ground, and upon the western side, at an elevation of sixty feet, or thereabouts, is another broad terrace, though of less extent than the former. In the middle

of the lower and larger terrace at the base of the mound, is a projection supposed to be the remains of a graded ascent from the plain. The base of this colossus of the earth-structures covers sixteen acres of ground, and merely in the matter of superficial area Cahokia is said to be the largest pyramid in the world, surpassing those of Egypt.

The immense works which have here been briefly described, with thousands more like them, and some scarcely inferior in size, together with the innumerable tumuli that dot the valleys of the whole Mississippi basin, incontestably prove that a vast race dwelt here. The character of the works themselves, the profusion of implements and ornaments in stone, flint and copper, the gorgets, bracelets, amulets, pipes, knives, axes, notably the pottery, and more than all else, the crumbling skeletons themselves, bear testimony to the fact that this race was one entirely distinct from the American Indians. This testimony is supported by divers other significant facts, among which is the almost entire absence of tradition among the Indians linking them with the people who built the mounds. The Lenni Lenape or Delaware Indians, indeed, as an exception had a legend of the Mound Builders, but it distinctly disavowed the descent of their nation from them and asserted that they were a distinct and powerful people, through whose land. they, the Delawares, had passed ages ago, after fighing a mighty battle with them. They called this people the Allegewi, which name combined with hanne (stream) has come by process of linguistic evolution Allegheny, the name of the river which marks the eastern limit of the Mound Builder country.

Whence came and whither vanished this mysterious race,-this mighty current of the blood of the earth that seemingly only emerged from obscurity to flow into oblivion? A little light has been thrown upon these problems by the patient study of a few scholars. The consensus of opinion among the most thorough seems to be, that the Mound Builders were of Oriental or Asiatic origin, and that they reached America by

way of its western shore. The recent find near Chillicothe is regarded by archæologists as contributing a fragment of cumulative evidence to the mass of minute data supporting this theory of origin.

As to the destiny of the race, or, rather, the direction of its passing from the field we have been reviewing, it seems highly irrational, from a study of the earth-works, the mortuary remains entombed in them, and the various artobjects which they enclose, to form any other opinion than that the nation gradually pushed its way down the valley of the Mississippi, and eventually spread into Mexico, very likely occupying the whole stretch of country from Lake Superior to the land of the Montezumas. Simultaneously, it is thought, that for a considerable period they held all thiscountry, relinquishing the northern portions of it reluctantly, and only under pressure of an enemy, against whom the great works of defense we have been considering were raised.

The character of the earth-remains* denotes a constant development as one follows them southward, while the rude arts which the people practised, as for instance that of making pottery, are shown by the relics unearthed to have undergone a gradual but marked improvement in proportion to the distance southward at which they are found. So, too, do the crania found in the mound sepulchres give evidence of a constant growth of the Mound Builder intellectually, indicating a considerable betterment of type as the race journeyed towards its destiny in Mexico.

Perhaps, some day, the elaborate and accurately presented hieroglyphics, and the masses of information preserved in such great works as Lord Kingsborough's (which cost its author besides his life, three hundred thousand dollars), may be the means, in the hands of other scholars and writers on Mexican antiquities of revealing with definiteness the secret of the Mound Builders' destiny and much of their history.

But in the meantime there is not wanting

* The writer of this paper acknowledges his indebtedness for the drawings which illustrate the article to Squier and Davis's "Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley," one of the important publications of the Smithsonian Institution.

The

evidence from the side of Mexican history, though incomplete and necessarily far from satisfactory,--that the people who, in the northern United States, and down the valley of the Father of Waters, reared the comparatively humble and yet massive earth-remains, performed a prouder work and reached a higher civilization, in the south, as a component part of the ancient Maya race. fragment which, though one of the latest, was one of the strongest, amalgamated in the composite Maya people, was known as the Nahua nation, and there is evidence in their own history, as handed down through Mexican and Spanish authorities, that they came from the North, where they long had dweltfrom a land which they called Hue hue Tlapalan.

That the Mound Builders were the Nahuas and the land of their long sojourn, the misty, traditional Hue hue Tlapalan was the region of the upper Mississippi and the Ohio- the region in which their multitudinous monuments still remain to excite the wonder of a greater race is pretty effectually argued

by several students of American antiquities. One of the ablest authors who takes this view of the subject deduces from what has come down to our era and race of Maya history that the era of the exodus of the people from the North, or rather of the appearance of the Nahuas in Mexico, was the year A. D. 241, or sixteen and a half centuries ago.

If the Mound Builders and the Nahuas were identical, then we find that the people who built the mounds and fortifications of the North, and who then had in all probability no written language, finally became an integral part of a great nation which reared what are now the most splendid ruins of Mexico, left innumerable hieroglyphical writings, and who, in the time of Cortez, were found to have approximated the true length of the year within two minutes and nine seconds, thus rivalling the learned astronomers of the Orient, and that, too, while the nation of the Conqueror and other Europeans were following a system of time measurement which had placed them nearly ten days in error.

ALFRED MATHEWS.

VIII.- WASHINGTON IRVING*

ORTY years have now elapsed since Washington Irving completed, with his ebbing life, the edifice of his literary reputation, by the publication of the faithful and patriotic study of the "Life of Washington." His fame as a writer, we all know, however, does not rest upon that product of his latterday pen. It rests upon the achievements of a period, forty years earlier, when the world with him was young, and he revelled in the fresh joyousness and bubbling humor of his untethered genius. To Irving, the era which saw the "Knickerbocker History of New York" and the "Sketch Book" first given to the world was one of whimsical fancies and gay indolence,— an era in which the heart was more active than the brain, and when the imagination was not sub

*See the biography of the author, in the Encyclopædia Britannica, Vol. XIII., p. 372.

ordinated to the judgment. It was the adolescent stage in American letters, when literature was fain to imp its wing for flight, but had hardly confidence to make the required effort. The modesty of Irving's aim when he began to write, and thereby create a new interest besides politics in the youthful Republic, is thus indicated in a sentence. "My writings," he said, "may appear light and trifling in our country of philosophers and politicians; but if they possess merit in the class of literature to which they belong, it is all to which I aspire." Considering his scanty and fitful education, and above all his delicate health, one may express surprise that he was so confident and successful. And yet, if his body was in youth feeble, he had from the first a thoroughly healthy, though never vigorous, mind. In creative gifts he was gracefully rather than richly endowed, and the canvas upon which he worked was that of the sketcher rather than the

painter. His optimism and cheery humor threw their charming lights on the picture, while a delightful instinct for art, coupled with minute observation and a facile power of drawing character, gave substance as well as brilliance to his work. Since Irving's day, the barque of American letters has made many, distant, and sometimes stormy, voyages; but the intellectual craft in which Geoffrey Crayon " first set sail carried him, to use the apt figure of a critic, -only "among the Happy Isles, and always on a Summer Sea."

We have said that Irving's education was scanty, and in view of that fact, and of what he was subsequently to achieve, we have to enrol him in the goodly company of the self-made and self-cultured men to whom the world owes much. The environment of his youth, together with a constitutional predisposition to idleness, were little favorable to literary activity. Society in his day was by no means intellectual. Commerce and the noisy game of politics, varied later on by the distractions of war, were the engrossing pursuits. For years the youth seems to have been but a dreamer and rambler, his physical weakness disabling him from methodical study or any serious preparation for life's work. His natural intelligence, amiability, and pleasant manners opened society's shrines to him, which he eagerly entered, as being more inviting than his father's kindly but demure home. Owing to his delicate health, his desultory mode of life was acquiesced in by his elder brothers, who were engaged in business, and when he came of age, in 1804, they sent him to recruit in Europe. Previous to his going abroad, Irving gave little promise of the career which he was afterwards to follow, save by such indications of budding authorship as appeared in a newspaper, established by his brother Peter. To this journal he contributed a series of letters, modelled upon those of Steele in the "Tatler," and signed by Jonathan Oldstyle.

After two years' idle sojourn in Europe, Irving returned to New York, where he was admitted to the bar; but he speedily abandoned law for literature, and the seductions of society. The attractions of the latter had been increased by his residence abroad, and by the ready manner in which society's doors were opened to one who was now even more willing

than of yore to be made of and caressed. It was at this period that the youth had his one, and, as it proved (though he was admirer of women all his days), his only bit of romance. Alas, it had an early and pitiful sequel, for the young lady (Matilda Hoffman), who had kindled the passion in his breast, died in her eighteenth year, and the blow was a crushing one to Irving.

crushing one to Irving. It served, however, to incline the youth to take life more seriously. He now sought to pursue a purely literary career, and in his resolve he was fostered by his brother William and by James K. Paulding, his brother-in-law, who were then issuing a semi-monthly miscellany, called "Salmagundi." The periodical was short-lived, and though it had considerable social repute, it had little literary distinction, beyond that which connected it with other and later imitations of Addison's "Spectator" and Goldsmith's " Citizen of the World."

Irving's habit of rambling and studying character, and his appreciation of historical surroundings, enabled him, in his excursions about the metropolis and the waterways of the Hudson, to gather a mass of material illustrative of the old Dutch life of the place, which he now proceeded to work up into a "History of New York." His initial purpose in projecting the work was to write a satire upon an elaborate piece of historical pedantry which had recently appeared, representing a picture of New York; but as the idea grew upon him and his humor fell to work upon it, he changed the plan of the book and produced the inimitable burlesque we now know, compiled, as he modestly put it, by modestly put it, by "Diedrich Knickerbocker." The work appeared in 1809, and the merriment its rollicking humor created was immediate and widespread. But its whimsicalities were not its only merit below the surface its delightful satire was soon detected, while the student of Manhattan's early social life enjoyed the solid history that lay embedded in its jocund mirth. Nor was the droll presentation of Dutch colonial character appreciated alone in this country in England the work was quickly esteemed a masterpiece of humor, and we are told that Sir Walter Scott, who had an immense liking for Washington Irving and later on found him a London publisher, used to read the history aloud to

his family amid peals of laughter. Scott admitted that the quaint and novel production had many touches that reminded him of Laurence Sterne, while the style of the narrative resembled that of Dean Swift. In this country, the vogue of the work has been constant, while it possesses qualities as a distinctively national effusion that give its author an enduring place in our literary Walhalla. Socially, even, its power has been great, since it has raised the denizens of New York to a caste rank and given many an old Knickerbocker family a quasi-patent of nobility.

Despite the encouragement the now full-fledged author received by the publication of the Knickerbocker History, he seems to have refrained even now from committing himself seriously to a literary career. One reason for this was his continued fondness for society, another was his absorption in the cares of a hardware business conducted by his brothers, in which he became a partner, but without being drawn to it by any love of trade. The house, it appears, had connections on the other side of the Atlantic, and to look after its interests there Washington Irving was dispatched at the close of the War of 1812-15. The embroilment of the two countries seriously crippled the operations of the firm, and in 1818 a financial crisis occurred which brought disaster to the house. The young author, who had hitherto been the indulged pride of the family, now became its chief mainstay and support. The spur of want pricked him to practical purpose, for we find him settling down in London to various literary tasks and to a lengthened residence abroad, spent partly in England and partly in Spain. The first and choice fruit of Irving's devotion to his pen appeared in this country in 1819-20, in the serial issues of the "Sketch Book," which instantly made a sensation and met with an enthusiastic reception in London, thanks to Scott's recommendation of a publisher. There was much in the collected volume, both in subject-matter and style, to attract the interest of the English, but the sympathetic beauty of the description of Westminster Abbey and the delightful account of an English Christmas were eclipsed by the Dutch material in the book, and especially by the exquisite

romantic sketches of "Rip Van Winkle" and the "Legend of Sleepy Hollow." It was on the strength of this book and the "Tales of a Traveller," perhaps Irving's most characteristic productions, that led Thackeray to speak of their author "as the first ambassador whom the New World of letters sent to the Old."

But Irving by his genius was not only to make classic the banks of the Hudson. He was also to popularize for his countrymen and the English-speaking race the land of the Spaniard and the Moor. His work in England, besides launching a London edition of the "Sketch Book" and making acquaintance with a large and interesting circle of English men of letters, included "Bracebridge Hall" and Tales of a Traveller," the latter the result of several years of delightful saunterings in the United Kingdom and on the European continent. Now (1826), when in his thirty-sixth year, he extended the area of his wanderings to Spain and took up his abode at Madrid, in the house of the American consul. Here, within the next three years, he earned by his pen, from his English publishers alone, the sum of £6,000 for the copyright of the four works which then engaged his attention. These were "The Alhambra," "Chronicles of the Conquest of Granada," "Legends of the Conquest of Spain," and the "Life and Voyages of Columbus." Of the works of this fruitful era, the Columbus biography has for his countrymen perhaps the greatest interest, and the gathering and verifying of its materials involved immense labor. Though the Life somewhat idealizes Columbus, it has the merit of substantial accuracy, while it is written on grand lines and with enthusiasm as well as sympathy. The other works appealed keenly to Irving's imagination, and in them we have a series of vivid and picturesque studies, enriched by the skill of the literary artist. To English writers, the field at the period was a virgin as well as an attractive one, and great was Irving's service in giving to the world such a charming group of histories dealing with the chivalrous episodes and romantic incidents in the annals of Spain.

In 1829, the appointment of Secretary of Legation at the Court of St. James withdrew our author to London, where he was received with the honors and dis

tinction which he had now fully earned. But he cared little for politics, and his head being full of literary projects he retired from the Legation, and in the next year (1832), after seventeen years' absence, returned to his home. At New York he was given a public banquet, and the health of the "Dutch Herodotus" was toasted with hearty honors. After the delirium of receptions had somewhat passed, the literary wanderer, to whom the sweets of a quiet rural life were always welcome, cast about him for a home. This he found, close to his old Sleepy Hollow haunt, in a pretty Dutch cottage at Tarrytown, close by the Hudson which his genius had enriched.

A

Here, at Sunnyside, with the exception of two absences - one on a visit to the West, chronicled in "A Tour on the Prairies," and the other on an ambassadorial mission to Madrid - he spent the late noon and evening of his days. To his western excursion across the continent, we owe two other works besides Tour on the Prairies"-viz.: the adventures (chiefly in the Rockies) of "Captain Bonneville," and "Astoria," a chronicle of the fur trade, dealing with John Jacob Astor's peltry post on the Columbia river in Oregon. To these were added about this time a collection of short stories, entitled "Wolfert's Roost,' a genially-written biography of "Oliver Goldsmith," and a work on Mahomet and His Successors." The latter two were published after his return (in 1846) from the political mission to Madrid. At this period, he surrendered to the historian Prescott a project he had long contemplated, namely, to write a history of the Conquest of Mexico. The sacrifice of his cherished purpose was well atoned for, as it gave him the leisure to prepare his last and perhaps most elaborate production, the Life of Washington.

For the writing of a memoir of the great figure of the Revolutionary era Irving lacked some essential qualifications. A patriot and lover of his country he in truth was, despite his long residence abroad, and the degree in which, as a man of letters, he drew his inspiration from the literary creations of the motherland. But he was no politician, nor had he that practical acquaintance with military matters which would have been helpful in writing critically of Washington as a soldier. He made good,

however, the lack of these things by his high moral qualities, added to fastidious literary taste and genuine artistic intelligence, often conspicuously wanting in the mere portrait painter. Yet his sketch of Washington, if unambitious, is all the more true to reality, for it sets the nation's hero faithfully before us, in all the unaffected yet natural dignity of the man, with no exaggeration in the way either of praise or dispraise. The author's estimate of him, while calm and judicial, is never cold or unsympathetic; nor in the portrayal of his character do we fail to find well brought out Washington's conspicuous virtues-patriotism, patience, wisdom, unselfishness, and that constant elevation of mind and character that was most typical of the man and contributed to his commanding position and influence.

The "Life of Washington "* was Irving's latest work, for, within a month of the close of the year (1859) that saw it published, America's first great man of letters ended his earthly life. Like Walter Scott, with whom our author had many traits in common, the creator of Rip Van Winkle sleeps amid the scenes which his genius has enriched. Though fond of domestic life and of all tender human ties, he never married, preferring to remain faithful to the betrothed one, of whom death early robbed him and whose memory he constantly cherished. Gentle, true, and unselfish, his home life is a picture to be studied. To his friends he was endeared by many graces of affection and courtesy, while he was more than kind to those dependent upon him. As a man of letters, he must always, and especially in this country, be held in high honor, since there are few American writers who are better worthy the rank of a classic, or whose personal life is more full of mental and moral beauty. There are still fewer whose books, after the lapse of two generations, are more attractive to read, and, considering the deficiencies and desultoriness of the author's education, that are more instructive and profitable to study. The world, truly, is the better for his work.

G. MERCER ADAM.

* Irving owes his Christian name to the fact that he was born at New York a few months before General Washington entered the city on its evacuation by the British.