childhood drafted into the reality of after life.

_The Red Rover_, the next sea story, came out in 1828. By that time
other novelists were writing tales of the sea, but they were mere
imitations of _The Pilot_. In _The Red Rover_ the genuine adventures
of the sailor class were again embodied in the thrilling narrative
that Cooper alone knew how to write, and this book has always been one
of the most popular of novels.

The Red Rover, so called because of his red beard, and whose name
gives the title to the book, is a well born Englishman who has turned
pirate, and whose daring adventures have made him famous along the
coasts of America, Europe and Africa. The scene opens in the harbor of
Newport in the days when that town was the most important port of the
Atlantic coast, and from there is carried to the high seas, whereon is
fought that famous last sea fight of the Red Rover, the description of
which forms one of Cooper's best efforts.

_Wing and Wing_ is a tale of the Mediterranean during the exciting
days of privateers and pirates in the latter part of the eighteenth
century. The great admiral, Nelson, is introduced in this book, which
abounds with incidents of the tropical seas and reflects much of
Cooper's experience during his apprenticeship on the Sterling. The
story is one of Cooper's masterpieces, and, like so much of his work,
has preserved in literature a phase of life that has forever passed
away.

In _The Two Admirals_ is introduced, for the first time in fiction, a
description of the evolution of great fleets in action. The scene
is taken from English history, and in many instances the story shows
Cooper at his best.

_The Water Witch_, and _Ned Myers, or Life Before the Mast_, a
biography almost of Cooper's own early life at sea, must be included
among the tales which illustrate the author's genius as a writer of
tales of the sea.

Nothing can be more different than the picture of Leatherstocking and
his Indian friends in the forest retreats of nature and that of the
reckless sailor race which found piracy and murder the only outcome
for their fierce ambitions. Yet both are touched with the art of a
master, and both illustrate Cooper's claim as one of the greatest
masters of fiction.

Besides his _Leather Stocking Tales_ and the sea stories Cooper
wrote novels, sketches of travel, essays on the social and political
condition of America, and innumerable pamphlets in answer to attacks
made upon h