Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

Sleep Hollow was a small town where everyone knew everyone.  It was of Dutch decent so the wives would spin and the husbands would tend to their farms.  There was a tall, lanky, skinny man named Ichabod Crane who was not much to look at.  

"...narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out of his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his whole frame most loosely hung together."

He was the towns teacher and a wanderer of sorts, living in one of his students houses' to the next, not having a true home.  Ichabod spent much of his time with the Dutch wives telling of witchcraft and omens and they would tell of ghost and goblins, most of all the Hessian of the Hollow.  The Hessian of the Hollow was to be the spirit of a fallen fighter, said to ride his house from the graveyard, along the woods in search of his head.  

Ichabod also sung in his church and there is where he met Katrina Van Tassel, her and her rich father.  When he saw where she lived, nothing but thoughts of getting rich raced through his mind.

"...he pictured to himself every roasting-pig running about with a pudding in his belly, and an apple in his mouth; the pigeons were snugly put to bed in a comfortable pie, and tucked in with a coverlet of crust; the geese were swimming in their own gravy; and the ducks pairing cosily in dishes, like snug married couples..."

To him, Katrina was a way to get rich and move out west.  He made a plan, to marry her and inherit all of her money.  What Ichabod did not realized was Brom Van Brunt was also interested in her.  Brunt was a man of pure mass, quite the opposite of Ichabod. 

"...rang with his feasts of strength and hardihood.  He was broad-shouldered and double-jointed, with short curly black hair, and a bluff, but not unpleasant countenance, having a mingled air of fun and arrogance."

They both took different ways in trying to receive Katrina's hand, Ichabod made friendly with her father, while Brunt tried to woe her in person.  Katrina's father invited them both, and multiple others, to a small gather.  It did no end will for Ichabod, his plan had failed and Katrina denied him.  He was devastated and rode off into the night.   The down fall of Ichabod being so into the stories of witchcraft and ghosts, made him very paranoid, especially that night.  Between being rejected and it being completely dark and him alone, he wasn't in his right mind.  

"All the stories of ghosts and goblins that he had heard in the afternoon, now came crowding upon his recollection.  The night grew darker and darker; the stars seemed to sink deeper in the sky, and the driving clouds occasionally hid them from his sight.  He had never felt so lonely and dismal."

This whole scenario was set up for failure.  His imagination got out of hand and ended up thinking the Headless Horseman was chasing him.  Ichabod ended up getting so scared, knocked off of his horse, and disappeared.

To me, Ichabod brought everything upon himself.  If he wasn't in it just for his own evil wants, this would not have happened.