diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 3172-0.txt | 911 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 3172-0.zip | bin | 0 -> 18770 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 3172-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 19965 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 3172-h/3172-h.htm | 1027 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/mtfco10.txt | 888 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/mtfco10.zip | bin | 0 -> 17731 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/mtfco11.txt | 878 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/mtfco11.zip | bin | 0 -> 18129 bytes |
11 files changed, 3720 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/3172-0.txt b/3172-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d6a493e --- /dev/null +++ b/3172-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,911 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences +by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + + +Title: Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences + +Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + + +Release Date: April, 2002 [Etext #3172] +Last Updated: February 24, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FENIMORE COOPER OFFENCES *** + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +FENIMORE COOPER'S LITERARY OFFENCES + +by Mark Twain + + + + The Pathfinder and The Deerslayer stand at the head of Cooper's + novels as artistic creations. There are others of his works + which contain parts as perfect as are to be found in these, and + scenes even more thrilling. Not one can be compared with + either of them as a finished whole. + + The defects in both of these tales are comparatively slight. + They were pure works of art.--Prof. Lounsbury. + + + The five tales reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention. + ... One of the very greatest characters in fiction, Natty + Bumppo.... + + The craft of the woodsman, the tricks of the trapper, all the + delicate art of the forest, were familiar to Cooper from his + youth up.--Prof. Brander Matthews. + + Cooper is the greatest artist in the domain of romantic fiction + yet produced by America.--Wilkie Collins. + + +It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English +Literature in Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and +Wilkie Collins to deliver opinions on Cooper's literature without having +read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent +and let persons talk who have read Cooper. + +Cooper's art has some defects. In one place in 'Deerslayer,' and in the +restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offences +against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record. + +There are nineteen rules governing literary art in the domain of +romantic fiction--some say twenty-two. In Deerslayer Cooper violated +eighteen of them. These eighteen require: + +1. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. But the +Deerslayer tale accomplishes nothing and arrives in the air. + +2. They require that the episodes of a tale shall be necessary parts of +the tale, and shall help to develop it. But as the Deerslayer tale is +not a tale, and accomplishes nothing and arrives nowhere, the episodes +have no rightful place in the work, since there was nothing for them to +develop. + +3. They require that the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in +the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell +the corpses from the others. But this detail has often been overlooked +in the Deerslayer tale. + +4. They require that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, +shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there. But this detail also +has been overlooked in the Deerslayer tale. + +5. They require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation, +the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human +beings would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have +a discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of +relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject in hand, and +be interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the +people cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has +been ignored from the beginning of the Deerslayer tale to the end of it. + +6. They require that when the author describes the character of a +personage in his tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage +shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention +in the Deerslayer tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove. + +7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated, +gilt-edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven-dollar Friendship's Offering +in the beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel +in the end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the +Deerslayer tale. + +8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the +reader as “the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest,” + by either the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is +persistently violated in the Deerslayer tale. + +9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves +to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, +the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible +and reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the Deerslayer +tale. + +10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep +interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he +shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad +ones. But the reader of the Deerslayer tale dislikes the good people in +it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned +together. + +11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly +defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given +emergency. But in the Deerslayer tale this rule is vacated. + +In addition to these large rules there are some little ones. These +require that the author shall: + +12. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it. + +13. Use the right word, not its second cousin. + +14. Eschew surplusage. + +15. Not omit necessary details. + +16. Avoid slovenliness of form. + +17. Use good grammar. + +18. Employ a simple and straightforward style. + +Even these seven are coldly and persistently violated in the Deerslayer +tale. + +Cooper's gift in the way of invention was not a rich endowment; but +such as it was he liked to work it, he was pleased with the effects, +and indeed he did some quite sweet things with it. In his little box of +stage properties he kept six or eight cunning devices, tricks, artifices +for his savages and woodsmen to deceive and circumvent each other with, +and he was never so happy as when he was working these innocent things +and seeing them go. A favorite one was to make a moccasined person tread +in the tracks of the moccasined enemy, and thus hide his own trail. +Cooper wore out barrels and barrels of moccasins in working that trick. +Another stage-property that he pulled out of his box pretty frequently +was his broken twig. He prized his broken twig above all the rest of his +effects, and worked it the hardest. It is a restful chapter in any book +of his when somebody doesn't step on a dry twig and alarm all the reds +and whites for two hundred yards around. Every time a Cooper person is +in peril, and absolute silence is worth four dollars a minute, he is +sure to step on a dry twig. There may be a hundred handier things to +step on, but that wouldn't satisfy Cooper. Cooper requires him to turn +out and find a dry twig; and if he can't do it, go and borrow one. In +fact, the Leather Stocking Series ought to have been called the Broken +Twig Series. + +I am sorry there is not room to put in a few dozen instances of the +delicate art of the forest, as practised by Natty Bumppo and some of the +other Cooperian experts. Perhaps we may venture two or three samples. +Cooper was a sailor--a naval officer; yet he gravely tells us how +a vessel, driving towards a lee shore in a gale, is steered for a +particular spot by her skipper because he knows of an undertow there +which will hold her back against the gale and save her. For just pure +woodcraft, or sailorcraft, or whatever it is, isn't that neat? For +several years Cooper was daily in the society of artillery, and he ought +to have noticed that when a cannon-ball strikes the ground it either +buries itself or skips a hundred feet or so; skips again a hundred feet +or so--and so on, till finally it gets tired and rolls. Now in one place +he loses some “females”--as he always calls women--in the edge of a wood +near a plain at night in a fog, on purpose to give Bumppo a chance to +show off the delicate art of the forest before the reader. These +mislaid people are hunting for a fort. They hear a cannonblast, and a +cannon-ball presently comes rolling into the wood and stops at their +feet. To the females this suggests nothing. The case is very different +with the admirable Bumppo. I wish I may never know peace again if he +doesn't strike out promptly and follow the track of that cannon-ball +across the plain through the dense fog and find the fort. Isn't it +a daisy? If Cooper had any real knowledge of Nature's ways of doing +things, he had a most delicate art in concealing the fact. For instance: +one of his acute Indian experts, Chingachgook (pronounced Chicago, +I think), has lost the trail of a person he is tracking through the +forest. Apparently that trail is hopelessly lost. Neither you nor I +could ever have guessed out the way to find it. It was very different +with Chicago. Chicago was not stumped for long. He turned a running +stream out of its course, and there, in the slush in its old bed, were +that person's moccasin-tracks. The current did not wash them away, as +it would have done in all other like cases--no, even the eternal laws +of Nature have to vacate when Cooper wants to put up a delicate job of +woodcraft on the reader. + +We must be a little wary when Brander Matthews tells us that Cooper's +books “reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention.” As a rule, I +am quite willing to accept Brander Matthews's literary judgments and +applaud his lucid and graceful phrasing of them; but that particular +statement needs to be taken with a few tons of salt. Bless your heart, +Cooper hadn't any more invention than a horse; and I don't mean a +high-class horse, either; I mean a clothes-horse. It would be very +difficult to find a really clever “situation” in Cooper's books, and +still more difficult to find one of any kind which he has failed to +render absurd by his handling of it. Look at the episodes of “the +caves”; and at the celebrated scuffle between Maqua and those others +on the table-land a few days later; and at Hurry Harry's queer +water-transit from the castle to the ark; and at Deerslayer's half-hour +with his first corpse; and at the quarrel between Hurry Harry and +Deerslayer later; and at--but choose for yourself; you can't go amiss. + +If Cooper had been an observer his inventive faculty would have worked +better; not more interestingly, but more rationally, more plausibly. +Cooper's proudest creations in the way of “situations” suffer noticeably +from the absence of the observer's protecting gift. Cooper's eye was +splendidly inaccurate. Cooper seldom saw anything correctly. He saw +nearly all things as through a glass eye, darkly. Of course a man who +cannot see the commonest little every-day matters accurately is +working at a disadvantage when he is constructing a “situation.” In the +Deerslayer tale Cooper has a stream which is fifty feet wide where it +flows out of a lake; it presently narrows to twenty as it meanders along +for no given reason; and yet when a stream acts like that it ought to +be required to explain itself. Fourteen pages later the width of the +brook's outlet from the lake has suddenly shrunk thirty feet, and become +“the narrowest part of the stream.” This shrinkage is not accounted for. +The stream has bends in it, a sure indication that it has alluvial banks +and cuts them; yet these bends are only thirty and fifty feet long. If +Cooper had been a nice and punctilious observer he would have noticed +that the bends were oftener nine hundred feet long than short of it. + +Cooper made the exit of that stream fifty feet wide, in the first place, +for no particular reason; in the second place, he narrowed it to less +than twenty to accommodate some Indians. He bends a “sapling” to the +form of an arch over this narrow passage, and conceals six Indians in +its foliage. They are “laying” for a settler's scow or ark which is +coming up the stream on its way to the lake; it is being hauled against +the stiff current by a rope whose stationary end is anchored in the +lake; its rate of progress cannot be more than a mile an hour. Cooper +describes the ark, but pretty obscurely. In the matter of dimensions “it +was little more than a modern canal-boat.” Let us guess, then, that it +was about one hundred and forty feet long. It was of “greater breadth +than common.” Let us guess, then, that it was about sixteen feet wide. +This leviathan had been prowling down bends which were but a third as +long as itself, and scraping between banks where it had only two feet of +space to spare on each side. We cannot too much admire this miracle. +A low-roofed log dwelling occupies “two-thirds of the ark's length”--a +dwelling ninety feet long and sixteen feet wide, let us say a kind of +vestibule train. The dwelling has two rooms--each forty-five feet long +and sixteen feet wide, let us guess. One of them is the bedroom of the +Hutter girls, Judith and Hetty; the other is the parlor in the daytime, +at night it is papa's bedchamber. The ark is arriving at the stream's +exit now, whose width has been reduced to less than twenty feet to +accommodate the Indians--say to eighteen. There is a foot to spare on +each side of the boat. Did the Indians notice that there was going to +be a tight squeeze there? Did they notice that they could make money by +climbing down out of that arched sapling and just stepping aboard when +the ark scraped by? No, other Indians would have noticed these things, +but Cooper's Indians never notice anything. Cooper thinks they are +marvelous creatures for noticing, but he was almost always in error +about his Indians. There was seldom a sane one among them. + +The ark is one hundred and forty feet long; the dwelling is ninety feet +long. The idea of the Indians is to drop softly and secretly from the +arched sapling to the dwelling as the ark creeps along under it at the +rate of a mile an hour, and butcher the family. It will take the ark a +minute and a half to pass under. It will take the ninety foot dwelling +a minute to pass under. Now, then, what did the six Indians do? It would +take you thirty years to guess, and even then you would have to give it +up, I believe. Therefore, I will tell you what the Indians did. Their +chief, a person of quite extraordinary intellect for a Cooper Indian, +warily watched the canal-boat as it squeezed along under him, and when +he had got his calculations fined down to exactly the right shade, as +he judged, he let go and dropped. And missed the house! That is actually +what he did. He missed the house, and landed in the stern of the scow. +It was not much of a fall, yet it knocked him silly. He lay there +unconscious. If the house had been ninety-seven feet long he would have +made the trip. The fault was Cooper's, not his. The error lay in the +construction of the house. Cooper was no architect. + +There still remained in the roost five Indians. + +The boat has passed under and is now out of their reach. Let me explain +what the five did--you would not be able to reason it out for yourself. +No. 1 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water astern of it. Then No. +2 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water still farther astern of it. +Then No. 3 jumped for the boat, and fell a good way astern of it. Then +No. 4 jumped for the boat, and fell in the water away astern. Then +even No. 5 made a jump for the boat--for he was a Cooper Indian. In +the matter of intellect, the difference between a Cooper Indian and the +Indian that stands in front of the cigarshop is not spacious. The scow +episode is really a sublime burst of invention; but it does not +thrill, because the inaccuracy of the details throws a sort of air of +fictitiousness and general improbability over it. This comes of Cooper's +inadequacy as an observer. + +The reader will find some examples of Cooper's high talent for +inaccurate observation in the account of the shooting-match in The +Pathfinder. + + “A common wrought nail was driven lightly into the target, its + head having been first touched with paint.” + +The color of the paint is not stated--an important omission, but Cooper +deals freely in important omissions. No, after all, it was not an +important omission; for this nail-head is a hundred yards from the +marksmen, and could not be seen by them at that distance, no matter what +its color might be. + +How far can the best eyes see a common house-fly? A hundred yards? It is +quite impossible. Very well; eyes that cannot see a house-fly that is a +hundred yards away cannot see an ordinary nailhead at that distance, for +the size of the two objects is the same. It takes a keen eye to see a +fly or a nailhead at fifty yards--one hundred and fifty feet. Can the +reader do it? + +The nail was lightly driven, its head painted, and game called. Then the +Cooper miracles began. The bullet of the first marksman chipped an edge +off the nail-head; the next man's bullet drove the nail a little way +into the target--and removed all the paint. Haven't the miracles +gone far enough now? Not to suit Cooper; for the purpose of +this whole scheme is to show off his prodigy, Deerslayer-- +Hawkeye--Long-Rifle--Leather-Stocking--Pathfinder--Bumppo before +the ladies. + + “'Be all ready to clench it, boys!' cried out Pathfinder, + stepping into his friend's tracks the instant they were vacant. + 'Never mind a new nail; I can see that, though the paint is + gone, and what I can see I can hit at a hundred yards, though + it were only a mosquito's eye. Be ready to clench!' + +“The rifle cracked, the bullet sped its way, and the head of the nail +was buried in the wood, covered by the piece of flattened lead.” + +There, you see, is a man who could hunt flies with a rifle, and command +a ducal salary in a Wild West show to-day if we had him back with us. + +The recorded feat is certainly surprising just as it stands; but it +is not surprising enough for Cooper. Cooper adds a touch. He has made +Pathfinder do this miracle with another man's rifle; and not only that, +but Pathfinder did not have even the advantage of loading it himself. +He had everything against him, and yet he made that impossible shot; and +not only made it, but did it with absolute confidence, saying, “Be ready +to clench.” Now a person like that would have undertaken that same feat +with a brickbat, and with Cooper to help he would have achieved it, too. + +Pathfinder showed off handsomely that day before the ladies. His +very first feat was a thing which no Wild West show can touch. He was +standing with the group of marksmen, observing--a hundred yards from the +target, mind; one Jasper raised his rifle and drove the centre of the +bull's-eye. Then the Quartermaster fired. The target exhibited no result +this time. There was a laugh. “It's a dead miss,” said Major Lundie. +Pathfinder waited an impressive moment or two; then said, in that calm, +indifferent, know-it-all way of his, “No, Major, he has covered Jasper's +bullet, as will be seen if any one will take the trouble to examine the +target.” + +Wasn't it remarkable! How could he see that little pellet fly through +the air and enter that distant bullet-hole? Yet that is what he did; for +nothing is impossible to a Cooper person. Did any of those people +have any deep-seated doubts about this thing? No; for that would imply +sanity, and these were all Cooper people. + + “The respect for Pathfinder's skill and for his 'quickness and + accuracy of sight'” (the italics [' '] are mine) “was so + profound and general, that the instant he made this declaration + the spectators began to distrust their own opinions, and a + dozen rushed to the target in order to ascertain the fact. + There, sure enough, it was found that the Quartermaster's + bullet had gone through the hole made by Jasper's, and that, + too, so accurately as to require a minute examination to be + certain of the circumstance, which, however, was soon clearly + established by discovering one bullet over the other in the + stump against which the target was placed.” + +They made a “minute” examination; but never mind, how could they know +that there were two bullets in that hole without digging the latest one +out? for neither probe nor eyesight could prove the presence of any +more than one bullet. Did they dig? No; as we shall see. It is the +Pathfinder's turn now; he steps out before the ladies, takes aim, and +fires. + +But, alas! here is a disappointment; an incredible, an unimaginable +disappointment--for the target's aspect is unchanged; there is nothing +there but that same old bullet-hole! + + “'If one dared to hint at such a thing,' cried Major Duncan, 'I + should say that the Pathfinder has also missed the target!'” + +As nobody had missed it yet, the “also” was not necessary; but never +mind about that, for the Pathfinder is going to speak. + + “'No, no, Major,' said he, confidently, 'that would be a risky + declaration. I didn't load the piece, and can't say what was + in it; but if it was lead, you will find the bullet driving + down those of the Quartermaster and Jasper, else is not my name + Pathfinder.' + + “A shout from the target announced the truth of this + assertion.” + +Is the miracle sufficient as it stands? Not for Cooper. The Pathfinder +speaks again, as he “now slowly advances towards the stage occupied by +the females”: + + “'That's not all, boys, that's not all; if you find the target + touched at all, I'll own to a miss. The Quartermaster cut the + wood, but you'll find no wood cut by that last messenger.” + +The miracle is at last complete. He knew--doubtless saw--at the distance +of a hundred yards--that his bullet had passed into the hole without +fraying the edges. There were now three bullets in that one hole--three +bullets embedded processionally in the body of the stump back of the +target. Everybody knew this--somehow or other--and yet nobody had dug +any of them out to make sure. Cooper is not a close observer, but he is +interesting. He is certainly always that, no matter what happens. And he +is more interesting when he is not noticing what he is about than when +he is. This is a considerable merit. + +The conversations in the Cooper books have a curious sound in our modern +ears. To believe that such talk really ever came out of people's mouths +would be to believe that there was a time when time was of no value to +a person who thought he had something to say; when it was the custom +to spread a two-minute remark out to ten; when a man's mouth was a +rolling-mill, and busied itself all day long in turning four-foot pigs +of thought into thirty-foot bars of conversational railroad iron by +attenuation; when subjects were seldom faithfully stuck to, but the talk +wandered all around and arrived nowhere; when conversations consisted +mainly of irrelevancies, with here and there a relevancy, a relevancy +with an embarrassed look, as not being able to explain how it got there. + +Cooper was certainly not a master in the construction of dialogue. +Inaccurate observation defeated him here as it defeated him in so many +other enterprises of his. He even failed to notice that the man who +talks corrupt English six days in the week must and will talk it on +the seventh, and can't help himself. In the Deerslayer story he lets +Deerslayer talk the showiest kind of book-talk sometimes, and at other +times the basest of base dialects. For instance, when some one asks +him if he has a sweetheart, and if so, where she abides, this is his +majestic answer: + + “'She's in the forest-hanging from the boughs of the trees, in + a soft rain--in the dew on the open grass--the clouds that + float about in the blue heavens--the birds that sing in the + woods--the sweet springs where I slake my thirst--and in all + the other glorious gifts that come from God's Providence!'” + +And he preceded that, a little before, with this: + + “'It consarns me as all things that touches a fri'nd consarns a + fri'nd.'” + +And this is another of his remarks: + + “'If I was Injin born, now, I might tell of this, or carry in + the scalp and boast of the expl'ite afore the whole tribe; or + if my inimy had only been a bear'”--and so on. + +We cannot imagine such a thing as a veteran Scotch Commander-in-Chief +comporting himself in the field like a windy melodramatic actor, but +Cooper could. On one occasion Alice and Cora were being chased by the +French through a fog in the neighborhood of their father's fort: + + “'Point de quartier aux coquins!' cried an eager pursuer, who + seemed to direct the operations of the enemy. + + “'Stand firm and be ready, my gallant 60ths!' suddenly + exclaimed a voice above them; wait to see the enemy; fire low, + and sweep the glacis.' + + “'Father? father!' exclaimed a piercing cry from out the mist; + 'it is I! Alice! thy own Elsie! spare, O! save your daughters!' + + “'Hold!' shouted the former speaker, in the awful tones of + parental agony, the sound reaching even to the woods, and + rolling back in solemn echo. ''Tis she! God has restored me my + children! Throw open the sally-port; to the field, 60ths, to + the field! pull not a trigger, lest ye kill my lambs! Drive + off these dogs of France with your steel!'” + +Cooper's word-sense was singularly dull. When a person has a poor ear +for music he will flat and sharp right along without knowing it. He +keeps near the tune, but it is not the tune. When a person has a poor +ear for words, the result is a literary flatting and sharping; you +perceive what he is intending to say, but you also perceive that he +doesn't say it. This is Cooper. He was not a word-musician. His ear was +satisfied with the approximate word. I will furnish some circumstantial +evidence in support of this charge. My instances are gathered from +half a dozen pages of the tale called Deerslayer. He uses “verbal,” + for “oral”; “precision,” for “facility”; “phenomena,” for “marvels”; +“necessary,” for “predetermined”; “unsophisticated,” for “primitive”; +“preparation,” for “expectancy”; “rebuked,” for “subdued”; “dependent +on,” for “resulting from”; “fact,” for “condition”; “fact,” for +“conjecture”; “precaution,” for “caution”; “explain,” for “determine”; +“mortified,” for “disappointed”; “meretricious,” for “factitious”; +“materially,” for “considerably”; “decreasing,” for “deepening”; +“increasing,” for “disappearing”; “embedded,” for “enclosed”; +“treacherous;” for “hostile”; “stood,” for “stooped”; “softened,” for +“replaced”; “rejoined,” for “remarked”; “situation,” for “condition”; +“different,” for “differing”; “insensible,” for “unsentient”; “brevity,” + for “celerity”; “distrusted,” for “suspicious”; “mental imbecility,” + for “imbecility”; “eyes,” for “sight”; “counteracting,” for “opposing”; +“funeral obsequies,” for “obsequies.” + +There have been daring people in the world who claimed that Cooper could +write English, but they are all dead now--all dead but Lounsbury. I +don't remember that Lounsbury makes the claim in so many words, still he +makes it, for he says that Deerslayer is a “pure work of art.” Pure, in +that connection, means faultless--faultless in all details--and language +is a detail. If Mr. Lounsbury had only compared Cooper's English with +the English which he writes himself--but it is plain that he didn't; +and so it is likely that he imagines until this day that Cooper's is as +clean and compact as his own. Now I feel sure, deep down in my heart, +that Cooper wrote about the poorest English that exists in our language, +and that the English of Deerslayer is the very worst that even Cooper +ever wrote. + +I may be mistaken, but it does seem to me that Deerslayer is not a work +of art in any sense; it does seem to me that it is destitute of every +detail that goes to the making of a work of art; in truth, it seems to +me that Deerslayer is just simply a literary delirium tremens. + +A work of art? It has no invention; it has no order, system, sequence, +or result; it has no lifelikeness, no thrill, no stir, no seeming of +reality; its characters are confusedly drawn, and by their acts and +words they prove that they are not the sort of people the author +claims that they are; its humor is pathetic; its pathos is funny; +its conversations are--oh! indescribable; its love-scenes odious; its +English a crime against the language. + +Counting these out, what is left is Art. I think we must all admit that. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences +by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FENIMORE COOPER OFFENCES *** + +***** This file should be named 3172-0.txt or 3172-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/7/3172/ + +Produced by David Widger + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project +Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the Foundation” + or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase “Project +Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase “Project Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +“Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, “Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.” + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +“Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right +of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/3172-0.zip b/3172-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f99a635 --- /dev/null +++ b/3172-0.zip diff --git a/3172-h.zip b/3172-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a799650 --- /dev/null +++ b/3172-h.zip diff --git a/3172-h/3172-h.htm b/3172-h/3172-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..580a046 --- /dev/null +++ b/3172-h/3172-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,1027 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences, by Mark Twain + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd7; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 5%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences +by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) +Last Updated: February 24, 2018 + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + + +Title: Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences + +Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +Release Date: August 20, 2006 [EBook #3172] +Last Updated: February 24, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FENIMORE COOPER OFFENCES *** + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + + <h1> + FENIMORE COOPER'S<br /> LITERARY OFFENCES + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h2> + by Mark Twain + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The Pathfinder and The Deerslayer stand at the head of Cooper's + novels as artistic creations. There are others of his works + which contain parts as perfect as are to be found in these, and + scenes even more thrilling. Not one can be compared with + either of them as a finished whole. + + The defects in both of these tales are comparatively slight. + They were pure works of art.—Prof. Lounsbury. +</pre> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The five tales reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention. + ... One of the very greatest characters in fiction, Natty + Bumppo.... + + The craft of the woodsman, the tricks of the trapper, all the + delicate art of the forest, were familiar to Cooper from his + youth up.—Prof. Brander Matthews. + + Cooper is the greatest artist in the domain of romantic fiction + yet produced by America.—Wilkie Collins. +</pre> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <p> + It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English + Literature in Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and + Wilkie Collins to deliver opinions on Cooper's literature without having + read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent and + let persons talk who have read Cooper. + </p> + <p> + Cooper's art has some defects. In one place in 'Deerslayer,' and in the + restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offences + against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record. + </p> + <p> + There are nineteen rules governing literary art in the domain of romantic + fiction—some say twenty-two. In Deerslayer Cooper violated eighteen + of them. These eighteen require: + </p> + <p> + 1. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. But the + Deerslayer tale accomplishes nothing and arrives in the air. + </p> + <p> + 2. They require that the episodes of a tale shall be necessary parts of + the tale, and shall help to develop it. But as the Deerslayer tale is not + a tale, and accomplishes nothing and arrives nowhere, the episodes have no + rightful place in the work, since there was nothing for them to develop. + </p> + <p> + 3. They require that the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in + the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the + corpses from the others. But this detail has often been overlooked in the + Deerslayer tale. + </p> + <p> + 4. They require that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall + exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there. But this detail also has been + overlooked in the Deerslayer tale. + </p> + <p> + 5. They require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation, + the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings + would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a + discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of + relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject in hand, and be + interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the people + cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has been + ignored from the beginning of the Deerslayer tale to the end of it. + </p> + <p> + 6. They require that when the author describes the character of a + personage in his tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage + shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention + in the Deerslayer tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove. + </p> + <p> + 7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated, + gilt-edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven-dollar Friendship's Offering in + the beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel in + the end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the + Deerslayer tale. + </p> + <p> + 8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the reader + as “the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest,” by either + the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is persistently + violated in the Deerslayer tale. + </p> + <p> + 9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves to + possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, the + author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and + reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the Deerslayer tale. + </p> + <p> + 10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep + interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he + shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad + ones. But the reader of the Deerslayer tale dislikes the good people in + it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned + together. + </p> + <p> + 11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly defined + that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given + emergency. But in the Deerslayer tale this rule is vacated. + </p> + <p> + In addition to these large rules there are some little ones. These require + that the author shall: + </p> + <p> + 12. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it. + </p> + <p> + 13. Use the right word, not its second cousin. + </p> + <p> + 14. Eschew surplusage. + </p> + <p> + 15. Not omit necessary details. + </p> + <p> + 16. Avoid slovenliness of form. + </p> + <p> + 17. Use good grammar. + </p> + <p> + 18. Employ a simple and straightforward style. + </p> + <p> + Even these seven are coldly and persistently violated in the Deerslayer + tale. + </p> + <p> + Cooper's gift in the way of invention was not a rich endowment; but such + as it was he liked to work it, he was pleased with the effects, and indeed + he did some quite sweet things with it. In his little box of stage + properties he kept six or eight cunning devices, tricks, artifices for his + savages and woodsmen to deceive and circumvent each other with, and he was + never so happy as when he was working these innocent things and seeing + them go. A favorite one was to make a moccasined person tread in the + tracks of the moccasined enemy, and thus hide his own trail. Cooper wore + out barrels and barrels of moccasins in working that trick. Another + stage-property that he pulled out of his box pretty frequently was his + broken twig. He prized his broken twig above all the rest of his effects, + and worked it the hardest. It is a restful chapter in any book of his when + somebody doesn't step on a dry twig and alarm all the reds and whites for + two hundred yards around. Every time a Cooper person is in peril, and + absolute silence is worth four dollars a minute, he is sure to step on a + dry twig. There may be a hundred handier things to step on, but that + wouldn't satisfy Cooper. Cooper requires him to turn out and find a dry + twig; and if he can't do it, go and borrow one. In fact, the Leather + Stocking Series ought to have been called the Broken Twig Series. + </p> + <p> + I am sorry there is not room to put in a few dozen instances of the + delicate art of the forest, as practised by Natty Bumppo and some of the + other Cooperian experts. Perhaps we may venture two or three samples. + Cooper was a sailor—a naval officer; yet he gravely tells us how a + vessel, driving towards a lee shore in a gale, is steered for a particular + spot by her skipper because he knows of an undertow there which will hold + her back against the gale and save her. For just pure woodcraft, or + sailorcraft, or whatever it is, isn't that neat? For several years Cooper + was daily in the society of artillery, and he ought to have noticed that + when a cannon-ball strikes the ground it either buries itself or skips a + hundred feet or so; skips again a hundred feet or so—and so on, till + finally it gets tired and rolls. Now in one place he loses some “females”—as + he always calls women—in the edge of a wood near a plain at night in + a fog, on purpose to give Bumppo a chance to show off the delicate art of + the forest before the reader. These mislaid people are hunting for a fort. + They hear a cannonblast, and a cannon-ball presently comes rolling into + the wood and stops at their feet. To the females this suggests nothing. + The case is very different with the admirable Bumppo. I wish I may never + know peace again if he doesn't strike out promptly and follow the track of + that cannon-ball across the plain through the dense fog and find the fort. + Isn't it a daisy? If Cooper had any real knowledge of Nature's ways of + doing things, he had a most delicate art in concealing the fact. For + instance: one of his acute Indian experts, Chingachgook (pronounced + Chicago, I think), has lost the trail of a person he is tracking through + the forest. Apparently that trail is hopelessly lost. Neither you nor I + could ever have guessed out the way to find it. It was very different with + Chicago. Chicago was not stumped for long. He turned a running stream out + of its course, and there, in the slush in its old bed, were that person's + moccasin-tracks. The current did not wash them away, as it would have done + in all other like cases—no, even the eternal laws of Nature have to + vacate when Cooper wants to put up a delicate job of woodcraft on the + reader. + </p> + <p> + We must be a little wary when Brander Matthews tells us that Cooper's + books “reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention.” As a rule, I am + quite willing to accept Brander Matthews's literary judgments and applaud + his lucid and graceful phrasing of them; but that particular statement + needs to be taken with a few tons of salt. Bless your heart, Cooper hadn't + any more invention than a horse; and I don't mean a high-class horse, + either; I mean a clothes-horse. It would be very difficult to find a + really clever “situation” in Cooper's books, and still more difficult to + find one of any kind which he has failed to render absurd by his handling + of it. Look at the episodes of “the caves”; and at the celebrated scuffle + between Maqua and those others on the table-land a few days later; and at + Hurry Harry's queer water-transit from the castle to the ark; and at + Deerslayer's half-hour with his first corpse; and at the quarrel between + Hurry Harry and Deerslayer later; and at—but choose for yourself; + you can't go amiss. + </p> + <p> + If Cooper had been an observer his inventive faculty would have worked + better; not more interestingly, but more rationally, more plausibly. + Cooper's proudest creations in the way of “situations” suffer noticeably + from the absence of the observer's protecting gift. Cooper's eye was + splendidly inaccurate. Cooper seldom saw anything correctly. He saw nearly + all things as through a glass eye, darkly. Of course a man who cannot see + the commonest little every-day matters accurately is working at a + disadvantage when he is constructing a “situation.” In the Deerslayer tale + Cooper has a stream which is fifty feet wide where it flows out of a lake; + it presently narrows to twenty as it meanders along for no given reason; + and yet when a stream acts like that it ought to be required to explain + itself. Fourteen pages later the width of the brook's outlet from the lake + has suddenly shrunk thirty feet, and become “the narrowest part of the + stream.” This shrinkage is not accounted for. The stream has bends in it, + a sure indication that it has alluvial banks and cuts them; yet these + bends are only thirty and fifty feet long. If Cooper had been a nice and + punctilious observer he would have noticed that the bends were oftener + nine hundred feet long than short of it. + </p> + <p> + Cooper made the exit of that stream fifty feet wide, in the first place, + for no particular reason; in the second place, he narrowed it to less than + twenty to accommodate some Indians. He bends a “sapling” to the form of an + arch over this narrow passage, and conceals six Indians in its foliage. + They are “laying” for a settler's scow or ark which is coming up the + stream on its way to the lake; it is being hauled against the stiff + current by a rope whose stationary end is anchored in the lake; its rate + of progress cannot be more than a mile an hour. Cooper describes the ark, + but pretty obscurely. In the matter of dimensions “it was little more than + a modern canal-boat.” Let us guess, then, that it was about one hundred + and forty feet long. It was of “greater breadth than common.” Let us + guess, then, that it was about sixteen feet wide. This leviathan had been + prowling down bends which were but a third as long as itself, and scraping + between banks where it had only two feet of space to spare on each side. + We cannot too much admire this miracle. A low-roofed log dwelling occupies + “two-thirds of the ark's length”—a dwelling ninety feet long and + sixteen feet wide, let us say a kind of vestibule train. The dwelling has + two rooms—each forty-five feet long and sixteen feet wide, let us + guess. One of them is the bedroom of the Hutter girls, Judith and Hetty; + the other is the parlor in the daytime, at night it is papa's bedchamber. + The ark is arriving at the stream's exit now, whose width has been reduced + to less than twenty feet to accommodate the Indians—say to eighteen. + There is a foot to spare on each side of the boat. Did the Indians notice + that there was going to be a tight squeeze there? Did they notice that + they could make money by climbing down out of that arched sapling and just + stepping aboard when the ark scraped by? No, other Indians would have + noticed these things, but Cooper's Indians never notice anything. Cooper + thinks they are marvelous creatures for noticing, but he was almost always + in error about his Indians. There was seldom a sane one among them. + </p> + <p> + The ark is one hundred and forty feet long; the dwelling is ninety feet + long. The idea of the Indians is to drop softly and secretly from the + arched sapling to the dwelling as the ark creeps along under it at the + rate of a mile an hour, and butcher the family. It will take the ark a + minute and a half to pass under. It will take the ninety foot dwelling a + minute to pass under. Now, then, what did the six Indians do? It would + take you thirty years to guess, and even then you would have to give it + up, I believe. Therefore, I will tell you what the Indians did. Their + chief, a person of quite extraordinary intellect for a Cooper Indian, + warily watched the canal-boat as it squeezed along under him, and when he + had got his calculations fined down to exactly the right shade, as he + judged, he let go and dropped. And missed the house! That is actually what + he did. He missed the house, and landed in the stern of the scow. It was + not much of a fall, yet it knocked him silly. He lay there unconscious. If + the house had been ninety-seven feet long he would have made the trip. The + fault was Cooper's, not his. The error lay in the construction of the + house. Cooper was no architect. + </p> + <p> + There still remained in the roost five Indians. + </p> + <p> + The boat has passed under and is now out of their reach. Let me explain + what the five did—you would not be able to reason it out for + yourself. No. 1 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water astern of it. + Then No. 2 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water still farther astern + of it. Then No. 3 jumped for the boat, and fell a good way astern of it. + Then No. 4 jumped for the boat, and fell in the water away astern. Then + even No. 5 made a jump for the boat—for he was a Cooper Indian. In + the matter of intellect, the difference between a Cooper Indian and the + Indian that stands in front of the cigarshop is not spacious. The scow + episode is really a sublime burst of invention; but it does not thrill, + because the inaccuracy of the details throws a sort of air of + fictitiousness and general improbability over it. This comes of Cooper's + inadequacy as an observer. + </p> + <p> + The reader will find some examples of Cooper's high talent for inaccurate + observation in the account of the shooting-match in The Pathfinder. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “A common wrought nail was driven lightly into the target, its + head having been first touched with paint.” + </pre> + <p> + The color of the paint is not stated—an important omission, but + Cooper deals freely in important omissions. No, after all, it was not an + important omission; for this nail-head is a hundred yards from the + marksmen, and could not be seen by them at that distance, no matter what + its color might be. + </p> + <p> + How far can the best eyes see a common house-fly? A hundred yards? It is + quite impossible. Very well; eyes that cannot see a house-fly that is a + hundred yards away cannot see an ordinary nailhead at that distance, for + the size of the two objects is the same. It takes a keen eye to see a fly + or a nailhead at fifty yards—one hundred and fifty feet. Can the + reader do it? + </p> + <p> + The nail was lightly driven, its head painted, and game called. Then the + Cooper miracles began. The bullet of the first marksman chipped an edge + off the nail-head; the next man's bullet drove the nail a little way into + the target—and removed all the paint. Haven't the miracles gone far + enough now? Not to suit Cooper; for the purpose of this whole scheme is to + show off his prodigy, Deerslayer Hawkeye—Long-Rifle—Leather-Stocking—Pathfinder—Bumppo + before the ladies. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'Be all ready to clench it, boys!' cried out Pathfinder, + stepping into his friend's tracks the instant they were vacant. + 'Never mind a new nail; I can see that, though the paint is + gone, and what I can see I can hit at a hundred yards, though + it were only a mosquito's eye. Be ready to clench!' +</pre> + <p> + “The rifle cracked, the bullet sped its way, and the head of the nail was + buried in the wood, covered by the piece of flattened lead.” + </p> + <p> + There, you see, is a man who could hunt flies with a rifle, and command a + ducal salary in a Wild West show to-day if we had him back with us. + </p> + <p> + The recorded feat is certainly surprising just as it stands; but it is not + surprising enough for Cooper. Cooper adds a touch. He has made Pathfinder + do this miracle with another man's rifle; and not only that, but + Pathfinder did not have even the advantage of loading it himself. He had + everything against him, and yet he made that impossible shot; and not only + made it, but did it with absolute confidence, saying, “Be ready to + clench.” Now a person like that would have undertaken that same feat with + a brickbat, and with Cooper to help he would have achieved it, too. + </p> + <p> + Pathfinder showed off handsomely that day before the ladies. His very + first feat was a thing which no Wild West show can touch. He was standing + with the group of marksmen, observing—a hundred yards from the + target, mind; one Jasper raised his rifle and drove the centre of the + bull's-eye. Then the Quartermaster fired. The target exhibited no result + this time. There was a laugh. “It's a dead miss,” said Major Lundie. + Pathfinder waited an impressive moment or two; then said, in that calm, + indifferent, know-it-all way of his, “No, Major, he has covered Jasper's + bullet, as will be seen if any one will take the trouble to examine the + target.” + </p> + <p> + Wasn't it remarkable! How could he see that little pellet fly through the + air and enter that distant bullet-hole? Yet that is what he did; for + nothing is impossible to a Cooper person. Did any of those people have any + deep-seated doubts about this thing? No; for that would imply sanity, and + these were all Cooper people. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “The respect for Pathfinder's skill and for his 'quickness and + accuracy of sight'” (the italics [''] are mine) “was so + profound and general, that the instant he made this declaration + the spectators began to distrust their own opinions, and a + dozen rushed to the target in order to ascertain the fact. + There, sure enough, it was found that the Quartermaster's + bullet had gone through the hole made by Jasper's, and that, + too, so accurately as to require a minute examination to be + certain of the circumstance, which, however, was soon clearly + established by discovering one bullet over the other in the + stump against which the target was placed.” + </pre> + <p> + They made a “minute” examination; but never mind, how could they know that + there were two bullets in that hole without digging the latest one out? + for neither probe nor eyesight could prove the presence of any more than + one bullet. Did they dig? No; as we shall see. It is the Pathfinder's turn + now; he steps out before the ladies, takes aim, and fires. + </p> + <p> + But, alas! here is a disappointment; an incredible, an unimaginable + disappointment—for the target's aspect is unchanged; there is + nothing there but that same old bullet-hole! + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'If one dared to hint at such a thing,' cried Major Duncan, 'I + should say that the Pathfinder has also missed the target!'” + </pre> + <p> + As nobody had missed it yet, the “also” was not necessary; but never mind + about that, for the Pathfinder is going to speak. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'No, no, Major,' said he, confidently, 'that would be a risky + declaration. I didn't load the piece, and can't say what was + in it; but if it was lead, you will find the bullet driving + down those of the Quartermaster and Jasper, else is not my name + Pathfinder.' + + “A shout from the target announced the truth of this + assertion.” + </pre> + <p> + Is the miracle sufficient as it stands? Not for Cooper. The Pathfinder + speaks again, as he “now slowly advances towards the stage occupied by the + females”: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'That's not all, boys, that's not all; if you find the target + touched at all, I'll own to a miss. The Quartermaster cut the + wood, but you'll find no wood cut by that last messenger.” + </pre> + <p> + The miracle is at last complete. He knew—doubtless saw—at the + distance of a hundred yards—that his bullet had passed into the hole + without fraying the edges. There were now three bullets in that one hole—three + bullets embedded processionally in the body of the stump back of the + target. Everybody knew this—somehow or other—and yet nobody + had dug any of them out to make sure. Cooper is not a close observer, but + he is interesting. He is certainly always that, no matter what happens. + And he is more interesting when he is not noticing what he is about than + when he is. This is a considerable merit. + </p> + <p> + The conversations in the Cooper books have a curious sound in our modern + ears. To believe that such talk really ever came out of people's mouths + would be to believe that there was a time when time was of no value to a + person who thought he had something to say; when it was the custom to + spread a two-minute remark out to ten; when a man's mouth was a + rolling-mill, and busied itself all day long in turning four-foot pigs of + thought into thirty-foot bars of conversational railroad iron by + attenuation; when subjects were seldom faithfully stuck to, but the talk + wandered all around and arrived nowhere; when conversations consisted + mainly of irrelevancies, with here and there a relevancy, a relevancy with + an embarrassed look, as not being able to explain how it got there. + </p> + <p> + Cooper was certainly not a master in the construction of dialogue. + Inaccurate observation defeated him here as it defeated him in so many + other enterprises of his. He even failed to notice that the man who talks + corrupt English six days in the week must and will talk it on the seventh, + and can't help himself. In the Deerslayer story he lets Deerslayer talk + the showiest kind of book-talk sometimes, and at other times the basest of + base dialects. For instance, when some one asks him if he has a + sweetheart, and if so, where she abides, this is his majestic answer: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'She's in the forest-hanging from the boughs of the trees, in + a soft rain—in the dew on the open grass—the clouds that + float about in the blue heavens—the birds that sing in the + woods—the sweet springs where I slake my thirst—and in all + the other glorious gifts that come from God's Providence!'” + </pre> + <p> + And he preceded that, a little before, with this: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'It consarns me as all things that touches a fri'nd consarns a + fri'nd.'” + </pre> + <p> + And this is another of his remarks: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'If I was Injin born, now, I might tell of this, or carry in + the scalp and boast of the expl'ite afore the whole tribe; or + if my inimy had only been a bear'”—and so on. +</pre> + <p> + We cannot imagine such a thing as a veteran Scotch Commander-in-Chief + comporting himself in the field like a windy melodramatic actor, but + Cooper could. On one occasion Alice and Cora were being chased by the + French through a fog in the neighborhood of their father's fort: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “'Point de quartier aux coquins!' cried an eager pursuer, who + seemed to direct the operations of the enemy. + + “'Stand firm and be ready, my gallant 60ths!' suddenly + exclaimed a voice above them; wait to see the enemy; fire low, + and sweep the glacis.' + + “'Father? father!' exclaimed a piercing cry from out the mist; + 'it is I! Alice! thy own Elsie! spare, O! save your daughters!' + + “'Hold!' shouted the former speaker, in the awful tones of + parental agony, the sound reaching even to the woods, and + rolling back in solemn echo. ''Tis she! God has restored me my + children! Throw open the sally-port; to the field, 60ths, to + the field! pull not a trigger, lest ye kill my lambs! Drive + off these dogs of France with your steel!'” + </pre> + <p> + Cooper's word-sense was singularly dull. When a person has a poor ear for + music he will flat and sharp right along without knowing it. He keeps near + the tune, but it is not the tune. When a person has a poor ear for words, + the result is a literary flatting and sharping; you perceive what he is + intending to say, but you also perceive that he doesn't say it. This is + Cooper. He was not a word-musician. His ear was satisfied with the + approximate word. I will furnish some circumstantial evidence in support + of this charge. My instances are gathered from half a dozen pages of the + tale called Deerslayer. He uses “verbal,” for “oral”; “precision,” for + “facility”; “phenomena,” for “marvels”; “necessary,” for “predetermined”; + “unsophisticated,” for “primitive”; “preparation,” for “expectancy”; + “rebuked,” for “subdued”; “dependent on,” for “resulting from”; “fact,” + for “condition”; “fact,” for “conjecture”; “precaution,” for “caution”; + “explain,” for “determine”; “mortified,” for “disappointed”; + “meretricious,” for “factitious”; “materially,” for “considerably”; + “decreasing,” for “deepening”; “increasing,” for “disappearing”; + “embedded,” for “enclosed”; “treacherous;” for “hostile”; “stood,” for + “stooped”; “softened,” for “replaced”; “rejoined,” for “remarked”; + “situation,” for “condition”; “different,” for “differing”; “insensible,” + for “unsentient”; “brevity,” for “celerity”; “distrusted,” for + “suspicious”; “mental imbecility,” for “imbecility”; “eyes,” for “sight”; + “counteracting,” for “opposing”; “funeral obsequies,” for “obsequies.” + </p> + <p> + There have been daring people in the world who claimed that Cooper could + write English, but they are all dead now—all dead but Lounsbury. I + don't remember that Lounsbury makes the claim in so many words, still he + makes it, for he says that Deerslayer is a “pure work of art.” Pure, in + that connection, means faultless—faultless in all details—and + language is a detail. If Mr. Lounsbury had only compared Cooper's English + with the English which he writes himself—but it is plain that he + didn't; and so it is likely that he imagines until this day that Cooper's + is as clean and compact as his own. Now I feel sure, deep down in my + heart, that Cooper wrote about the poorest English that exists in our + language, and that the English of Deerslayer is the very worst that even + Cooper ever wrote. + </p> + <p> + I may be mistaken, but it does seem to me that Deerslayer is not a work of + art in any sense; it does seem to me that it is destitute of every detail + that goes to the making of a work of art; in truth, it seems to me that + Deerslayer is just simply a literary delirium tremens. + </p> + <p> + A work of art? It has no invention; it has no order, system, sequence, or + result; it has no lifelikeness, no thrill, no stir, no seeming of reality; + its characters are confusedly drawn, and by their acts and words they + prove that they are not the sort of people the author claims that they + are; its humor is pathetic; its pathos is funny; its conversations are—oh! + indescribable; its love-scenes odious; its English a crime against the + language. + </p> + <p> + Counting these out, what is left is Art. I think we must all admit that. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offences +by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK FENIMORE COOPER OFFENCES *** + +***** This file should be named 3172-h.htm or 3172-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/7/3172/ + +Produced by David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project +Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the Foundation” + or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the phrase “Project +Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere 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 + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase “Project Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +“Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, “Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.” + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +“Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right +of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </p> + </body> +</html> diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7bd3811 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #3172 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3172) diff --git a/old/mtfco10.txt b/old/mtfco10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5c427fb --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mtfco10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,888 @@ +Project Gutenberg Etext of Fenimore Cooper Offences, by Twain +#33 in our series by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the laws for your country before redistributing these files!!!!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. + +Please do not remove this. + +This should be the first thing seen when anyone opens the book. +Do not change or edit it without written permission. The words +are carefully chosen to provide users with the information they +need about what they can legally do with the texts. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. We need your donations. +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a 501(c)(3) +organization with EIN [Employee Identification Number] 64-6221541 + +As of 12/12/00 contributions are only being solicited from people in: +Colorado, Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, +Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Montana, +Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, +Texas, Vermont, and Wyoming. + +As the requirements for other states are met, +additions to this list will be made and fund raising +will begin in the additional states. Please feel +free to ask to check the status of your state. + +International donations are accepted, +but we don't know ANYTHING about how +to make them tax-deductible, or +even if they CAN be made deductible, +and don't have the staff to handle it +even if there are ways. + +These donations should be made to: + +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +PMB 113 +1739 University Ave. +Oxford, MS 38655-4109 + + +Title: Fenimore Cooper Offences + +Author: Mark Twain + +Release Date: April, 2002 [Etext #3172] +[Yes, we are about one year ahead of schedule] +[The actual date this file first posted = 02/08/01] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Project Gutenberg Etext of Fenimore Cooper Offences, by Twain +****This file should be named mtfco10.txt or mtfco10.zip***** + +Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, mtfco11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, mtfco10a.txt + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + +Project Gutenberg Etexts are usually created from multiple editions, +all of which are in the Public Domain in the United States, unless a +copyright notice is included. Therefore, we usually do NOT keep any +of these books in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +We are now trying to release all our books one year in advance +of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing. +Please be encouraged to send us error messages even years after +the official publication date. + +Please note: neither this list nor its contents are final till +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. + +Most people start at our sites at: +http://gutenberg.net +http://promo.net/pg + + +Those of you who want to download any Etext before announcement +can surf to them as follows, and just download by date; this is +also a good way to get them instantly upon announcement, as the +indexes our cataloguers produce obviously take a while after an +announcement goes out in the Project Gutenberg Newsletter. + +http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext02 +or +ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext02 + +Or /etext01, 00, 99, 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90 + +Just search by the first five letters of the filename you want, +as it appears in our Newsletters. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours +to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. This +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If our value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 +million dollars per hour this year as we release fifty new Etext +files per month, or 500 more Etexts in 2000 for a total of 3000+ +If they reach just 1-2% of the world's population then the total +should reach over 300 billion Etexts given away by year's end. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext +Files by December 31, 2001. [10,000 x 100,000,000 = 1 Trillion] +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only about 4% of the present number of computer users. + +At our revised rates of production, we will reach only one-third +of that goal by the end of 2001, or about 3,333 Etexts unless we +manage to get some real funding. + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been created +to secure a future for Project Gutenberg into the next millennium. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +Presently, contributions are only being solicited from people in: +Colorado, Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, +Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Montana, +Nevada, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, +Texas, Vermont, and Wyoming. + +As the requirements for other states are met, +additions to this list will be made and fund raising +will begin in the additional states. + +These donations should be made to: + +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +PMB 113 +1739 University Ave. +Oxford, MS 38655-4109 + + +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, +EIN [Employee Identification Number] 64-6221541, +has been approved as a 501(c)(3) organization by the US Internal +Revenue Service (IRS). Donations are tax-deductible to the extent +permitted by law. As the requirements for other states are met, +additions to this list will be made and fund raising will begin in the +additional states. + +All donations should be made to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation. Mail to: + +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +PMB 113 +1739 University Avenue +Oxford, MS 38655-4109 [USA] + + +We need your donations more than ever! + +You can get up to date donation information at: + +http://www.gutenberg.net/donation.html + + +*** + +If you can't reach Project Gutenberg, +you can always email directly to: + +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> + +hart@pobox.com forwards to hart@prairienet.org and archive.org +if your mail bounces from archive.org, I will still see it, if +it bounces from prairienet.org, better resend later on. . . . + +Prof. Hart will answer or forward your message. + +We would prefer to send you information by email. + + +*** + + +Example command-line FTP session: + +ftp ftp.ibiblio.org +login: anonymous +password: your@login +cd pub/docs/books/gutenberg +cd etext90 through etext99 or etext00 through etext02, etc. +dir [to see files] +get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files] +GET GUTINDEX.?? [to get a year's listing of books, e.g., GUTINDEX.99] +GET GUTINDEX.ALL [to get a listing of ALL books] + + +**The Legal Small Print** + + +(Three Pages) + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you may distribute copies of this etext if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etexts, +is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor Michael S. Hart +through the Project Gutenberg Association (the "Project"). +Among other things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext +under the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +Please do not use the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark to market +any commercial products without permission. + +To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] Michael Hart and the Foundation (and any other party you may +receive this etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims +all liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold Michael Hart, the Foundation, +and its trustees and agents, and any volunteers associated +with the production and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm +texts harmless, from all liability, cost and expense, including +legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of the +following that you do or cause: [1] distribution of this etext, +[2] alteration, modification, or addition to the etext, +or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word + processing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the etext (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Foundation of 20% of the + gross profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation" + the 60 days following each date you prepare (or were + legally required to prepare) your annual (or equivalent + periodic) tax return. Please contact us beforehand to + let us know your plans and to work out the details. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +Project Gutenberg is dedicated to increasing the number of +public domain and licensed works that can be freely distributed +in machine readable form. + +The Project gratefully accepts contributions of money, time, +public domain materials, or royalty free copyright licenses. +Money should be paid to the: +"Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +If you are interested in contributing scanning equipment or +software or other items, please contact Michael Hart at: +hart@pobox.com + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.12.12.00*END* + + + + + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + + + +FENIMORE COOPER'S LITERARY OFFENCES + +by Mark Twain + + + The Pathfinder and The Deerslayer stand at the head of Cooper's + novels as artistic creations. There are others of his works + which contain parts as perfect as are to be found in these, and + scenes even more thrilling. Not one can be compared with + either of them as a finished whole. + + The defects in both of these tales are comparatively slight. + They were pure works of art.--Prof. Lounsbury. + + + The five tales reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention. + . . . One of the very greatest characters in fiction, Natty + Bumppo . . . . + + The craft of the woodsman, the tricks of the trapper, all the + delicate art of the forest, were familiar to Cooper from his + youth up.--Prof. Brander Matthews. + + Cooper is the greatest artist in the domain of romantic fiction + yet produced by America.--Wilkie Collins. + + +It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English +Literature in Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and +Wilkie Collins to deliver opinions on Cooper's literature without having +read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent +and let persons talk who have read Cooper. + +Cooper's art has some defects. In one place in 'Deerslayer,' and in the +restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offences +against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record. + +There are nineteen rules governing literary art in the domain of romantic +fiction--some say twenty-two. In Deerslayer Cooper violated eighteen of +them. These eighteen require: + +1. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. But the +Deerslayer tale accomplishes nothing and arrives in the air. + +2. They require that the episodes of a tale shall be necessary parts of +the tale, and shall help to develop it. But as the Deerslayer tale is +not a tale, and accomplishes nothing and arrives nowhere, the episodes +have no rightful place in the work, since there was nothing for them to +develop. + +3. They require that the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in +the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the +corpses from the others. But this detail has often been overlooked in +the Deerslayer tale. + +4. They require that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, +shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there. But this detail also +has been overlooked in the Deerslayer tale. + +5. They require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation, +the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings +would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a +discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of +relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject in hand, and be +interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the +people cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has +been ignored from the beginning of the Deerslayer tale to the end of it. + +6. They require that when the author describes the character of a +personage in his tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage +shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention +in the Deerslayer tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove. + +7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated, gilt- +edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven-dollar Friendship's Offering in the +beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel in the +end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the Deerslayer +tale. + +8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the +reader as "the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest," by +either the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is +persistently violated in the Deerslayer tale. + +9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves +to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, +the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and +reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the Deerslayer tale. + +10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep +interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he +shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad +ones. But the reader of the Deerslayer tale dislikes the good people in +it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned +together. + +11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly +defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given +emergency. But in the Deerslayer tale this rule is vacated. + +In addition to these large rules there are some little ones. These +require that the author shall: + +12. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it. + +13. Use the right word, not its second cousin. + +14. Eschew surplusage. + +15. Not omit necessary details. + +16. Avoid slovenliness of form. + +17. Use good grammar. + +18. Employ a simple and straightforward style. + +Even these seven are coldly and persistently violated in the Deerslayer +tale. + +Cooper's gift in the way of invention was not a rich endowment; but such +as it was he liked to work it, he was pleased with the effects, and +indeed he did some quite sweet things with it. In his little box of +stage properties he kept six or eight cunning devices, tricks, artifices +for his savages and woodsmen to deceive and circumvent each other with, +and he was never so happy as when he was working these innocent things +and seeing them go. A favorite one was to make a moccasined person tread +in the tracks of the moccasined enemy, and thus hide his own trail. +Cooper wore out barrels and barrels of moccasins in working that trick. +Another stage-property that he pulled out of his box pretty frequently +was his broken twig. He prized his broken twig above all the rest of his +effects, and worked it the hardest. It is a restful chapter in any book +of his when somebody doesn't step on a dry twig and alarm all the reds +and whites for two hundred yards around. Every time a Cooper person is +in peril, and absolute silence is worth four dollars a minute, he is sure +to step on a dry twig. There may be a hundred handier things to step on, +but that wouldn't satisfy Cooper. Cooper requires him to turn out and +find a dry twig; and if he can't do it, go and borrow one. In fact, the +Leather Stocking Series ought to have been called the Broken Twig Series. + +I am sorry there is not room to put in a few dozen instances of the +delicate art of the forest, as practised by Natty Bumppo and some of the +other Cooperian experts. Perhaps we may venture two or three samples. +Cooper was a sailor--a naval officer; yet he gravely tells us how a +vessel, driving towards a lee shore in a gale, is steered for a +particular spot by her skipper because he knows of an undertow there +which will hold her back against the gale and save her. For just pure +woodcraft, or sailorcraft, or whatever it is, isn't that neat? For +several years Cooper was daily in the society of artillery, and he ought +to have noticed that when a cannon-ball strikes the ground it either +buries itself or skips a hundred feet or so; skips again a hundred feet +or so--and so on, till finally it gets tired and rolls. Now in one place +he loses some "females"--as he always calls women--in the edge of a wood +near a plain at night in a fog, on purpose to give Bumppo a chance to +show off the delicate art of the forest before the reader. These mislaid +people are hunting for a fort. They hear a cannonblast, and a cannon- +ball presently comes rolling into the wood and stops at their feet. To +the females this suggests nothing. The case is very different with the +admirable Bumppo. I wish I may never know peace again if he doesn't +strike out promptly and follow the track of that cannon-ball across the +plain through the dense fog and find the fort. Isn't it a daisy? If +Cooper had any real knowledge of Nature's ways of doing things, he had a +most delicate art in concealing the fact. For instance: one of his acute +Indian experts, Chingachgook (pronounced Chicago, I think), has lost the +trail of a person he is tracking through the forest. Apparently that +trail is hopelessly lost. Neither you nor I could ever have guessed out +the way to find it. It was very different with Chicago. Chicago was not +stumped for long. He turned a running stream out of its course, and +there, in the slush in its old bed, were that person's moccasin-tracks. +The current did not wash them away, as it would have done in all other +like cases--no, even the eternal laws of Nature have to vacate when +Cooper wants to put up a delicate job of woodcraft on the reader. + +We must be a little wary when Brander Matthews tells us that Cooper's +books "reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention." As a rule, I am +quite willing to accept Brander Matthews's literary judgments and applaud +his lucid and graceful phrasing of them; but that particular statement +needs to be taken with a few tons of salt. Bless your heart, Cooper +hadn't any more invention than a horse; and I don't mean a high-class +horse, either; I mean a clothes-horse. It would be very difficult to +find a really clever "situation" in Cooper's books, and still more +difficult to find one of any kind which he has failed to render absurd by +his handling of it. Look at the episodes of "the caves"; and at the +celebrated scuffle between Maqua and those others on the table-land a few +days later; and at Hurry Harry's queer water-transit from the castle to +the ark; and at Deerslayer's half-hour with his first corpse; and at the +quarrel between Hurry Harry and Deerslayer later; and at--but choose for +yourself; you can't go amiss. + +If Cooper had been an observer his inventive faculty would have worked +better; not more interestingly, but more rationally, more plausibly. +Cooper's proudest creations in the way of "situations" suffer noticeably +from the absence of the observer's protecting gift. Cooper's eye was +splendidly inaccurate. Cooper seldom saw anything correctly. He saw +nearly all things as through a glass eye, darkly. Of course a man who +cannot see the commonest little every-day matters accurately is working +at a disadvantage when he is constructing a "situation." In the +Deerslayer tale Cooper has a stream which is fifty feet wide where it +flows out of a lake; it presently narrows to twenty as it meanders along +for no given reason; and yet when a stream acts like that it ought to be +required to explain itself. Fourteen pages later the width of the +brook's outlet from the lake has suddenly shrunk thirty feet, and become +"the narrowest part of the stream." This shrinkage is not accounted for. +The stream has bends in it, a sure indication that it has alluvial banks +and cuts them; yet these bends are only thirty and fifty feet long. If +Cooper had been a nice and punctilious observer he would have noticed +that the bends were oftener nine hundred feet long than short of it. + +Cooper made the exit of that stream fifty feet wide, in the first place, +for no particular reason; in the second place, he narrowed it to less +than twenty to accommodate some Indians. He bends a "sapling" to the +form of an arch over this narrow passage, and conceals six Indians in its +foliage. They are "laying" for a settler's scow or ark which is coming +up the stream on its way to the lake; it is being hauled against the +stiff current by a rope whose stationary end is anchored in the lake; its +rate of progress cannot be more than a mile an hour. Cooper describes +the ark, but pretty obscurely. In the matter of dimensions "it was +little more than a modern canal-boat." Let us guess, then, that it was +about one hundred and forty feet long. It was of "greater breadth than +common." Let us guess, then, that it was about sixteen feet wide. This +leviathan had been prowling down bends which were but a third as long as +itself, and scraping between banks where it had only two feet of space to +spare on each side. We cannot too much admire this miracle. A low- +roofed log dwelling occupies "two-thirds of the ark's length"--a dwelling +ninety feet long and sixteen feet wide, let us say a kind of vestibule +train. The dwelling has two rooms--each forty-five feet long and sixteen +feet wide, let us guess. One of them is the bedroom of the Hutter girls, +Judith and Hetty; the other is the parlor in the daytime, at night it is +papa's bedchamber. The ark is arriving at the stream's exit now, whose +width has been reduced to less than twenty feet to accommodate the +Indians--say to eighteen. There is a foot to spare on each side of the +boat. Did the Indians notice that there was going to be a tight squeeze +there? Did they notice that they could make money by climbing down out +of that arched sapling and just stepping aboard when the ark scraped by? +No, other Indians would have noticed these things, but Cooper's Indians +never notice anything. Cooper thinks they are marvelous creatures for +noticing, but he was almost always in error about his Indians. There was +seldom a sane one among them. + +The ark is one hundred and forty feet long; the dwelling is ninety feet +long. The idea of the Indians is to drop softly and secretly from the +arched sapling to the dwelling as the ark creeps along under it at the +rate of a mile an hour, and butcher the family. It will take the ark a +minute and a half to pass under. It will take the ninety foot dwelling a +minute to pass under. Now, then, what did the six Indians do? It would +take you thirty years to guess, and even then you would have to give it +up, I believe. Therefore, I will tell you what the Indians did. Their +chief, a person of quite extraordinary intellect for a Cooper Indian, +warily watched the canal-boat as it squeezed along under him, and when he +had got his calculations fined down to exactly the right shade, as he +judged, he let go and dropped. And missed the house! That is actually +what he did. He missed the house, and landed in the stern of the scow. +It was not much of a fall, yet it knocked him silly. He lay there +unconscious. If the house had been ninety-seven feet long he would have +made the trip. The fault was Cooper's, not his. The error lay in the +construction of the house. Cooper was no architect. + +There still remained in the roost five Indians. + +The boat has passed under and is now out of their reach. Let me explain +what the five did--you would not be able to reason it out for yourself. +No. 1 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water astern of it. Then No. +2 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water still farther astern of it. +Then No. 3 jumped for the boat, and fell a good way astern of it. Then +No, 4. jumped for the boat, and fell in the water away astern. Then +even No. 5 made a jump for the boat--for he was a Cooper Indian. In the +matter of intellect, the difference between a Cooper Indian and the +Indian that stands in front of the cigarshop is not spacious. The scow +episode is really a sublime burst of invention; but it does not thrill, +because the inaccuracy of the details throws a sort of air of +fictitiousness and general improbability over it. This comes of Cooper's +inadequacy as an observer. + +The reader will find some examples of Cooper's high talent for inaccurate +observation in the account of the shooting-match in The Pathfinder. + + "A common wrought nail was driven lightly into the target, its + head having been first touched with paint." + +The color of the paint is not stated--an important omission, but Cooper +deals freely in important omissions. No, after all, it was not an +important omission; for this nail-head is a hundred yards from the +marksmen, and could not be seen by them at that distance, no matter what +its color might be. + +How far can the best eyes see a common house-fly? A hundred yards? It +is quite impossible. Very well; eyes that cannot see a house-fly that is +a hundred yards away cannot see an ordinary nailhead at that distance, +for the size of the two objects is the same. It takes a keen eye to see +a fly or a nailhead at fifty yards--one hundred and fifty feet. Can the +reader do it? + +The nail was lightly driven, its head painted, and game called. Then the +Cooper miracles began. The bullet of the first marksman chipped an edge +off the nail-head; the next man's bullet drove the nail a little way into +the target--and removed all the paint. Haven't the miracles gone far +enough now? Not to suit Cooper; for the purpose of this whole scheme is +to show off his prodigy, Deerslayer Hawkeye--Long-Rifle-Leather-Stocking- +Pathfinder-Bumppo before the ladies. + + "'Be all ready to clench it, boys I' cried out Pathfinder, + stepping into his friend's tracks the instant they were vacant. + 'Never mind a new nail; I can see that, though the paint is + gone, and what I can see I can hit at a hundred yards, though + it were only a mosquito's eye. Be ready to clench!' + +"The rifle cracked, the bullet sped its way, and the head of the nail was +buried in the wood, covered by the piece of flattened lead." + +There, you see, is a man who could hunt flies with a rifle, and command a +ducal salary in a Wild West show to-day if we had him back with us. + +The recorded feat is certainly surprising just as it stands; but it is +not surprising enough for Cooper. Cooper adds a touch. He has made +Pathfinder do this miracle with another man's rifle; and not only that, +but Pathfinder did not have even the advantage of loading it himself. He +had everything against him, and yet he made that impossible shot; and not +only made it, but did it with absolute confidence, saying, "Be ready to +clench." Now a person like that would have undertaken that same feat +with a brickbat, and with Cooper to help he would have achieved it, too. + +Pathfinder showed off handsomely that day before the ladies. His very +first feat was a thing which no Wild West show can touch. He was +standing with the group of marksmen, observing--a hundred yards from the +target, mind; one jasper raised his rifle and drove the centre of the +bull's-eye. Then the Quartermaster fired. The target exhibited no +result this time. There was a laugh. "It's a dead miss," said Major +Lundie. Pathfinder waited an impressive moment or two; then said, in +that calm, indifferent, know-it-all way of his, "No, Major, he has +covered jasper's bullet, as will be seen if any one will take the trouble +to examine the target." + +Wasn't it remarkable! How could he see that little pellet fly through +the air and enter that distant bullet-hole? Yet that is what he did; for +nothing is impossible to a Cooper person. Did any of those people have +any deep-seated doubts about this thing? No; for that would imply +sanity, and these were all Cooper people. + + "The respect for Pathfinder's skill and for his 'quickness and + accuracy of sight'" (the italics [''] are mine) "was so + profound and general, that the instant he made this declaration + the spectators began to distrust their own opinions, and a + dozen rushed to the target in order to ascertain the fact. + There, sure enough, it was found that the Quartermaster's + bullet had gone through the hole made by Jasper's, and that, + too, so accurately as to require a minute examination to be + certain of the circumstance, which, however, was soon clearly + established by discovering one bullet over the other in the + stump against which the target was placed." + +They made a "minute" examination; but never mind, how could they know +that there were two bullets in that hole without digging the latest one +out? for neither probe nor eyesight could prove the presence of any more +than one bullet. Did they dig? No; as we shall see. It is the +Pathfinder's turn now; he steps out before the ladies, takes aim, and +fires. + +But, alas! here is a disappointment; an incredible, an unimaginable +disappointment--for the target's aspect is unchanged; there is nothing +there but that same old bullet-hole! + + "'If one dared to hint at such a thing,' cried Major Duncan, 'I + should say that the Pathfinder has also missed the target!'" + +As nobody had missed it yet, the "also" was not necessary; but never mind +about that, for the Pathfinder is going to speak. + + "'No, no, Major,' said he, confidently, 'that would be a risky + declaration. I didn't load the piece, and can't say what was + in it; but if it was lead, you will find the bullet driving + down those of the Quartermaster and Jasper, else is not my name + Pathfinder.' + + "A shout from the target announced the truth of this + assertion." + +Is the miracle sufficient as it stands? Not for Cooper. The Pathfinder +speaks again, as he "now slowly advances towards the stage occupied by +the females": + + "'That's not all, boys, that's not all; if you find the target + touched at all, I'll own to a miss. The Quartermaster cut the + wood, but you'll find no wood cut by that last messenger." + +The miracle is at last complete. He knew--doubtless saw--at the distance +of a hundred yards--that his bullet had passed into the hole without +fraying the edges. There were now three bullets in that one hole--three +bullets embedded processionally in the body of the stump back of the +target. Everybody knew this--somehow or other--and yet nobody had dug +any of them out to make sure. Cooper is not a close observer, but he is +interesting. He is certainly always that, no matter what happens. And +he is more interesting when he is not noticing what he is about than when +he is. This is a considerable merit. + +The conversations in the Cooper books have a curious sound in our modern +ears. To believe that such talk really ever came out of people's mouths +would be to believe that there was a time when time was of no value to a +person who thought he had something to say; when it was the custom to +spread a two-minute remark out to ten; when a man's mouth was a rolling- +mill, and busied itself all day long in turning four-foot pigs of thought +into thirty-foot bars of conversational railroad iron by attenuation; +when subjects were seldom faithfully stuck to, but the talk wandered all +around and arrived nowhere; when conversations consisted mainly of +irrelevancies, with here and there a relevancy, a relevancy with an +embarrassed look, as not being able to explain how it got there. + +Cooper was certainly not a master in the construction of dialogue. +Inaccurate observation defeated him here as it defeated him in so many +other enterprises of his. He even failed to notice that the man who +talks corrupt English six days in the week must and will talk it on the +seventh, and can't help himself. In the Deerslayer story he lets +Deerslayer talk the showiest kind of book-talk sometimes, and at other +times the basest of base dialects. For instance, when some one asks him +if he has a sweetheart, and if so, where she abides, this is his majestic +answer: + + "'She's in the forest-hanging from the boughs of the trees, in + a soft rain--in the dew on the open grass--the clouds that + float about in the blue heavens--the birds that sing in the + woods--the sweet springs where I slake my thirst--and in all + the other glorious gifts that come from God's Providence!'" + +And he preceded that, a little before, with this: + + "'It consarns me as all things that touches a fri'nd consarns a + fri'nd.'" + +And this is another of his remarks: + + "'If I was Injin born, now, I might tell of this, or carry in + the scalp and boast of the expl'ite afore the whole tribe; or + if my inimy had only been a bear'"--and so on. + +We cannot imagine such a thing as a veteran Scotch Commander-in-Chief +comporting himself in the field like a windy melodramatic actor, but +Cooper could. On one occasion Alice and Cora were being chased by the +French through a fog in the neighborhood of their father's fort: + + "'Point de quartier aux coquins!' cried an eager pursuer, who + seemed to direct the operations of the enemy. + + "'Stand firm and be ready, my gallant Goths!' suddenly + exclaimed a voice above them; wait to see the enemy; fire low, + and sweep the glacis.' + + "'Father? father!' exclaimed a piercing cry from out the mist; + it is I! Alice! thy own Elsie! spare, O! save your daughters!' + + "'Hold!' shouted the former speaker, in the awful tones of + parental agony, the sound reaching even to the woods, and + rolling back in solemn echo. "Tis she! God has restored me my + children! Throw open the sally-port; to the field, Goths, to + the field! pull not a trigger, lest ye kill my lambs! Drive + off these dogs of France with your steel!'" + +Cooper's word-sense was singularly dull. When a person has a poor ear +for music he will flat and sharp right along without knowing it. He +keeps near the tune, but it is not the tune. When a person has a poor +ear for words, the result is a literary flatting and sharping; you +perceive what he is intending to say, but you also perceive that he +doesn't say it. This is Cooper. He was not a word-musician. His ear +was satisfied with the approximate word. I will furnish some +circumstantial evidence in support of this charge. My instances are +gathered from half a dozen pages of the tale called Deerslayer. He uses +"verbal," for "oral"; "precision," for "facility"; "phenomena," for +"marvels"; "necessary," for "predetermined"; "unsophisticated," for +"primitive"; "preparation," for "expectancy"; "rebuked," for "subdued"; +"dependent on," for "resulting from"; "fact," for "condition"; "fact," +for "conjecture"; "precaution," for "caution"; "explain," for +"determine"; "mortified," for "disappointed"; "meretricious," for +"factitious"; "materially," for "considerably"; "decreasing," for +"deepening"; "increasing," for "disappearing"; "embedded," for +"enclosed"; "treacherous;" for "hostile"; "stood," for "stooped"; +"softened," for "replaced"; "rejoined," for "remarked"; "situation," for +"condition"; "different," for "differing"; "insensible," for +"unsentient"; "brevity," for "celerity"; "distrusted," for "suspicious"; +"mental imbecility," for "imbecility"; "eyes," for "sight"; +"counteracting," for "opposing"; "funeral obsequies," for "obsequies." + +There have been daring people in the world who claimed that Cooper could +write English, but they are all dead now--all dead but Lounsbury. +I don't remember that Lounsbury makes the claim in so many words, still +he makes it, for he says that Deerslayer is a "pure work of art." +Pure, in that connection, means faultless--faultless in all details and +language is a detail. If Mr. Lounsbury had only compared Cooper's +English with the English which he writes himself--but it is plain that he +didn't; and so it is likely that he imagines until this day that Cooper's +is as clean and compact as his own. Now I feel sure, deep down in my +heart, that Cooper wrote about the poorest English that exists in our +language, and that the English of Deerslayer is the very worst that even +Cooper ever wrote. + +I may be mistaken, but it does seem to me that Deerslayer is not a work +of art in any sense; it does seem to me that it is destitute of every +detail that goes to the making of a work of art; in truth, it seems to me +that Deerslayer is just simply a literary delirium tremens. + +A work of art? It has no invention; it has no order, system, sequence, +or result; it has no lifelikeness, no thrill, no stir, no seeming of +reality; its characters are confusedly drawn, and by their acts and words +they prove that they are not the sort of people the author claims that +they are; its humor is pathetic; its pathos is funny; its conversations +are--oh! indescribable; its love-scenes odious; its English a crime +against the language. + +Counting these out, what is left is Art. I think we must all admit that. + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext of Fenimore Cooper Offences, by Mark Twain + diff --git a/old/mtfco10.zip b/old/mtfco10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0cad8e2 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mtfco10.zip diff --git a/old/mtfco11.txt b/old/mtfco11.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..64246af --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mtfco11.txt @@ -0,0 +1,878 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext of Fennimore Cooper Offences, +by Mark Twain, #33 in our series by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before distributing this or any other +Project Gutenberg file. + +We encourage you to keep this file, exactly as it is, on your +own disk, thereby keeping an electronic path open for future +readers. Please do not remove this. + +This header should be the first thing seen when anyone starts to +view the etext. Do not change or edit it without written permission. +The words are carefully chosen to provide users with the +information they need to understand what they may and may not +do with the etext. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These Etexts Are Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get etexts, and +further information, is included below. We need your donations. + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a 501(c)(3) +organization with EIN [Employee Identification Number] 64-6221541 + + + +Title: Fennimore Cooper's Literary Offences + +Author: Mark Twain + +Release Date: April, 2002 [Etext #3172] +[Yes, we are about one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on February 8, 2001] +[Most recently updated: November 29, 2001] + +Edition: 11 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +The Project Gutenberg Etext of Fennimore Cooper Offences, by Mark Twain +**********This file should be named mtfco11.txt or mtfco11.zip********* + +Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, mtfco12.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, mtfco11a.txt + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + +Project Gutenberg Etexts are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we usually do not +keep etexts in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +We are now trying to release all our etexts one year in advance +of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing. +Please be encouraged to tell us about any error or corrections, +even years after the official publication date. + +Please note neither this listing nor its contents are final til +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. + +Most people start at our sites at: +http://gutenberg.net or +http://promo.net/pg + +These Web sites include award-winning information about Project +Gutenberg, including how to donate, how to help produce our new +etexts, and how to subscribe to our email newsletter (free!). + + +Those of you who want to download any Etext before announcement +can get to them as follows, and just download by date. This is +also a good way to get them instantly upon announcement, as the +indexes our cataloguers produce obviously take a while after an +announcement goes out in the Project Gutenberg Newsletter. + +http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/etext03 or +ftp://ftp.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/etext03 + +Or /etext02, 01, 00, 99, 98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90 + +Just search by the first five letters of the filename you want, +as it appears in our Newsletters. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours +to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. Our +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If the value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 +million dollars per hour in 2001 as we release over 50 new Etext +files per month, or 500 more Etexts in 2000 for a total of 4000+ +If they reach just 1-2% of the world's population then the total +should reach over 300 billion Etexts given away by year's end. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext +Files by December 31, 2001. [10,000 x 100,000,000 = 1 Trillion] +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only about 4% of the present number of computer users. + +At our revised rates of production, we will reach only one-third +of that goal by the end of 2001, or about 4,000 Etexts. We need +funding, as well as continued efforts by volunteers, to maintain +or increase our production and reach our goals. + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been created +to secure a future for Project Gutenberg into the next millennium. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +As of November, 2001, contributions are being solicited from people +and organizations in: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, +Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, +Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New +Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, +Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, +Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, +and Wyoming. + +*In Progress + +We have filed in about 45 states now, but these are the only ones +that have responded. + +As the requirements for other states are met, additions to this list +will be made and fund raising will begin in the additional states. +Please feel free to ask to check the status of your state. + +In answer to various questions we have received on this: + +We are constantly working on finishing the paperwork to legally +request donations in all 50 states. If your state is not listed and +you would like to know if we have added it since the list you have, +just ask. + +While we cannot solicit donations from people in states where we are +not yet registered, we know of no prohibition against accepting +donations from donors in these states who approach us with an offer to +donate. + +International donations are accepted, but we don't know ANYTHING about +how to make them tax-deductible, or even if they CAN be made +deductible, and don't have the staff to handle it even if there are +ways. + +All donations should be made to: + +Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +PMB 113 +1739 University Ave. +Oxford, MS 38655-4109 + +Contact us if you want to arrange for a wire transfer or payment +method other than by check or money order. + + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation has been approved by +the US Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) organization with EIN +[Employee Identification Number] 64-622154. Donations are +tax-deductible to the maximum extent permitted by law. As fundraising +requirements for other states are met, additions to this list will be +made and fundraising will begin in the additional states. + +We need your donations more than ever! + +You can get up to date donation information at: + +http://www.gutenberg.net/donation.html + + +*** + +If you can't reach Project Gutenberg, +you can always email directly to: + +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> + +Prof. Hart will answer or forward your message. + +We would prefer to send you information by email. + + +**The Legal Small Print** + + +(Three Pages) + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you may distribute copies of this etext if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etexts, +is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor Michael S. Hart +through the Project Gutenberg Association (the "Project"). +Among other things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext +under the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +Please do not use the "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark to market +any commercial products without permission. + +To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] Michael Hart and the Foundation (and any other party you may +receive this etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims +all liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold Michael Hart, the Foundation, +and its trustees and agents, and any volunteers associated +with the production and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm +texts harmless, from all liability, cost and expense, including +legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of the +following that you do or cause: [1] distribution of this etext, +[2] alteration, modification, or addition to the etext, +or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word + processing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the etext (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Foundation of 20% of the + gross profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation" + the 60 days following each date you prepare (or were + legally required to prepare) your annual (or equivalent + periodic) tax return. Please contact us beforehand to + let us know your plans and to work out the details. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +Project Gutenberg is dedicated to increasing the number of +public domain and licensed works that can be freely distributed +in machine readable form. + +The Project gratefully accepts contributions of money, time, +public domain materials, or royalty free copyright licenses. +Money should be paid to the: +"Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +If you are interested in contributing scanning equipment or +software or other items, please contact Michael Hart at: +hart@pobox.com + +[Portions of this header are copyright (C) 2001 by Michael S. Hart +and may be reprinted only when these Etexts are free of all fees.] +[Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be used in any sales +of Project Gutenberg Etexts or other materials be they hardware or +software or any other related product without express permission.] + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.10/04/01*END* + + + + + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + + + +FENIMORE COOPER'S LITERARY OFFENCES + +by Mark Twain + + + + The Pathfinder and The Deerslayer stand at the head of Cooper's + novels as artistic creations. There are others of his works + which contain parts as perfect as are to be found in these, and + scenes even more thrilling. Not one can be compared with + either of them as a finished whole. + + The defects in both of these tales are comparatively slight. + They were pure works of art.--Prof. Lounsbury. + + + The five tales reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention. + . . . One of the very greatest characters in fiction, Natty + Bumppo . . . . + + The craft of the woodsman, the tricks of the trapper, all the + delicate art of the forest, were familiar to Cooper from his + youth up.--Prof. Brander Matthews. + + Cooper is the greatest artist in the domain of romantic fiction + yet produced by America.--Wilkie Collins. + + +It seems to me that it was far from right for the Professor of English +Literature in Yale, the Professor of English Literature in Columbia, and +Wilkie Collies to deliver opinions on Cooper's literature without having +read some of it. It would have been much more decorous to keep silent +and let persons talk who have read Cooper. + +Cooper's art has some defects. In one place in 'Deerslayer,' and in the +restricted space of two-thirds of a page, Cooper has scored 114 offences +against literary art out of a possible 115. It breaks the record. + +There are nineteen rules governing literary art in the domain of romantic +fiction--some say twenty-two. In Deerslayer Cooper violated eighteen of +them. These eighteen require: + +1. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. But the +Deerslayer tale accomplishes nothing and arrives in the air. + +2. They require that the episodes of a tale shall be necessary parts of +the tale, and shall help to develop it. But as the Deerslayer tale is +not a tale, and accomplishes nothing and arrives nowhere, the episodes +have no rightful place in the work, since there was nothing for them to +develop. + +3. They require that the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in +the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the +corpses from the others. But this detail has often been overlooked in +the Deerslayer tale. + +4. They require that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, +shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there. But this detail also +has been overlooked in the Deerslayer tale. + +5. They require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation, +the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings +would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a +discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of +relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject in hand, and be +interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the +people cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has +been ignored from the beginning of the Deerslayer tale to the end of it. + +6. They require that when the author describes the character of a +personage in his tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage +shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention +in the Deerslayer tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove. + +7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated, gilt- +edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven-dollar Friendship's Offering in the +beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel in the +end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the Deerslayer +tale. + +8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the +reader as "the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest," by +either the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is +persistently violated in the Deerslayer tale. + +9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves +to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, +the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and +reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the Deerslayer tale. + +10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep +interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he +shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad +ones. But the reader of the Deerslayer tale dislikes the good people in +it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned +together. + +11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly +defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given +emergency. But in the Deerslayer tale this rule is vacated. + +In addition to these large rules there are some little ones. These +require that the author shall: + +12. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it. + +13. Use the right word, not its second cousin. + +14. Eschew surplusage. + +15. Not omit necessary details. + +16. Avoid slovenliness of form. + +17. Use good grammar. + +18. Employ a simple and straightforward style. + +Even these seven are coldly and persistently violated in the Deerslayer +tale. + +Cooper's gift in the way of invention was not a rich endowment; but such +as it was he liked to work it, he was pleased with the effects, and +indeed he did some quite sweet things with it. In his little box of +stage properties he kept six or eight cunning devices, tricks, artifices +for his savages and woodsmen to deceive and circumvent each other with, +and he was never so happy as when he was working these innocent things +and seeing them go. A favorite one was to make a moccasined person tread +in the tracks of the moccasined enemy, and thus hide his own trail. +Cooper wore out barrels and barrels of moccasins in working that trick. +Another stage-property that he pulled out of his box pretty frequently +was his broken twig. He prized his broken twig above all the rest of his +effects, and worked it the hardest. It is a restful chapter in any book +of his when somebody doesn't step on a dry twig and alarm all the reds +and whites for two hundred yards around. Every time a Cooper person is +in peril, and absolute silence is worth four dollars a minute, he is sure +to step on a dry twig. There may be a hundred handier things to step on, +but that wouldn't satisfy Cooper. Cooper requires him to turn out and +find a dry twig; and if he can't do it, go and borrow one. In fact, the +Leather Stocking Series ought to have been called the Broken Twig Series. + +I am sorry there is not room to put in a few dozen instances of the +delicate art of the forest, as practised by Natty Bumppo and some of the +other Cooperian experts. Perhaps we may venture two or three samples. +Cooper was a sailor--a naval officer; yet he gravely tells us how a +vessel, driving towards a lee shore in a gale, is steered for a +particular spot by her skipper because he knows of an undertow there +which will hold her back against the gale and save her. For just pure +woodcraft, or sailorcraft, or whatever it is, isn't that neat? For +several years Cooper was daily in the society of artillery, and he ought +to have noticed that when a cannon-ball strikes the ground it either +buries itself or skips a hundred feet or so; skips again a hundred feet +or so--and so on, till finally it gets tired and rolls. Now in one place +he loses some "females"--as he always calls women--in the edge of a wood +near a plain at night in a fog, on purpose to give Bumppo a chance to +show off the delicate art of the forest before the reader. These mislaid +people are hunting for a fort. They hear a cannonblast, and a cannon- +ball presently comes rolling into the wood and stops at their feet. To +the females this suggests nothing. The case is very different with the +admirable Bumppo. I wish I may never know peace again if he doesn't +strike out promptly and follow the track of that cannon-ball across the +plain through the dense fog and find the fort. Isn't it a daisy? If +Cooper had any real knowledge of Nature's ways of doing things, he had a +most delicate art in concealing the fact. For instance: one of his acute +Indian experts, Chingachgook (pronounced Chicago, I think), has lost the +trail of a person he is tracking through the forest. Apparently that +trail is hopelessly lost. Neither you nor I could ever have guessed out +the way to find it. It was very different with Chicago. Chicago was not +stumped for long. He turned a running stream out of its course, and +there, in the slush in its old bed, were that person's moccasin-tracks. +The current did not wash them away, as it would have done in all other +like cases--no, even the eternal laws of Nature have to vacate when +Cooper wants to put up a delicate job of woodcraft on the reader. + +We must be a little wary when Brander Matthews tells us that Cooper's +books "reveal an extraordinary fulness of invention." As a rule, I am +quite willing to accept Brander Matthews's literary judgments and applaud +his lucid and graceful phrasing of them; but that particular statement +needs to be taken with a few tons of salt. Bless your heart, Cooper +hadn't any more invention than a horse; and I don't mean a high-class +horse, either; I mean a clothes-horse. It would be very difficult to +find a really clever "situation" in Cooper's books, and still more +difficult to find one of any kind which he has failed to render absurd by +his handling of it. Look at the episodes of "the caves"; and at the +celebrated scuffle between Maqua and those others on the table-land a few +days later; and at Hurry Harry's queer water-transit from the castle to +the ark; and at Deerslayer's half-hour with his first corpse; and at the +quarrel between Hurry Harry and Deerslayer later; and at--but choose for +yourself; you can't go amiss. + +If Cooper had been an observer his inventive faculty would have worked +better; not more interestingly, but more rationally, more plausibly. +Cooper's proudest creations in the way of "situations" suffer noticeably +from the absence of the observer's protecting gift. Cooper's eye was +splendidly inaccurate. Cooper seldom saw anything correctly. He saw +nearly all things as through a glass eye, darkly. Of course a man who +cannot see the commonest little every-day matters accurately is working +at a disadvantage when he is constructing a "situation." In the +Deerslayer tale Cooper has a stream which is fifty feet wide where it +flows out of a lake; it presently narrows to twenty as it meanders along +for no given reason; and yet when a stream acts like that it ought to be +required to explain itself. Fourteen pages later the width of the +brook's outlet from the lake has suddenly shrunk thirty feet, and become +"the narrowest part of the stream." This shrinkage is not accounted for. +The stream has bends in it, a sure indication that it has alluvial banks +and cuts them; yet these bends are only thirty and fifty feet long. If +Cooper had been a nice and punctilious observer he would have noticed +that the bends were oftener nine hundred feet long than short of it. + +Cooper made the exit of that stream fifty feet wide, in the first place, +for no particular reason; in the second place, he narrowed it to less +than twenty to accommodate some Indians. He bends a "sapling" to the +form of an arch over this narrow passage, and conceals six Indians in its +foliage. They are "laying" for a settler's scow or ark which is coming +up the stream on its way to the lake; it is being hauled against the +stiff current by a rope whose stationary end is anchored in the lake; its +rate of progress cannot be more than a mile an hour. Cooper describes +the ark, but pretty obscurely. In the matter of dimensions "it was +little more than a modern canal-boat." Let us guess, then, that it was +about one hundred and forty feet long. It was of "greater breadth than +common." Let us guess, then, that it was about sixteen feet wide. This +leviathan had been prowling down bends which were but a third as long as +itself, and scraping between banks where it had only two feet of space to +spare on each side. We cannot too much admire this miracle. A low- +roofed log dwelling occupies "two-thirds of the ark's length"--a dwelling +ninety feet long and sixteen feet wide, let us say a kind of vestibule +train. The dwelling has two rooms--each forty-five feet long and sixteen +feet wide, let us guess. One of them is the bedroom of the Hutter girls, +Judith and Hetty; the other is the parlor in the daytime, at night it is +papa's bedchamber. The ark is arriving at the stream's exit now, whose +width has been reduced to less than twenty feet to accommodate the +Indians--say to eighteen. There is a foot to spare on each side of the +boat. Did the Indians notice that there was going to be a tight squeeze +there? Did they notice that they could make money by climbing down out +of that arched sapling and just stepping aboard when the ark scraped by? +No, other Indians would have noticed these things, but Cooper's Indians +never notice anything. Cooper thinks they are marvelous creatures for +noticing, but he was almost always in error about his Indians. There was +seldom a sane one among them. + +The ark is one hundred and forty feet long; the dwelling is ninety feet +long. The idea of the Indians is to drop softly and secretly from the +arched sapling to the dwelling as the ark creeps along under it at the +rate of a mile an hour, and butcher the family. It will take the ark a +minute and a half to pass under. It will take the ninety foot dwelling a +minute to pass under. Now, then, what did the six Indians do? It would +take you thirty years to guess, and even then you would have to give it +up, I believe. Therefore, I will tell you what the Indians did. Their +chief, a person of quite extraordinary intellect for a Cooper Indian, +warily watched the canal-boat as it squeezed along under him, and when he +had got his calculations fined down to exactly the right shade, as he +judged, he let go and dropped. And missed the house! That is actually +what he did. He missed the house, and landed in the stern of the scow. +It was not much of a fall, yet it knocked him silly. He lay there +unconscious. If the house had been ninety-seven feet long he would have +made the trip. The fault was Cooper's, not his. The error lay in the +construction of the house. Cooper was no architect. + +There still remained in the roost five Indians. + +The boat has passed under and is now out of their reach. Let me explain +what the five did--you would not be able to reason it out for yourself. +No. 1 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water astern of it. Then No. +2 jumped for the boat, but fell in the water still farther astern of it. +Then No. 3 jumped for the boat, and fell a good way astern of it. Then +No, 4. jumped for the boat, and fell in the water away astern. Then +even No. 5 made a jump for the boat--for he was a Cooper Indian. In the +matter of intellect, the difference between a Cooper Indian and the +Indian that stands in front of the cigarshop is not spacious. The scow +episode is really a sublime burst of invention; but it does not thrill, +because the inaccuracy of the details throws a sort of air of +fictitiousness and general improbability over it. This comes of Cooper's +inadequacy as an observer. + +The reader will find some examples of Cooper's high talent for inaccurate +observation in the account of the shooting-match in The Pathfinder. + + "A common wrought nail was driven lightly into the target, its + head having been first touched with paint." + +The color of the paint is not stated--an important omission, but Cooper +deals freely in important omissions. No, after all, it was not an +important omission; for this nail-head is a hundred yards from the +marksmen, and could not be seen by them at that distance, no matter what +its color might be. + +How far can the best eyes see a common house-fly? A hundred yards? It +is quite impossible. Very well; eyes that cannot see a house-fly that is +a hundred yards away cannot see an ordinary nailhead at that distance, +for the size of the two objects is the same. It takes a keen eye to see +a fly or a nailhead at fifty yards--one hundred and fifty feet. Can the +reader do it? + +The nail was lightly driven, its head painted, and game called. Then the +Cooper miracles began. The bullet of the first marksman chipped an edge +off the nail-head; the next man's bullet drove the nail a little way into +the target--and removed all the paint. Haven't the miracles gone far +enough now? Not to suit Cooper; for the purpose of this whole scheme is +to show off his prodigy, Deerslayer Hawkeye--Long-Rifle-Leather-Stocking- +Pathfinder-Bumppo before the ladies. + + "'Be all ready to clench it, boys I' cried out Pathfinder, + stepping into his friend's tracks the instant they were vacant. + 'Never mind a new nail; I can see that, though the paint is + gone, and what I can see I can hit at a hundred yards, though + it were only a mosquito's eye. Be ready to clench!' + +"The rifle cracked, the bullet sped its way, and the head of the nail was +buried in the wood, covered by the piece of flattened lead." + +There, you see, is a man who could hunt flies with a rifle, and command a +ducal salary in a Wild West show to-day if we had him back with us. + +The recorded feat is certainly surprising just as it stands; but it is +not surprising enough for Cooper. Cooper adds a touch. He has made +Pathfinder do this miracle with another man's rifle; and not only that, +but Pathfinder did not have even the advantage of loading it himself. He +had everything against him, and yet he made that impossible shot; and not +only made it, but did it with absolute confidence, saying, "Be ready to +clench." Now a person like that would have undertaken that same feat +with a brickbat, and with Cooper to help he would have achieved it, too. + +Pathfinder showed off handsomely that day before the ladies. His very +first feat was a thing which no Wild West show can touch. He was +standing with the group of marksmen, observing--a hundred yards from the +target, mind; one jasper raised his rifle and drove the centre of the +bull's-eye. Then the Quartermaster fired. The target exhibited no +result this time. There was a laugh. "It's a dead miss," said Major +Lundie. Pathfinder waited an impressive moment or two; then said, in +that calm, indifferent, know-it-all way of his, "No, Major, he has +covered jasper's bullet, as will be seen if any one will take the trouble +to examine the target." + +Wasn't it remarkable! How could he see that little pellet fly through +the air and enter that distant bullet-hole? Yet that is what he did; for +nothing is impossible to a Cooper person. Did any of those people have +any deep-seated doubts about this thing? No; for that would imply +sanity, and these were all Cooper people. + + "The respect for Pathfinder's skill and for his 'quickness and + accuracy of sight'" (the italics [''] are mine) "was so + profound and general, that the instant he made this declaration + the spectators began to distrust their own opinions, and a + dozen rushed to the target in order to ascertain the fact. + There, sure enough, it was found that the Quartermaster's + bullet had gone through the hole made by Jasper's, and that, + too, so accurately as to require a minute examination to be + certain of the circumstance, which, however, was soon clearly + established by discovering one bullet over the other in the + stump against which the target was placed." + +They made a "minute" examination; but never mind, how could they know +that there were two bullets in that hole without digging the latest one +out? for neither probe nor eyesight could prove the presence of any more +than one bullet. Did they dig? No; as we shall see. It is the +Pathfinder's turn now; he steps out before the ladies, takes aim, and +fires. + +But, alas! here is a disappointment; an incredible, an unimaginable +disappointment--for the target's aspect is unchanged; there is nothing +there but that same old bullet-hole! + + "'If one dared to hint at such a thing,' cried Major Duncan, 'I + should say that the Pathfinder has also missed the target!'" + +As nobody had missed it yet, the "also" was not necessary; but never mind +about that, for the Pathfinder is going to speak. + + "'No, no, Major,' said he, confidently, 'that would be a risky + declaration. I didn't load the piece, and can't say what was + in it; but if it was lead, you will find the bullet driving + down those of the Quartermaster and Jasper, else is not my name + Pathfinder.' + + "A shout from the target announced the truth of this + assertion." + +Is the miracle sufficient as it stands? Not for Cooper. The Pathfinder +speaks again, as he "now slowly advances towards the stage occupied by +the females": + + "'That's not all, boys, that's not all; if you find the target + touched at all, I'll own to a miss. The Quartermaster cut the + wood, but you'll find no wood cut by that last messenger." + +The miracle is at last complete. He knew--doubtless saw--at the distance +of a hundred yards--that his bullet had passed into the hole without +fraying the edges. There were now three bullets in that one hole--three +bullets embedded processionally in the body of the stump back of the +target. Everybody knew this--somehow or other--and yet nobody had dug +any of them out to make sure. Cooper is not a close observer, but he is +interesting. He is certainly always that, no matter what happens. And +he is more interesting when he is not noticing what he is about than when +he is. This is a considerable merit. + +The conversations in the Cooper books have a curious sound in our modern +ears. To believe that such talk really ever came out of people's mouths +would be to believe that there was a time when time was of no value to a +person who thought he had something to say; when it was the custom to +spread a two-minute remark out to ten; when a man's mouth was a rolling- +mill, and busied itself all day long in turning four-foot pigs of thought +into thirty-foot bars of conversational railroad iron by attenuation; +when subjects were seldom faithfully stuck to, but the talk wandered all +around and arrived nowhere; when conversations consisted mainly of +irrelevancies, with here and there a relevancy, a relevancy with an +embarrassed look, as not being able to explain how it got there. + +Cooper was certainly not a master in the construction of dialogue. +Inaccurate observation defeated him here as it defeated him in so many +other enterprises of his. He even failed to notice that the man who +talks corrupt English six days in the week must and will talk it on the +seventh, and can't help himself. In the Deerslayer story he lets +Deerslayer talk the showiest kind of book-talk sometimes, and at other +times the basest of base dialects. For instance, when some one asks him +if he has a sweetheart, and if so, where she abides, this is his majestic +answer: + + "'She's in the forest-hanging from the boughs of the trees, in + a soft rain--in the dew on the open grass--the clouds that + float about in the blue heavens--the birds that sing in the + woods--the sweet springs where I slake my thirst--and in all + the other glorious gifts that come from God's Providence!'" + +And he preceded that, a little before, with this: + + "'It consarns me as all things that touches a fri'nd consarns a + fri'nd.'" + +And this is another of his remarks: + + "'If I was Injin born, now, I might tell of this, or carry in + the scalp and boast of the expl'ite afore the whole tribe; or + if my inimy had only been a bear'"--and so on. + +We cannot imagine such a thing as a veteran Scotch Commander-in-Chief +comporting himself in the field like a windy melodramatic actor, but +Cooper could. On one occasion Alice and Cora were being chased by the +French through a fog in the neighborhood of their father's fort: + + "'Point de quartier aux coquins!' cried an eager pursuer, who + seemed to direct the operations of the enemy. + + "'Stand firm and be ready, my gallant Goths!' suddenly + exclaimed a voice above them; wait to see the enemy; fire low, + and sweep the glacis.' + + "'Father? father!' exclaimed a piercing cry from out the mist; + it is I! Alice! thy own Elsie! spare, O! save your daughters!' + + "'Hold!' shouted the former speaker, in the awful tones of + parental agony, the sound reaching even to the woods, and + rolling back in solemn echo. ''Tis she! God has restored me my + children! Throw open the sally-port; to the field, Goths, to + the field! pull not a trigger, lest ye kill my lambs! Drive + off these dogs of France with your steel!'" + +Cooper's word-sense was singularly dull. When a person has a poor ear +for music he will flat and sharp right along without knowing it. He +keeps near the tune, but it is not the tune. When a person has a poor +ear for words, the result is a literary flatting and sharping; you +perceive what he is intending to say, but you also perceive that he +doesn't say it. This is Cooper. He was not a word-musician. His ear +was satisfied with the approximate word. I will furnish some +circumstantial evidence in support of this charge. My instances are +gathered from half a dozen pages of the tale called Deerslayer. He uses +"verbal," for "oral"; "precision," for "facility"; "phenomena," for +"marvels"; "necessary," for "predetermined"; "unsophisticated," for +"primitive"; "preparation," for "expectancy"; "rebuked," for "subdued"; +"dependent on," for "resulting from"; "fact," for "condition"; "fact," +for "conjecture"; "precaution," for "caution"; "explain," for +"determine"; "mortified," for "disappointed"; "meretricious," for +"factitious"; "materially," for "considerably"; "decreasing," for +"deepening"; "increasing," for "disappearing"; "embedded," for +"enclosed"; "treacherous;" for "hostile"; "stood," for "stooped"; +"softened," for "replaced"; "rejoined," for "remarked"; "situation," for +"condition"; "different," for "differing"; "insensible," for +"unsentient"; "brevity," for "celerity"; "distrusted," for "suspicious"; +"mental imbecility," for "imbecility"; "eyes," for "sight"; +"counteracting," for "opposing"; "funeral obsequies," for "obsequies." + +There have been daring people in the world who claimed that Cooper could +write English, but they are all dead now--all dead but Lounsbury. +I don't remember that Lounsbury makes the claim in so many words, still +he makes it, for he says that Deerslayer is a "pure work of art." +Pure, in that connection, means faultless--faultless in all details and +language is a detail. If Mr. Lounsbury had only compared Cooper's +English with the English which he writes himself--but it is plain that he +didn't; and so it is likely that he imagines until this day that Cooper's +is as clean and compact as his own. Now I feel sure, deep down in my +heart, that Cooper wrote about the poorest English that exists in our +language, and that the English of Deerslayer is the very worst that even +Cooper ever wrote. + +I may be mistaken, but it does seem to me that Deerslayer is not a work +of art in any sense; it does seem to me that it is destitute of every +detail that goes to the making of a work of art; in truth, it seems to me +that Deerslayer is just simply a literary delirium tremens. + +A work of art? It has no invention; it has no order, system, sequence, +or result; it has no lifelikeness, no thrill, no stir, no seeming of +reality; its characters are confusedly drawn, and by their acts and words +they prove that they are not the sort of people the author claims that +they are; its humor is pathetic; its pathos is funny; its conversations +are--oh! indescribable; its love-scenes odious; its English a crime +against the language. + +Counting these out, what is left is Art. I think we must all admit that. + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Fennimore Cooper's Literary Offences +by Mark Twain + diff --git a/old/mtfco11.zip b/old/mtfco11.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..72c9d93 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/mtfco11.zip |