of the Causeway and the Square, and to him Walter Scott and his brother
went early the next morning and asked if he would take Green Breeks some
money to pay for his wound and loss of time in the tailor's shop. Green
Breeks in the hospital had been asked to tell the name of the one who
had struck him, but had refused pointblank, and none of either party
could be found to tell. When the wounded leader heard of Walter's offer
he refused to accept the money on the ground that such accidents were
apt to happen to any one in battle, and that he did not need the money.
Walter sent another message, inquiring if Green Breeks' family were in
need of anything he could supply, and received the answer that he lived
with his aged grandmother who was very fond of taking snuff. Thereupon
Walter presented the old woman with a pound of snuff, and as soon as
Green Breeks was out of the hospital made him one of his friends.
With the opening of spring Walter spent all his spare hours in his
favorite pursuit, riding through the country on a search for old
legends or curious tales of the neighborhood. Scottish history was his
never-ending delight; he knew every battle-field in the vicinity of
Edinburgh, and could tell how the armies had come to meet and what was
the result. Stories of sprites and goblins, of witches and magicians,
were eagerly sought by him. Many an old woman was led to tell the lame
boy with the eager eyes the tales she had heard as a schoolgirl, and was
well repaid by the boy's rapt attention. Hardly a stick or a stone, a
stream or a hill in the Lowlands that had a history but Walter Scott
learned it, and at the same time he learned to know the plain people,
all their habits and customs, and all the little eccentricities that
made up their characters.
[Illustration: STREET IN EDINBURGH WHERE SCOTT PLAYED AS A BOY]
Every Saturday in fair weather, and more frequently during the
vacations, his father allowed him a holiday from the office. Walter and
a boy friend named John Irving used to take two or three books from the
public library of Edinburgh, and go out into the neighboring country, to
Salisbury Crags, Arthur's Seat, or to a height called Blackford Hill,
from which there was a splendid view of the Lowland country. There they
read the books together, Walter always a little ahead of his friend, and
obliged to wait at the end of every two pages for him to catch up. The
books were almost always stories of knights-errant; the romances of
Spenser, the "Castle of Otranto," and translations from such Italian
writers as Ariosto, were very popular.
Often the boys would climb high up over the rocks to find places where
they would be sheltered from the wind, and the harder the nooks were to
reach the better they liked them. Walter, in spite of his lameness, was
a good climber, and time and again, when it seemed as though they had
contrived to get into a place from which there was no way out, and must
call to passers-by for help, he would manage to discover some jutting
stone or crevice in the rock that allowed them finally to make a
perilous escape.
That sort of adventure appealed to the boy tremendously; he liked to try
to use his wits in grappling with some natural difficulty, as the heroes
of his stories so often had to do.
The boys devoured a great many books in these expeditions, which lasted
over two years, and Walter so mastered the pages that he read that he
could recite long passages from them to his friend weeks after they had
finished the stories. Finally they fell into the habit of making up
stories of knights for themselves, first Walter telling the adventures
of a knight to John, and leaving the hero in some very difficult
situation for John to rescue him from, and then John carrying on the
story with another adventure, and leaving the next rescue to his friend.
The stories went on from day to day, and week to week, because the boys
grew so fond of their heroes that neither had the heart to kill the
brave knight, and they could find no other way to bring his adventures
to an end.
Although Walter spent considerable time in his father's office, he was
still studying under a tutor with other boys, preparing for college. He
was a brilliant scholar when he wanted to be, but all subjects did not
interest him.
At one time there was a certain boy who always stood at the top of
Walter's class whom young Scott could not supplant, try as he would.
Finally Walter noticed that whenever the master asked that boy a
question the latter always fumbled with his fingers at a certain button
on the lower part of his waistcoat. Walter Scott thereupon determined to
cut off that particular button, and see what would happen. He found a
chance soon after and cut off the button with a knife, while the owner
of the coat was not looking. Then Walter waited with the greatest
interest to see what would happen.
The next time the master asked questions of the youth at the head of the
class Walter saw the boy's fingers feel for the button, and then saw him
look down at the place on his coat where it should have been. When he
saw it was missing he grew confused, stammered, muttered to himself, and
could not answer the question. Walter came next, and, being able to
answer the question, took the other boy's place, chuckling to himself.
He did not hold it long. He had simply wished to see what would happen,
and having found out he was quite willing to surrender the place to the
boy who was really the better scholar.
In a thousand ways Walter showed his love of history and romance.
Anything that was picturesque, whether it was a view or an old dirk,
caught his attention at once. For a short time he took lessons in oil
painting from a German. He soon found that he had not the eye nor the
hand for the work, but it happened that the teacher's father had been a
soldier in the army of Frederick the Great, and as soon as Walter found
this out, he plied the man with questions. Long afterward he said he
vividly remembered the man's picturesque account of seeing a party of
the famous Black Hussars bringing in forage carts which they had
captured from the Cossacks, with the wounded Cossacks themselves lying
high up on the piles of straw.
Often in good weather the boys of George's Square would go on long
excursions into the country, frequently staying away from home for
several days at a time. On one such occasion they found themselves some
twenty miles away from Edinburgh without a single sixpence left among
them. Walter said afterward, "We were certainly put to our shifts, but
we asked every now and then at a cottage door for a drink of water; and
one or two of the good wives, observing our worn-out looks brought out
milk in place of water--so with that, and hips and haws, we came in
little the worse."
His father was not at all pleased with his long absence, and asked how
he had managed with so little money.
"Pretty much like the ravens," said the boy. "I only wished I had been
as good a player on the flute as poor George Primrose in 'The Vicar of
Wakefield.' If I had his art, I should like nothing better than to tramp
like him from cottage to cottage over the world."
"I doubt," said the father, "I greatly doubt, sir, you were born for nae
better than a scapegoat."
It may be that as a result of these chance expeditions Walter's father
finally came to realize that the boy might be made use of in certain
legal business that required sending messengers into the Highlands. Soon
he was sent with some legal papers to the Maclarens, who lived in that
beautiful lake country about Loch Lomond which Scott was later to make
famous in "The Lady of the Lake." It was the first time he had been in
that country, and the changing panorama unrolled before his eyes like a
land of dreams.
It happened that Walter was traveling in the company of a sergeant and
six men from a Highland regiment stationed in Sterling, and so he
journeyed quite like some ancient chieftain, with a front and rear
guard, and bearing arms. The sergeant was a thorough Highlander, full of
stories of Rob Roy and of his own early adventures, and an excellent
companion. The trip was a great success, and fired Walter's desires to
see more of a country which even then was only half-civilized.
A little later he had another chance, being sent north to visit another
of his father's clients, an old Jacobite who had fought in the uprisings
of 1715 and 1745. Paul Jones was then threatening a descent on the
Scotch coast, and Walter had the satisfaction of seeing the old Jacobite
chief making ready to bear arms again, and heard him exult at the
prospect of drawing claymore once more before he died. The boy was so
delighted at the stories the old man told that the latter invited him to
visit him that fall, and so he spent his holiday with him.
Riding northward on this visit the vale of Perth first burst on his
view. Long afterward he described the tremendous impression this sight
made upon him. "I recollect pulling up the reins," he wrote later,
"without meaning to do so, and gazing on the scene before me as if I had
been afraid it would shift, like those in a theatre, before I could
distinctly observe its different parts, or convince myself that what I
saw was real."
Even as he remembered so vividly the tales the old men and women had
told him when he was a very little boy, the stories of his grandmother,
of border warfare, of heroes of Scotland, such as Watt of Harden, and
Wight Willie of Aikwood, merrymen much like Robin Hood and Little John,
and as he remembered the romances he and his friend had read in the
hills, so he was now treasuring up wild bits of scenery with all the
ardor of a poet or a painter. He was growing to know Scotland as no
other man had ever known it.
The boy Walter had little knowledge then of the great use to which he
was later to put his love of Scottish history; he expected to be a
lawyer and was studying to that end, but all his spare moments were
spent in hunting legends of his land. He became eager to visit the then
wild and inaccessible region of Liddesdale, so that he might see the
ruins of the famous castle of the Hermitage, and try to pick up some of
the ancient "riding ballads" as they were called, songs which were said
to be still preserved among the descendants of the old moss-troopers,
who had followed the banners of the House of Douglass, when they were
lords of that remote castle.
He found a man who knew that rugged country well, and for seven
successive years Walter Scott made a "raid," as he called it, into that
country, following each stream to its source, and studying every ruined
tower or castle from foundation stone to topmost battlement.
There were no inns in the whole district. The explorers had to stop over
night at any chance shepherd's hut or farmer's cottage, but everywhere
they met with open welcome, and from each home they gathered songs and
stories, and sometimes relics of border wars to take back with them to
Edinburgh. Even then the youth had little notion of what he should do
with all the facts he was gathering. The friend he traveled with said
later, "Walter was makin' himself a' the time, but he didna ken maybe
what he was about till years had passed. At first he thought o' little,
I dare say, but the queerness and the fun."
* * * * *
In course of time Scott was called to the bar as a lawyer, and took his
place with the dozens of young men who hung about the Parliament House
in Edinburgh waiting for briefs of cases to be argued. There were lots
of debating clubs in the Scotch capital at that time, and Scott was a
member of several. Some time was spent in argument, but more in telling
stories and in singing songs.
Here the young lawyer ruled supreme. No other man could tell such tales
as he, and none knew so many and such curious songs. The stories were
not all his own; frequently he retold old ones that he had heard,
dressing them up to suit his taste. Once a friend complained that he had
changed a story told him the day before.
"Why," said Scott, with twinkling eyes, "I don't change stories. I only
put a cocked hat on their heads, and stick a cane into their hands--to
make them fit for going into company."
Fifteen years passed and all England was reading eagerly the wonderful
historical poems and romances written by a man who called himself the
"Wizard of the North."
Scotland had always been a desolate barren country in the eyes of the
rest of the world, its history unknown, its people cold and uninviting.
Suddenly all that was changed: Scotland sprang into being as a land of
romance, filled with poetry, a country full of glorious scenery, a
people descended from a line of kings. Even the narrow streets of
Edinburgh and the old Canongate itself became historic ground under the
Wizard's spell. The Wizard was Walter Scott, and now he found the whole
world as eager to hear the stories and poems he had to tell about his
country as his boy friends had been years before. He had not changed
much as he grew up. At the height of his fame Walter Scott was still in
spirit the eager boy of the old city, finding romance everywhere about
him because he looked for it with the eyes of youth.
XVI
James Fenimore Cooper
The Boy of Otsego Hall: 1789-1851
The finest house in central New York State in 1801 was Otsego Hall. The
owner of the house, a Mr. Cooper, fond of old English customs, lived
much like a lord of the manor of the old country, and kept open house
for his neighbors of the region. On a Saturday afternoon in September of
that year he was giving a great party, and all roads in the neighborhood
of Cooperstown, which had been named in honor of this popular gentleman,
led to Otsego Hall.
A gay stream flowed up to the great stone posts that flanked the
entrance driveway. There were men in bright-hued, tight-fitting trousers
with high shining top-boots, brilliant plum and claret colored coats and
fawn or scarlet waistcoats, with lace stocks at their throats, their
hair well powdered, their tri-cornered hats matching their vivid coats.
They rode fine, spirited horses, and they knew how to ride, for most of
them had seen service under General Washington. Some of the ladies also
rode, but more of them came in open carriages. These latter wore
flowered satins, and carried painted fans and sunshades. Some came
across fields on foot, a young gallant swinging a light gold-headed
cane, and paying lavish compliments to the fair girl whose dimples were
heightened by small beauty patches cut in stars or crescents.
The gay throng wound up the long drive of Otsego Hall, themselves
scarcely less brilliant than the flowers beside the path. At the top of
the drive was the big, white colonial mansion, with its high storied
porch and great white pillars. On the porch stood the genial host in a
buff-colored suit with knee-breeches, his kindly face radiating welcome
to each guest. The riders sprang from their saddles and threw the
bridles to the waiting servants, the chaises and the chariots emptied
their owners and were whisked away. All mounted the wide steps, greeted
Mr. Cooper, and passed across the porch into the polished hall.
Here stood a large round table with a huge punchbowl in the centre and a
ring of shining glasses about it. Each guest toasted the fair lady of
the manor, and some particular lady of his own fancy, with such charming
sentiments as his wit supplied. There was a great buzz of talk and
laughter and neighborly greeting.
Presently three young men, all dressed in the height of fashion, came up
the driveway and shook hands with Mr. Cooper. He was especially glad to
see them, for they were sons of men he had known in war times. All three
came of wealthy families living in the city of New York, and were now
traveling north to learn something of the business possibilities of the
young country. They stopped for a moment to chat with Mr. Cooper, and
then two of them entered the hall. The third was looking at a small boy,
who, dressed like Mr. Cooper in buff clothes, stood at one side of the
porch.
"Who is the youngster?" asked the visitor.
Mr. Cooper turned about to see. "Oh, that's my son James." He beckoned
to the boy. "Come here, son. I want you to meet Captain Philip Kent, one
of father's old friends."
The boy, not at all abashed, put out his hand, and welcomed Captain
Kent. "Have you ever fought Indians?" he asked solemnly.
Kent laughed and winked at Mr. Cooper. "Oh, yes. We've all fought
Indians in our day. But, thank God, that day's passed. What we want now
is a chance to rest in quiet, and try our hands at writing, and singing,
and painting, like other civilized people." He saw that some other
guests were arriving, and put his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Come,
James. You and I don't care to go salute the ladies just yet. Let's find
a place in the garden and have a talk."
They went down a gravel path and turned in to the rose-garden. A bench
invited them to rest. Captain Kent sat down, and drawing a gilded
snuff-box from his waistcoat-pocket, offered it to the boy. "The very
best rappee," he said.
James Cooper shook his head. "I don't like snuff, sir. I'd rather smoke
a pipe."
Captain Kent took snuff and flicked the grains from his coat with his
handkerchief. "Tut, tut, young man, if you're to be a man of fashion,
and I misdoubt your father's son could be ought else, you must like what
the fashion likes. The gentlemen of St. James' Palace still take snuff,
and never are seen smoking pipes, like some of our clumsy Dutchmen over
here."
"But St. James' Palace is in London, and we're free from England now."
"Quite so, my good sir. But our fashions still come from across the
seas."
"And what is a man of fashion?" asked the boy.
Captain Kent smiled. "Ah, so you are concerned? Good! Well, I am a man
of fashion, and so are those two friends of mine who just entered your
hall. A man of fashion has a discriminating taste in wines and foods. He
knows what colors go in harmony, how to draw his sword in any matter of
honor, how to tread a minuet--oh, yes, and how to write verses to his
lady's eyes."
The Captain put his hand in the pocket of his coat and drew out several
folded sheets of paper. He spread them out on his knee. "Do you know
Miss Betty Cosgrove?" he asked.
The boy nodded. "Yes, indeed. She lives very near us, and always gives
me plum-cake when I go there with messages from mother."
"Ah, she does!" exclaimed Kent, as though greatly struck and charmed by
the idea. "Well, Mr. James Cooper, I have written some verses in her
honor, hoping I might offer them to her here this afternoon. I'll read
them to you."
"She's indoors," said the boy. "I saw her come."
"Quite so. But I hope to lure her out here later, and I want to rehearse
the verses. What do you think of this?"
The young man held the paper before him, and read from it. Every few
lines he would glance at the boy. James did not think much of the
poetry. He heard a great deal about tresses, and eyes, and smiles, about
Gods and Goddesses, but nothing about soldiers or Indians. He was
surprised that the Captain should have become so red in the face and
that his eyes should shine so brightly.
"What do you think of it?" asked Captain Kent, when he had finished.
"I don't understand it," said James. Then he added frankly, "I don't
think much of poetry."
"May Heaven grant she does!" exclaimed the Captain. "I think 'tis quite
a fair performance for an humble poet." He folded the verses and put
them away. "Some day you will be doing the same thing, Mr. Cooper."
"No," said the boy. "I'm to go to Yale College at New Haven next year
and learn Greek."
"'Tis better to write verses than learn Greek," objected Kent. He put
his hand on the boy's shoulder. "But there's better yet waiting to be
done, boy. In London men write what they call novels; wonderful stories
of the great world of fashion. There's one called 'Amelia,' by Henry
Fielding, and another named 'Clarissa Harlowe,' by Richardson. Why
should not some one write such tales of our country? Alas, I fancy
because as yet we have so little fashion."
"But we've plenty of hunters and Indians and sailors," said the boy; "I
wish I had a book about what's happened in those great woods back of
Albany."
"Write it, lad, write it," said the Captain. "We've had our soldiers,
you and your friends must be our poets and writers. I envy you. Now let
us be going in to greet the ladies."
The lower floor of Otsego Hall was now filled with people. All the
gentry of the countryside were gathered in the great hall, in the
dining-room, and other apartments that opened into it. Captain Kent and
his boy friend made their way through the crowd, and the Captain bent
over the hand of Mrs. Cooper and congratulated her on having so fine a
son. The boy liked his gallant friend and stayed near him, even when the
Captain finally caught sight of Miss Betty Cosgrove talking with his two
mates in a corner of the hall.
James watched the Captain advance and in his most polished manner bend
over the lady's hand and touch it with his lips. Then the four of them
started to laugh and talk rapidly as though they had a great many things
to tell each other. The boy thought this very tiresome, and was about to
make his way back to the porch and freedom when he heard a man who stood
on the broad stairs call out, "Ladies and gentlemen, I give you all a
toast, our worthy friend and most gracious host, Mr. Cooper!"
Servants passed glasses of punch to the guests and soon all held their
glasses raised high.
"I pledge them," cried the man on the stairs, and the toast was drunk
with a murmur of cheers.
"Another to our charming hostess!" some one cried, and this also was
drunk.
Then Captain Kent clapped his hands for silence. "Ladies and gentlemen
of Cooperstown," said he, "three of us here have journeyed from New York
City to pay our duty to the fairest maid in all the thirteen states. We
have none like her on Manhattan Island. I give you Mistress Betty
Cosgrove!"
The three young men raised their glasses, the rest followed their
example, and the toast was drunk. Miss Cosgrove blushed the color of the
rose she wore.
One of the young men looked down to find a small boy pulling his sleeve.
"What is it?" he asked.
"Captain Kent's been writing verses to her too," said James Cooper. "He
read them to me in the garden."
"Ho--ho," came the laughing answer. "Good enough." He turned about.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my friend Captain Kent is a poet. He has some
verses in his pocket written to the adorable Mistress Betty. Shall we
hear them?"
"Yes, yes," came a chorus of voices.
It was poor Kent's turn to blush. He looked very uncomfortable. Miss
Cosgrove glanced at him with wide inquiring eyes. He had not expected to
read his poetry in such a setting. He stepped forward, and seizing
little James Cooper under the arms lifted him to a chair.
"Behold," he said, "I should be glad to read the verses, but this
gentleman, Master Cooper, has told me they are poor, and he should know
because he plans to be an author."
The Captain's diversion succeeded. The guests were looking at the boy.
"My son James an author!" exclaimed Mrs. Cooper. "It's the first I've
heard of it!"
"I don't want to," said the boy, very uncomfortable now that he was the
centre of notice. "I want to be a soldier."
"That's right," said his father, "and I hope you may be if ever the
country needs you. Friends, I give you these United States!"
By the time that toast was drunk Captain Kent had drawn Miss Cosgrove
into a little alcove under the stairs and James had stolen out of the
great hall.
James Cooper was a very fortunate boy. His father's house stood in one
of the loveliest reaches of country on the Atlantic coast. Cooperstown
lay on the southeastern shore of Otsego Lake, where the Susquehanna
rushes out through a fertile valley between high hills. Bays and points
of woodland break the Lake's edge, and in the distance rise the clear
blue slopes of mountains.
Otsego Hall was built about the time when the young republic was
stretching out for space in which to grow. Mr. Cooper found this lovely
lake, and built on the frontier. Beyond his home spread seemingly
endless forests, filled with the wandering bands of the Indians of the
Six Nations, and with all manner of wild animals. The Lake was the home
of flocks of gulls, loons and wild duck, and more times than he could
count young Cooper had seen a long file of Indian canoes steal swiftly
across its upper bays. It was an ideal region for a boy of an
adventurous turn of mind, fond of the outdoor world.
The heir of Otsego Hall was not such a boy of the wilderness as were
Daniel Boone, Andrew Jackson or Abraham Lincoln. He did not have to
fight his way in the rough new world as they did. Mr. Cooper was
well-to-do, and intended that his son should take a proper place in the
young nation. There was little he could learn at the local academy, and
so he was soon sent to school at Albany, where he lived in the home of
an English clergyman who was fond of denouncing the war of the
Revolution and the new country, and so made James Cooper more of an
ardent patriot than ever.