The history and progress of the world . that office upon him-self. There can be no doubt that Cooper was too prolific,too tediously prolix in his style, and actually trashy andinsipid in his novels of society. But this should not blindus to the real merits of his greater romances, which farsurpassed the writings of Irving in their intenseAmericanism, and which are almost as fascinatingto-day as when they were first published. So greatwas their appeal to mankind that Morse, the electrician, de-clared in 1833: In every city of Europe thatI visited, the works of Cooper were conspicuously placedin
The history and progress of the world . that office upon him-self. There can be no doubt that Cooper was too prolific,too tediously prolix in his style, and actually trashy andinsipid in his novels of society. But this should not blindus to the real merits of his greater romances, which farsurpassed the writings of Irving in their intenseAmericanism, and which are almost as fascinatingto-day as when they were first published. So greatwas their appeal to mankind that Morse, the electrician, de-clared in 1833: In every city of Europe thatI visited, the works of Cooper were conspicuously placedin the windows of every book-shop. They are publishedas soon as he produces them, in thirty-four different placesin Europe. They have been seen by American travelersin the languages of Turkey and Persia, in Constantinople,in Egypt, at Jerusalem, and Ispahan. Cooper was oneof the worlds great story-tellers, whose defects of styleare abundantly compensated by the invention of his nar-rative in plot and incident. He became, furthermore, the. AMERICAN 409 first voice of primeval America, of her virgin wildernessand her aboriginal children. He created the Indian as alife-size figure of literature, impressive even if as he originated the novel of the forest, so to a certainextent he originated the novel of the sea. The early child-hood of Cooper was mainly passed in the wilderness atthe very time, as his biographer says, when the firstwave of civilization was beginning to break against itshills. ... he was on the border, if he could not justlybe said to be in the midst, of mighty and seemingly inter-minable woods. The settlers axe had as yet scarcelydispelled the perpetual twilight of the primeval little lake lay enclosed in a border of gigantic afterward in the first flush of his fame Cooper setout to revive the memory of the days of the pioneers, hesaid that he might have chosen for his subject happierperiods, more interesting events and possibly m
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