Of these years there are records of Cooper's kindly love for little folk. Miss Caroline A. Foot, a schoolgirl of thirteen and a frequent visitor at Otsego Hall, had always a warm welcome from Mr. Cooper and his family. When she was about to leave her Cooperstown home for another elsewhere, "she made bold to enter his sanctum, carrying her album in her hand and asking him to write a verse or two in the same." Those verses have been treasured many years by that little girl, who became Mrs. George Pomeroy Keese. Two of her treasured verses are:
The delight of the winsome little lady was great, not only for the loving sentiment but also for the autograph, which is now both rare and valuable. Not long after the capture of her verses a copy of them was sent to her friend Julia Bryant, daughter of Mr. Cooper's friend, the poet. Miss Julia wrote at once in reply that she never would be happy until she too had some lines over the same autograph. An immediate request was made of Mr. Cooper at his desk in the old Hall library, and with "dear Cally" by his side, he wrote:
On page 155 of "The Cooperstown Centennial" there appears "A new glimpse of Cooper"—caught and kept by yet another little girl who firmly believed the author to be "a genuine lover of children." She writes that to meet him on the street "was always a pleasure. His eye twinkled, his face beamed, and his cane pointed at you with a smile and a greeting of some forthcoming humor. When I happened to be passing the gates of the old Hall, and he and Mrs. Cooper were driving home from his farm, I often ran to open the gate for him, which trifling act he always acknowledged with old-time courtesy. His fine garden joined my father's, and once, being in the vicinity of the fence, he tossed me several muskmelons to catch, which at that time were quite rare." In 1844 Mr. Cooper sent this youthful miss a picture-book, "The Young American's Library." "The Primer" came with a note "written on large paper, with a large seal." It was a reprint from an English copy, and kept for sixty years, it is still thought "delightful reading." In part the accompanying note reads: " Hall, Cooperstown, April 22, 1844. Mr. Fenimore Cooper begs Miss Alice Worthington will do him the favor to accept the accompanying book (which was written expressly for Princess Alice of Great Britain).
"Mr. Cooper felt quite distressed for Miss Worthington's muff during the late hot weather, and begs to offer her the use of his new ice-house should the muff complain." Miss Alice and her cousin were out walking a very warm April day, with their "precious muffs, which gave him the merry thought about the ice-house."
Four years later Miss Worthington received another letter from Mr. Cooper, in acknowledgment of her sending to him a newspaper clipping about one of his books. Of this letter is noted: "His handwriting was fine, beautifully clear, and very distinguished." The note reads:
OTSEGO HALL, COOPERSTOWN, Feb. 12, 1848.
MY DEAR MISS ALICE WORTHINGTON,—I have received your letter with the most profound sentiments of gratitude. The compliments from the newspapers did not make half the impression that was made by your letter; but the attentions of a young lady of your tender years, to an old man, who is old enough to be her grandfather, are not so easily overlooked. Nor must you mistake the value I attach to the passage cut from the paper, for, even that coming through your little hands is far sweeter than would have been two candy-horns filled with sugar-plums.
I hope that you and I and John will have an opportunity of visiting the blackberry bushes next summer. I now invite you to select your party—of as many little girls, and boys, too, if you can find those you like, to go to my farm. It shall be your party, and the invitations must go out in your name. You can have your school if you like. I shall ask only one guest myself, and that will be John, who knows the road.
With highest consideration,
Your most obliged and humble servant,
J. FENIMORE COOPER.
During 1844 Cooper brought to print "Afloat and Ashore" and "Miles Wallingford"—"which two are one," he wrote, "with a good deal of love in part second for the delight of the ladies." Adventure is plenty, however, and the water-craft very much alive. In England "Miles Wallingford" appeared under the name of its heroine, Lucy Harding; and, says one: "It is a hard task not to fancy he was drawing, in slight particulars at least, the picture of his own wife, and telling the story of his early love." The tale is of the good old times in New York, and land scenes of her river counties.
LIEUT. ALEXANDER SLIDELL MACKENZIE. Those interested in Cooper's review of the naval court-martial of Lieutenant Alexander Slidell Mackenzie, for the execution of Spencer, will find the whole subject and its lesson of fearful retribution in Graham's Magazine of 1843-44. Alleged "mutiny on the high seas" was charged to young Spencer. He was the son of Secretary of State John C. Spencer who, as superintendent of public instruction, rejected with harsh, short comment Cooper's "Naval History" offered (unknown to the author) for school use and directed the purchase of Mackenzie's "Life of Perry." Just as Cooper was putting through the press his severe criticism of Mackenzie's version of the Battle of Lake Erie, the Somers returned from her unfortunate cruise. Cooper instantly stopped his paper at the expense of a round sum to the printer, saying: "The poor fellow will have enough to do to escape the consequences of his own weakness. It is no time to be hard on him now."
The year 1845 brought from Cooper's pen "Satanstoe"—quaint, old-fashioned, and the first of his three anti-rent books. Its hero, a member of the Littlepage family, writes his own life-story. From his home on one of the necks of Long-Island Sound, in Westchester County, he visits New York City, catches a glimpse of the pleasant Dutch life in Albany, and with comrades plunges into the wilderness to examine, work, and settle his new, large grant of land at Mooseridge. Professor Lounsbury's able life of Cooper affirms of "Satanstoe": "It is a picture of colonial life and manners in New York during the eighteenth century, such as can be found drawn nowhere else so truthfully and vividly." The title "Satanstoe" was given in a moment of Cooper's "intense disgust" at the "canting" attempt then made to change the name of the dangerous passage of Hell Gate, East River, to Hurl Gate.
"The Chainbearer," second of the anti-rent series, was published early in 1846, and continues the story of "Satanstoe" in the person of the hero's son, who finds in the squatters on his wilderness inheritance the first working of the disorderly spirit of anti-rent—the burning question of New York at that time. Honest Andries Coejemans and his pretty niece Ursula, the wily Newcome and rude Thousandacres of this story are each strong types of character.
The key to Cooper's own character is expressed in his words: "The most expedient thing in existence is to do right." In the hour of danger to aid in protecting the rights of the people from abuse of these rights by the evil minded among themselves, he held to be the high duty of every honest, generous, and wise citizen. With such sentiments in mind, he wrote "The Redskins"—the third and last of the anti-rent series. Distinguished jurists of our country have declared "remarkable," the legal knowledge and skill in this series of books.
Eighteen hundred and forty-six saw also in book form Cooper's "Lives of Distinguished American Naval Officers," which had already appeared in Graham's Magazine. Many of these eminent men had been the author's friends and messmates in early life. In 1847 "The Crater, or Vulcan's Peak—A Tale of the Pacific," came from Cooper's pen. The Introduction states that the book was written from the journal of a distinguished member of the Woolston family of Pennsylvania, who "struggled hard to live more in favor with God than in favor with man," and quotes that warning text of Scripture: "Let him that thinketh he standeth, take heed lest he fall!" and adds, "we have endeavored to imitate the simplicity of Captain Woolston in writing this book." The story of "a ship-wrecked mariner, cast away on a reef not laid down on any chart." This barren spot the castaway makes to bloom as a rose, then brings immigrants to his Pacific Eden, which finally vanishes like a dream. The work is said to be an excellent study of the author's own character.
Full of spirit and vigor at fifty-eight, Mr. Cooper in June, 1847, made a pleasant few weeks' visit to the middle west, going as far as Detroit. The country beyond Seneca Lake—the prairies and fine open groves of Michigan—was new to him. Affluent towns with well-tilled lands between, full of mid-summer promise, where forty years before he had crossed a wilderness, gave added interest to the entire way. He was far more deeply impressed with sublime Niagara than in his earlier years and before he had seen all the falls of Europe. The idea of weaving its majesty into an Indian story came to him, but, alas! was never written.
He was pleased with the growth and promise of Buffalo and Detroit, was charmed with "the beautiful flowery prairies and natural groves of Michigan," and wrote of them: "To get an idea of Prairie Round,—imagine an oval plain of some thirty-thousand acres, of surprising fertility, without an eminence; a few small cavities, however, are springs of water the cattle will drink." In the prairie's center was a forest island of some six hundred acres "of the noblest native trees," and in the heart of this wood was a small round lake a quarter of a mile across. Into this scene Cooper called some creatures of his fancy; among them a bee-hunter, suggested by the following incident.
One morning not long after his return from Europe he was passing, as usual, his leisure hours at the mountain farm. While overlooking his workmen he espied a small skiff leaving an opposite shore-point of the lake and making directly for his own landing. Mr. Cooper thought the boatman was on an errand to himself. Presently the stranger, tin pail in hand, made his appearance and inquired of Cooper and his men whether a large swarm of bees had been seen "somewhere there-abouts." He had lost a fine swarm early in the morning several days before, and had since looked in vain for them; but "a near-by farmer's wife had seen them cross the lake that way." No bees had been seen by the men of Châlet. One of them said, however, "bees had been very plenty about the blossoms for a day or two." The farmer began to look about closely, and from the unusual number of bees coming and going among the flowers on the hill, he felt sure his honeybees were lodged somewhere near. So, with Mr. Cooper, much interested, the search for the lost swarm began. A young grove skirted the cliffs; above were scattered some full, tall, forest trees,—here and there one charred and lifeless. The farmer seemed very knowing as to bees, and boasted of having one of the largest bee-sheds in the county. Rustic jokes at his expense were made by the workmen. They asked him which of the great tall trees his bees had chosen; they wished to know, for they would like to see him climb it, as Mr. Cooper had said that no axe should fell his forest favorites. The farmer nodded his head and replied that there was no climbing nor chopping for him that day—the weather was too warm; that he intended to call his bees down—that was his fashion. Taking up his pail he began moving among the flowers, and soon found a honey-bee sipping from the cup of a rose-raspberry. He said he knew at once the face of his own bee, "to say nothin' of the critter's talk"—meaning its buzzing of wings. A glass with honey from the tin pail soon captured the bee: uneasy at first, it was soon sipping the sweets. When quite satisfied it was set free, and its flight closely followed by the farmer's eye. Another bee was found on a head of golden-rod; it was served the same way but set free at an opposite point from the first's release; this second flight was also closely noted. Some twelve of the tiny creatures from the clover and daisies were likewise treated, until the general direction of the flight of all was sure. This "hiving the bees" by the air-line they naturally took to their new home proved the farmer to be right, for an old, half-charred oak-stub, some forty feet high and "one limb aloft was their lighting-place, and there they were buzzing about the old blighted bough." The farmer then went to his boat and brought back a new hive and placed it not far from the old oak; he put honey about its tiny doorway and strewed many flowers around it. With the sunset his bees had taken possession of their new home, and by moonlight they were rowed across the lake and placed beside the mother-swarm in the farmer's garden.
The author placed this incident in the "Prairie Round" of "The Oak Openings." Its Indian Peter shows how Christian influences in time triumph over revenge—the deadliest passion of the red-man's heart. On New Year's Day, 1848, "The Oak Openings" was begun, and the following spring saw it finished. This note appears in the author's diary: "Saturday, January 1, 1848. Read St. John. No church. Weather very mild, though snow fell in the night. Walking very bad, and I paid no visits outside of the family. Had —— at dinner. A merry evening with the young people. Played chess with my wife. Wrote a little in 'Oak Openings' to begin the year with."
Cooper was a born story-teller, and with a born sailor's love of salt water could not for long keep from spinning tales of the sea. All of which accounts for spirited and original "Jack Tier," which came from his pen in 1848. The story was called at first "Rose Budd"—the name of the young creature who is one of its important characters. But plain, homely, hard-working "Jack," under a sailor's garb, following her commonplace, grasping husband the world over, and finding herself in woman's gear and grief by his side when he made his last voyage of all without her—it is she who had earned the real heroine's right to the name "Jack Tier." It is a story of the treacherous reefs off Florida and the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
All those quiet years in Cooperstown the author kept pace in mind and interest with the times, and often gave expression to his opinion on current events. Of General Scott in Mexico he wrote, February 1, 1848: "Has not Scott achieved marvels! The gun-thunders in the valley of the Aztecs were heard in echoes across the Atlantic." Years before this the last chapter of "The Spy" paid tribute to the "bravery of Scott's gallant brigade" in 1814, at Lundy's Lane, not far from Niagara. That Cooper strongly condemned Scott's "General Order" is another record of later years.
Reform—along all lines of service—was Cooper's watchword; his home-cry, first and last, was to "build up our navy!" And, with his knowledge of naval affairs and accurate estimate of seamen of all grades, what an admirable secretary of our navy these qualifications would have made him! His political instincts seemed clear and unerring. April 13, 1850, he thought "Congress a prodigious humbug; Calhoun's attitude another," as was also Webster's answer, which, however, had "capital faults." From almost a seer and a prophet came in 1850 these words: "We are on the eve of great events. Every week knocks a link out of the chain of the Union." This was written to a dear and valued friend of South Carolina, to whom a few months later he further wrote: "The Southerns talk of fighting Uncle Sam,—that long-armed, well-knuckled, hard-fisted old scamp, Uncle Sam." And among the dearest of his life-long friends stood this "Southern" Commodore, William Branford Shubrick. Yet in close quarters, "he would rather have died than lied to him." His standards of honesty were as rock-hewn; and his words on his friend Lawrence perhaps apply as aptly to himself: "There was no more dodge in him than there was in the mainmast."
During some years prior to 1850, political party issues on "Anti-slavery," grew from mild to violent. And famous in the annals of Cooperstown was the spirited debate, between Mr. Cooper, for colonization, and his friend, the Hon. Gerrit Smith, for immediate abolition. This vital question of national interest was given able and exhaustive treatment by both debaters who spoke several hours while "The audience listened with riveted attention." At its close the two gentlemen walked arm in arm to the "Hall," Cooper's home, where they dined together.
From Mr. Keese comes an anecdote of Commodore Shubrick's visit to his old shipmate at Cooperstown: "Mr. Cooper had a raw Irishman in his employ, as a man of all work. Sending him to the post-office one day for the mail, he told him to ask if there were any letters for Commodore Shubrick. Pat came to the window and with great confidence called out, 'Is there any letter for Commodore Brickbat?' 'Who?' said the astonished postmaster. The name was repeated. A villager coming in at that time, the postmaster asked him if he knew who was visiting Mr. Cooper. 'Commodore Shubrick,' was the reply. 'All, that's the name!' said Pat; 'and sure, didn't I come near it, though!'"
Possibly the sailing of Sir John Franklin in 1845 for the frozen country of the North Star led Fenimore Cooper to write "The Sea Lions," in the winter of 1849. When the Highlands were white, and its tree-life hoary with frost, the author could pen best his picture of a voyage to the ice-bergs, rifts, and snow-drifts, for which his two schooners, both called The Sea Lion, were launched.
In the early years of his married life Cooper made many visits to the island home of a relative, by marriage, who, off the eastern shore of Long Island, led a half-sea life that was full of attraction for the young sailor. This gentleman only, his family and dependents, lived on Shelter Island, between which and the mainland all coming and going was by boat. Here they had shooting, fishing, and cruising a-plenty. The author's thorough knowledge of these waters was the probable reason for starting his two sealers from this port in search of valuable sealing-grounds in the polar seas. The schooners and their captains were American. One of the sealers was owned by an old, hard-fisted miser of Puritanic pattern, whose sweet niece Mary, pretty and simply good, makes the very lovable heroine of this book. Beneath the low porch and within the thrifty garden and great orchard of her island home, Mary's heart had been captured by Roswell Gardner, the daring young captain of her uncle's schooner The Sea Lion. In the faith of the Star and the Cross the young girl worshipped with strong and childlike piety, while her lover "stood coldly by and erect with covered head,"—a doubter, but honestly striving to find his balance. Mary prays and hopes while the young man sails to the far-away ice land, where, shipwrecked and alone with his Maker, he finds the light of Truth shining for him on the far-away shores of his frozen hold. Of this sea tale Professor Lounsbury writes: "'The Sea Lions' is certainly one of the most remarkable conceptions that it ever entered into the mind of a novelist to create." And he adds: "It is a powerful story."
"Ways of the Hour" came from Cooper's pen in 1850. The purpose of this story was to attack trial by jury.
From the time of Cooper's friendship with Charles Mathews in the early 1820's, he had been in touch with the stage, and in June, 1850, he mentions writing a three-act play in "ridicule of new notions." The title was "Upside Down; or, Philosophy in Petticoats"—a comedy. Of this play Cooper's friend Hackett, the American Falstaff of that day, wrote him: "I was at Burton's its first night and saw the whole of the play. The first act told well; the second, pretty well, but grew heavy; the third dragged until the conclusion surprised the attention into warm applause."
This clever but not over-successful farce closed the literary career of James Fenimore Cooper.
Of Charles Mathews, the peerless comedy artist of England, and Fenimore Cooper, his old-time friend, Dr. John Wakefield Francis, wrote:
"During a memorable excursion made to Albany with [the actor] Dunlap, Mathews, and Mr. Cooper in the spring of 1823, I found him abounding in dramatic anecdotes as well as associations the striking scenery of the Hudson brought to mind. 'The Spy' was, however, the leading subject of Mathews' conversation. Cooper unfolded his intention of writing a series of works illustrative of his country, revolutionary occurrences, and the red man of the western world. Mathews expressed in strong terms the patriotic benefits of such an undertaking, and complimented Cooper on the specimen already furnished in Harvey Birch. The approbation of Mathews could never be slightly appreciated. There was little of flattery in him at any time. He was a sort of 'My Lord Lofty,' who valued himself in pride of opinion. Such an individual could not but enlist the feelings of Mr. Cooper. I hardly know whether I have ever seen Mr. Cooper manifest as much enthusiasm with any other person when occasion was felicitous, the subject of interest, and the comedian in his happy vein. Dunlap, were he speaking, might tell you of his [Cooper's] gratuities to the unfortunate playwright and the dramatic performer." In 1832 William Dunlap's "History of the American Theatre" was "Dedicated to James Fenimore Cooper Esq., by his Friend, the Author."
It was in this year of 1850 that the author's daughter, Susan Augusta, had her "Rural Hours" about ready to print. And of this book her father wrote: "It will be out in July. There is elegance, purity, knowledge, and grace about it. It will make her the Cooper at once. Quite puts her papa's nose out of joint." More, concerning this book and New York City of that day, appears in her father's letter to her mother, written in that city at the Broadway Hotel, September 19, 1850.
BROADWAY HOTEL, September 19, 1850.
MY BELOVED S,—The post office is sadly out of joint. I wrote you the day I arrived.... Right and left I hear of "Rural Hours." I am stopped in the street a dozen times a day to congratulate me. The price of the fine edition is $7.00. It will be the presentation volume of the season. I can see that Putnam expects to sell some eight hundred or a thousand of them.... The improvements here are wonderful. They build chiefly of brown freestone and noble edifices of five and six stories with a good deal of architectural pretension.... I sat three times for lithographs yesterday and with vastly better success than before. The pictures are all very like and very pleasing. I am to have one which will fall to your lot as a matter of course. Your letter of Tuesday reached me this morning. You ought to have had three letters from me by Tuesday evening. F.'s [the author's daughter Frances] shawl went by "A." I suppose it is a courting shawl. It is almost the only one of the kind Stewart had—a little too grave perhaps but scarcely so for the country. Stewart is making a palace of a store. He takes the whole front of the block on Broadway with fifteen windows in front—and all of marble. With the tenderest regards to all, I remain yours Most affectionately, J.F.C.
Miss Cooper makes alive each season's charms, as they pass over the Glimmerglass and wane beyond Hannah's Hill. From gentry to humble-folk, real Cooperstown types appear and disappear among these pages; and even the "half-a-dozen stores" have place, where "at the same counter you may buy kid gloves and a spade; a lace veil and a jug of molasses; a satin dress and a broom," among other things of even greater variety. She tells how St. Valentine's Day was celebrated in a very original way as Vrouwen-Daghe, or women's day of the old Dutch colonists.
She also records that first lake party to Point Judith, given by her grandfather, Judge Cooper, in August, 1799, but leaves the description of her father's lake parties to Mr. Keese: "He was fond of picnic excursions on the lake, generally to the Three Mile Point, and often with a party of gentlemen to Gravelly, where the main treat was a chowder, which their host made up with great gusto. He could also brew a bowl of punch for festive occasions, though he himself rarely indulged beyond a glass of wine for dinner." JOE TOM. Concerning these festivities Mr. Keese adds: "Lake excursions until 1840 were made by a few private boats or the heavy, flat-bottomed skiff which worthy Dick Case kept moored at the foot of Fair Street. But Dick's joints were too stiff to row more than an easy reach from the village; to the Fairy Spring was the usual measure of his strength. The Three Mile Point was the goal of the best oarsmen. Dick's successor in the thirties was an ugly horse-boat that in 1840 gave place to the famous scow of Joe Tom and his men, which for twenty years took picnic parties to the Point. A president of our country, several governors of the State, and Supreme Court judges were among these distinguished passengers. Doing such duty the scow is seen in the 1840 pictures of Cooperstown. No picnic of his day was complete without famous 'Joe Tom,' who had men to row the scow, clean the fish, stew potatoes, make coffee, and announce the meal. Rowing back in the gloaming of a summer's night, he would awake the echoes of Natty Bumppo's Cave for the pleasure of the company." At times a second echo would return from Hannah's Hill, and a third from Mt. Vision.
Between the lines can be read the hearty and cheery author's pleasure in all this merriment, yet, none the less, life's shadows exacted full attention, as the following shows: "Cooper took a generous and active part in sending relief to the starving people of Ireland; for, March 8, 1847, James Fenimore Cooper heads his town committee, and, 'in the name of charity and in obedience to the commands of God,' he urges an appeal 'from house to house, for Food is wanting that we possess in abundance.'"
"Cooper would admit of no denial of principle but could be lenient to offenders. One day he caught a man stealing fruit from his garden. Instead of flying into a passion, he told him how wrong it was to make the neighbors think there was no way of getting his fruit but by stealing it, and bid him the next time to come in at the gate and ask for it like a true man. Cooper then helped him to fill his basket and let him go." The author's fine fruit trees must have been tempting!
One day while walking in the garden with some ladies, Mr. Cooper led the way to a tree well laden with fine apples. Unable to reach them, he called to a boy in the street, and presenting him to his friends as one of the best boys in the village,—one who never disturbed his fruit,—he lifted the little fellow up to the branches to pick apples for the guests, and then filled his pockets as a reward for his honesty, and promised him more when he came again. The delighted boy waited for a few days and then repeated his visit to the tree, but forgetting to ask permission. Not knowing him from frequent intruders, Mr. Cooper's high voice from a distance, added to the savage barking of his watch-dog, frightened the well-meaning forager into a resolve that he would not forget the easier way next time of first asking before picking.
The author's genuine interest in his hometown folk never waned. Among the many and sincere expressions of his good-will were the free lectures he gave to the villagers. His descriptions of naval actions were full of vigor. On the blackboard he presented fleets, changing their positions, moving ship after ship as the contest went on, at the same time stating the facts in history and using his cane as a pointer.
It is of note that Mr. Cooper's personal appearance in 1850 was remarkable. He seemed in perfect health and highest energy and activity of faculties, but the autumn of this year found him in New York City under mild ailments. His friend, Mr. George Washington Green, regretted not noting better his last talk with the author about this time, of which he says: "He excused himself that morning at Putnam's for not rising to shake hands. 'My feet,' said he, 'are so tender that I do not like to stand longer than I can help.' Yet when we walked together into Broadway, I could not help turning now and then to admire his commanding figure and firm bearing. Sixty years seemed to sit lightly on him. After a short stroll we went to his room at the Globe and sat down to talk. I never found him so free upon his own works and literary habits. He confessed his partiality for Leather stocking. Said he: 'I meant to have added one more scene and introduced him in the Revolution, but I thought the public had had enough of him, and never ventured it.'"
Cooper's enjoyment of the marvelous voice of "The Swedish Nightingale," as Jenny Lind was called, the publication of his daughter's "Rural Hours," and the active progress of his own book sales are noted in his letter to his beloved wife.
BROADWAY HOTEL, Friday, Nov. 15, 1850.
MY DEAREST W.,—Julia and Miss Thomas came down with me to hear Jenny Lind. "Have you heard Jenny Lind?" "How do you like Jenny Lind?" are the questions which supplant "Fine weather to-day" and other similar comprehensive remarks. I am patiently waiting for the "Lake Gun" [a magazine article]. I am well and shall commence in earnest next week. Tell Sue [his daughter] I have seen Putnam, who will be delighted to publish her new book. "Naval History" is a little slack for the moment. There are less than a hundred copies of second edition on hand and the third must be shortly prepared. The fine edition will be published to-morrow. About two hundred copies have been sent to the trade and with that issue he will start. He has had five and twenty copies done up in papier machia at $9.00. N—— is well. D.Z. is still here. Old Peter is not yet married, but the affair is postponed until Spring, when the bride and groom will return to America. They wish to prolong the delightful delusion of courtship. I hope they may be as happy as we have been and love each other as much forty—days after their union as we do forty years.... Yours J.F.C.
At No. 1 Bond Street stood the old-time mansion of Dr. John W. Francis, where were welcomed many eminent in arts and letters at home and abroad, and where their host wrote his "Reminiscences of Sixty Years." Here it was that Cooper, on his last visit to New York, came seeking aid for his failing health. But with December the author returned to Cooperstown, whence he wrote a friend: "I have gone into dock with my old hulk, to be overhauled. Francis says I have congestion, and I must live low, deplete, and take pills. While I am frozen, my wife tells me my hands, feet, and body are absolutely warm. The treatment is doing good. You cannot imagine the old lady's delight at getting me under, in the way of food. I get no meat, or next to none, and no great matter in substitutes. This morning being Christmas, I had a blow-out of oysters, and at dinner it will go hard if I do not get a cut into the turkey. I have lost pounds, yet I feel strong and clearheaded. I have had a narrow escape, if I have escaped."
The following spring Cooper again went to New York City, whence he dates a letter to his wife:
Saturday, March 29, 1851
COLLEGE HOTEL, NEW YORK
Your letter of Thursday has just reached me. I am decidedly better.—Last night I was actually dissipated. L.—— came for me in a carriage and carried me off almost by force to Doctor Bellows, where I met the Sketch Club, some forty people, many of whom I knew. I stayed until past ten, ate a water ice, talked a great deal, returned, went to bed fatigued and slept it off.—My friends are very attentive to me, they all seem glad to see me and think I am improving, as I certainly am.... I shall come home shortly—I want to be in my garden and I wish to be in your dear hands, love, for though you know nothing you do a great deal that is right. Last evening I passed with Charlotte M.—who wanted to take me home to nurse me. There is no chance of seeing S.——.
Adieu, my love.... My blessing on the girls—all four of them.
J.F.C.
In April, 1851, the poet Bryant wrote of him "Cooper is in town, in ill health. When I saw him last he was in high health and excellent spirits." These spirits were not dashed by the progressing malady that took him home to Cooperstown. Not realizing what illness meant, he bravely accepted what it brought,—the need to dictate the later parts of his "History of the United States Navy," and the "Towns of Manhattan," when he himself could no longer write. The latter was planned, partly written, and in press at the time of his death. That which was printed was burnt, the manuscript in part rescued, and finished by the pen of one of the family.
It was Fenimore Cooper's happiness to be blessed with a family whose greatest pleasure was to supply his every needed comfort; and one of his daughters was ever a companion in his pursuits, the wise and willing writer of his letters and dictations, and the most loving, never-tiring nurse of his latter days. Of these last months there is a pretty child-record by a friend who, "entering without notice," one day saw Mr. Cooper "lying at full length on the parlor floor, with a basket of cherries by his side. Upon his chest, vainly trying to bestride the portly form, sat his little grandson, to whom he passed cherries, and who, in turn, with childish glee, was dropping them, one by one, into his grandfather's mouth. The smiles that played over the features of child and man during this sweet and gentle dalliance were something not easily forgotten. A few months after this both child and man had passed beyond 'the smiling'; aye, and 'the weeping,' too."
Letters from Cooperstown led Dr. Francis to go there August 27, 1851, to see his esteemed friend in his own home. And of Cooper the Doctor wrote: "I explained to him the nature of his malady—frankly assured him that within the limits of a week a change was indispensable to lessen our forebodings of its ungovernable nature. He listened with fixed attention.—Not a murmur escaped his lips. Never was information of so grave a cast received by any individual in a calmer spirit."
So passed the summer days of 1851 with the author, near his little lake, the Glimmerglass, and its Mt. Vision, when one mid-September Sunday afternoon, with his soul's high standard of right and truth undimmed, James Fenimore Cooper crossed the bar.
While from youth Cooper was a reverent follower of the Christian faith, his religious nature deepened with added years. Eternal truth grew in his heart and mind as he, in time, learned to look above and beyond this world's sorrows and failures. In July, 1851, he was confirmed in Christ's Church,—the little parish church just over the way from the old-Hall home, whose interests he had faithfully and generously served as sometime warden and as vestryman since 1834.
Of one such service Mr. Keese writes that in 1840 the original Christ's Church of Cooperstown underwent important alterations. Its entire interior was removed and replaced by native oak. As vestryman Mr. Cooper was prime mover and chairman of the committee of change, and hearing of the chancel screen in the old Johnstown church, first built by Sir William Johnson, he took a carpenter and went there to have drawings made of this white-painted pine screen, which at his own expense he had reproduced with fine, ornamental effect in oak, and made it a gift to Christ's Church. It was removed from Christ's Church about 1891, badly broken and abandoned. This so disturbed Cooper's daughters that his grandson, James Fenimore Cooper of Albany, New York, had the pieces collected, and stored them for using in his Cooperstown home; but he—by request of the Reverend Mr. Birdsall—had them made into two screens for the aisles of the church, where they were erected as a memorial to his father, Paul Fenimore, and his great-grandfather, Judge William Cooper.
Mr. Keese's words, dating January, 1910, are: "And now comes in a rather singular discovery made by the writer a few days ago: In looking over a book in my library, published about ninety years ago, there is an article on Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire, England, with a steel engraving of the front of the Abbey, which is almost identical with the design of the original screen in Christ Church. Who was responsible for transplanting the same to this country appears to be unknown, but the fact is interesting in that Newstead Abbey was the home of the Byron family and that of Lord Byron."
In a letter of April 22, 1840, to H. Bleeker, Esq., Cooper wrote of this screen: "I have just been revolutionizing Christ's Church, Cooperstown, not turning out a vestry but converting its pine interior into oak—bona fide oak, and erecting a screen that I trust, though it may have no influence on my soul, will carry my name down to posterity. It is really a pretty thing—pure Gothic, and is the wonder of the country round."
Of Cooper himself was said: "Thus step by step his feet were guided into the ways of peace." It was of the Protestant Episcopal church that his wife's brother, William Heathcote de Lancey—a genius of goodness—was bishop.
A beautiful, tender, and touching tribute to the love of his life was Fenimore Cooper's will. In part it reads: "I, James Fenimore Cooper, give and bequeath to my wife, Susan Augusta, all my property, whether personal or mixed, to be enjoyed by her and her heirs forever. I make my said wife the executrix of my will."
In a little over four months his wife followed him to the far country. Of his children, Elizabeth, the first-born, died in infancy; Susan Augusta, the author, was the second; the third, Caroline Martha, became Mrs. Henry Frederick Phinney; next came Anne Charlotte, then Maria Frances, who married Richard Cooper; Fenimore, the first son, they lost in babyhood, and Paul Fenimore, the youngest, became a member of the bar in Albany, New York.
Cooper left his family a competency, but the Hall home soon passed into other hands; later it was burnt. From rescued brick an attractive house was built on the west bank of the Susquehanna for his daughters Susan Augusta and Anne Charlotte, both now resting near father and mother in Christ's Church yard. Their niece, Miss Susan Augusta Cooper, daughter of their sister, Maria Frances, Mrs. Richard Cooper, now lives in this picturesque house, and there she reverently treasures many personal belongings of her famous grandfather, and also those of her author-aunt, Susan Augusta Cooper, whose best memorial, however, is the noble orphanage on the river-bank some ways below. The oaken doors saved from the flames of the burning Hall served for this new home, which overlooked the grounds of their old home. The site of the latter is marked by Ward's "Indian Hunter." Aptly placed, peering through mists of green toward the author's church-yard grave, he is a most fitting guardian of the one-time garden of Fenimore Cooper.