The Land of Sleepy Hollow

              The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.              9
the crackling wood-fire, and where, of course, no spectre dared to show his face, it was dearly purchased by the terrors of his subsequent walk homewards. What fearful shapes and shadows beset his path amidst the dim and ghastly glare of a snowy night!—With what wistful look did he eye every trembling ray of light streaming across the waste fields from some distant window !—How often was he appalled by some shrub covered with snow, which, like a sheeted spectre, beset his very path !—How often did he shrink with curdling awe at the sound of his own steps on the frosty crust beneath his feet; and dread to look over his shoulder, lest he should behold some uncouth being tramping close behind him !—and how often was he thrown into complete dismay by some rushing blast, howling among the trees, in the idea that it was the Galloping Hessian on one of his nightly scourings! All these, however, were mere terrors of the night, phantoms of the mind that walk in darkness; and though he had seen many spectres in his time, and been more than once beset by Satan in divers shapes, in his lonely perambulations, yet daylight put an end to all these evils ; and he would have passed a pleasant life of it, in despite of the Devil and all his works, if his path had not been crossedby a being that causes more perplexity to mortal man than ghosts,goblins, and the whole race of witches put together, and that was—a woman. Among the musical disciples who assembled, one evening in each week, to receive his instructions in psalmody, was Katrina VanTassel, the daughter and only child of a substantial Dutch farmer.She was a blooming lass of fresh eighteen; plump as a partridge ; ripe and melting and rosy-cheeked as one of her father's peaches, and universally famed, not merely for her beauty, but her vast expectations. She was withal a little of a coquette, as might be perceived even in her dress, which was a mixture of ancient and modern fashions, as most suited to set off her charms. She wore the ornaments of pure yellow gold, which her great-great-grandmother had