About 1820 he was appointed professor of the Evidences of Christianity in the General Protestant Episcopal Seminary, and in 1824 published a volume of essays on this subject. In 1825 he was elected a member of Congress from New York City and remained in the House eight years. He was especially prominent in advocacy of the bill extending the term of copyright from twenty-eight to forty-two years. For several years he was a member of the New York Senate. In 1827 Verplanck, Sands and Bryant united in the production of an annual called 7'he Talisman. Mr. Verplanck also wrote a number of essays on a variety of subjects and published an edition of Shakespeare's plays, with notes from various sources, including some from his own pen. Mr. Verplanck, who was born in New York City August 6, 1786, died there March 18, 1870. His private life, says Bryant, " was as beautiful as his public life was useful and beneficent."

James Fenimore Cooper is another distinguished name which may be included among the literati or Westchester County, for his first novel was written while he resided at Mamaroneck. Cooper was born at Burlington, N. J., September 15, 1789. His father, Judge William Cooper, removed the following year to the neighborhood of Otsego Lake, N. Y., where he had purchased a large tract of land on which he

LITERATURE AND LITERARY MEN.

established a settlement, to which he gave the name oC Cooperstown. In this (Vonlicr home, in the midst of a population of settlers, tra])i)ers and Indians, youiif^ Cooper imbibed that knowledge of backwoods lil'c and of the habits of the aborigines which afterwards served him so well in the construction of his romances. At the age of thirteen he entered Yale College, and after remaining there three years received an apof the bishop of Western New York.