Book account

"A drowsy,
dreamy influence seems to hang over the land, and to pervade the very
atmosphere. Some say the place was bewitched by a high German doctor
during the early days of the settlement; others that an old Indian
chief, the wizard of his tribe, held his pow-wows there before
Hendrick Hudson's discovery of the river. The dominant spirit,
however, that haunts this enchanted region, is the apparition of
a figure on horse-back, without a head, said to be the ghost of a
Hessian trooper, and was known at all the country firesides as the
'Headless horseman' of Sleepy Hollow."
* * *
O waters of Pocantico!
Wild rivulet of wood and glen!
May thy glad laughter, sweet and low,
Long, long outlive the sighs of men.
_S. H. Thayer._
* * *
[Illustration: SLEEPY HOLLOW CHURCH.]
=Sleepy Hollow.=--The Old Dutch Church, the oldest on the Hudson, is
about one-half mile north from Tarrytown.
It was built by "Frederick Filipse and his wife Katrina Van Cortland
in 1690." The material is partly of stone and partly of brick brought
from Holland.


Pages:
101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125