The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
ish, discontented cry. Before the barn-door strutted the gallant cock,
that pattern of a husband, a warrior, and a fine gentleman, clapping
his burnished wings, and crowing in the pride and gladness of his
heart—sometimes tearing up the earth with his feet, and then generously calling his ever-hungry family of wives and children to enjoy
the rich morsel which he had discovered.
The pedagogue's mouth watered, as he looked upon this sumptuous promise of luxurious winter fare. In his devouring mind's eye
he pictured to himself every roasting pig running about with a pudding in his belly, and an apple in his mouth ; the pigeons were snugly
put to bed in a comfortable pie, and tucked in with a coverlet of
crust; the geese were swimming in their own gravy; and the ducks
pairing cosily in dishes, like snug married couples, with a decent
competency of onion sauce. In the porkers he saw carved out the
future sleek side of bacon, and juicy, relishing ham ; not a turkey but
he beheld daintily trussed up, with its gizzard under its wing, and,
peradventure, a necklace of savory sausages ; and even bright chanticleer himself lay sprawling on his back, in a side-dish, with uplifted
claws, as if craving that quarter which his chivalrous spirit disdained
to ask while living.
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 the orchard 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 the immense tracts of wild
land, 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 bestriding a pacing mare, with a colt at her heels, setting out for Kentucky, Tennessee, or the Lord knows where.
