Rip Van Winkle
A Posthumous Writing of Diedrich Knickerbocker
By Washington Irving
(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 bookworm.
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 how
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 in 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 among
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.)
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.
Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Catskill
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, with lattice windows, gable
fronts surmounted with weathercocks, and built of small yellow bricks brought
from Holland.
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, henpecked 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.
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.
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
even refuse to assist a neighbor in the roughest toil, and was a foremost man at
all country frolics for husking Indian corn, or building stonefences. 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, it was impossible.
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 outdoor 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.
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.
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. 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
henpecked husband.
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 so often going 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 would fly to the door with yelping
precipitation.
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 edged tool that grows keener by 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
traveler. 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.
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 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.
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 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, while 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 Catskill Mountains.
He was after his favorite sport of squirrel shooting, and the still solitudes
had echoed and reëchoed 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, 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 assistance, he
hastened down to yield it.
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 around 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 one another, 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 mountain heights, he proceeded. Passing
through the ravine, they came to a hollow, like a small amphitheater,
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 marveled 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.
On entering the amphitheater, new objects of wonder
presented themselves. On a level spot in the center was a company of odd-looking
personages playing at ninepins. They were dressed in a quaint, outlandish
fashion: some wore short doublets, others jerkins, with long knives in their
belts, and most 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 Dominie Van Schaick, the village parson, and which
had been brought over from Holland at the time of the settlement.
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 fixed statue-like gaze,
and such strange, uncouth, lack-luster 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.
On awaking, 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 a keg of liquor—the mountain
ravine—the wild retreat among the rocks—the woe-begone party at ninepins—the
flagon—“Oh! that flagon! that wicked flagon!” thought Rip—“what excuse shall I
make to Dame Van Winkle?”
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
incrusted 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, 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.
At length he reached to where the ravine had opened through
the cliffs to the amphitheater; 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 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.
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 their 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, none of which he recognized for his old
acquaintances, 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 began to misgive him; he doubted whether both he and the world
around him were not bewitched. Surely this was his native village, which he had
left but the day before. There stood the Catskill 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 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 rung for a moment with his
voice, and then all again was silence.
He now hurried forth, and hastened to his old resort, the
little 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 which 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 nightcap, 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 stuck in the hand instead of a scepter, the head was
decorated with a cocked hat, and underneath was painted in large characters, GENERAL WASHINGTON.
There was, as usual, a crowd of folk about the door, but
none whom 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 ’76—and other words, that were a perfect Babylonish jargon to
the bewildered Van Winkle.
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 around him, eying 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 raising 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 akimbo, 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?” “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 then inquired, “Where’s
Nicholas Vedder?”
There was 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 tombstone in the churchyard that used
to tell all about him, but that’s rotted 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 battle of Stony Point—others say he was drowned
in a 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?
“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 bystanders 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 in the cocked
hat retired with some precipitation. At this critical moment a fresh, likely
woman pressed 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. “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?”
“Oh, she too had died but a short time since; she broke a
blood vessel in a fit of passion at a New England peddler.”
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?”
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
where 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.
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 Catskill 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 Half-Moon, 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 ninepins in a hollow of the
mountain; and that he himself had heard, one summer afternoon, the sound of
their balls, like long peals of thunder.
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 an 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 III.,
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.
He used to tell his story to every stranger that arrived at
Dr. 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
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 Catskills, but
they say Hendrick Hudson and his crew are at their game of ninepins; 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 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 marvelous 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 a
doubt.
“D. K.”
POSTSCRIPT 1 .—The
following are traveling notes from a memorandum book of Mr. Knickerbocker:—
The Kaatsberg, or Catskill Mountains, have always been a
region full of fable. The Indians considered them the abode of spirits, who
influenced the weather, spreading sunshine or clouds over the landscape, and
sending good or bad hunting seasons. They were ruled by an old squaw spirit,
said to be their mother. She dwelt on the highest peak of the Catskills, and
had charge of the doors of day and night to open and shut them at the proper
hour. She hung up the new moon in the skies, and cut up the old ones into
stars. In times of drought, if properly propitiated, she would spin light
summer clouds out of cobwebs and morning dew, and send them off from the crest
of the mountain, flake after flake, like flakes of carded cotton, to float in
the air; until, dissolved by the heat of the sun, they would fall in gentle
showers, causing the grass to spring, the fruits to ripen, and the corn to grow
an inch an hour. If displeased, however, she would brew up clouds black as ink,
sitting in the midst of them like a bottle-bellied spider in the midst of its
web; and when these clouds broke, woe betide the valleys!
In old times, say the Indian traditions, there was a kind of Manitou
or Spirit, who kept about the wildest recesses of the Catskill Mountains, and
took a mischievous pleasure in wreaking all kinds of evils and vexations upon
the red men. Sometimes he would assume the form of a bear, a panther, or a
deer, lead the bewildered hunter a weary chase through tangled forests and
among ragged rocks; and then spring off with a loud ho! ho! leaving him aghast
on the brink of a beetling precipice or raging torrent.
The favorite abode of this Manitou is still shown. It is a
great rock or cliff on the loneliest part of the mountains, and, from the
flowering vines which clamber about it, and the wild flowers which abound in
its neighborhood, is known by the name of the Garden Rock. Near the foot of it
is a small lake, the haunt of the solitary bittern, with water snakes basking
in the sun on the leaves of the pond lilies which lie on the surface. This
place was held in great awe by the Indians, insomuch that the boldest hunter
would not pursue his game within its precincts. Once upon a time, however, a
hunter who had lost his way, penetrated to the Garden Rock, where he beheld a
number of gourds placed in the crotches of trees. One of these he seized, and
made off with it, but in the hurry of his retreat he let it fall among the
rocks, when a great stream gushed forth, which washed him away and swept him
down precipices, where he was dashed to pieces, and the stream made its way to
the Hudson, and continues to flow to the present day; being the identical
stream known by the name of Kaaterskill.
