y pilgrimage. The hurried tourist is disappointed in not being
greeted by some conspicuous monument to beckon him at once to the famous
tomb; but a more genuine tribute to the novelist's memory appears when
the visitor's eye lights upon the path leading from the gate of the
enclosure, and deeply worn in the sod by the feet of wayfarers in many a
long journey, through the years, to Cooper's grave.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 102: _James Fenimore Cooper_, by Mary E. Phillips, p. 262.]

[Footnote 103: In 1826 he applied to the legislature to change his name
to James Cooper Fenimore, since there were no men of his mother's family
to continue the name. The request was not granted, but the change was
made to James Fenimore-Cooper. He soon dropped the hyphen.]

[Footnote 104: Now in the hall at Fynmere, the home built in Cooperstown
by the novelist's grandson, James Fenimore Cooper of Albany.]

[Footnote 105: _James Fenimore Cooper_, by Thomas R. Lounsbury, American
Men of Letters series, p. 80.]

[Footnote 106: Now at Fynmere.]

[Footnote 107: Now at Edgewater.]

[Footnote 108: _Pages and Pictures_, Susan Fenimore Cooper, p. 322.]

[Footnote 109: _James Fenimore Cooper_, W. B. Shubrick Clymer, p. 90.]

[Footnote 110: Livermore, p. 204.]

[Footnote 111: John Worthington, afterward United States Consul in
Malta.]

[Footnote 112: Lounsbury.]

[Footnote 113: Cooperstown Centennial Book, p. 133.]

[Footnote 114: _Reminiscences_, Elihu Phinney, 1890.]

CHAPTER XV

MR. JUSTICE NELSON

Samuel Nelson, LL.D., who became a resident of Cooperstown in 1824, made
this village his home for nearly fifty years. At the time of his death
in 1873, he had long been recognized not only as the first citizen of
Cooperstown, but as a man of national reputation.

Before taking up his residence in Cooperstown, Nelson had become judge
of the Sixth circuit, which included Otsego county; in 1831 he was
promoted to the bench of the Supreme Court of the State, of which, six
years later, he became chief justice. In 1845 he went upon the bench of
the Supreme Court of the United States, and served with distinction
until his voluntary retirement in 1872, which brought to a close the
longest judicial career in history, covering a period of half a century.
In 1871 Judge Nelson was one of five members representing the United
States in the Joint High Commission appointed to devise means to settle
differences between the American and Briti