Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1873-01-16
The Law or RIp Van Wrinkle.

lection.
The Law OF Rip Van Wrinkle.
The drama or domestic play Of Rip
Van Wrinkle has been portrayed in this
city by Messrs. Jefferson and McWade
many time and oft, yet not a single
critic has squinted at it from a legal
standpoint. 1t will be remembered that
Rip Inherited large estate from his
paternM ancestors, which estate he In
vested in sundry drinks at the bar Of a
neighboring GROCERY, kept by Won Hector.
Mrs. Van Wrinkle, whose ancestral histo-
ry is involved in obscurity, seems to have
been strong minded, but fair-weather
help-mate, who, when nearly all Rips
patrimony had been turned into liquids,
became a termagant, and ordered Rip
from his own house without authority Of
law. She had not applied for any divorce
or alimony, nor had she obtained any
writ to stay waste" or destruction of
property, but Ui ct armis dispossessed
the true owner and occupantin manner
not becoming a femme covert, nor, in
deed, in a manner sanctioned by any
statute. The only obvious reason for all
this seems to be that she had ceased to
love" Rip. and had in her mind eye,
Horatio, the grocery-keeper, Derrick
Won Hector, whom she married few
years after Rips disappearance. Her
banished lord and master moved out
West" and for twenty years "grew up
with the country" thereby anticipating
the sage advice of the lamented Horace
Greeley. He settled on the wild lands
belonging to the States General of Hol-
land, which lands were situated on the
top of tie Catskill mountains. Here he
6welt with other wanderers or so called
vagabonds from the valley where domes-
tic infelicity and marital tyranny had
sway. The story of Captain Hudson
and his ghostly crew was an invention
in keeping with the superstitious age of
New Amsterdam. The sailors or
mariners seen on the mountain lwere
river rats and vagabonds, who fled from
Dutch ships in the bay, after having pill
fered provisions from the cook galley.
Rip did not sign any deed of trust or
mortgage on his lands, nor did he con-
convey them to any person; hence
the lands remained his, but
we're, probably, encountered With
executions and distress warrants levied
for debts, Nicolson pavement, poll and
other taxes--a mere cloud upon the
title of the Van Wrinkle estate During
Rips absence his unworthy wife com
mitted bigamy by marrying Won Hector,
thereby giving Rip good grounds for
divorce in any court in Christendom.
WhenRip returned, the possessions of the
States General had passed to the crown
Of England, and King George held all
lands belonging heretofore on theHudson
% the Dutch Government. Rip no doubt
earningof these international compli-
returned for that reason, know
ing well that his Dutch debts had been
Iettled by the transfer Of sovereignty.
On returning and finding his wife the
spouse Of the grocery keeper; he did not
.ender conformation, nor did he live with
ler afterward, being advised not 50 to do
1ya shrewd attorney-name unknown.
de obtained the usual decree Of divorce
/ vinculo, and recovered back his pat ;
'imony, on which he lived many
7ears, and then left it to his ;
,hildren and their heirs, who hold frag {
nents of it to this day, he having with
forethought eRtailed it in
he us-al manner known to the English
aw. The dereliet ex-Mrs. Van Win
tie, seeing her schemes bnrsted, and 1
caring indictment by the Grand Jury
or crimes and misdemeanors, embarked !
With her second husband ard sailed
way to Amsterdam, in Holland, where,
{ is said, her descendants 10 this good
lay are most respectable burgers. The ]
IAN Wrinkles Of New York at the pres
mt day pride themselves on their illus
rious progenitors, and dent fail to have
i least half a dozen Rips" in the fam
" each generation out Of respect to the
memory Of the heroic vagabOud Of the
)atskill mountains, who passed success Ii