to find his balance.  Mary prays and hopes while the young man sails to the far-away ice land, where, shipwrecked and alone with his Maker, he finds the light of Truth shining for him on the far-away shores of his frozen hold.  Of this sea tale Professor Lounsbury writes:  “‘The Sea Lions’ is certainly one of the most remarkable conceptions that it ever entered into the mind of a novelist to create.”  And he adds:  “It is a powerful story.”

“Ways of the Hour” came from Cooper’s pen in 1850.  The purpose of this story was to attack trial by jury.

From the time of Cooper’s friendship with Charles Mathews in the early 1820’s, he had been in touch with the stage, and in June, 1850, he mentions writing a three-act play in “ridicule of new notions.”  The title was “Upside Down; or, Philosophy in Petticoats”—­a comedy.  Of this play Cooper’s friend Hackett, the American Falstaff of that day, wrote him:  “I was at Burton’s its first night and saw the whole of the play.  The first act told well; the second, pretty well, but grew heavy; the third dragged until the conclusion surprised the attention into warm applause.”

[Illustration:  JAMES H. HACKETT.]

This clever but not over-successful farce closed the literary career of
James Fenimore Cooper.

[Illustration:  CHARLES MATHEWS.]

Of Charles Mathews, the peerless comedy artist of England, and Fenimore Cooper, his old-time friend, Dr. John Wakefield Francis, wrote: 

“During a memorable excursion made to Albany with [the actor] Dunlap, Mathews, and Mr. Cooper in the spring of 1823, I found him abounding in dramatic anecdotes as well as associations the striking scenery of the Hudson brought to mind.  ‘The Spy’ was, however, the leading subject of Mathews’ conversation.  Cooper unfolded his intention of writing a series of works illustrative of his country, revolutionary occurrences, and the red man of the western world.  Mathews expressed in strong terms the patriotic benefits of such an undertaking, and complimented Cooper on the specimen already furnished in Harvey Birch.  The approbation of Mathews could never be slightly appreciated.  There was little of flattery in him at any time.  He was a sort of ‘My Lord Lofty,’ who valued himself in pride of opinion.  Such an individual could not but enlist the feelings of Mr. Cooper.  I hardly know whether I have ever seen Mr. Cooper manifest as much enthusiasm with any other person when occasion was felicitous, the subject of interest, and the comedian in his happy vein.  Dunlap, were he speaking, might tell you of his [Cooper’s] gratuities to the unfortunate playwright and the dramatic performer.”  In 1832 William Dunlap’s “History of the American Theatre” was “Dedicated to James Fenimore Cooper Esq., by his Friend, the Author.”

It was in this year of 1850 that the author’s daughter, Susan Augusta, had her “Rural Hours” about ready to print.  And of this book her father wrote:  “It will be out in July.  There is elegance, purity, knowledge, and grace about it.  It will make her the Cooper at once.  Quite puts her papa’s nose out of joint.”  More, concerning this book and New York City of that day, appears in her father’s letter to her mother, written in that city at the Broadway Hotel, September 19, 1850.