During the summer of 1825 Mr. Cooper made one of a party of young men,—­which included also the Hon. Mr. Stanley, afterwards Lord Derby, Prime Minister of England, and the Hon. Wortley Montagu, later Lord Wharncliffe, in an excursion to Saratoga and the Lake George country.  They went slowly up the Hudson, paid a brief visit to West Point, thence to Catskill, where, like Leatherstocking, they saw “Creation!”—­as Natty said, dropping the end of his rod into the water, and sweeping one hand around him in a circle—­“all creation, lad.”  In the hills they saw the two small ponds, and the merry stream crooking and winding through the valley to the rocks; and the “Leap” in its first plunge of two hundred feet:  “It’s a drop for the old Hudson,” added Natty.  The Shakers were called upon in their beautiful valley and neat village at Lebanon; good dinners were eaten at friendly tables in Albany; and gay were the times they had in Ballston and Saratoga.  Thence to the Lake George region, its wooded heights, islands, crystal lakes, silent shores.  For a while they lingered with delight, then turned back for the dark, still caverns in the heart of Glens Fall.  These caverns were, Natty said, “Two little holes for us to hide in.”  He added, “Falls on two sides of us, and the river above and below!—­it would be worth the trouble to step up on the height of this rock and look at the pervarcity of the water.  It falls by no rule at all.”  Within the shadows and silence of these caverns Mr. Stanley suggested to Cooper that “here was the very scene for a romance,” and the author promised his friend that a book should be written in which these caves would play an important part.  A story of strong Indian make-up first came then to the author’s mind.  Before leaving, these caverns and the surrounding country were closely examined for future use.

[Illustration:  SUNRISE AT SOUTH MOUNTAIN.]

[Illustration:  GLEN’S FALL’S CAVERNS.]

[Illustration:  HONORABLE MR. STANLEY.]

Besides his youthful and Lake Ontario experiences with Indians, Cooper followed parties of them from Albany to New York, and several times to Washington, for the purpose of closely studying their natures and habits; all authorities in print were consulted.  On his return home the book was begun and rapidly written.  “Planned beneath the summer leaves, on the far shore of picturesque Hell Gate, above smiling fields and bowering orchards of his Angevine home, those leaves had scarcely fallen when the story was told—­’the most uniformly exciting and powerful of his fictions’—­’The Last of the Mohicans,’ and Natty and Chingachgook were left in the wilderness beside the rude grave of Uncas.”  Again they came into the shadow of the unbroken forest, as called for by the one friend he now constantly consulted,—­his faithful, loving life-mate.  At the time of its writing Cooper had a serious illness, during which his mind was filled with ideas for this book.