ling powers thought false. The schools did not furnish much instruction,
but owing to this considerate watchfulness they were innocent if they
were inefficient. Still this ingenious arrangement for stopping the
progress of the human mind could not work forever. From the start there
was a dangerous element, though in this case the colonists had not come
from New England but from the Middle States. Very speedily that innate
depravity of the human heart which does not like to hear a clergyman
read prayers, which looks with suspicion upon a liturgy, began to
manifest itself. This, however, was kept under control until the arrival
of new colonists. This Eden was then invaded not by one serpent only,
but by several. Four of them were clergymen; one a Presbyterian, one a
Methodist, one a Baptist, and one a Quaker. This was too much for the
solitary Episcopalian who had previously been on the ground, and who is
represented as combining a weak physical constitution with a very strong
conception of his apostolic authority as a divine. It must be conceded
that for a population of about five hundred souls the supply of
spiritual teachers was ample. With them came also a lawyer and an
editor. The seeds of dissolution were at once sown. The colonists became
ungrateful, and began to inquire not only into the conduct of their
governor, but even into the title by which he held some of his lands. He
finally left the spot in disgust, and having first taken the precaution
to dispose of his property at a good price, returned to his native
country. A natural yearning to see the community he had established led
the discoverer to revisit, after a few months, the scene of his trials.
He sailed to the spot but he could not find it. A convulsion of nature
similar to that which had raised the reef above the level of the (p. 258)
waves had sunk it again out of sight. Ungrateful colonists,
clergymen, editor, and lawyer, had all perished.

In June, 1847, Cooper made a trip to the West, and went as far as
Detroit. One result of this journey was the novel of "The Oak Openings;
or, the Bee-Hunter." This must be looked upon as a decided failure. The
desire to lecture his fellow-men on manners had now given place to a
desire to edify them; and he was no more successful in the one than he
had been in the other. In this instance the issue of the story depends
on the course of an Indian who is converted to Christianity by
witnessing the way in which a self-