and he felt it slipping from under him. He seized it by the pommel, and endeavored to hold it firm, but in vain; and had just time to save himself by clasping old Gunpowder round the neck, when the saddle fell to the earth, and he heard it 5 trampled under foot by his pursuer. For a moment the terror of Hans Van Ripper's wrath passed across his mind-for it was his Sunday saddle; but this was no time for petty fears; the goblin was hard on his haunches; and (unskillful rider that he was!) he had much ado to maintain his seat; sometimes 10 slipping on one side, sometimes on another, and sometimes jolted on the high ridge of his horse's back-bone, with a violence that he verily feared would cleave him asunder.

An opening in the trees now cheered him with the hopes. that the church bridge was at hand. The wavering reflection 15 of a silver star in the bosom of the brook told him that he was not mistaken. He saw the walls of the church dimly glaring under the trees beyond. Heecollected the place where Brom Bones's ghostly competitor had disappeared. "If I can but reach the ge," thought Ichabod, "I am safe." Just 20 then he heard the black steed panting and blowing close behind him; he even fancied that he his hot breath. Another convulsive kick in the ribs, and old Gunpowder sprang on the bridge; he thundered over the resounding planks; he rained the opposite side; and now Ichabod cast a look behind o see if his pursuer should vanish, according to rule, in a flash of fire and brimstone. Just then he saw the goblin rising in his stirrups, and in the very act Hurling his head at him. Ichabod endeavored to dodge the horrible missile, but too late. It encountered his cranium wit a tremendous crash-he was 30 tumbled headlong into the dust, and Gunpowder, the black steed, and the goblin rider passed by like a whirlwind.

The next morning the old horse was found without his saddle, and with the bridle under his feet, soberly cropping the grass at his master's gate. Ichabod did not make his appearour came, but no Ichabod. The

35 ance at breakfast-din

boys assembled at the school-house, and strolled idly about the banks of the brook, but no school-master. Hans Van Ripper now began to feel some uneasiness about the fate of poor Ichabod, and his saddle. An inquiry was set on foot, 5 and after diligent investigation they came upon his tre In one part of the road leading to the church was found the saddle trampled in the dirt; the tracks of horses' hoofs deeply dented in the road, and evidently at furious speed, were traced to the bridge, beyond which, on the bank of a broad part of the te brook, where the water ran deep and black, was found the hat of the unfortunate Ichabod, and close beside it a shattered pumpkin.

The brook was searched, but the body of the school-master was not to be discovered. Hans Van Ripper, as executer of 15 his estate, examined the ble which contained all his worldly effects. They consisted of two shirts and a half; two stocks for the neck; pair two of worsted stockings; an old pair of corduroy small-clothes; a rusty razor; a book of psalm tunes, full of dogs' ears; and a broken As to the 20 books and furniture of the school-house, they belonged to the community, excepting Mather's History of Witcha New England Almanac, and a book of dreams and fortune-telling; in which was a sheet of foolscap much scribbled and blotted in several fruitless

25 copy

30

to make

verses in honor of the heiress of Van Tassel. The magic books and the poetic scrawl were forthwith consigned to the flames by Hans Ripper, who from that time forward determined to send his children no more to school, observing that he never knew

and writing. Whatever

good come of this same readmoney the schoolmaster possessed, and he had received his quarter's pay but a day or two before, he must have about his person at the time of his disappearance.

The mysterious event caused much speculation at the 35 church on the following Sunday. of gazers and gossips

were collected in the church-yard, at the bridge, and at the spot where the hat and pumpkin had been found. The stories of Brouwer, of Bones, and a whole budget of others, were called to mind; and when they had diligently considered them 5 all, and compared them with the symptoms of the present case, they shook their heads, and came to the conclusion that Ichabod had been carried off by the galloping Hessian. As he was a bachelor, and in nobody's debt, nobody troubled his head any more about him. The school was removed to a dif10 ferent quarter of the hollow, and another, pedagogue reigned in

It is true, an old farmer, who had been down to New York, on a visit several years after, and from whom this account of the ghostly adventure was received, brought home the intelli15 gence that Ichabod Crane was still alive; that he had left the neighborhood, partly through fear of the goblin and Hans Van Ripper, and partly in mortification at having been suddenly dismissed by the heiress; that he had changed his quarters to a distant part of the country; had kept school and studied law at the 20 same time, had been admitted to the bar, turned politician, elec tioneered written for the newspapers, and finally had been made a justice the Pound Court. Brom Bones, t, who shortly after rival's disappearance conducted bloomKatrina in triumph to the altar, observed to look exceedingly knowing whenever the story of Ichabod was related, nd always burst into a hearty laugh ate mention of pumpkin, which led some to suspect. that he knew more about matter than he chose to tell. но

Te old country wives, howeyer, who are t best judges 30 of these matters, maintain to this day that Ichabod was spirited away by supernatural means; and it is a favorite story often told about the neighborhood round the winter evening fire. The bridge became more than ever an object of superstitious awe, and that may be the reason why the road has been 35 altered of late years, so as to approach the church by the border

от

of the mill-pond. The school-house being deserted, soon fell to decay, and was reported to be haunted by the ghost of the unfortunate pedagogue; and the ploughboy, loitering homeward of a still summer evening, has often fancied his voice at a distance, 5 chanting a melancholy psalm tune among the tranquil solitudes of Sleepy Hollow.