December 31, 2023 • 31 mins
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow follows Ichabod Crane, a superstitious schoolteacher, who competes for Katrina Van Tassel’s love. One eerie night, he encounters the legendary Headless Horseman, leading to his mysterious disappearance, leaving Sleepy Hollow haunted forever. Summary by Dream AudioBooks
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Part last of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, written by
Washington Irving, presented by Dream Audio Books.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Ichabod prided himself upon his dancing as much as upon
his vocal powers. Not a limb, not a fiber about
him was idle, And to have seen his loosely hung
frame in full motion and clattering about the room, you
would have thought Saint Vitas himself, that blessed patron of
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the dance, was figuring before you in person. He was
the admiration of all the negroes, who, having gathered of
all ages and sizes from the farm and the neighborhood,
stood forming a pyramid of shining black faces at every
door and window, gazing with delight at the scene, rolling
their white eyeballs, and showing grinning rows of ivory from
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ear to ear. How could the flogger of urchins be
otherwise than animated and joyous. The lady of his heart
was his partner in the dance, and smiling graciously in
reply to all his amorous oglings, while brom Bones, sorely
smitten with love and jealousy, sat brooding by himself in
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one corner. When the dance was at an end, Ichabod
was attracted to a knot of the Sager folks, who,
with Old van Tussel, sat smoking at one end of
the piazza, gossiping over farmer times and drawing out long
stories about the war. This neighborhood, at the time of
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which I am speaking, was one of those highly favored
places which abound with chronicle and great men. The British
and American line had run near it during the war.
It had therefore been the scene of marauding and infesting
with refugees, cowboys, and all kinds of border chivalry. Just
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sufficient time had elapsed to enable each storyteller to dress
up his tale with a little becoming fiction, and in
the indistinctness of his recollection, to make himself the hero
of every exploit. There was the story of Doufu Martling,
a large blue bearded Dutchman who had nearly taken a
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British frigate with an old r nine pounder from a
mud breastwork, only that his gun burst at the sixth discharge.
And there was an old gentleman, who shall be nameless,
being too rich a mine here to be lightly mentioned,
who in the Battle of White Plains, being an excellent
master of defense carried a musketball with a small sword,
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insomuch that he absolutely felt it whiz round the blade
and glance off at the hilt, in proof of which
he was ready at any time to show the sword
with the hilt a little bent. There were several more
that had been equally great in the field, not one
of whom but was persuaded that he had a considerable
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hand in bringing the war to a happy termination. But
all these were nothing to the tales of ghosts and
apparitions that succeeded. The neighborhood is rich in legendary treasures
of the kind. Local tales and superstitions thrive best in
these sheltered, long settled retreats, but are trampled under foot
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by the shifting throng that forms the population of most
of our country places. Besides, there is no encouragement for
ghosts in most of our villages, for they have scarcely
had time to finish their first nap and turn themselves
in their graves before their surviving friends have traveled away
from the neighborhood, so that when they turn out at
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night to walk their rounds, they have no acquaintance left
to call upon. This is perhaps the reason why we
so seldom hear of ghosts, except in our long established
Dutch communities. The immediate cause, however, of the prevalence of
supernatural stories in these parts, was doubtless owing to the
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vicinity of Sleepy Hollow. There was a contagion in the
very air that blew from that haunted region. It breathed
forth an atmosphere of dreams and fancies, infecting all the land.
Several of the Sleepy Hollow people were present at von Tussel's,
and as usual, were doling out their wild and wonderful legends.
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Many dismal tales were told about funeral trains and morning
cries and willings heard and seen about the Great Tree,
where the unfortunate Major Andre was taken, and which stood
in the neighborhood. Some mention was made also of the
woman in white that haunted the dark glen at Raven Rock,
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and was also often heard to shriek on winter nights
before a storm, having perished there in the snow. The
chief part of the stories, however, turned upon the favorite
specter of Sleepy Hollow, the headless Horseman, who had been
heard several times of late patrolling the country, and it
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was said, tethered his horse nightly among the graves in
the churchyard. The sequestered situation of this church seemed always
to have made it a favorite haunt of troubled spirits.
It stands on a knoll, surrounded by locust trees and
lofty elms, from among which its decent, whitewashed walls shine
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modestly forth, like Christian purity, beaming through the shades of retirement.
A gentle slope descends from it to a silver sheet
of water, bordered by high trees, between which peeps may
be caught at the blue hills of the Hudson. To
look upon its grass grown yard, where the sunbeam seems
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to sleep so quietly, one would think that there, at
least the dead might rest in peace. On one side
of the church extends a wide, woody dell, along which
raves a large brook among broken rocks and trunks of
fallen trees. Over a deep black part of the stream.
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Not far from the church was formerly thrown a wooden bridge.
The road that led to it and the bridge itself
were thickly shaded by overhanging trees, which cast a gloom
about it. Even in the daytime, but occasioned a fearful
darkness at night. Such was one of the favorite haunts
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of the headless Horsemen, and the place where he was
most frequently encountered. The tale was told of Old Brower,
a most heretical disbeliever in ghosts, how he met the
horseman returning from his foray into Sleepy Hollow, and was
obliged to get up behind him. How they galloped over
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bush and brake, over heel and swamp until they reached
the bridge, when the horsemen suddenly turned into a skeleton,
threw Old Brower into the brook and sprang away over
the tree tops with a clap of thunder. This story
was immediately matched by a thrice marblous adventure of brom Bones,
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whom made light of the galloping Hessian As an arrant jockey.
He affirmed that, on returning one night from the neighboring
village of Sing Sing, he had been overtaken by this
midnight trooper, that he had offered to race with him
for a bowl of punch, and should have won it too,
for the daredevil beat the goblin horse all hollow, but
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just as they came to the church bridge, the Hessian
bolted and vanished in a flash of fire. All these
tales told in that drowsy undertone with which men talk
in the dark. The countenances of the listeners only now
and then, receiving a casual will gleam from the glare
of a pipe, sank deep in the mind of Ikabod.
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He repaid them in kind with large extracts from his
invaluable author, Cotton Mather, and added many marvelous events that
had taken place in his native state of Connecticut, and
fearful sights which he had seen in his nightly walks
about sleepy Hollow. The revel now gradually broke up. The
old farmers gathered together their families in their wagons, and
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were heard for some time rattling along the hollow roads
and over the distant hills. Some of the damsels mounted
on pillions behind their favorite swains, and their light hearted laughter,
mingling with the clatter of hoofs, echoed along the silent woodlands,
sounding fainter and fainter, until they gradually died away, and
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the late scene of noise and frolic was all silent
and deserted. Ikabod only lingered behind and, according to the
custom of country lovers, to have a tete a tete
with the heiress, fully convinced that he was now on
the high road to success. What passed at this interview
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I will not pretend to say, for in fact I
do not know. Something. However, I fear me must have
gone wrong, for he certainly sallied forth after no very
great interval, with an air quite desolate and chapfallen. Oh,
these women, these women. Could that girl have been playing
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off any of her coquettish tricks? Was her encouragement of
the poor pedagogue all a mere sham to secure her
conquest of his rival? Heavens only knows not. I let
it suffice to say, Ichabod stole forth with the air
of one who has been sacking a hen roost rather
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than a fair lady's heart, without looking to the right
or left to notice the scene of rural wealth on
which he had so often gloated. He went straight to
the stable, and, with several hardy cuffs and kicks, roused
his steed most uncourteously from the comfortable quarters in which
he was soundly sleeping, dreaming of mountains of corn and
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oats and whole valleys of Timothy and Clover. It was
the very witching time of night that Dicobod, heavy hearted
and crestfallen, pursued his travels homewards along the sides of
the lofty hills which rise above Tarrytown, and which he
had traversed so cheerily in the afternoon. The hour was
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as dismal as himself. Far below him, the topon ze
spread its dusky and indistinct waste of waters, with here
and there the tall mast of a sloop riding quietly
at anchor under the land. In the deep hush of midnight,
he could even hear the barking of the watchdog from
the opposite shore of the Hudson, but it was so
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vague and faint as only to give an idea of
his distance from this trusted companion of man. Now and
then too, the long drawn crowing of a cock accidentally
awakened would sound far far off from some farm house
away among the hills, but it was like a dreaming
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sound in his ear. No sign of life occurred near him,
but occasionally the melancholy chirp of a cricket, or perhaps
the guttural twang of a bullfrog from a neighboring marsh,
as if sleeping uncomfortably and turning suddenly in his bed.
All the stories of ghosts and goblins that he had
heard in the afternoon now came crowding upon his recollection.
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The night grew darker and darker, The stars seemed to
sink deeper in the sky, and dry, driving clouds occasionally
hid them from his sight. He had never felt so
lonely and dismal. He was moreover approaching the very place
where many of the scenes of the ghost stories had
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been laid. In the center of the road stood an
enormous tulip tree, which towered like a giant above all
the other trees of the neighborhood and formed a kind
of landmark. Its limbs were gnarled and fantastic, large enough
to form trunks for ordinary trees, twisting down almost to
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the earth, then rising again into the air. It was
connected with the tragical story of the unfortunate Andre, who
had been taken prisoner hard by, and was universally known
by the name of Major Andre's Tree. The common people
regarded it with a mixture of respect and superstition, partly
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out of sympathy for the fate of its ill starred namesake,
and partly for the tails of strange sights and doleful
lamentations told concerning it. As Igabab approached this fearful tree,
he began to whistle. He thought his whistle was answered.
It was but a blast sweeping sharply through the dry branches.
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As he approached a little nearer, he thought he saw
something white hanging in the midst of the tree. He
paused and seized whistling, but on looking more narrowly, perceived
that it was a place where the tree had been
scathed by lightning, and the white wood laid bare. Suddenly
he heard a groan, His teeth chattered, and his knees
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smote against the saddle. It was but the rubbing of
one huge bough upon another, as they were swayed about
by the breeze. He passed the tree in safety, but
new perils lay before him. About two hundred yards from
the tree, a small brook crossed the road and ran
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into a marshy and thickly wooded glen known by the
name of Wiley's Swamp. A few rough logs laid side
by side served for a bridge. Over the stream. On
that side of the road where the brook entered the wood,
a group of oaks and chestnuts matted thick with wild
grape vines, threw a cavernous gloom over it. To pass
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this bridge was the severest trial. It was at this
identical spot that the unfortunate Andre was captured, and under
the covert of those chestnuts and vines were the sturdy
yeoman concealed who surprised him. This has ever since been
considered a haunted stream, and fearful of the feelings of
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the schoolboy who has to cross it alone after dark.
As he approached the stream, his heart bea began to thump.
He summoned up, however, all his resolution, gave his horse
half a score of kicks in the ribs, and attempted
to dash briskly across the bridge. But instead of starting forward,
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the perverse old animal made a lateral movement and ran
broadside against the fence. Ichabod, whose fears increased with the delay,
jerked the reins on the other side, and kicked lustily
with the contrary foot. It was all in vain his
deed started, it is true, but it was only to
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plunge to the opposite side of the road, into a
thicket of brambles and alder bushes. The schoolmaster now bestowed
both whip and heel upon the starveling ribs of old gunpowder,
who dashed forward, snuffling and snorting, but came to a
stand just by the bridge with a suddenness that had
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nearly sent his riders sprawling over his head. At the moment,
a plashy tramp by the side of the bridge caught
the sensitive ear of Ichabod. In the dark shadow of
the grove on the margin of the brook, he beheld
something huge, misshapen and towering. It stirred not, but seemed
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gathered up in the gloom, like some gigantic monster, ready
to spring upon the traveler. The hair of the affrighted
pedagogue rose upon his head with terror. What was to
be done to turn and fly? Wast thou too late?
And besides, what chance was there of escaping ghost or goblin,
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if such it was, which could ride upon the wings
of the wind? Summoning up therefore a show of courage,
he demanded, in stammering accents, who are you? He received
no reply. He repeated his demand in a still more
agitated voice. Still there was no answer. Once more, he
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cudgeled the sides of the inflexible Gunpowder, and, shutting his eyes,
broke forth with an involuntary fervor into psalm tune. Just
then the shadowy object of alarm put itself in motion,
and with a scramble and a bound stood at once
in the middle of the road. Though the night was
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dark and dismal, yet the form of the unknown might
now in some degree be ascertained. He appeared to be
a horseman of large dimensions, and mounted on a black
horse of powerful frame. He made no offer of molestation
or sociability, but kept aloof on one side of the road,
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jogging along on the blind side of old Gunpowder, who
had now got over his fright and waywardness. Ichabod, who
had no relish for this strange midnight companion, and bethought
himself of the adventure of brom Bones. With the galloping Hessian,
now quickened his steed in hopes of leaving him behind.
The stranger, however, quickened his horse to an equal pace.
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Ichabod pulled up and fell into a walk, thinking to
lag behind. The other did the same. His heart began
to sink within him. He endeavored to resume his psalm tune,
but his parched tongue clove to the roof of his mouth,
and he could not utter a stave. There was something
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in the moody and dogged silence of this pertinacious companion
that was mysterious and appalling. It was soon fearfully accounted for.
On mounting a rising ground, which brought the figure of
his fellow traveler in relief against the sky, gigantic in
height and muffled in the cloak, Ichabod was horror struck
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on perceiving that he was headless, But his heart was
still more increased on observing that the head, which should
have rested on his shoulders, was carried before him on
the pommel of his saddle. His terror rose to desperation.
He rained a shower of kicks and blows upon gunpowder,
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hoping by a sudden movement to give his companion the slip,
But the specter started full jump with him away. Then
they dashed through thick and thin stones, flying and sparks
flashing at every bound. Ichabod's flimsy garments fluttered in the
air as he stretched his long lank body away over
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his horse's head in the eagerness of his flight. They
had now reached the road which turns off to Sleepy Hollow,
but Gunpowder, who seemed possessed with a demon, instead of
keeping up it, made an opposite turn and plunged headlong
down hill to the left. This road leads through a
sandy hollow shaded by trees for about a quar of
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a mile, where it crosses the bridge famous in Goblin's story,
and just beyond swells the green node on which stands
the white washed Church. As yet, the panic of the
steed had given his unskillful rider an apparent advantage in
the chase. But just as he had got half way
through the hollow, the girths of the saddle gave way,
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and he felt it slipping from under him. He seized
it by the pommel and endeavored to hold it firm
but in vain, and had just time to save himself
by clasping old Gunpowder round the neck when the saddle
fell to the earth, and he heard it trampled on
the foot by his pursuer. For a moment, the terror
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of Hans van Ripper's wrath passed across his mind, for
it was his Sunday saddle. But this was no time
for petty fears. The goblin was hard on his haunches,
and unskillful rider that he was, he had much ado
to maintain his seat, sometimes slipping on one side, sometimes
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on another, and sometimes jolted on the high ridge of
his horse's backbone with a violence that he verily feared
would cleave him asunder. And opening in the trees now
cheered him with the hopes that the church bridge was
at hand. The wavering reflection of a silver star in
the bosom of the brook told him that he was
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not mistaken. He saw the walls of the church dimly
glaring under the trees. Beyond, he recollected the place where
brom Bones's ghostly competitor had disappeared. If I can but
reach that bridge, thought Ikobod. I am safe. Just then
he heard the black steed panting and blowing close behind him.
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He even fancied that he felt his hot breath. Another
convulsive kick in the ribs, and old gunpowder sprang upon
the bridge. He thundered over the resounding planks. He gained
the opposite side, and now Icabod cast a look behind
to see if his pursuer should vanish according to rule
in a flash of fire and brimstone. Just then he
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saw the Goblin rising in his stirrups, and in the
very act of hurling his head at him. Ikabod endeavored
to dodge the horrible missile, but too late it encountered
his cranium with a tremendous crash. He was tumbled headlong
into the dust and gunpowder. The black steed and the
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goblin rider passed by like a whirlwind. The next morning,
the old horse was found without his saddle and with
the bridle under his feet, soberly cropping the grass at
his master's gate. Icabod did not make his appearance at breakfast.
Dinner hour came, but no Ichabod. The boys assembled at
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the schoolhouse and strolled idly about the banks of the brook,
but no Schoolmaster Hans van Ripper now began to feel
some uneasiness about the fate of poor Ichabod and his saddle.
An inquiry was set on foot, and after diligent investigation,
they came upon his traces. In one part of the
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road leading to the church was found the saddle trampled
in the dirt. The tracks of horses, hoofs deeply dented
in the road and evidently at furious speed, were traced
to the bridge, beyond which, on the bank of a
broad part of the brook, where the water ran deep
and black, was found the hat of the unfortunate Ichabod,
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and close beside it a shattered pumpkin. The brook was searched,
but the body of the schoolmaster was not to be discovered.
Hans van Ripper, as executor of his estate, examined the
bundle which contained all his worldly effects. They consisted of
two shirts and to have two stocks for the neck,
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a pair or two of worsted stockings, and old pair
of corduroy small clothes, a rusty racer, a book of
psalm tunes full of dog ears, and a broken pitch pipe.
As to the books and furniture of the schoolhouse, they
belonged to the community, excepting Cotton Mather's History of Witchcraft,
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a New England Almanac, and a book of Dreams and
fortune Telling, in which last was a sheet of foolscap,
much scribbled and blotted. In several fruitless attempts to make
a copy of verses in honor of the heiress of
von Tussel. These magic books and the poetic scroll were
forthwith consigned to the flames by Hans van Ripper, who
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from that time forward determined to send his children no
more to school, observing that he never knew any good
come of this same reading and writing. Whatever money the
schoolmaster possessed an he had received his quarter's pay but
a day or two before, he must have had about
his person at the time of his disappearance. The mysterious
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event caused much speculation at the church. On the following Sunday,
knots of gazers and gossips were collected in the churchyard
at the bridge and at the spot where the hat
and pumpkin had been found. The stories of Bower of Bones,
and a whole budget of others were called to mind,
And when they had diligently considered them all and compared
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them with the symptoms of the present case, they shook
their heads and came to the conclusion that Ichabod had
been carried off by the galloping Hessian. As he was
a bachelor, and in nobody's debt, nobody troubled his head
any more about him. The school was removed to a
different quarter of the hollow, and another pedagogue reigned in
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his stead. It is true an old farmer who had
been down to New York on a visit several years after,
and from whom this account of the ghostly adventure was received,
brought home the intelligence that Ichabod Crane was still alive.
That he had left the neighborhood, partly through fear of
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the Goblin and Hans van Ripper, and partly in mortification
at having been suddenly dismissed by the heiress. That he
had changed his quarters to a distant part of the country,
had kept school and studied law. At the same time,
had been admitted to the bar, turned politician, electioneered, written
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for the newspapers, and finally had been made a Justice
of the ten Pound Court. Brom Bones, too, who shortly
after his rival's disappearance, conducted the Blooming Katrina in triumph
to the Altar, was observed to look exceedingly knowing whenever
the story of Ichabod was related, and always burst into
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a hearty laugh at the mention of the pumpkin, which
led some to suspect that he knew more about the
matter than he chose to tell. The old country wives However,
who are the best judges of these matters, maintain to
this day that Ichabod was spirited away by supernatural means,
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and it is a favorite story often told about the
neighborhood round the winter evening fire. The bridge became more
than ever an object of superstitious awe, and that may
be the reason why the road has been altered of
late years, so as to approach the church by the
border of the mill pond. The schoolhouse, being deserted, soon
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fell to decay, and was reported to be haunted by
the ghosts of the unfortunate pedagogue, and the plowboy loitering
homeward of a still summer evening, has often fancied his
voice at a distance, chanting a melancholy psalm tune among
the tranquil solitudes of sleepy hollow. PostScript found in the
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handwriting of mister Knickerbucker. The preceding tale is given almost
in the precise words in which I heard it related
at a corporation meeting at the ancient city of Manhatto's,
at which were present many of its sagest and most
illustrious burghers. The narrator was a pleasant, shabby gentlemanly old
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fellow in pepper and salt clothes, with a sadly humorous face,
and one whom I strongly suspected of being poor. He
made such efforts to be entertaining. When his story was concluded,
there was much laughter and approbation, particularly from two or
three deputy aldermen who had been asleep the greater part
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of the time. There was, however, one tall, dry looking
old gentleman with beakling eyebrows, who maintained a grave and
rather severe face throughout now and then, folding his arms,
inclining his head, and looking down upon the floor as
if turning a doubt over in his mind. He was
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one of your wary men who never laughed, but upon
good grounds when they have reason and law on their side.
When the mirth of the rest of the company had
subsided and silence was restored, he leaned one arm on
the elbow of his chair, and sticking the other. Akimbo demanded,
with a slight but exceedingly sage motion of the head
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and contraction of the brow, what was the moral of
the story and what it went to prove? The story teller,
who was just putting a glass of wine to his
lips as a refreshment after his toils. Paused for a moment,
looked at his inquirer with an air of infinite deference,
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and lowering the glass slowly to the table, observed that
the story was intended most logically to prove that there
is no situation in life, but has its advantages and pleasures,
provided we will but take a joke as we find
it that therefore, he that runs races with goblin troopers
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is likely to have rough writing of it. Ergo for
a country schoolmaster to be refused the hand of a
Dutch heiress is a certain step to high preferment in
the state. The cautious old gentleman knit his brows tenfold
closer after this explanation, being sorely puzzled by the recionation
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of the syllogism, while methought the one in pepper and
salt eyed him with something of a triumphant leer. At length,
he observed that all this was very well, but still
he thought the story a little on the extravagant. There
were one or two points on which he had his doubts.
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Faith Sir replied the story teller, as to that matter,
I don't believe one half of it myself.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
End of the last part, end of the legend of
Sleepy Hollow, written by Washington Irving Dream Audio Books.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Hopes you have enjoyed this program.
Part last of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, written by
Washington Irving, presented by Dream Audio Books.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Ichabod prided himself upon his dancing as much as upon
his vocal powers. Not a limb, not a fiber about
him was idle, And to have seen his loosely hung
frame in full motion and clattering about the room, you
would have thought Saint Vitas himself, that blessed patron of
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the dance, was figuring before you in person. He was
the admiration of all the negroes, who, having gathered of
all ages and sizes from the farm and the neighborhood,
stood forming a pyramid of shining black faces at every
door and window, gazing with delight at the scene, rolling
their white eyeballs, and showing grinning rows of ivory from
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ear to ear. How could the flogger of urchins be
otherwise than animated and joyous. The lady of his heart
was his partner in the dance, and smiling graciously in
reply to all his amorous oglings, while brom Bones, sorely
smitten with love and jealousy, sat brooding by himself in
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one corner. When the dance was at an end, Ichabod
was attracted to a knot of the Sager folks, who,
with Old van Tussel, sat smoking at one end of
the piazza, gossiping over farmer times and drawing out long
stories about the war. This neighborhood, at the time of
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which I am speaking, was one of those highly favored
places which abound with chronicle and great men. The British
and American line had run near it during the war.
It had therefore been the scene of marauding and infesting
with refugees, cowboys, and all kinds of border chivalry. Just
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sufficient time had elapsed to enable each storyteller to dress
up his tale with a little becoming fiction, and in
the indistinctness of his recollection, to make himself the hero
of every exploit. There was the story of Doufu Martling,
a large blue bearded Dutchman who had nearly taken a
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British frigate with an old r nine pounder from a
mud breastwork, only that his gun burst at the sixth discharge.
And there was an old gentleman, who shall be nameless,
being too rich a mine here to be lightly mentioned,
who in the Battle of White Plains, being an excellent
master of defense carried a musketball with a small sword,
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insomuch that he absolutely felt it whiz round the blade
and glance off at the hilt, in proof of which
he was ready at any time to show the sword
with the hilt a little bent. There were several more
that had been equally great in the field, not one
of whom but was persuaded that he had a considerable
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hand in bringing the war to a happy termination. But
all these were nothing to the tales of ghosts and
apparitions that succeeded. The neighborhood is rich in legendary treasures
of the kind. Local tales and superstitions thrive best in
these sheltered, long settled retreats, but are trampled under foot
(03:25):
by the shifting throng that forms the population of most
of our country places. Besides, there is no encouragement for
ghosts in most of our villages, for they have scarcely
had time to finish their first nap and turn themselves
in their graves before their surviving friends have traveled away
from the neighborhood, so that when they turn out at
(03:47):
night to walk their rounds, they have no acquaintance left
to call upon. This is perhaps the reason why we
so seldom hear of ghosts, except in our long established
Dutch communities. The immediate cause, however, of the prevalence of
supernatural stories in these parts, was doubtless owing to the
(04:09):
vicinity of Sleepy Hollow. There was a contagion in the
very air that blew from that haunted region. It breathed
forth an atmosphere of dreams and fancies, infecting all the land.
Several of the Sleepy Hollow people were present at von Tussel's,
and as usual, were doling out their wild and wonderful legends.
(04:32):
Many dismal tales were told about funeral trains and morning
cries and willings heard and seen about the Great Tree,
where the unfortunate Major Andre was taken, and which stood
in the neighborhood. Some mention was made also of the
woman in white that haunted the dark glen at Raven Rock,
(04:53):
and was also often heard to shriek on winter nights
before a storm, having perished there in the snow. The
chief part of the stories, however, turned upon the favorite
specter of Sleepy Hollow, the headless Horseman, who had been
heard several times of late patrolling the country, and it
(05:14):
was said, tethered his horse nightly among the graves in
the churchyard. The sequestered situation of this church seemed always
to have made it a favorite haunt of troubled spirits.
It stands on a knoll, surrounded by locust trees and
lofty elms, from among which its decent, whitewashed walls shine
(05:37):
modestly forth, like Christian purity, beaming through the shades of retirement.
A gentle slope descends from it to a silver sheet
of water, bordered by high trees, between which peeps may
be caught at the blue hills of the Hudson. To
look upon its grass grown yard, where the sunbeam seems
(05:58):
to sleep so quietly, one would think that there, at
least the dead might rest in peace. On one side
of the church extends a wide, woody dell, along which
raves a large brook among broken rocks and trunks of
fallen trees. Over a deep black part of the stream.
(06:18):
Not far from the church was formerly thrown a wooden bridge.
The road that led to it and the bridge itself
were thickly shaded by overhanging trees, which cast a gloom
about it. Even in the daytime, but occasioned a fearful
darkness at night. Such was one of the favorite haunts
(06:39):
of the headless Horsemen, and the place where he was
most frequently encountered. The tale was told of Old Brower,
a most heretical disbeliever in ghosts, how he met the
horseman returning from his foray into Sleepy Hollow, and was
obliged to get up behind him. How they galloped over
(07:00):
bush and brake, over heel and swamp until they reached
the bridge, when the horsemen suddenly turned into a skeleton,
threw Old Brower into the brook and sprang away over
the tree tops with a clap of thunder. This story
was immediately matched by a thrice marblous adventure of brom Bones,
(07:21):
whom made light of the galloping Hessian As an arrant jockey.
He affirmed that, on returning one night from the neighboring
village of Sing Sing, he had been overtaken by this
midnight trooper, that he had offered to race with him
for a bowl of punch, and should have won it too,
for the daredevil beat the goblin horse all hollow, but
(07:43):
just as they came to the church bridge, the Hessian
bolted and vanished in a flash of fire. All these
tales told in that drowsy undertone with which men talk
in the dark. The countenances of the listeners only now
and then, receiving a casual will gleam from the glare
of a pipe, sank deep in the mind of Ikabod.
(08:05):
He repaid them in kind with large extracts from his
invaluable author, Cotton Mather, and added many marvelous events that
had taken place in his native state of Connecticut, and
fearful sights which he had seen in his nightly walks
about sleepy Hollow. The revel now gradually broke up. The
old farmers gathered together their families in their wagons, and
(08:29):
were heard for some time rattling along the hollow roads
and over the distant hills. Some of the damsels mounted
on pillions behind their favorite swains, and their light hearted laughter,
mingling with the clatter of hoofs, echoed along the silent woodlands,
sounding fainter and fainter, until they gradually died away, and
(08:51):
the late scene of noise and frolic was all silent
and deserted. Ikabod only lingered behind and, according to the
custom of country lovers, to have a tete a tete
with the heiress, fully convinced that he was now on
the high road to success. What passed at this interview
(09:13):
I will not pretend to say, for in fact I
do not know. Something. However, I fear me must have
gone wrong, for he certainly sallied forth after no very
great interval, with an air quite desolate and chapfallen. Oh,
these women, these women. Could that girl have been playing
(09:36):
off any of her coquettish tricks? Was her encouragement of
the poor pedagogue all a mere sham to secure her
conquest of his rival? Heavens only knows not. I let
it suffice to say, Ichabod stole forth with the air
of one who has been sacking a hen roost rather
(09:58):
than a fair lady's heart, without looking to the right
or left to notice the scene of rural wealth on
which he had so often gloated. He went straight to
the stable, and, with several hardy cuffs and kicks, roused
his steed most uncourteously from the comfortable quarters in which
he was soundly sleeping, dreaming of mountains of corn and
(10:21):
oats and whole valleys of Timothy and Clover. It was
the very witching time of night that Dicobod, heavy hearted
and crestfallen, pursued his travels homewards along the sides of
the lofty hills which rise above Tarrytown, and which he
had traversed so cheerily in the afternoon. The hour was
(10:44):
as dismal as himself. Far below him, the topon ze
spread its dusky and indistinct waste of waters, with here
and there the tall mast of a sloop riding quietly
at anchor under the land. In the deep hush of midnight,
he could even hear the barking of the watchdog from
the opposite shore of the Hudson, but it was so
(11:06):
vague and faint as only to give an idea of
his distance from this trusted companion of man. Now and
then too, the long drawn crowing of a cock accidentally
awakened would sound far far off from some farm house
away among the hills, but it was like a dreaming
(11:27):
sound in his ear. No sign of life occurred near him,
but occasionally the melancholy chirp of a cricket, or perhaps
the guttural twang of a bullfrog from a neighboring marsh,
as if sleeping uncomfortably and turning suddenly in his bed.
All the stories of ghosts and goblins that he had
heard in the afternoon now came crowding upon his recollection.
(11:52):
The night grew darker and darker, The stars seemed to
sink deeper in the sky, and dry, driving clouds occasionally
hid them from his sight. He had never felt so
lonely and dismal. He was moreover approaching the very place
where many of the scenes of the ghost stories had
(12:14):
been laid. In the center of the road stood an
enormous tulip tree, which towered like a giant above all
the other trees of the neighborhood and formed a kind
of landmark. Its limbs were gnarled and fantastic, large enough
to form trunks for ordinary trees, twisting down almost to
(12:34):
the earth, then rising again into the air. It was
connected with the tragical story of the unfortunate Andre, who
had been taken prisoner hard by, and was universally known
by the name of Major Andre's Tree. The common people
regarded it with a mixture of respect and superstition, partly
(12:56):
out of sympathy for the fate of its ill starred namesake,
and partly for the tails of strange sights and doleful
lamentations told concerning it. As Igabab approached this fearful tree,
he began to whistle. He thought his whistle was answered.
It was but a blast sweeping sharply through the dry branches.
(13:19):
As he approached a little nearer, he thought he saw
something white hanging in the midst of the tree. He
paused and seized whistling, but on looking more narrowly, perceived
that it was a place where the tree had been
scathed by lightning, and the white wood laid bare. Suddenly
he heard a groan, His teeth chattered, and his knees
(13:44):
smote against the saddle. It was but the rubbing of
one huge bough upon another, as they were swayed about
by the breeze. He passed the tree in safety, but
new perils lay before him. About two hundred yards from
the tree, a small brook crossed the road and ran
(14:06):
into a marshy and thickly wooded glen known by the
name of Wiley's Swamp. A few rough logs laid side
by side served for a bridge. Over the stream. On
that side of the road where the brook entered the wood,
a group of oaks and chestnuts matted thick with wild
grape vines, threw a cavernous gloom over it. To pass
(14:30):
this bridge was the severest trial. It was at this
identical spot that the unfortunate Andre was captured, and under
the covert of those chestnuts and vines were the sturdy
yeoman concealed who surprised him. This has ever since been
considered a haunted stream, and fearful of the feelings of
(14:52):
the schoolboy who has to cross it alone after dark.
As he approached the stream, his heart bea began to thump.
He summoned up, however, all his resolution, gave his horse
half a score of kicks in the ribs, and attempted
to dash briskly across the bridge. But instead of starting forward,
(15:14):
the perverse old animal made a lateral movement and ran
broadside against the fence. Ichabod, whose fears increased with the delay,
jerked the reins on the other side, and kicked lustily
with the contrary foot. It was all in vain his
deed started, it is true, but it was only to
(15:34):
plunge to the opposite side of the road, into a
thicket of brambles and alder bushes. The schoolmaster now bestowed
both whip and heel upon the starveling ribs of old gunpowder,
who dashed forward, snuffling and snorting, but came to a
stand just by the bridge with a suddenness that had
(15:55):
nearly sent his riders sprawling over his head. At the moment,
a plashy tramp by the side of the bridge caught
the sensitive ear of Ichabod. In the dark shadow of
the grove on the margin of the brook, he beheld
something huge, misshapen and towering. It stirred not, but seemed
(16:19):
gathered up in the gloom, like some gigantic monster, ready
to spring upon the traveler. The hair of the affrighted
pedagogue rose upon his head with terror. What was to
be done to turn and fly? Wast thou too late?
And besides, what chance was there of escaping ghost or goblin,
(16:40):
if such it was, which could ride upon the wings
of the wind? Summoning up therefore a show of courage,
he demanded, in stammering accents, who are you? He received
no reply. He repeated his demand in a still more
agitated voice. Still there was no answer. Once more, he
(17:04):
cudgeled the sides of the inflexible Gunpowder, and, shutting his eyes,
broke forth with an involuntary fervor into psalm tune. Just
then the shadowy object of alarm put itself in motion,
and with a scramble and a bound stood at once
in the middle of the road. Though the night was
(17:27):
dark and dismal, yet the form of the unknown might
now in some degree be ascertained. He appeared to be
a horseman of large dimensions, and mounted on a black
horse of powerful frame. He made no offer of molestation
or sociability, but kept aloof on one side of the road,
(17:49):
jogging along on the blind side of old Gunpowder, who
had now got over his fright and waywardness. Ichabod, who
had no relish for this strange midnight companion, and bethought
himself of the adventure of brom Bones. With the galloping Hessian,
now quickened his steed in hopes of leaving him behind.
The stranger, however, quickened his horse to an equal pace.
(18:13):
Ichabod pulled up and fell into a walk, thinking to
lag behind. The other did the same. His heart began
to sink within him. He endeavored to resume his psalm tune,
but his parched tongue clove to the roof of his mouth,
and he could not utter a stave. There was something
(18:33):
in the moody and dogged silence of this pertinacious companion
that was mysterious and appalling. It was soon fearfully accounted for.
On mounting a rising ground, which brought the figure of
his fellow traveler in relief against the sky, gigantic in
height and muffled in the cloak, Ichabod was horror struck
(18:55):
on perceiving that he was headless, But his heart was
still more increased on observing that the head, which should
have rested on his shoulders, was carried before him on
the pommel of his saddle. His terror rose to desperation.
He rained a shower of kicks and blows upon gunpowder,
(19:17):
hoping by a sudden movement to give his companion the slip,
But the specter started full jump with him away. Then
they dashed through thick and thin stones, flying and sparks
flashing at every bound. Ichabod's flimsy garments fluttered in the
air as he stretched his long lank body away over
(19:37):
his horse's head in the eagerness of his flight. They
had now reached the road which turns off to Sleepy Hollow,
but Gunpowder, who seemed possessed with a demon, instead of
keeping up it, made an opposite turn and plunged headlong
down hill to the left. This road leads through a
sandy hollow shaded by trees for about a quar of
(20:00):
a mile, where it crosses the bridge famous in Goblin's story,
and just beyond swells the green node on which stands
the white washed Church. As yet, the panic of the
steed had given his unskillful rider an apparent advantage in
the chase. But just as he had got half way
through the hollow, the girths of the saddle gave way,
(20:24):
and he felt it slipping from under him. He seized
it by the pommel and endeavored to hold it firm
but in vain, and had just time to save himself
by clasping old Gunpowder round the neck when the saddle
fell to the earth, and he heard it trampled on
the foot by his pursuer. For a moment, the terror
(20:45):
of Hans van Ripper's wrath passed across his mind, for
it was his Sunday saddle. But this was no time
for petty fears. The goblin was hard on his haunches,
and unskillful rider that he was, he had much ado
to maintain his seat, sometimes slipping on one side, sometimes
(21:05):
on another, and sometimes jolted on the high ridge of
his horse's backbone with a violence that he verily feared
would cleave him asunder. And opening in the trees now
cheered him with the hopes that the church bridge was
at hand. The wavering reflection of a silver star in
the bosom of the brook told him that he was
(21:26):
not mistaken. He saw the walls of the church dimly
glaring under the trees. Beyond, he recollected the place where
brom Bones's ghostly competitor had disappeared. If I can but
reach that bridge, thought Ikobod. I am safe. Just then
he heard the black steed panting and blowing close behind him.
(21:48):
He even fancied that he felt his hot breath. Another
convulsive kick in the ribs, and old gunpowder sprang upon
the bridge. He thundered over the resounding planks. He gained
the opposite side, and now Icabod cast a look behind
to see if his pursuer should vanish according to rule
in a flash of fire and brimstone. Just then he
(22:12):
saw the Goblin rising in his stirrups, and in the
very act of hurling his head at him. Ikabod endeavored
to dodge the horrible missile, but too late it encountered
his cranium with a tremendous crash. He was tumbled headlong
into the dust and gunpowder. The black steed and the
(22:34):
goblin rider passed by like a whirlwind. The next morning,
the old horse was found without his saddle and with
the bridle under his feet, soberly cropping the grass at
his master's gate. Icabod did not make his appearance at breakfast.
Dinner hour came, but no Ichabod. The boys assembled at
(22:57):
the schoolhouse and strolled idly about the banks of the brook,
but no Schoolmaster Hans van Ripper now began to feel
some uneasiness about the fate of poor Ichabod and his saddle.
An inquiry was set on foot, and after diligent investigation,
they came upon his traces. In one part of the
(23:19):
road leading to the church was found the saddle trampled
in the dirt. The tracks of horses, hoofs deeply dented
in the road and evidently at furious speed, were traced
to the bridge, beyond which, on the bank of a
broad part of the brook, where the water ran deep
and black, was found the hat of the unfortunate Ichabod,
(23:41):
and close beside it a shattered pumpkin. The brook was searched,
but the body of the schoolmaster was not to be discovered.
Hans van Ripper, as executor of his estate, examined the
bundle which contained all his worldly effects. They consisted of
two shirts and to have two stocks for the neck,
(24:02):
a pair or two of worsted stockings, and old pair
of corduroy small clothes, a rusty racer, a book of
psalm tunes full of dog ears, and a broken pitch pipe.
As to the books and furniture of the schoolhouse, they
belonged to the community, excepting Cotton Mather's History of Witchcraft,
(24:23):
a New England Almanac, and a book of Dreams and
fortune Telling, in which last was a sheet of foolscap,
much scribbled and blotted. In several fruitless attempts to make
a copy of verses in honor of the heiress of
von Tussel. These magic books and the poetic scroll were
forthwith consigned to the flames by Hans van Ripper, who
(24:47):
from that time forward determined to send his children no
more to school, observing that he never knew any good
come of this same reading and writing. Whatever money the
schoolmaster possessed an he had received his quarter's pay but
a day or two before, he must have had about
his person at the time of his disappearance. The mysterious
(25:09):
event caused much speculation at the church. On the following Sunday,
knots of gazers and gossips were collected in the churchyard
at the bridge and at the spot where the hat
and pumpkin had been found. The stories of Bower of Bones,
and a whole budget of others were called to mind,
And when they had diligently considered them all and compared
(25:31):
them with the symptoms of the present case, they shook
their heads and came to the conclusion that Ichabod had
been carried off by the galloping Hessian. As he was
a bachelor, and in nobody's debt, nobody troubled his head
any more about him. The school was removed to a
different quarter of the hollow, and another pedagogue reigned in
(25:55):
his stead. It is true an old farmer who had
been down to New York on a visit several years after,
and from whom this account of the ghostly adventure was received,
brought home the intelligence that Ichabod Crane was still alive.
That he had left the neighborhood, partly through fear of
(26:15):
the Goblin and Hans van Ripper, and partly in mortification
at having been suddenly dismissed by the heiress. That he
had changed his quarters to a distant part of the country,
had kept school and studied law. At the same time,
had been admitted to the bar, turned politician, electioneered, written
(26:36):
for the newspapers, and finally had been made a Justice
of the ten Pound Court. Brom Bones, too, who shortly
after his rival's disappearance, conducted the Blooming Katrina in triumph
to the Altar, was observed to look exceedingly knowing whenever
the story of Ichabod was related, and always burst into
(26:56):
a hearty laugh at the mention of the pumpkin, which
led some to suspect that he knew more about the
matter than he chose to tell. The old country wives However,
who are the best judges of these matters, maintain to
this day that Ichabod was spirited away by supernatural means,
(27:17):
and it is a favorite story often told about the
neighborhood round the winter evening fire. The bridge became more
than ever an object of superstitious awe, and that may
be the reason why the road has been altered of
late years, so as to approach the church by the
border of the mill pond. The schoolhouse, being deserted, soon
(27:38):
fell to decay, and was reported to be haunted by
the ghosts of the unfortunate pedagogue, and the plowboy loitering
homeward of a still summer evening, has often fancied his
voice at a distance, chanting a melancholy psalm tune among
the tranquil solitudes of sleepy hollow. PostScript found in the
(28:02):
handwriting of mister Knickerbucker. The preceding tale is given almost
in the precise words in which I heard it related
at a corporation meeting at the ancient city of Manhatto's,
at which were present many of its sagest and most
illustrious burghers. The narrator was a pleasant, shabby gentlemanly old
(28:24):
fellow in pepper and salt clothes, with a sadly humorous face,
and one whom I strongly suspected of being poor. He
made such efforts to be entertaining. When his story was concluded,
there was much laughter and approbation, particularly from two or
three deputy aldermen who had been asleep the greater part
(28:46):
of the time. There was, however, one tall, dry looking
old gentleman with beakling eyebrows, who maintained a grave and
rather severe face throughout now and then, folding his arms,
inclining his head, and looking down upon the floor as
if turning a doubt over in his mind. He was
(29:09):
one of your wary men who never laughed, but upon
good grounds when they have reason and law on their side.
When the mirth of the rest of the company had
subsided and silence was restored, he leaned one arm on
the elbow of his chair, and sticking the other. Akimbo demanded,
with a slight but exceedingly sage motion of the head
(29:32):
and contraction of the brow, what was the moral of
the story and what it went to prove? The story teller,
who was just putting a glass of wine to his
lips as a refreshment after his toils. Paused for a moment,
looked at his inquirer with an air of infinite deference,
(29:52):
and lowering the glass slowly to the table, observed that
the story was intended most logically to prove that there
is no situation in life, but has its advantages and pleasures,
provided we will but take a joke as we find
it that therefore, he that runs races with goblin troopers
(30:15):
is likely to have rough writing of it. Ergo for
a country schoolmaster to be refused the hand of a
Dutch heiress is a certain step to high preferment in
the state. The cautious old gentleman knit his brows tenfold
closer after this explanation, being sorely puzzled by the recionation
(30:37):
of the syllogism, while methought the one in pepper and
salt eyed him with something of a triumphant leer. At length,
he observed that all this was very well, but still
he thought the story a little on the extravagant. There
were one or two points on which he had his doubts.
(30:57):
Faith Sir replied the story teller, as to that matter,
I don't believe one half of it myself.
Speaker 1 (31:06):
End of the last part, end of the legend of
Sleepy Hollow, written by Washington Irving Dream Audio Books.
Speaker 2 (31:15):
Hopes you have enjoyed this program.
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