Fenimore Cooper had a keen sense of the ridiculous.  His table-talk by his own fireside was full of cheery life, fun, and glowing merriment.  “Severe and stern his fine face could be when touching on serious subjects,” but his relish of the ludicrous and comical was very strongly marked, and when such came his way in reading, it was carried at once to the family circle and read by him with zest, and a laugh so hearty it brought the tears rolling down his cheeks.  While in Europe he outlined a satirical tale in which the men’s parts should be seriously assumed by monkeys.  An English baronet, Sir John Goldencalf, and a Yankee skipper, Captain Noah Poke, were made to travel together through the different parts of Monkeyland, called Leaphigh, Leaplow, and Leapthrough, representing England, America, and France.  This tale was hastily written in his New York home on Bleecker Street near Thompson.  Of these countries, their people, and that time, the story was a strong, clever, and ludicrous picture, which in this day would be accepted as such, and be equally helpful and amusing to writers and readers.  It was called “The Monikins,” and was published in 1835.

Delight in the scenery of Switzerland led Cooper to put in book form his notes on his visits to that small country of many interests and magnificent views.  Under the name of “Sketches in Switzerland,” it was published in 1836.  The France and England part of his “Gleanings in Europe” went to print the next year.  Concerning his book on old England, Cooper, in the autumn of 1837, writes:  “They tell me it has made a stir in London, where I get abused and read a la Trollope.  It ought to do them good, but whether it does or not depends upon Divine grace.”  This effort has been called keen, clever, but untimely, tending rather to set people by their ears than to save them from their sins.

In the summer of 1837 Cooper found himself facing the disputed ownership of “Three-Mile Point” of Lake Otsego.  On his return from Europe he found that his townspeople regarded this point—­Myrtle Grove—­as belonging to them.  But Judge Cooper’s will left it to all his heirs until 1850, when it was to go to the youngest bearing his name.  While willing to allow the villagers picnic privileges, Cooper insisted on his clear title to this pretty shore point; but Cooperstown Solons hotly fought what they called “the arrogant claims of one J. Fenimore Cooper,” who, however, finally proved his title by winning the case at law.  But he lost much of the good-will of his townsmen, whom he thought “progressive in killing the red-man and chopping down trees.”

[Illustration:  WILD-ROSE POINT OR THREE-MILE POINT.]