during intimacy with the refined and charming
Hoffman family which was so deeply to influence all his life. His health
had always been delicate, and his friends were now alarmed by symptoms
of pulmonary weakness. This physical disability no doubt had much to do
with his disinclination to severe study. For the next two or three years
much time was consumed in excursions up the Hudson and the Mohawk,
and in adventurous journeys as far as the wilds of Ogdensburg and to
Montreal, to the great improvement of his physical condition, and in
the enjoyment of the gay society of Albany, Schenectady, Ballston, and
Saratoga Springs. These explorations and visits gave him material for
future use, and exercised his pen in agreeable correspondence; but his
tendency at this time, and for several years afterwards, was to the idle
life of a man of society. Whether the literary impulse which was born
in him would have ever insisted upon any but an occasional and fitful
expression, except for the necessities of his subsequent condition, is
doubtful.

Irving's first literary publication was a series of letters, signed
Jonathan Oldstyle, contributed in 1802 to the "Morning Chronicle," a
newspaper then recently established by his brother Peter. The attention
that these audacious satires of the theater, the actors, and their
audience attracted is evidence of the literary poverty of the period.
The letters are open imitations of the "Spectator" and the "Tatler,"
and, although sharp upon local follies, are of no consequence at present
except as foreshadowing the sensibility and quiet humor of the future
author, and his chivalrous devotion to woman. What is worthy of note
is that a boy of nineteen should turn aside from his caustic satire
to protest against the cruel and unmanly habit of jesting at ancient
maidens. It was enough for him that they are women, and possess the
strongest claim upon our admiration, tenderness, and protection.

III. MANHOOD--FIRST VISIT TO EUROPE

Irving's health, always delicate, continued so much impaired when he
came of age, in 1804., that his brothers determined to send him to
Europe. On the 19th of May he took passage for Bordeaux in a sailing
vessel, which reached the mouth of the Garonne on the 25th of June. His
consumptive appearance when he went on board caused the captain to say
to himself, "There's a chap who will go overboard before we get across;"
but his condition was much improved by the voyage.