Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Stories

by Washington Irving

  Note.

  “Bacchus to give the toping world surprize

  Produced one sober son, and here he lies.

  Though rear’d among full hogsheads he defy’d

  The charms of wine, and every one beside.

  O reader if to justice thou‘rt inclin’d

  Keep honest Preston daily in thy mind.

  He drew good wine, took care to fill his pots

  Had sundry virtues that excus’d his faults.

  You that on Bacchus have the like dependance,

  Pray copy Bob, in measure and attendance.”

  The old sexton had taken the landlady aside and with an air of profound importance imparted to her my errand. Dame Honeyball was a likely, plump, bustling little woman, and no bad substitute for that paragon of hostesses Dame Quickly. She seemed delighted with an opportunity to oblige, and hurrying up stairs to the archives of her house, where the precious vessels of the parish club were deposited, she returned smiling and curtseying with them in her hands.

  The first she presented me was a japanned iron Tobacco box of gigantic size, out of which I was told the vestry had smoked at their stated meetings since time immemorial; and which was never suffered to be profaned by vulgar hands or used on common occasions. I received it with becoming reverence, but what was my delight on beholding on its cover the identical painting of which I was in quest. There was displayed the outside of the Boar’s head Tavern, and before the door was to be seen the whole convivial group at table in full revel; pictured with that wonderful fidelity and force, with which the portraits of renowned generals and commodores are illustrated on Tobacco boxes, for the benefit of posterity. Lest, however, there should be any mistake, the cunning limner had warily inscribed the names of Prince Hal and Falstaff on the bottoms of their chairs.

  On the inside of the cover was an inscription, nearly obliterated, recording that this box was the gift of Sir Richard Gore, for the use of the vestry meetings at the Boar’s head Tavern, and that it was “repaired and beautified by his successor Mr. John Packard 1767.” Such is a faithful description of this august and venerable relique, and I question whether the learned Scriblerius contemplated his Roman shield, or the Knights of the Round Table the long sought san-greal with more exultation.

  While I was meditating on it with enraptured gaze, Dame Honeyball, who was highly gratified by the interest it excited, put in my hands a drinking cup or goblet, which also belonged to the vestry, and was descended from the old Boar’s head. It bore the inscription of having been the gift of Francis Wythers, Knight, and was held, she told me, in exceeding great value, being considered very “antyke.” This last opinion was strengthened by the shabby gentleman in the red nose and oil cloth hat, and whom I strongly suspected of being a lineal descendant from the valiant Bardolph. He suddenly aroused from his meditation on the pot of porter, and casting a knowing look at the goblet exclaimed—“Aye-aye, the head don’t ache now, that made that there article.”—

  The great importance attached to this memento of ancient revelry by modern church wardens, at first puzzled me; but there is nothing sharpens the apprehension so much as antiquarian research; for I immediately perceived that this could be no other than the identical “parcel-gilt goblet” on which Falstaff made his loving but faithless vow to Dame Quickly; and which would of course be treasured up with care among the regalia of her domains, as a testimony of that solemn contract.17

  Mine hostess indeed gave me a long history how the goblet had been handed down from generation to generation. She also entertained me with many particulars concerning the worthy vestrymen who have seated themselves thus quietly on the stools of the ancient roysters of East cheap, and, like so many commentators, utter clouds of smoke in honour of Shakespeare. These I forbear to relate, lest my readers should not be as curious in these matters as myself. Suffice it to say, the neighbours one and all about East cheap, believe that Falstaff and his merry crew actually lived and revelled there. Nay there are several legendary anecdotes concerning him still extant among the oldest frequenters of the Mason’s arms; which they give, as transmitted down from their forefathers; and Mr. McKash, an Irish hair dresser, whose shop stands onNote.

  the scite of the old Boar’s head, has several dry jokes of Fat Jack’s, not laid down in the books, with which he makes his customers ready to die of laughter.

  I now turned to my friend the sexton to make some further enquiries, but I found him sunk in pensive meditation. His head had declined a little on one side—a deep sigh heaved from the very bottom of his stomach, and though I could not see a tear trembling in his eye, yet a moisture was evidently stealing from a corner of his mouth. I followed the direction of his eye through the door which stood open and found it fixed wistfully on the savoury breast of lamb, roasting in dripping richness before the fire.

  I now called to mind, that in the eagerness of my recondite investigation I was keeping the poor man from his dinner. My bowels yearned with sympathy, and, putting in his hand a small token of my gratitude and good will, I departed with a hearty benediction on him, Dame Honeyball and the parish club of Crooked Lane—not forgetting my shabby, but sententious friend, in the oil cloth hat and copper nose.

  Thus have I given a “tedious brief” account of this interesting research, for which, if it prove too short and unsatisfactory, I can only plead my inexperience in this branch of literature so deservedly popular at the present day. I am aware that a more skillful illustrator of the immortal bard would have swelled the materials I have but touched upon, to a good merchantable bulk—comprizing the biographies of William Walworth, Jack Straw and Robert Preston—some notice of the Eminent Fishmongers of St. Michael’s—the history of East cheap, great and little-private anecdotes of Dame Honeyball and her pretty daughter, whom I have not even mentioned, to say nothing of a damsel tending the breast of lamb (and whom, by the way, I remarked to be a comely lass, with a neat foot and ancle)—the whole enlivened by the riots of Wat Tyler, and illuminated by the great fire of London.

  All this I leave as a rich mine to be worked by future commentators; nor do I despair of seeing the Tobacco box and the “parcel-gilt goblet” which I have thus brought to light, the subjects of future engravings and almost as fruitful of voluminous dissertations and disputes as the shield of Achilles, or the far famed Portland vase.

  THE MUTABILITY OF LITERATURE A COLLOQUY IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY

  I know that all beneath the moon decays,

  And what by mortals in this world is brought,

  In time’s great period shall return to nought.

  I know that all the muses’ heavenly layes,

  With toil of sprite which are so dearly bought,

  As idle sounds of few or none are sought,

  That there is nothing lighter than mere praise.

  DRUMMOND OF HAWTHORNDEN.

  There are certain half dreaming moods of mind, in which we naturally steal away from noise and glare, and seek some quiet haunt, where we may indulge our reveries and build our air castles undisturbed. In such a mood I was loitering about the old gray cloisters of Westminster Abbey, enjoying that luxury of wandering thought which one is apt to dignify with the name of reflection, when suddenly an irruption of madcap boys from Westminster school playing at football broke in upon the monastic stillness of the place, making the vaulted passages and mouldering tombs echo with their merriment. I sought to take refuge from their noise by penetrating still deeper into the solitudes of the pile, and applied to one of the vergers for admission to the library. He conducted me through a portal rich with the crumbling sculpture of former ages, which opened upon a gloomy passage leading to the chapter house and the chamber in which doomsday book is deposited. Just within the passage is a small door on the left. To this the verger applied a key; it was double locked, and opened with some difficulty, as if seldom used. We now ascended a dark narrow staircase, and passing through a second door, entered the library.

  I found myself in a lofty antique
hall, the roof supported by massive joists of old English oak. It was soberly lighted by a row of Gothic windows at a considerable height from the floor, and which apparently opened upon the roofs of the cloisters. An ancient picture of some reverend dignitary of the church in his robes hung over the fire place. Around the hall and in a small gallery were the books, arranged in carved oaken cases. They consisted principally of old polemical writers, and were much more worn by time than use. In the centre of the library was a solitary table with two or three books on it; an inkstand without ink, and a few pens parched by long disuse. The place seemed fitted for quiet study and profound meditation. It was buried deep among the massive walls of the abbey, and shut up from the tumult of the world. I could only hear now and then the shouts of the schoolboys faintly swelling from the cloister, and the sound of a bell tolling for prayers, echoing soberly along the roofs of the abbey. By degrees the shouts of merriment grew fainter and fainter, and at length died away. The bell ceased to toll, and a profound silence reigned through the dusky hall.

  I had taken down a little thick quarto, curiously bound in parchment, with brass clasps, and seated myself at the table in a venerable elbow chair. Instead of reading, however, I was beguiled by the solemn monastic air, and lifeless quiet of the place, into a train of musing. As I looked around upon the old volumes in their mouldering covers, thus ranged on the shelves, and apparently never disturbed in their repose, I could not but consider the library a kind of literary catacomb, where authors, like mummies, are piously entombed, and left to blacken and moulder in dusty oblivion.

  How much, thought I, has each of these volumes, now thrust aside with such indifference, cost some aching head; how many weary days-how many sleepless nights. How have their authors buried themselves in the solitude of cells and cloisters; shut themselves up from the face of man, and the still more blessed face of nature, and devoted themselves to painful research and intense reflection. And all for what! to occupy an inch of dusty shelf—to have the title of their works read now and then in a future age, by some drowsy churchman, or casual straggler like myself; and in another age to be lost, even to remembrance. Such is the amount of this boasted immortality.—A mere temporary rumour, a local sound, like the tone of that bell which has just tolled among these towers, filling the ear for a moment—lingering transiently in echo—and then passing away, like a thing that was not!

  While I sat half murmuring, half meditating these unprofitable speculations, with my head resting on my hand, I was thrumming with the other hand upon the quarto, until I accidentally loosened the clasps, when, to my utter astonishment, the little book gave two or three yawns, like one awakening from a deep sleep; then a husky hem, and at length began to talk. At first its voice was very hoarse and broken, being much troubled by a cobweb which some studious spider had woven across it; and having probably contracted a cold from long exposure to the chills and damps of the abbey. In a short time, however, it became more distinct, and I soon found it an exceedingly fluent conversable little tome. Its language, to be sure, was rather quaint and obsolete, and its pronunciation, what, in the present day, would be deemed barbarous; but I shall endeavour, as far as I am able, to render it in modern parlance.

  It began with railings about the neglect of the world—about merit being suffered to languish in obscurity, and other such common place topics of literary repining, and complained bitterly that it had not been opened for more than two centuries. That the Dean only looked now and then into the library, sometimes took down a volume or two, trifled with them for a few moments, and then returned them to their shelves. “What a plague do they mean,” said the little quarto, which I began to perceive was somewhat choleric, “what a plague do they mean by keeping several thousand volumes of us shut up here, and watched by a set of old vergers like so many beauties in a harem, merely to be looked at now and then by the Dean? Books were written to give pleasure and to be enjoyed; and I would have a rule passed that the Dean should pay each of us a visit at least once a year; or if he is not equal to the task, let them once in a while turn loose the whole school of Westminster among us, that at any rate we may now and then have an airing.”

  “Softly, my worthy friend,” replied I, “you are not aware how much better you are off than most books of your generation. By being stored away in this ancient library, you are like the treasured remains of those saints and monarchs which lie enshrined in the adjoining chapels, while the remains of your contemporary mortals, left to the ordinary course of nature, have long since returned to dust.”

  “Sir,” said the little tome, ruffling his leaves and looking big, “I was written for all the world, not for the bookworms of an abbey. I was intended to circulate from hand to hand, like other great contemporary works; but here have I been clasped up for more than two centuries, and might have silently fallen a prey to these worms that are playing the very vengeance with my intestines, if you had not by chance given me an opportunity of uttering a few last words before I go to pieces.”

  “My good friend,” rejoined I, “had you been left to the circulation of which you speak, you would long ere this have been no more. To judge from your physiognomy, you are now well stricken in years: very few of your contemporaries can be at present in existence; and those few owe their longevity to being immured like yourself in old libraries: which, suffer me to add, instead of likening to harems, you might more properly and gratefully have compared to those infirmaries attached to religious establishments, for the benefit of the old and decrepid, and where, by quiet fostering and no employment, they often endure to an amazingly good for nothing old age. You talk of your contemporaries as if in circulation—where do we meet with their works? what do we hear of Robert Grosteste of Lincoln? No one could have toiled harder than he for immortality. He is said to have written nearly two hundred volumes. He built, as it were, a pyramid of books to perpetuate his name: but, alas! the pyramid has long since fallen, and only a few fragments are scattered in various libraries, where they are scarcely disturbed even by the antiquarian. What do we hear of Gyraldus Cambrensis, the historian, antiquary, philosopher, theologian, and poet? He declined two bishoprics that he might shut himself up and write for posterity; but posterity never inquires after his labours. What of Henry of Huntingdon, who, beside a learned history of England, wrote a treatise on the contempt of the world, which the world has revenged by forgetting him. What is quoted of Joseph of Exeter, styled the miracle of his age in classical composition? Of his three great heroic poems one is lost forever, excepting a mere fragment; the others are known only to a few of the curious in literature, and as to his love verses and epigrams, they have entirely disappeared. What is in current use of John Wallis, the Franciscan, who acquired the name of the tree of life? Of William of Malmsbury;—of Simeon of Durham; of Benedict of Peterborough; of John Hanvill of St. Albans; of—”

  “Prithee, friend,” cried the quarto in a testy tone, “how old do you think me? You are talking of authors that lived long before my time, and wrote either in Latin or French, so that they in a manner expatriated themselves, and deserved to be forgotten;18 but I, sir, was ushered into the world from the press of the renowned Wynkyn de Worde. I was written in my own native tongue at a time when the language had become fixed, and indeed I was considered a model of pure and elegant English.”

  (I should observe that these remarks were couched in such intolerably antiquated terms, that I have had infinite difficulty in rendering them into modern phraseology.)

  “I cry you mercy,” said I, “for mistaking your age; but it matters little; almost all the writers of your time have likewise passed into forgetfulness; and De Worde’s publications are mere literary rarities among book collectors. The purity and stability of language, too, on which you found your claims to perpetuity, have been the fallacious dependence of authors of every age, even back to the times of the worthy Robert of Gloucester, who wrote his history in rhymes of mongrel Saxon.19 Even now, many talk of Spenser’s ‘well of pure Eng
lish undefiled,’ as if the language ever sprang from a well or fountain head, and was not rather a mere confluence of various tongues, perpetually subject to changes and intermixtures. It is this which has made English literature so extremely mutable, and the reputation built upon it so fleeting. Unless thought can be committed to something more permanent and unchangeable than such a medium, even thought must share the fate of every thing else, and fall into decay. This should serve as a check upon the vanity and exultation of the most popular writer. He finds the language in which he has embarked his fame gradually altering, and subject to the dilapidations of time and the caprice of fashion. He looks back and beholds the early authors of his country, once the favourites of their day, supplanted by modern writers. A few short ages have covered them with obscurity, and their merits can only be relished by the quaint taste of the bookworm. And such, he anticipates, will be the fate of his own work, which, however it may be admired in its day, and held up as a model of purity, will in the course of years grow antiquated and obsolete, until it shall become almost as unintelligible in its native land as an Egyptian obelisk, or one of those Runic inscriptions said to exist in the deserts of Tartary. I declare,” added I with some emotion, ”when I contemplate a modern library, filled with new works in all the bravery of rich gilding and binding, I feel disposed to sit down and weep, like the good Xerxes when he surveyed his army, pranked out in all the splendour of military array, and reflected that in one hundred years not one of them would be in existence!”