University of Virginia Library

BOOK III.

1. CHAP. I.

The renowned Wouter (or Walter) Van
Twiller, was descended from a long line of
dutch burgomasters, who had successively dozed
away their lives and grown fat upon the bench of
magistracy in Rotterdam; and who had comported
themselves with such singular wisdom and propriety,
that they were never either heard or talked of—
which, next to being universally applauded, should
be the object of ambition of all sage magistrates and
rulers.

His surname of Twiller, is said to be a corruption
of the original Twijfler, which in English
means doubter; a name admirably descriptive of

his deliberative habits. For though he was a man,
shut up within himself like an oyster, and of such a
profoundly reflective turn, that he scarcely ever spoke
except in monosyllables, yet did he never make up
his mind, on any doubtful point. This was clearly
accountd for by his adherents, who affirmed that
he always conceived every subject on so comprehensive
a scale, that he had not room in his head,
to turn it over and examine both sides of it, so that
he always remained in doubt, merely in consequence
of the astonishing magnitude of his ideas!

There are two opposite ways by which some
men get into notice—one by talking a vast deal
and thinking a little, and the other by holding
their tongues and not thinking at all. By the first
many a vapouring, superficial pretender acquires
the reputation of a man of quick parts—by the other
many a vacant dunderpate, like the owl, the stupidest
of birds, comes to be complimented, by a discerning
world, with all the attributes of wisdom.
This, by the way, is a mere casual remark, which
I would not for the universe have it thought, I apply
to Governor Van Twiller. On the contrary he
was a very wise dutchman, for he never said a foolish
thing—and of such invincible gravity, that he
was never known to laugh, or even to smile, through
the course of a long and prosperous life. Certain
however it is, there never was a matter proposed,
however simple, and on which your common narrow

minded mortals, would rashly determine at the
first glance, but what the renowned Wouter, put on
a mighty mysterious, vacant kind of look, shook
his capacious head, and having smoked for five
minutes with redoubled earnestness, sagely observed,
that “he had his doubts about the matter”—
which in process of time gained him the character
of a man slow of belief, and not easily imposed on.

The person of this illustrious old gentleman
was as regularly formed and nobly proportioned, as
though it had been moulded by the hands of some
cunning dutch statuary, as a model of majesty and
lordly grandeur. He was exactly five feet six
inches in height, and six feet five inches in circumference.
His head was a perfect sphere, far excelling
in magnitude that of the great Pericles (who
was thence waggishly called Schenocephalus, or
onion head)—indeed, of such stupendous dimensions
was it, that dame nature herself, with all her
sex's ingenuity, would have been puzzled to construct
a neck, capable of supporting it; wherefore
she wisely declined the attempt, and settled it
firmly on the top of his back bone, just between the
shoulders; where it remained, as snugly bedded,
as a ship of war in the mud of the Potowmac.
His body was of an oblong form, particularly capacious
at bottom; which was wisely ordered by
providence, seeing that he was a man of sedentary
habits, and very averse to the idle labour of walking.

His legs, though exceeding short, were sturdy
in proportion to the weight they had to sustain;
so that when erect, he had not a little the appearance
of a robustious beer barrel, standing on skids.
His face, that infallible index of the mind, presented
a vast expanse perfectly unfurrowed or deformed by
any of those lines and angles, which disfigure the
human countenance with what is termed expression.
Two small grey eyes twinkled feebly in the midst,
like two stars of lesser magnitude, in a hazy firmament;
and his full fed cheeks, which seemed to
have taken toll of every thing that went into his
mouth, were curiously mottled and streaked with
dusky red, like a spitzenberg apple.

His habits were as regular as his person. He
daily took his four stated meals, appropriating exactly
an hour to each; he smoked and doubted
eight hours, and he slept the remaining twelve of
the four and twenty. Such was the renowned
Wouter Van Twiller—a true philosopher, for his
mind was either elevated above, or tranquilly settled
below, the cares and perplexities of this world.
He had lived in it for years, without feeling the
least curiosity to know whether the sun revolved
round it, or it round the sun; and he had even
watched for at least half a century, the smoke curling
from his pipe to the ceiling, without once troubling
his head with any of those numerous theories,
by which a philosopher would have perplexed his

brain, in accounting for its rising above the surrounding
atmosphere.

In his council he presided with great state and
solemnity. He sat in a huge chair of solid oak
hewn in the celebrated forest of the Hague, fabricated
by an experienced Timmerman of Amsterdam,
and curiously carved about the arms and feet,
into exact imitations of gigantic eagle's claws.
Instead of a sceptre he swayed a long turkish pipe,
wrought with jasmin and amber, which had been
presented to a stadtholder of Holland, at the conclusion
of a treaty with one of the petty Barbary
powers.—In this stately chair would he sit, and
this magnificent pipe would he smoke, shaking his
right knee with a constant motion, and fixing his
eye for hours together upon a little print of Amsterdam,
which hung in a black frame, against the
opposite wall of the council chamber. Nay, it has
ever been said, that when any deliberation of extraordinary
length and intricacy was on the carpet,
the renowned Wouter would absolutely shut his
eyes for full two hours at a time, that he might not
be disturbed by external objects—and at such times
the internal commotion of his mind, was evinced
by certain regular guttural sounds, which his admirers
declared were merely the noise of conflict,
made by his contending doubts and opinions.

It is with infinite difficulty I have been enabled
to collect these biographical anecdotes of the great

man under consideration. The facts respecting
him were so scattered and vague, and divers of
them so questionable in point of authenticity, that
I have had to give up the search after many, and
decline the admission of still more, which would
have tended to heighten the colouring of his portrait.

I have been the more anxious to delineate fully,
the person and habits of the renowned Van Twiller,
from the consideration that he was not only the first,
but also the best governor that ever presided over
this ancient and respectable province; and so tranquil
and benevolent was his reign, that I do not find
throughout the whole of it, a single instance of any
offender being brought to punishment:—a most indubitable
sign of a merciful governor, and a case
unparalleled, excepting in the reign of the illustrious
King Log, from whom, it is hinted, the renowned
Van Twiller was a lineal descendant.

The very outset of the career of this excellent
magistrate, like that of Solomon, or to speak more
appropriately, like that of the illustrious governor of
Barataria, was distinguished by an example of legal
acumen, that gave flattering presage of a wise and
equitable administration. The very morning after
he had been solemnly installed in office, and at the
moment that he was making his breakfast from a
prodigious earthen dish, filled with milk and Indian
pudding, he was suddenly interrupted by the appearance

of one Wandle Schoonhoven, a very important
old burgher of New Amsterdam, who complained
bitterly of one Barent Bleecker, inasmuch as he
fraudulently refused to come to a settlement of accounts,
seeing that there was a heavy balance in
favour of the said Wandle. Governor Van Twiller,
as I have already observed, was a man of few words,
he was likewise a mortal enemy to multiplying
writings—or being disturbed at his breakfast. Having
therefore listened attentively to the statement of
Wandle Schoonhoven, giving an occasional grunt,
as he shovelled a mighty spoonful of Indian pudding
into his mouth—either as a sign that he relished
the dish, or comprehended the story—he called unto
him his constable, and pulling out of his breeches
pocket a huge jack-knife, dispatched it after the defendant
as a summons, accompanied by his tobacco
box as a warrant.

This summary process was as effectual in those
simple days, as was the seal ring of the great Haroun
Alraschid, among the true believers—the two parties,
being confronted before him, each produced a
book of accounts, written in a language and character
that would have puzzled any but a High Dutch
commentator, or a learned decypherer of Egyptian
obelisks, to understand. The sage Wouter took
them one after the other, and having poised them
in his hands, and attentively counted over the number

of leaves, fell straightway into a very great doubt,
and smoked for half an hour without saying a word;
at length, laying his finger beside his nose, and shutting
his eyes for a moment, with the air of a man
who has just caught a subtle idea by the tail, he
slowly took his pipe from his mouth, puffed forth a
column of tobacco smoke, and with marvellous gravity
and solemnity pronounced—that having carefully
counted over the leaves and weighed the books,
it was found, that one was just as thick and as heavy
as the other—therefore it was the final opinion of
the court that the accounts were equally balanced—
therefore Wandle should give Barent a receipt, and
Barent should give Wandle a receipt—and the constable
should pay the costs.

This decision being straightway made known,
diffused general joy throughout New Amsterdam,
for the people immediately perceived, that they had
a very wise and equitable magistrate to rule over
them. But its happiest effect was, that not another
law suit took place throughout the whole of his administration—and
the office of constable fell into
such decay, that there was not one of those lossel
scouts known in the province for many years. I am
the more particular in dwelling on this transaction,
not only because I deem it one of the most sage
and righteous judgments on record, and well worthy
the attention of modern magistrates, but because it

was a miraculous event in the history of the renowned
Wouter—being the only time he was ever known
to come to a decision, in the whole course of his
life.

2. CHAP. II.

In treating of the early governors of the province,
I must caution my readers against confounding
them, in point of dignity and power, with those
worthy gentlemen, who are whimsically denominated
governors, in this enlightened republic—a set
of unhappy victims of popularity, who are in fact
the most dependent, hen-pecked beings in community:
doomed to bear the secret goadings and corrections
of their own party, and the sneers and revilings
of the whole world beside.—Set up, like
geese, at christmas hollidays, to be pelted and shot
at by every whipster and vagabond in the land. On
the contrary, the dutch governors enjoyed that uncontrolled
authority vested in all commanders of
distant colonies or territories. They were in a
manner, absolute despots in their little domains,
lording it, if so disposed, over both law and gospel,
and accountable to none but the mother country;
which it is well known is astonishingly deaf to all
complaints against its governors, provided they

discharge the main duty of their station—squeezing
out a good revenue. This hint will be of importance,
to prevent my readers from being seized
with doubt and incredulity, whenever, in the course
of this authentic history, they encounter the uncommon
circumstance, of a governor, acting with
independence, and in opposition to the opinions of
the multitude.

To assist the doubtful Wouter, in the arduous
business of legislation, a board of magistrates was
appointed, which presided immediately over the
police. This potent body consisted of a schout or
bailiff, with powers between those of the present
mayor and sheriff—five burgermeesters, who were
equivalent to aldermen, and five schepens, who officiated
as scrubs, sub-devils, or bottle-holders to
the burgermeesters, in the same manner as do assistant
aldermen to their principals at the present
day; it being their duty to fill the pipes of the lordly
burgermeesters—see that they were accommodated
with spitting boxes—hunt the markets for delicacies
for corporation dinners, and to discharge such
other little offices of kindness, as were occasionally
required. It was moreover, tacitly understood,
though not specifically enjoined, that they should
consider themselves as butts for the blunt wits of
the burgermeesters, and should laugh most heartily
at all their jokes; but this last was a duty as rarely
called in action in those days, as it is at present,

and was shortly remitted, in consequence of the
tragical death of a fat little Schepen—who actually
died of suffocation in an unsuccessful effort
to force a laugh, at one of Burgermeester Van
Zandt's best jokes.

In return for these humble services, they
were permitted to say yes and no at the council
board, and to have that enviable privilege, the
run of the public kitchen—being graciously permitted
to eat, and drink, and smoke, at all those
snug junkettings and public gormandizings, for
which the ancient magistrates were equally famous
with their more modern successors. The
post of Schepen therefore, like that of assistant
alderman, was eagerly coveted by all your burghers
of a certain description, who have a huge
relish for good feeding, and a humble ambition to
be great men, in a small way—who thirst after a
little brief authority, that shall render them the
terror of the alms house, and the bridewell—that
shall enable them to lord it over obsequious poverty,
vagrant vice, outcast prostitution, and hunger
driven dishonesty—that shall place in their hands
the lesser, but galling scourge of the law, and give
to their beck a hound like pack of catchpoles and
bum bailiffs—tenfold greater rogues than the culprits
they hunt down!—My readers will excuse
this sudden warmth, which I confess is unbecoming
of a grave historian—but I have a mortal antipathy
to catchpoles, bum bailiffs, and little great men.

The ancient magistrates of this city, corresponded
with those of the present time, no less in
form, magnitude and intellect, than in prerogative
and privilege. The burgomasters, like our aldermen,
were generally chosen by weight—and not
only the weight of the body, but likewise the weight
of the head. It is a maxim practically observed in
all honest, plain thinking, regular cities, that an alderman
should be fat—and the wisdom of this can
be proved to a certainty. That the body is in some
measure an image of the mind, or rather that the
mind is moulded to the body, like melted lead to
the clay in which it is cast, has been insisted on by
many men of science, who have made human nature
their peculiar study—For as a learned gentleman
of our city observes “there is a constant relation
between the moral character of all intelligent creatures,
and their physical constitution—between their
habits and the structure of their bodies.” Thus we
see, that a lean, spare, diminutive body, is generally
accompanied by a petulant, restless, meddling mind
—either the mind wears down the body, by its continual
motion; or else the body, not affording the
mind sufficient house room, keeps it continually in
a state of fretfulness, tossing and worrying about
from the uneasiness of its situation. Whereas your
round, sleek, fat, unwieldly periphery is ever attended
by a mind, like itself, tranquil, torpid and
at ease; and we may always observe, that your

well fed, robustious burghers are in general very
tenacious of their ease and comfort; being great
enemies to noise, discord and disturbance—and
surely none are more likely to study the public
tranquillity than those who are so careful of their
own—Who ever hears of fat men heading a riot, or
herding together in turbulent mobs?—no—no—it
is your lean, hungry men, who are continually worrying
society, and setting the whole community by
the ears.

The divine Plato, whose doctrines are not sufficiently
attended to by philosophers of the present
age, allows to every man three souls—one, immortal
and rational, seated in the brain, that it may
overlook and regulate the body—a second consisting
of the surly and irascible passions, which
like belligerent powers lie encamped around the
heart—a third mortal and sensual, destitute of
reason, gross and brutal in its propensities, and
enchained in the belly, that it may not disturb the
divine soul, by its ravenous howlings. Now, according
to this excellent theory what can be more
clear, than that your fat alderman, is most likely
to have the most regular and well conditioned mind.
His head is like a huge, spherical chamber, containing
a prodigious mass of soft brains, whereon the
rational soul lies softly and snugly couched, as on a
feather bed; and the eyes, which are the windows
of the bed chamber, are usually half closed that its

slumberings may not be disturbed by external objects.
A mind thus comfortably lodged, and protected
from disturbance, is manifestly most likely
to perform its functions with regularity and ease.
By dint of good feeding, moreover, the mortal and
malignant soul, which is confined in the belly, and
which by its raging and roaring, puts the irritable
soul in the neighbourhood of the heart in an intolerable
passion, and thus renders men crusty and
quarrelsome when hungry, is completely pacified,
silenced and put to rest—whereupon a host of
honest good fellow qualities and kind hearted affections,
which had lain perdue, slily peeping out of
the loop holes of the heart, finding this cerberus
asleep, do pluck up their spirits, turn out one and all
in their holliday suits, and gambol up and down the
diaphragm—disposing their possessor to laughter,
good humour and a thousand friendly offices towards
his fellow mortals.

As a board of magistrates, formed on this model,
think but very little, they are the less likely to
differ and wrangle about favourite opinions—and as
they generally transact business upon a hearty dinner,
they are naturally disposed to be lenient and
indulgent in the administration of their duties.
Charlemagne was conscious of this, and therefore
(a pitiful measure, for which I can never forgive
him), ordered in his cartularies, that no judge
should hold a court of justice, except in the morning,

on an empty stomach.—A rule which, I warrant,
bore hard upon all the poor culprits in his
kingdom. The more enlightened and humane generation
of the present day, have taken an opposite
course, and have so managed that the aldermen are
the best fed men in the community; feasting lustily
on the fat things of the land, and gorging so heartily
on oysters and turtles, that in process of time they
acquire the activity of the one, and the form, the waddle,
and the green fat of the other. The consequence
is, as I have just said; these luxurious feastings do
produce such a dulcet equanimity and repose of the
soul, rational and irrational, that their transactions
are proverbial for unvarying monotony—and the
profound laws, which they enact in their dozing
moments, amid the labours of digestion, are quietly
suffered to remain as dead letters, and never enforced,
when awake. In a word your fair round-bellied
burgomaster, like a full fed mastiff, dozes
quietly at the house-door, always at home, and always
at hand to watch over its safety—but as to electing
a lean, meddling candidate to the office, as has now
and then been done, I would as leave put a greyhound,
to watch the house, or a race horse to drag
an ox waggon.

The Burgo-masters then, as I have already
mentioned, were wisely chosen by weight, and the
Schepens, or assistant aldermen, were appointed to
attend upon them, and help them eat; but the latter,

in the course of time, when they had been fed and
fattened into sufficient bulk of body and drowsiness
of brain, became very eligible candidates for the
Burgomasters' chairs, having fairly eaten themselves
into office, as a mouse eats his way into a comfortable
lodgement in a goodly, blue-nosed, skim'd
milk, New England cheese.

Nothing could equal the profound deliberations
that took place between the renowned Wouter, and
these his worthy compeers, unless it be the sage divans
of some of our modern corporations. They
would sit for hours smoking and dozing over public
affairs, without speaking a word to interrupt that
perfect stillness, so necessary to deep reflection—
faithfully observing an excellent maxim, which the
good old governor had caused to be written in letters
of gold, on the walls of the council chamber

which, being rendered into English for the benefit of
modern legislatures, means—

Under the sober way, therefore, of the renowned
Van Twiller, and the sage superintendance of
his burgomasters, the infant settlement waxed vigorous
apace, gradually emerging from the swamps
and forests, and exhibiting that mingled appearance

of town and country, customary in new cities, and
which at this day may be witnessed in the great city
of Washington; that immense metropolis, which
makes such a glorious appearance—upon paper.

Ranges of houses began to give the idea of
streets and lanes, and wherever an interval occurred,
it was over-run by a wilderness of sweet smelling
thorn apple, vulgarly called stinkweed. Amid
these fragrant bowers, the honest burghers, like so
many patriarchs of yore, sat smoking their pipes of
a sultry afternoon, inhaling the balmy odours wafted
on every gale, and listening with silent gratulation
to the clucking of their hens, the cackling of
their geese, or the sonorous gruntings of their
swine; that combination of farm-yard melody,
which may truly be said to have a silver sound, inasmuch
as it conveys a certain assurance of profitable
marketing.

The modern spectator, who wanders through
the crowded streets of this populous city, can scarce
form an idea, of the different appearance which
every object presented, in those primitive times.
The busy hum of commerce, the noise of revelry,
the rattling equipages of splendid luxury, were unknown
in the peaceful settlement of New Amsterdam.
The bleating sheep and frolicksome calves
sported about the verdant ridge, where now their
legitimate successors, the Broadway loungers, take
their morning's stroll; the cunning fox or ravenous

wolf, skulked in the woods, where now are to be
seen the dens of Gomez and his righteous fraternity
of money brokers, and flocks of vociferous
geese cackled about the field, where now the patriotic
tavern of Martling echoes with the wranglings
of the mob.[1] The whole island, at least such
parts of it as were inhabited, bloomed like a second
Eden; every dwelling had its own cabbage garden,
and that esculent vegetable, while it gave promise
of bounteous loads of sour crout, was also emblematic
of the rapid growth and regular habits of the
youthful colony.

Such are the soothing scenes presented by a fat
government. The province of the New Netherlands,
destitute of wealth, possessed a sweet tranquillity
that wealth could never purchase. It seemed
indeed as if old Saturn had again commenced
his reign, and renewed the golden days of primeval
simplicity. For the golden age, says Ovid, was
totally destitute of gold, and for that very reason
was called the golden age, that is, the happy and

fortunate age—because the evils produced by the
precious metals, such as avarice, covetuousness,
theft, rapine, usury, banking, note-shaving, lottery-insuring,
and the whole catalogue of crimes and
grievances were then unknown. In the iron age
there was abundance of gold, and on that very
account it was called the iron age, because of the
hardships, the labours, the dissentions, and the
wars, occasioned by the thirst of gold.

The genial days of Wouter Van Twiller therefore,
may truly be termed the golden age of our
city. There were neither public commotions, nor
private quarrels; neither parties, nor sects, nor
schisms; neither prosecutions, nor trials, nor punishments;
nor were there counsellors, attornies,
catch-poles or hangmen. Every man attended to
what little business he was lucky enough to have,
or neglect it if he pleased, without asking the opinion
of his neighbour.—In those days nobody meddled
with concerns above his comprehension, nor
thrust his nose into other people's affairs; nor neglected
to correct his own conduct, and reform his
own character, in his zeal to pull to pieces the
characters of others—but in a word, every respectable
citizen eat when he was not hungry, drank
when he was not thirsty, and went regularly to bed,
when the sun set, and the fowls went to roost,
whether he was sleepy or not; all which, being
agreeable to the doctrines of Malthus, tended so

remarkably to the population of the settlement, that
I am told every dutiful wife throughout New Amsterdam,
made a point of always enriching her husband
with at least one child a year, and very often
a brace—this superabundance of good things clearly
constituting the true luxury of life, according to
the favourite dutch maxim that “more than enough
constitutes a feast.” Every thing therefore went
on exactly as it should do, and in the usual words
employed by historians to express the welfare of a
country, “the profoundest tranquillity and repose
reigned throughout the province.”

3. CHAP. III.

Manifold are the tastes and dispositions of
the enlightened literati, who turn over the pages of
history. Some there be whose hearts are brim
full of the yeast of courage, and whose bosoms do
work, and swell, and foam with untried valour,
like a barrel of new cider, or a train-band captain,
fresh from under the hands of his taylor. This
doughty class of readers can be satisfied with nothing
but bloody battles, and horrible encounters;
they must be continually storming forts, sacking
cities, springing mines, marching up to the muzzles
of cannons, charging bayonet through every
page, and revelling in gun-powder and carnage.
Others, who are of a less martial, but equally ardent
imagination, and who, withal, are a little given
to the marvellous, will dwell with wonderous satisfaction
on descriptions of prodigies, unheard of
events, hair-breadth escapes, hardy adventures, and
all those astonishing narrations, that just amble
along the boundary line of possibility.—A third
class, who, not to speak slightingly of them, are of

a lighter turn, and skin over the records of past
times, as they do over the edifying pages of a novel,
merely for relaxation and innocent amusement;
do singularly delight in treasons, executions, sabine
rapes, tarquin outrages, conflagrations, murders,
and all the other catalogue of hideous crimes,
that like Cayenne in cookery, do give a pungency
and flavour, to the dull detail of history—while a
fourth class, of more philosophic habits, do diligently
pore over the musty chronicles of time, to
investigate the operations of the human mind, and
watch the gradual changes in men and manners,
effected by the progress of knowledge, the vicissitudes
of events, or the influence of situation.

If the three first classes find but little wherewithal
to solace themselves, in the tranquil reign of
Wouter Van Twiller, I entreat them to exert their
patience for a while, and bear with the tedious picture
of happiness, prosperity and peace, which my
duty as a faithful historian obliges me to draw;
and I promise them, that as soon as I can possibly
light upon any thing horrible, uncommon or impossible,
it shall go hard, but I will make it afford
them entertainment. This being premised, I turn
with great complacency to the fourth class of my
readers, who are men, or, if possible, women, after
my own heart; grave, philosophical and investigating;
fond of analyzing characters, of taking a start
from first causes, and so hunting a nation down,

through all the mazes of innovation and improvement.
Such will naturally be anxious to witness
the first development of the newly hatched colony,
and the primitive manners and customs, prevalent
among its inhabitants, during the halcyon reign
of Van Twiller or the doubter.

To describe minutely the gradual advances,
from the rude log hut, to the stately dutch mansion,
with a brick front, glass windows, and shingle
roof—from the tangled thicket, to the luxuriant
cabbage garden, and from the skulking Indian to
the ponderous burgomaster, would probably be fatiguing
to my reader, and certainly very inconvenient
to myself; suffice it to say, trees were cut
down, stumps grubbed up, bushes cleared away,
until the new city rose gradually from amid swamps
and stinkweeds, like a mighty fungus, springing
from a mass of rotten wood.

The sage council, as has been mentioned in a
preceding chapter, not being able to determine upon
any plan for the building of their city—the cows,
in a laudable fit of patriotism, took it under their
particular charge, and as they went to and from
pasture, established paths through the bushes, on
each side of which the good folks built their houses;
which is one cause of the rambling and picturesque
turns and labyrinths, which distinguish certain
streets of New York, at this very day.

Some, it must be noted, who were strenuous
partizans of Mynheer Ten Breeches, (or Ten
Brock) vexed that his plan of digging canals was
not adopted, made a compromise with their inclinations,
by establishing themselves on the margins
of those creeks and inlets, which meandered through
various parts of the ground laid out for improvement.
To these may be particularly ascribed the first
settlement of Broad street; which originally was
built along a creek, that ran up, to what at present
is called Wall street. The lower part soon became
very busy and populous; and a ferry house[2] was
in process of time established at the head of it;
being at that day called “the head of inland navigation.”

The disciples of Mynheer Toughbreeches, on
the other hand, no less enterprising, and more industrious
than their rivals, stationed themselves
along the shore of the river, and laboured with unexampled
perseverance, in making little docks and
dykes, from which originated that multitude of
mud traps with which this city is fringed. To
these docks would the old Burghers repair, just at
those hours when the falling tide had left the beach

uncovered, that they might snuff up the fragrant
effluvia of mud and mire; which they observed had
a true wholesome smell, and reminded them of the
canals of Holland. To the indefatigable labours,
and praiseworthy example of this latter class of
projectors, are we indebted for the acres of artificial
ground, on which several of our streets, in the
vicinity of the rivers are built; and which, if we
may credit the assertions of several learned physicians
of this city, have been very efficacious in
producing the yellow fever.

The houses of the higher class, were generally
constructed of wood, excepting the gable end, which
was of small black and yellow dutch bricks, and
always faced on the street, as our ancestors, like
their descendants, were very much given to outward
shew, and were noted for putting the best leg foremost.
The house was always furnished with
abundance of large doors and small windows on
every floor, the date of its erection was curiously
designated by iron figures on the front, and on the
top of the roof was perched a fierce little weather
cock, to let the family into the important secret,
which way the wind blew. These, like the weather
cocks on the tops of our steeples, pointed so many
different ways, that every man could have a wind
to his mind; and you would have thought old Eolus
had set all his bags of wind adrift, pell mell, to
gambol about this windy metropolis—the most

Some, it must be noted, who were strenuous
partizans of Mynheer Ten Breeches, (or Ten
Brock) vexed that his plan of digging canals was
not adopted, made a compromise with their inclinations,
by establishing themselves on the margins
of those creeks and inlets, which meandered through
various parts of the ground laid out for improvement.
To these may be particularly ascribed the first
settlement of Broad street; which originally was
built along a creek, that ran up, to what at present
is called Wall street. The lower part soon became
very busy and populous; and a ferry house[3] was
in process of time established at the head of it;
being at that day called “the head of inland navigation.”

The disciples of Mynheer Toughbreeches, on
the other hand, no less enterprising, and more industrious
than their rivals, stationed themselves
along the shore of the river, and laboured with unexampled
perseverance, in making little docks and
dykes, from which originated that multitude of
mud traps with which this city is fringed. To
these docks would the old Burghers repair, just at
those hours when the falling tide had left the beach

have the tails of mermaids—but this I look upon
to be a mere sport of fancy, or what is worse, a
wilful misrepresentation.

The grand parlour was the sanctum sanctorum,
where the passion for cleaning was indulged without
controul. In this sacred apartment no one
was permitted to enter, excepting the mistress and
her confidential maid, who visited it once a week,
for the purpose of giving it a thorough cleaning,
and putting things to rights—always taking the
precaution of leaving their shoes at the door, and
entering devoutly, on their stocking feet. After
scrubbing the floor, sprinkling it with fine white
sand, which was curiously stroked into angles, and
curves, and rhomboids, with a broom—after washing
the windows, rubbing and polishing the furniture,
and putting a new bunch of evergreens in the
fire-place—the window shutters were again closed
to keep out the flies, and the room carefully locked
up until the revolution of time, brought round the
weekly cleaning day.

As to the family, they always entered in at the
gate, and most generally lived in the kitchen. To
have seen a numerous household assembled around
the fire, one would have imagined that he was
transported back to those happy days of primeval
simplicity, which float before our imaginations like
golden visions. The fire-places were of a truly
patriarchal magnitude, where the whole family,

old and young, master and servant, black and
white, nay even the very cat and dog, enjoyed a
community of privilege, and had each a prescriptive
right to a corner. Here the old burgher would set
in perfect silence, puffing his pipe, looking in the
fire with half shut eyes, and thinking of nothing
for hours together; the goede vrouw on the opposite
side would employ herself diligently in spinning
her yarn, or knitting stockings. The young
foks would crowd around th hearth, listening with
breathless attention to some old crone of a negro,
who was the oracle of the family,--and who, perched
like a raven in a corner of the chimney, would
croak forth for a long winter afternoon, a string of incredible
stories about New England witches--grisly
ghosts--horses without heads--and hairbreadth
scapes and bloody encounters among the Indians.

In those happy days a well regulated family
always rose with the dawn, dined at eleven, and
went to bed at sun down. Dinner was invariably
a private meal, and the fat old burghers shewed incontestible
symptoms of disappropriation and uneasiness,
at being surpised by a visit from a neighbour
on such occasions. But though our worthy
ancestors were thus singularly averse to giving dinners,
yet they kept up the social bands of intimacy
by occasional banquettings, called tea parties.

As this is the first introduction of those delectable
orgies which have since become so fashionable

in this city, I am conscious my fair readers will be
very curious to receive information on the subject.
Sorry am I, that there will be but little in my description
calculated to excite their admiration. I
can neither delight them with accounts of suffocating
crowds, nor brilliant drawing rooms, nor
towering feathers, nor sparkling diamonds, nor immeasurable
trains. I can detail no choice anecdotes
of scandal, for in those primitive times the
simple folk were either too stupid, or too good natured
to pull each other's characters to pieces—
nor can I furnish any whimsical anecdotes of brag—
how one lady cheated, or another bounced into a passion;
for as yet there was no junto of dulcet old
dowagers, who met to win each other's money, and
lose their own tempers at a card table.

These fashionable parties were generally confined
to the higher classes, or noblesse, that is to
say, such as kept their own cows, and drove their
own waggons. The company commonly assembled
at three o'clock, and went away about six, unless
it was in winter time, when the fashionable
hours were a little earlier, that the ladies might
get home before dark. I do not find that they
ever treated their company to iced creams, jellies
or syllabubs; or regaled them with musty almonds,
mouldy raisins, or sour oranges, as is often done in
the present age of refinement.—Our ancestors were
fond of more sturdy, substantial fare. The tea table

was crowned with a huge earthen dish, well
stored with slices of fat pork, fried brown, cut up
into mouthfuls, and swimming in doup or gravy.
The company being seated around the genial board,
and each furnished with a fork, evinced their dexterity
in launching at the fattest pieces in this
mighty dish—in much the same manner as sailors
harpoon porpoises at sea, or our Indians spear salmon
in the lakes. Sometimes the table was graced
with immense apple pies, or saucers full of preserved
peaches and pears; but it was always sure to
boast an enormous dish of balls of sweetened
dough, fried in hog's fat, and called dough nuts, or
oly koeks—a delicious kind of cake, at present,
scarce known in this city, excepting in genuine
dutch families; but which retains its pre-eminent
station at the tea tables in Albany.

The tea was served out of a majestic delft teapot,
ornamented with paintings of fat little dutch
shepherds and shepherdesses, tending pigs—with
boats sailing in the air, and houses built in the
clouds, and sundry other ingenious dutch fantasies.
The beaux distinguished themselves by their adroitness
in replenishing this pot, from a huge copper
tea kettle, which would have made the pigmy macaronies
of these degenerate days, sweat, merely to
look at it. To sweeten the beverage, a lump of
sugar was laid beside each cup—and the company
alternately nibbled and sipped with great decorum,

until an improvement was introduced by a shrewd
and economic old lady, which was to suspend a
large lump directly over the tea table, by a string
from the ceiling, so that it could be swung from
mouth to mouth—an ingenious expedient, which is
still kept up by some families in Albany; but which
prevails without exception, in Communipaw, Bergen,
Flat-Bush, and all our uncontaminated dutch
villages.

At these primitive tea-parties the utmost propriety
and dignity of deportment prevailed. No
flirting nor coquetting—no gambling of old ladies
nor hoyden chattering and romping of young ones—
No self satisfied struttings of wealthy gentlemen
with their brains in their pockets—nor amusing
conceits, and monkey divertisements of smart young
gentlemen, with no brains at all. On the contrary,
the young ladies seated themselves demurely in
their rush-bottomed chairs, and knit their own
woollen stockings; nor ever opened their lips, excepting
to say yah Mynher, or yah, ya Vrouw, to
any question that was asked them; behaving in all
things, like decent, well educated damsels. As to
the gentlemen, each of them tranquilly smoked his
pipe, and seemed lost in contemplation of the blue
and white tiles, with which the fire-places were decorated;
wherein sundry passages of scripture,
were piously pourtrayed—Tobit and his dog figured
to great advantage; Haman swung conspicuously

on his gibbet, and Jonah appeared most manfully
bouncing out of the whale, like Harlequin
through a barrel of fire.

The parties broke up without noise and without
confusion—for, strange as it may seem, the ladies
and gentlemen were content to take their own cloaks
and shawls and hats; not dreaming, simple souls!
of the ingenious system of exchange established in
modern days; by which those who first leave a
party are authorized to choose the best shawl or hat
they can find—a custom which has doubtless arisen
in consequence of our commercial habits. They
were carried home by their own carriages, that is
to say, by the vehicles nature had provided them,
excepting such of the wealthy, as could afford to
keep a waggon. The gentlemen gallantly attended
their fair ones to their respective abodes, and took
leave of them with a hearty smack at the door:
which as it was an established piece of etiquette,
done in perfect simplicity and honesty of heart, occasioned
no scandal at that time, nor should it at
the present—if our great grandfathers approved of
the custom, it would argue a great want of reverence
in their descendants to say a word against it.

4. CHAP IV.

In this dulcet period of my history, when the
beauteous island of Mannahata presented a scene,
the very counterpart of those glowing pictures drawn
by old Hesiod of the golden reign of Saturn, there
was a happy ignorance, an honest simplicity prevalent
among its inhabitants, which were I even able
to depict, would be but little understood by the degenerate
age for which I am doomed to write.
Even the female sex, those arch innovaters upon the
tranquillity, the honesty, and grey-beard customs of
society, seemed for a while to conduct themselves
with incredible sobriety and comeliness, and indeed
behaved almost as if they had not been sent into the
world, to bother mankind, baffle philosophy, and
confound the universe.

Their hair untortured by the abominations of art,
was scrupulously pomatomed back from their foreheads
with a candle, and covered with a little cap
of quilted calico, which fitted exactly to their heads.
Their petticoats of linsey woolsey, were striped with
a variety of gorgeous dyes, rivalling the many coloured
robes of Iris—though I must confess these

gallant garments were rather short, scarce reaching
below the knee; but then they made up in the
number, which generally equalled that of the gentlemen's
small clothes; and what is still more praise-worthy,
they were all of their own manufacture—of
which circumstance, as may well be supposed, they
were not a little vain.

These were the honest days, in which every
woman staid at home, read the bible and wore
pockets—aye, and that too of a goodly size, fashioned
with patch-work into many curious devices, and
ostentatiously worn on the outside. These in fact,
were convenient receptacles, where all good house-wives
carefully stored away such things as they
wished to have at hand; by which means they often
came to be incredibly crammed—and I remember
there was a story current when I was a boy, that
the lady of Wouter Van Twiller, having occasion
to empty her right pocket in search of a wooden
ladle, the contents filled three corn baskets, and the
utensil was at length discovered lying among some
rubbish in one corner—but we must not give too
much faith to all these stories; the anecdotes of
these remote periods being very subject to exaggeration.

Beside these notable pockets, they likewise wore
scissars and pincushions suspended from their
girdles by red ribbands, or among the more opulent
and shewy classes, by brass and even silver chains—

indubitable tokens of thrifty housewives and industrious
spinsters. I cannot say much in vindication
of the shortness of the petticoats; it doubtless was
introduced for the purpose of giving the stockings
a chance to be seen, which were generally of blue
worsted with magnificent red clocks—or perhaps
to display a well turned ankle, and a neat, though
serviceable foot; set off by a high-heel'd leathern
shoe, with a large and splendid silver buckle. Thus
we find, that the gentle sex in all ages, have shewn
the same disposition to infringe a little upon the
laws of decorum, in order to betray a lurking beauty,
or gratify an innocent love of finery.

From the sketch here given it will be seen, that
our good grandmothers differed considerably in
their ideas of a fine figure, from their scantily dressed
descendants of the present day. A fine lady, in
those times, waddled under more clothes even on
a fair summer's day, than would have clad the
whole bevy of a modern ball room. Nor were
they the less admired by the gentlemen in consequence
thereof. On the contrary, the greatness of
a lover's passion seemed to encrease in proportion
to the magnitude of its object—and a voluminous
damsel, arrayed in a dozen of petticoats, was declared
by a low-dutch sonnetteer of the province, to
be radiant as a sunflower, and luxuriant as a full
blown cabbage. Certain it is, that in those days,
the heart of a lover could not contain more than

one lady at a time; whereas the heart of a modern
gallant has often room enough to accommodate half
a dozen—The reason of which I conclude to be,
either that the hearts of the gentlemen have grown
larger, or the persons of the ladies smaller—this
however is a question for physiologists to determine.

But there was a secret charm in these petticoats,
which no doubt entered into the consideration of
the prudent gallant. The wardrobe of a lady was
in those days her only fortune; and she who had
a good stock of petticoats and stockings, was as
absolutely an heiress, as is a Kamschatka damsel
with a store of bear skins, or a Lapland belle with a
plenty of rein deer. The ladies therefore, were
very anxious to display these powerful attractions
to the greatest advantage; and the best rooms in
the house instead of being adorned with caricatures
of dame nature, in water colours and needle work,
were always hung round with abundance of home-spun
garments; the manufacture and property of
the females—a piece of laudable ostentation that
still prevails among the heiresses of our dutch
villages. Such were the beauteous belles of the
ancient city of New Amsterdam, rivalling in primæval
simplicity of manners, the renowned and
courtly dames, so loftily sung by Dan Homer—
who tells us that the princess Nausicaa, washed the
family linen, and the fair Penelope wove her own
petticoats.

The gentlemen in fact, who figured in the circles
of the gay world in these ancient times, corresponded
in most particulars, with the beauteous damsels
whose smiles they were ambitious to deserve.
True it is, their merits would make but a very inconsiderable
impression, upon the heart of a modern
fair; they neither drove in their curricles nor sported
their tandems, for as yet those gaudy vehicles
were not even dreamt of—neither did they distinguish
themselves by their brilliance at the table, and
their consequent rencoutres with watchmen, for our
forefathers were of too pacific a disposition to need
those guardians of the night, every soul throughout
the town being in full snore before nine o'clock.
Neither did they establish their claims by gentility
at the expense of their taylors—for as yet those
offenders against the pockets of society, and the
tranquillity of all aspiring young gentlemen, were
unknown in New Amsterdam; every good house-wife
made the clothes of her husband and family,
and even the goede vrouw of Van Twiller himself,
thought it no disparagement to cut out her husband's
linsey woolsey galligaskins.

Not but what there were some two or three
youngsters who manifested the first dawnings of
what is called fire and spirit. Who held all labour
in contempt; skulked about docks and market
places; loitered in the sun shine; squandered what
little money they could procure at hustle cap and

chuck farthing, swore, boxed, fought cocks, and
raced their neighbours' horses—in short who promised
to be the wonder, the talk and abomination of
the town, had not their stylish career been unfortunately
cut short, by an affair of honour with a
whipping post.

Far other, however, was the truly fashionable
gentleman of those days—his dress, which served
for both morning and evening, street and drawing
room, was a linsey woolsey coat, made perhaps by
the fair hands of the mistress of his affections, and
gallantly bedecked with abundance of large brass
buttons.—Half a score of breeches heightened the
proportions of his figure—his shoes were decorated
by enormous copper buckles—a low crowned
broad brimmed hat overshadowed his burley visage,
and his hair dangled down his back, in a prodigious
queue of eel skin.

Thus equipped, he would manfully sally forth
with pipe in mouth to besiege some fair damsel's obdurate
heart—not such a pipe, good reader, as that
which Acis did sweetly tune in praise of his Galatea,
but one of true delft manufacture and furnished
with a charge of fragrant Cow-pen tobacco. With
this would he resolutely set himself down before
the fortress, and rarely failed in the process of time
to smoke the fair enemy into a surrender, upon
honourable terms.

Such was the happy reign of Wouter Van

Twiller, celebrated in many a long forgotten song
as the real golden age, the rest being nothing but
counterfeit copper-washed coin. In that delightful
period, a sweet and holy calm reigned over the
whole province. The Burgomaster smoked his
pipe in peace—the substantial solace of his domestic
house, his well petticoated yffrouw, after her
daily cares were done, sat soberly at her door, with
arms crossed over her apron of snowy white, without
being insulted by ribald street walkers or vagabond
boys—those unlucky urchins, who do so infest
our streets, displaying under the roses of youth,
the thorns and briars of iniquity. Then it was that
the lover with ten breeches and the damsel with
petticoats of half a score indulged in all the innocent
endearments of virtuous love, without fear
and without reproach—for what had that virtue to
fear, which was defended by a shield of good
linsey woolseys, equal at least to the seven bull
hides of the invincible Ajax.

Thrice happy, and never to be forgotten age!
when every thing was better than it has ever been
since, or ever will be again—when Buttermilk
channel was quite dry at low water—when the
shad in the Hudson were all salmon, and when the
moon shone with a pure and resplendent whiteness,
instead of that melancholy yellow light, which is the
consequence of her sickening at the abominations
she every night witnesses in this degenerate city!

5. CHAP. V.

In the year of our Lord, one thousand eight
hundred and four, on a fine afternoon, in the mellow
month of October, I took my customary walk upon
the battery, which is at once the pride and bulwark
of this ancient and impregnable city of New York.
I remember well the season, for it immediately preceded
that remarkably cold winter, in which our
sagacious corporation, in a spasm of economical
philanthropy, pulled to pieces, at an expense of several
hundred dollars, the wooden ramparts, which
had cost them several thousand; and distributed
the rotten fragments, which were worth considerably
less than nothing, among the shivering poor of
the city—never, since the fall of the walls of Jericho,
or the heaven built battlements of Troy, had
there been known such a demolition—nor did it go
unpunished; five men, eleven old women and nineteen
children, besides cats, dogs and negroes, were
blinded, in vain attempts to smoke themselves warm,
with this charitable substitute for firewood, and an
epidemic complaint of sore eyes was moreover produced,

which has since recurred every winter; particularly
among those who undertake to burn rotten
logs—who warm themselves with the charity of
others—or who use patent chimnies.

On the year and month just designated, did I
take my accustomed walk of meditation, on that
same battery, which, though at present, no battery,
furnishes the most delightful walk, and commands
the noblest prospect, in the whole known world.
The ground on which I trod was hallowed by recollections
of the past, and as I slowly wandered
through the long alleys of poplars, which, like so
many birch brooms standing on end, diffused a melancholy
and lugubrious shade, my imagination
drew a contrast between the surrounding scenery,
and what it was in the classic days of our forefathers.
Where the government house by name,
but the custom house by occupation, proudly reared
its brick walls and wooden pillars; there whilome
stood the low but substantial, red tiled mansion of
the renowned Wouter Van Twiller. Around it
the mighty bulwarks of fort Amsterdam frowned
defiance to every absent foe; but, like many a whiskered
warrior and gallant militia captain, confined
their martial deeds to frowns alone—alas! those
threatening bulwarks had long since been sapped by
time, and like the walls of Carthage, presented no
traces to the enquiring eye of the antiquarian. The
mud breast works had long been levelled with the

earth, and their scite converted into the green lawns
and leafy alleys of the battery; where the gay apprentice
sported his sunday coat, and the laborious
mechanic, relieved from the dirt and drudgery of
the week, poured his septennial tale of love into the
half averted ear of the sentimental chambermaid.
The capacious bay still presented the same expansive
sheet of water, studded with islands, sprinkled
with fishing boats, and bounded by shores of picturesque
beauty. But the dark forests which once
clothed these shores had been violated by the
savage hand of cultivation, and their tangled mazes,
and impracticable thickets, had degenerated into
teeming orchards and waving fields of grain. Even
Governors Island, once a smiling garden, appertaining
to the sovereigns of the province, was now
covered with fortifications, inclosing a tremendous
block house—so that this once peaceful island resembled
a fierce little warrior in a big cocked hat,
breathing gunpowder and defiance to the world!

For some time did I indulge in this pensive train
of thought; contrasting in sober sadness, the present
day, with the hallowed years behind the mountains;
lamenting the melancholy progress of improvement,
and praising the zeal, with which our
worthy burghers endeavour to preserve the wrecks
of venerable customs, prejudices and errors, from
the overwhelming tide of modern innovation—
when by degrees my ideas took a different turn,

and I insensibly awakened to an enjoyment of the
beauties around me.

It was one of those rich autumnal days which
heaven particularly bestows upon the beauteous
island of Mannahata and its vicinity—not a floating
cloud obscured the azure firmament—the sun,
rolling in glorious splendour through his etherial
course, seemed to expand his honest dutch
countenance into an unusual expression of benevolence,
as he smiled his evening salutation upon a
city, which he delights to visit with his most bounteous
beams—the very winds seemed to hold in
their breaths in mute attention, lest they should
ruffle the tranquillity of the hour—and the waveless
bosom of the bay presented a polished mirror,
in which nature beheld herself and smiled!—The
standard of our city, which, like a choice handkerchief,
is reserved for days of gala, hung motionless
on the flag staff, which forms the handle to a gigantic
churn; and even the tremulous leaves of the
poplar and the aspen, which, like the tongues of the
immortal sex, are seldom still, now ceased to vibrate
to the breath of heaven. Every thing seemed
to acquiesce in the profound repose of nature.—
The formidable eighteen pounders slept in the embrazures
of the wooden batteries, seemingly gathering
fresh strength, to fight the battles of their country
on the next fourth of July—the solitary drum
on Governor's island forgot to call the garrison to
their shovels—the evening gun had not yet sounded

its signal, for all the regular, well meaning poultry
throughout the country, to go to roost; and the
fleet of canoes, at anchor between Gibbet Island
and Communipaw, slumbered on their rakes, and
suffered the innocent oysters to lie for a while unmolested,
in the soft mud of their native banks!—
My own feelings sympathized in the contagious
tranquillity, and I should infallibly have dozed upon
one of those fragments of benches, which our
benevolent magistrates have provided for the benefit
of convalescent loungers, had not the extraordinary
inconvenience of the couch set all repose at
defiance.

In the midst of this soothing slumber of the soul,
my attention was attracted to a black speck, peering
above the western horizon, just in the rear of Bergen
steeple—gradually it augments and overhangs
the would-be cities of Jersey, Harsimus and Hoboken,
which, like three jockies, are starting cheek by
jowl on the career of existence, and jostling each
other at the commencement of the race. Now it
skirts the long shore of ancient Pavonia, spreading
its wide shadows from the high settlements at Weehawk
quite to the lazaretto and quarentine, erected
by the sagacity of our police, for the embarrassment
of commerce—now it climbs the serene vault of
heaven, cloud rolling over cloud, like successive billows,
shrouding the orb of day, darkening the vast
expanse, and bearing thunder and hail, and tempest

in its bosom. The earth seems agitated at the confusion
of the heavens—the late waveless mirror is
lashed into furious waves, that roll their broken
surges in hollow murmurs to the shore—the oyster
boats that erst sported in the placid vicinity of Gibbet
Island, now hurry affrighted to the shore—the
late dignified, unbending poplar, writhes and twists,
before the merciless blast—descending torrents of
drenching rain and sounding hail deluge the battery
walks, the gates are thronged by 'prentices, servant
maids and little Frenchmen, with their pocket
handkerchiefs over their hats, scampering from the
storm—the late beauteous prospect presents one
scene of anarchy and wild uproar, as though old
chaos had resumed his reign, and was hurling back
into one vast turmoil, the conflicting elements of
nature. Fancy to yourself, oh reader! the awful
combat sung by old Hesiod, of Jupiter, and the
Titans—fancy to yourself the long rebellowing artillery
of heaven, streaming at the heads of the gigantic
sons of earth.—In short, fancy to yourself
all that has ever been said or sung, of tempest, storm
and hurricane—and you will save me the trouble
of describing it.

Whether I fled from the fury of the storm, or
remained boldly at my post, as our gallant train
band captains, who march their soldiers through
the rain without flinching, are points which I leave
to the conjecture of the reader. It is possible he

may be a little perplexed also, to know the reason
why I introduced this most tremendous and unheard
of tempest, to disturb the serenity of my
work. On this latter point I will gratuitously instruct
his ignorance. The panorama view of the
battery was given, merely to gratify the reader with
a correct description of that celebrated place, and
the parts adjacent—secondly, the storm was played
off, partly to give a little bustle and life to this
tranquil part of my work, and to keep my drowsy
readers from falling asleep—and partly to serve as
a preparation, or rather an overture, to the tempestuous
times, that are about to assail the pacific
province of Nieuw Nederlandt—and that over-hang
the slumbrous administration of the renowned
Wouter Van Twiller. It is thus the experienced
play-wright puts all the fiddles, the french horns,
the kettle drums and trumpets of his orchestra in
requisition, to usher in one of those horrible and
brimstone uproars, called Melodrames—and it is
thus he discharges his thunder, his lightening, his
rosin and saltpetre, preparatory to the raising of a
ghost, or the murdering of a hero—We will now
proceed with our history.

Whatever Plato, Aristotle, Grotius, Puffendorf,
Sydney, Thomas Jefferson or Tom Paine may say
to the contrary, I insist that, as to nations, the old
maxim that “honesty is the best policy,” is a sheer
and ruinous mistake. It might have answered well

enough in the honest times when it was made; but
in these degenerate days, if a nation pretends to
rely merely upon the justice of its dealings, it will
fare something like an honest man among thieves,
who unless he has something more than his honest
to depend upon, stands but a poor chance of profiting
by his company. Such at least was the case with
the guileless government of the New Netherlands;
which, like a worthy unsuspicious old burgher,
quietly settled itself down into the city of New Amsterdam,
as into a snug elbow chair—and fell into a
comfortable nap—while in the mean time its cunning
neighbours stepp'd in and picked its pockets. Thus
may we acribe the commencement of all the woes
of this great province, and its magnificent metropolis,
to the tranquil security, or to speak more
accurately, to the unfortunate honesty of its government.
But as I dislike to begin an important part
of my history, towards the end of a chapter; and
as my readers like myself must doubtless be exceedingly
fatigued with the long walk we have
taken, and the tempest we have sustained—I hold
it meet we shut up the book, smoke a pipe and
having thus refreshed our spirits; take a fair start
in the next chapter.

6. CHAP. VI.

That my readers may the more fully comprehend
the extent of the calamity, at this very moment
impending over the honest, unsuspecting province
of Nieuw Nederlandts, and its dubious Governor,
it is necessary that I should give some account
of a horde of strange barbarians, bordering upon the
eastern frontier.

Now so it came to pass, that many years previous
to the time of which we are treating, the sage
cabinet of England had adopted a certain national
creed, a kind of public walk of faith, or rather a
religious turnpike in which every loyal subject was
directed to travel to Zion—taking care to pay the
toll gatherers by the way.

Albeit a certain shrewd race of men, being very
much given to indulge their own opinions, on all
manner of subjects (a propensity, exceedingly obnoxious
to your free governments of Europe) did

most presumptuously dare to think for themselves
in matters of religion, exercising what they considered
a natural and unextinguishable right—the liberty
of conscience.

As however they possessed that ingenious habit
of mind which always thinks aloud; which in a manner
rides cock-a-hoop on the tongue, and is forever
galloping into other people's ears, it naturally followed
that their liberty of conscience likewise implied
liberty of speech, which being freely indulged, soon
put the country in a hubbub, and aroused the pious
indignation of the vigilant fathers of the church.

The usual methods were adopted to reclaim
them, that in those days were considered so efficacious
in bringing back stray sheep to the fold;
that is to say, they were coaxed, they were admonished,
they were menaced, they were buffeted—
line upon line, precept upon precept, lash upon lash,
here a little and there a great deal, were exhausted
without mercy, but without success; until at
length the worthy pastors of the church wearied out
by their unparalleled stubbornness, were driven in
the excess of their tender mercy, to adopt the
scripture text, and literally “heaped live embers on
their heads.”

Nothing however could subdue that invincible
spirit of independence which has ever distinguished
this singular race of people, so that rather than submit
to such horrible tyranny, they one and all embarked

for the wilderness of America, where they
might enjoy unmolested, the inestimable luxury of
talking. No sooner did they land on this loquacious
soil, than as if they had caught the disease
from the climate, they all lifted up their voices at
once, and for the space of one whole year, did keep
up such a joyful clamour, that we are told they
frightened every bird and beast out of the neighbourhood,
and so completely dumb-founded certain
fish, which abound on their coast, that they
have been called dumb-fish ever since.

From this simple circumstance, unimportant
as it may seem, did first originate that renowned
privilege so loudly boasted of throughout this
country—which is so eloquently exercised in news-papers,
pamphlets, ward meetings, pot-house committees
and congressional deliberations—which establishes
the right of talking without ideas and
without information—of misrepresenting public affairs;
of decrying public measures—of aspersing
great characters, and destroying little ones; in
short, that grand palladium of our country, the
liberty of speech; or as it has been more vulgarly
denominated—the gift of the gab.

The simple aborigenes of the land for a while
contemplated these strange folk in utter astonishment,
but discovering that they wielded harmless
though noisy weapons, and were a lively, ingenious,
good-humoured race of men, they became very

friendly and sociable, and gave them the name of
Yanokies, which in the Mais-Tchusaeg (or Massachusett)
language signifies silent men—a waggish
appellation, since shortened into the familiar epithet
of Yankees, which they retain unto the present
day.

True it is, and my fidelity as an historian will
not allow me to pass it over in silence, that the zeal
of these good people, to maintain their rights and
privileges unimpaired, did for a while betray them
into errors, which it is easier to pardon than defend.
Having served a regular apprenticeship in
the school of persecution, it behoved them to shew
that they had become proficients in the art. They
accordingly employed their leisure hours in banishing,
scourging or hanging, divers heretical papists,
quakers and anabaptists, for daring to abuse the
liberty of conscience; which they now clearly proved
to imply nothing more, than that every man
should think as he pleased in matters of religion—
provided he thought right; for otherwise it would
be giving a latitude to damnable heresies. Now as
they (the majority) were perfectly convinced that
they alone thought right, it consequently followed,
that whoever thought different from them though
wrong—and whoever thought wrong and obstinately
persisted in not being convinced and converted,
was a flagrant violater of the inestimable liberty of
conscience, and a corrupt and infectious member of

the body politic, and deserved to be lopped off and
cast into the fire.

Now I'll warrant, there are hosts of my readers,
ready at once to lift up their hands and eyes,
with that virtuous indignation with which we always
contemplate the faults and errors of our
neighbours, and to exclaim at these well meaning
but mistaken people, for inflicting on others the injuries
they had suffered themselves—for indulging
the preposterous idea of convincing the mind by
toasting the carcass, and establishing the doctrine
of charity and forbearance, by intolerant persecution.—But
soft you, my very captious sirs! what
are we doing at this very day, and in this very enlightened
nation, but acting upon the very same
principle, in our political controversies. Have we
not within but a few years released ourselves from
the shackles of a government, which cruelly denied
us the privilege of governing ourselves, and using
in full latitude that invaluable member, the tongue?
and are we not at this very moment striving our
best to tyrannise over the opinions, tie up the
tongues, or ruin the fortunes of one another? What
are our great political societies, but mere political
inquisitions—our pot-house committees, but little
tribunals of denunciation—our news-papers but
mere whipping posts and pillories, where unfortunate
individuals are pelted with rotten eggs—and
our council of appointment—but a grand auto de fé,

where culprits are annually sacrificed for their political
heresies?

Where then is the difference in principle between
our measures and those you are so ready to
condemn among the people I am treating of? There
is none; the difference is merely circumstantial.—
Thus we denounce, instead of banishing—We libel
instead of scourging—we turn out of office instead
of hanging—and where they burnt an offender in
propria personæ—we either tar and feather or burn
him in effigy—this political persecution being, some
how or other, the grand palladium of our liberties,
and an incontrovertible proof that this is a free
country!

But notwithstanding the fervent zeal with which
this holy war was prosecuted against the whole race
of unbelievers, we do not find that the population of
this new colony was in any wise hindered thereby;
on the contrary they multiplied to a degree, which
would be incredible to any man unacquainted with
the marvellous fecundity of this growing country.

This amazing increase, may indeed be partly
ascribed to a singular custom prevalent among them,
and which was probably borrowed from the ancient
republic of Sparta; where we are told the young
ladies, either from being great romps and hoydens, or
else like many modern heroines, very fond of meddling
with matters that did not appertain to their
sex, used frequently to engage with the men, in

wrestling, and other athletic exercises of the gymnasium.
The custom to which I allude was vulgarly
known by the name of bundling—a superstitious
rite observed by the young people of both
sexes, with which they usually terminated their festivities;
and which was kept up with religious
strictness, by the more bigoted and vulgar part
of the community. This ceremony was likewise,
in those primitive times considered as an indispensible
preliminary to matrimony; their courtships
commencing, where ours usually finish—by
which means they acquired that intimate acquaintance
with each others good qualities before marriage,
that has been pronounced by philosophers
the sure basis of a happy union. Thus early did
this cunning and ingenious people, display a shrewdness
at making a bargain which has ever since distinguished
them—and a strict adherence to the good
old vulgar maxim about “buying a pig in a poke.”

To this sagacious custom, therefore, do I chiefly
attribute the unparalleled increase of the yanokie
or yankee tribe; for it is a certain fact, well authenticated
by court records and parish registers, that
wherever the practice of bundling prevailed, there
was an amazing number of sturdy brats annually
born unto the state, without the license of
the law, or the benefit of clergy; and it is truly astonishing
that the learned Malthus, in his treatise on
population, has entirely overlooked this singular

fact. Neither did the irregularity of their birth
operate in the least to their disparagement. On
the contrary they grew up a long sided, raw boned,
hardy race of whoreson whalers, wood cutters, fishermen
and pedlars, and strapping corn-fed wenches;
who by their united efforts tended marvellously towards
populating those notable tracts of country,
called Nantucket, Piscataway and Cape Cod.

7. CHAP. VII.

In the last chapter, my honest little reader, I
have given thee a faithful and unprejudiced account,
of the origin of that singular race of people, inhabiting
the country eastward of the Nieuw Nederlandts;
but I have yet to mention certain peculiar habits
which rendered them exceedingly obnoxious to our
ever honoured dutch ancestors.

The most prominent of these was a certain
rambling propensity, with which, like the sons of
Ishmael, they seem to have been gifted by heaven,
and which continually goads them on, to shift their
residence from place to place, so that a Yankey
farmer is in a constant state of migration; tarrying
occasionally here and there; clearing lands for
other people to enjoy, building houses for others to
inhabit, and in a manner may be considered the
wandering Arab of America.

His first thought, on coming to the years of
manhood, is to settle himself in the world—which
means nothing more nor less than to begin his rambles.
To this end he takes unto himself for a wife,

some dashing country heiress; that is to say, a
buxom rosy cheeked wench, passing rich in red
ribbands, glass beads and mock tortoise-shell combs,
with a white gown and morocco shoes for Sunday,
and deeply skilled in the mystery of making apple
sweetmeats, long sauce and pumpkin pie.

Having thus provided himself, like a true pedlar
with a heavy knapsack, wherewith to regale his
shoulders through the journey of life, he literally
sets out on the peregrination. His whole family,
household furniture and farming utensils are hoisted
into a covered cart; his own and his wife's wardrobe
packed up in a firkin—which done, he
shoulders his axe, takes staff in hand, whistles
“yankee doodle” and trudges off to the woods,
as confident of the protection of providence, and
relying as cheerfully upon his own resources, as did
ever a patriarch of yore, when he journeyed into a
strange country of the Gentiles. Having buried
himself in the wilderness, he builds himself a log
hut, clears away a cornfield and potatoe patch, and,
providence smiling upon his labours, is soon surrounded
by a snug farm and some half a score of
flaxen headed urchins, who by their size, seem to
have sprung all at once out of the earth, like a crop
of toad-stools.

But it is not the nature of this most indefatigable
of speculators, to rest contented with any state
of sublunary enjoyment—improvement is his darling

passion, and having thus improved his lands the
next care is to provide a mansion worthy the residence
of a land holder. A huge palace of pine
boards immediately springs up in the midst of the
wilderness, large enough for a parish church, and
furnished with windows of all dimensions, but so
rickety and flimsy withal, that every blast gives it
a fit of the ague.

By the time the outside of this mighty air castle
is completed, either the funds or the zeal of our
adventurer are exhausted, so that he barely manages
to half finish one room within, where the whole
family burrow together—while the rest of the house
is devoted to the curing of pumpkins, or storing of
carrots and potatoes, and is decorated with fanciful
festoons of wilted peaches and dried apples. The
outside remaining unpainted, grows venerably black
with time: the family wardrobe is laid under contribution
for old hats, petticoats and breeches to
stuff into the broken windows, while the four winds
of heaven keep up a whistling and howling about
this aerial palace, and play as many unruly gambols,
as they did of yore, in the cave of old Eolus.

The humble log hut, which whilome nestled
this improving family snugly within its narrow but
comfortable walls, stands hard by in ignominious
contrast, degraded into a cow house or pig stye;
and the whole scene reminds one forcibly of a fable,
which I am surprised has never been recorded,

of an aspiring snail who quit his humble habitation
which he filled with great respectability, to crawl
into the empty shell of a lobster—where he would
no doubt have resided with great style and splendour,
the envy and hate of all the pains-taking snails
of his neighbourhood, had he not accidentally
perished with cold, in one corner of his stupendous
mansion.

Being thus completely settled, and to use his
own words, “to rights,” one would imagine that
he would begin to enjoy the comforts of his situation,
to read newspapers, talk politics, neglect his
own business, and attend to the affairs of the nation,
like a useful and patriotic citizen; but now it is
that his wayward disposition begins again to operate.
He soon grows tired of a spot, where there is no
longer any room for improvement—sells his farm,
air castle, petticoat windows and all, reloads his
cart, shoulders his axe, puts himself at the head of
his family, and wanders away in search of new
lands—again to fell trees—again to clear cornfields—again
to build a shingle palace, and again to
sell off, and wander.

Such were the people of Connecticut, who bordered
upon the eastern frontier of Nieuw Nederlandts,
and my readers may easily imagine what
obnoxious neighbors this light hearted but restless
tribe must have been to our tranquil progenitors.
If they cannot, I would ask them, if they have ever

known one of our regular, well organized, antediluvian
dutch families, whom it hath pleased heaven
to afflict with the neighbourhood of a French boarding
house. The honest old burgher cannot take
his afternoon's pipe, on the bench before his door,
but he is persecuted with the scraping of fiddles,
the chattering of women, and the squalling of children—he
cannot sleep at night for the horrible melodies
of some amateur, who chooses to serenade
the moon, and display his terrible proficiency in
execution, by playing demisemiquavers in alt on the
clarionet, the hautboy, or some other soft toned instrument—nor
can he leave the street door open,
but his house is defiled by the unsavoury visits of a
troop of pug dogs, who even sometimes carry their
loathsome ravages into the sanctum sanctorum, the
parlour!

If my readers have ever witnessed the sufferings
of such a family, so situated, they may form some
idea, how our worthy ancestors were distressed by
their mercurial neighbours of Connecticut.

Gangs of these marauders we are told, penetrated
into the New Netherland settlements and
threw whole villages into consternation by their
unparalleled volubility and their intolerable inquisitiveness—two
evil habits hitherto unknown in those
parts, or only known to be abhorred; for our ancestors
were noted, as being men of truly spartan
taciturnity, and who neither knew nor cared aught

about any body's concerns but their own. Many
enormities were committed on the high ways, where
several unoffending burghers were brought to a
stand, and so tortured with questions and guesses,
that it was a miracle they escaped with their five
senses.

Great jealousy did they likewise stir up, by their
intermeddling and successes among the divine sex;
for being a race of brisk, likely, pleasant tongued
varlets, they soon seduced the light affections of
the simple damsels, from their honest but ponderous
dutch gallants. Among other hideous customs
they attempted to introduce among them that of
bundling, which the dutch lasses of the Nederlandts,
with that eager passion for novelty and foreign
fashions, natural to their sex, seemed very
well inclined to follow, but that their mothers, being
more experienced in the world, and better acquainted
with men and things strenuously discountenanced
all such outlandish innovations.

But what chiefly operated to embroil our ancestors
with these strange folk, was an unwarrantable
liberty which they occasionally took, of entering
in hordes into the territories of the New
Netherlands, and settling themselves down, without
leave or licence, to improve the land, in the manner
I have before noticed. This unceremonious mode
of taking possession of new land was technically
termed squatting, and hence is derived the appellation

of squatters; a name odious in the ears of all
great landholders, and which is given to those enterprizing
worthies, who seize upon land first, and
take their chance to make good their title to it
afterwards.

All these grievances, and many others which
were constantly accumulating, tended to form that
dark and portentous cloud, which as I observed in
a former chapter, was slowly gathering over the
tranquil province of New Netherlands. The pacific
cabinet of Van Twiller, however, as will be
perceived in the sequel, bore them all with a magnanimity
that redounds to their immortal credit—
becoming by passive endurance inured to this increasing
mass of wrongs; like the sage old woman
of Ephesus, who by dint of carrying about a calf,
from the time it was born, continued to carry it
without difficulty, when it had grown to be an ox.

8. CHAP. VIII.

By this time my readers must fully perceive,
what an arduous task I have undertaken—collecting
and collating with painful minuteness, the chronicles
of past times, whose events almost defy the
powers of research—raking in a little kind of Herculaneum
of history, which had lain nearly for
ages, buried under the rubbish of years, and almost
totally forgotten—raking up the limbs and fragments
of disjointed facts, and endeavouring to put
them scrupulously together, so as to restore them
to their original form and connection—now lugging
forth the character of an almost forgotten hero, like
a mutilated statue—now decyphering a half defaced
inscription, and now lighting upon a mouldering
manuscript, which after painful study, scarce repays
the trouble of perusal.

In such case how much has the reader to depend
upon the honour and probity of his author, lest like
a cunning antiquarian, he either impose upon him
some spurious fabrication of his own, for a precious
relique from antiquity—or else dress up the dismembered
fragment, with such false trappings, that

it is scarcely possible to distinguish the truth from
the fiction with which it is enveloped. This is a
grievance which I have more than once had to lament,
in the course of my wearisome researches
among the works of my fellow historians; who have
strangely disguised and distorted the facts respecting
this country; and particularly respecting the
great province of New Netherlands; as will be
perceived by any who will take the trouble to compare
their romantic effusions, tricked out in the
meretricious gauds of fable, with this excellent little
history—universally to be renowned for its severe
simplicity and unerring truth.

I have had more vexations of the kind to encounter,
in those parts of my history which treat
of the transactions on the eastern border, than in
any other, in consequence of the troops of historians
who have infested these quarters, and have
shewn the honest people of New Nederlandt no
mercy in their works. Among the rest, Mr.
Benjamin Trumbull arrogantly declares that “the
Dutch were always mere intruders.”—Now to this
I shall make no other reply, than to proceed in the
steady narration of my history, which will contain
not only proofs that the Dutch had clear title and
possession in the fair valleys of the Connecticut,
and that they were wrongfully dispossessed thereof—but
likewise that they have been scandalously
maltreated ever since, by the misrepresentations of

the crafty historians of New England. And in this
I shall be guided by a spirit of truth and impartiality,
and a regard to my immortal fame—for I
would not wittingly dishonour my work by a single
falsehood, misrepresentation or prejudice, though
it should gain our forefathers the whole country
of New England.

It was at an early period of the province, and previous
to the arrival of the renowned Wouter—that
the cabinet of Nieuw Nederlandts purchased the
lands about the Connecticut, and established, for
their superintendance and protection, a fortified post
on the banks of the river, which was called Fort Goed
Hoop, and was situated hard by the present fair
city of Hartford. The command of this important
post, together with the rank, title, and appointments
of commissary, were given in charge to the gallant
Jacobus Van Curlet, or as some historians will have
it Van Curlis—a most doughty soldier of that stomachful
class of which we have such numbers on parade
days—who are famous for eating all they kill.
He was of a very soldierlike appearance, and would
have been an exceeding tall man, had his legs been
in proportion to his body; but the latter being long,
and the former uncommonly short, it gave him the
uncouth appearance of a tall man's body, mounted
upon a little man's legs. He made up for this turnspit
construction of body by throwing his legs to
such an extent when he marched, that you would

have sworn he had on the identical seven league
boots of the farfamed Jack the giant killer; and so
astonishingly high did he tread on any great military
occasion, that his soldiers were oft times alarmed,
lest the little man should trample himself under
foot.

But notwithstanding the erection of this fort,
and the appointment of this ugly little man of war
as a commander, the intrepid Yankees, continued
those daring interlopings which I have hinted at in
my last chapter; and taking advantage of the
character which the cabinet of Wouter Van Twiller
soon acquired, for profound and phlegmatic
tranquillity—did audaciously invade the territories
of the Nieuw Nederlandts, and squat themselves
down within the very jurisdiction of fort
Goed Hoop.

On beholding this outrage, the long bodied Van
Curlet proceeded as became a prompt and valiant
officer. He immediately protested against these
unwarrantable encroachments, in low dutch, by
way of inspiring more terror, and forthwith dispatched
a copy of the protest to the governor at
New Amsterdam, together with a long and bitter
account of the aggressions of the enemy. This
done, he ordered his men, one and all to be of good
cheer—shut the gate of the fort, smoked three
pipes, went to bed and awaited the result with a
resolute and intrepid tranquillity, that greatly ani

mated his adherents, and no doubt struck sore dismay
and affright into the hearts of the enemy.

Now it came to pass, that about this time, the
renowned Wouter Van Twiller, full of years and
honours, and council dinners, had reached that period
of life and faculty which, according to the
great Gulliver, entitle a man to admission into
the ancient order of Struldbruggs. He employed
his time in smoking his turkish pipe, amid an assemblage
of sages, equally enlightened, and nearly
as venerable as himself, and who for their silence,
their gravity, their wisdom, and their cautious
averseness to coming to any conclusion in business,
are only to be equalled by certain profound corporations
which I have known in my time. Upon
reading the protest of the gallant Jacobus Van Curlet
therefore, his excellency fell straightway into one
of the deepest doubts that ever he was known to
encounter; his capacious head gradually drooped
on his chest,[4] he closed his eyes and inclined his
ear to one side, as if listening with great attention to
the discussion that was going on in his belly;
which all who knew him, declared to be the huge
court-house, or council chamber of his thoughts;
forming to his head what the house of representatives

does to the senate. An inarticulate sound,
very much resembling a snore, occasionally escaped
him—but the nature of this internal cogitation,
was never known, as he never opened his lips on
the subject to man, woman or child. In the mean
time, the protest of Van Curlet laid quietly on the table,
where it served to light the pipes of the venerable
sages assembled in council; and in the great smoke
which they raised, the gallant Jacobus, his protest,
and his mighty Fort Goed Hoop, were soon as
completely beclouded and forgotten, as is a question
of emergency swallowed up in the speeches
and resolutions of a modern session of congress.

There are certain emergencies when your profound
legislators and sage deliberative councils, are
mightily in the way of a nation; and when an
ounce of hair-brained decision, is worth a pound of
sage doubt, and cautious discussion. Such at least
was the case at present; for while the renowned
Wouter Van Twiller was daily battling with his
doubts, and his resolution growing weaker and
weaker in the contest, the enemy pushed further
and further into his territories, and assumed a most
formidable appearance in the neighbourhood of
Fort Goed Hoop. Here they founded the mighty
town of Pyquag, or as it has since been called
Weathersfield, a place which, if we may credit the
assertions of that worthy historian John Josselyn,
Gent. “hath been infamous by reason of the witches

therein.”—And so daring did these men of Pyquag
become, that they extended those plantations of
onions, for which their town is illustrious, under
the very noses of the garrison of Fort Goed Hoop—
insomuch that the honest dutchmen could not look
toward that quarter, without tears in their eyes.

This crying injustice was regarded with proper
indignation by the gallant Jacobus Van Curlet. He
absolutely trembled with the amazing violence of
his choler and the exacerbations of his valour;
which seemed to be the more turbulent in their
workings, from the length of the body, in which
they were agitated. He forthwith proceeded to
strengthen his redoubts, heighten his breastworks,
deepen his fosse, and fortify his position with a
double row of abbatis; after which valiant precautions,
he with unexampled intrepidity, dispatched a
fresh courier with tremendous accounts of his perilous
situation. Never did the modern hero, who
immortalized himself at the second Sabine war,
shew greater valour in the art of letter writing, or
distinguish himself more gloriously upon paper,
than the heroic Van Curlet.

The courier chosen to bear these alarming dispatches,
was a fat, oily little man, as being least
liable to be worn out, or to lose leather on the journey;
and to insure his speed, he was mounted on
the fleetest waggon horse in the garrison; remarkable
for his length of limb, largeness of bone, and hardness

of trot; and so tall, that the little messenger
was obliged to climb on his back by means of his
tail and crupper. Such extraordinary speed did he
make, that he arrived at Fort Amsterdam in little
less than a month, though the distance was full two
hundred pipes, or about 120 miles.

The extraordinary appearance of this portentous
stranger would have thrown the whole town of
New Amsterdam into a quandary, had the good
people troubled themselves about any thing more
than their domestic affairs. With an appearance
of great hurry and business, and smoking a short
travelling pipe, he proceeded on a long swing trot
through the muddy lanes of the metropolis, demolishing
whole batches of dirt pies, which the little
dutch children were making in the road; and for
which kind of pastry the children of this city have
ever been famous—On arriving at the governor's
house he climbed down from his steed in great trepidation;
roused the grey headed door keeper, old Skaats
who like his lineal decendant, and faithful representative,
the venerable crier of our court, was nodding
at his post—rattled at the door of the council chamber,
and startled the members as they were dozing
over a plan for establishing a public market.

At that very moment a gentle grunt, or rather a
deep drawn snore was heard from the chair of the
governor; a whiff of smoke was at the same instant
observed to escape from his lips, and a slight cloud

to ascend from the bowl of his pipe. The council
of course supposed him engaged in deep sleep for
the good of the community, and according to custom
in all such cases established, every man bawled
out silence, in order to maintain tranquillity; when
of a sudden, the door flew open and the little courier
straddled into the apartment, cased to the middle
in a pair of Hessian boots, which he had got into for
the sake of expedition. In his right hand he held forth
the ominous dispatches, and with his left he grasped
firmly the waist-band of his galligaskins; which
had unfortunately given way, in the exertion of
descending from his horse. He stumped resolutely
up to the governor, and with more hurry than
perspicuity delivered his message. But fortunately
his ill tidings came too late, to ruffle the tranquillity
of this most tranquil of rulers. His venerable
excellency had just breathed and smoked his
last—his lungs and his pipe having been exhausted
together, and his peaceful soul, as Dan Homer
would have said, having escaped in the last whiff
that curled from his tobacco pipe.—In a word the
renowned Wouter Van Twiller, alias Walter the
Doubter, who had so often slumbered with his cotemporaries,
now slept with his fathers, and Wilhelmus
Kieft governed in his stead.