Cooper's work in this series brings us face to face with the activities of nature and man in God's great out of doors. Cooper makes us realize that the life of the pioneer was not without its elemental spirit of poetry. We may feel something of this spirit in the reply of Leatherstocking to the trembling Cora, when she asked him at midnight what caused a certain fearful sound:-- "'Lady,' returned the scout, solemnly, 'I have listened to all the sounds of the woods for thirty years, as a man will listen, whose life and death depend so often on the quickness of his ears. There is no whine of the panther, no whistle of the catbird, nor any invention of the devilish Mingos, that can cheat me. I have heard the forest moan like mortal men in their affliction; often and again have I listened to the wind playing its music in the branches of the girdled trees; and I have heard the lightning cracking in the air, like the snapping of blazing brush, as it spitted forth sparks and forked flames; but never have I thought that I heard more than the pleasure of him, who sported with the things of his hand. But neither the Mohicans, nor I, who am a white man without a cross, can explain the cry just heard.'" In addition to the five _Leatherstocking Tales_, three other romances show special power. They are:-- _The Spy; a Tale of the Neutral Ground_ (1821). _The Pilot; a Tale of the Sea_ (1824). _The Red Rover; a Tale_ (1828). The last two show Cooper's mastery in telling stories of the sea. Tom Coffin, in _The Pilot_, is a fine creation. Some of the more than thirty works of fiction that Cooper wrote are almost unreadable, and some appeal more to special students than to general readers. _Satanstoe_ (1845), for instance, gives vivid pictures of mid-eighteenth century colonial life in New York. The English critic's query, "Who reads an American book?" could have received the answer in 1820, "The English public is reading Irving." In 1833, Morse, the inventor of the electric telegraph, had another answer ready--"Europe is reading Cooper." He said that as soon as Cooper's works were finished they were published in thirty-four different places in Europe. American literature was commanding attention for its original work. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.--Cooper's best romances are masterpieces of action and adventure in the forest and on the sea. No other writer has so well told the story of the pioneer. He is not a successful novelist of the drawing-room. His women are mediocre and conventional, of the type described in the old Sunday school books. But when he leaves the haunts of men and enters the forest, power comes naturally to his pen. His greatest stage of action is the forest. He loved wild nature and the sea.