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 1045 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 1050 at his master's gate. Ichabod did not make his appearance at breakfast. Dinner-hour came; but no Ichabod! The boys assembled at the school-house, 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 1055 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 1060 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 1065 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 fur- 1070 niture of the school-house, 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

1065. Executor. The person appointed by the maker of a will to see that it is carried into effect. What is an administrator?

1068. Corduroy (Fr. corde-du-roi, cord of the king), a thick ribbed cottoncloth used for pantaloons, gaiters, etc.

1070. Dog's-ears, the turned-down corners of the leaves in a book.

which last was a sheet of foolscap much scribbled and blotted in several fruitless attempts to make a copy of verses in honor 1075 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 school-1080 master 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 1085 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 1090 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

1095

neighborhood, partly through fear of the goblin and Hans Van 1100 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 1105

1074. Foolscap. A fool's cap was a pointed cap once worn by professional jesters, court fools, or circus clowns. The figure of this cap was formerly used as the water-mark of the writing-paper now known as fools

сар.

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 1110 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 1115 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 mill-pond. The school-house, being deserted, soon fell to decay, 1120 and was reported to be haunted by the ghost of the unfortunate pedagogue; and the ploughboy, 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.

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POSTSCRIPT,

FOUND IN THE HANDWRITING OF MR. KNICKERBOCKER.

THE preceding tale is given, almost in the precise words in which I heard it related at a Corporation meeting of the ancient city of Manhattoes, at which were present many of its sagest

1106. Ten-pound Court, an inferior court having jurisdiction in cases involving not over ten pounds.

1014. Spirited away, carried away swiftly and secretly, as if by a spirit. Postscript (Lat. post, after, and scriptum, written), a sentence or passage added to a letter, and signed by the writer; any addition made to a book or composition after it had been supposed to be finished.

5

and most illustrious burghers. The narrator was a pleasant, shabby, gentlemanly old fellow, in pepper-and-salt clothes, with a sadly humorous face, and one whom I strongly suspected of being poor, he made such efforts to be entertaining. When his story was concluded, there was much laughter and approbation, particularly from two or three deputy aldermen, who had been asleep the greater part of the time. There was, 10 however, one tall, dry-looking old gentleman, with beetling eyebrows, who maintained a grave and rather a severe face throughout; now and then folding his arms, inclining his head, and looking down upon the floor, as if turning a doubt over in his mind. He was one of your wary men, who never laugh but 15 upon good grounds, when they have reason and the law on their side. When the mirth of the rest of the company had subsided, and silence was restored, he leaned one arm on the elbow of his chair, and, sticking the other a-kimbo, demanded, with a slight but exceedingly sage motion of the head, and 20 contraction of the brow, what was the moral of the story, and what it went to prove?

The story-teller, who was just putting a glass of wine to his lips, as a refreshment after his toils, paused for a moment, looked at his inquirer with an air of infinite deference, and, 25 lowering the glass slowly to the table, observed that the story was intended most logically to prove :

"That there is no situation in life but has its advantages and pleasures, - provided we will but take a joke as we find it : "That, therefore, he that runs races with goblin troopers is 30 likely to have rough riding of it.

"Ergo, for a country schoolmaster to be refused the hand of a Dutch heiress is a certain step to high preferment in the

The cautious old gentleman knit his brows tenfold closer after this explanation, being sorely puzzled by the ratiocination 35 of the syllogism: while, methought, the one in pepper-and-salt eyed him with something of a triumphant leer. At length he observed that all this was very well, but still he thought the story a little on the extravagant, - there were one or two points on which he had his doubts.

"Faith, sir," replied the story-teller, "as to that matter, I don't believe one half of it myself."

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SUGGESTIONS OF TOPICS OF INQUIRY.

✓ What is the general character of this sketch, -- pathetic? didactic?

humorous?

Where is Sleepy Hollow? Describe it.

Who is the hero of this sketch? the heroine?