erence,"
says Leather-Stocking, "atween givin' up territory afore a war, out of a
dread of war, or givin' it up after a war, because we can't help
it--onless it be that the last is most manful and honorable."

The features of Cooper's personal character, as well as his prejudices
and limitations, are always to be kept in mind because they explain much
that is defective in his art, and account for much of his unpopularity.
Some of them became unpleasantly conspicuous in the writings of his
later years. In 1840 he entered upon a new period of creative activity
which lasted until 1850. Between and including those years he brought
out seventeen works of fiction. Eleven of them were written during the
first half of this period ending with 1845, and even these did not
constitute the whole of what he then wrote. This fertility is made the
more remarkable by the fact that during this same time he was engaged in
the special controversy about the battle of Lake Erie, not to speak of
his standing quarrel with the press and his running fight of libel suits
in which he was not only plaintiff, but did the main work of the
prosecution.

It is possible that his unpopularity stirred him to unwonted exertion.
There is certainly no question that the years from 1840 to 1845
inclusive, are, as a whole, the supreme creative period of Cooper's
career. Its production does not dwarf his early achievement in vigor or
interest; but it does often show a far higher mastery of his art. Two of
the works then written mark the culmination of his powers. These (p. 239)
were the Leather-Stocking tales called "The Pathfinder" and "The
Deerslayer." The former appeared on the 14th of March, 1840, the latter
on the 27th of August, 1841. They complete the circle of these stories;
for others which he contemplated writing he unfortunately never executed.
Still the series was a perfect one as it was left. The life of
Leather-Stocking was now a complete drama in five acts, beginning with
the first war-path in "The Deerslayer," followed by his career of
activity and of love in "The Last of the Mohicans" and "The Pathfinder,"
and his old age and death in "The Pioneers" and "The Prairie."

"The Pathfinder" and "The Deerslayer" stand at the head of Cooper's
novels as artistic creations. There are others of his works which
contain parts as perfect as are to be found in these, and scenes even
more thrilling. Not one can be compared with either of them as a
finishe