James Fenimore Cooper

The Red Rover James Fenimore Cooper

Book Excerpt: ...it was in vain for that miserable tribe of "animalculæ, who live by feeding on the body of genius," to attempt to undermine a reputation that was embalmed in the faith of so many parishes. The brochure was diligently scattered through the provinces, lauded around the tea-pot, openly extolled in the prints--by some kindred spirit, as was manifest in the striking similarity of style--and by one believer, more zealous or perhaps more interested than the rest, actually put on board the next ship which sailed for "home," as England was then affectionately termed, enclosed in an envelope which bore an address no less imposing than the Majesty of Britain. Its effect on the straight-going mind of the dogmatic German, who then filled the throne of the Conqueror, was never known, though they, who were in the secret of the trans mission, long looked, in vain, for the signal reward that was to follow so striking an exhibition of human intellect. Notwithstanding these high and beneficent gifts, their possessor was now...