University of Virginia Library

2. CHAP. II.

The very first movements of the great Peter, on
taking the reins of government, displayed the magnanimity
of his mind, though they occasioned not a
little marvel and uneasiness among the people of the
Manhattoes. Finding himself constantly interrupted
by the opposition and annoyed by the sage advice
of his privy council, the members of which
had acquired the unreasonable habit of thinking and
speaking for themselves during the preceding reign;
he determined at once to put a stop to such a grievous
abomination. Scarcely therefore had he entered
upon his authority than he kicked out of office
all those meddlesome spirits that composed the
factious cabinet of William the Testy, in place of
whom he chose unto himself councillors from
those fat, somniferous, respectable families, that
had flourished and slumbered under the easy reign
of Walter the Doubter. All these he caused to be
furnished with abundance of fair long pipes, and to
be regaled with frequent corporation dinners, admonishing
then to smoke and eat and sleep for the

good of the nation, while he took all the burden of
government upon his own shoulders—an arrangement
to which they all gave a hearty grunt of acquiescence.

Nor did he stop here, but made a hideous rout
among the ingenious inventions and expedients of
his learned predecessor—demolishing his flagstaffs
and wind-mills, which like mighty giants,
guarded the ramparts of New Amsterdam—pitching
to the duyvel whole batteries of quaker guns—
rooting up his patent gallows, where caitiff vagabonds
were suspended by the breech, and in a word,
turning topsy-turvy the whole philosophic, economic
and wind-mill system of the immortal sage of
Saardam.

The honest folk of New Amsterdam, began to
quake now for the fate of their matchless champion
Antony the trumpeter, who had acquired
prodigious favour in the eyes of the women by
means of his whiskers and his trumpet. Him did
Peter the Headstrong, cause to be brought into his
presence, and eyeing him for a moment from head
to foot, with a countenance that would have appalled
any thing else than a sounder of brass—“Prythee
who and what art thou?” said he.—“Sire,” replied
the other in no wise dismayed,—“for my
name, it is Antony Van Corlear—for my parentage,
I am the son of my mother—for my profession

I am champion and garrison of this great city
of New Amsterdam.”---“I doubt me much,” said
Peter Stuyvesant,” that thou art some scurvy costard-monger
knave—how didst thou acquire this
paramount honour and dignity?”—“Marry sir,”
replied the other, “like many a great man before
me, simply by sounding my own trumpet.”—“Aye,
is it so?” quoth the governor, why then let us have
a relish of thy art.” Whereupon he put his instrument
to his lips and sounded a charge, with such
a tremendous outset, such a delectable quaver, and
such a triumphant cadence that it was enough to
make your heart leap out of your mouth only to be
within a mile of it. Like as a war-worn charger,
while sporting in peaceful plains, if by chance he
hears the strains of martial music, pricks up his
ears, and snorts and paws and kindles at the noise,
so did the heroic soul of the mighty Peter joy to
hear the clangour of the trumpet; for of him might
truly be said what was recorded of the renowned
St. George of England, “there was nothing in all
the world that more rejoiced his heart, than to hear
the pleasant sound of war, and see the soldiers
brandish forth their steeled weapons.” Casting
his eyes more kindly therefore, upon the sturdy
Van Corlear, and finding him to be a jolly, fat little
man, shrewd in his discourse, yet of great discretion
and immeasurable wind, he straightway
conceived an astonishing kindness for him; and
discharging him from the troublesome duty of garrisoning,
defending and alarming the city, ever
after retained him about his person, as his chief
favourite, confidential envoy and trusty squire. Instead
of disturbing the city with disastrous notes,
he was instructed to play so as to delight the governor,
while at his repasts, as did the minstrels
of yore in the days of glorious chivalry—and on
all public occasions, to rejoice the ears of the people
with warlike melody—thereby keeping alive a
noble and martial spirit.

Many other alterations and reformations, both
for the better and for the worse, did the governor
make, of which my time will not serve me to record
the particulars, suffice it to say, he soon contrived
to make the province feel that he was its
master, and treated the sovereign people with such
tyrannical rigour, that they were all fain to hold
their tongues, stay at home and attend to their business;
insomuch that party feuds and distinctions
were almost forgotten, and many thriving keepers
of taverns and dram-shops, were utterly ruined for
want of business.

Indeed the critical state of public affairs at this
time, demanded the utmost vigilance, and promptitude.
The formidable council of the Amphyctions,
which had caused so much tribulation to the un

fortunate Kieft, still continued augmenting its
forces, and threatened to link within its union, all
the mighty principalities and powers of the cast.
In the very year following the inauguration of governor
Stuyvesant a grand deputation departed
from the city of Providence (famous for its dusty
streets, and beauteous women,) in behalf of the
puissant plantation of Rhode Island, praying to be
admitted into the league.

The following mention is made of this application
in the records still extant, of that assemblage
of worthies.[2]

I confess the very sight of this fearful document,
made me to quake for the safety of my beloved
province. The name of Alexander, however
misspelt, has been warlike in every age, and though
its fierceness is in some measure softened by being
coupled with the gentle cognomen of Partridge,
still, like the colour of scarlet, it bears an exceeding
great resemblance to the sound of a trumpet.
From the style of the letter, moreover, and the soldierlike
ignorance of orthography displayed by the
noble captain Alicxsander Partridg in spelling his
own name, we may picture to ourselves this mighty
man of Rhodes like a second Ajax, strong in arms,
great in the field, but in other respects, (meaning
no disparagement) as great a dom cop, as if he had
been educated among that learned people of Thrace,
who Aristotle most slanderously assures us, could
not count beyond the number four.

But whatever might be the threatening aspect
of this famous confederation, Peter Stuyvesant
was not a man to be kept in a state of incertitude
and vague apprehension; he liked nothing so much
as to meet danger face to face, and take it by the
beard. Determined therefore to put an end to all
these petty maraudings on the borders, he wrote
two or three categorical letters to the grand council,
which though neither couched in bad latin, nor yet
graced by rhetorical tropes about wolfs and lambs,

and beetle flies, yet had more effect than all the
elaborate epistles, protests and proclamations of his
learned predecessor, put together. In consequence
of his urgent propositions, the sage council of the
amphyctions agreed to enter into a final adjustment
of grievances and settlement of boundaries, to the
end that a perpetual and happy peace might take
place between the two powers. For this purpose
governor Stuyvesant deputed two ambassadors, to
negotiate with commissioners from the grand council
of the league, and a treaty was solemnly concluded
at Hartford. On receiving intelligence of this
event, the whole community was in an uproar of
exultation. The trumpet of the sturdy Van Corlear,
sounded all day with joyful clangour from the
ramparts of Fort Amsterdam, and at night the city
was magnificently illuminated with two hundred
and fifty tallow candles; besides a barrel of tar,
which was burnt before the governor's house, on
the cheering aspect of public affairs.

And now my worthy, but simple reader, is
doubtless, like the great and good Peter, congratulating
himself with the idea, that his feelings will
no longer be molested by afflicting details of stolen
horses, broken heads, impounded hogs, and all the
other catalogue of heart-rending cruelties, that disgraced
these border wars. But if my reader should
indulge in such expectations, it is only another proof,

among the many he has already given in the course
of this work, of his utter ignorance of state affairs—
and this lamentable ignorance on his part, obliges
me to enter into a very profound dissertation, to
which I call his attention in the next chapter—
wherein I will shew that Peter Stuyvesant has already
committed a great error in politics; and by
effecting a peace, has materially jeopardized the
tranquility of the province.