Pocantico's hushed waters glide
Through Sleepy Hollow's haunted ground,
And whisper to the listening tide
The name carved o'er one lowly mound.

To one loving our early history and legends there is no spot more
central or delightful than Tarrytown. Irving humorously says that
Tarrytown took its name from husbands tarrying too late at the village
tavern, but its real derivation is Tarwen-Dorp, or Wheat-town. The
name of the old Indian village at this point was Alipconck (the place
of elms). It has often occurred to the writer that, more than any
other river, the Hudson has a distinct personality, and also that
the four main divisions of human life are particularly marked in the
Adirondacks, the Catskills, the Highlands and Tappan Bay:

The Adirondacks, childhood's glee;
The Catskills, youth with dreams o'ercast;
The Highlands, manhood bold and free;
The Tappan Zee, age come at last.

This was the spot that Irving loved; we linger by his grave at
Sleepy Hollow with devotion; we sit upon his porch at Sunnyside with
reverence:

Thrice blest and happy Tappan Zee,
Whose banks along thy glistening tide
Have legend, truth, and poetry
Sweetly expressed in Sunnyside!