Leather-Stocking guided Elizabeth Temple and
Edwards, and carried the dying Chingachgook. On this spot, with his
glazing eyes fixed upon the western hills, the last of the Mohicans
yielded up his spirit. Here was the scene of Captain Hollister's charge
at the head of the Templeton Light Infantry, so swiftly followed by the
revelation of the mystery which the cave concealed.

[Illustration: GRAVELLY POINT]

Not far from the spot upon which the Leather-Stocking monument now
stands, near the main entrance of Lakewood cemetery, the log hut of
Leather-Stocking stood, and afterward, according to the story,
Chingachgook was buried there. Farther southward, the road that branches
off to ascend Mount Vision is the one by which Judge Temple and his
daughter approached the village in the opening scene of the story, and
it was during their descent from the upper level of this road that the
buck was shot by Edwards and Leather-Stocking, when Judge Temple's
marksmanship had failed. Near the branching of this road a stairway
climbs the mountain, and reaches the pathway of Prospect Rock, where
Elizabeth found the old Mohican, and was trapped by the forest fire.
Upon this natural terrace a rustic observatory now stands, which offers
a superb view of the lake and village.

It was on the summit of Mount Vision, overlooking the village, that
Elizabeth Temple was faced by a panther crouching to spring upon her,
and had resigned herself to a cruel death, when she heard the quiet
voice of old Leather-Stocking, followed by the crack of the rifle that
saved her life, as he said:

"Hist! hist! Stoop lower, gal; your bonnet hides the creatur's head!"

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 120: _Pages and Pictures_, 301.]

[Footnote 121: Elihu Phinney in Shaw's _History of Cooperstown_.]

[Footnote 122: Letter to John W. Francis, 1822.]

[Footnote 123: Vol xxix, p. 35.]

[Footnote 124: U.S. National Museum, Bulletin 47, p. 465.]

[Footnote 125: Livermore, _History of Cooperstown_, p. 133.]

[Footnote 126: G. P. Keese, _Harper's Magazine_, October, 1885.]

[Footnote 127: For the purpose of the story, as he explains in the
preface of _The Deerslayer_, Cooper places the "sunken island" farther
south, nearly opposite to Hutter's Point, and at a greater distance from
the shore than its real situation.]

CHAPTER XIX

TWENTIETH CENTURY BEGINNINGS

A man of national reputation made Cooperstown his summer home in 1903,
when the Rt. Rev. Dr. H