THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

FOUND AMONG THE PAPERS

OF THE LATE DIEDRICH

KNICKERBOCKER.

 

 

A pleasing land of drowsy head it was,

Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye;

And of gay castles in the clouds that pass,

Forever flushing round a summer sky.

CASTLE OF INDOLENCE.

In the bosom of one of those spacious coves which indent the

eastern shore of the Hudson, at that broad expansion of the river

denominated by the ancient Dutch navigators the Tappan Zee, and

where they always prudently shortened sail and implored the

protection of St. Nicholas when they crossed, there lies a small

market town or rural port, which by some is called Greensburgh, but

which is more generally and properly known by the name of Tarry

Town. This name was given, we are told, in former days, by the

good housewives of the adjacent country, from the inveterate

propensity of their husbands to linger about the village tavern on

market days. Be that as it may, I do not vouch for the fact, but

merely advert to it, for the sake of being precise and authentic. Not

far from this village, perhaps about two miles, there is a little valley

or rather lap of land among high hills, which is one of the quietest

places in the whole world. A small brook glides through it, with just

murmur enough to lull one to repose; and the occasional whistle of a

quail or tapping of a woodpecker is almost the only sound that ever

breaks in upon the uniform tranquillity.

I recollect that, when a stripling, my first exploit in squirrel-

shooting was in a grove of tall walnut-trees that shades one side of

the valley. I had wandered into it at noontime, when all nature is

peculiarly quiet, and was startled by the roar of my own gun, as it

broke the Sabbath stillness around and was prolonged and

reverberated by the angry echoes. If ever I should wish for a retreat

whither I might steal from the world and its distractions, and dream

quietly away the remnant of a troubled life, I know of none more

promising than this little valley.

 

 

 

 

From the listless repose of the place, and the peculiar character of

its inhabitants, who are descendants from the original Dutch settlers,

this sequestered glen has long been known by the name of SLEEPY

HOLLOW, and its rustic lads are called the Sleepy Hollow Boys

throughout all the neighboring country. A drowsy, dreamy influence

seems to hang over the land, and to pervade the very atmosphere.

Some say that the place was bewitched by a High German doctor,

during the early days of the settlement; others, that an old Indian

chief, the prophet or wizard of his tribe, held his powwows there

before the country was discovered by Master Hendrick Hudson.

Certain it is, the place still continues under the sway of some

witching power, that holds a spell over the minds of the good people,

causing them to walk in a continual reverie. They are given to all

kinds of marvellous beliefs, are subject to trances and visions, and

frequently see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air.

The whole neighborhood abounds with local tales, haunted spots,

and twilight superstitions; stars shoot and meteors glare oftener

across the valley than in any other part of the country, and the

nightmare, with her whole ninefold, seems to make it the favorite

scene of her gambols.

The dominant spirit, however, that haunts this enchanted region,

and seems to be commander-in-chief of all the powers of the air, is

the apparition of a figure on horseback, without a head. It is said by

some to be the ghost of a Hessian trooper, whose head had been

carried away by a cannon-ball, in some nameless battle during the

Revolutionary War, and who is ever and anon seen by the country

folk hurrying along in the gloom of night, as if on the wings of the

wind. His haunts are not confined to the valley, but extend at times

to the adjacent roads, and especially to the vicinity of a church at no

great distance. Indeed, certain of the most authentic historians of

those parts, who have been careful in collecting and collating the

floating facts concerning this spectre, allege that the body of the

trooper having been buried in the churchyard, the ghost rides forth

to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head, and that the

rushing speed with which he sometimes passes along the Hollow,

like a midnight blast, is owing to his being belated, and in a hurry to

get back to the churchyard before daybreak.

Such is the general purport of this legendary superstition, which

has furnished materials for many a wild story in that region of

 

 

 

 

shadows; and the spectre is known at all the country firesides, by

the name of the Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow.

It is remarkable that the visionary propensity I have mentioned is

not confined to the native inhabitants of the valley, but is

unconsciously imbibed by every one who resides there for a time.

However wide awake they may have been before they entered that

sleepy region, they are sure, in a little time, to inhale the witching

influence of the air, and begin to grow imaginative, to dream

dreams, and see apparitions.

I mention this peaceful spot with all possible laud, for it is in such

little retired Dutch valleys, found here and there embosomed in the

great State of New York, that population, manners, and customs

remain fixed, while the great torrent of migration and improvement,

which is making such incessant changes in other parts of this restless

country, sweeps by them unobserved. They are like those little nooks

of still water, which border a rapid stream, where we may see the

straw and bubble riding quietly at anchor, or slowly revolving in

their mimic harbor, undisturbed by the rush of the passing current.

Though many years have elapsed since I trod the drowsy shades of

Sleepy Hollow, yet I question whether I should not still find the

same trees and the same families vegetating in its sheltered bosom.

In this by-place of nature there abode, in a remote period of

American history, that is to say, some thirty years since, a worthy

wight of the name of Ichabod Crane, who sojourned, or, as he

expressed it, "tarried," in Sleepy Hollow, for the purpose of

instructing the children of the vicinity. He was a native of

Connecticut, a State which supplies the Union with pioneers for the

mind as well as for the forest, and sends forth yearly its legions of

frontier woodmen and country schoolmasters. The cognomen of

Crane was not inapplicable to his person. He was tall, but

exceedingly lank, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands

that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have served for

shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung together. His head

was small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy eyes,

and a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather-cock perched

upon his spindle neck to tell which way the wind blew. To see him

striding along the profile of a hill on a windy day, with his clothes

bagging and fluttering about him, one might have mistaken him for

 

 

 

 

the genius of famine descending upon the earth, or some scarecrow

eloped from a cornfield.

His schoolhouse was a low building of one large room, rudely

constructed of logs; the windows partly glazed, and partly patched

with leaves of old copybooks. It was most ingeniously secured at

vacant hours, by a withe twisted in the handle of the door, and

stakes set against the window shutters; so that though a thief might

get in with perfect ease, he would find some embarrassment in

getting out,—an idea most probably borrowed by the architect, Yost

Van Houten, from the mystery of an eelpot. The schoolhouse stood

in a rather lonely but pleasant situation, just at the foot of a woody

hill, with a brook running close by, and a formidable birch-tree

growing at one end of it. From hence the low murmur of his pupils'

voices, conning over their lessons, might be heard in a drowsy

summer's day, like the hum of a beehive; interrupted now and then

by the authoritative voice of the master, in the tone of menace or

command, or, peradventure, by the appalling sound of the birch, as

he urged some tardy loiterer along the flowery path of knowledge.

Truth to say, he was a conscientious man, and ever bore in mind the

golden maxim, "Spare the rod and spoil the child." Ichabod Crane's

scholars certainly were not spoiled.

I would not have it imagined, however, that he was one of those

cruel potentates of the school who joy in the smart of their subjects;

on the contrary, he administered justice with discrimination rather

than severity; taking the burden off the backs of the weak, and

laying it on those of the strong. Your mere puny stripling, that

winced at the least flourish of the rod, was passed by with

indulgence; but the claims of justice were satisfied by inflicting a

double portion on some little tough wrong-headed, broad-skirted

Dutch urchin, who sulked and swelled and grew dogged and sullen

beneath the birch. All this he called "doing his duty by their parents;"

and he never inflicted a chastisement without following it by the

assurance, so consolatory to the smarting urchin, that "he would

remember it and thank him for it the longest day he had to live."

When school hours were over, he was even the companion and

playmate of the larger boys; and on holiday afternoons would convoy

some of the smaller ones home, who happened to have pretty sisters,

or good housewives for mothers, noted for the comforts of the

cupboard. Indeed, it behooved him to keep on good terms with his

 

 

 

 

pupils. The revenue arising from his school was small, and would

have been scarcely sufficient to furnish him with daily bread, for he

was a huge feeder, and, though lank, had the dilating powers of an

anaconda; but to help out his maintenance, he was, according to

country custom in those parts, boarded and lodged at the houses of

the farmers whose children he instructed. With these he lived

successively a week at a time, thus going the rounds of the

neighborhood, with all his worldly effects tied up in a cotton

handkerchief.

That all this might not be too onerous on the purses of his rustic

patrons, who are apt to consider the costs of schooling a grievous

burden, and schoolmasters as mere drones, he had various ways of

rendering himself both useful and agreeable. He assisted the farmers

occasionally in the lighter labors of their farms, helped to make hay,

mended the fences, took the horses to water, drove the cows from

pasture, and cut wood for the winter fire. He laid aside, too, all the

dominant dignity and absolute sway with which he lorded it in his

little empire, the school, and became wonderfully gentle and

ingratiating. He found favor in the eyes of the mothers by petting the

children, particularly the youngest; and like the lion bold, which

whilom so magnanimously the lamb did hold, he would sit with a

child on one knee, and rock a cradle with his foot for whole hours

together.

In addition to his other vocations, he was the singing-master of the

neighborhood, and picked up many bright shillings by instructing the

young folks in psalmody. It was a matter of no little vanity to him on

Sundays, to take his station in front of the church gallery, with a

band of chosen singers; where, in his own mind, he completely

carried away the palm from the parson. Certain it is, his voice

resounded far above all the rest of the congregation; and there are

peculiar quavers still to be heard in that church, and which may

even be heard half a mile off, quite to the opposite side of the

millpond, on a still Sunday morning, which are said to be

legitimately descended from the nose of Ichabod Crane. Thus, by

divers little makeshifts, in that ingenious way which is commonly

denominated "by hook and by crook," the worthy pedagogue got on

tolerably enough, and was thought, by all who understood nothing of

the labor of headwork, to have a wonderfully easy life of it.

 

 

 

 

The schoolmaster is generally a man of some importance in the

female circle of a rural neighborhood; being considered a kind of

idle, gentlemanlike personage, of vastly superior taste and

accomplishments to the rough country swains, and, indeed, inferior

in learning only to the parson. His appearance, therefore, is apt to

occasion some little stir at the tea-table of a farmhouse, and the

addition of a supernumerary dish of cakes or sweetmeats, or,

peradventure, the parade of a silver teapot. Our man of letters,

therefore, was peculiarly happy in the smiles of all the country

damsels. How he would figure among them in the churchyard,

between services on Sundays; gathering grapes for them from the

wild vines that overran the surrounding trees; reciting for their

amusement all the epitaphs on the tombstones; or sauntering, with a

whole bevy of them, along the banks of the adjacent millpond; while

the more bashful country bumpkins hung sheepishly back, envying

his superior elegance and address.

From his half-itinerant life, also, he was a kind of travelling

gazette, carrying the whole budget of local gossip from house to

house, so that his appearance was always greeted with satisfaction.

He was, moreover, esteemed by the women as a man of great

erudition, for he had read several books quite through, and was a

perfect master of Cotton Mather's "History of New England

Witchcraft," in which, by the way, he most firmly and potently

believed.

He was, in fact, an odd mixture of small shrewdness and simple

credulity. His appetite for the marvellous, and his powers of

digesting it, were equally extraordinary; and both had been increased

by his residence in this spell-bound region. No tale was too gross or

monstrous for his capacious swallow. It was often his delight, after

his school was dismissed in the afternoon, to stretch himself on the

rich bed of clover bordering the little brook that whimpered by his

schoolhouse, and there con over old Mather's direful tales, until the

gathering dusk of evening made the printed page a mere mist before

his eyes. Then, as he wended his way by swamp and stream and

awful woodland, to the farmhouse where he happened to be

quartered, every sound of nature, at that witching hour, fluttered his

excited imagination,—the moan of the whip-poor-will from the

hillside, the boding cry of the tree toad, that harbinger of storm, the

dreary hooting of the screech owl, or the sudden rustling in the

thicket of birds frightened from their roost. The fireflies, too, which

 

 

 

 

sparkled most vividly in the darkest places, now and then startled

him, as one of uncommon brightness would stream across his path;

and if, by chance, a huge blockhead of a beetle came winging his

blundering flight against him, the poor varlet was ready to give up

the ghost, with the idea that he was struck with a witch's token. His

only resource on such occasions, either to drown thought or drive

away evil spirits, was to sing psalm tunes and the good people of

Sleepy Hollow, as they sat by their doors of an evening, were often

filled with awe at hearing his nasal melody, "in linked sweetness long

drawn out," floating from the distant hill, or along the dusky road.

Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was to pass long winter

evenings with the old Dutch wives, as they sat spinning by the fire,

with a row of apples roasting and spluttering along the hearth, and

listen to their marvellous tales of ghosts and goblins, and haunted

fields, and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted

houses, and particularly of the headless horseman, or Galloping

Hessian of the Hollow, as they sometimes called him. He would

delight them equally by his anecdotes of witchcraft, and of the

direful omens and portentous sights and sounds in the air, which

prevailed in the earlier times of Connecticut; and would frighten

them woefully with speculations upon comets and shooting stars;

and with the alarming fact that the world did absolutely turn round,

and that they were half the time topsy-turvy!

But if there was a pleasure in all this, while snugly cuddling in the

chimney corner of a chamber that was all of a ruddy glow from the

crackling wood fire, and where, of course, no spectre dared to show

its face, it was dearly purchased by the terrors of his subsequent

walk homewards. What fearful shapes and shadows beset his path,

amidst the dim and ghastly glare of a snowy night! With what wistful

look did he eye every trembling ray of light streaming across the

waste fields from some distant window! How often was he appalled

by some shrub covered with snow, which, like a sheeted spectre,

beset his very path! How often did he shrink with curdling awe at

the sound of his own steps on the frosty crust beneath his feet; and

dread to look over his shoulder, lest he should behold some uncouth

being tramping close behind him! And how often was he thrown into

complete dismay by some rushing blast, howling among the trees, in

the idea that it was the Galloping Hessian on one of his nightly

scourings!

 

 

 

 

All these, however, were mere terrors of the night, phantoms of

the mind that walk in darkness; and though he had seen many

spectres in his time, and been more than once beset by Satan in

divers shapes, in his lonely perambulations, yet daylight put an end

to all these evils; and he would have passed a pleasant life of it, in

despite of the Devil and all his works, if his path had not been

crossed by a being that causes more perplexity to mortal man than

ghosts, goblins, and the whole race of witches put together, and that

was—a woman.

Among the musical disciples who assembled, one evening in each

week, to receive his instructions in psalmody, was Katrina Van

Tassel, the daughter and only child of a substantial Dutch farmer.

She was a blooming lass of fresh eighteen; plump as a partridge; ripe

and melting and rosy-cheeked as one of her father's peaches, and

universally famed, not merely for her beauty, but her vast

expectations. She was withal a little of a coquette, as might be

perceived even in her dress, which was a mixture of ancient and

modern fashions, as most suited to set off her charms. She wore the

ornaments of pure yellow gold, which her great-great-grandmother

had brought over from Saardam; the tempting stomacher of the

olden time, and withal a provokingly short petticoat, to display the

prettiest foot and ankle in the country round.

Ichabod Crane had a soft and foolish heart towards the sex; and it

is not to be wondered at that so tempting a morsel soon found favor

in his eyes, more especially after he had visited her in her paternal

mansion. Old Baltus Van Tassel was a perfect picture of a thriving,

contented, liberal-hearted farmer. He seldom, it is true, sent either

his eyes or his thoughts beyond the boundaries of his own farm; but

within those everything was snug, happy and well-conditioned. He

was satisfied with his wealth, but not proud of it; and piqued

himself upon the hearty abundance, rather than the style in which he

lived. His stronghold was situated on the banks of the Hudson, in

one of those green, sheltered, fertile nooks in which the Dutch

farmers are so fond of nestling. A great elm tree spread its broad

branches over it, at the foot of which bubbled up a spring of the

softest and sweetest water, in a little well formed of a barrel; and

then stole sparkling away through the grass, to a neighboring brook,

that babbled along among alders and dwarf willows. Hard by the

farmhouse was a vast barn, that might have served for a church;

every window and crevice of which seemed bursting forth with the

 

 

 

 

treasures of the farm; the flail was busily resounding within it from

morning to night; swallows and martins skimmed twittering about

the eaves; and rows of pigeons, some with one eye turned up, as if

watching the weather, some with their heads under their wings or

buried in their bosoms, and others swelling, and cooing, and bowing

about their dames, were enjoying the sunshine on the roof. Sleek

unwieldy porkers were grunting in the repose and abundance of their

pens, from whence sallied forth, now and then, troops of sucking

pigs, as if to snuff the air. A stately squadron of snowy geese were

riding in an adjoining pond, convoying whole fleets of ducks;

regiments of turkeys were gobbling through the farmyard, and

Guinea fowls fretting about it, like ill-tempered housewives, with

their peevish, discontented cry. Before the barn door strutted the

gallant cock, that pattern of a husband, a warrior and a fine

gentleman, clapping his burnished wings and crowing in the pride

and gladness of his heart,—sometimes tearing up the earth with his

feet, and then generously calling his ever-hungry family of wives and

children to enjoy the rich morsel which he had discovered.

The pedagogue's mouth watered as he looked upon this sumptuous

promise of luxurious winter fare. In his devouring mind's eye, he

pictured to himself every roasting-pig running about with a pudding

in his belly, and an apple in his mouth; the pigeons were snugly put

to bed in a comfortable pie, and tucked in with a coverlet of crust;

the geese were swimming in their own gravy; and the ducks pairing

cosily in dishes, like snug married couples, with a decent

competency of onion sauce. In the porkers he saw carved out the

future sleek side of bacon, and juicy relishing ham; not a turkey but

he beheld daintily trussed up, with its gizzard under its wing, and,

peradventure, a necklace of savory sausages; and even bright

chanticleer himself lay sprawling on his back, in a side dish, with

uplifted claws, as if craving that quarter which his chivalrous spirit

disdained to ask while living.

As the enraptured Ichabod fancied all this, and as he rolled his

great green eyes over the fat meadow lands, the rich fields of wheat,

of rye, of buckwheat, and Indian corn, and the orchards burdened

with ruddy fruit, which surrounded the warm tenement of Van

Tassel, his heart yearned after the damsel who was to inherit these

domains, and his imagination expanded with the idea, how they

might be readily turned into cash, and the money invested in

immense tracts of wild land, and shingle palaces in the wilderness.

 

 

 

 

Nay, his busy fancy already realized his hopes, and presented to him

the blooming Katrina, with a whole family of children, mounted on

the top of a wagon loaded with household trumpery, with pots and

kettles dangling beneath; and he beheld himself bestriding a pacing

mare, with a colt at her heels, setting out for Kentucky, Tennessee,—

or the Lord knows where!

When he entered the house, the conquest of his heart was

complete. It was one of those spacious farmhouses, with high-ridged

but lowly sloping roofs, built in the style handed down from the first

Dutch settlers; the low projecting eaves forming a piazza along the

front, capable of being closed up in bad weather. Under this were

hung flails, harness, various utensils of husbandry, and nets for

fishing in the neighboring river. Benches were built along the sides

for summer use; and a great spinning-wheel at one end, and a churn

at the other, showed the various uses to which this important porch

might be devoted. From this piazza the wondering Ichabod entered

the hall, which formed the centre of the mansion, and the place of

usual residence. Here rows of resplendent pewter, ranged on a long

dresser, dazzled his eyes. In one corner stood a huge bag of wool,

ready to be spun; in another, a quantity of linsey-woolsey just from

the loom; ears of Indian corn, and strings of dried apples and

peaches, hung in gay festoons along the walls, mingled with the gaud

of red peppers; and a door left ajar gave him a peep into the best

parlor, where the claw-footed chairs and dark mahogany tables

shone like mirrors; andirons, with their accompanying shovel and

tongs, glistened from their covert of asparagus tops; mock-oranges

and conch-shells decorated the mantelpiece; strings of various-

colored birds eggs were suspended above it; a great ostrich egg was

hung from the centre of the room, and a corner cupboard, knowingly

left open, displayed immense treasures of old silver and well-mended

china.

From the moment Ichabod laid his eyes upon these regions of

delight, the peace of his mind was at an end, and his only study was

how to gain the affections of the peerless daughter of Van Tassel. In

this enterprise, however, he had more real difficulties than generally

fell to the lot of a knight-errant of yore, who seldom had anything

but giants, enchanters, fiery dragons, and such like easily conquered

adversaries, to contend with and had to make his way merely

through gates of iron and brass, and walls of adamant to the castle

keep, where the lady of his heart was confined; all which he

 

 

 

 

achieved as easily as a man would carve his way to the centre of a

Christmas pie; and then the lady gave him her hand as a matter of

course. Ichabod, on the contrary, had to win his way to the heart of

a country coquette, beset with a labyrinth of whims and caprices,

which were forever presenting new difficulties and impediments; and

he had to encounter a host of fearful adversaries of real flesh and

blood, the numerous rustic admirers, who beset every portal to her

heart, keeping a watchful and angry eye upon each other, but ready

to fly out in the common cause against any new competitor.

Among these, the most formidable was a burly, roaring, roystering

blade, of the name of Abraham, or, according to the Dutch

abbreviation, Brom Van Brunt, the hero of the country round, which

rang with his feats of strength and hardihood. He was broad-

shouldered and double-jointed, with short curly black hair, and a

bluff but not unpleasant countenance, having a mingled air of fun

and arrogance. From his Herculean frame and great powers of limb

he had received the nickname of BROM BONES, by which he was

universally known. He was famed for great knowledge and skill in

horsemanship, being as dexterous on horseback as a Tartar. He was

foremost at all races and cock fights; and, with the ascendancy

which bodily strength always acquires in rustic life, was the umpire

in all disputes, setting his hat on one side, and giving his decisions

with an air and tone that admitted of no gainsay or appeal. He was

always ready for either a fight or a frolic; but had more mischief

than ill-will in his composition; and with all his overbearing

roughness, there was a strong dash of waggish good humor at

bottom. He had three or four boon companions, who regarded him

as their model, and at the head of whom he scoured the country,

attending every scene of feud or merriment for miles round. In cold

weather he was distinguished by a fur cap, surmounted with a

flaunting fox's tail; and when the folks at a country gathering

descried this well-known crest at a distance, whisking about among a

squad of hard riders, they always stood by for a squall. Sometimes

his crew would be heard dashing along past the farmhouses at

midnight, with whoop and halloo, like a troop of Don Cossacks; and

the old dames, startled out of their sleep, would listen for a moment

till the hurry-scurry had clattered by, and then exclaim, "Ay, there

goes Brom Bones and his gang!" The neighbors looked upon him with

a mixture of awe, admiration, and good-will; and, when any madcap

prank or rustic brawl occurred in the vicinity, always shook their

heads, and warranted Brom Bones was at the bottom of it.

 

 

 

 

This rantipole hero had for some time singled out the blooming

Katrina for the object of his uncouth gallantries, and though his

amorous toyings were something like the gentle caresses and

endearments of a bear, yet it was whispered that she did not

altogether discourage his hopes. Certain it is, his advances were

signals for rival candidates to retire, who felt no inclination to cross

a lion in his amours; insomuch, that when his horse was seen tied to

Van Tassel's paling, on a Sunday night, a sure sign that his master

was courting, or, as it is termed, "sparking," within, all other suitors

passed by in despair, and carried the war into other quarters.

Such was the formidable rival with whom Ichabod Crane had to

contend, and, considering all things, a stouter man than he would

have shrunk from the competition, and a wiser man would have

despaired. He had, however, a happy mixture of pliability and

perseverance in his nature; he was in form and spirit like a supple-

jack—yielding, but tough; though he bent, he never broke; and

though he bowed beneath the slightest pressure, yet, the moment it

was away—jerk!—he was as erect, and carried his head as high as

ever.

To have taken the field openly against his rival would have been

madness; for he was not a man to be thwarted in his amours, any

more than that stormy lover, Achilles. Ichabod, therefore, made his

advances in a quiet and gently insinuating manner. Under cover of

his character of singing-master, he made frequent visits at the

farmhouse; not that he had anything to apprehend from the

meddlesome interference of parents, which is so often a stumbling-

block in the path of lovers. Balt Van Tassel was an easy indulgent

soul; he loved his daughter better even than his pipe, and, like a

reasonable man and an excellent father, let her have her way in

everything. His notable little wife, too, had enough to do to attend to

her housekeeping and manage her poultry; for, as she sagely

observed, ducks and geese are foolish things, and must be looked

after, but girls can take care of themselves. Thus, while the busy

dame bustled about the house, or plied her spinning-wheel at one

end of the piazza, honest Balt would sit smoking his evening pipe at

the other, watching the achievements of a little wooden warrior,

who, armed with a sword in each hand, was most valiantly fighting

the wind on the pinnacle of the barn. In the mean time, Ichabod

would carry on his suit with the daughter by the side of the spring

 

 

 

 

under the great elm, or sauntering along in the twilight, that hour so

favorable to the lover's eloquence.

I profess not to know how women's hearts are wooed and won. To

me they have always been matters of riddle and admiration. Some

seem to have but one vulnerable point, or door of access; while

others have a thousand avenues, and may be captured in a thousand

different ways. It is a great triumph of skill to gain the former, but a

still greater proof of generalship to maintain possession of the latter,

for man must battle for his fortress at every door and window. He

who wins a thousand common hearts is therefore entitled to some

renown; but he who keeps undisputed sway over the heart of a

coquette is indeed a hero. Certain it is, this was not the case with

the redoubtable Brom Bones; and from the moment Ichabod Crane

made his advances, the interests of the former evidently declined: his

horse was no longer seen tied to the palings on Sunday nights, and a

deadly feud gradually arose between him and the preceptor of Sleepy

Hollow.

Brom, who had a degree of rough chivalry in his nature, would

fain have carried matters to open warfare and have settled their

pretensions to the lady, according to the mode of those most concise

and simple reasoners, the knights-errant of yore,—by single combat;

but Ichabod was too conscious of the superior might of his adversary

to enter the lists against him; he had overheard a boast of Bones,

that he would "double the schoolmaster up, and lay him on a shelf of

his own schoolhouse;" and he was too wary to give him an

opportunity. There was something extremely provoking in this

obstinately pacific system; it left Brom no alternative but to draw

upon the funds of rustic waggery in his disposition, and to play off

boorish practical jokes upon his rival. Ichabod became the object of

whimsical persecution to Bones and his gang of rough riders. They

harried his hitherto peaceful domains; smoked out his singing school

by stopping up the chimney; broke into the schoolhouse at night, in

spite of its formidable fastenings of withe and window stakes, and

turned everything topsy-turvy, so that the poor schoolmaster began

to think all the witches in the country held their meetings there. But

what was still more annoying, Brom took all opportunities of turning

him into ridicule in presence of his mistress, and had a scoundrel

dog whom he taught to whine in the most ludicrous manner, and

introduced as a rival of Ichabod's, to instruct her in psalmody.

 

 

 

 

In this way matters went on for some time, without producing any

material effect on the relative situations of the contending powers.

On a fine autumnal afternoon, Ichabod, in pensive mood, sat

enthroned on the lofty stool from whence he usually watched all the

concerns of his little literary realm. In his hand he swayed a ferule,

that sceptre of despotic power; the birch of justice reposed on three

nails behind the throne, a constant terror to evil doers, while on the

desk before him might be seen sundry contraband articles and

prohibited weapons, detected upon the persons of idle urchins, such

as half-munched apples, popguns, whirligigs, fly-cages, and whole

legions of rampant little paper gamecocks. Apparently there had

been some appalling act of justice recently inflicted, for his scholars

were all busily intent upon their books, or slyly whispering behind

them with one eye kept upon the master; and a kind of buzzing

stillness reigned throughout the schoolroom. It was suddenly

interrupted by the appearance of a negro in tow-cloth jacket and

trowsers, a round-crowned fragment of a hat, like the cap of

Mercury, and mounted on the back of a ragged, wild, half-broken

colt, which he managed with a rope by way of halter. He came

clattering up to the school door with an invitation to Ichabod to

attend a merry-making or "quilting frolic," to be held that evening at

Mynheer Van Tassel's; and having delivered his message with that

air of importance, and effort at fine language, which a negro is apt to

display on petty embassies of the kind, he dashed over the brook,

and was seen scampering away up the hollow, full of the importance

and hurry of his mission.

All was now bustle and hubbub in the late quiet schoolroom. The

scholars were hurried through their lessons without stopping at

trifles; those who were nimble skipped over half with impunity, and

those who were tardy had a smart application now and then in the

rear, to quicken their speed or help them over a tall word. Books

were flung aside without being put away on the shelves, inkstands

were overturned, benches thrown down, and the whole school was

turned loose an hour before the usual time, bursting forth like a

legion of young imps, yelping and racketing about the green in joy at

their early emancipation.

The gallant Ichabod now spent at least an extra half hour at his

toilet, brushing and furbishing up his best, and indeed only suit of

rusty black, and arranging his locks by a bit of broken looking-glass

that hung up in the schoolhouse. That he might make his appearance

 

 

 

 

before his mistress in the true style of a cavalier, he borrowed a

horse from the farmer with whom he was domiciliated, a choleric old

Dutchman of the name of Hans Van Ripper, and, thus gallantly

mounted, issued forth like a knight-errant in quest of adventures.

But it is meet I should, in the true spirit of romantic story, give some

account of the looks and equipments of my hero and his steed. The

animal he bestrode was a broken-down plow-horse, that had outlived

almost everything but its viciousness. He was gaunt and shagged,

with a ewe neck, and a head like a hammer; his rusty mane and tail

were tangled and knotted with burs; one eye had lost its pupil, and

was glaring and spectral, but the other had the gleam of a genuine

devil in it. Still he must have had fire and mettle in his day, if we

may judge from the name he bore of Gunpowder. He had, in fact,

been a favorite steed of his master's, the choleric Van Ripper, who

was a furious rider, and had infused, very probably, some of his own

spirit into the animal; for, old and broken-down as he looked, there

was more of the lurking devil in him than in any young filly in the

country.

Ichabod was a suitable figure for such a steed. He rode with short

stirrups, which brought his knees nearly up to the pommel of the

saddle; his sharp elbows stuck out like grasshoppers'; he carried his

whip perpendicularly in his hand, like a sceptre, and as his horse

jogged on, the motion of his arms was not unlike the flapping of a

pair of wings. A small wool hat rested on the top of his nose, for so

his scanty strip of forehead might be called, and the skirts of his

black coat fluttered out almost to the horses tail. Such was the

appearance of Ichabod and his steed as they shambled out of the

gate of Hans Van Ripper, and it was altogether such an apparition as

is seldom to be met with in broad daylight.

It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day; the sky was clear and

serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery which we always

associate with the idea of abundance. The forests had put on their

sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind had

been nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes of orange, purple, and

scarlet. Streaming files of wild ducks began to make their appearance

high in the air; the bark of the squirrel might be heard from the

groves of beech and hickory-nuts, and the pensive whistle of the

quail at intervals from the neighboring stubble field.

 

 

 

 

The small birds were taking their farewell banquets. In the fullness

of their revelry, they fluttered, chirping and frolicking from bush to

bush, and tree to tree, capricious from the very profusion and variety

around them. There was the honest cock robin, the favorite game of

stripling sportsmen, with its loud querulous note; and the twittering

blackbirds flying in sable clouds; and the golden-winged woodpecker

with his crimson crest, his broad black gorget, and splendid

plumage; and the cedar bird, with its red-tipt wings and yellow-tipt

tail and its little monteiro cap of feathers; and the blue jay, that

noisy coxcomb, in his gay light blue coat and white underclothes,

screaming and chattering, nodding and bobbing and bowing, and

pretending to be on good terms with every songster of the grove.

As Ichabod jogged slowly on his way, his eye, ever open to every

symptom of culinary abundance, ranged with delight over the

treasures of jolly autumn. On all sides he beheld vast store of apples;

some hanging in oppressive opulence on the trees; some gathered

into baskets and barrels for the market; others heaped up in rich

piles for the cider-press. Farther on he beheld great fields of Indian

corn, with its golden ears peeping from their leafy coverts, and

holding out the promise of cakes and hasty-pudding; and the yellow

pumpkins lying beneath them, turning up their fair round bellies to

the sun, and giving ample prospects of the most luxurious of pies;

and anon he passed the fragrant buckwheat fields breathing the odor

of the beehive, and as he beheld them, soft anticipations stole over

his mind of dainty slapjacks, well buttered, and garnished with

honey or treacle, by the delicate little dimpled hand of Katrina Van

Tassel.

Thus feeding his mind with many sweet thoughts and "sugared

suppositions," he journeyed along the sides of a range of hills which

look out upon some of the goodliest scenes of the mighty Hudson.

The sun gradually wheeled his broad disk down in the west. The

wide bosom of the Tappan Zee lay motionless and glassy, excepting

that here and there a gentle undulation waved and prolonged the

blue shadow of the distant mountain. A few amber clouds floated in

the sky, without a breath of air to move them. The horizon was of a

fine golden tint, changing gradually into a pure apple green, and

from that into the deep blue of the mid-heaven. A slanting ray

lingered on the woody crests of the precipices that overhung some

parts of the river, giving greater depth to the dark gray and purple of

their rocky sides. A sloop was loitering in the distance, dropping

 

 

 

 

slowly down with the tide, her sail hanging uselessly against the

mast; and as the reflection of the sky gleamed along the still water, it

seemed as if the vessel was suspended in the air.

It was toward evening that Ichabod arrived at the castle of the

Heer Van Tassel, which he found thronged with the pride and flower

of the adjacent country. Old farmers, a spare leathern-faced race, in

homespun coats and breeches, blue stockings, huge shoes, and

magnificent pewter buckles. Their brisk, withered little dames, in

close-crimped caps, long-waisted short gowns, homespun petticoats,

with scissors and pincushions, and gay calico pockets hanging on the

outside. Buxom lasses, almost as antiquated as their mothers,

excepting where a straw hat, a fine ribbon, or perhaps a white frock,

gave symptoms of city innovation. The sons, in short square-skirted

coats, with rows of stupendous brass buttons, and their hair

generally queued in the fashion of the times, especially if they could

procure an eel-skin for the purpose, it being esteemed throughout the

country as a potent nourisher and strengthener of the hair.

Brom Bones, however, was the hero of the scene, having come to

the gathering on his favorite steed Daredevil, a creature, like himself,

full of mettle and mischief, and which no one but himself could

manage. He was, in fact, noted for preferring vicious animals, given

to all kinds of tricks which kept the rider in constant risk of his

neck, for he held a tractable, well-broken horse as unworthy of a lad

of spirit.

Fain would I pause to dwell upon the world of charms that burst

upon the enraptured gaze of my hero, as he entered the state parlor

of Van Tassel's mansion. Not those of the bevy of buxom lasses, with

their luxurious display of red and white; but the ample charms of a

genuine Dutch country tea-table, in the sumptuous time of autumn.

Such heaped up platters of cakes of various and almost indescribable

kinds, known only to experienced Dutch housewives! There was the

doughty doughnut, the tender oly koek, and the crisp and crumbling

cruller; sweet cakes and short cakes, ginger cakes and honey cakes,

and the whole family of cakes. And then there were apple pies, and

peach pies, and pumpkin pies; besides slices of ham and smoked

beef; and moreover delectable dishes of preserved plums, and

peaches, and pears, and quinces; not to mention broiled shad and

roasted chickens; together with bowls of milk and cream, all mingled

higgledy-piggledy, pretty much as I have enumerated them, with the

 

 

 

 

motherly teapot sending up its clouds of vapor from the midst—

Heaven bless the mark! I want breath and time to discuss this

banquet as it deserves, and am too eager to get on with my story.

Happily, Ichabod Crane was not in so great a hurry as his historian,

but did ample justice to every dainty.

He was a kind and thankful creature, whose heart dilated in

proportion as his skin was filled with good cheer, and whose spirits

rose with eating, as some men's do with drink. He could not help,

too, rolling his large eyes round him as he ate, and chuckling with

the possibility that he might one day be lord of all this scene of

almost unimaginable luxury and splendor. Then, he thought, how

soon he'd turn his back upon the old schoolhouse; snap his fingers in

the face of Hans Van Ripper, and every other niggardly patron, and

kick any itinerant pedagogue out of doors that should dare to call

him comrade!

Old Baltus Van Tassel moved about among his guests with a face

dilated with content and good humor, round and jolly as the harvest

moon. His hospitable attentions were brief, but expressive, being

confined to a shake of the hand, a slap on the shoulder, a loud

laugh, and a pressing invitation to "fall to, and help themselves."

And now the sound of the music from the common room, or hall,

summoned to the dance. The musician was an old gray-headed

negro, who had been the itinerant orchestra of the neighborhood for

more than half a century. His instrument was as old and battered as

himself. The greater part of the time he scraped on two or three

strings, accompanying every movement of the bow with a motion of

the head; bowing almost to the ground, and stamping with his foot

whenever a fresh couple were to start.

Ichabod prided himself upon his dancing as much as upon his

vocal powers. Not a limb, not a fibre about him was idle; and to

have seen his loosely hung frame in full motion, and clattering about

the room, you would have thought St. Vitus himself, that blessed

patron of the dance, was figuring before you in person. He was the

admiration of all the negroes; who, having gathered, of all ages and

sizes, from the farm and the neighborhood, stood forming a pyramid

of shining black faces at every door and window, gazing with delight

at the scene, rolling their white eyeballs, and showing grinning rows

of ivory from ear to ear. How could the flogger of urchins be

otherwise than animated and joyous? The lady of his heart was his

 

 

 

 

partner in the dance, and smiling graciously in reply to all his

amorous oglings; while Brom Bones, sorely smitten with love and

jealousy, sat brooding by himself in one corner.

When the dance was at an end, Ichabod was attracted to a knot of

the sager folks, who, with Old Van Tassel, sat smoking at one end of

the piazza, gossiping over former times, and drawing out long stories

about the war.

This neighborhood, at the time of which I am speaking, was one of

those highly favored places which abound with chronicle and great

men. The British and American line had run near it during the war;

it had, therefore, been the scene of marauding and infested with

refugees, cowboys, and all kinds of border chivalry. Just sufficient

time had elapsed to enable each storyteller to dress up his tale with a

little becoming fiction, and, in the indistinctness of his recollection,

to make himself the hero of every exploit.

There was the story of Doffue Martling, a large blue-bearded

Dutchman, who had nearly taken a British frigate with an old iron

nine-pounder from a mud breastwork, only that his gun burst at the

sixth discharge. And there was an old gentleman who shall be

nameless, being too rich a mynheer to be lightly mentioned, who, in

the battle of White Plains, being an excellent master of defence,

parried a musket-ball with a small sword, insomuch that he

absolutely felt it whiz round the blade, and glance off at the hilt; in

proof of which he was ready at any time to show the sword, with the

hilt a little bent. There were several more that had been equally great

in the field, not one of whom but was persuaded that he had a

considerable hand in bringing the war to a happy termination.

But all these were nothing to the tales of ghosts and apparitions

that succeeded. The neighborhood is rich in legendary treasures of

the kind. Local tales and superstitions thrive best in these sheltered,

long-settled retreats; but are trampled under foot by the shifting

throng that forms the population of most of our country places.

Besides, there is no encouragement for ghosts in most of our villages,

for they have scarcely had time to finish their first nap and turn

themselves in their graves, before their surviving friends have

travelled away from the neighborhood; so that when they turn out at

night to walk their rounds, they have no acquaintance left to call

upon. This is perhaps the reason why we so seldom hear of ghosts

except in our long-established Dutch communities.

 

 

 

 

The immediate cause, however, of the prevalence of supernatural

stories in these parts, was doubtless owing to the vicinity of Sleepy

Hollow. There was a contagion in the very air that blew from that

haunted region; it breathed forth an atmosphere of dreams and

fancies infecting all the land. Several of the Sleepy Hollow people

were present at Van Tassel's, and, as usual, were doling out their

wild and wonderful legends. Many dismal tales were told about

funeral trains, and mourning cries and wailings heard and seen

about the great tree where the unfortunate Major André was taken,

and which stood in the neighborhood. Some mention was made also

of the woman in white, that haunted the dark glen at Raven Rock,

and was often heard to shriek on winter nights before a storm,

having perished there in the snow. The chief part of the stories,

however, turned upon the favorite spectre of Sleepy Hollow, the

Headless Horseman, who had been heard several times of late,

patrolling the country; and, it was said, tethered his horse nightly

among the graves in the churchyard.

The sequestered situation of this church seems always to have

made it a favorite haunt of troubled spirits. It stands on a knoll,

surrounded by locust-trees and lofty elms, from among which its

decent, whitewashed walls shine modestly forth, like Christian

purity beaming through the shades of retirement. A gentle slope

descends from it to a silver sheet of water, bordered by high trees,

between which, peeps may be caught at the blue hills of the Hudson.

To look upon its grass-grown yard, where the sunbeams seem to

sleep so quietly, one would think that there at least the dead might

rest in peace. On one side of the church extends a wide woody dell,

along which raves a large brook among broken rocks and trunks of

fallen trees. Over a deep black part of the stream, not far from the

church, was formerly thrown a wooden bridge; the road that led to

it, and the bridge itself, were thickly shaded by overhanging trees,

which cast a gloom about it, even in the daytime; but occasioned a

fearful darkness at night. Such was one of the favorite haunts of the

Headless Horseman, and the place where he was most frequently

encountered. The tale was told of old Brouwer, a most heretical

disbeliever in ghosts, how he met the Horseman returning from his

foray into Sleepy Hollow, and was obliged to get up behind him; how

they galloped over bush and brake, over hill and swamp, until they

reached the bridge; when the Horseman suddenly turned into a

skeleton, threw old Brouwer into the brook, and sprang away over

the tree-tops with a clap of thunder.

 

 

 

 

This story was immediately matched by a thrice marvellous

adventure of Brom Bones, who made light of the Galloping Hessian

as an arrant jockey. He affirmed that on returning one night from the

neighboring village of Sing Sing, he had been overtaken by this

midnight trooper; that he had offered to race with him for a bowl of

punch, and should have won it too, for Daredevil beat the goblin

horse all hollow, but just as they came to the church bridge, the

Hessian bolted, and vanished in a flash of fire.

All these tales, told in that drowsy undertone with which men talk

in the dark, the countenances of the listeners only now and then

receiving a casual gleam from the glare of a pipe, sank deep in the

mind of Ichabod. He repaid them in kind with large extracts from his

invaluable author, Cotton Mather, and added many marvellous

events that had taken place in his native State of Connecticut, and

fearful sights which he had seen in his nightly walks about Sleepy

Hollow.

The revel now gradually broke up. The old farmers gathered

together their families in their wagons, and were heard for some time

rattling along the hollow roads, and over the distant hills. Some of

the damsels mounted on pillions behind their favorite swains, and

their light-hearted laughter, mingling with the clatter of hoofs,

echoed along the silent woodlands, sounding fainter and fainter,

until they gradually died away,—and the late scene of noise and

frolic was all silent and deserted. Ichabod only lingered behind,

according to the custom of country lovers, to have a tête-à-tête with

the heiress; fully convinced that he was now on the high road to

success. What passed at this interview I will not pretend to say, for

in fact I do not know. Something, however, I fear me, must have

gone wrong, for he certainly sallied forth, after no very great

interval, with an air quite desolate and chapfallen. Oh, these women!

these women! Could that girl have been playing off any of her

coquettish tricks? Was her encouragement of the poor pedagogue all

a mere sham to secure her conquest of his rival? Heaven only knows,

not I! Let it suffice to say, Ichabod stole forth with the air of one

who had been sacking a henroost, rather than a fair lady's heart.

Without looking to the right or left to notice the scene of rural

wealth, on which he had so often gloated, he went straight to the

stable, and with several hearty cuffs and kicks roused his steed most

uncourteously from the comfortable quarters in which he was

 

 

 

 

soundly sleeping, dreaming of mountains of corn and oats, and

whole valleys of timothy and clover.

It was the very witching time of night that Ichabod, heavy-hearted

and crestfallen, pursued his travels homewards, along the sides of

the lofty hills which rise above Tarry Town, and which he had

traversed so cheerily in the afternoon. The hour was as dismal as

himself. Far below him the Tappan Zee spread its dusky and

indistinct waste of waters, with here and there the tall mast of a

sloop, riding quietly at anchor under the land. In the dead hush of

midnight, he could even hear the barking of the watchdog from the

opposite shore of the Hudson; but it was so vague and faint as only

to give an idea of his distance from this faithful companion of man.

Now and then, too, the long-drawn crowing of a cock, accidentally

awakened, would sound far, far off, from some farmhouse away

among the hills—but it was like a dreaming sound in his ear. No

signs of life occurred near him, but occasionally the melancholy

chirp of a cricket, or perhaps the guttural twang of a bullfrog from a

neighboring marsh, as if sleeping uncomfortably and turning

suddenly in his bed.

All the stories of ghosts and goblins that he had heard in the

afternoon now came crowding upon his recollection. The night grew

darker and darker; the stars seemed to sink deeper in the sky, and

driving clouds occasionally hid them from his sight. He had never

felt so lonely and dismal. He was, moreover, approaching the very

place where many of the scenes of the ghost stories had been laid. In

the centre of the road stood an enormous tulip-tree, which towered

like a giant above all the other trees of the neighborhood, and

formed a kind of landmark. Its limbs were gnarled and fantastic,

large enough to form trunks for ordinary trees, twisting down almost

to the earth, and rising again into the air. It was connected with the

tragical story of the unfortunate André, who had been taken prisoner

hard by; and was universally known by the name of Major André's

tree. The common people regarded it with a mixture of respect and

superstition, partly out of sympathy for the fate of its ill-starred

namesake, and partly from the tales of strange sights, and doleful

lamentations, told concerning it.

As Ichabod approached this fearful tree, he began to whistle; he

thought his whistle was answered; it was but a blast sweeping

sharply through the dry branches. As he approached a little nearer,

 

 

 

 

he thought he saw something white, hanging in the midst of the tree:

he paused and ceased whistling but, on looking more narrowly,

perceived that it was a place where the tree had been scathed by

lightning, and the white wood laid bare. Suddenly he heard a

groan—his teeth chattered, and his knees smote against the saddle:

it was but the rubbing of one huge bough upon another, as they were

swayed about by the breeze. He passed the tree in safety, but new

perils lay before him.

About two hundred yards from the tree, a small brook crossed the

road, and ran into a marshy and thickly-wooded glen, known by the

name of Wiley's Swamp. A few rough logs, laid side by side, served

for a bridge over this stream. On that side of the road where the

brook entered the wood, a group of oaks and chestnuts, matted thick

with wild grape-vines, threw a cavernous gloom over it. To pass this

bridge was the severest trial. It was at this identical spot that the

unfortunate André was captured, and under the covert of those

chestnuts and vines were the sturdy yeomen concealed who

surprised him. This has ever since been considered a haunted

stream, and fearful are the feelings of the schoolboy who has to pass

it alone after dark.

As he approached the stream, his heart began to thump; he

summoned up, however, all his resolution, gave his horse half a

score of kicks in the ribs, and attempted to dash briskly across the

bridge; but instead of starting forward, the perverse old animal made

a lateral movement, and ran broadside against the fence. Ichabod,

whose fears increased with the delay, jerked the reins on the other

side, and kicked lustily with the contrary foot: it was all in vain; his

steed started, it is true, but it was only to plunge to the opposite side

of the road into a thicket of brambles and alder bushes. The

schoolmaster now bestowed both whip and heel upon the starveling

ribs of old Gunpowder, who dashed forward, snuffling and snorting,

but came to a stand just by the bridge, with a suddenness that had

nearly sent his rider sprawling over his head. Just at this moment a

plashy tramp by the side of the bridge caught the sensitive ear of

Ichabod. In the dark shadow of the grove, on the margin of the

brook, he beheld something huge, misshapen and towering. It stirred

not, but seemed gathered up in the gloom, like some gigantic

monster ready to spring upon the traveller.

 

 

 

 

The hair of the affrighted pedagogue rose upon his head with

terror. What was to be done? To turn and fly was now too late; and

besides, what chance was there of escaping ghost or goblin, if such it

was, which could ride upon the wings of the wind? Summoning up,

therefore, a show of courage, he demanded in stammering accents,

"Who are you?" He received no reply. He repeated his demand in a

still more agitated voice. Still there was no answer. Once more he

cudgelled the sides of the inflexible Gunpowder, and, shutting his

eyes, broke forth with involuntary fervor into a psalm tune. Just then

the shadowy object of alarm put itself in motion, and with a

scramble and a bound stood at once in the middle of the road.

Though the night was dark and dismal, yet the form of the unknown

might now in some degree be ascertained. He appeared to be a

horseman of large dimensions, and mounted on a black horse of

powerful frame. He made no offer of molestation or sociability, but

kept aloof on one side of the road, jogging along on the blind side of

old Gunpowder, who had now got over his fright and waywardness.

Ichabod, who had no relish for this strange midnight companion,

and bethought himself of the adventure of Brom Bones with the

Galloping Hessian, now quickened his steed in hopes of leaving him

behind. The stranger, however, quickened his horse to an equal

pace. Ichabod pulled up, and fell into a walk, thinking to lag

behind,—the other did the same. His heart began to sink within him;

he endeavored to resume his psalm tune, but his parched tongue

clove to the roof of his mouth, and he could not utter a stave. There

was something in the moody and dogged silence of this pertinacious

companion that was mysterious and appalling. It was soon fearfully

accounted for. On mounting a rising ground, which brought the

figure of his fellow-traveller in relief against the sky, gigantic in

height, and muffled in a cloak, Ichabod was horror-struck on

perceiving that he was headless!—but his horror was still more

increased on observing that the head, which should have rested on

his shoulders, was carried before him on the pommel of his saddle!

His terror rose to desperation; he rained a shower of kicks and blows

upon Gunpowder, hoping by a sudden movement to give his

companion the slip; but the spectre started full jump with him.

Away, then, they dashed through thick and thin; stones flying and

sparks flashing at every bound. Ichabod's flimsy garments fluttered

in the air, as he stretched his long lank body away over his horse's

head, in the eagerness of his flight.

 

 

 

 

They had now reached the road which turns off to Sleepy Hollow;

but Gunpowder, who seemed possessed with a demon, instead of

keeping up it, made an opposite turn, and plunged headlong

downhill to the left. This road leads through a sandy hollow shaded

by trees for about a quarter of a mile, where it crosses the bridge

famous in goblin story; and just beyond swells the green knoll on

which stands the whitewashed church.

As yet the panic of the steed had given his unskilful rider an

apparent advantage in the chase, but just as he had got half way

through the hollow, the girths of the saddle gave way, and he felt it

slipping from under him. He seized it by the pommel, and

endeavored to hold it firm, but in vain; and had just time to save

himself by clasping old Gunpowder round the neck, when the saddle

fell to the earth, and he heard it trampled under foot by his pursuer.

For a moment the terror of Hans Van Ripper's wrath passed across

his mind,—for it was his Sunday saddle; but this was no time for

petty fears; the goblin was hard on his haunches; and (unskilful rider

that he was!) he had much ado to maintain his seat; sometimes

slipping on one side, sometimes on another, and sometimes jolted on

the high ridge of his horse's backbone, with a violence that he verily

feared would cleave him asunder.

An opening in the trees now cheered him with the hopes that the

church bridge was at hand. The wavering reflection of a silver star in

the bosom of the brook told him that he was not mistaken. He saw

the walls of the church dimly glaring under the trees beyond. He

recollected the place where Brom Bones's ghostly competitor had

disappeared. "If I can but reach that bridge," thought Ichabod, "I am

safe." Just then he heard the black steed panting and blowing close

behind him; he even fancied that he felt his hot breath. Another

convulsive kick in the ribs, and old Gunpowder sprang upon the

bridge; he thundered over the resounding planks; he gained the

opposite side; and now Ichabod cast a look behind to see if his

pursuer should vanish, according to rule, in a flash of fire and

brimstone. Just then he saw the goblin rising in his stirrups, and in

the very act of hurling his head at him. Ichabod endeavored to dodge

the horrible missile, but too late. It encountered his cranium with a

tremendous crash,—he was tumbled headlong into the dust, and

Gunpowder, the black steed, and the goblin rider, passed by like a

whirlwind.

 

 

 

 

The next morning the old horse was found without his saddle, and

with the bridle under his feet, soberly cropping the grass at his

master's gate. Ichabod did not make his appearance at breakfast;

dinner-hour came, but no Ichabod. The boys assembled at the

schoolhouse, and strolled idly about the banks of the brook; but no

schoolmaster. Hans Van Ripper now began to feel some uneasiness

about the fate of poor Ichabod, and his saddle. An inquiry was set

on foot, and after diligent investigation they came upon his traces. In

one part of the road leading to the church was found the saddle

trampled in the dirt; the tracks of horses' hoofs deeply dented in the

road, and evidently at furious speed, were traced to the bridge,

beyond which, on the bank of a broad part of the brook, where the

water ran deep and black, was found the hat of the unfortunate

Ichabod, and close beside it a shattered pumpkin.

The brook was searched, but the body of the schoolmaster was not

to be discovered. Hans Van Ripper as executor of his estate,

examined the bundle which contained all his worldly effects. They

consisted of two shirts and a half; two stocks for the neck; a pair or

two of worsted stockings; an old pair of corduroy small-clothes; a

rusty razor; a book of psalm tunes full of dog's-ears; and a broken

pitch-pipe. As to the books and furniture of the schoolhouse, they

belonged to the community, excepting Cotton Mather's "History of

Witchcraft," a "New England Almanac," and a book of dreams and

fortune-telling; in which last was a sheet of foolscap much scribbled

and blotted in several fruitless attempts to make a copy of verses in

honor of the heiress of Van Tassel. These magic books and the poetic

scrawl were forthwith consigned to the flames by Hans Van Ripper;

who, from that time forward, determined to send his children no

more to school, observing that he never knew any good come of this

same reading and writing. Whatever money the schoolmaster

possessed, and he had received his quarter's pay but a day or two

before, he must have had about his person at the time of his

disappearance.

The mysterious event caused much speculation at the church on

the following Sunday. Knots of gazers and gossips were collected in

the churchyard, at the bridge, and at the spot where the hat and

pumpkin had been found. The stories of Brouwer, of Bones, and a

whole budget of others were called to mind; and when they had

diligently considered them all, and compared them with the

symptoms of the present case, they shook their heads, and came to

 

 

 

 

the conclusion that Ichabod had been carried off by the Galloping

Hessian. As he was a bachelor, and in nobody's debt, nobody

troubled his head any more about him; the school was removed to a

different quarter of the hollow, and another pedagogue reigned in his

stead.

It is true, an old farmer, who had been down to New York on a

visit several years after, and from whom this account of the ghostly

adventure was received, brought home the intelligence that Ichabod

Crane was still alive; that he had left the neighborhood partly

through fear of the goblin and Hans Van Ripper, and partly in

mortification at having been suddenly dismissed by the heiress; that

he had changed his quarters to a distant part of the country; had

kept school and studied law at the same time; had been admitted to

the bar; turned politician; electioneered; written for the newspapers;

and finally had been made a justice of the Ten Pound Court. Brom

Bones, too, who, shortly after his rival's disappearance conducted

the blooming Katrina in triumph to the altar, was observed to look

exceedingly knowing whenever the story of Ichabod was related, and

always burst into a hearty laugh at the mention of the pumpkin;

which led some to suspect that he knew more about the matter than

he chose to tell.

The old country wives, however, who are the best judges of these

matters, maintain to this day that Ichabod was spirited away by

supernatural means; and it is a favorite story often told about the

neighborhood round the winter evening fire. The bridge became more

than ever an object of superstitious awe; and that may be the reason

why the road has been altered of late years, so as to approach the

church by the border of the millpond. The schoolhouse being

deserted soon fell to decay, and was reported to be haunted by the

ghost of the unfortunate pedagogue and the plowboy, loitering

homeward of a still summer evening, has often fancied his voice at a

distance, chanting a melancholy psalm tune among the tranquil

solitudes of Sleepy Hollow.