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 _STANDARD LITERATURE SERIES_

 THE SPY

 BY

 J. FENIMORE COOPER

 CONDENSED FOR USE IN SCHOOLS

 _WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND EXPLANATORY NOTES_

 NEW YORK AND NEW ORLEANS
 UNIVERSITY PUBLISHING CO.
 1898




 COPYRIGHT, 1895, BY
 UNIVERSITY PUBLISHING CO.

 Press of J. J. Little & Co.
 Astor Place, New York




INTRODUCTION.


James Fenimore Cooper was born in Burlington, N. J., in 1789--the year
in which George Washington was inaugurated first President of the
United States. His boyhood was passed at Cooperstown, N. Y., a village
founded by his father. After completing his studies at Yale, young
Cooper entered the American navy as midshipman, subsequently obtaining
the rank of lieutenant. He also made some voyages in a merchant
vessel, and in this service acquired that knowledge of sea life of
which he made good use in many of his novels.

Cooper has been styled the Walter Scott of America. It is hardly an
exaggeration to rank him so high, for he has done for America what
Scott did for Scotland: he has illustrated and popularized much of its
history and many of its olden traditions in stories that will have
appreciative readers so long as the