Cooper’s novel of 1829 deals with the moral and religious hypocrisy displayed by Puritan settlers who sought to displace the American natives from their wilderness home. Set on the Connecticut frontier during the second half of the seventeenth century, its protagonist is Mark Heathcote, whose family hope to set up a Puritan community in the wilderness of New England. After a peaceful start, the Puritans become embroiled in the disastrous Indian War of 1675-78, a conflict that brings the tensions between the settlers and the Natives tragically into relief. The title of the novel refers to the valley of the ‘wish-ton-wish’ or ‘whip-poor-will’, where the Heathcote family establish their settlement. The ‘wept’ is Mark’s granddaughter Ruth, who is kidnapped by Indian raiders during the course of the uprising.