associated with the history and life of his adopted state; and the two poets, William Cullen Bryant, who was born in Western Massachusetts but was for more than half a century the most prominent figure in the journalistic, literary, and cultural life of New York City, and later in the century Walt Whitman, who was born on Long Island and lived almost entirely in the Middle Atlantic States, for the most part in the neighborhood of New York, calling it "Mannahatta, my city." With these four major writers we may associate a large company of minor writers whose work, especially when compared with much of our earlier literature, is highly meritorious.

Washington Irving. Washington Irving (1783-1859) has been called "The Father of American Literature," just as the great statesman and soldier for whom he was named is called "The Father of His Country." In a certain sense, Irving is the father of American literature. He was not our first author to devote himself entirely to literature, for Charles Brockden Brown had done that just before him; but he was the first of our authors to gain recognition abroad, or, as Thackeray happily phrased it in his essay "Nil Nisi Bonum," "Irving was the first ambassador whom the New World of letters sent to the Old." The Sketch Book was, in fact, the first positive answer to the tantalizing British query, "Who reads an American book?”

His early life and education. Irving was born in New York City, April 3, 1783, the year which marked the treaty of peace and the close of the Revolution, and his mother, who was an ardent patriot, decided to name him for the great American general, for, she said, "Washington's work is ended, and the child shall be named for him." When Irving was six years old, his old Scotch nurse presented him to President Washington for his blessing. Irving remembered the incident, remarking in later years, "That blessing has attended me through life." It is interesting, finally,

to note in this connection that Irving's last great work was the five-volume Life of Washington, which appeared in 1859

From an engraving by E. Burney, after a photograph WASHINGTON IRVING

just before his death. Irving's parents were both born abroad, his father being of Scotch and his mother of English descent. There were born to them eleven children, of whom Washington was the youngest. He was a delicate and wayward sort of child, and hence his education was not very thorough or systematic. He read tales of travel and adventure, particularly The Arabian Nights and Robinson Crusoe, when he ought to have been studying his arithmetic;

and it is said that he would willingly write the other boys' compositions if they would work his sums for him. He dropped out of school at sixteen, failing to take advantage of the opportunity of attending Columbia College as two of his brothers did. Instead, he spent his time in reading tales of romance, slipping away from home before and after family prayers to attend the newly opened theater, and roaming the country roundabout, listening to the good wives' tales about ghosts and fairies in the surrounding hills and valleys. He made several long holiday excursions into the Hudson River hill country farther north, going on onetrip as far north as Canada, ever collecting those legends and nature pictures which he has so well preserved in "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow."

Irving's love affair. The plan for young Irving's future was that he should become a lawyer. The chief result of his five years of desultory study of law, largely in Judge Hoffman's office, was his acquaintance with the Judge's daughter, Matilda. She was a beautiful and quick-witted girl, and Irving fell desperately in love with her. She was equally attracted to the handsome and genial youth and promised to marry him, but developed quick consumption and died in her eighteenth year. Irving's devotion to her memory is one of the most beautiful things in his life. He did not seclude himself from society or become sentimentally morbid; indeed, he was always delighted with the society of women, and the evidence seems to show that he had some serious intentions of marrying later in life. But the fact remains that he never married, and after his death there were found among his cherished personal belongings a lock of Miss Hoffman's hair and her Bible and prayerbook.

His first trip abroad: early literary undertakings. Irving's constitution was still frail, and so in 1804 it was decided that he should visit Europe partly in search of health, but partly also for literary and cultural advantages. He traveled

through Italy, France, and England, meeting many distinguished persons and making many friends by his genial manners and attractive personality. On his return in 1806, he was admitted to the bar, but he devoted his time more to social engagements and literary experiments than to his profession. Before his trip abroad he had contributed to a New York paper a series of light satiric letters, signing them "Jonathan Oldstyle," a name indicating at this early period his fondness for the eighteenth-century Addisonian prose. With James Kirke Paulding1 he now undertook another experiment, a semi-monthly periodical called Salmagundi. It was modeled on the Spectator of Addison and Steele, and though it did not run quite a year, it gave both of these men an outlet for their literary aspirations and eventually led to other undertakings in authorship.

His works classified. Irving's works may be divided into three classes: his humorous and serious essays and sketches, his longer connected narratives, and his biographical and historical narratives. The first of these is the most important and will receive the major part of our attention.

"Knickerbocker's History." In 1809 there appeared the first really important work by Irving, namely, A History of New York by Diedrich Knickerbocker. It was begun as a satiric burlesque on Dr. Samuel Mitchell's Picture of New York, but it was carried out in such a fine spirit of humorous extravaganza that it was at once recognized as an original and imaginative work. It was preceded by a clever series of advertising notes in the form of news items about the peculiar and distressing disappearance of Diedrich Knickerbocker, "a small, elderly gentleman, dressed in an old black coat and a cocked hat." He had left behind him a curious manuscript,

1Aside from his association with Irving in the Salmagundi papers, James Kirke Paulding (1778-1860) is now chiefly remembered for his novel, The Dutchman's Fireside (1831), which portrays with considerable charm and accuracy the quaint Dutch customs and beautiful Hudson river scenery which Irving had some years before made famous in his Knickerbocker's History and Sketch Book.

which would be sold to pay his board bill. Naturally, when this manuscript was published everybody wanted to read it, and everybody, with the exception of a few serious-minded Dutch historians, was delighted with the good-natured and playful satire, the mock-serious exaggeration, and the quaint Dutch reminiscences which the book contained. It was talked of and bandied about so freely that it gave a new word to the language, Knickerbocker, the generic name for the Dutch freeholders, a term later applied to the first school of nineteenth century American writers. It is a difficult thing for a purely humorous work to hold its place of popularity, and so we find today comparatively few readers of Knickerbocker's History. A little of it is still highly amusing, but style in writing, as in dress, changes from generation to generation, and the broad splashes of humor and elephantine facetiousness of the celebrated Knickerbocker's History are not so attractive to modern readers as they were to Irving's contemporaries.

Irving's social activities. After Knickerbocker's History Irving seems to have rested on his laurels for a period of ten years. He was nominally engaged in business with his brothers, but his duties seem to have been mainly to keep up the social side of the house. He was sent to Washington, ostensibly to protect the claims of certain business interests before Congress, but his letters relate more of his experiences in the drawing-rooms of Mrs. Dolly Madison and others than of his business activities. He also visited Baltimore and Philadelphia, where he was received in the best society. His literary success had paved the way for him everywhere, and he was already something of a social lion. So ran the merry years away; and some serious ones, too, for Irving passed through the War of 1812, not in active service, it is true, but as a military aid to Governor Tompkins of New York. Irving's second visit to Europe: "The Sketch Book." In 1815 he went to England to visit one of his brothers,