arm of manner. There is some
pleasant correspondence between Irving and Miss Mary Fairlie, a belle of
the time, who married the tragedian, Thomas A. Cooper; the "fascinating
Fairlie," as Irving calls her, and the Sophie Sparkle of the
"Salmagundi." Irving's susceptibility to the charms and graces of
women--a susceptibility which continued always fresh--was tempered and
ennobled by the most chivalrous admiration for the sex as a whole.
He placed them on an almost romantic pinnacle, and his actions always
conformed to his romantic ideal, although in his writings he sometimes
adopts the conventional satire which was more common fifty years ago
than now. In a letter to Miss Fairlie, written from Richmond, where he
was attending the trial of Aaron Burr, he expresses his exalted opinion
of the sex. It was said in accounting for the open sympathy of the
ladies with the prisoner that Burr had always been a favorite with them;
"but I am not inclined," he writes, "to account for it in so illiberal
a manner; it results from that merciful, that heavenly disposition,
implanted in the female bosom, which ever inclines in favor of the
accused and the unfortunate. You will smile at the high strain in which
I have indulged; believe me, it is because I feel it; and I love your
sex ten times better than ever."--[An amusing story in connection
with this Richmond visit illustrates the romantic phase of Irving's
character. Cooper, who was playing at the theater, needed small-clothes
for one of his parts; Irving lent him a pair,--knee breeches being still
worn,--and the actor carried them off to Baltimore. From that city he
wrote that he had found in the pocket an emblem of love, a mysterious
locket of hair in the shape of a heart. The history of it is curious:
when Irving sojourned at Genoa, he was much taken with the beauty of a
young Italian lady, the wife of a Frenchman. He had never spoken with
her, but one evening before his departure he picked up from the floor
her handkerchief which she had dropped, and with more gallantry than
honesty carried it off to Sicily. His pocket was picked of the precious
relic while he was attending a religious function in Catania, and he
wrote to his friend Storm, the consul at Genoa, deploring his loss. The
consul communicated the sad misfortune to the lovely Bianca, for that
was the lady's name, who thereupon sent him a lock of her hair, with the
request that he would come to see her on his return. He neve