from Holland.
Together we paced the ample church-yard. With deep veneration would
he turn down the weeds and brambles that obscured the modest brown
grave-stones, half sunk in earth, on which were recorded, in Dutch, the
names of the patriarchs of ancient days, the Ackers, the Van Tassels,
and the Van Warts. As we sat on one of the tomb-stones, he recounted to
me the exploits of many of these worthies; and my heart smote me, when I
heard of their great doings in days of yore, to think how heedlessly I
had once sported over their graves.
From the church, the venerable Diedrich proceeded in his researches up
the Hollow. The genius of the place seemed to hail its future historian.
All nature was alive with gratulation. The quail whistled a greeting
from the corn-field; the robin carolled a song of praise from the
orchard; the loquacious catbird flew from bush to bush, with restless
wing, proclaiming his approach in every variety of note, and anon would
whisk about, and perk inquisitively into his face, as if to get a
knowledge of his physiognomy; the wood-pecker, also, tapped a tattoo on
the hollow apple-tree, and then peered knowingly round the trunk, to
see how the great Diedrich relished his salutation; while the
ground-squirrel scampered along the fence, and occasionally whisked his
tail over his head, by way of a huzza!
The worthy Diedrich pursued his researches in the valley with
characteristic devotion; entering familiarly into the various cottages,
and gossiping with the simple folk, in the style of their own
simplicity. I confess my heart yearned with admiration, to see so great
a man, in his eager quest after knowledge, humbly demeaning himself
to curry favor with the humblest; sitting patiently on a three-legged
stool, patting the children, and taking a purring grimalkin on his lap,
while he conciliated the good-will of the old Dutch housewife, and drew
from her long ghost stories, spun out to the humming accompaniment of
her wheel.
His greatest treasure of historic lore, however, was discovered in an
old goblin-looking mill, situated among rocks and waterfalls, with
clanking wheels, and rushing streams, and all kinds of uncouth noises.
A horse-shoe, nailed to the door to keep off witches and evil spirits,
showed that this mill was subject to awful visitations. As we approached
it, an old negro thrust his head, all dabbled with flour, out of a hole
above the water-wheel, and grinned, and rolled his eyes, and looked like
the very hobgoblin of the place. The illustrious Diedrich fixed upon
him, at once, as the very one to give him that invaluable kind of
information never to be acquired from books. He beckoned him from his
nest, sat with him by the hour on a broken mill-stone, by the side of
the waterfall, heedless of the noise of the water, and the clatter
of the mill; and I verily believe it was to his conference with this
African sage, and the precious revelations of the good dame of the
spinning-wheel, that we are indebted for the surprising though true
history of Ichabod Crane and the headless horseman, which has since
astounded and edified the world.
But I have said enough of the good old times of my youthful days; let me
speak of the Hollow as I found it, after an absence of many years,
when it was kindly given me once more to revisit the haunts of my
boyhood. It was a genial day, as I approached that fated region. The
warm sunshine was tempered by a slight haze, so as to give a dreamy
effect to the landscape. Not a breath of air shook the foliage. The
broad Tappan Sea was without a ripple, and the sloops, with drooping
sails, slept on its grassy bosom. Columns of smoke, from burning
brush-wood, rose lazily from the folds of the hills, on the opposite
side of the river, and slowly expanded in mid-air. The distant lowing
of a cow, or the noontide crowing of a cock, coming faintly to the ear,
seemed to illustrate, rather than disturb, the drowsy quiet of the
scene.
I entered the hollow with a beating heart. Contrary to my apprehensions,
I found it but little changed. The march of intellect, which had
made such rapid strides along every river and highway, had not yet,
apparently, turned down into this favored valley. Perhaps the wizard
spell of ancient days still reigned over the place, binding up the
faculties of the inhabitants in happy contentment with things as they
had been handed down to them from yore. There were the same little farms
and farmhouses, with their old hats for the housekeeping wren; their
stone wells, moss-covered buckets, and long balancing poles. There were
the same little rills, whimpering down to pay their tributes to the
Pocantico; while that wizard stream still kept on its course, as of old,
through solemn woodlands and fresh green meadows: nor were there wanting
joyous holiday boys to loiter along its banks, as I have done; throw
their pin-hooks in the stream, or launch their mimic barks. I watched
them with a kind of melancholy pleasure, wondering whether they were
under the same spell of the fancy that once rendered this valley a fairy
land to me. Alas! alas! to me every thing now stood revealed in its
simple reality. The echoes no longer answered with wizard tongues; the
dream of youth was at an end; the spell of Sleepy Hollow was broken!
I sought the ancient church on the following Sunday. There it stood, on
its green bank, among the trees; the Pocantico swept by it in a deep
dark stream, where I had so often angled; there expanded the mill-pond,
as of old, with the cows under the willows on its margin, knee-deep in
water, chewing the cud, and lashing the flies from their sides with
their tails. The hand of improvement, however, had been busy with the
venerable pile. The pulpit, fabricated in Holland, had been superseded
by one of modern construction, and the front of the semi-Gothic
edifice was decorated by a semi-Grecian portico. Fortunately, the two
weather-cocks remained undisturbed on their perches at each end of the
church, and still kept up a diametrical opposition to each other on all
points of windy doctrine.
On entering the church the changes of time continued to be apparent. The
elders round the pulpit were men whom I had left in the gamesome frolic
of their youth, but who had succeeded to the sanctity of station of
which they once had stood so much in awe. What most struck my eye was
the change in the female part of the congregation. Instead of the
primitive garbs of homespun manufacture and antique Dutch fashion,
I beheld French sleeves, French capes, and French collars, and a
fearful-fluttering of French ribbands.
When the service was ended I sought the church-yard, in which I had
sported in my unthinking days of boyhood. Several of the modest brown
stones, on which were recorded in Dutch the names and virtues of the
patriarchs, had disappeared, and had been succeeded by others of white
marble, with urns and wreaths, and scraps of English tomb-stone poetry,
marking the intrusion of taste and literature and the English language
in this once unsophisticated Dutch neighborhood.
As I was stumbling about among these silent yet eloquent memorials of
the dead, I came upon names familiar to me; of those who had paid
the debt of nature during the long interval of my absence. Some, I
remembered, my companions in boyhood, who had sported with me on the
very sod under which they were now mouldering; others who in those days
had been the flower of the yeomanry, figuring in Sunday finery on the
church green; others, the white-haired elders of the sanctuary, once
arrayed in awful sanctity around the pulpit, and ever ready to rebuke
the ill-timed mirth of the wanton stripling who, now a man, sobered by
years and schooled by vicissitudes, looked down pensively upon their
graves. "Our fathers," thought I, "where are they!--and the prophets,
can they live for ever!"