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-The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving

-

-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and

-most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions

-whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms

-of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at

-www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you

-will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before

-using this eBook.

-

-Title: Rip Van Winkle

-

-Author: Washington Irving

-

-Illustrator: Frank T. Merrill

-

-Release Date: February 26, 2021 [eBook #64636]

-

-Language: English

-

-Character set encoding: UTF-8

-

-Produced by: Sue Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at

-             https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images

-             generously made available by the Library of Congress)

-

-*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***

-

-

-

-

-[Illustration]

-

-    _This Edition is

-    limited to

-    Two Hundred and

-    Fifty Copies

-    for the

-    United Kingdom._

-    No. 141

-

-

-

-

-RIP VAN WINKLE.

-

-

-

-

-[Illustration: ~Washington Irving.~]

-

-

-

-

-    RIP

-    VAN WINKLE

-

-    By

-    Washington Irving.

-

-    [Illustration]

-

-    Illustrated by FRANK T. MERRILL.

-

-    Boston. U. S. A.

-    S. E. Cassino.

-    MDCCCLXXXVIII.

-

-

-

-

-    _Copyright by_

-    SAMUEL E. CASSINO,

-    1887.

-

-    TYPOGRAPHY BY J. S. CUSHING & CO., BOSTON. U. S. A.

-

-    PRESSWORK BY BERWICK & SMITH, BOSTON. U. S. A.

-

-

-

-

-LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

-

-

-                                                                    PAGE

-

-    PORTRAIT                                                           4

-

-    Illustrated Title-Page                                             5

-

-    List of Illustrations                                              7

-

-    Diedrich Knickerbocker                                             9

-

-    Up the Hudson                                                     11

-

-    “He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”                          12

-

-    “He assisted at their sports”                              facing 12

-

-    “A termagant wife”                                                13

-

-    “Fish all day without a murmur”                                   14

-

-    “Used to employ him to run their errands”                         15

-

-    “He would carry a fowling-piece”                                  17

-

-    “His cow among the cabbages”                                      18

-

-    “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”                      18

-

-    “How solemnly they would listen”                           facing 18

-

-    “He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up his eyes” 19

-

-    “Yelping precipitation”                                           20

-

-    “He would share the contents of his wallet”                facing 20

-

-    Nicholas Vedder                                                   21

-

-    “The brow of a precipice”                                         23

-

-    “He heard a voice”                                                26

-

-    “A strange figure”                                                27

-

-    “Rip and his companion labored on in silence”                     29

-

-    “A company of odd-looking personages”                      facing 29

-

-    “One who seemed to be the commander”                              30

-

-    “They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”              facing 30

-

-    “I have not slept here all night”                                 31

-

-    “Wanting in his usual activity”                                   32

-

-    “He called again and whistled after his dog”               facing 32

-

-    “Stroked their chins”                                             33

-

-    “A troop of strange children ran at his heels”             facing 34

-

-    “He found the house gone to decay”                                35

-

-    “He recognized on the sign”                                       37

-

-    “They crowded round him”                                   facing 38

-

-    “A lean, bilious-looking fellow”                                  39

-

-    “He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”                    41

-

-    “A great militia-general”                                         42

-

-    “That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”                                  43

-

-    “A fresh, comely woman”                                           44

-

-    “What is your name, my good woman?”                        facing 44

-

-    Peter Vanderdonk                                                  45

-

-    “Friends among the rising generation”                             46

-

-    “Once more on the bench at the inn door”                   facing 46

-

-    “He used to tell his story to every stranger”                     48

-

-

-

-

-RIP VAN WINKLE.

-

-A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.

-

-

-    By Woden, God of Saxons,

-    From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday.

-    Truth is a thing that ever I will keep

-    Unto thylke day in which I creep into

-    My sepulchre----                      CARTWRIGHT.

-

-[Illustration: Diedrich Knickerbocker]

-

-[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich

-Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the

-Dutch history of the province, and the manners of the descendants from

-its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie

-so much among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty

-on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still

-more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to true

-history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,

-snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore,

-he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and

-studied it with the zeal of a book-worm.

-

-The result of all these researches was a history of the province during

-the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.

-There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his

-work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.

-Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little

-questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely

-established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections as a

-book of unquestionable authority.

-

-The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and

-now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to

-say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier

-labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though

-it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his

-neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt the

-truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies are

-remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be suspected

-that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his memory may

-be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk whose good

-opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain biscuit-bakers,

-who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their New-Year cakes;

-and have thus given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the

-being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne’s Farthing.]

-

-

-

-

-[Illustration: Up the Hudson]

-

-Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill

-mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian

-family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a

-noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change

-of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day,

-produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains,

-and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect

-barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in

-blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;

-but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will

-gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last

-rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.

-

-At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the

-light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among

-the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the

-fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great

-antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the

-early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government

-of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!) and there were some

-of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,

-built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed

-windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.

-

-[Illustration: “He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”]

-

-In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell

-the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived

-many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,

-a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a

-descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous

-days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort

-Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial character of

-his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple, good-natured man;

-he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient, hen-pecked husband.

-Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing that meekness of

-spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for those men are

-most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad who are under the

-discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered

-pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation, and a

-curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the

-virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant wife may, therefore,

-in some respects, be considered a tolerable blessing; and if so, Rip Van

-Winkle was thrice blessed.

-

-[Illustration: “He assisted at their sports”]

-

-[Illustration: “A termagant wife”]

-

-Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of

-the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all

-family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters

-over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van

-Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever

-he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,

-taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told them long stories

-of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the

-village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts,

-clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with

-impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.

-

-[Illustration: “Fish all day without a murmur”]

-

-The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to

-all kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of

-assiduity or perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as

-long and heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur,

-even though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would

-carry a fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours together, trudging

-through woods and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few

-squirrels or wild pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor

-even in the roughest toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics

-for husking Indian corn, or building stone fences; the women of the

-village, too, used to employ him to run their errands, and to do such

-little odd jobs as their less obliging husbands would not do for them.

-In a word, Rip was ready to attend to anybody’s business but his own;

-but as to doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it

-impossible.

-

-[Illustration: “Used to employ him to run their errands”]

-

-In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the

-most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything

-about it went wrong, and would go wrong in spite of him. His fences were

-continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get

-among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than

-anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had

-some out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had

-dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little

-more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the

-worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood.

-

-[Illustration: “He would carry a fowling-piece”]

-

-His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to

-nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to

-inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally

-seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in a pair of

-his father’s cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up

-with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.

-

-[Illustration: “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”]

-

-Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,

-well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or

-brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would

-rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he

-would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept

-continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,

-and the ruin he was bringing on his family.

-

-[Illustration: “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”]

-

-Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and

-everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household

-eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind,

-and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his

-shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This,

-however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that he was

-fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of the house--the

-only side which, in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked husband.

-

-[Illustration: “How solemnly they would listen”]

-

-Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked

-as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in

-idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of

-his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit

-befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever

-scoured the woods--but what courage can withstand the ever-during and

-all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the

-house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between

-his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong

-glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or

-ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.

-

-[Illustration: “He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up

-his eyes”]

-

-Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony

-rolled on: a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is

-the only edge tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long while

-he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind

-of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages

-of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a small inn,

-designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here

-they used to sit in the shade of a long lazy summer’s day, talking

-listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about

-nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s money to have

-heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by

-chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing

-traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled

-out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little

-man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the

-dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some

-months after they had taken place.

-

-[Illustration: “Yelping precipitation”]

-

-The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas

-Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the door

-of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving

-sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so

-that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements, as accurately

-as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked

-his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has

-his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his

-opinions. When anything that was read or related displeased him, he was

-observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to send forth short,

-frequent, and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would inhale the smoke

-slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid clouds, and

-sometimes taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the fragrant vapor

-curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token of perfect

-approbation.

-

-[Illustration: “He would share the contents of his wallet”]

-

-[Illustration: Nicholas Vedder]

-

-From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his

-termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of the

-assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august

-personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of

-this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her

-husband in habits of idleness.

-

-Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair, and his only

-alternative to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his

-wife, was to take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here he

-would sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the

-contents of his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a

-fellow-sufferer in persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress

-leads thee a dog’s life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live

-thou shalt never want a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would wag his

-tail, look wistfully in his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I

-verily believe he reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.

-

-In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had

-unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill

-mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the

-still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.

-Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a

-green knoll covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a

-precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the

-lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the

-lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic

-course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging

-bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing

-itself in the blue highlands.

-

-On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,

-lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending

-cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun.

-For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually

-advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the

-valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the

-village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the

-terrors of Dame Van Winkle.

-

-As he was about to descend he heard a voice from a distance

-hallooing, “Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could

-see nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain.

-He thought his fancy must have deceived him, and turned again to

-descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still evening air,

-“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”--at the same time Wolf bristled up his

-back, and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s side, looking

-fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague apprehension stealing

-over him; he looked anxiously in the same direction, and perceived a

-strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks, and bending under the weight

-of something he carried on his back. He was surprised to see any human

-being in this lonely and unfrequented place, but supposing it to be some

-one of the neighborhood in need of his assistance, he hastened down to

-yield it.

-

-[Illustration: “The brow of a precipice”]

-

-On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of

-the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with

-thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique

-Dutch fashion--a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist--several pair of

-breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons

-down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a

-stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to

-approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful

-of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity, and

-mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,

-apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip

-every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that

-seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty

-rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an

-instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient

-thunder-showers which often take place in the mountain heights, he

-proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a

-small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the

-brinks of which, impending trees shot their branches, so that you only

-caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During

-the whole time, Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for

-though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying

-a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange

-and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked

-familiarity.

-

-[Illustration: “He heard a voice”]

-

-On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented

-themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking

-personages playing at nine-pins. They were dressed in a quaint

-outlandish fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long

-knives in their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of

-similar style with that of the guide’s. Their visages too, were

-peculiar: one had a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the

-face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted

-by a white sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They

-all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who seemed

-to be the commander. He was a stout old gentleman, with a weather-beaten

-countenance; he wore a laced doublet, broad belt and hanger,

-high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and high-heeled shoes, with

-roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of the figures in an old

-Flemish painting, in the parlor of Domine Van Schaick, the village

-parson, and which had been brought over from Holland at the time of the

-settlement.

-

-[Illustration: “A strange figure”]

-

-[Illustration: “Rip and his companion labored on in silence”]

-

-[Illustration: “A company of odd-looking personages”]

-

-What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were

-evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the

-most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of

-pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the

-scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,

-echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.

-

-As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from

-their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and

-such strange, uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned

-within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the

-contents of the keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait

-upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the

-liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.

-

-By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when

-no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had

-much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty

-soul, and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked

-another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at

-length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head

-gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.

-

-[Illustration: “One who seemed to be the commander”]

-

-On waking, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had

-first seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed his eyes--it was a bright

-sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes,

-and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure mountain

-breeze. “Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all night.” He

-recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange man with the

-keg of liquor--the mountain ravine--the wild retreat among the

-rocks--the woe-begone party at nine-pins--the flagon--“Oh! that wicked

-flagon!” thought Rip--“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van Winkle?”

-

-[Illustration: “They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”]

-

-[Illustration: “I have not slept here all night”]

-

-He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled

-fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel

-encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He

-now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick

-upon him, and having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun.

-Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a

-squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but

-all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was

-to be seen.

-

-He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if

-he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to

-walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual

-activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and

-if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall

-have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got

-down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had

-ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain

-stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling

-the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble up

-its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,

-sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the

-wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to

-tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.

-

-[Illustration: “Wanting in his usual activity”]

-

-At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the

-cliffs to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The

-rocks presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came

-tumbling in a sheet of feathery foam, and fell into a broad deep basin,

-black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then, poor Rip

-was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his dog; he

-was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows, sporting high

-in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny precipice; and who,

-secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and scoff at the poor

-man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning was passing away,

-and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He grieved to give up

-his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it would not do to

-starve among the mountains. He shook his head, shouldered the rusty

-firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and anxiety, turned his

-steps homeward.

-

-[Illustration: “He called again and whistled after his dog”]

-

-[Illustration: “Stroked their chins”]

-

-As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom

-he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself

-acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was of

-a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all

-stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes

-upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence of

-this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his

-astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!

-

-He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange

-children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray

-beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old

-acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:

-it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had

-never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had

-disappeared. Strange names were over the doors--strange faces at the

-windows--everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began to

-doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.

-Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.

-There stood the Kaatskill mountains--there ran the silver Hudson at a

-distance--there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always

-been--Rip was sorely perplexed--“That flagon last night,” thought he,

-“has addled my poor head sadly!”

-

-It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,

-which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the

-shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay--the

-roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A

-half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip

-called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed

-on. This was an unkind cut indeed.--“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has

-forgotten me!”

-

-He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had

-always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and apparently

-abandoned. This desolateness overcame all his connubial fears--he called

-loudly for his wife and children--the lonely chambers rang for a moment

-with his voice, and then all again was silence.

-

-[Illustration: “A troop of strange children ran at his heels”]

-

-[Illustration: “He found the house gone to decay”]

-

-[Illustration: “He recognized on the sign”]

-

-He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village

-inn--but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its

-place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with

-old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union

-Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to

-shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall

-naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red night-cap,

-and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of

-stars and stripes--all this was strange and incomprehensible. He

-recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, under

-which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was

-singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and

-buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was

-decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large

-characters, GENERAL WASHINGTON.

-

-[Illustration: “They crowded round him”]

-

-There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip

-recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was

-a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed

-phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the sage Nicholas

-Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long pipe, uttering

-clouds of tobacco smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van Bummel, the

-schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient newspaper.

-In place of these, a lean bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets

-full of handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of

-citizens--election--members of Congress--liberty--Bunker’s hill--heroes

-of seventy-six--and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon

-to the bewildered Van Winkle.

-

-[Illustration: “A lean, bilious-looking fellow”]

-

-The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty

-fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children

-that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the attention of the

-tavern politicians. They crowded round him, eyeing him from head to

-foot, with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing

-him partly aside, inquired, “on which side he voted?” Rip stared in

-vacant stupidity. Another short but busy little fellow pulled him by the

-arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in his ear, “whether he was Federal

-or Democrat.” Rip was equally at a loss to comprehend the question; when

-a knowing, self-important old gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his

-way through the crowd, putting them to the right and left with his

-elbows as he passed, and planting himself before Van Winkle, with one

-arm a-kimbo, the other resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat

-penetrating, as it were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere

-tone, “what brought him to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and

-a mob at his heels, and whether he meant to breed a riot in the

-village?”

-

-[Illustration: “He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”]

-

-“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet

-man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless

-him!”

-

-Here a general shout burst from the bystanders--“a tory! a tory! a spy!

-a refugee! hustle him! away with him!”

-

-It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked

-hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow,

-demanded again of the unknown culprit, what he came there for, and whom

-he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm,

-but merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, who used to

-keep about the tavern.

-

-“Well--who are they?--name them.”

-

-Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, “Where’s Nicholas Vedder?”

-

-[Illustration: “A great militia-general”]

-

-There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a

-thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these

-eighteen years! There was a wooden tomb-stone in the church-yard that

-used to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”

-

-“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”

-

-“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he

-was killed at the storming of Stony-Point--others say he was drowned in

-the squall, at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know--he never came

-back again.”

-

-“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”

-

-“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now

-in Congress.”

-

-Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and

-friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer

-puzzled him, too, by treating of such enormous lapses of time, and of

-matters which he could not understand: war--Congress--Stony-Point!--he

-had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,

-“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”

-

-“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s

-Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”

-

-Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up

-the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor

-fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and

-whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,

-the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?

-

-[Illustration: “That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”]

-

-“God knows,” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself--I’m

-somebody else--that’s me yonder--no--that’s somebody else, got into my

-shoes--I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and

-they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I

-can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”

-

-The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink

-significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads. There was

-a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from

-doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man

-with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical

-moment a fresh comely woman passed through the throng to get a peep at

-the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,

-frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,

-you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child, the

-air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of

-recollections in his mind.

-

-[Illustration: “A fresh, comely woman”]

-

-“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.

-

-“Judith Gardenier.”

-

-“And your father’s name?”

-

-“Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it’s twenty years since he

-went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since--his

-dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried

-away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl.”

-

-Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering

-voice:

-

-“Where’s your mother?”

-

-[Illustration: “What is your name, my good woman?”]

-

-Oh, she too had died but a short time since: she broke a blood-vessel in

-a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.

-

-There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest

-man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her

-child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he--“Young Rip Van Winkle

-once--old Rip Van Winkle now--Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”

-

-All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the

-crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for a

-moment, exclaimed, “Sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle--it is himself.

-Welcome home again, old neighbor--Why, where have you been these twenty

-long years?”

-

-[Illustration: Peter Vanderdonk]

-

-Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him

-but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were

-seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and

-the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,

-had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and

-shook his head--upon which there was a general shaking of the head

-throughout the assemblage.

-

-[Illustration: “Friends among the rising generation”]

-

-It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter

-Vanderdonk, who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a

-descendant of the historian of that name, who wrote one of the earliest

-accounts of the province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the

-village, and well versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of

-the neighborhood. He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story

-in the most satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a

-fact, handed down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill

-mountains had always been haunted by strange beings. That it was

-affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the

-river and country, kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with

-his crew of the Halfmoon, being permitted in this way to revisit the

-scenes of his enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the

-great city called by his name. That his father had once seen them in

-their old Dutch dresses playing at nine-pins in the hollow of the

-mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound

-of their balls, like distant peals of thunder.

-

-[Illustration: “Once more on the bench at the inn door”]

-

-To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the

-more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to

-live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery

-farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that

-used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto

-of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on

-the farm; but evinced a hereditary disposition to attend to anything

-else but his business.

-

-Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his

-former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of

-time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with

-whom he soon grew into great favor.

-

-Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when

-a man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the

-bench, at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of

-the village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was

-some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could

-be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his

-torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war--that the country

-had thrown off the yoke of old England--and that, instead of being a

-subject of his majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of

-the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of

-states and empires made but little impression on him; but there was one

-species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that

-was--petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his

-neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he

-pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her

-name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,

-and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of

-resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.

-

-[Illustration: “He used to tell his story to every stranger”]

-

-He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.

-Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points

-every time he told it, which was doubtless owing to his having so

-recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have

-related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it

-by heart. Some always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted

-that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point on which

-he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, almost

-universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never hear a

-thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they say

-Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it is a

-common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when life

-hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught out

-of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.

-

-    NOTE.--The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested

-    to Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the

-    Emperor Frederick _der Rothbart_ and the Kypphauser mountain;

-    the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the tale,

-    shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual

-    fidelity.

-

-    “The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but

-    nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity

-    of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to

-    marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many

-    stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson;

-    all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I

-    have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I

-    saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational

-    and consistent on every other point, that I think no

-    conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain;

-    nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a

-    country justice, and signed with a cross, in the justice’s own

-    handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of

-    doubt.”

-

-

-

-

-Transcriber’s Note:

-

-The order of illustrations has been retained as published in the

-original publication.

-

-The following changes were made:

-

-    On the title page

-      S. E Cassino _changed to_ S. E. Cassino

-

-    In the List of Illustrations

-      personages” facing 26 _changed to_ facing 29

-

-    Page 38

-      intead of the _changed to_ instead of the

-

-*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***

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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 64636 ***
+
+[Illustration]
+
+    _This Edition is
+    limited to
+    Two Hundred and
+    Fifty Copies
+    for the
+    United Kingdom._
+    No. 141
+
+
+
+
+RIP VAN WINKLE.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: ~Washington Irving.~]
+
+
+
+
+    RIP
+    VAN WINKLE
+
+    By
+    Washington Irving.
+
+    [Illustration]
+
+    Illustrated by FRANK T. MERRILL.
+
+    Boston. U. S. A.
+    S. E. Cassino.
+    MDCCCLXXXVIII.
+
+
+
+
+    _Copyright by_
+    SAMUEL E. CASSINO,
+    1887.
+
+    TYPOGRAPHY BY J. S. CUSHING & CO., BOSTON. U. S. A.
+
+    PRESSWORK BY BERWICK & SMITH, BOSTON. U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+                                                                    PAGE
+
+    PORTRAIT                                                           4
+
+    Illustrated Title-Page                                             5
+
+    List of Illustrations                                              7
+
+    Diedrich Knickerbocker                                             9
+
+    Up the Hudson                                                     11
+
+    “He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”                          12
+
+    “He assisted at their sports”                              facing 12
+
+    “A termagant wife”                                                13
+
+    “Fish all day without a murmur”                                   14
+
+    “Used to employ him to run their errands”                         15
+
+    “He would carry a fowling-piece”                                  17
+
+    “His cow among the cabbages”                                      18
+
+    “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”                      18
+
+    “How solemnly they would listen”                           facing 18
+
+    “He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up his eyes” 19
+
+    “Yelping precipitation”                                           20
+
+    “He would share the contents of his wallet”                facing 20
+
+    Nicholas Vedder                                                   21
+
+    “The brow of a precipice”                                         23
+
+    “He heard a voice”                                                26
+
+    “A strange figure”                                                27
+
+    “Rip and his companion labored on in silence”                     29
+
+    “A company of odd-looking personages”                      facing 29
+
+    “One who seemed to be the commander”                              30
+
+    “They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”              facing 30
+
+    “I have not slept here all night”                                 31
+
+    “Wanting in his usual activity”                                   32
+
+    “He called again and whistled after his dog”               facing 32
+
+    “Stroked their chins”                                             33
+
+    “A troop of strange children ran at his heels”             facing 34
+
+    “He found the house gone to decay”                                35
+
+    “He recognized on the sign”                                       37
+
+    “They crowded round him”                                   facing 38
+
+    “A lean, bilious-looking fellow”                                  39
+
+    “He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”                    41
+
+    “A great militia-general”                                         42
+
+    “That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”                                  43
+
+    “A fresh, comely woman”                                           44
+
+    “What is your name, my good woman?”                        facing 44
+
+    Peter Vanderdonk                                                  45
+
+    “Friends among the rising generation”                             46
+
+    “Once more on the bench at the inn door”                   facing 46
+
+    “He used to tell his story to every stranger”                     48
+
+
+
+
+RIP VAN WINKLE.
+
+A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.
+
+
+    By Woden, God of Saxons,
+    From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday.
+    Truth is a thing that ever I will keep
+    Unto thylke day in which I creep into
+    My sepulchre----                      CARTWRIGHT.
+
+[Illustration: Diedrich Knickerbocker]
+
+[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich
+Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the
+Dutch history of the province, and the manners of the descendants from
+its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie
+so much among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty
+on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still
+more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to true
+history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,
+snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore,
+he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and
+studied it with the zeal of a book-worm.
+
+The result of all these researches was a history of the province during
+the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.
+There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his
+work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.
+Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little
+questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely
+established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections as a
+book of unquestionable authority.
+
+The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and
+now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to
+say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier
+labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though
+it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his
+neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt the
+truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies are
+remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be suspected
+that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his memory may
+be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk whose good
+opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain biscuit-bakers,
+who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their New-Year cakes;
+and have thus given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the
+being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne’s Farthing.]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: Up the Hudson]
+
+Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill
+mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian
+family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a
+noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change
+of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day,
+produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains,
+and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect
+barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in
+blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;
+but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will
+gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last
+rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.
+
+At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the
+light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among
+the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the
+fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great
+antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the
+early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government
+of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!) and there were some
+of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,
+built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed
+windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.
+
+[Illustration: “He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”]
+
+In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell
+the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived
+many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,
+a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a
+descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous
+days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort
+Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial character of
+his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple, good-natured man;
+he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient, hen-pecked husband.
+Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing that meekness of
+spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for those men are
+most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad who are under the
+discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered
+pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation, and a
+curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the
+virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant wife may, therefore,
+in some respects, be considered a tolerable blessing; and if so, Rip Van
+Winkle was thrice blessed.
+
+[Illustration: “He assisted at their sports”]
+
+[Illustration: “A termagant wife”]
+
+Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of
+the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all
+family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters
+over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van
+Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever
+he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,
+taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told them long stories
+of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the
+village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts,
+clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with
+impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.
+
+[Illustration: “Fish all day without a murmur”]
+
+The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to
+all kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of
+assiduity or perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as
+long and heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur,
+even though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would
+carry a fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours together, trudging
+through woods and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few
+squirrels or wild pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor
+even in the roughest toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics
+for husking Indian corn, or building stone fences; the women of the
+village, too, used to employ him to run their errands, and to do such
+little odd jobs as their less obliging husbands would not do for them.
+In a word, Rip was ready to attend to anybody’s business but his own;
+but as to doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it
+impossible.
+
+[Illustration: “Used to employ him to run their errands”]
+
+In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the
+most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything
+about it went wrong, and would go wrong in spite of him. His fences were
+continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get
+among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than
+anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had
+some out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had
+dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little
+more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the
+worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood.
+
+[Illustration: “He would carry a fowling-piece”]
+
+His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to
+nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to
+inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally
+seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in a pair of
+his father’s cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up
+with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.
+
+[Illustration: “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”]
+
+Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,
+well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or
+brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would
+rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he
+would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept
+continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,
+and the ruin he was bringing on his family.
+
+[Illustration: “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”]
+
+Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and
+everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household
+eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind,
+and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his
+shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This,
+however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that he was
+fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of the house--the
+only side which, in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked husband.
+
+[Illustration: “How solemnly they would listen”]
+
+Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked
+as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in
+idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of
+his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit
+befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever
+scoured the woods--but what courage can withstand the ever-during and
+all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the
+house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between
+his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong
+glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or
+ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.
+
+[Illustration: “He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up
+his eyes”]
+
+Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony
+rolled on: a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is
+the only edge tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long while
+he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind
+of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages
+of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a small inn,
+designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here
+they used to sit in the shade of a long lazy summer’s day, talking
+listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about
+nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s money to have
+heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by
+chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing
+traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled
+out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little
+man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the
+dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some
+months after they had taken place.
+
+[Illustration: “Yelping precipitation”]
+
+The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas
+Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the door
+of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving
+sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so
+that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements, as accurately
+as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked
+his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has
+his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his
+opinions. When anything that was read or related displeased him, he was
+observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to send forth short,
+frequent, and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would inhale the smoke
+slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid clouds, and
+sometimes taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the fragrant vapor
+curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token of perfect
+approbation.
+
+[Illustration: “He would share the contents of his wallet”]
+
+[Illustration: Nicholas Vedder]
+
+From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his
+termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of the
+assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august
+personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of
+this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her
+husband in habits of idleness.
+
+Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair, and his only
+alternative to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his
+wife, was to take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here he
+would sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the
+contents of his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a
+fellow-sufferer in persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress
+leads thee a dog’s life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live
+thou shalt never want a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would wag his
+tail, look wistfully in his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I
+verily believe he reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.
+
+In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had
+unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill
+mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the
+still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.
+Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a
+green knoll covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a
+precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the
+lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the
+lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic
+course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging
+bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing
+itself in the blue highlands.
+
+On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,
+lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending
+cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun.
+For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually
+advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the
+valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the
+village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the
+terrors of Dame Van Winkle.
+
+As he was about to descend he heard a voice from a distance
+hallooing, “Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could
+see nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain.
+He thought his fancy must have deceived him, and turned again to
+descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still evening air,
+“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”--at the same time Wolf bristled up his
+back, and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s side, looking
+fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague apprehension stealing
+over him; he looked anxiously in the same direction, and perceived a
+strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks, and bending under the weight
+of something he carried on his back. He was surprised to see any human
+being in this lonely and unfrequented place, but supposing it to be some
+one of the neighborhood in need of his assistance, he hastened down to
+yield it.
+
+[Illustration: “The brow of a precipice”]
+
+On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of
+the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with
+thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique
+Dutch fashion--a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist--several pair of
+breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons
+down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a
+stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to
+approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful
+of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity, and
+mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,
+apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip
+every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that
+seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty
+rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an
+instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient
+thunder-showers which often take place in the mountain heights, he
+proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a
+small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the
+brinks of which, impending trees shot their branches, so that you only
+caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During
+the whole time, Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for
+though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying
+a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange
+and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked
+familiarity.
+
+[Illustration: “He heard a voice”]
+
+On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented
+themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking
+personages playing at nine-pins. They were dressed in a quaint
+outlandish fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long
+knives in their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of
+similar style with that of the guide’s. Their visages too, were
+peculiar: one had a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the
+face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted
+by a white sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They
+all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who seemed
+to be the commander. He was a stout old gentleman, with a weather-beaten
+countenance; he wore a laced doublet, broad belt and hanger,
+high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and high-heeled shoes, with
+roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of the figures in an old
+Flemish painting, in the parlor of Domine Van Schaick, the village
+parson, and which had been brought over from Holland at the time of the
+settlement.
+
+[Illustration: “A strange figure”]
+
+[Illustration: “Rip and his companion labored on in silence”]
+
+[Illustration: “A company of odd-looking personages”]
+
+What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were
+evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the
+most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of
+pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the
+scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,
+echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.
+
+As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from
+their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and
+such strange, uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned
+within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the
+contents of the keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait
+upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the
+liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.
+
+By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when
+no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had
+much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty
+soul, and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked
+another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at
+length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head
+gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.
+
+[Illustration: “One who seemed to be the commander”]
+
+On waking, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had
+first seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed his eyes--it was a bright
+sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes,
+and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure mountain
+breeze. “Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all night.” He
+recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange man with the
+keg of liquor--the mountain ravine--the wild retreat among the
+rocks--the woe-begone party at nine-pins--the flagon--“Oh! that wicked
+flagon!” thought Rip--“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van Winkle?”
+
+[Illustration: “They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”]
+
+[Illustration: “I have not slept here all night”]
+
+He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled
+fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel
+encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He
+now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick
+upon him, and having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun.
+Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a
+squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but
+all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was
+to be seen.
+
+He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if
+he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to
+walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual
+activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and
+if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall
+have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got
+down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had
+ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain
+stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling
+the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble up
+its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,
+sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the
+wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to
+tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.
+
+[Illustration: “Wanting in his usual activity”]
+
+At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the
+cliffs to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The
+rocks presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came
+tumbling in a sheet of feathery foam, and fell into a broad deep basin,
+black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then, poor Rip
+was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his dog; he
+was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows, sporting high
+in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny precipice; and who,
+secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and scoff at the poor
+man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning was passing away,
+and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He grieved to give up
+his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it would not do to
+starve among the mountains. He shook his head, shouldered the rusty
+firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and anxiety, turned his
+steps homeward.
+
+[Illustration: “He called again and whistled after his dog”]
+
+[Illustration: “Stroked their chins”]
+
+As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom
+he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself
+acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was of
+a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all
+stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes
+upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence of
+this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his
+astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!
+
+He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange
+children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray
+beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old
+acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:
+it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had
+never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had
+disappeared. Strange names were over the doors--strange faces at the
+windows--everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began to
+doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.
+Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.
+There stood the Kaatskill mountains--there ran the silver Hudson at a
+distance--there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always
+been--Rip was sorely perplexed--“That flagon last night,” thought he,
+“has addled my poor head sadly!”
+
+It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,
+which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the
+shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay--the
+roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A
+half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip
+called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed
+on. This was an unkind cut indeed.--“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has
+forgotten me!”
+
+He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had
+always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and apparently
+abandoned. This desolateness overcame all his connubial fears--he called
+loudly for his wife and children--the lonely chambers rang for a moment
+with his voice, and then all again was silence.
+
+[Illustration: “A troop of strange children ran at his heels”]
+
+[Illustration: “He found the house gone to decay”]
+
+[Illustration: “He recognized on the sign”]
+
+He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village
+inn--but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its
+place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with
+old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union
+Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to
+shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall
+naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red night-cap,
+and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of
+stars and stripes--all this was strange and incomprehensible. He
+recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, under
+which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was
+singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and
+buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was
+decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large
+characters, GENERAL WASHINGTON.
+
+[Illustration: “They crowded round him”]
+
+There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip
+recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was
+a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed
+phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the sage Nicholas
+Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long pipe, uttering
+clouds of tobacco smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van Bummel, the
+schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient newspaper.
+In place of these, a lean bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets
+full of handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of
+citizens--election--members of Congress--liberty--Bunker’s hill--heroes
+of seventy-six--and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon
+to the bewildered Van Winkle.
+
+[Illustration: “A lean, bilious-looking fellow”]
+
+The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty
+fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children
+that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the attention of the
+tavern politicians. They crowded round him, eyeing him from head to
+foot, with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing
+him partly aside, inquired, “on which side he voted?” Rip stared in
+vacant stupidity. Another short but busy little fellow pulled him by the
+arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in his ear, “whether he was Federal
+or Democrat.” Rip was equally at a loss to comprehend the question; when
+a knowing, self-important old gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his
+way through the crowd, putting them to the right and left with his
+elbows as he passed, and planting himself before Van Winkle, with one
+arm a-kimbo, the other resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat
+penetrating, as it were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere
+tone, “what brought him to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and
+a mob at his heels, and whether he meant to breed a riot in the
+village?”
+
+[Illustration: “He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”]
+
+“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet
+man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless
+him!”
+
+Here a general shout burst from the bystanders--“a tory! a tory! a spy!
+a refugee! hustle him! away with him!”
+
+It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked
+hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow,
+demanded again of the unknown culprit, what he came there for, and whom
+he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm,
+but merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, who used to
+keep about the tavern.
+
+“Well--who are they?--name them.”
+
+Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, “Where’s Nicholas Vedder?”
+
+[Illustration: “A great militia-general”]
+
+There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a
+thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these
+eighteen years! There was a wooden tomb-stone in the church-yard that
+used to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”
+
+“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”
+
+“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he
+was killed at the storming of Stony-Point--others say he was drowned in
+the squall, at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know--he never came
+back again.”
+
+“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”
+
+“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now
+in Congress.”
+
+Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and
+friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer
+puzzled him, too, by treating of such enormous lapses of time, and of
+matters which he could not understand: war--Congress--Stony-Point!--he
+had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,
+“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”
+
+“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s
+Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”
+
+Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up
+the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor
+fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and
+whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,
+the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?
+
+[Illustration: “That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”]
+
+“God knows,” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself--I’m
+somebody else--that’s me yonder--no--that’s somebody else, got into my
+shoes--I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and
+they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I
+can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”
+
+The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink
+significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads. There was
+a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from
+doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man
+with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical
+moment a fresh comely woman passed through the throng to get a peep at
+the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,
+frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,
+you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child, the
+air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of
+recollections in his mind.
+
+[Illustration: “A fresh, comely woman”]
+
+“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.
+
+“Judith Gardenier.”
+
+“And your father’s name?”
+
+“Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it’s twenty years since he
+went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since--his
+dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried
+away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl.”
+
+Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering
+voice:
+
+“Where’s your mother?”
+
+[Illustration: “What is your name, my good woman?”]
+
+Oh, she too had died but a short time since: she broke a blood-vessel in
+a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.
+
+There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest
+man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her
+child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he--“Young Rip Van Winkle
+once--old Rip Van Winkle now--Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”
+
+All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the
+crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for a
+moment, exclaimed, “Sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle--it is himself.
+Welcome home again, old neighbor--Why, where have you been these twenty
+long years?”
+
+[Illustration: Peter Vanderdonk]
+
+Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him
+but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were
+seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and
+the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,
+had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and
+shook his head--upon which there was a general shaking of the head
+throughout the assemblage.
+
+[Illustration: “Friends among the rising generation”]
+
+It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter
+Vanderdonk, who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a
+descendant of the historian of that name, who wrote one of the earliest
+accounts of the province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the
+village, and well versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of
+the neighborhood. He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story
+in the most satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a
+fact, handed down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill
+mountains had always been haunted by strange beings. That it was
+affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the
+river and country, kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with
+his crew of the Halfmoon, being permitted in this way to revisit the
+scenes of his enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the
+great city called by his name. That his father had once seen them in
+their old Dutch dresses playing at nine-pins in the hollow of the
+mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound
+of their balls, like distant peals of thunder.
+
+[Illustration: “Once more on the bench at the inn door”]
+
+To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the
+more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to
+live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery
+farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that
+used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto
+of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on
+the farm; but evinced a hereditary disposition to attend to anything
+else but his business.
+
+Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his
+former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of
+time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with
+whom he soon grew into great favor.
+
+Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when
+a man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the
+bench, at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of
+the village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was
+some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could
+be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his
+torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war--that the country
+had thrown off the yoke of old England--and that, instead of being a
+subject of his majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of
+the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of
+states and empires made but little impression on him; but there was one
+species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that
+was--petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his
+neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he
+pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her
+name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,
+and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of
+resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.
+
+[Illustration: “He used to tell his story to every stranger”]
+
+He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.
+Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points
+every time he told it, which was doubtless owing to his having so
+recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have
+related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it
+by heart. Some always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted
+that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point on which
+he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, almost
+universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never hear a
+thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they say
+Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it is a
+common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when life
+hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught out
+of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.
+
+    NOTE.--The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested
+    to Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the
+    Emperor Frederick _der Rothbart_ and the Kypphauser mountain;
+    the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the tale,
+    shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual
+    fidelity.
+
+    “The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but
+    nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity
+    of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to
+    marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many
+    stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson;
+    all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I
+    have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I
+    saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational
+    and consistent on every other point, that I think no
+    conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain;
+    nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a
+    country justice, and signed with a cross, in the justice’s own
+    handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of
+    doubt.”
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber’s Note:
+
+The order of illustrations has been retained as published in the
+original publication.
+
+The following changes were made:
+
+    On the title page
+      S. E Cassino _changed to_ S. E. Cassino
+
+    In the List of Illustrations
+      personages” facing 26 _changed to_ facing 29
+
+    Page 38
+      intead of the _changed to_ instead of the
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 64636 ***
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-<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving</div>

-

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-<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Rip Van Winkle</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Washington Irving</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Illustrator: Frank T. Merrill</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: February 26, 2021 [eBook #64636]</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Sue Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Library of Congress)</div>

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-<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***</div>

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-

-

-<hr class="divider" />

-

-<div class="figcenter width300">

-<img class="noborder" src="images/i001.png" width="300" height="373" alt="" />

-</div>

-

-<p class="center">

-<i>This Edition is<br />

-limited to<br />

-Two Hundred and<br />

-Fifty Copies<br />

-for the<br />

-United Kingdom.</i><br />

-No. 141</p>

-

-

-

-<div class="section">

-<hr class="divider" />

-<h1>RIP VAN WINKLE.</h1>

-</div>

-

-<div class="section">

-<hr class="divider2" />

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i006" src="images/i006.jpg" width="400" height="553" alt="" />

-<div class="caption"><em>Washington Irving.</em></div>

-</div>

-</div>

-

-

-<div class="section">

-<hr class="divider2" />

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="title" src="images/i007.jpg" width="500" height="721" alt="Title page" />

-</div>

-

-<p class="center">

-<span class="smcap">Rip Van Winkle</span><br />

-By Washington Irving.<br />

-Illustrated by <span class="smcap">Frank T. Merrill</span>.<br />

-Boston. <span class="smcap">U. S. A.</span><br />

-S. <a name="fullstop" id="fullstop"></a><ins title="Original has no fullstop">E.</ins>

-Cassino.<br />

-MDCCCLXXXVIII.</p>

-</div>

-

-

-

-<div class="section">

-<p class="center">

-<i>Copyright by</i><br />

-<span class="smcap">Samuel E. Cassino</span>,<br />

-1887.

-</p>

-

-<p class="center mt3">

-<span class="smcap">Typography by J. S. Cushing &amp; Co.,

-Boston. U. S. A.</span></p>

-

-<hr class="printer" />

-

-<p class="center">

-<span class="smcap">Presswork by Berwick &amp; Smith, Boston. U. S. A.</span>

-</p>

-</div>

-

-

-

-<div class="section">

-<hr class="divider" />

-<h2 id="list-of-illustrations">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>

-</div>

-<table summary="List of Illustrations">

-<tr>

-<th>&nbsp;</th>

-<th class="tdr">PAGE</th>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl"><span class="smcap">Portrait</span></td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i006">4</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">Illustrated Title-Page</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#title">5</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">List of Illustrations</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#list-of-illustrations">7</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">Diedrich Knickerbocker</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i011">9</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">Up the Hudson</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i013">11</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i014">12</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He assisted at their sports”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i015">12</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A termagant wife”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i017">13</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Fish all day without a murmur”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i018">14</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Used to employ him to run their errands”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i019">15</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He would carry a fowling-piece”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i021">17</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“His cow among the cabbages”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i022b">18</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i022a">18</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“How solemnly they would listen”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i023">18</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He shrugged his shoulders,

- shook his head, and cast up his eyes”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i025">19</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Yelping precipitation”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i026">20</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He would share the contents

-of his wallet”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i027">20</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">Nicholas Vedder</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i029">21</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“The brow of a precipice”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i031">23</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He heard a voice”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i034">26</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A strange figure”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i035">27</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Rip and his companion labored

-on in silence”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i037">29</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A company of odd-looking personages”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a name="facing" id="facing"></a>facing&nbsp;<a href="#i039"><ins title="original has 26">29</ins></a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“One who seemed to be the commander”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i040">30</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i041">30</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“I have not slept here all night”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i043">31</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Wanting in his usual activity”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i044">32</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He called again and whistled after

-his dog”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i045">32</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Stroked their chins”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i047">33</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A troop of strange children ran at his heels”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i049">34</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He found the house gone to decay”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i051">35</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He recognized on the sign”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i053">37</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“They crowded round him”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i055">38</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A lean, bilious-looking fellow”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i057">39</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i059">41</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A great militia-general”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i060">42</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i061">43</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“A fresh, comely woman”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i062">44</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“What is your name, my good woman?”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i063">44</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">Peter Vanderdonk</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i065">45</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Friends among the rising generation”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i066">46</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“Once more on the bench at the inn door”</td>

-<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i067">46</a></td>

-</tr>

-<tr>

-<td class="tdl">“He used to tell his story to every stranger”</td>

-<td class="tdr"><a href="#i070">48</a></td>

-</tr>

-</table>

-

-

-

-<div class="chapter">

-<hr class="divider" />

-<h2>RIP VAN WINKLE.</h2>

-</div>

-

-<p class="center">A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.</p>

-

-<div class="poetry-container">

-<div class="poetry">

-<div class="verse">

-<div class="line">By Woden, God of Saxons,</div>

-<div class="line">From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday.</div>

-<div class="line">Truth is a thing that ever I will keep</div>

-<div class="line">Unto thylke day in which I creep into</div>

-<div class="line">My sepulchre&mdash;&mdash; <span class="smcap pl5">Cartwright.</span></div>

-</div></div>

-</div>

-

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i011" src="images/i011.jpg" width="500" height="491" alt="Diedrich Knickerbocker" />

-</div>

-

-<blockquote>

-<p>[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich

-Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the

-Dutch history of the province, and the manners of the descendants from

-its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie

-so much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">10</a></span> among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty

-on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still

-more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to true

-history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,

-snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore,

-he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and

-studied it with the zeal of a book-worm.</p>

-

-<p>The result of all these researches was a history of the province during

-the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.

-There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his

-work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.

-Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little

-questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely

-established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections as a

-book of unquestionable authority.</p>

-

-<p>The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and

-now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to

-say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier

-labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though

-it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his

-neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt the

-truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies are

-remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be suspected

-that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his memory may

-be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk whose good

-opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain biscuit-bakers,

-who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their New-Year cakes;

-and have thus given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the

-being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne’s Farthing.]</p>

-</blockquote>

-

-

-<div class="chapter">

-<hr class="divider" />

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">11</a></span>

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i013" src="images/i013.jpg" width="500" height="309" alt="Up the Hudson" />

-</div>

-

-<p class="noi"><span class="drop-cap">W</span>HOEVER has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill

-mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian

-family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a

-noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change

-of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day,

-produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains,

-and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect

-barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in

-blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;

-but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will

-gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last

-rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.</p>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">12</a></span>

-At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the

-light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among

-the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the

-fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great

-antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the

-early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government

-of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!) and there were some

-of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,

-built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed

-windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i014" src="images/i014.jpg" width="250" height="396" alt="“He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell

-the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived

-many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,

-a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a

-descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous

-days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort

-Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">13</a></span> character of his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple,

-good-natured man; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient,

-hen-pecked husband. Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing

-that meekness of spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for

-those men are most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad who are

-under the discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are

-rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic

-tribulation, and a curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world

-for teaching the virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant

-wife may, therefore, in some respects, be considered a tolerable

-blessing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i015" src="images/i015.jpg" width="500" height="747" alt="“He assisted at their sports”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i017" src="images/i017.jpg" width="250" height="443" alt="“A termagant wife”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of

-the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all

-family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters

-over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van

-Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever

-he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,

-taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">14</a></span> them long stories

-of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the

-village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts,

-clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with

-impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i018" src="images/i018.jpg" width="400" height="519" alt="“Fish all day without a murmur”" />

-</div>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">15</a></span>

-The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to all

-kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of assiduity or

-perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as long and

-heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur, even

-though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would carry a

-fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours together, trudging through woods

-and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few squirrels or wild

-pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even in the roughest

-toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics for husking Indian

-corn, or building stone fences; the women of the village, too, used to

-employ him to run their errands, and to do such little odd jobs as their

-less obliging husbands would not do for them. In a word, Rip was ready

-to attend to anybody’s

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">16</a></span>

-business but his own; but as to

-doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it

-impossible.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">17</a></span>

-<img id="i019" src="images/i019.jpg" width="500" height="618" alt="“Used to employ him to run their errands”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the

-most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything

-about it went wrong, and would go wrong in spite of him. His fences were

-continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get

-among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than

-anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had

-some out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had

-dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little

-more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the

-worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i021" src="images/i021.jpg" width="400" height="710" alt="“He would carry a fowling-piece”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to

-nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to

-inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally

-seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in a pair of

-his father’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">18</a></span> cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up

-with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i022a" src="images/i022a.jpg" width="250" height="362" alt="“Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,

-well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or

-brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would

-rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he

-would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept

-continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,

-and the ruin he was bringing on his family.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width300">

-<img id="i022b" src="images/i022b.jpg" width="300" height="312" alt="“His cow among the cabbages”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and

-everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household

-eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind,

-and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his

-shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This,

-however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">19</a></span> he was fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of

-the house&mdash;the only side which, in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked

-husband.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i023" src="images/i023.jpg" width="500" height="659" alt="“How solemnly they would listen”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked

-as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in

-idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of

-his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit

-befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever

-scoured the woods&mdash;but what courage can withstand the ever-during and

-all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the

-house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between

-his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong

-glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or

-ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i025" src="images/i025.jpg" width="250" height="674" alt="“He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up his eyes”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony

-rolled on: a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is

-the only edge tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long while

-he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind

-of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages

-of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a small inn,

-designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here

-they used to sit in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">20</a></span> shade of a long lazy summer’s day, talking

-listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about

-nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s money to have

-heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by

-chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing

-traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled

-out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little

-man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the

-dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some

-months after they had taken place.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i026" src="images/i026.jpg" width="400" height="592" alt="“Yelping precipitation”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas

-Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the door

-of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving

-sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so

-that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements, as accurately

-as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked

-his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has

-his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his

-opinions. When anything that was read <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">21</a></span> or related

-displeased him, he was observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to

-send forth short, frequent, and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would

-inhale the smoke slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid

-clouds, and sometimes taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the

-fragrant vapor curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token

-of perfect approbation.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i027" src="images/i027.jpg" width="500" height="672" alt="“He would share the contents of his wallet”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i029" src="images/i029.jpg" width="400" height="454" alt="Nicholas Vedder" />

-</div>

-

-<p>From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his

-termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of the

-assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august

-personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of

-this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her

-husband in habits of idleness.</p>

-

-<p>Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair, and his only alternative

-to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his wife, was to

-take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here he would

-sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the contents of

-his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a fellow-sufferer in

-persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress leads thee a dog’s

-life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live thou shalt never want

-a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">22</a></span> wag his tail, look wistfully in

-his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I verily believe he

-reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.</p>

-

-<p>In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had

-unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill

-mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the

-still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.

-Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a

-green knoll covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a

-precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the

-lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the

-lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic

-course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging

-bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing

-itself in the blue highlands.</p>

-

-<p>On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,

-lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending

-cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun.

-For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually

-advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the

-valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the

-village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the

-terrors of Dame Van Winkle.</p>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">23</a></span>

-As he was about to descend he heard a voice from a distance hallooing,

-“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could see

-nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain. He

-thought his fancy <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">24</a></span>

- must have deceived him, and turned

-again to descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still

-evening air, “Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”&mdash;at the same time Wolf

-bristled up his back, and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s

-side, looking fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague

-apprehension stealing over him; he looked anxiously in the same

-direction, and perceived a strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks,

-and bending under the weight of something he carried on his back. He was

-surprised to see any human being in this lonely and unfrequented place,

-but supposing it to be some one of the neighborhood in need of his

-assistance, he hastened down to yield it.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">25</a></span>

-<img id="i031" src="images/i031.jpg" width="500" height="577" alt="“The brow of a precipice”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of

-the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with

-thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique

-Dutch fashion&mdash;a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist&mdash;several pair of

-breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons

-down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a

-stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to

-approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful

-of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity, and

-mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,

-apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip

-every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that

-seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty

-rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an

-instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient

-thunder-showers which often take place in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">26</a></span> mountain heights, he

-proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a

-small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the

-brinks of which, impending trees shot their branches, so that you only

-caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During

-the whole time, Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for

-though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying

-a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange

-and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked

-familiarity.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i034" src="images/i034.jpg" width="400" height="571" alt="“He heard a voice”" />

-</div>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">27</a></span>

-On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented

-themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking

-personages playing at nine-pins. They were dressed in a quaint

-outlandish fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long

-knives in their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of

-similar style with that of the guide’s. Their visages too, were

-peculiar: one had a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the

-face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted

-by a white sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They

-all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">28</a></span>

-seemed to be the commander. He was a stout old

-gentleman, with a weather-beaten countenance; he wore a laced doublet,

-broad belt and hanger, high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and

-high-heeled shoes, with roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of

-the figures in an old Flemish painting, in the parlor of Domine Van

-Schaick, the village parson, and which had been brought over from

-Holland at the time of the settlement.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">29</a></span>

-<img id="i035" src="images/i035.jpg" width="500" height="654" alt="“A strange figure”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i037" src="images/i037.jpg" width="500" height="673" alt="“Rip and his companion labored on in silence”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i039" src="images/i039.jpg" width="400" height="596" alt="“A company of odd-looking personages”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were

-evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the

-most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of

-pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the

-scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,

-echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.</p>

-

-<p>As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from

-their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and

-such strange, uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned

-within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the

-contents of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">30</a></span> keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait

-upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the

-liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.</p>

-

-<p>By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when

-no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had

-much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty

-soul, and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked

-another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at

-length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head

-gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i040" src="images/i040.jpg" width="400" height="489" alt="“One who seemed to be the commander”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>On waking, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had first

-seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">31</a></span> his eyes&mdash;it was

-a bright sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the

-bushes, and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure

-mountain breeze. “Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all

-night.” He recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange

-man with the keg of liquor&mdash;the mountain ravine&mdash;the wild retreat among

-the rocks&mdash;the woe-begone party at nine-pins&mdash;the flagon&mdash;“Oh! that

-wicked flagon!” thought Rip&mdash;“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van

-Winkle?”</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i041" src="images/i041.jpg" width="500" height="658" alt="“They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i043" src="images/i043.jpg" width="400" height="359" alt="“I have not slept here all night”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled

-fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel

-encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He

-now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick

-upon him, and having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun.

-Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a

-squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">32</a></span>

-all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was

-to be seen.</p>

-

-<p>He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if

-he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to

-walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual

-activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and

-if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall

-have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got

-down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had

-ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain

-stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling

-the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble up

-its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,

-sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the

-wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to

-tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i044" src="images/i044.jpg" width="400" height="596" alt="“Wanting in his usual activity”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the cliffs

-to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The rocks

-presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came tumbling

-in a sheet of feathery <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">33</a></span>

-foam, and fell into a broad deep

-basin, black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then,

-poor Rip was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his

-dog; he was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows,

-sporting high in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny

-precipice; and who, secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and

-scoff at the poor man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning

-was passing away, and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He

-grieved to give up his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it

-would not do to starve among the mountains. He shook his head,

-shouldered the rusty firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and

-anxiety, turned his steps homeward.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i045" src="images/i045.jpg" width="500" height="664" alt="“He called again and whistled after his dog”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i047" src="images/i047.jpg" width="500" height="236" alt="“Stroked their chins”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom

-he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself

-acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was of

-a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all

-stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes

-upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">34</a></span> of

-this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his

-astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!</p>

-

-<p>He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange

-children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray

-beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old

-acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:

-it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had

-never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had

-disappeared. Strange names were over the doors&mdash;strange faces at the

-windows&mdash;everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began to

-doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.

-Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.

-There stood the Kaatskill mountains&mdash;there ran the silver Hudson at a

-distance&mdash;there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always

-been&mdash;Rip was sorely perplexed&mdash;“That flagon last night,” thought he,

-“has addled my poor head sadly!”</p>

-

-<p>It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,

-which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the

-shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay&mdash;the

-roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A

-half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip

-called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed

-on. This was an unkind cut indeed.&mdash;“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has

-forgotten me!”</p>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">35</a></span>

-He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had

-always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and

-apparently abandoned. This desolateness overcame all

-his connubial fears&mdash;he called loudly for his wife and children&mdash;the

-lonely chambers rang for a moment with his voice, and then all again was

-silence.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">36</a></span>

-<img id="i049" src="images/i049.jpg" width="500" height="706" alt="“A troop of strange children ran at his heels”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">37</a></span>

-<img id="i051" src="images/i051.jpg" width="500" height="568" alt="“He found the house gone to decay”" />

-</div>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i053" src="images/i053.jpg" width="400" height="622" alt="“He recognized on the sign”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village

-inn&mdash;but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its

-place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with

-old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union

-Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to

-shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall

-naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">38</a></span> night-cap,

-and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of

-stars and stripes&mdash;all this was strange and incomprehensible. He

-recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, under

-which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was

-singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and

-buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was

-decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large

-characters, <span class="smcap">General Washington</span>.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i055" src="images/i055.jpg" width="500" height="721" alt="“They crowded round him”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip

-recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was

-a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it,

-<a name="instead" id="instead"></a><ins title="Original has 'intead'">instead</ins>

-of the accustomed phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the

-sage Nicholas Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long

-pipe, uttering clouds of tobacco smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van

-Bummel, the schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient

-newspaper. In place of these, a lean bilious-looking fellow, with his

-pockets full of handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of

-citizens&mdash;election&mdash;members of Congress&mdash;liberty&mdash;Bunker’s hill&mdash;heroes

-of seventy-six&mdash;and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon

-to the bewildered Van Winkle.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i057" src="images/i057.jpg" width="500" height="629" alt="“A lean, bilious-looking fellow”" />

-</div>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">39</a></span>

-The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty

-fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children

-that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the attention of the

-tavern politicians. They crowded round him, eyeing him from head to

-foot, with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing

-him partly aside, inquired, “on which side he voted?” Rip stared in

-vacant stupidity. Another short but busy

-little fellow pulled him by the arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in

-his ear, “whether he was Federal or Democrat.” Rip was equally at a loss

-to comprehend the question; when a knowing, self-important old

-gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his way through the crowd,

-putting them to the right and left with his elbows as he passed, and

-planting himself before Van Winkle, with one arm a-kimbo, the other

-resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat penetrating, as it

-were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere tone, “what brought him

-to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and a mob at his heels, and

-whether he meant to breed a riot in the village?”</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">40</a></span>

-<img id="i059" src="images/i059.jpg" width="400" height="360" alt="“He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”" />

-</div>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">41</a></span>

-“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet

-man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless

-him!”</p>

-

-<p>Here a general shout burst from the bystanders&mdash;“a tory! a tory! a spy!

-a refugee! hustle him! away with him!”</p>

-

-<p>It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked

-hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow,

-demanded again of the unknown culprit, what he came there for, and whom

-he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm,

-but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">42</a></span> merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, who used to

-keep about the tavern.</p>

-

-<p>“Well&mdash;who are they?&mdash;name them.”</p>

-

-<p>Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, “Where’s Nicholas Vedder?”</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width400">

-<img id="i060" src="images/i060.jpg" width="400" height="468" alt="“A great militia-general”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a

-thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these

-eighteen years! There was a wooden tomb-stone in the church-yard that

-used to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”</p>

-

-<p>“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”</p>

-

-<p>“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he

-was killed at the storming of Stony-Point&mdash;others say he was drowned in

-the squall, at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know&mdash;he never came

-back again.”</p>

-

-<p>“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”</p>

-

-<p>“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now

-in Congress.”</p>

-

-<p>Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and

-friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer

-puzzled him, too, by treating of such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">43</a></span> enormous lapses of time, and of

-matters which he could not understand: war&mdash;Congress&mdash;Stony-Point!&mdash;he

-had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,

-“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”</p>

-

-<p>“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s

-Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”</p>

-

-<p>Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up

-the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor

-fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and

-whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,

-the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i061" src="images/i061.jpg" width="250" height="470" alt="“That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>“God knows,” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself&mdash;I’m

-somebody else&mdash;that’s me yonder&mdash;no&mdash;that’s somebody else, got into my

-shoes&mdash;I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and

-they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I

-can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”</p>

-

-<p>The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink

-significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">44</a></span> There was

-a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from

-doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man

-with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical

-moment a fresh comely woman passed through the throng to get a peep at

-the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,

-frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,

-you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child, the

-air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of

-recollections in his mind.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i062" src="images/i062.jpg" width="250" height="418" alt="“A fresh, comely woman”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.</p>

-

-<p>“Judith Gardenier.”</p>

-

-<p>“And your father’s name?”</p>

-

-<p>“Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it’s twenty years since he

-went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since&mdash;his

-dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried

-away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl.”</p>

-

-<p>Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering

-voice:</p>

-

-<p>“Where’s your mother?”</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i063" src="images/i063.jpg" width="500" height="654" alt="“What is your name, my good woman?”" />

-</div>

-

-<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">45</a></span>

-Oh, she too had died but a short time since: she broke a blood-vessel in

-a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.</p>

-

-<p>There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest

-man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her

-child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he&mdash;“Young Rip Van Winkle

-once&mdash;old Rip Van Winkle now&mdash;Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”</p>

-

-<p>All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the

-crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for a

-moment, exclaimed, “Sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle&mdash;it is himself.

-Welcome home again, old neighbor&mdash;Why, where have you been these twenty

-long years?”</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width250">

-<img id="i065" src="images/i065.jpg" width="250" height="354" alt="Peter Vanderdonk" />

-</div>

-

-<p>Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him

-but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were

-seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and

-the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,

-had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and

-shook his head&mdash;upon which there was a general shaking of the head

-throughout the assemblage.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i066" src="images/i066.jpg" width="500" height="386" alt="“Friends among the rising generation”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter Vanderdonk,

-who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a descendant of the

-historian of that name, who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">46</a></span> wrote one of the earliest accounts of the

-province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the village, and well

-versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of the neighborhood.

-He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story in the most

-satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a fact, handed

-down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill mountains had

-always been haunted by strange beings. That it was affirmed that the

-great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the river and country,

-kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with his crew of the

-Halfmoon, being permitted in this way to revisit the scenes of his

-enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the great city

-called by his name. That his father had once seen them in their old

-Dutch dresses playing at nine-pins in the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">47</a></span> hollow of the

-mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound

-of their balls, like distant peals of thunder.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i067" src="images/i067.jpg" width="500" height="638" alt="“Once more on the bench at the inn door”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the

-more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to

-live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery

-farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that

-used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto

-of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on

-the farm; but evinced a hereditary disposition to attend to anything

-else but his business.</p>

-

-<p>Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his

-former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of

-time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with

-whom he soon grew into great favor.</p>

-

-<p>Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when a

-man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the

-bench, at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of

-the village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was

-some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could

-be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his

-torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war&mdash;that the country

-had thrown off the yoke of old England&mdash;and that, instead of being a

-subject of his majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of

-the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of

-states and empires made but little impression on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">48</a></span> him; but there was one

-species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that

-was&mdash;petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his

-neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he

-pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her

-name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,

-and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of

-resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.</p>

-

-<div class="figcenter width500">

-<img id="i070" src="images/i070.jpg" width="500" height="332" alt="“He used to tell his story to every stranger”" />

-</div>

-

-<p>He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.

-Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points

-every time he told it, which was doubtless owing to his having so

-recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have

-related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it

-by heart. Some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">49</a></span> always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and

-insisted that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point

-on which he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however,

-almost universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never

-hear a thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they

-say Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it

-is a common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when

-life hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught

-out of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.</p>

-

-<blockquote>

-<p><span class="smcap">Note.</span>&mdash;The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested

-to Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the

-Emperor Frederick <i>der Rothbart</i> and the Kypphauser mountain;

-the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the tale,

-shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual

-fidelity.</p>

-

-<p>“The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but

-nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity

-of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to

-marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many

-stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson;

-all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I

-have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I

-saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational

-and consistent on every other point, that I think no

-conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain;

-nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a

-country justice, and signed with a cross, in the justice’s own

-handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of

-doubt.”</p>

-</blockquote>

-

-

-<div class="section">

-<hr class="divider" />

-</div>

-<div class="tn">

-<p class="center">Transcriber’s Note:</p>

-

-<p class="noi">The order of illustrations has been retained as published in the

-original publication.</p>

-

-<p>The following changes were made:</p>

-

-<ul>

-<li>On the title page<br />

-S. E Cassino <i>changed to</i><br />

-S. <a href="#fullstop">E.</a> Cassino</li>

-

-<li>In the List of Illustrations<br />

-personages” facing 26 <i>changed to</i>

-<a href="#facing">facing 29</a></li>

-

-<li>Page 38<br />

-intead of the <i>changed to</i><br />

-<a href="#instead">instead</a> of the</li>

-</ul>

-</div>

-

-<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***</div>

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+    <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" />
+    <title>
+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving
+    </title>
+    <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" />
+    <style type="text/css">
+      body {margin: 0 10%;}
+      .chapter, .section {page-break-before: always;}
+      h1,h2 {text-align: center; clear: both;}
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+
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+      .poetry-container {text-align: center; margin: 0;}
+      .poetry {display: inline-block; text-align: left;}
+      .poetry .verse {margin: 1em 0em;}
+      .poetry .line {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;}
+
+      /* Drop caps */
+      .drop-cap {float: left; font-weight: normal;
+                 font-size: 3.5em; padding: 0 .02em 0 0;
+                 line-height: 0.85em; height: 0.85em; color: #333;}
+
+      /* Notes */
+      .tn {max-width: 30em; margin: auto; padding: .5em 1em;
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+                     font-size: 3.5em; padding: 0 .02em 0 0;
+                     line-height: 0.85em; height: 0.85em;}
+      .x-ebookmaker a {text-decoration: none;}
+    </style>
+  </head>
+<body>
+<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 64636 ***</div>
+
+<div class="x-ebookmaker-drop">
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img class="noborder" src="images/cover2.jpg" width="500" height="633" alt="Cover" />
+</div>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<hr class="divider" />
+
+<div class="figcenter width300">
+<img class="noborder" src="images/i001.png" width="300" height="373" alt="" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">
+<i>This Edition is<br />
+limited to<br />
+Two Hundred and<br />
+Fifty Copies<br />
+for the<br />
+United Kingdom.</i><br />
+No. 141</p>
+
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<h1>RIP VAN WINKLE.</h1>
+</div>
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider2" />
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i006" src="images/i006.jpg" width="400" height="553" alt="" />
+<div class="caption"><em>Washington Irving.</em></div>
+</div>
+</div>
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider2" />
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="title" src="images/i007.jpg" width="500" height="721" alt="Title page" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">
+<span class="smcap">Rip Van Winkle</span><br />
+By Washington Irving.<br />
+Illustrated by <span class="smcap">Frank T. Merrill</span>.<br />
+Boston. <span class="smcap">U. S. A.</span><br />
+S. <a name="fullstop" id="fullstop"></a><ins title="Original has no fullstop">E.</ins>
+Cassino.<br />
+MDCCCLXXXVIII.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<p class="center">
+<i>Copyright by</i><br />
+<span class="smcap">Samuel E. Cassino</span>,<br />
+1887.
+</p>
+
+<p class="center mt3">
+<span class="smcap">Typography by J. S. Cushing &amp; Co.,
+Boston. U. S. A.</span></p>
+
+<hr class="printer" />
+
+<p class="center">
+<span class="smcap">Presswork by Berwick &amp; Smith, Boston. U. S. A.</span>
+</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<h2 id="list-of-illustrations">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
+</div>
+<table summary="List of Illustrations">
+<tr>
+<th>&nbsp;</th>
+<th class="tdr">PAGE</th>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl"><span class="smcap">Portrait</span></td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i006">4</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Illustrated Title-Page</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#title">5</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">List of Illustrations</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#list-of-illustrations">7</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Diedrich Knickerbocker</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i011">9</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Up the Hudson</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i013">11</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i014">12</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He assisted at their sports”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i015">12</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A termagant wife”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i017">13</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Fish all day without a murmur”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i018">14</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Used to employ him to run their errands”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i019">15</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He would carry a fowling-piece”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i021">17</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“His cow among the cabbages”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i022b">18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i022a">18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“How solemnly they would listen”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i023">18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He shrugged his shoulders,
+ shook his head, and cast up his eyes”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i025">19</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Yelping precipitation”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i026">20</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He would share the contents
+of his wallet”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i027">20</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Nicholas Vedder</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i029">21</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“The brow of a precipice”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i031">23</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He heard a voice”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i034">26</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A strange figure”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i035">27</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Rip and his companion labored
+on in silence”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i037">29</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A company of odd-looking personages”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a name="facing" id="facing"></a>facing&nbsp;<a href="#i039"><ins title="original has 26">29</ins></a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“One who seemed to be the commander”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i040">30</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i041">30</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“I have not slept here all night”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i043">31</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Wanting in his usual activity”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i044">32</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He called again and whistled after
+his dog”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i045">32</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Stroked their chins”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i047">33</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A troop of strange children ran at his heels”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i049">34</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He found the house gone to decay”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i051">35</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He recognized on the sign”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i053">37</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“They crowded round him”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i055">38</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A lean, bilious-looking fellow”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i057">39</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i059">41</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A great militia-general”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i060">42</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i061">43</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A fresh, comely woman”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i062">44</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“What is your name, my good woman?”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i063">44</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Peter Vanderdonk</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i065">45</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Friends among the rising generation”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i066">46</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Once more on the bench at the inn door”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i067">46</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He used to tell his story to every stranger”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i070">48</a></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+
+
+<div class="chapter">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<h2>RIP VAN WINKLE.</h2>
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.</p>
+
+<div class="poetry-container">
+<div class="poetry">
+<div class="verse">
+<div class="line">By Woden, God of Saxons,</div>
+<div class="line">From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday.</div>
+<div class="line">Truth is a thing that ever I will keep</div>
+<div class="line">Unto thylke day in which I creep into</div>
+<div class="line">My sepulchre&mdash;&mdash; <span class="smcap pl5">Cartwright.</span></div>
+</div></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i011" src="images/i011.jpg" width="500" height="491" alt="Diedrich Knickerbocker" />
+</div>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich
+Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the
+Dutch history of the province, and the manners of the descendants from
+its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie
+so much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">10</a></span> among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty
+on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still
+more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to true
+history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,
+snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore,
+he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and
+studied it with the zeal of a book-worm.</p>
+
+<p>The result of all these researches was a history of the province during
+the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.
+There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his
+work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.
+Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little
+questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely
+established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections as a
+book of unquestionable authority.</p>
+
+<p>The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and
+now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to
+say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier
+labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though
+it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his
+neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt the
+truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies are
+remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be suspected
+that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his memory may
+be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk whose good
+opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain biscuit-bakers,
+who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their New-Year cakes;
+and have thus given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the
+being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne’s Farthing.]</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+
+<div class="chapter">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">11</a></span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i013" src="images/i013.jpg" width="500" height="309" alt="Up the Hudson" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="noi"><span class="drop-cap">W</span>HOEVER has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill
+mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian
+family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a
+noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change
+of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day,
+produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains,
+and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect
+barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in
+blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;
+but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will
+gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last
+rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">12</a></span>
+At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the
+light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among
+the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the
+fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great
+antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the
+early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government
+of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!) and there were some
+of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,
+built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed
+windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i014" src="images/i014.jpg" width="250" height="396" alt="“He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell
+the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived
+many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,
+a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a
+descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous
+days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort
+Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">13</a></span> character of his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple,
+good-natured man; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient,
+hen-pecked husband. Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing
+that meekness of spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for
+those men are most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad who are
+under the discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are
+rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic
+tribulation, and a curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world
+for teaching the virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant
+wife may, therefore, in some respects, be considered a tolerable
+blessing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i015" src="images/i015.jpg" width="500" height="747" alt="“He assisted at their sports”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i017" src="images/i017.jpg" width="250" height="443" alt="“A termagant wife”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of
+the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all
+family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters
+over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van
+Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever
+he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,
+taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">14</a></span> them long stories
+of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the
+village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts,
+clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with
+impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i018" src="images/i018.jpg" width="400" height="519" alt="“Fish all day without a murmur”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">15</a></span>
+The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to all
+kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of assiduity or
+perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as long and
+heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur, even
+though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would carry a
+fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours together, trudging through woods
+and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few squirrels or wild
+pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even in the roughest
+toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics for husking Indian
+corn, or building stone fences; the women of the village, too, used to
+employ him to run their errands, and to do such little odd jobs as their
+less obliging husbands would not do for them. In a word, Rip was ready
+to attend to anybody’s
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">16</a></span>
+business but his own; but as to
+doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it
+impossible.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">17</a></span>
+<img id="i019" src="images/i019.jpg" width="500" height="618" alt="“Used to employ him to run their errands”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the
+most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything
+about it went wrong, and would go wrong in spite of him. His fences were
+continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get
+among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than
+anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had
+some out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had
+dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little
+more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the
+worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i021" src="images/i021.jpg" width="400" height="710" alt="“He would carry a fowling-piece”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to
+nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to
+inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally
+seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in a pair of
+his father’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">18</a></span> cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up
+with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i022a" src="images/i022a.jpg" width="250" height="362" alt="“Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,
+well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or
+brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would
+rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he
+would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept
+continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,
+and the ruin he was bringing on his family.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width300">
+<img id="i022b" src="images/i022b.jpg" width="300" height="312" alt="“His cow among the cabbages”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and
+everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household
+eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind,
+and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his
+shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This,
+however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">19</a></span> he was fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of
+the house&mdash;the only side which, in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked
+husband.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i023" src="images/i023.jpg" width="500" height="659" alt="“How solemnly they would listen”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked
+as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in
+idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of
+his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit
+befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever
+scoured the woods&mdash;but what courage can withstand the ever-during and
+all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the
+house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between
+his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong
+glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or
+ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i025" src="images/i025.jpg" width="250" height="674" alt="“He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up his eyes”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony
+rolled on: a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is
+the only edge tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long while
+he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind
+of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages
+of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a small inn,
+designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here
+they used to sit in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">20</a></span> shade of a long lazy summer’s day, talking
+listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about
+nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s money to have
+heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by
+chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing
+traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled
+out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little
+man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the
+dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some
+months after they had taken place.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i026" src="images/i026.jpg" width="400" height="592" alt="“Yelping precipitation”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas
+Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the door
+of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving
+sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so
+that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements, as accurately
+as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked
+his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has
+his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his
+opinions. When anything that was read <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">21</a></span> or related
+displeased him, he was observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to
+send forth short, frequent, and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would
+inhale the smoke slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid
+clouds, and sometimes taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the
+fragrant vapor curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token
+of perfect approbation.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i027" src="images/i027.jpg" width="500" height="672" alt="“He would share the contents of his wallet”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i029" src="images/i029.jpg" width="400" height="454" alt="Nicholas Vedder" />
+</div>
+
+<p>From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his
+termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of the
+assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august
+personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of
+this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her
+husband in habits of idleness.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair, and his only alternative
+to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his wife, was to
+take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here he would
+sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the contents of
+his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a fellow-sufferer in
+persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress leads thee a dog’s
+life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live thou shalt never want
+a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">22</a></span> wag his tail, look wistfully in
+his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I verily believe he
+reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.</p>
+
+<p>In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had
+unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill
+mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the
+still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.
+Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a
+green knoll covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a
+precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the
+lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the
+lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic
+course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging
+bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing
+itself in the blue highlands.</p>
+
+<p>On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,
+lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending
+cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun.
+For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually
+advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the
+valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the
+village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the
+terrors of Dame Van Winkle.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">23</a></span>
+As he was about to descend he heard a voice from a distance hallooing,
+“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could see
+nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain. He
+thought his fancy <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">24</a></span>
+ must have deceived him, and turned
+again to descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still
+evening air, “Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”&mdash;at the same time Wolf
+bristled up his back, and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s
+side, looking fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague
+apprehension stealing over him; he looked anxiously in the same
+direction, and perceived a strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks,
+and bending under the weight of something he carried on his back. He was
+surprised to see any human being in this lonely and unfrequented place,
+but supposing it to be some one of the neighborhood in need of his
+assistance, he hastened down to yield it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">25</a></span>
+<img id="i031" src="images/i031.jpg" width="500" height="577" alt="“The brow of a precipice”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of
+the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with
+thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique
+Dutch fashion&mdash;a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist&mdash;several pair of
+breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons
+down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a
+stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to
+approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful
+of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity, and
+mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,
+apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip
+every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that
+seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty
+rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an
+instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient
+thunder-showers which often take place in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">26</a></span> mountain heights, he
+proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a
+small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the
+brinks of which, impending trees shot their branches, so that you only
+caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During
+the whole time, Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for
+though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying
+a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange
+and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked
+familiarity.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i034" src="images/i034.jpg" width="400" height="571" alt="“He heard a voice”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">27</a></span>
+On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented
+themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking
+personages playing at nine-pins. They were dressed in a quaint
+outlandish fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long
+knives in their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of
+similar style with that of the guide’s. Their visages too, were
+peculiar: one had a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the
+face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted
+by a white sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They
+all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">28</a></span>
+seemed to be the commander. He was a stout old
+gentleman, with a weather-beaten countenance; he wore a laced doublet,
+broad belt and hanger, high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and
+high-heeled shoes, with roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of
+the figures in an old Flemish painting, in the parlor of Domine Van
+Schaick, the village parson, and which had been brought over from
+Holland at the time of the settlement.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">29</a></span>
+<img id="i035" src="images/i035.jpg" width="500" height="654" alt="“A strange figure”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i037" src="images/i037.jpg" width="500" height="673" alt="“Rip and his companion labored on in silence”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i039" src="images/i039.jpg" width="400" height="596" alt="“A company of odd-looking personages”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were
+evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the
+most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of
+pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the
+scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,
+echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.</p>
+
+<p>As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from
+their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and
+such strange, uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned
+within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the
+contents of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">30</a></span> keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait
+upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the
+liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.</p>
+
+<p>By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when
+no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had
+much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty
+soul, and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked
+another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at
+length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head
+gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i040" src="images/i040.jpg" width="400" height="489" alt="“One who seemed to be the commander”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>On waking, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had first
+seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">31</a></span> his eyes&mdash;it was
+a bright sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the
+bushes, and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure
+mountain breeze. “Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all
+night.” He recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange
+man with the keg of liquor&mdash;the mountain ravine&mdash;the wild retreat among
+the rocks&mdash;the woe-begone party at nine-pins&mdash;the flagon&mdash;“Oh! that
+wicked flagon!” thought Rip&mdash;“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van
+Winkle?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i041" src="images/i041.jpg" width="500" height="658" alt="“They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i043" src="images/i043.jpg" width="400" height="359" alt="“I have not slept here all night”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled
+fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel
+encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He
+now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick
+upon him, and having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun.
+Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a
+squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">32</a></span>
+all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was
+to be seen.</p>
+
+<p>He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if
+he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to
+walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual
+activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and
+if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall
+have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got
+down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had
+ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain
+stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling
+the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble up
+its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,
+sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the
+wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to
+tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i044" src="images/i044.jpg" width="400" height="596" alt="“Wanting in his usual activity”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the cliffs
+to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The rocks
+presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came tumbling
+in a sheet of feathery <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">33</a></span>
+foam, and fell into a broad deep
+basin, black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then,
+poor Rip was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his
+dog; he was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows,
+sporting high in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny
+precipice; and who, secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and
+scoff at the poor man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning
+was passing away, and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He
+grieved to give up his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it
+would not do to starve among the mountains. He shook his head,
+shouldered the rusty firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and
+anxiety, turned his steps homeward.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i045" src="images/i045.jpg" width="500" height="664" alt="“He called again and whistled after his dog”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i047" src="images/i047.jpg" width="500" height="236" alt="“Stroked their chins”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom
+he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself
+acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was of
+a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all
+stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes
+upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">34</a></span> of
+this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his
+astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!</p>
+
+<p>He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange
+children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray
+beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old
+acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:
+it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had
+never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had
+disappeared. Strange names were over the doors&mdash;strange faces at the
+windows&mdash;everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began to
+doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.
+Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.
+There stood the Kaatskill mountains&mdash;there ran the silver Hudson at a
+distance&mdash;there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always
+been&mdash;Rip was sorely perplexed&mdash;“That flagon last night,” thought he,
+“has addled my poor head sadly!”</p>
+
+<p>It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,
+which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the
+shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay&mdash;the
+roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A
+half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip
+called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed
+on. This was an unkind cut indeed.&mdash;“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has
+forgotten me!”</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">35</a></span>
+He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had
+always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and
+apparently abandoned. This desolateness overcame all
+his connubial fears&mdash;he called loudly for his wife and children&mdash;the
+lonely chambers rang for a moment with his voice, and then all again was
+silence.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">36</a></span>
+<img id="i049" src="images/i049.jpg" width="500" height="706" alt="“A troop of strange children ran at his heels”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">37</a></span>
+<img id="i051" src="images/i051.jpg" width="500" height="568" alt="“He found the house gone to decay”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i053" src="images/i053.jpg" width="400" height="622" alt="“He recognized on the sign”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village
+inn&mdash;but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its
+place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with
+old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union
+Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to
+shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall
+naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">38</a></span> night-cap,
+and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of
+stars and stripes&mdash;all this was strange and incomprehensible. He
+recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, under
+which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was
+singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and
+buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was
+decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large
+characters, <span class="smcap">General Washington</span>.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i055" src="images/i055.jpg" width="500" height="721" alt="“They crowded round him”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip
+recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was
+a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it,
+<a name="instead" id="instead"></a><ins title="Original has 'intead'">instead</ins>
+of the accustomed phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the
+sage Nicholas Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long
+pipe, uttering clouds of tobacco smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van
+Bummel, the schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient
+newspaper. In place of these, a lean bilious-looking fellow, with his
+pockets full of handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of
+citizens&mdash;election&mdash;members of Congress&mdash;liberty&mdash;Bunker’s hill&mdash;heroes
+of seventy-six&mdash;and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon
+to the bewildered Van Winkle.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i057" src="images/i057.jpg" width="500" height="629" alt="“A lean, bilious-looking fellow”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">39</a></span>
+The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty
+fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children
+that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the attention of the
+tavern politicians. They crowded round him, eyeing him from head to
+foot, with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing
+him partly aside, inquired, “on which side he voted?” Rip stared in
+vacant stupidity. Another short but busy
+little fellow pulled him by the arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in
+his ear, “whether he was Federal or Democrat.” Rip was equally at a loss
+to comprehend the question; when a knowing, self-important old
+gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his way through the crowd,
+putting them to the right and left with his elbows as he passed, and
+planting himself before Van Winkle, with one arm a-kimbo, the other
+resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat penetrating, as it
+were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere tone, “what brought him
+to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and a mob at his heels, and
+whether he meant to breed a riot in the village?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">40</a></span>
+<img id="i059" src="images/i059.jpg" width="400" height="360" alt="“He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">41</a></span>
+“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet
+man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless
+him!”</p>
+
+<p>Here a general shout burst from the bystanders&mdash;“a tory! a tory! a spy!
+a refugee! hustle him! away with him!”</p>
+
+<p>It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked
+hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow,
+demanded again of the unknown culprit, what he came there for, and whom
+he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm,
+but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">42</a></span> merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, who used to
+keep about the tavern.</p>
+
+<p>“Well&mdash;who are they?&mdash;name them.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, “Where’s Nicholas Vedder?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i060" src="images/i060.jpg" width="400" height="468" alt="“A great militia-general”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a
+thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these
+eighteen years! There was a wooden tomb-stone in the church-yard that
+used to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”</p>
+
+<p>“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”</p>
+
+<p>“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he
+was killed at the storming of Stony-Point&mdash;others say he was drowned in
+the squall, at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know&mdash;he never came
+back again.”</p>
+
+<p>“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”</p>
+
+<p>“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now
+in Congress.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and
+friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer
+puzzled him, too, by treating of such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">43</a></span> enormous lapses of time, and of
+matters which he could not understand: war&mdash;Congress&mdash;Stony-Point!&mdash;he
+had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,
+“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”</p>
+
+<p>“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s
+Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up
+the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor
+fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and
+whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,
+the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i061" src="images/i061.jpg" width="250" height="470" alt="“That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>“God knows,” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself&mdash;I’m
+somebody else&mdash;that’s me yonder&mdash;no&mdash;that’s somebody else, got into my
+shoes&mdash;I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and
+they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I
+can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”</p>
+
+<p>The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink
+significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">44</a></span> There was
+a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from
+doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man
+with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical
+moment a fresh comely woman passed through the throng to get a peep at
+the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,
+frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,
+you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child, the
+air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of
+recollections in his mind.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i062" src="images/i062.jpg" width="250" height="418" alt="“A fresh, comely woman”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.</p>
+
+<p>“Judith Gardenier.”</p>
+
+<p>“And your father’s name?”</p>
+
+<p>“Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it’s twenty years since he
+went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since&mdash;his
+dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried
+away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering
+voice:</p>
+
+<p>“Where’s your mother?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i063" src="images/i063.jpg" width="500" height="654" alt="“What is your name, my good woman?”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">45</a></span>
+Oh, she too had died but a short time since: she broke a blood-vessel in
+a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.</p>
+
+<p>There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest
+man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her
+child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he&mdash;“Young Rip Van Winkle
+once&mdash;old Rip Van Winkle now&mdash;Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”</p>
+
+<p>All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the
+crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for a
+moment, exclaimed, “Sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle&mdash;it is himself.
+Welcome home again, old neighbor&mdash;Why, where have you been these twenty
+long years?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i065" src="images/i065.jpg" width="250" height="354" alt="Peter Vanderdonk" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him
+but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were
+seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and
+the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,
+had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and
+shook his head&mdash;upon which there was a general shaking of the head
+throughout the assemblage.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i066" src="images/i066.jpg" width="500" height="386" alt="“Friends among the rising generation”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter Vanderdonk,
+who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a descendant of the
+historian of that name, who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">46</a></span> wrote one of the earliest accounts of the
+province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the village, and well
+versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of the neighborhood.
+He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story in the most
+satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a fact, handed
+down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill mountains had
+always been haunted by strange beings. That it was affirmed that the
+great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the river and country,
+kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with his crew of the
+Halfmoon, being permitted in this way to revisit the scenes of his
+enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the great city
+called by his name. That his father had once seen them in their old
+Dutch dresses playing at nine-pins in the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">47</a></span> hollow of the
+mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound
+of their balls, like distant peals of thunder.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i067" src="images/i067.jpg" width="500" height="638" alt="“Once more on the bench at the inn door”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the
+more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to
+live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery
+farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that
+used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto
+of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on
+the farm; but evinced a hereditary disposition to attend to anything
+else but his business.</p>
+
+<p>Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his
+former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of
+time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with
+whom he soon grew into great favor.</p>
+
+<p>Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when a
+man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the
+bench, at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of
+the village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was
+some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could
+be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his
+torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war&mdash;that the country
+had thrown off the yoke of old England&mdash;and that, instead of being a
+subject of his majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of
+the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of
+states and empires made but little impression on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">48</a></span> him; but there was one
+species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that
+was&mdash;petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his
+neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he
+pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her
+name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,
+and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of
+resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i070" src="images/i070.jpg" width="500" height="332" alt="“He used to tell his story to every stranger”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.
+Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points
+every time he told it, which was doubtless owing to his having so
+recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have
+related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it
+by heart. Some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">49</a></span> always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and
+insisted that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point
+on which he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however,
+almost universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never
+hear a thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they
+say Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it
+is a common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when
+life hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught
+out of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Note.</span>&mdash;The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested
+to Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the
+Emperor Frederick <i>der Rothbart</i> and the Kypphauser mountain;
+the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the tale,
+shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual
+fidelity.</p>
+
+<p>“The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but
+nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity
+of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to
+marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many
+stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson;
+all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I
+have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I
+saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational
+and consistent on every other point, that I think no
+conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain;
+nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a
+country justice, and signed with a cross, in the justice’s own
+handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of
+doubt.”</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider" />
+</div>
+<div class="tn">
+<p class="center">Transcriber’s Note:</p>
+
+<p class="noi">The order of illustrations has been retained as published in the
+original publication.</p>
+
+<p>The following changes were made:</p>
+
+<ul>
+<li>On the title page<br />
+S. E Cassino <i>changed to</i><br />
+S. <a href="#fullstop">E.</a> Cassino</li>
+
+<li>In the List of Illustrations<br />
+personages” facing 26 <i>changed to</i>
+<a href="#facing">facing 29</a></li>
+
+<li>Page 38<br />
+intead of the <i>changed to</i><br />
+<a href="#instead">instead</a> of the</li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+
+<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 64636 ***</div>
+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
+will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
+using this eBook.
+
+Title: Rip Van Winkle
+
+Author: Washington Irving
+
+Illustrator: Frank T. Merrill
+
+Release Date: February 26, 2021 [eBook #64636]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+Produced by: Sue Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
+             https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
+             generously made available by the Library of Congress)
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration]
+
+    _This Edition is
+    limited to
+    Two Hundred and
+    Fifty Copies
+    for the
+    United Kingdom._
+    No. 141
+
+
+
+
+RIP VAN WINKLE.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: ~Washington Irving.~]
+
+
+
+
+    RIP
+    VAN WINKLE
+
+    By
+    Washington Irving.
+
+    [Illustration]
+
+    Illustrated by FRANK T. MERRILL.
+
+    Boston. U. S. A.
+    S. E. Cassino.
+    MDCCCLXXXVIII.
+
+
+
+
+    _Copyright by_
+    SAMUEL E. CASSINO,
+    1887.
+
+    TYPOGRAPHY BY J. S. CUSHING & CO., BOSTON. U. S. A.
+
+    PRESSWORK BY BERWICK & SMITH, BOSTON. U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+                                                                    PAGE
+
+    PORTRAIT                                                           4
+
+    Illustrated Title-Page                                             5
+
+    List of Illustrations                                              7
+
+    Diedrich Knickerbocker                                             9
+
+    Up the Hudson                                                     11
+
+    “He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”                          12
+
+    “He assisted at their sports”                              facing 12
+
+    “A termagant wife”                                                13
+
+    “Fish all day without a murmur”                                   14
+
+    “Used to employ him to run their errands”                         15
+
+    “He would carry a fowling-piece”                                  17
+
+    “His cow among the cabbages”                                      18
+
+    “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”                      18
+
+    “How solemnly they would listen”                           facing 18
+
+    “He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up his eyes” 19
+
+    “Yelping precipitation”                                           20
+
+    “He would share the contents of his wallet”                facing 20
+
+    Nicholas Vedder                                                   21
+
+    “The brow of a precipice”                                         23
+
+    “He heard a voice”                                                26
+
+    “A strange figure”                                                27
+
+    “Rip and his companion labored on in silence”                     29
+
+    “A company of odd-looking personages”                      facing 29
+
+    “One who seemed to be the commander”                              30
+
+    “They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”              facing 30
+
+    “I have not slept here all night”                                 31
+
+    “Wanting in his usual activity”                                   32
+
+    “He called again and whistled after his dog”               facing 32
+
+    “Stroked their chins”                                             33
+
+    “A troop of strange children ran at his heels”             facing 34
+
+    “He found the house gone to decay”                                35
+
+    “He recognized on the sign”                                       37
+
+    “They crowded round him”                                   facing 38
+
+    “A lean, bilious-looking fellow”                                  39
+
+    “He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”                    41
+
+    “A great militia-general”                                         42
+
+    “That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”                                  43
+
+    “A fresh, comely woman”                                           44
+
+    “What is your name, my good woman?”                        facing 44
+
+    Peter Vanderdonk                                                  45
+
+    “Friends among the rising generation”                             46
+
+    “Once more on the bench at the inn door”                   facing 46
+
+    “He used to tell his story to every stranger”                     48
+
+
+
+
+RIP VAN WINKLE.
+
+A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.
+
+
+    By Woden, God of Saxons,
+    From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday.
+    Truth is a thing that ever I will keep
+    Unto thylke day in which I creep into
+    My sepulchre----                      CARTWRIGHT.
+
+[Illustration: Diedrich Knickerbocker]
+
+[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich
+Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the
+Dutch history of the province, and the manners of the descendants from
+its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie
+so much among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty
+on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still
+more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to true
+history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,
+snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore,
+he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and
+studied it with the zeal of a book-worm.
+
+The result of all these researches was a history of the province during
+the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.
+There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his
+work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.
+Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little
+questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely
+established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections as a
+book of unquestionable authority.
+
+The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and
+now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to
+say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier
+labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though
+it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his
+neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt the
+truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies are
+remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be suspected
+that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his memory may
+be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk whose good
+opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain biscuit-bakers,
+who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their New-Year cakes;
+and have thus given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the
+being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne’s Farthing.]
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: Up the Hudson]
+
+Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill
+mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian
+family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a
+noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change
+of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day,
+produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains,
+and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect
+barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in
+blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;
+but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will
+gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last
+rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.
+
+At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the
+light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among
+the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the
+fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great
+antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the
+early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government
+of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!) and there were some
+of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,
+built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed
+windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.
+
+[Illustration: “He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”]
+
+In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell
+the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived
+many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,
+a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a
+descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous
+days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort
+Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial character of
+his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple, good-natured man;
+he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient, hen-pecked husband.
+Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing that meekness of
+spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for those men are
+most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad who are under the
+discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered
+pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation, and a
+curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the
+virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant wife may, therefore,
+in some respects, be considered a tolerable blessing; and if so, Rip Van
+Winkle was thrice blessed.
+
+[Illustration: “He assisted at their sports”]
+
+[Illustration: “A termagant wife”]
+
+Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of
+the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all
+family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters
+over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van
+Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever
+he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,
+taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told them long stories
+of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the
+village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts,
+clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with
+impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.
+
+[Illustration: “Fish all day without a murmur”]
+
+The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to
+all kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of
+assiduity or perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as
+long and heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur,
+even though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would
+carry a fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours together, trudging
+through woods and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few
+squirrels or wild pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor
+even in the roughest toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics
+for husking Indian corn, or building stone fences; the women of the
+village, too, used to employ him to run their errands, and to do such
+little odd jobs as their less obliging husbands would not do for them.
+In a word, Rip was ready to attend to anybody’s business but his own;
+but as to doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it
+impossible.
+
+[Illustration: “Used to employ him to run their errands”]
+
+In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the
+most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything
+about it went wrong, and would go wrong in spite of him. His fences were
+continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get
+among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than
+anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had
+some out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had
+dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little
+more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the
+worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood.
+
+[Illustration: “He would carry a fowling-piece”]
+
+His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to
+nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to
+inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally
+seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in a pair of
+his father’s cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up
+with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.
+
+[Illustration: “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”]
+
+Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,
+well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or
+brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would
+rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he
+would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept
+continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,
+and the ruin he was bringing on his family.
+
+[Illustration: “Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”]
+
+Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and
+everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household
+eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind,
+and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his
+shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This,
+however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that he was
+fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of the house--the
+only side which, in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked husband.
+
+[Illustration: “How solemnly they would listen”]
+
+Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked
+as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in
+idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of
+his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit
+befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever
+scoured the woods--but what courage can withstand the ever-during and
+all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the
+house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between
+his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong
+glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or
+ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.
+
+[Illustration: “He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up
+his eyes”]
+
+Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony
+rolled on: a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is
+the only edge tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long while
+he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind
+of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages
+of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a small inn,
+designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here
+they used to sit in the shade of a long lazy summer’s day, talking
+listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about
+nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s money to have
+heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by
+chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing
+traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled
+out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little
+man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the
+dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some
+months after they had taken place.
+
+[Illustration: “Yelping precipitation”]
+
+The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas
+Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the door
+of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving
+sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so
+that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements, as accurately
+as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked
+his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has
+his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his
+opinions. When anything that was read or related displeased him, he was
+observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to send forth short,
+frequent, and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would inhale the smoke
+slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid clouds, and
+sometimes taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the fragrant vapor
+curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token of perfect
+approbation.
+
+[Illustration: “He would share the contents of his wallet”]
+
+[Illustration: Nicholas Vedder]
+
+From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his
+termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of the
+assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august
+personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of
+this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her
+husband in habits of idleness.
+
+Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair, and his only
+alternative to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his
+wife, was to take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here he
+would sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the
+contents of his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a
+fellow-sufferer in persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress
+leads thee a dog’s life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live
+thou shalt never want a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would wag his
+tail, look wistfully in his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I
+verily believe he reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.
+
+In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had
+unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill
+mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the
+still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.
+Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a
+green knoll covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a
+precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the
+lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the
+lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic
+course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging
+bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing
+itself in the blue highlands.
+
+On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,
+lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending
+cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun.
+For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually
+advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the
+valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the
+village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the
+terrors of Dame Van Winkle.
+
+As he was about to descend he heard a voice from a distance
+hallooing, “Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could
+see nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain.
+He thought his fancy must have deceived him, and turned again to
+descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still evening air,
+“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”--at the same time Wolf bristled up his
+back, and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s side, looking
+fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague apprehension stealing
+over him; he looked anxiously in the same direction, and perceived a
+strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks, and bending under the weight
+of something he carried on his back. He was surprised to see any human
+being in this lonely and unfrequented place, but supposing it to be some
+one of the neighborhood in need of his assistance, he hastened down to
+yield it.
+
+[Illustration: “The brow of a precipice”]
+
+On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of
+the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with
+thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique
+Dutch fashion--a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist--several pair of
+breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons
+down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a
+stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to
+approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful
+of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity, and
+mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,
+apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip
+every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that
+seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty
+rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an
+instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient
+thunder-showers which often take place in the mountain heights, he
+proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a
+small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the
+brinks of which, impending trees shot their branches, so that you only
+caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During
+the whole time, Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for
+though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying
+a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange
+and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked
+familiarity.
+
+[Illustration: “He heard a voice”]
+
+On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented
+themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking
+personages playing at nine-pins. They were dressed in a quaint
+outlandish fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long
+knives in their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of
+similar style with that of the guide’s. Their visages too, were
+peculiar: one had a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the
+face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted
+by a white sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They
+all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who seemed
+to be the commander. He was a stout old gentleman, with a weather-beaten
+countenance; he wore a laced doublet, broad belt and hanger,
+high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and high-heeled shoes, with
+roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of the figures in an old
+Flemish painting, in the parlor of Domine Van Schaick, the village
+parson, and which had been brought over from Holland at the time of the
+settlement.
+
+[Illustration: “A strange figure”]
+
+[Illustration: “Rip and his companion labored on in silence”]
+
+[Illustration: “A company of odd-looking personages”]
+
+What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were
+evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the
+most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of
+pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the
+scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,
+echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.
+
+As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from
+their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and
+such strange, uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned
+within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the
+contents of the keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait
+upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the
+liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.
+
+By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when
+no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had
+much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty
+soul, and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked
+another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at
+length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head
+gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.
+
+[Illustration: “One who seemed to be the commander”]
+
+On waking, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had
+first seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed his eyes--it was a bright
+sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the bushes,
+and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure mountain
+breeze. “Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all night.” He
+recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange man with the
+keg of liquor--the mountain ravine--the wild retreat among the
+rocks--the woe-begone party at nine-pins--the flagon--“Oh! that wicked
+flagon!” thought Rip--“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van Winkle?”
+
+[Illustration: “They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”]
+
+[Illustration: “I have not slept here all night”]
+
+He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled
+fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel
+encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He
+now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick
+upon him, and having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun.
+Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a
+squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but
+all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was
+to be seen.
+
+He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if
+he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to
+walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual
+activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and
+if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall
+have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got
+down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had
+ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain
+stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling
+the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble up
+its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,
+sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the
+wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to
+tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.
+
+[Illustration: “Wanting in his usual activity”]
+
+At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the
+cliffs to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The
+rocks presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came
+tumbling in a sheet of feathery foam, and fell into a broad deep basin,
+black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then, poor Rip
+was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his dog; he
+was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows, sporting high
+in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny precipice; and who,
+secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and scoff at the poor
+man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning was passing away,
+and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He grieved to give up
+his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it would not do to
+starve among the mountains. He shook his head, shouldered the rusty
+firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and anxiety, turned his
+steps homeward.
+
+[Illustration: “He called again and whistled after his dog”]
+
+[Illustration: “Stroked their chins”]
+
+As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom
+he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself
+acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was of
+a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all
+stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes
+upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence of
+this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his
+astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!
+
+He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange
+children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray
+beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old
+acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:
+it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had
+never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had
+disappeared. Strange names were over the doors--strange faces at the
+windows--everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began to
+doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.
+Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.
+There stood the Kaatskill mountains--there ran the silver Hudson at a
+distance--there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always
+been--Rip was sorely perplexed--“That flagon last night,” thought he,
+“has addled my poor head sadly!”
+
+It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,
+which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the
+shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay--the
+roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A
+half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip
+called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed
+on. This was an unkind cut indeed.--“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has
+forgotten me!”
+
+He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had
+always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and apparently
+abandoned. This desolateness overcame all his connubial fears--he called
+loudly for his wife and children--the lonely chambers rang for a moment
+with his voice, and then all again was silence.
+
+[Illustration: “A troop of strange children ran at his heels”]
+
+[Illustration: “He found the house gone to decay”]
+
+[Illustration: “He recognized on the sign”]
+
+He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village
+inn--but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its
+place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with
+old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union
+Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to
+shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall
+naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red night-cap,
+and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of
+stars and stripes--all this was strange and incomprehensible. He
+recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, under
+which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was
+singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and
+buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was
+decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large
+characters, GENERAL WASHINGTON.
+
+[Illustration: “They crowded round him”]
+
+There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip
+recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was
+a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it, instead of the accustomed
+phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the sage Nicholas
+Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long pipe, uttering
+clouds of tobacco smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van Bummel, the
+schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient newspaper.
+In place of these, a lean bilious-looking fellow, with his pockets
+full of handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of
+citizens--election--members of Congress--liberty--Bunker’s hill--heroes
+of seventy-six--and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon
+to the bewildered Van Winkle.
+
+[Illustration: “A lean, bilious-looking fellow”]
+
+The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty
+fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children
+that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the attention of the
+tavern politicians. They crowded round him, eyeing him from head to
+foot, with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing
+him partly aside, inquired, “on which side he voted?” Rip stared in
+vacant stupidity. Another short but busy little fellow pulled him by the
+arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in his ear, “whether he was Federal
+or Democrat.” Rip was equally at a loss to comprehend the question; when
+a knowing, self-important old gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his
+way through the crowd, putting them to the right and left with his
+elbows as he passed, and planting himself before Van Winkle, with one
+arm a-kimbo, the other resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat
+penetrating, as it were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere
+tone, “what brought him to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and
+a mob at his heels, and whether he meant to breed a riot in the
+village?”
+
+[Illustration: “He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”]
+
+“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet
+man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless
+him!”
+
+Here a general shout burst from the bystanders--“a tory! a tory! a spy!
+a refugee! hustle him! away with him!”
+
+It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked
+hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow,
+demanded again of the unknown culprit, what he came there for, and whom
+he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm,
+but merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, who used to
+keep about the tavern.
+
+“Well--who are they?--name them.”
+
+Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, “Where’s Nicholas Vedder?”
+
+[Illustration: “A great militia-general”]
+
+There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a
+thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these
+eighteen years! There was a wooden tomb-stone in the church-yard that
+used to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”
+
+“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”
+
+“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he
+was killed at the storming of Stony-Point--others say he was drowned in
+the squall, at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know--he never came
+back again.”
+
+“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”
+
+“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now
+in Congress.”
+
+Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and
+friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer
+puzzled him, too, by treating of such enormous lapses of time, and of
+matters which he could not understand: war--Congress--Stony-Point!--he
+had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,
+“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”
+
+“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s
+Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”
+
+Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up
+the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor
+fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and
+whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,
+the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?
+
+[Illustration: “That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”]
+
+“God knows,” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself--I’m
+somebody else--that’s me yonder--no--that’s somebody else, got into my
+shoes--I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and
+they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I
+can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”
+
+The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink
+significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads. There was
+a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from
+doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man
+with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical
+moment a fresh comely woman passed through the throng to get a peep at
+the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,
+frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,
+you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child, the
+air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of
+recollections in his mind.
+
+[Illustration: “A fresh, comely woman”]
+
+“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.
+
+“Judith Gardenier.”
+
+“And your father’s name?”
+
+“Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it’s twenty years since he
+went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since--his
+dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried
+away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl.”
+
+Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering
+voice:
+
+“Where’s your mother?”
+
+[Illustration: “What is your name, my good woman?”]
+
+Oh, she too had died but a short time since: she broke a blood-vessel in
+a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.
+
+There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest
+man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her
+child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he--“Young Rip Van Winkle
+once--old Rip Van Winkle now--Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”
+
+All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the
+crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for a
+moment, exclaimed, “Sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle--it is himself.
+Welcome home again, old neighbor--Why, where have you been these twenty
+long years?”
+
+[Illustration: Peter Vanderdonk]
+
+Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him
+but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were
+seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and
+the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,
+had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and
+shook his head--upon which there was a general shaking of the head
+throughout the assemblage.
+
+[Illustration: “Friends among the rising generation”]
+
+It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter
+Vanderdonk, who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a
+descendant of the historian of that name, who wrote one of the earliest
+accounts of the province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the
+village, and well versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of
+the neighborhood. He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story
+in the most satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a
+fact, handed down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill
+mountains had always been haunted by strange beings. That it was
+affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the
+river and country, kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with
+his crew of the Halfmoon, being permitted in this way to revisit the
+scenes of his enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the
+great city called by his name. That his father had once seen them in
+their old Dutch dresses playing at nine-pins in the hollow of the
+mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound
+of their balls, like distant peals of thunder.
+
+[Illustration: “Once more on the bench at the inn door”]
+
+To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the
+more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to
+live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery
+farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that
+used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto
+of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on
+the farm; but evinced a hereditary disposition to attend to anything
+else but his business.
+
+Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his
+former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of
+time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with
+whom he soon grew into great favor.
+
+Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when
+a man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the
+bench, at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of
+the village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was
+some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could
+be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his
+torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war--that the country
+had thrown off the yoke of old England--and that, instead of being a
+subject of his majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of
+the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of
+states and empires made but little impression on him; but there was one
+species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that
+was--petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his
+neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he
+pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her
+name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,
+and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of
+resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.
+
+[Illustration: “He used to tell his story to every stranger”]
+
+He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.
+Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points
+every time he told it, which was doubtless owing to his having so
+recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have
+related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it
+by heart. Some always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and insisted
+that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point on which
+he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however, almost
+universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never hear a
+thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they say
+Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it is a
+common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when life
+hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught out
+of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.
+
+    NOTE.--The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested
+    to Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the
+    Emperor Frederick _der Rothbart_ and the Kypphauser mountain;
+    the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the tale,
+    shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual
+    fidelity.
+
+    “The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but
+    nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity
+    of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to
+    marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many
+    stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson;
+    all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I
+    have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I
+    saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational
+    and consistent on every other point, that I think no
+    conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain;
+    nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a
+    country justice, and signed with a cross, in the justice’s own
+    handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of
+    doubt.”
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber’s Note:
+
+The order of illustrations has been retained as published in the
+original publication.
+
+The following changes were made:
+
+    On the title page
+      S. E Cassino _changed to_ S. E. Cassino
+
+    In the List of Illustrations
+      personages” facing 26 _changed to_ facing 29
+
+    Page 38
+      intead of the _changed to_ instead of the
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***
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+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving
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+
+<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rip Van Winkle, by Washington Irving</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
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+country where you are located before using this eBook.
+</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Rip Van Winkle</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Washington Irving</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Illustrator: Frank T. Merrill</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: February 26, 2021 [eBook #64636]</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Sue Clark and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by the Library of Congress)</div>
+
+<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***</div>
+
+<div class="x-ebookmaker-drop">
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img class="noborder" src="images/cover2.jpg" width="500" height="633" alt="Cover" />
+</div>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<hr class="divider" />
+
+<div class="figcenter width300">
+<img class="noborder" src="images/i001.png" width="300" height="373" alt="" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">
+<i>This Edition is<br />
+limited to<br />
+Two Hundred and<br />
+Fifty Copies<br />
+for the<br />
+United Kingdom.</i><br />
+No. 141</p>
+
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<h1>RIP VAN WINKLE.</h1>
+</div>
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider2" />
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i006" src="images/i006.jpg" width="400" height="553" alt="" />
+<div class="caption"><em>Washington Irving.</em></div>
+</div>
+</div>
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider2" />
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="title" src="images/i007.jpg" width="500" height="721" alt="Title page" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">
+<span class="smcap">Rip Van Winkle</span><br />
+By Washington Irving.<br />
+Illustrated by <span class="smcap">Frank T. Merrill</span>.<br />
+Boston. <span class="smcap">U. S. A.</span><br />
+S. <a name="fullstop" id="fullstop"></a><ins title="Original has no fullstop">E.</ins>
+Cassino.<br />
+MDCCCLXXXVIII.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<p class="center">
+<i>Copyright by</i><br />
+<span class="smcap">Samuel E. Cassino</span>,<br />
+1887.
+</p>
+
+<p class="center mt3">
+<span class="smcap">Typography by J. S. Cushing &amp; Co.,
+Boston. U. S. A.</span></p>
+
+<hr class="printer" />
+
+<p class="center">
+<span class="smcap">Presswork by Berwick &amp; Smith, Boston. U. S. A.</span>
+</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<h2 id="list-of-illustrations">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2>
+</div>
+<table summary="List of Illustrations">
+<tr>
+<th>&nbsp;</th>
+<th class="tdr">PAGE</th>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl"><span class="smcap">Portrait</span></td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i006">4</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Illustrated Title-Page</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#title">5</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">List of Illustrations</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#list-of-illustrations">7</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Diedrich Knickerbocker</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i011">9</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Up the Hudson</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i013">11</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i014">12</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He assisted at their sports”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i015">12</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A termagant wife”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i017">13</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Fish all day without a murmur”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i018">14</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Used to employ him to run their errands”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i019">15</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He would carry a fowling-piece”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i021">17</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“His cow among the cabbages”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i022b">18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i022a">18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“How solemnly they would listen”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i023">18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He shrugged his shoulders,
+ shook his head, and cast up his eyes”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i025">19</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Yelping precipitation”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i026">20</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He would share the contents
+of his wallet”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i027">20</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Nicholas Vedder</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i029">21</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“The brow of a precipice”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i031">23</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He heard a voice”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i034">26</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A strange figure”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i035">27</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Rip and his companion labored
+on in silence”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i037">29</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A company of odd-looking personages”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a name="facing" id="facing"></a>facing&nbsp;<a href="#i039"><ins title="original has 26">29</ins></a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“One who seemed to be the commander”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i040">30</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i041">30</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“I have not slept here all night”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i043">31</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Wanting in his usual activity”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i044">32</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He called again and whistled after
+his dog”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i045">32</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Stroked their chins”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i047">33</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A troop of strange children ran at his heels”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i049">34</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He found the house gone to decay”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i051">35</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He recognized on the sign”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i053">37</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“They crowded round him”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i055">38</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A lean, bilious-looking fellow”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i057">39</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i059">41</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A great militia-general”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i060">42</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i061">43</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“A fresh, comely woman”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i062">44</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“What is your name, my good woman?”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i063">44</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">Peter Vanderdonk</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i065">45</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Friends among the rising generation”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i066">46</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“Once more on the bench at the inn door”</td>
+<td class="tdr">facing&nbsp;<a href="#i067">46</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="tdl">“He used to tell his story to every stranger”</td>
+<td class="tdr"><a href="#i070">48</a></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+
+
+<div class="chapter">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<h2>RIP VAN WINKLE.</h2>
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER.</p>
+
+<div class="poetry-container">
+<div class="poetry">
+<div class="verse">
+<div class="line">By Woden, God of Saxons,</div>
+<div class="line">From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday.</div>
+<div class="line">Truth is a thing that ever I will keep</div>
+<div class="line">Unto thylke day in which I creep into</div>
+<div class="line">My sepulchre&mdash;&mdash; <span class="smcap pl5">Cartwright.</span></div>
+</div></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i011" src="images/i011.jpg" width="500" height="491" alt="Diedrich Knickerbocker" />
+</div>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p>[The following Tale was found among the papers of the late Diedrich
+Knickerbocker, an old gentleman of New York, who was very curious in the
+Dutch history of the province, and the manners of the descendants from
+its primitive settlers. His historical researches, however, did not lie
+so much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">10</a></span> among books as among men; for the former are lamentably scanty
+on his favorite topics; whereas he found the old burghers, and still
+more their wives, rich in that legendary lore so invaluable to true
+history. Whenever, therefore, he happened upon a genuine Dutch family,
+snugly shut up in its low-roofed farmhouse, under a spreading sycamore,
+he looked upon it as a little clasped volume of black-letter, and
+studied it with the zeal of a book-worm.</p>
+
+<p>The result of all these researches was a history of the province during
+the reign of the Dutch governors, which he published some years since.
+There have been various opinions as to the literary character of his
+work, and, to tell the truth, it is not a whit better than it should be.
+Its chief merit is its scrupulous accuracy, which indeed was a little
+questioned on its first appearance, but has since been completely
+established; and it is now admitted into all historical collections as a
+book of unquestionable authority.</p>
+
+<p>The old gentleman died shortly after the publication of his work; and
+now that he is dead and gone, it cannot do much harm to his memory to
+say that his time might have been much better employed in weightier
+labors. He, however, was apt to ride his hobby his own way; and though
+it did now and then kick up the dust a little in the eyes of his
+neighbors, and grieve the spirit of some friends, for whom he felt the
+truest deference and affection, yet his errors and follies are
+remembered “more in sorrow than in anger,” and it begins to be suspected
+that he never intended to injure or offend. But however his memory may
+be appreciated by critics, it is still held dear by many folk whose good
+opinion is well worth having; particularly by certain biscuit-bakers,
+who have gone so far as to imprint his likeness on their New-Year cakes;
+and have thus given him a chance for immortality, almost equal to the
+being stamped on a Waterloo Medal, or a Queen Anne’s Farthing.]</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+
+<div class="chapter">
+<hr class="divider" />
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">11</a></span>
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i013" src="images/i013.jpg" width="500" height="309" alt="Up the Hudson" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="noi"><span class="drop-cap">W</span>HOEVER has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill
+mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian
+family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a
+noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change
+of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day,
+produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains,
+and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect
+barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in
+blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear evening sky;
+but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will
+gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last
+rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">12</a></span>
+At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have descried the
+light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among
+the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the
+fresh green of the nearer landscape. It is a little village of great
+antiquity, having been founded by some of the Dutch colonists in the
+early times of the province, just about the beginning of the government
+of the good Peter Stuyvesant (may he rest in peace!) and there were some
+of the houses of the original settlers standing within a few years,
+built of small yellow bricks brought from Holland, having latticed
+windows and gable fronts, surmounted with weathercocks.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i014" src="images/i014.jpg" width="250" height="396" alt="“He was a descendant of the Van Winkles”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>In that same village, and in one of these very houses (which, to tell
+the precise truth, was sadly time-worn and weather-beaten), there lived
+many years since, while the country was yet a province of Great Britain,
+a simple, good-natured fellow, of the name of Rip Van Winkle. He was a
+descendant of the Van Winkles who figured so gallantly in the chivalrous
+days of Peter Stuyvesant, and accompanied him to the siege of Fort
+Christina. He inherited, however, but little of the martial
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">13</a></span> character of his ancestors. I have observed that he was a simple,
+good-natured man; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient,
+hen-pecked husband. Indeed, to the latter circumstance might be owing
+that meekness of spirit which gained him such universal popularity; for
+those men are most apt to be obsequious and conciliating abroad who are
+under the discipline of shrews at home. Their tempers, doubtless, are
+rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic
+tribulation, and a curtain-lecture is worth all the sermons in the world
+for teaching the virtues of patience and long-suffering. A termagant
+wife may, therefore, in some respects, be considered a tolerable
+blessing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i015" src="images/i015.jpg" width="500" height="747" alt="“He assisted at their sports”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i017" src="images/i017.jpg" width="250" height="443" alt="“A termagant wife”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Certain it is, that he was a great favorite among all the good wives of
+the village, who, as usual with the amiable sex, took his part in all
+family squabbles, and never failed, whenever they talked those matters
+over in their evening gossipings, to lay all the blame on Dame Van
+Winkle. The children of the village, too, would shout with joy whenever
+he approached. He assisted at their sports, made their playthings,
+taught them to fly kites and shoot marbles, and told<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">14</a></span> them long stories
+of ghosts, witches, and Indians. Whenever he went dodging about the
+village, he was surrounded by a troop of them, hanging on his skirts,
+clambering on his back, and playing a thousand tricks on him with
+impunity; and not a dog would bark at him throughout the neighborhood.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i018" src="images/i018.jpg" width="400" height="519" alt="“Fish all day without a murmur”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">15</a></span>
+The great error in Rip’s composition was an insuperable aversion to all
+kinds of profitable labor. It could not be from the want of assiduity or
+perseverance; for he would sit on a wet rock, with a rod as long and
+heavy as a Tartar’s lance, and fish all day without a murmur, even
+though he should not be encouraged by a single nibble. He would carry a
+fowling-piece on his shoulder for hours together, trudging through woods
+and swamps, and up hill and down dale, to shoot a few squirrels or wild
+pigeons. He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even in the roughest
+toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics for husking Indian
+corn, or building stone fences; the women of the village, too, used to
+employ him to run their errands, and to do such little odd jobs as their
+less obliging husbands would not do for them. In a word, Rip was ready
+to attend to anybody’s
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">16</a></span>
+business but his own; but as to
+doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, he found it
+impossible.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">17</a></span>
+<img id="i019" src="images/i019.jpg" width="500" height="618" alt="“Used to employ him to run their errands”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>In fact, he declared it was of no use to work on his farm; it was the
+most pestilent little piece of ground in the whole country; everything
+about it went wrong, and would go wrong in spite of him. His fences were
+continually falling to pieces; his cow would either go astray, or get
+among the cabbages; weeds were sure to grow quicker in his fields than
+anywhere else; the rain always made a point of setting in just as he had
+some out-door work to do; so that though his patrimonial estate had
+dwindled away under his management, acre by acre, until there was little
+more left than a mere patch of Indian corn and potatoes, yet it was the
+worst conditioned farm in the neighborhood.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i021" src="images/i021.jpg" width="400" height="710" alt="“He would carry a fowling-piece”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>His children, too, were as ragged and wild as if they belonged to
+nobody. His son Rip, an urchin begotten in his own likeness, promised to
+inherit the habits, with the old clothes of his father. He was generally
+seen trooping like a colt at his mother’s heels, equipped in a pair of
+his father’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">18</a></span> cast-off galligaskins, which he had much ado to hold up
+with one hand, as a fine lady does her train in bad weather.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i022a" src="images/i022a.jpg" width="250" height="362" alt="“Trooping like a colt at its mother’s heels”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Rip Van Winkle, however, was one of those happy mortals, of foolish,
+well-oiled dispositions, who take the world easy, eat white bread or
+brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would
+rather starve on a penny than work for a pound. If left to himself, he
+would have whistled life away, in perfect contentment; but his wife kept
+continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness,
+and the ruin he was bringing on his family.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width300">
+<img id="i022b" src="images/i022b.jpg" width="300" height="312" alt="“His cow among the cabbages”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and
+everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household
+eloquence. Rip had but one way of replying to all lectures of the kind,
+and that, by frequent use, had grown into a habit. He shrugged his
+shoulders, shook his head, cast up his eyes, but said nothing. This,
+however, always provoked a fresh volley from his wife, so that
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">19</a></span> he was fain to draw off his forces, and take to the outside of
+the house&mdash;the only side which, in truth, belongs to a hen-pecked
+husband.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i023" src="images/i023.jpg" width="500" height="659" alt="“How solemnly they would listen”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked
+as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in
+idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye, as the cause of
+his master’s going so often astray. True it is, in all points of spirit
+befitting an honorable dog, he was as courageous an animal as ever
+scoured the woods&mdash;but what courage can withstand the ever-during and
+all-besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue? The moment Wolf entered the
+house, his crest fell, his tail drooped to the ground, or curled between
+his legs, he sneaked about with a gallows air, casting many a sidelong
+glance at Dame Van Winkle, and at the least flourish of a broomstick or
+ladle, he would fly to the door with yelping precipitation.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i025" src="images/i025.jpg" width="250" height="674" alt="“He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head, and cast up his eyes”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony
+rolled on: a tart temper never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is
+the only edge tool that grows keener with constant use. For a long while
+he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind
+of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages
+of the village, which held its sessions on a bench before a small inn,
+designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here
+they used to sit in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">20</a></span> shade of a long lazy summer’s day, talking
+listlessly over village gossip, or telling endless sleepy stories about
+nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman’s money to have
+heard the profound discussions which sometimes took place, when by
+chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing
+traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled
+out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little
+man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the
+dictionary; and how sagely they would deliberate upon public events some
+months after they had taken place.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i026" src="images/i026.jpg" width="400" height="592" alt="“Yelping precipitation”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>The opinions of this junto were completely controlled by Nicholas
+Vedder, a patriarch of the village, and landlord of the inn, at the door
+of which he took his seat from morning till night, just moving
+sufficiently to avoid the sun, and keep in the shade of a large tree; so
+that the neighbors could tell the hour by his movements, as accurately
+as by a sun-dial. It is true, he was rarely heard to speak, but smoked
+his pipe incessantly. His adherents, however (for every great man has
+his adherents), perfectly understood him, and knew how to gather his
+opinions. When anything that was read <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">21</a></span> or related
+displeased him, he was observed to smoke his pipe vehemently, and to
+send forth short, frequent, and angry puffs; but when pleased, he would
+inhale the smoke slowly and tranquilly, and emit it in light and placid
+clouds, and sometimes taking the pipe from his mouth, and letting the
+fragrant vapor curl about his nose, would gravely nod his head in token
+of perfect approbation.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i027" src="images/i027.jpg" width="500" height="672" alt="“He would share the contents of his wallet”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i029" src="images/i029.jpg" width="400" height="454" alt="Nicholas Vedder" />
+</div>
+
+<p>From even this stronghold the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his
+termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon the tranquillity of the
+assemblage, and call the members all to nought; nor was that august
+personage, Nicholas Vedder himself, sacred from the daring tongue of
+this terrible virago, who charged him outright with encouraging her
+husband in habits of idleness.</p>
+
+<p>Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair, and his only alternative
+to escape from the labor of the farm and the clamor of his wife, was to
+take gun in hand, and stroll away into the woods. Here he would
+sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the contents of
+his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a fellow-sufferer in
+persecution. “Poor Wolf,” he would say, “thy mistress leads thee a dog’s
+life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live thou shalt never want
+a friend to stand by thee!” Wolf would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">22</a></span> wag his tail, look wistfully in
+his master’s face, and if dogs can feel pity, I verily believe he
+reciprocated the sentiment with all his heart.</p>
+
+<p>In a long ramble of the kind, on a fine autumnal day, Rip had
+unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill
+mountains. He was after his favorite sport of squirrel-shooting, and the
+still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with the reports of his gun.
+Panting and fatigued, he threw himself, late in the afternoon, on a
+green knoll covered with mountain herbage, that crowned the brow of a
+precipice. From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the
+lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the
+lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic
+course, with the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging
+bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing
+itself in the blue highlands.</p>
+
+<p>On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild,
+lonely, and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending
+cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun.
+For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually
+advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the
+valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the
+village; and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the
+terrors of Dame Van Winkle.</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">23</a></span>
+As he was about to descend he heard a voice from a distance hallooing,
+“Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!” He looked around, but could see
+nothing but a crow winging its solitary flight across the mountain. He
+thought his fancy <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">24</a></span>
+ must have deceived him, and turned
+again to descend, when he heard the same cry ring through the still
+evening air, “Rip Van Winkle! Rip Van Winkle!”&mdash;at the same time Wolf
+bristled up his back, and giving a low growl, skulked to his master’s
+side, looking fearfully down into the glen. Rip now felt a vague
+apprehension stealing over him; he looked anxiously in the same
+direction, and perceived a strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks,
+and bending under the weight of something he carried on his back. He was
+surprised to see any human being in this lonely and unfrequented place,
+but supposing it to be some one of the neighborhood in need of his
+assistance, he hastened down to yield it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">25</a></span>
+<img id="i031" src="images/i031.jpg" width="500" height="577" alt="“The brow of a precipice”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>On nearer approach, he was still more surprised at the singularity of
+the stranger’s appearance. He was a short, square-built old fellow, with
+thick bushy hair, and a grizzled beard. His dress was of the antique
+Dutch fashion&mdash;a cloth jerkin strapped round the waist&mdash;several pair of
+breeches, the outer one of ample volume, decorated with rows of buttons
+down the sides, and bunches at the knees. He bore on his shoulders a
+stout keg, that seemed full of liquor, and made signs for Rip to
+approach and assist him with the load. Though rather shy and distrustful
+of this new acquaintance, Rip complied with his usual alacrity, and
+mutually relieving each other, they clambered up a narrow gully,
+apparently the dry bed of a mountain torrent. As they ascended, Rip
+every now and then heard long rolling peals, like distant thunder, that
+seemed to issue out of a deep ravine, or rather cleft between lofty
+rocks, toward which their rugged path conducted. He paused for an
+instant, but supposing it to be the muttering of one of those transient
+thunder-showers which often take place in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">26</a></span> mountain heights, he
+proceeded. Passing through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a
+small amphitheatre, surrounded by perpendicular precipices, over the
+brinks of which, impending trees shot their branches, so that you only
+caught glimpses of the azure sky and the bright evening cloud. During
+the whole time, Rip and his companion had labored on in silence; for
+though the former marvelled greatly what could be the object of carrying
+a keg of liquor up this wild mountain, yet there was something strange
+and incomprehensible about the unknown, that inspired awe, and checked
+familiarity.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i034" src="images/i034.jpg" width="400" height="571" alt="“He heard a voice”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">27</a></span>
+On entering the amphitheatre, new objects of wonder presented
+themselves. On a level spot in the centre was a company of odd-looking
+personages playing at nine-pins. They were dressed in a quaint
+outlandish fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long
+knives in their belts, and most of them had enormous breeches, of
+similar style with that of the guide’s. Their visages too, were
+peculiar: one had a large head, broad face, and small piggish eyes; the
+face of another seemed to consist entirely of nose, and was surmounted
+by a white sugar-loaf hat, set off with a little red cock’s tail. They
+all had beards, of various shapes and colors. There was one who
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">28</a></span>
+seemed to be the commander. He was a stout old
+gentleman, with a weather-beaten countenance; he wore a laced doublet,
+broad belt and hanger, high-crowned hat and feather, red stockings, and
+high-heeled shoes, with roses in them. The whole group reminded Rip of
+the figures in an old Flemish painting, in the parlor of Domine Van
+Schaick, the village parson, and which had been brought over from
+Holland at the time of the settlement.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">29</a></span>
+<img id="i035" src="images/i035.jpg" width="500" height="654" alt="“A strange figure”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i037" src="images/i037.jpg" width="500" height="673" alt="“Rip and his companion labored on in silence”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i039" src="images/i039.jpg" width="400" height="596" alt="“A company of odd-looking personages”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>What seemed particularly odd to Rip was, that though these folks were
+evidently amusing themselves, yet they maintained the gravest faces, the
+most mysterious silence, and were, withal, the most melancholy party of
+pleasure he had ever witnessed. Nothing interrupted the stillness of the
+scene but the noise of the balls, which, whenever they were rolled,
+echoed along the mountains like rumbling peals of thunder.</p>
+
+<p>As Rip and his companion approached them, they suddenly desisted from
+their play, and stared at him with such a fixed statue-like gaze, and
+such strange, uncouth, lack-lustre countenances, that his heart turned
+within him, and his knees smote together. His companion now emptied the
+contents of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">30</a></span> keg into large flagons, and made signs to him to wait
+upon the company. He obeyed with fear and trembling; they quaffed the
+liquor in profound silence, and then returned to their game.</p>
+
+<p>By degrees, Rip’s awe and apprehension subsided. He even ventured, when
+no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had
+much of the flavor of excellent Hollands. He was naturally a thirsty
+soul, and was soon tempted to repeat the draught. One taste provoked
+another, and he reiterated his visits to the flagon so often, that at
+length his senses were overpowered, his eyes swam in his head, his head
+gradually declined, and he fell into a deep sleep.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i040" src="images/i040.jpg" width="400" height="489" alt="“One who seemed to be the commander”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>On waking, he found himself on the green knoll from whence he had first
+seen the old man of the glen. He rubbed <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">31</a></span> his eyes&mdash;it was
+a bright sunny morning. The birds were hopping and twittering among the
+bushes, and the eagle was wheeling aloft, and breasting the pure
+mountain breeze. “Surely,” thought Rip, “I have not slept here all
+night.” He recalled the occurrences before he fell asleep. The strange
+man with the keg of liquor&mdash;the mountain ravine&mdash;the wild retreat among
+the rocks&mdash;the woe-begone party at nine-pins&mdash;the flagon&mdash;“Oh! that
+wicked flagon!” thought Rip&mdash;“what excuse shall I make to Dame Van
+Winkle?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i041" src="images/i041.jpg" width="500" height="658" alt="“They quaffed the liquor in profound silence”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i043" src="images/i043.jpg" width="400" height="359" alt="“I have not slept here all night”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He looked round for his gun, but in place of the clean well-oiled
+fowling-piece, he found an old firelock lying by him, the barrel
+encrusted with rust, the lock falling off, and the stock worm-eaten. He
+now suspected that the grave roysters of the mountain had put a trick
+upon him, and having dosed him with liquor, had robbed him of his gun.
+Wolf, too, had disappeared, but he might have strayed away after a
+squirrel or partridge. He whistled after him and shouted his name, but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">32</a></span>
+all in vain; the echoes repeated his whistle and shout, but no dog was
+to be seen.</p>
+
+<p>He determined to revisit the scene of the last evening’s gambol, and if
+he met with any of the party, to demand his dog and gun. As he rose to
+walk, he found himself stiff in the joints, and wanting in his usual
+activity. “These mountain beds do not agree with me,” thought Rip, “and
+if this frolic should lay me up with a fit of the rheumatism, I shall
+have a blessed time with Dame Van Winkle.” With some difficulty he got
+down into the glen; he found the gully up which he and his companion had
+ascended the preceding evening; but to his astonishment a mountain
+stream was now foaming down it, leaping from rock to rock, and filling
+the glen with babbling murmurs. He, however, made shift to scramble up
+its sides, working his toilsome way through thickets of birch,
+sassafras, and witch-hazel; and sometimes tripped up or entangled by the
+wild grape vines that twisted their coils and tendrils from tree to
+tree, and spread a kind of network in his path.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i044" src="images/i044.jpg" width="400" height="596" alt="“Wanting in his usual activity”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through the cliffs
+to the amphitheatre; but no traces of such opening remained. The rocks
+presented a high impenetrable wall, over which the torrent came tumbling
+in a sheet of feathery <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">33</a></span>
+foam, and fell into a broad deep
+basin, black from the shadows of the surrounding forest. Here, then,
+poor Rip was brought to a stand. He again called and whistled after his
+dog; he was only answered by the cawing of a flock of idle crows,
+sporting high in the air about a dry tree that overhung a sunny
+precipice; and who, secure in their elevation, seemed to look down and
+scoff at the poor man’s perplexities. What was to be done? The morning
+was passing away, and Rip felt famished for want of his breakfast. He
+grieved to give up his dog and gun; he dreaded to meet his wife; but it
+would not do to starve among the mountains. He shook his head,
+shouldered the rusty firelock, and, with a heart full of trouble and
+anxiety, turned his steps homeward.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i045" src="images/i045.jpg" width="500" height="664" alt="“He called again and whistled after his dog”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i047" src="images/i047.jpg" width="500" height="236" alt="“Stroked their chins”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>As he approached the village, he met a number of people, but none whom
+he knew, which somewhat surprised him, for he had thought himself
+acquainted with every one in the country round. Their dress, too, was of
+a different fashion from that to which he was accustomed. They all
+stared at him with equal marks of surprise, and whenever they cast eyes
+upon him, invariably stroked their chins. The constant recurrence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">34</a></span> of
+this gesture induced Rip, involuntarily, to do the same, when, to his
+astonishment, he found his beard had grown a foot long!</p>
+
+<p>He had now entered the skirts of the village. A troop of strange
+children ran at his heels, hooting after him, and pointing at his gray
+beard. The dogs, too, not one of which he recognized for an old
+acquaintance, barked at him as he passed. The very village was altered:
+it was larger and more populous. There were rows of houses which he had
+never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had
+disappeared. Strange names were over the doors&mdash;strange faces at the
+windows&mdash;everything was strange. His mind now misgave him; he began to
+doubt whether both he and the world around him were not bewitched.
+Surely this was his native village, which he had left but a day before.
+There stood the Kaatskill mountains&mdash;there ran the silver Hudson at a
+distance&mdash;there was every hill and dale precisely as it had always
+been&mdash;Rip was sorely perplexed&mdash;“That flagon last night,” thought he,
+“has addled my poor head sadly!”</p>
+
+<p>It was with some difficulty that he found the way to his own house,
+which he approached with silent awe, expecting every moment to hear the
+shrill voice of Dame Van Winkle. He found the house gone to decay&mdash;the
+roof fallen in, the windows shattered, and the doors off the hinges. A
+half-starved dog, that looked like Wolf, was skulking about it. Rip
+called him by name, but the cur snarled, showed his teeth, and passed
+on. This was an unkind cut indeed.&mdash;“My very dog,” sighed poor Rip, “has
+forgotten me!”</p>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">35</a></span>
+He entered the house, which, to tell the truth, Dame Van Winkle had
+always kept in neat order. It was empty, forlorn, and
+apparently abandoned. This desolateness overcame all
+his connubial fears&mdash;he called loudly for his wife and children&mdash;the
+lonely chambers rang for a moment with his voice, and then all again was
+silence.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">36</a></span>
+<img id="i049" src="images/i049.jpg" width="500" height="706" alt="“A troop of strange children ran at his heels”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">37</a></span>
+<img id="i051" src="images/i051.jpg" width="500" height="568" alt="“He found the house gone to decay”" />
+</div>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i053" src="images/i053.jpg" width="400" height="622" alt="“He recognized on the sign”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the village
+inn&mdash;but it too was gone. A large rickety wooden building stood in its
+place, with great gaping windows, some of them broken, and mended with
+old hats and petticoats, and over the door was painted, “The Union
+Hotel, by Jonathan Doolittle.” Instead of the great tree that used to
+shelter the quiet little Dutch inn of yore, there now was reared a tall
+naked pole, with something on the top that looked like a red<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">38</a></span> night-cap,
+and from it was fluttering a flag, on which was a singular assemblage of
+stars and stripes&mdash;all this was strange and incomprehensible. He
+recognized on the sign, however, the ruby face of King George, under
+which he had smoked so many a peaceful pipe, but even this was
+singularly metamorphosed. The red coat was changed for one of blue and
+buff, a sword was held in the hand instead of a sceptre, the head was
+decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large
+characters, <span class="smcap">General Washington</span>.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i055" src="images/i055.jpg" width="500" height="721" alt="“They crowded round him”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but none that Rip
+recollected. The very character of the people seemed changed. There was
+a busy, bustling, disputatious tone about it,
+<a name="instead" id="instead"></a><ins title="Original has 'intead'">instead</ins>
+of the accustomed phlegm and drowsy tranquillity. He looked in vain for the
+sage Nicholas Vedder, with his broad face, double chin, and fair long
+pipe, uttering clouds of tobacco smoke, instead of idle speeches; or Van
+Bummel, the schoolmaster, doling forth the contents of an ancient
+newspaper. In place of these, a lean bilious-looking fellow, with his
+pockets full of handbills, was haranguing vehemently about rights of
+citizens&mdash;election&mdash;members of Congress&mdash;liberty&mdash;Bunker’s hill&mdash;heroes
+of seventy-six&mdash;and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon
+to the bewildered Van Winkle.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i057" src="images/i057.jpg" width="500" height="629" alt="“A lean, bilious-looking fellow”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">39</a></span>
+The appearance of Rip, with his long, grizzled beard, his rusty
+fowling-piece, his uncouth dress, and the army of women and children
+that had gathered at his heels, soon attracted the attention of the
+tavern politicians. They crowded round him, eyeing him from head to
+foot, with great curiosity. The orator bustled up to him, and drawing
+him partly aside, inquired, “on which side he voted?” Rip stared in
+vacant stupidity. Another short but busy
+little fellow pulled him by the arm, and rising on tiptoe, inquired in
+his ear, “whether he was Federal or Democrat.” Rip was equally at a loss
+to comprehend the question; when a knowing, self-important old
+gentleman, in a sharp cocked hat, made his way through the crowd,
+putting them to the right and left with his elbows as he passed, and
+planting himself before Van Winkle, with one arm a-kimbo, the other
+resting on his cane, his keen eyes and sharp hat penetrating, as it
+were, into his very soul, demanded in an austere tone, “what brought him
+to the election with a gun on his shoulder, and a mob at his heels, and
+whether he meant to breed a riot in the village?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">40</a></span>
+<img id="i059" src="images/i059.jpg" width="400" height="360" alt="“He was killed at the storming of Stony Point”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">41</a></span>
+“Alas! gentlemen,” cried Rip, somewhat dismayed, “I am a poor, quiet
+man, a native of the place, and a loyal subject of the King, God bless
+him!”</p>
+
+<p>Here a general shout burst from the bystanders&mdash;“a tory! a tory! a spy!
+a refugee! hustle him! away with him!”</p>
+
+<p>It was with great difficulty that the self-important man in the cocked
+hat restored order; and having assumed a tenfold austerity of brow,
+demanded again of the unknown culprit, what he came there for, and whom
+he was seeking. The poor man humbly assured him that he meant no harm,
+but<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">42</a></span> merely came there in search of some of his neighbors, who used to
+keep about the tavern.</p>
+
+<p>“Well&mdash;who are they?&mdash;name them.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip bethought himself a moment, and inquired, “Where’s Nicholas Vedder?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width400">
+<img id="i060" src="images/i060.jpg" width="400" height="468" alt="“A great militia-general”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>There was a silence for a little while, when an old man replied, in a
+thin, piping voice, “Nicholas Vedder? why, he is dead and gone these
+eighteen years! There was a wooden tomb-stone in the church-yard that
+used to tell all about him, but that’s rotten and gone too.”</p>
+
+<p>“Where’s Brom Dutcher?”</p>
+
+<p>“Oh, he went off to the army in the beginning of the war; some say he
+was killed at the storming of Stony-Point&mdash;others say he was drowned in
+the squall, at the foot of Antony’s Nose. I don’t know&mdash;he never came
+back again.”</p>
+
+<p>“Where’s Van Bummel, the schoolmaster?”</p>
+
+<p>“He went off to the wars, too; was a great militia general, and is now
+in Congress.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip’s heart died away, at hearing of these sad changes in his home and
+friends, and finding himself thus alone in the world. Every answer
+puzzled him, too, by treating of such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">43</a></span> enormous lapses of time, and of
+matters which he could not understand: war&mdash;Congress&mdash;Stony-Point!&mdash;he
+had no courage to ask after any more friends, but cried out in despair,
+“Does nobody here know Rip Van Winkle?”</p>
+
+<p>“Oh, Rip Van Winkle!” exclaimed two or three. “Oh, to be sure! that’s
+Rip Van Winkle yonder, leaning against the tree.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip looked, and beheld a precise counterpart of himself as he went up
+the mountain; apparently as lazy, and certainly as ragged. The poor
+fellow was now completely confounded. He doubted his own identity, and
+whether he was himself or another man. In the midst of his bewilderment,
+the man in the cocked hat demanded who he was, and what was his name?</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i061" src="images/i061.jpg" width="250" height="470" alt="“That is Rip Van Winkle, yonder”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>“God knows,” exclaimed he at his wit’s end; “I’m not myself&mdash;I’m
+somebody else&mdash;that’s me yonder&mdash;no&mdash;that’s somebody else, got into my
+shoes&mdash;I was myself last night, but I fell asleep on the mountain, and
+they’ve changed my gun, and everything’s changed, and I’m changed, and I
+can’t tell what’s my name, or who I am!”</p>
+
+<p>The by-standers began now to look at each other, nod, wink
+significantly, and tap their fingers against their foreheads.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">44</a></span> There was
+a whisper, also, about securing the gun, and keeping the old fellow from
+doing mischief; at the very suggestion of which, the self-important man
+with the cocked hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical
+moment a fresh comely woman passed through the throng to get a peep at
+the gray-bearded man. She had a chubby child in her arms, which,
+frightened at his looks, began to cry. “Hush, Rip,” cried she, “hush,
+you little fool; the old man won’t hurt you.” The name of the child, the
+air of the mother, the tone of her voice, all awakened a train of
+recollections in his mind.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i062" src="images/i062.jpg" width="250" height="418" alt="“A fresh, comely woman”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>“What is your name, my good woman?” asked he.</p>
+
+<p>“Judith Gardenier.”</p>
+
+<p>“And your father’s name?”</p>
+
+<p>“Ah, poor man, his name was Rip Van Winkle; it’s twenty years since he
+went away from home with his gun, and never has been heard of since&mdash;his
+dog came home without him; but whether he shot himself, or was carried
+away by the Indians, nobody can tell. I was then but a little girl.”</p>
+
+<p>Rip had but one question more to ask; but he put it with a faltering
+voice:</p>
+
+<p>“Where’s your mother?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i063" src="images/i063.jpg" width="500" height="654" alt="“What is your name, my good woman?”" />
+</div>
+
+<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">45</a></span>
+Oh, she too had died but a short time since: she broke a blood-vessel in
+a fit of passion at a New-England pedler.</p>
+
+<p>There was a drop of comfort, at least, in this intelligence. The honest
+man could contain himself no longer. He caught his daughter and her
+child in his arms. “I am your father!” cried he&mdash;“Young Rip Van Winkle
+once&mdash;old Rip Van Winkle now&mdash;Does nobody know poor Rip Van Winkle!”</p>
+
+<p>All stood amazed, until an old woman, tottering out from among the
+crowd, put her hand to her brow, and peering under it in his face for a
+moment, exclaimed, “Sure enough! it is Rip Van Winkle&mdash;it is himself.
+Welcome home again, old neighbor&mdash;Why, where have you been these twenty
+long years?”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width250">
+<img id="i065" src="images/i065.jpg" width="250" height="354" alt="Peter Vanderdonk" />
+</div>
+
+<p>Rip’s story was soon told, for the whole twenty years had been to him
+but as one night. The neighbors stared when they heard it; some were
+seen to wink at each other, and put their tongues in their cheeks; and
+the self-important man in the cocked hat, who, when the alarm was over,
+had returned to the field, screwed down the corners of his mouth, and
+shook his head&mdash;upon which there was a general shaking of the head
+throughout the assemblage.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i066" src="images/i066.jpg" width="500" height="386" alt="“Friends among the rising generation”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>It was determined, however, to take the opinion of old Peter Vanderdonk,
+who was seen slowly advancing up the road. He was a descendant of the
+historian of that name, who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">46</a></span> wrote one of the earliest accounts of the
+province. Peter was the most ancient inhabitant of the village, and well
+versed in all the wonderful events and traditions of the neighborhood.
+He recollected Rip at once, and corroborated his story in the most
+satisfactory manner. He assured the company that it was a fact, handed
+down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill mountains had
+always been haunted by strange beings. That it was affirmed that the
+great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the river and country,
+kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with his crew of the
+Halfmoon, being permitted in this way to revisit the scenes of his
+enterprise, and keep a guardian eye upon the river and the great city
+called by his name. That his father had once seen them in their old
+Dutch dresses playing at nine-pins in the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">47</a></span> hollow of the
+mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound
+of their balls, like distant peals of thunder.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i067" src="images/i067.jpg" width="500" height="638" alt="“Once more on the bench at the inn door”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>To make a long story short, the company broke up, and returned to the
+more important concerns of the election. Rip’s daughter took him home to
+live with her; she had a snug, well-furnished house, and a stout cheery
+farmer for a husband, whom Rip recollected for one of the urchins that
+used to climb upon his back. As to Rip’s son and heir, who was the ditto
+of himself, seen leaning against the tree, he was employed to work on
+the farm; but evinced a hereditary disposition to attend to anything
+else but his business.</p>
+
+<p>Rip now resumed his old walks and habits; he soon found many of his
+former cronies, though all rather the worse for the wear and tear of
+time; and preferred making friends among the rising generation, with
+whom he soon grew into great favor.</p>
+
+<p>Having nothing to do at home, and being arrived at that happy age when a
+man can do nothing with impunity, he took his place once more on the
+bench, at the inn door, and was reverenced as one of the patriarchs of
+the village, and a chronicle of the old times “before the war.” It was
+some time before he could get into the regular track of gossip, or could
+be made to comprehend the strange events that had taken place during his
+torpor. How that there had been a revolutionary war&mdash;that the country
+had thrown off the yoke of old England&mdash;and that, instead of being a
+subject of his majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of
+the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of
+states and empires made but little impression on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">48</a></span> him; but there was one
+species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that
+was&mdash;petticoat government. Happily, that was at an end; he had got his
+neck out of the yoke of matrimony, and could go in and out whenever he
+pleased, without dreading the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle. Whenever her
+name was mentioned, however, he shook his head, shrugged his shoulders,
+and cast up his eyes; which might pass either for an expression of
+resignation to his fate, or joy at his deliverance.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter width500">
+<img id="i070" src="images/i070.jpg" width="500" height="332" alt="“He used to tell his story to every stranger”" />
+</div>
+
+<p>He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at Mr.
+Doolittle’s hotel. He was observed, at first, to vary on some points
+every time he told it, which was doubtless owing to his having so
+recently awaked. It at last settled down precisely to the tale I have
+related, and not a man, woman, or child in the neighborhood, but knew it
+by heart. Some<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">49</a></span> always pretended to doubt the reality of it, and
+insisted that Rip had been out of his head, and that this was one point
+on which he always remained flighty. The old Dutch inhabitants, however,
+almost universally gave it full credit. Even to this day, they never
+hear a thunder-storm of a summer afternoon about the Kaatskill, but they
+say Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of nine-pins; and it
+is a common wish of all henpecked husbands in the neighborhood, when
+life hangs heavy on their hands, that they might have a quieting draught
+out of Rip Van Winkle’s flagon.</p>
+
+<blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Note.</span>&mdash;The foregoing tale, one would suspect, had been suggested
+to Mr. Knickerbocker by a little German superstition about the
+Emperor Frederick <i>der Rothbart</i> and the Kypphauser mountain;
+the subjoined note, however, which he had appended to the tale,
+shows that it is an absolute fact, narrated with his usual
+fidelity.</p>
+
+<p>“The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but
+nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity
+of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to
+marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many
+stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson;
+all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I
+have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I
+saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational
+and consistent on every other point, that I think no
+conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain;
+nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a
+country justice, and signed with a cross, in the justice’s own
+handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of
+doubt.”</p>
+</blockquote>
+
+
+<div class="section">
+<hr class="divider" />
+</div>
+<div class="tn">
+<p class="center">Transcriber’s Note:</p>
+
+<p class="noi">The order of illustrations has been retained as published in the
+original publication.</p>
+
+<p>The following changes were made:</p>
+
+<ul>
+<li>On the title page<br />
+S. E Cassino <i>changed to</i><br />
+S. <a href="#fullstop">E.</a> Cassino</li>
+
+<li>In the List of Illustrations<br />
+personages” facing 26 <i>changed to</i>
+<a href="#facing">facing 29</a></li>
+
+<li>Page 38<br />
+intead of the <i>changed to</i><br />
+<a href="#instead">instead</a> of the</li>
+</ul>
+</div>
+
+<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RIP VAN WINKLE ***</div>
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