"There was the doughty doughnut, the tender oly koek, and the crisp and crumbling cruller; sweet cakes and short cakes, ginger cakes and honey cakes, and the whole family of cakes." (Irving). 1. This imagery reveals just how much food the Van Tassel's had at their party, and just how extravagant it was. This is crucial because it ties directly to one of Irving's themes. The theme of the abundance of wealth and resources that the U.S. had. Irving wrote Sleepy Hollow to show how great America was, and one of the ways he went about doing this was expresses the amount of extra resources and wealth we had in Sleepy Hollow. He expresses how fancy and expansive the Van Tassel's manor was, and he goes into great detail to describe how extravagant the food looked. This is to show that the Van Tassel's, a wealthy American family, had extreme wealth, and resources. His point was that in America this can be attained by anyone if they work hard enough at it in America. He uses detailed and lengthy descriptions of the land and the food to show the readers just how nice it all truly was. This is why Irving is regarded as the first "American" writer. Through his expansive detail and use of imagery he showed how great the U.S.A. was and that anything in this country is attainable.