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* COOPEB. 375 COOPER. eration smiles -n-onderingly &i the whole matter, but sympathizes with tlie inisiiacious author. The hist few years of Cooper's life saw the puh- lioation of enouffh novels to oocupy an ordinary lifelinie. but they added little to his reputation. He maintained his proud independeni-e to the last, and just before his death forbade his family to give any biographer access to his papers, an in- junction which has been obeyed, but which has not prevented the life written by Prof. T. R. Louns- bury (q.v. ) in the '■American Men of Letters Se- ries" (Boston, 1SS5) from being an admirable piece of work. Cooper died at Cooperstown, N. Y., September 14, 1851. Six months after his death a public meeting in Xew York, addressed by Dan- iel Webster and William CuUen Bryant did some- thing to atone for the evil treatment America had accorded one of the very greatest of her writers. But even after the lapse of half a centurj-, it •can hardly be said that Americans are prepared to do full" justice to Cooper. His great romances are frequently spoken of as if they were, in the main, fit reading for boys only. His undoubted defects, such as his careless style, his exploit<a- tion of his prejudices, his stilted conversations, his inability, as a rule, to draw women who were not distressingly prim, the fact that he wrote entirely too many novels, and that not a few of his men are as wooden as his women — these grave faults have been put forward, while his greater merits have been kept in the background. For, when at his best, as in nearly all the romances named above. Cooper was a very great novelist. He had the narrative faculty of carrying his read- ers along, hoever much they might griunble at tliis detail or that. In "Leatherstocking" he iidded a character to the small gallery of the world's fictitious personages — something no other American has ever done, except Jlrs. Stowe — and in Harvey Birch, Long Tom Coffin, and other sailors, as well as in Uncas, Chingachgook. and other Indians, he created characters of tuidying ]>ower. His Indians, at whom it was once the fash- ion to sneer^ as the creations of a romantic fancy, are now said by ethnologists to be far fi-om overdra^vn portraitures. He was, as we have seen, practically the first writer to extend the domain of fiction over the sea, the primeval forest, and the prairie. If he was in a way a follower of a still greater romancer, Scott, he won the enthusi- astic commendation of another great writer of fiction, Balzac, and he has the unique credit of having written a prose epic of the planting of his native country, which is as spacious and free as the virgin woods and lakes amid which its scenes are laid. In other words. Cooper is a large genius, who ranks well with his fellow- romancers. It is almost absurd to judge one of Cooper's rapidly written romances by the canons one might legitimately apply to a short story by Daudct or ^laupassant. When the man is judged in the large by the effects of his best works, and when he is compared with his rivals like Simms and Bird, and with his predecessor, Broekden Brown, his full genius and the service lie did American literature emerge splendidly. For carrying power his work has probably had no equal in America : with fewer crying faults he- would in all likelihood have been our greatest author. A full bibliography of Cooper is not needed here, but to the works alreadv named may be added: The Wept ofWish-ton-Wish (1829); The Ueidcnmauer (18.32); The Headsman (18.33); Sketches of Switzerland (1835); The American Democrat (1838); The Chronicles of Cooiiers- toicn (1838); Homeward Hound (1838); ^fcr- cedes of Castile (1840); Wyandotte (1843); Ycd J/7/crs (1843) ; Afloat and Ashore (1844) ; The Crater (1847); Jack Tier (1848); Oak Openings (1848); The Sea-Lions (1849): and The Woijs of the Hour (1850); Lounsbury's Life, already mentioned, contains a good bibliog- raphy and the best criticism that has yet been devoted to Cooper. Consult, also: Clymer, James Fenimore Cooper (1901) : Richardson, American Literature, vol. ii. (New York, 1887-88) ; Wen- dell. A Literary History of America (New York, 1900) ; and essays by Jtark Twain, T. W. Hig- ginson. and Brander Matthews. COOPEK, Myles (1737-85). An English clergyman, scholar, and educator, second presi- dent "( 1763-76) of King's College (now Colimibia University). He was educated at Queen's Col- lege, Oxford (M.A. 17C0), was appointed a fel- low of that college, and in 1762, on the recom- mendation of the Archbishop of Canterbury, came to America as fellow of King's College, pro- fessor of moral philosophy, and assistant to President Samuel Johnson. ' In 1763 he succeed- ed Dr. Johnson in the presidency. He strength- ened the curriculum, and to the academic depart- ment and divinity school already existing added a medical school, which was organized in 1768, and in 1769 conferred the first medical degrees bestowed in America. In 1771 he visited Eng- land on behalf of the college. A true Oxonian, a high-churchman, and a Toiy, he supported the cause of King George against the Colonies, and by such vehement pamphlets as A Friendly Ad- dress to All lieasonahle Americans on the Sub- ject of our Late Political Confusion and What Think ye of Conarcss yow? made himself cor- dially detested. 'On Jlay 10, 1775, he escaped from'a mob attack upon the college, and the next day took passage for England. He there received tlie livings of Sulhanisted-Abbots and Cowley, and afterwards l>ecame senior minister of the English chapel at Edinburgh. Among those trained under him were Gouverneur Morris, Rob- ert R. Livingston, John .Jay, and Alexander Hamilton. He was perhaps the finest classical scholar in eighteeuth-centuiy America. COOPEB, Peter (1791-1883). An Ameri- can inventor, manufacturer, and philanthropist, born in New York City. He assisted his father in his successive occupations of hatter, brewer, and brick-maker: gained such education as his limited means allowed, and from 1808 to 1812 was apprenticed to a carriage-builder. He in- vented a machine for shearing cloth, which was used during the War of 1812-15; then manufac- tured cabinet-ware: was for a time a grocer, and finally established a glue and isinglass fac- tory on Long Island, continuing the business for more than fifty years and acquiring great wealth. In 1828 he biiilt large iron-works in Baltimore, and afterwards a rolling and wire mill in New York, and blast-furnaces in Pennsylvania, In 1830 he designed and built the first American locomotive engine, a rude little contrivance, which he exhibited on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, and about 1845 made at Trenton the first rolled-iron beams for building pur- poses. He was among the earliest to pro- mote the laving of the Atlantic cable, and for