publicly announced that he had
made up his mind to abandon authorship. Into this letter he imported
some remarks upon a political controversy which was then agitating the
nation, and touched the political situation in such a way, at a time
when feeling ran high, that he succeeded in enraging the adherents of
both political parties.

A storm of newspaper abuse then fell upon Cooper. He was not the man to
realize that, in controversy, silence is sometimes the most effective
weapon. He replied to every attack. Nor did he remain on the defensive.
He began new hostilities. He abandoned his resolution to abandon
authorship. _The Monikins_, a satirical novel in which men are
burlesqued by monkeys, was published in 1835. In the ten volumes of
travel published from 1836 to 1838 he dealt out occasional criticisms of
both England and America with so impartial a hand that he drew down upon
himself the savage vituperation of the press on both sides of the
Atlantic. Then came the period during which, from being the most popular
American author, he became the most unpopular man of letters to whom the
nation has ever given birth. "For years," says Lounsbury, "a storm of
abuse fell upon him, which for violence, for virulence, and even for
malignity, surpassed anything in the history of American literature, if
not in the history of literature itself."

[Illustration: THREE-MILE POINT]

On the western shore of Otsego Lake there is a low, wooded tongue of
land which projects for a short distance into the water, and is called,
in reference to its distance from Cooperstown, Three-Mile Point. This
has been a favorite resort for picnics and other outings of villagers
since 1822. When Fenimore Cooper took up his residence in the village in
1834, after his return from Europe, he found that the free use of
Three-Mile Point by the public had given rise to the notion that it was
owned by the community. This impression he took pains to correct, saying
that while he had no desire to prevent the public from resorting to the
Point, he wished it clearly understood that it was owned by the
descendants of Judge William Cooper, of whose will he was executor. A
defiant attitude toward his claim, and the destruction of a tree at
Three-Mile Point afterward led Cooper to publish in the _Freeman's
Journal_ the following warning:

The public is warned against trespassing on the Three-Mile
Point, it being the intention of the subscriber rigidly to