a tale of two cities

The Legend of Sleepy

Hollow

Washington Irving

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Found among the papers of the late Diedrech

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 marvelous 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 considered 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 mill-pond, on a still

Sunday morning, which are said to be legitimately

desce