The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving — Part 2

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

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Part two of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, written by
Washington Irving, presented by Dream Audio Books. As the enraptured
Ichabod fancied all this, and as he rolled his great
green eyes over the fat meadow lands, the rich fields
of wheat, of rye of buckwheat, and Indian corn, and

(00:20):
the orchards burdened with ruddy fruit which surrounded the warm
tenement of Van Tassel, his heart yearned after the damsel
who was to inherit these domains, and his imagination expanded
with the idea how they might be readily turned into cash,
and the money invested in immense tracts of wild land

(00:40):
and shingle palaces in the wilderness. Nay, his busy fancy
already realized his hopes and presented to him the blooming Katrina,
with a whole family of children, mounted on the top
of a wagon loaded with household trumpery, with pots and
kettles dangling beneath. And he beheld himself bestride a pacing

(01:03):
mare with the colt at her heels, setting out for Kentucky, Tennessee,
or the Lord knows where. When he entered the house,
the conquest of his heart was complete. It was one
of those spacious farm houses with high ridged but lowly
sloping roofs, built in the style handed down from the

(01:23):
first Dutch settlers, the low projecting eaves forming a piazza
along the front, capable of being closed up in bad weather.
Under this were hung flails, harnesses, various utensils of husbandry,
and nets for fishing in the neighboring river. Benches were
built along the sides for summer use, and a great

(01:45):
spinning wheel at one end and a churn at the
other showed the various uses to which this important porch
might be devoted. From this piazza, the wondering Ichabod entered
the hull which formed the center of the manchin and
the place of usual residence. Here, rows of resplendent pewter

(02:05):
ranged on a long dresser dazzled his eyes. In one
corner stood a huge bag of wool ready to be spun.
In another, a quantity of linsey woolsey just from the loom.
Ears of Indian corn and strings of dried apples and
peaches hung in gay festoons along the walls, mingled with

(02:27):
the god of red peppers, and a door left Ajar
gave him a peep into the best parlor, where the
claw footed chairs and dark mahogany tables shone like mirrors,
and irons with their accompanying shovel and tongs glistened from
their covert of asparagus tops, mock oranges and conch shells
decorated the mantelpiece. Strings of various colored birds eggs were

(02:51):
suspended above it. A great ostrich egg was hung from
the center of the room, and a corner covered knowingly
left open, displayed immense treasures of old silver and well
mended china. From the moment Ichabod laid his eyes upon
these regions of delight, the peace of his mind was

(03:13):
at an end, and his only study was how to
gain the affections of the peerless daughter of von Tussel.
In this enterprise, however, he had more real difficulties than
generally fell to the lot of a knight errant of yore,
who seldom had anything but giants, enchanters, fiery dragons, and suchlike,
easily conquered adversaries to contend with, and had to make

(03:35):
his way merely through gates of iron and brass and
walls of adamant to the castle keep, where the lady
of his heart was confined, all which he achieved as
easily as a man could carve his way to the
center of a Christmas pie, and then the lady gave
him her hand. As a matter of course, Ikabod, on
the contrary, had to win his way to the heart

(03:58):
of a country coquette beside with a labyrinth of whims
and caprices, which were forever presenting new difficulties and impediments,
and he had to encounter a host of fearful adversaries
of real flesh and blood, the numerous rustic admirers who
beset every portal to her heart, keeping a watchful and

(04:19):
angry eye upon each other, but ready to fly out
in the common cause against any new competitor. Among these,
the most formidable was a burly, roaring, roistering blade of
the name of Abraham, or according to the Dutch abbreviation
Brahm von Brundt, the hero of the country round, which

(04:41):
rang with his feats of strength and hardihood. He was
broad shouldered and double jointed, with short, curly black hair
and a bluff but not unpleasant countenance, having a mangled air,
of fun and arrogance. From his herculean frame and great
powers of land, he had received the nickname of Brahm Bones,

(05:04):
by which he was universally known. He was famed for
great knowledge and skill in horsemanship, being as dexterous on
horseback as a tartar. He was foremost at all races
and cockfights, and with the ascendancy which bodily strength always
acquires in rustic life, was the umpire in all disputes,

(05:25):
setting his hat on one side, and giving his decisions
with an air and tone that admitted of no gainsay
or appeal. He was always ready for a fight or
a frolic, but had more mischief than ill will in
his composition, and with all his overbearing roughness, there was
a strong dash of waggish good humor. At bottom. He

(05:48):
had three or four boon companions who regarded him as
their model, and at the head of whom he scoured
the country, attending every scene of feud or merriment for
miles round. In cold weather, he was distinguished by a
fur cap surmounted with a flaunting foxtail, and when the

(06:08):
folks at a country gathering descried this well known crest
at a distance, whisking about among a squad of hard riders.
They always stood by for a squall. Sometimes his crew
would be heard dashing along past the farmhouses at midnight
with whoop and halloo, like a troop of don Cossacks,

(06:29):
and the old dames startled out of their sleep, would
listen for a moment till the hurry scurry had clattered by,
and then exclaim, I there goes brom Bones and his gang.
The neighbors looked upon him with a mixture of awe,
admiration and good will, and when any madcap prank or

(06:49):
rustic brawl occurred in the vicinity, always shook their heads
and warranted brom Bones was at the bottom of it.
This rant apole hero had for some time sangled out
the blooming Katrina for the object of his uncouth gallantries.
And though his amorous toyings were something like the gentle

(07:11):
caresses and endearments of a bear, yet it was whispered
that she did not altogether discourage his hopes. Certain it
is his advances were signals for rival candidates to retire,
who felt no inclination to cross a lion in his almoors.
Insomuch that when his horse was seen tied to von

(07:32):
Tussel's paling on a Sunday night, a sure sign that
his master was courting, or as it is termed, sparking within,
all other suitors passed by in despair and carried the
war into other quarters. Such was the formidable rival with
whom Ikabad Crane had to contend, and considering all things,

(07:56):
a stouter man than he would have shrunk from the competition,
and a wiser man would have despaired. He had, However,
a happy mixture of pliability and perseverance in his nature.
He was in form and spirit like a supple jack,
yielding but tough. Though he bent, he never broke. And

(08:17):
though he bowed beneath the slightest pressure, yet the moment
it was away jerk, he was as e wrecked and
carried his head as high as ever. To have taken
the field openly against his rival would have been madness,
for he was not a man to be thwarted in
his amours any more than that stormy lover Achilles. Ichabad

(08:39):
therefore made his advances in a quiet and gentle, insinuating manner.
Under cover of his character of singing master. He made
frequent visits to the farmhouse, not that he had anything
to apprehend from the meddlesome interference of parents, which is
so often a stumbling block in the path of lovers.

(09:00):
Bolt von Tussel was an easy, indulgent soul. He loved
his daughter better even than his pipe, and, like a
reasonable man and an excellent father, let her have her
way in everything. His notable little wife, too, had enough
to do to attend to her housekeeping and manage her poultry, for,
as she sagely observed, ducks and geese are foolish things

(09:24):
and must be looked after, But girls can take care
of themselves. Thus, while the busy dame bustled about the
house or plied her spinning wheel at one end of
the piazza, honest Bolt would sit smoking his evening pipe
at the other, watching the achievements of a little wooden warrior, who,
armed with the sword in each hand, was most valiantly

(09:45):
fighting the wind on the pinnacle of the barn. In
the meantime, Ichabod would carry on his suit with the
daughter by the side of the spring under the great elm,
or sauntering along in the twilight that hours so favorable
to the life lover's eloquence. I profess not to know
how women's hearts are wooed and won. To me, they

(10:06):
have always been matters of riddle and admiration. Some seem
to have but one vulnerable point or door of excess,
while others have a thousand avenues and may be captured
in a thousand different ways. It is a great triumph
of skill to gain the farmer, but a still greater
proof of generalship to maintain possession of the latter. For

(10:29):
man must battle for his fortress at every door and window.
He who wins a thousand common hearts is therefore entitled
to some renown. But he who keeps undisputed sway over
the heart of a cooquette is indeed a hero. Certain
it is. This was not the case with the redoubtable
brom Bones, and from the moment Ikeaba Crane made his advances,

(10:54):
the interests of the farmer evidently declined. His horse was
no longer seen tied to the palings on Sunday nights,
and a deadly feud gradually arose between him and the
preceptor of Sleepy Hollow, Brohm, who had a degree of
rough chivalry in his nature would fain have carried matters

(11:14):
to open warfare, and have settled their pretensions to the
lady according to the mode of those most concise and
simple reasoners the knight errant of your by single combat.
But Igabod was too conscious of the superior might of
his adversary to enter the lists against him. He had
overheard a boast of Bones that he would double the

(11:38):
schoolmaster up and lay him on a shelf of his
own schoolhouse, and he was too wary to give him
an opportunity. There was something extremely provoking in this obstinately
pacific system. It left Brom no alternative but to draw
upon the funds of rustic waggery in his disposition, and
to play off boorish practical jokes of his rival. Igabod

(12:02):
became the object of whimsical persecution to Bones and his
gang of rough riders. They harried his hitherto peaceful domains,
smoked out his singing school by stopping up the chimney,
broke into the schoolhouse at night in spite of its
formidable fastenings of wife and window stakes, and turned everything

(12:23):
topsy turvy, so that the poor schoolmaster began to think
all the witches in the country held their meetings there.
But what was still more annoying, Brahm took all opportunities
of turning him into ridicule in presence of his mistress,
and had a scoundrel dog, whom he taught to whine

(12:44):
in the most ludicrous manner, and introduced as a rival
of Igabod's, to instruct her in psalmody. In this way,
matters went on for some time without producing any material
effect on the relative situations of the contending powers. On
a fine autumnal afternoon, Dicobod, in a pensive mood, sat

(13:07):
enthroned on the lofty stool, from whence he usually watched
all the concerns of his little literary realm. In his hand,
he swayed a ferule, that scepter of despotic power, the
birch of justice, reposed on three nails behind the throne,
a constant terror to evildoers. While on the desk before

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him might be seen sundry contraband articles and prohibited weapons
detected upon the persons of idle urchins, such as half
munched apples, pop guns, whirligigs, fly cages, and whole legions
of rampant little paper game cocks. Apparently there had been

(13:50):
some appalling act of justice recently inflicted, for his scholars
were all busily intent upon their books, or slyly whispering
behind them, with one eye kept upon the master, and
a kind of buzzing stillness reigned throughout the schoolroom. It
was suddenly interrupted by the appearance of a negro in

(14:11):
tow cloth jacket and trousers, a round crowned fragment of
a hat like the cap of mercury, and mounted on
the back of a ragged, wild, half broken coat, which
he managed with a rope by way of halter. He
came clattering up to the school door with an invitation
to Ichabod to attend a merry making or quilting frolic

(14:33):
to be held that evening at Mynheer von Tossel's. And,
having delivered his message with that air of importance and
efforted fine language which a negro is apt to display
on petty embassies of the kind, he dashed over the
brook and was seen scampering away up the hollow, full
of the importance and hurry of the mission. All was

(14:55):
now bustle and hubbub in the late quiet schoolroom the
sky were hurried through their lessons without stopping at trifles.
Those who were nimble skipped over half with impunity, and
those who were tardy had a smart application now and
then in the rear to quicken their speed or help
them over a tall word. Books were flung aside without

(15:18):
being put away on the shelves, ink stands were overturned,
benches thrown down, and the whole school was turned loose
an hour before the usual time, bursting forth like a
legion of young imps, yelping and racketing about the green
in joy at their early emancipation. The gallant Ichabod now

(15:40):
spent at least an extra half hour at his toilet,
brushing and furbishing up his best and indeed only suit
of rustic black, and arranging his locks by a bit
of broken looking glass that hung up in the schoolhouse,
that he might make his appearance before his mistress in
the true style of a cavalier. He borrowed a horse

(16:01):
from the farmer with whom he was domiciled, a choleric
old Dutchman of the name of Hans upon the ripper,
and thus gallantly mounted issued forth like a knight errant
in quest of adventures. But it is meat I should,
in the true spirit of romantic story, give some account
of the looks and equipments of my hero and his steed.

(16:24):
The animal he bestrode was a broken down plow horse
that had outlived almost everything but its viciousness. He was
gaunt and shagged, with a ewe neck and a head
like a hammer. His rusty mane and tail were tangled
and knotted with burrs. One eye had lost its pupil
and was glaring and spectral, but the other had a

(16:47):
gleam of a genuine devil in it. Still, he must
have had fire and metal in his day, if we
may judge from the name he bore of gunpowder. He had,
in fact been a favorite steed of his master's, the
choleric von Ripper, who was a famous rider, and had
infused very probably some of his own spirit into the animal.

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For old and broken down as he looked, there was
more of a lurking devil in him than in any
young filly in the country. Ikabod was a suitable figure
for such a steed. He rode with sharp stirrups, which
brought his knees nearly up to the pommel of the saddle.
His sharp elbows stuck out like grasshoppers. He carried his

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whip perpendicularly in his hand like a scepter, and as
his horse jogged on, the motion of his arms was
not unlike the flapping of a pair of wings. A
small wild hat rested on the top of his nose,
for so his scanty strip of forehead might be called,
and the skirts of his black coat fluttered out almost

(17:56):
to the horse's tail. Such was the appearance of Ichabod
and his steed as they shambled out of the gate
of hans Van River. And it was altogether such an
apparition as is seldom to be met with in broad daylight.
It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day.
The sky was clear and serene, and nature wore that

(18:20):
rich and golden livery which we always associate with the
idea of abundance. The forests had put on their sober
brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind
had been nipped by the frosts with brilliant dyes of orange,
purple and scarlet. Streaming files of wild ducks began to

(18:41):
make their appearance high in the air. The bark of
the squirrel might be heard from the groves of beech
and hickory nuts, and the pensive whistle of the quail
at intervals from the neighboring stubblefield. The small birds were
taking their farewell banquets. In the fullness of their revelry.
They fluttered, chirpping and frolicking from bush to bush and

(19:03):
tree to tree, capricious from the very profusion and variety
around them. There was the honest cock robin, the favorite
game of stripling sportsmen, with its loud, querulous note, and
the twittering blackbirds flying in sable clouds, and the golden
winged woodpecker with his crimson crest, his broad black garget

(19:24):
and splendid plumage, and the cedar bird with its red
tipped wings and yellow tipped tail and its little montero
cap of feathers. And the blue jay that noisy cockscomb
in his gay light blue coat and white underclothes, screaming
and chattering, nodding and bobbing and bowing and pretending to
be on good terms with every songster of the grove.

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As Ichabod jogged slowly on his way, his eye ever
opened to every symptom of culinary abundance, ranged with delight
over the treasures of jolly autumn. On all sides he
beheld vast store of apples, some hanging in oppressive opulence
or the trees, some gathered into baskets and barrels for

(20:10):
the market, others heaped up in rich piles for the
cider press. Farther on he beheld great fields of Indian corn,
with its golden ears peeping from their leafy coverts and
holding out the promise of cakes and hasty puddings, and
the yellow pumpkins lying beneath them, turning up their fair
round bellies to the sun and giving ample prospects of

(20:34):
the most luxurious of pies and anon. He passed the
fragrant buckwheat fields, breathing the odor of the beehive, and
as he beheld them, soft anticipations stole over his mind
of dainty slapjacks, well buttered and garnished with honey or
trickle by the delicate, little dimpled hand a Katrina van Tossel,

(20:58):
thus feeding his mind with many sweet thoughts and sugared suppositions.
He journeyed along the sides of a range of hills
which look out upon some of the goodliest scenes of
the mighty Hudson. The sun gradually wheeled his broad disk
down in the west. The wide bosom of the top
on Ze lay motionless and glassy, excepting that here and

(21:22):
there a gentle undulation waved and prolonged the blue shadow
of the distant mountain. A few amber clouds floated in
the sky, without a breath of air to move them.
The horizon was of a fine golden tent, changing gradually
into a pure apple green, and from that into the

(21:43):
deep blue of the mid heaven. A slanting ray lingered
on the woody crests of the precipices that overhung some
parts of the river, giving greater depth to the dark
gray and purple of their rocky sides. A sloop was
loitering in the distance, dropping slowly down with the tide,
her sail hanging uselessly against the mast, and as the

(22:05):
reflection of the sky gleamed along the still water, it
seemed as if the vessel were suspended in the air.
It was toward evening that Nikobob arrived at the castle
of the hirevan Tassel, which he found thronged with the
pride and flower of the adjacent country. Old farmers a sparse,
leathern faced race in home spun coats and breeches, blue stockings,

(22:30):
huge shoes, and magnificent pewter buckles. Their brisk, withered little
dames in close crimped caps, long waisted short gowns, home
spun petticoats with scissors and pincushions, and gay calico pockets
hanging on the outside buxom lasses, almost as antiquated as
their mothers, excepting where a straw hat, a fine ribbon,

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or perhaps a white frock gave symptoms of city innovation.
The suns in short, square skirted coats with rows of
stupendous brass buttons, and their hair generally cured in the
fashion of the times, especially if they could procure an
eel skin for the purpose, it being esteemed throughout the
country as a potent nourisher and strengthener of the hair.

(23:18):
Brom Bones, however, was the hero of the scene, having
come to the gathering on his favorite steed, Dare Devil,
a creature like himself, full of metal and mischief, and
which no one but himself could manage. He was in
fact noted for preferring vicious animals, given to all kinds
of tricks, which kept the rider in constant risk of

(23:40):
his neck, for he held a tractable, well broken horse as
unworthy of a lad of spirit. Fain would I pause
to dwell upon the world of charms that burst upon
the enraptured gaze of my hero as he entered the
state parlor of von Tussel's mansion. Not those of the
bevy of buxom lasses with their luxurious display of red

(24:03):
and white, but the ample charms of a genuine Dutch
country tea table in the sumptuous time of autumn. Such
heaped up platters of cakes of various and almost indescribable
kinds known only to experienced Dutch housewives. There was the
doughty doughnut, the tender only coke, and the crisp and

(24:27):
crumbling cruller, sweet cakes and short cakes, ginger cakes and honeycakes,
and the whole family of cakes. And then there were
apple pies and peach pies and pumpkin pies, besides slices
of ham and smoked beef, and moreover, delectable dishes of

(24:47):
preserved plums and peaches and pears and quinces, not to
mention boiled, shod and roasted chickens, together with bowls of
milk and cream, all mingled higgily, pretty much as I
have enumerated them, with the motherly teapot sending up its
clouds of vapor from the midst heaven, bless the mark.

(25:10):
I want breath in time to discuss this banquet as
it deserves, and him too eager to get on with
my story happily. Ekeby Crane was not in so great
a hurry as his historian, but did ample justice to
every dainty. He was a kind and thankful creature, whose
heart dilated in proportion as his skin was filled with

(25:32):
good cheer, and whose spirit rose with eating as some
men's do with drink. He could not help too, rolling
his large eyes round him as he ate and chuckling
with the possibility that he might one day be lord
of all this scene of almost unimaginable luxury and splendor.
Then he thought, how soon he turned his back upon

(25:55):
the old schoolhouse, snap his fingers in the face of
Hans von Ripper and every other niggardly patron, and kick
any itinerant pedagogue out of doors, that should dare to
call him a comrade. Old Baltus von Tossel moved about
among his guests with a face dilated with content and

(26:16):
good humor, round in jolly as the harvest moon. His
hospitable attentions were brief but expressive, being confined to a
shake of the hand, a slap on the shoulder, a
loud laugh, and a pressing invitation to fall to and
help themselves. And now the sound of the music from

(26:36):
the common room our hall summoned to the dance. The
musician was an old, gray headed Negro who had been
the itinerant orchestra of the neighborhood for more than half
a century. His instrument was as old and battered as himself.
The greater part of the time he scraped on two
or three strings, accompanying every movement of the bow with

(26:58):
a motion of the head, bowing almost to the ground,
and stamping with his foot whenever a fresh couple were
to start. End of Part two. Dream Audio Books hopes
you have enjoyed this program.