1830.
The month of December, 1830, which saw the publication of "The Water
Witch," closed the first and far the most fortunate decade of Cooper's
literary life. In the decade which followed began that career of
controversy which lasted, with little intermission, until his death. By
it his reputation and his fortunes were profoundly affected. It worked a
complete revolution both in the sentiments with which he regarded others,
and in the sentiments with which others regarded him. The most intense
lover of his country, he became the most unpopular man of letters to
whom it has ever given birth. For years a storm of abuse fell upon him,
which for violence, for virulence, and even for malignity, surpassed
anything in the history of American literature, if not in the history of
literature itself. Nor did the effect of this disappear with his life.
The misrepresentations and calumnies, which were then set in motion,
have not ceased to operate even at this day. Full as marked, still, was
the influence which the controversies, in which he was engaged, had upon
his literary reputation. A direct result of them at the time was not
only to impair the estimation in which his previous writings had been
held, but to cause the later productions of his pen to be treated with
systematic injustice. Both in England and America the effect of this
hostile criticism has not yet died away.
On the other hand, it was no one-sided contest that took place. (p. 079)
If Cooper was attacked, he, in turn, did his part in attacking. No man
has ever criticised his own country more unsparingly, and in some
instances more unjustly, than did he, who, in foreign lands, had been
its stoutest and most pronounced defender. Nor, in the controversies
that followed his return from Europe, did one side conduct itself with
perfect righteousness, and the other with deliberate villainy. Had the
parties but seen fit to act in this manner, the duties of a biographer
would have been sensibly lightened. A fair and dispassionate account of
the circumstances that led to the unpopularity which clouded, though it
could hardly be said to darken, Cooper's later life, demands a full and
careful examination of many facts which, in some instances, seem to have
no relation to the subject. Especially is a knowledge of the European
estimate of America during the period that the novelist resided abroad a
matter of first importance. But even of as great importance is a
knowledge of certain traits of his character and of certain sentiments
which he strongly felt, and of certain beliefs which he earnestly held.
To bring out these points clearly, it is necessary for a while to arrest
the progress of the narrative.
It is to be remarked at the outset that the first impression which Cooper
made upon strangers was rarely in his favor. To this we have the
concurrent testimony of those who knew him slightly, and of those who
knew him well. It was due to a variety of causes. He had infinite pride,
and there was in his manner a self-assertion that often bordered, or seemed
to border, upon arrogance. His earnestness, moreover, was often mistaken
for brusqueness and violence; for he was, in some measure, of that (p. 080)
class of men who appear to be excited when they are only interested. The
result was that at first he was apt to repel rather than attract. Without
referring to other evidence, we need here only to quote the guarded
statement of one of his warmest friends in describing the beginning of
their acquaintance. "I remember," says Bryant, "being somewhat startled,
coming, as I did, from the seclusion of a country life, with a certain
emphatic frankness in his manner which, however, I came at last to like
and to admire." But besides this he had other characteristics which, to
the majority of men, could not be agreeable. Thoroughly grounded in his
own convictions, positive and uncompromising in the expression of them,
he had no patience with those--and the number is far from being a small
one--who embrace their views loosely, hold them halfheartedly, or defend
them ignorantly. The opinions of such he was not content, like most men of
ability, with quietly and unobtrusively despising. The contempt he felt he
did not pay sufficient deference to human nature to hide. It was inevitable
that the self-love of many should be offended by the arbitrariness and
imperiousness with which he overrode their opinions, and still more by
the unequivocal disdain manifested for them. It must be conceded, also,
that to those for whom he felt indifference or dislike, he had in no
slight degree that capacity of making himself disagreeable which
reaches, and then only in rare instances, the ripened perfection of
offensiveness in him who has breathed from earliest youth the social air
of England. These were traits that were sure to make him enemies in
private life. In public life, moreover, the ardor of his temperament was
such as to hurry him into controversy; and the number of those (p. 081)
hostile to him on personal grounds, was always liable to receive
accessions from men who had never seen him face to face. No gage of
battle could be thrown down which he did not stand ready to take up.
Opposition only inflamed him; it never daunted him. He had not the
slightest particle of that prudence which teaches a man to keep out of
contests in which he can gain no advantage, or in which success will be
only a little less disastrous than defeat. It hardly needs to be said
that a politic line of conduct is usually the very last which a person
of such a temperament follows. But when to all these characteristics is
added a peculiar sensitiveness to criticism, it is evident that if
proper opportunities are offered, personal unpopularity will be certain
to result from the ample materials existing for its development.
Against this view of his character, it is fair to add here that he had
many qualities which would tend to bring about an entirely opposite
result. He was more than ordinarily generous; and gave with a liberality
that went at times beyond what most men would look upon as prudence. He
was prompt to relieve merit that stood in need of help. Many cases of
this kind there are unpublished and unknown out of a very small circle;
for Cooper was not one to let his left hand know what his right hand was
doing. One fact, however, has been so often mentioned, that it is
violating no sanctity of private life to repeat it here. He was the
first to discover the excellence of Greenough and to make that sculptor
known to his countrymen. "Fenimore Cooper saved me from despair," wrote
the latter in 1833, "after my second return to Italy. He employed me as
I wished to be employed; and has up to this moment been a (p. 082)
father to me in kindness." To this generosity, it is to be added that
his sense of personal honor was of the loftiest kind. It was sometimes,
indeed, carried to an extreme almost Quixotic; so that men morally
fat-witted could not even comprehend his principles of action, and men
who contented themselves with conventional morality resented his
assertion of them as a reflection upon themselves. His loyalty to those
who had become dear to him was, moreover, just as conspicuous as his
loyalty to what he deemed right. It withstood every chance of change,
every accident of time and circumstance, and only gave way on absolute
proof of unworthiness. Intimate acquaintance was sure to bring to Cooper
respect, admiration, and finally affection. Few men have stood better
than he that final test of excellence which rests upon the fact that
those who knew him best loved him most. Yet even these were often forced
to admit, that it was necessary to know him well to appreciate how
generous, how true, and how lofty-minded he was.
Besides these traits of character, it is important to understand some of
Cooper's political and social opinions. He was an aristocrat in feeling,
and a democrat by conviction. To some this seems a combination so
unnatural that they find it hard to comprehend it. That a man whose
tastes and sympathies and station connect him with the highest class,
and to whom contact with the uneducated and unrefined brings with it a
sense of personal discomfort and often of disgust, should avow his
belief in the political rights of those socially inferior, should be
unwilling to deny them privileges which he claims for himself, is
something so appalling to many that their minds strive vainly to grasp
it. But this feeling was so thoroughly wrought into Cooper's (p. 083)
nature that he almost disliked those of his countrymen whom he found not
to share in it. "I confess," he wrote at the time when he was generally
denounced as an aristocrat, "that I now feel mortified and grieved when
I meet with an American gentleman who professes anything but liberal
opinions as respects the rights of his fellow-creatures." He went on to
explain that by liberal opinions he meant "the generous, manly
determination to let all enjoy equal political rights, and to bring
those to whom authority is necessarily confided under the control of the
community they serve." He despised the cant that the people were their
own worst enemies. So far from it, he believed in widening the
foundations of society by making representation as real as possible, and
thereby giving to every interest in the state its fair measure of power;
for no government, in his eyes, could ever be just or pure in which the
governors have interests distinct from those of the governed. These
opinions he put sometimes in an extreme form. "I have never yet been in
a country," he said, "in which what are called the lower orders have not
clearer and sounder views than their betters, of the great principles
which ought to predominate in the control of human affairs." At the same
time his belief in democracy was not in the least one of unmixed
admiration. He was far from looking upon it as a perfect form of
government. It was only the one that, taking all things into
consideration, was attended with fewer evils and greater advantages than
any other. It had faults and dangers peculiar to itself. His liberal
opinions, he took frequent care to say, had nothing in common with the
devices of demagogues who teach the doctrine, that the voice of (p. 084)
the people is the voice of God; that the aggregation of fallible parts,
acting, too, with diminished responsibilities, forms an infallible whole.
Along with this clear understanding of the advantages and disadvantages
of democracy there was mingled, however, a weakness of feeling on the
subject of position, which occasionally degenerated into an almost
ridiculous pettiness. This was especially true of his later life. His
utterances were sometimes so apparently contradictory, however, that it
is hard to tell whether justice has been done to his real meaning on
account of the difficulty of ascertaining what his real meaning was. But
he spoke often of "the gentry of America," as if there were or could be
here a class of gentlemen outside and independent of those engaged in
professions or occupations. He seemed at times to attach that supreme
importance to descent which we are usually accustomed to see exhibited
in this country only by those who have little or nothing else to boast
of. His contempt of trade and of those employed in it had frequently
about its expression a spice of affectation. Moreover, he subjected
himself to much misrepresentation and ill-will by the manner in which he
lectured his countrymen on the distinctions that must prevail in
society. There are certain things which are everywhere recognized and
quietly accepted: they only become offensive when proclaimed. A man may
unhesitatingly acquiesce in his inferiority, socially, to one who is
politically only his equal; but he will very naturally resent a
reference, by the latter, to the fact of his social inferiority. A good
deal of Cooper's later writings was deformed by solemn commonplaces on
the inevitable necessity of the existence of class distinctions. This
drew upon him the condemnation of many who did not look upon the (p. 085)
expression of such views as an offense against truth, but as an offense
against good manners. To correct the folly of fools was itself folly; and
wise men, no matter what their station in life, did not thank him for
the instruction, the very giving of which implied an insult to their
intelligence. His remarks on the subject were never heeded, if indeed
they were ever read, by those for whom they were specially designed. But
to his enemies they furnished ample opportunities for misrepresentation
and abuse.
But any account of Cooper would be of slight value that failed to take
notice of his love of country. No other man of letters has there been in
America, or perhaps in any other land, to whom this has been a passion
so absorbing. It entered into the very deepest feelings of his heart.
Even in the storm of calumny, which fell upon him in his later years, if
the flame of his patriotism seemed at times to die away, any little
circumstance was sure to revive it at once. No proclaimer of "manifest
destiny" ever had more faith than he in the imperial greatness and
grandeur to which the republic was to attain. All that in vulgar minds
took the shape of braggart boasting, was in his idealized and glorified
by his lofty conception of the majestic part which his country was to
play in deciding the destinies of mankind. In spite of short-comings he
deplored, of perils that he feared, firm in his heart was the conviction
that here was to be the home of the great new race that was to rule the
world. Other lands might look to the future with hope or doubt; his own
was as sure of it as if it lay already in its grasp. This was a
confidence that survived all changes, and despised all forebodings. The
question of slavery certainly disturbed him, but it did not shake (p. 086)
his trust. The prophecies of the dissolution of the Union, current
in Europe, he laughed to scorn. Even in the days of nullification his
faith never wavered one jot. To no one, more justly than to him, could
perpetual thanks have been voted, because he never despaired of the
republic.
Cooper's lofty views of his country he soon found were essentially
different from those entertained abroad. The knowledge of America even
now possessed in Europe is not burdensomely great. But in 1830 its
ignorance was prodigious; and the nearest approach to interest was
usually the result of something of that same vague fear which haunted
the citizens of the Roman Empire at the possible perils to civilization
that might lie hid in the boundless depths of the German forests. On the
Continent the ignorance was greater than it was in England, and Cooper
had plenty of opportunities of witnessing the exhibition of it. In the
case of the common people he was amused by it. That the whites who had
emigrated to America had not yet become entirely black; that it was
reasonable to expect that time, while it could not restore their original
hue to these deteriorated Europeans tanned to ebony, might in the
revolution of the suns elevate them to a fair degree of civilization;
these, and similar sage opinions, did not disturb him when uttered by the
philosophers of the lower classes. Yet their ignorance, great as it was,
he found not to surpass materially that of men who ought to have known
better, so long as they pretended to know at all. That the colonies had
been settled by convicts, was a common impression among the best educated.
While residing in Paris Cooper had the gratification of having his country
quoted in the French Chamber of Deputies as an example of the (p. 087)
possibility of forming respectable communities by the transportation of
criminals. Even men who sympathized with republican institutions, he
informs us, did not think of denying the fact; they denied merely the
inference. The brilliant publicist, Paul Courier, had asserted it would
be as unjust to reproach the modern Romans with being descendants of
ravishers and robbers, as it would be to reproach the Americans with
being descendants of convicts. All could not be expected, however, to be
so liberal as this constitutional reformer. The gross vices which in
foreign opinion distinguished the inhabitants of the United States, were
held to be the natural consequences of their settlement by felons.
Cooper subsequently took care to furnish the sons of the Puritans with
all needful information as to the light in which their fathers were
viewed in Europe. At the time, however, it was far different. Keenly
sensitive to his country's honor, and knowing the morals of his
countrymen to be far higher than those of the men of any other land,
derogatory statements of this kind were galling in the extreme.
But it was the English opinion that Cooper resented most bitterly. This
was partly because he believed from the community of origin and speech
it ought to be better informed, and partly because he looked upon it as
responsible for many of the absurd and erroneous impressions that
prevailed in the rest of Europe. His feelings were rendered still keener
by the direct contact with English prejudice which he had personally
during his residence abroad. The attitude of the Continent towards
America was that of supreme ignorance and indifference. But there was at
the time something besides that in the attitude of England, so far (p. 088)
certainly as it was represented by its periodical literature. In the
most favorable cases it was supercilious and patronizing, an attitude
which never permits the nation criticising to understand the nation
criticised. There was never any effort to penetrate into the real nature
of the social and political movements that were taking place on this
side of the water. Men were contented with the examination of mere
external phenomena, which, whether good or bad in themselves, belonged
to a period of growth and were certain to pass away. Not the slightest
sympathy existed with the feelings and aspirations of a people closely
allied in blood and speech, and the lack of desire involved the lack of
ability to enter into the spirit of their institutions. There was no
idea that there could be other types of character than those found on
British soil, or any room or reason for the play of other social and
political forces than were at work in British communities.
At the time, however, that Cooper took up his residence in Europe there
was more than supercilious indifference in the character of English
criticism. There was steady misrepresentation and abuse, due in a few
cases to design, in more to ignorance, in most to that disposition on
the part of all men to believe readily what they wish ardently. It made
little difference whether the writer were Whig or Tory. If anything the
open dislike of the latter was preferable to the patronizing regard of
the former. In 1804 the poet Moore visited America. He wrote home a
number of poetical epistles, in which he told his friends that he had
found us old in our youth and blasted in our prime. The demon gold was
running loose; everything and everybody was corrupt; truth, (p. 089)
conscience, and virtue were regularly made matters of barter and sale. A
succession of English travelers repeated from year to year the same
dismal story, and their statements were caught up and paraded and dwelt
upon in the English periodical press. In "The Quarterly Review," in
particular, our condition was constantly held up as an awful example of
the results of democratic institutions and universal suffrage. Certain
facts and predictions had been repeated so often that they came to be
accepted and believed by all. We spoke a dialect of the English tongue;
our manners were bad, if we could be said to have any at all; loyalty we
could know nothing about, because we had no king; religion we were
entirely devoid of, because there was no established church; the
federation was steadily tending towards monarchy; the wealthy were
longing to be nobles; and the Union could not last above a quarter of a
century. Worse than all, intrigue and bribery were sapping the national
life; or to use a still favorite phrase of the newspapers, though the
repetition of a hundred years has now made it somewhat stale, corruption
was preying upon the vitals of the republic.
There is not the slightest exaggeration in these statements. Their truth
any one familiar with the periodical literature of that period will
least of all doubt. There was a perfect agreement between those who
visited us and described us and those who drew their description from
their imaginations. Nothing distinguished the English traveler or the
English reviewer so much as his piety, and his profound conviction that
religion could not exist where it was not carefully watched over by an
established church. Besides this inevitable moral destitution, we (p. 090)
were irreclaimably given over to vulgarity. Manners there could not be
in a land abandoned to an unbridled democracy. In the most praiseworthy
instances even, men lacked that repose, that fine tact, which were found
universally in the higher orders in the mother country. The defect was
ineradicable, according to most; for it had its baleful origin in
popular institutions themselves. In justice it must be added that there
were some who, in consequence of the American passion for traveling,
entertained a mild hope that in time this rudeness would wear away, and
this total ignorance of good breeding would be enlightened by the polish
and refinement that would be picked up from the quantity to be found
scattered about foreign courts. The published correspondence of that
period is delicious in its frankness. The Englishman, writing to his
American friend, never descends from his lofty position of censor both
of great and petty morals. The inferiority of manners in this country is
a point insisted upon by the former with an assiduity and assurance that
are sufficient of themselves to make clear how high was the breeding to
which he himself had attained. It makes little difference who write the
letters. They all express the same sentiments. They all offer advice as
to the best method America can take to retrieve the good opinion of
Europe which it has lost. They are careful to say that they entertain
the kindest of feelings to the United States; that they neglect no
occasion of doing justice to the good and wise that had found there a
home. Unfortunately these are few in number; and with a lofty sense of
justice they never fail to express disapprobation in strong terms of the
vast amount to be condemned in a land which had fallen under the sway
of a reckless democracy and a godless church. One English (p. 091)
gentleman in the British military service, after being some time in this
country, writes, after his return, to an American friend, and thus
cheerfully records his impressions. "The frightful effects produced by
an unrestrained democracy," he says, "the demoralizing effects produced
by universal suffrage never appeared to me so odious as they do now by
contrast with the good breeding, the order and mutual support which all
give to each other in this country, from the highest to the lowest."
This letter belongs to the year 1839, and it only continues a line of
remark common for the half-century previous. Everything that came from
America, if praised at all, was praised with a qualification. Not a
compliment could be uttered of an individual without an implied
disparagement of the land that gave him birth. The record of every man
who was well received in English society will bear out this assertion.
Scott wrote to Southey in 1819, that Ticknor was "a wondrous fellow for
romantic lore and antiquarian research, _considering his country_." Even
words of genuine affection were often accompanied with an impertinence
which has a delightfulness of its own from the utter unconsciousness on
the part of the writer or speaker of having said anything out of the
way. They were compliments of the kind which intimated that the person
addressed was a sort of redeeming feature in a wild waste of desert.
"You have taught us," writes in 1840 Mrs. Basil Montagu to Charles
Sumner, "to think much more highly of your country--from whom we have
hitherto seen no such men."
There is nothing to be gained in raking over at this day the ashes of
dead controversies and revilings. Americans no longer read the (p. 092)
writings of the kind described, and Englishmen have largely forgotten
that they were ever written. The new commentators on our habits and
customs have taken up a new line of remark, and the new prophets of woe
foresee an entirely new class of calamities. But it has been necessary
to revive here the memory of the old charges and forebodings, in order
to show the state of feeling that would be developed by them in a man of
a peculiarly sensitive and proud nature, such as was the subject of this
biography. Rubbish as they may seem now, they were to the men of that
time a grievous sore. Whatever may have been Cooper's feelings previously,
it was not until after he had resided for a while in Europe that any
hostility towards England is seen in his works. But there it soon began
to manifest itself, though at first rather in the way of defense than
attack. As time went on it increased rather than diminished. It largely
affected his own fortunes by the personal hostility it provoked in
return. To some extent, without doubt, his oft-repeated declaration was
true, that in the dependence then existing here upon foreign opinion,
every American author held his reputation at the mercy of the British
reviewer. It would be unjust to say that it seemed at one period almost
as if Cooper had sworn towards England undying hate. But it is certainly
a fact that he gave utterance to his inmost feelings when he described
it as a country that cast a chill over his affections, a country that
all men respected but that few men loved. Yet he had been brought up in
the school of the Federalist party, in which admiration for the
literature, policy, and morals of the motherland was taught as a duty;
in which every door was thrown open to visitors from England as an act
of hospitality due to kinsmen separated merely by the accident of (p. 093)
position. He himself tells us how, an ardent boy of seventeen, he leaped
for the first time upon the soil of Great Britain, feeling for it a love
almost as devoted as that which he bore the land of his birth, and
looking upon every native of it in the light of a brother. It did not
take him long to find out that the fancied tie of kinship was not
recognized, that it was even despised; and that if he made friends, it
must be in spite of his country, and not because of it. His connection
with the navy had also led him to be keenly sensitive to the injustice
and indignities connected with the impressment of seamen. In his first
voyage in a merchant ship he had seen two native Americans taken from
the vessel and forced into the British service. His own captain even had
on one occasion been seized, though speedily liberated. There had also
been an attempt to press a Swede belonging to the crew, on the ground
that his country and England were in alliance, and the latter had
therefore a right to his help. These were not the acts to inspire
devotion towards the people who committed or who authorized them. The
keen resentment Cooper felt for the wrongs then perpetrated upon the
American marine he afterward expressed in his novels of "Wing-and-Wing"
and "Miles Wallingford." He never forgot those early experiences. When
he came to reside in Europe he was as little disposed to forgive the
depreciation of his country which he imputed, whether justly or
unjustly, to English influence. Distrust became dislike, and dislike
deepened into hostility.
There is little doubt that with a man of Cooper's nature the revulsion
from his original feelings would tend to swing him to the opposite
extreme; that, as a consequence of that, he would often fancy (p. 094)
insult where none was intended, and impute to design conduct that was
the result of chance or even of personal timidity. But making full
allowance for this inevitable source of error, there was plenty of
reason furnished for offense to a man whose personal pride was equal to
that of the whole British aristocracy, and whose pride in his country
exceeded even his personal pride. The ignorant criticism which amused
most Americans was apt to make him indignant. No compliment, in
particular, could be paid with safety to him individually at the expense
of his country. This was a practice, however, which the Englishmen of
that day seemed to regard as the consummate crown of adulation.
Depreciation of America of any sort he resented at once. If conversation
touched upon matters discreditable to the United States--which was far
from being an uncommon topic--it was very much his practice, instead of
listening to it patiently, to bring up matters discreditable to Great
Britain. There was unquestionably ample material on both sides with
which each could blacken the other. But while this tended to make the
conversation less monotonous, it likewise tended to make the converser
less popular. Cooper lost early by his bearing in English society much
of the favor which he had won from his writings. To this we have
positive evidence. It is specifically mentioned in the sketch of his
life, which along with his portrait appeared in 1831 in Colburn's "New
Monthly Magazine." The article went on, after mentioning this fact, to
pay a tribute to his somewhat aggressive patriotism. "Yet he seems," it
said, "to claim little consideration on the score of intellectual
greatness; he is evidently prouder of his birth than of his genius; and
looks, speaks, and walks as if he exulted more in being recognized (p. 095)
as an American citizen than as the author of 'The Pilot' and 'The Prairie.'"
To a man whose heart was thus full of the future glories of the
republic, the indifference and neglect with which it was regarded could
not but be galling. Still this was nothing to the positive contempt
which often manifested itself in social slights that could be felt but
could not well be resented. This was especially noticeable in the case
of the legations, the conduct of which was largely under the control of
the home government. The English policy was here in marked contrast to
that of Russia, which, even at that early day, cultivated almost
ostentatiously friendship with America. Between the legations of these
two countries there was always the best of understandings. The direct
contrary often prevailed between the ministers of Great Britain and of
the United States. The influence of the former was frequently thought to
be exerted to the social injury of the latter. Whether true or false,
this was generally believed. Cooper certainly credited it and looked
forward to the time when the whole attitude of England would be altered.
We were then less than twelve millions in population; but the day would
come when we should be fifty millions. The existing state of things
would then be changed. You and I may not live to see it, he wrote
substantially to his friends, but our sons and grandsons will. They may
not like us any better, but they will take care to hide their feelings.
Strong resentment sometimes drove him into taking up positions he would
not in his cooler moments have maintained. "As one citizen of the
republic," he wrote, "however insignificant, I have no notion of being
blackguarded and vituperated half a century and then cajoled (p. 096)
into forgetfulness at the suggestion of fear and expediency, as
circumstances render our good-will of importance." Not one of these
slights and insults would he have the fifty millions forget. He did not
bear in mind that fifty millions could not afford to remember. It was
like asking the man of middle life to revenge upon the sons the
indignities which the boy had received from the fathers.
Cooper's residence in England was only for a few months during the first
half of the year 1828. With his feelings towards that country and with
the feeling entertained in it toward his own, nothing could have made
his stay highly pleasant. But it is one of the numerous minor falsehoods
that came to be connected with his life, that it was unpleasant. On the
contrary, his company was sought by many of the most distinguished men,
though in accordance with his usual custom he carried no letters of
introduction. At a later period he said that in no country had he been
personally so well treated as in England; he was as strongly convinced
as his worst enemy, that as an author he had been extolled there beyond
his merits; nor had he failed to receive quite as much substantial
remuneration as he could properly lay claim to. But the social
atmosphere there prevailing was not the atmosphere he loved. The poet
Moore relates in his diary a story told him by Sydney Smith of the
"touchiness" of "the Republican"--so the American novelist is styled--as
evinced by the indignation of the latter at the conduct of Lord Nugent.
This nobleman, it appears, invited Cooper to take a walk with him to a
certain street. Arriving there he unceremoniously entered the (p. 097)
house of a friend and left his companion to make his way back alone.
Cooper's resentment of the treatment may have been unwisely shown; for
though often termed an aristocrat, he never exhibited in the slightest
degree that reticence which is or is supposed to be the peculiar
characteristic of aristocracy. But few would now be found to deny that
his indignation was both natural and just, and that the act of Lord
Nugent was the act of a boor and not of a gentleman. It was certainly
unreasonable to expect that a society which could rejoice in this method
of rebuking republican pretension could itself be agreeable to a
republican. Cooper could not but be offended by the prejudices he found
existing against his country and the dislike usually felt and sometimes
expressed for it. The only man he met whom he thought well informed
about America was Sir James Mackintosh. The ignorance of some of his
friends was so great that even to him it caused amusement rather than
anger. Many readers will have heard of the practice of "gouging," with
which, according to the veracious English traveler of early days, the
native American gave the charm of diversity and diversion to a life
whose serious thoughts were wholly absorbed in the acquisition of pelf.
Some will remember the definition given of it in Grose's "Dictionary of
the Vulgar Tongue:" "to squeeze out a man's eye with the thumb; a cruel
practice used by the Bostonians in America." A curious illustration of
the belief in this myth occurred to Cooper. One of his friends in
England was an amiable and pleasant man of letters, named William
Sotheby, little heard of in these days; and even in his own days he had
to endure the double degradation of being called a small poet by the
small poets themselves. He was at this time an old gentleman of (p. 098)
over seventy, and was preparing to make a creditable close to his
career by performing the task, which seems to assume the shape of a duty
to every literary Englishman of leisure, of translating the Iliad and
the Odyssey. Not unnaturally he was more familiar with the way the wrath
of Achilles manifested itself than with the shape taken by the wrath of
the men of his race beyond the sea. On one occasion he condoled with
Cooper because of the quarrelsomeness and fighting prevalent in America,
making during this expression of his sympathy an obvious allusion to
gouging. It was useless to attempt setting him right. His interest in
ancient fiction had not been so absorbing as to close his mind to the
acquisition of modern fact; and to Cooper's denial of what he had
implied he listened with a polite but incredulous smile.