|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 34
If he had any doubts of the sentiments of his countrymen toward him, his
reception in New York dissipated them. America greeted her most famous
literary man with a spontaneous outburst of love and admiration. The
public banquet in New York, that was long remembered for its brilliancy,
was followed by the tender of the same tribute in other cities,--an
honor which his unconquerable shrinking from this kind of publicity
compelled him to decline. The "Dutch Herodotus, Diedrich Knickerbocker,"
to use the phrase of a toast, having come out of one such encounter with
fair credit, did not care to tempt Providence further. The thought of
making a dinner-table speech threw him into a sort of whimsical
panic,--a noble infirmity, which characterized also Hawthorne and
Thackeray.
The enthusiasm manifested for the homesick author was equaled by his own
for the land and the people he supremely loved. Nor was his surprise at
the progress made during seventeen years less than his delight in it.
His native place had become a city of two hundred thousand inhabitants;
the accumulation of wealth and the activity of trade astonished him, and
the literary stir was scarcely less unexpected. The steamboat had come
to be used, so that he seemed to be transported from place to place by
magic; and on a near view the politics of America seemed not less
interesting than those of Europe. The nullification battle was set; the
currency conflict still raged; it was a time of inflation and land
speculation; the West, every day more explored and opened, was the land
of promise for capital and energy. Fortunes were made in a day by buying
lots in "paper towns." Into some of these speculations Irving put his
savings; the investments were as permanent as they were unremunerative.
Irving's first desire, however, on his recovery from the state of
astonishment into which these changes plunged him, was to make himself
thoroughly acquainted with the entire country and its development. To
this end he made an extended tour in the South and West, which passed
beyond the bounds of frontier settlement. The fruit of his excursion
into the Pawnee country, on the waters of the Arkansas, a region
untraversed by white men, except solitary trappers, was "A Tour on the
Prairies," a sort of romance of reality, which remains to-day as good a
description as we have of hunting adventure on the plains. It led also
to the composition of other books on the West, which were more or less
mere pieces of book-making for the market.
Our author was far from idle. Indeed, he could not afford to be.
Although he had received considerable sums from his books, and perhaps
enough for his own simple wants, the responsibility of the support of
his two brothers, Peter and Ebenezer, and several nieces, devolved upon
him. And, besides, he had a longing to make himself a home, where he
could pursue his calling undisturbed, and indulge the sweets of domestic
and rural life, which of all things lay nearest his heart. And these
two undertakings compelled him to be diligent with his pen to the end of
his life. The spot he chose for his "Roost" was a little farm on the
bank of the river at Tarrytown, close to his old Sleepy Hollow haunt,
one of the loveliest, if not the most picturesque, situations on the
Hudson. At first he intended nothing more than a summer retreat,
inexpensive and simply furnished. But his experience was that of all who
buy, and renovate, and build. The farm had on it a small stone Dutch
cottage, built about a century before, and inhabited by one of the Van
Tassels. This was enlarged, still preserving the quaint Dutch
characteristics; it acquired a tower and a whimsical weathercock, the
delight of the owner ("it was brought from Holland by Gill Davis, the
King of Coney Island, who says he got it from a windmill which they were
demolishing at the gate of Rotterdam, which windmill has been mentioned
in 'Knickerbocker'"), and became one of the most snug and picturesque
residences on the river. When the slip of Melrose ivy, which was
brought over from Scotland by Mrs. Renwick and given to the author, had
grown and well overrun it, the house, in the midst of sheltering groves
and secluded walks, was as pretty a retreat as a poet could desire. But
the little nook proved to have an insatiable capacity for swallowing up
money, as the necessities of the author's establishment increased: there
was always something to be done to the grounds; some alterations in the
house; a green-house, a stable, a gardener's cottage, to be built,--and
to the very end the outlay continued. The cottage necessitated economy
in other personal expenses, and incessant employment of his pen. But
Sunnyside, as the place was named, became the dearest spot on earth to
him; it was his residence, from which he tore himself with reluctance,
and to which he returned with eager longing; and here, surrounded by
relatives whom he loved, he passed nearly all the remainder of his
years, in as happy conditions, I think, as a bachelor ever enjoyed. His
intellectual activity was unremitting, he had no lack of friends, there
was only now and then a discordant note in the general estimation of his
literary work, and he was the object of the most tender care from his
nieces. Already, he writes, in October, 1838, "my little cottage is well
stocked. I have Ebenezer's five girls, and himself also, whenever he can
be spared from town; sister Catherine and her daughter; Mr. Davis
occasionally, with casual visits from all the rest of our family
connection. The cottage, therefore, is never lonely." I like to dwell in
thought upon this happy home, a real haven of rest after many
wanderings; a seclusion broken only now and then by enforced absence,
like that in Madrid as minister, but enlivened by many welcome guests.
Perhaps the most notorious of these was a young Frenchman, a "somewhat
quiet guest," who, after several months' imprisonment on board a French
man-of-war, was set on shore at Norfolk, and spent a couple of months in
New York and its vicinity, in 1837. This visit was vividly recalled to
Irving in a letter to his sister, Mrs. Storrow, who was in Paris in
1853, and had just been presented at court:--
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|