University of Virginia Library

THE BUCCANEERS.

BOOK THE THIRD.
THE TIMES OF JACOB LEISLER.[1]

SECTION I.

The Mariner's Tale.

That the reader may draw breath as well as myself,
at every convenient stoppage of the narrative, I have

proposed, nay, determined on an experiment; to which I
now proceed; and deeming it the duty of a writer, that what
he does in his discourses with the world, he must do boldly,
as the soldier who volunteers the forlorn hope; for he cannot,
if he be no servile flatterer, expect to meet all favour—he
must offend the taste of some, to please others
—nay, to gratify his own;—at a period of the romance
like that to which it is now brought, I have concluded
without offence, I hope, et sans ceremonie, to any person
concerned, to take leave of the rule, which in the latter
sections of the second book in this work, I had bound
myself to observe—and, leaving the characters I have
heretofore summoned to fill my scenes, to take care of
themselves, for awhile I shall enter on a new ground,
which, however, may in the denouement, be found to
forward the progress of the main business; but in the
pursuit of this object, I feel I shall often need to
be called to order—for a habit, which has, I have no
doubt, been a great drawback on my readers already,
still sticks to me; and is so miserably interwoven in my
nature, that I fear it will bear me out in the very last
page; it is, that reflect I must—and what is worse, I
must trouble my readers with my thoughts and dissertations;
and as I am now approaching a portion of the
work, to which all the former parts may appear merely
subservient, I cannot refrain (from the nature of the events
which I shall be forced to detail) from frequently remarking
on men and manners as they exist, when compared
to them as they have once existed. There were
indeed bad men, bad deeds, and a bad world, in the
olden day, but then were the ages of barbarism and
idolatry; but for all the storied chronicles relate—for
all the pen of the historian hath traced—for all the scorn
that is heaped on our unlettered and unpolished forbears,
I am brought to believe, and that on no weak foundation,
that the most foul crime they knew, hath its superior,
and where they had the ability to commit one vile action,
among us a thousand are hourly perpetrated, far
beyond what the most abandoned could have once
dreamed of; and though this be termed the age of wisdom,
of morality and religion; yet the most glaring vices,
and most atrocious criminals, stalk abroad in open day,
with upright front; and it is virtue alone, that like some
trembling and timid bird shunning the fowler's eye, seeketh
darkness, and fearfully cowers in the shade; indeed
honesty is the marah, the bitter waters of the Scripture;
few love to taste it. Although perhaps the wickedness of
these times may have been exceeded in the capability of
its enactors; at least, at no period hath it ever been more
impudent and barefaced, seeming as if that, which with
our forefathers was but in the bud, hath now blown out
to its fulness: in truth, decency of behaviour is scarcely
observed in any station of life or state of society; at
present, the higher are only distinguished from the lower
classes, by their ingenuity in roguery, and their refinement
in debauchery: for while the ragged losel robs for a
few coppers to supply his drunkenness, the proud gentleman
as he terms himself, filches from his friend, his
brother, his patron, thousands which he riots away on
bawds, dice and wassail; and yet there never was more
religion than now; but then, never was there less morality.
What a convenient garb for villany, for hypocrisy,
hath ever been the scapulary—the black badge of
priesthood; what numbers of our divines are avaricious,
canting deceivers—who, dead to true piety, own no
spring except the strong urgings of private interest; who
have no charity for man, no heart but for themselves—
no God but gold—and who preach, but practise not: in
numerous instances, religion hath been made an article
of traffic, and bought and sold as though it was a mere
carnal thing—a piece of merchandise formed for the
uses of man; and so it has been—for the simple religion
of nature, when the worshipper without the pomp
of carved altars and pillared chapels—without the rich
bound, gilded prayer book, and the soft and crimson
cushion, poured forth in simple guise, his heart unto his
maker, hath passed—and devotion hath become the enaction
of foppery, of sleek locked bigots—of starched and
sanctified apes, who assume a meekness of heart, which
is but outward show, the covering of depravity; who talk
of lowliness, while they flutter like butterflies, proud of
their silken cloaks and snow white bands: yes, the
preacher even at the desk, seeketh not the meekness
that should become his station—but with the heart of
the tiger, thirsting for blood, points out the way to persecution:
at times, yea, in the self same breath, he
talks of charity, and of death and torments to those who
differ in their creed from that to which he is bound, by
bonds of iron, of ignorance, of bigotry, of livelihood;
for often his bread depends upon spreading doctrines
which he scorns and laughs at, over his secret convivial
cups—and which he brings his false lips to utter, to gratify
the infant minds of doting old women, and simple
girls; for such are the true supporters of the clergy.
Out on the garments of disguise! I have known one of
them, who, from the cold, stony, and frosted threshold of
his doorway, hath thrust forth even to the storm, the
scarce garbed and shivering beggar, bidding him, unpitied,
seek relief in the bleak winds of winter; yet he,
a pampered pauper, revelled in luxury: I have heard
his voice denounce as vile, amusements, which he himself
slily enjoyed;—away with such deception! Sad
indeed is it, that the gown should be changed to the
leper's mantle, a cloak to cover and hide vile spots,
loathsome deformities, and deadly passions—the fierce,
revengeful hatred, and the baser frailties of weak hu
manity, and serve alike for the garb of hypocrisy and
the blackest designs. Here, however, let it be borne in
mind, that no one more venerates and respects, than the
inditer of these sentiments, true and unfeigned piety,
gentleness and devotion: but where are they to be
found? for it is too palpable to every observer,
that there are more unblushing pretenders among
the votaries of religion, than any other following; and I
must confess, I cannot endure to behold with patience or
temper, so many puritanical mountebanks impose on the
unwary multitude: wretches whom Cibber describes as
making a trade of religion, and showing an uncommon
concern for the next world, only to raise their fortunes
with greater security in this.[2] Yes, from the very bottom
of my heart, I do detest this over pious species, who, losel-like,
fatten on the richest benefices, swelled by the
alms of the blinded, the besotted and the childish; who
riot in the plentiful contributions of the ignorant, who
are gulled out of their time and money on false pretences,
the conversion of the Hottentot or the Samoide, and who
after performing a thousand nefarious deeds unpunished,
hold up their hands, and groan in the very spiritual nasal
twang of the conventicle at the every action of another.
Again, of what consists the crowd of our civilians, but of
abandoned sharpers and needy knaves, who prowl abroad
like the insatiable hyena, seeking whom they may devour,
defiling the purity of justice with their unhallowed doings;
they are like that treacherous animal, who, discontented
with its due share of food, seeks for an unguarded
moment of its master's meal with eager lip and flashing
eye, to pounce upon the dish and glut its ravenous appetite
with all that it can prey on, watching even for the
life's blood of him who had been its fondest protector;[3]
the most vile and really weak chicanery are allowed to overcome
right, and men are oftener robbed of life or fortune
by the incorrectness of a word than by truth and justice;
and it is this that makes the law the villain's refuge and
the honest man's bane; for judges pride themselves more
on giving ear to the letter of the law, the meaning of a
word, a technical form, or rather, as it is called, legal knowledge,
which closes the hearing though it may sharpen the
sight, than the voice of evidence, and the facts in dispute;
and it is seldom but the most perfidious and villanous of
mankind, on the most frivolous subtities and the flimsiest
subterfuges, escape even though clearly detected, their
deserved punishment. Such is the law; a base and wilful
false swearing, though it may be the ground of misery, of
ruin, and of misfortune, is not a punishable perjury if it
be not material to some frivolous point on trial. Out on
these childish forms, the legal trickeries that do, by
shielding the wicked and the profligate, destroy honor,
honesty and truth! And farther, if a man be a politician,
a follower of the ruling party of the day, in this part of
the world, he is amenable to no offence; it is true, if his
conduct be too flagrant to be glossed over, or to smother
from public indignation, the mockery of an investigation
is gone through; but it is a flimsy fiction to cheat the
multitude, and, by bringing forth the offender pure and
unspotted, give him new opportunities to pursue his atrocities
with impunity. I have beheld one man ascend the
judgment seat (but him we all know[4] ) to set on trial of a
felon, so afterwards convicted, accused of wilful perjury,
whose hand, as though a dear friend, he had clasped a
moment before the opening of the court, though, let it be
remembered, an indictment had long been found, and, as
may be supposed from this, care was taken that sentence
never should be passed upon the culprit; for why? he was
influential at the poles, at an election. Aye, this very
judge, I have been told, and have cause to believe it,
with the same breath hath encouraged the rogue, and the
honest man hath he denounced; the popular cry with him
is the law, he would kiss the feet of a leper, drink the gutters
dry, steal, murder, for men in power; indeed he is a
fair allegory of the fabled figure that crowns the building
wherein he has a seat being blind of one eye; but
his blind side hath a certain cure the instant he feels it
the strongest. But this man has some virtues that are
not to be denied; he can with such good nature, apparent
rectitude, and unblushing confidence decide a cause,
or rather a point of law, at one hour in one manner,
and a different time in another; and has so many authorities,
unknown to any other jurist, at command, that it confirms
the idea, there is more talent required to be an honest
man than a knave; in a word, through the artifices
of rogues like this man, who seek for protection or service
from their power, the law hath become so overburthened
with rotten statutes, that it hath grown rather an
oppression than a safeguard to those who honestly have
recourse to it, and who really may be termed with some
propriety, in the words of a writer whose name has escaped
me, “patients, rather than clients.” Indeed the law
is like some huge umbrageous tree, rooted in discord,
loaded and almost weighed down by innumerable dead
and dying branches and withering foliage, and which cannot
again flourish until fairly trimmed by the skilful knife
of the woodman; but which, left longer unimproved, will
become unfit for aught but the forest axe to level, and to
he hewed from the roots for the fire; or perhaps the law
may be better likened to some old, scarce inhabited tower,
the home of the bat, the night owl and the rook; a tall
pile whose roof is matted o'er with withering flowers, and
whose blackened visage proclaims the lapse of years, the
wrecks of man, the changes dire which time effects and
his dark servant death—the extent of whose ruined apartments
is scarce known to its possessors, who still, with
mad fondness, dwell on amid the dust and the lumber of
ages; amid the gloom of its wide halls, which scarce feel
like the dwelling of man, but rather his sepulchre; disdaining
the social and convenient comforts of a neat modern
mansion for an ancient rookery, which hath nothing
to recommend it except veneration for the moss and ivy,
which like some creeping thing of life, hath glided up the
crumbling wall, and, with its green and smiling visage
carpeting the cold brown stone, o'er which a hundred
winters had spent their fury, seeming like some tender
and youthful child embracing its aged ancestor, and bespeaking
its antiquity. And to pursue the inquiry of this
subject, the state of the times, let me ask what now is the
man of medicine, but a conceited empirick, a mere fop
of pill and glister, a self-be-puffed pedant, swelling and
bristling with ignorance and his own lofty pretensions to
importance? though as to knowledge, more exact in the
set and knot of a neckcloth than in the beat of a fevered
pulse, or the means to allay a throbbing temple—there is
one of this species, the very buffalo of his breed, a huge,
strapping creature, as empty as a hogshead of all except
arrogance and presumption, by whose unmerited success,
the minor followers of the lancet trim their course and
fashion their manners; troth, he is a very mother All-flesh,
in bulk and intellect; heavy, vastly heavy, alike in wit
and countenance; he hath the amplitude and features of
a bull, fattened by high feeding, and looketh the square
compound of every sense, except that which is the most
wanted; he is the very humbug and jest of notoriety,
pleased with the rattle of a child and the dividing of a
straw, his whole study is to thrust himself into celebrity,
in the very face of public opinion; and to build his own fame
he taketh every mean method; the suppression of the
honours, and the name of another is of little consequence if
it interferes with his plans; a servile press his organ, he
crams his absurdities upon the world, which, surprised at
his impudence, scarce knows whether to resent it or despise
the vain ape—who makes his admirers, not by his
talents, but his feasts; for indeed in what doth this creature
excel? with a lamb's heart and a sheep's head, he
is superior in but one quality, selfishness—an utter disregard
to every principle except his own views; and that
the ideas of a physician on this are equal to any other intriguer's
is not to be doubted, when we remember how
the public purse hath been fleeced by these preservers
of health, when we recall the successive experiment of
that famous botanist and lucky alchymist, who turned a
garden of rotten herbs and stinking weeds to gold, by
means alone of a broad face of brass.[5] And to proceed,
what in reality are all these scientific, historical, graphical,
philosophical, and charitable societies, but so many
respectable names for associations of gourmands and
topers? What single assistance hath been derived by the
student from their frequent revels, save there be science,
virtue, or learning in dissipated habits, and the practice
of horrid acts of debauch; the foundation of such institutions,
says Addison, are on eating and drinking: the vulgar
and the ignorant are modest, they gulp their drams
in secret and alone, but it is the pride of learned men to
guzzle in crowds, and show their gluttony to the world,
to fill the journals of the day with their pleasantries in
their cups, in the shape of hackneyed sentiments, whose
dullness not even wine can enliven, and which, in numbers,
are an army of compliments, that drunken rivals belard
each other with, so that the hardest skull would be
fairly cracked, e'er one could get half through with a
glass to each; indeed, it is now considered as an extraordinary
annunciation to state, that at such festals `all
things went off with proper and becoming decorum,'
which, in plainer language, signifies that no thick headed
professor[6] got so beastly drunk that he was obliged to be
carted home at midnight; or that no tunbellied alderman
(which sort of cotton bales are always ex-officio honorary
members of philosophical associations, probably owing
such dignified preferments to the profound knowledge
which these venerable worthies ever discover at carving
the best portion of a public contract for themselves, as
well as the breast or wing of a goose; or otherwise the
honour may be a matter of course, granted out of respect
to the nautical skill shown by the `grave signors,' in
steering clear of fines and sequestrations, when they break
the laws they help to enact) gave in of a surfeit at the
fourth course, in evident fear of bursting, though doubtless,
there is more heading than hooping wanted among
such rioters; still they are fully on an equality with those
companies who are ostensibly congregated for benevolent
purposes; for from them (natheless their apparent object,)
what hath the sick or poor benefitted? there are as many
destitute, sinking unrelieved in want and disease as before
such societies existed; the tavern and the wine
cellar hath truly gained by them, but it is a question if
ever the lazar hath been bettered a meal from their banquets,
the exercises of which are pretty much the same
with those celebrated by order of the Macedonian conqueror
at the funeral pyre of Calanus, a combat of hard
drinkers, of whom it is related, nearly forty died on the
spot, from the power of the grape, and he who triumphed
did scarce survive his hard got victory the brief space of
thirty-six hours.[7] Such being the performances of those
who call themselves the learned and respectable, what can
be expected from the herd who must follow in their wake,
but that they are equally contaminated, and alike dissolute.
There is not a single occurrence that is not tainted with
vileness and abandoned knavery; your very neighbour,
nay, your dearest friend chuckles delighted, if for the value
of a farthing he can cheat you; and thinks it a rare
jest to tell his cunning to your face, and laugh at your
credulity. All is overreaching duplicity, and the more
apparent the sharper, the more barefaced the rogue; the
more the man is lauded: and he who fairly hath in justice
won the halter, and from which it would be hard to rescue
him in any other country, is the one who is most trusted,
finds the most defenders, and indeed, in the world's opinion,
stands the clearest. His rogueries are quoted by
the admiring crowd as specimens of talent, his hair-breadth
escapes from the clutches of the law are but passports of
respectability. But it must be remembered these remarks
are qualified; for the knave must be a rich one; that as
well as he hath preserved his neck, he hath kept his
plunder; for `an he be a poor rogue' the Lord help him,
he will find himself as bad off as an honest man. But that
the city of our residence is crowded with characters
as described, may in one wise be accounted for, since it is
the great mart of adventure, where all the itinerant vagabonds
of the continent gather en masse, for the sake of
pushing their fortunes, or, rather, of preying on those of
better folks. To one point they flock like a flight of carrion
crows about a corpse, determined to devour; without
a solitary dollar, they look for maintenance in the pockets
of others; upon nothing, except an eager wit, barefaced
assurance, and hungry stomachs, they set out, and with full
purses, swaggering consequence and arrogant pride, as
might be expected from their means, do they end their
journies of adventure. Here comes a troop of half-starved,
beggarly, breechless, ragged, lean, long-necked Yankee
lawyers, schoolmasters, pedlars, and what not, who in all
probability have to a man been drummed out, or whipped
through every town of their own states, ready to cheat,
rob, lie, or talk for any body that will employ them. Firm
in bad principles, and determined to push onwards, is it
to be wondered that the lawyer, who had at home tended
pigs, fed poultry, sowed pumpkins, and skinned onions, in
a little while is elevated—not to the gallows, oh, no! but
to the bench of the judge, or a seat in the hall of congress,
—for where could the populace find a more convenient representative,
or one more willing to slave for his constituents,
so as he makes his own fortune. The schoolmaster,
who used to sit, and deem it an honour too, in a
corner of the deacon's kitchen, where he was on board,
and sleep in the garret, among rats, old boots, broken spinning-wheels,
dust, draperies of dried peppers, peaches, and
molasses jars, is metamorphosed into an impudent office-hunter,
boastful of his services and his pretensions, or a
corrupt scribbler, with a pen for all occasions, and for every
party that may believe him worth the purchasing. And
lastly, the pedlar, whose whole employment had been to
take in the `fellers and gals' with trumpery baubles, whose
best meals were the charity of the farmers where he stopped,
Indian pudding baked beans, `sarse, and innards,'
whose happiness had been to rest in a barn upon straw, or
among the corn-stalks, and whose highest ideas had been
to mount the horse which he stole from his customers, or
to sit on the ducking stool; this creature is changed in
a short period, by the prosperous trade of deception and
knavery he has pursued, to the lofty nosed merchant,
who would fain carry his head as high as the mast of one
of his own ships; the cock-sparrow of the exchange,
whose capital is the credit he can obtain from all the fools
who are eager to trust him; and there are no lack of these,
for heaven knows there are five times as many who would
put confidence in, and lend money to a knave, a sheet
rascal, than a poor honest man; for in truth, it is no wonder,
it is more satisfactory; for at once you are acquainted
with what you are to expect, for the latter can and will
only pay you as he is able, which is oftentimes giving a
long time, while the former, like an upright fellow, puts
you straightway out of all misery, by telling you `you
are an impolite dog to ask any thing of a man of honour,
who condescended to receive your paltry goods, and since
you are so importunate, he'll be damn'd if he ever pays you
at all; you may sue an you like—who cares a jot? no
one need trouble himself while there is a Recorder and
an Insolvent Act in New-York.' Thus do these men
vaunt, and while they push themselves into consequence,
gentility, and even power, the good citizen, the gentleman,
who seeks for happiness in retirement, or as virtue
is always backward, is too modest to thrust himself, whatever
may be his just claims, on public favour, remains
neglected, his very existence unknown, without influence
or name; while yet these creatures, usurping his place
in the community, the scum of dirt and impurity, the
origin of the kennel, still unwashed and rank with filth,
all flimsiness and vapour, obtrude themselves with giant
airs in every public business of importance: is a committee
formed to encourage some noble national object, are
the names you read of such committee, men of worth or
respectability? No. they are these self-imposed, self-nominated
chaps, who take care by a ready out-a-door cut
and dried plan, to figure in the public prints, in places
where worth, honesty, integrity, respectability and
learning are wanted, and ought to have been. If a station,
no matter what, be vacant, though it be one that demands
men of the choicest to uphold, it is sure to be first
sought after by these blood suckers: indeed, so unparalleled
is their audacity, that the good have become inert
and indifferent; and these have been besotted with
success, and really begin to believe themselves the mighty
personages they would be, and of that moment, that the
world without their aid, would come to a dead stop; and
they break out on the astonished natives, with all the
airs of a jay, when disguised in the peacock's plumage.

Away with such upstarts! these great little men—these
time serving, dirt born objects of self-conceited mightiness—these
insignificant, detestable parasites—faithless
to every virtue, and undeserving of the name of man.
The influence arising from the laxity of morals, that has
been treated on, is most severely felt in the decay it
brings to the very heart of the social virtues; there, indeed,
it strikes home, and no barrier can be raised against
the attack: as the customs of the day become contaminated,
all must alike be injured; and even women, lovely
women, whose primeval brightness is as beautiful as
the sunny blossoms of the laburnum wound in a chaplet
for the brows of Spring, is touched with the fatal spirit,
and is fast casting away all that adorned her, as she
would a yoke of slavery; for that which delights her
ear, and is termed by its professors a strain of innocent
gallantry, is but a scarce veiled tirade of shameless licentiousness:
and it appears as if all a female now aims
at is to be noticed by the crowd, either for the richness
or the singularity of her dress; it is not a difficult thing
to be singular, says the Abbe Le Blanc, persons need
only push their character, whatever it be, to excess, and
have no regard to decency—and on this principle, do
the ladies of the day act; to spend hour after hour at
the toilette—to dress so as to be mistaken for the painted
bawds of the brothel—to parade the streets with no
earthly object, but to gratify their vanity and be seen—
to discourse or laugh so loud, as to attract all eyes—to
toss their heads affectedly—to utter affected phrases and
conceited words—to read novels filled with lack-a-daisical
sentimentalities; these, and no more are needed, to
make an accomplished belle; and these are the pleasant
amusements of the most fashionable—who plume themselves
on being the mirrors of elegance and manners.
However, that a want of delicacy should be theirs, is not
surprising, when we behold among their evening resorts,
the playhouse takes a conspicuous station—for what but
ill can arise from frequenting the very hot bed of vice—
the building within whose walls debaucbery is licensed,
and immorality is countenanced? the theatre hath had

its enemies, and its hired defenders; the good and ill
effects of the drama, hath been often pointed out, oftentimes
cried out unto the heedless world, who care not,
in the search for enjoyment, whether the grasp is good
or evil: suffice it to say, on the one point, no man of
reason can be an enemy to the drama—I mean the written
works of genius—the perusal—the honest enaction
of some of which, if it were withheld from the
world, would be a loss to virtue, of lessons more
powerful, more impressive, than a thousand homilies
from the lips of paid preachers; but it is the mimics,
the charlatans, the performers, and the fashion of the
enaction, that every moral man should condemn; in
these consist the danger, and the causes for which
the theatre should be shunned, even as a pest-house,
where disease and death is to be received. What
is the life of an actor? drunkenness, debauchery, harlotry
and dissipation of every kind. Who are these men? vagabond
strollers at first, characters of the most desperate
description, who have had but one choice, the highway
or the stage. Enter into the walls, and behold the passing
scene:—can any female who hath the least feeling or
modesty, nay, can a man, who is not lost to every sense
of right and shame, look on without his very soul being
harrowed up in disgust and indignation. Behold yon losel,
his eye yet glaring with the late wassail, while the paint,
necessary to the character he has assumed, can scarce
disguise the parched and sallow cheek his long life of dissipation
hath left him: still, though before an audience,
doth he believe himself in the brothel, and the chaste diction
of the poet doth deform with interpolations and actions
which, though it may please the swine who herd in the
pit and gallery, sickens the sight, and is not fit for man or
woman, who are not outcasts, to hear or look upon. And
then, is there a drinking house about the purlieus of the
town where there is more riotous revelry, or more encouragement,
open and unbridled by law, for youth to be led
astray. A portion of the building is set aside for the sale
of every liquor, and for the exhibition of ladies of easy
virtue, and these are in the very glance of the fair and
virtuous dames who frequent the house, and who, be as
fastidious as they may, cannot turn their eyes, lest they
should be blasted with lewd and lascivious actions that
would cause the blood to rush warm to their brows, while
their cheeks glow with crimson, like the sun-touched nectarine.
On one ground, the defenders of the stage have
plumed themselves, that there have been females who have
followed it as a profession, who have been virtuous;—this
may be, but the examples are so rare they can scarce be
designated, and the very boast of it discovers how few
there are, and the poorness of this defence. This opinion
on this matter is not the formation of an hour; I have had
the opportunity, and my remarks have facts, `stubborn
facts,' to found their sentiments upon; the very nature of
an actress' life is such that she must be a woman of little
honour:—for what modest female would expose herself before
the sight, the rude and daring eyes of thousands, and
bear the remarks, and the examination, of the sensualist
and the debauchee; for their amusement assume dresses,
habits unbecoming her sex, and even common modesty.
The courtezan will not expose herself in the light, but
here, women pretending virtue deck themselves in worse
attire than the livery of harlots and prostitutes; then, the
scenes that are gone through with, should be as abhorrent
to a female as to a male:—the liberties allowed and
taken in the view of hundreds, such as none who felt for
herself would admit for mines of wealth; then, the allowances
presumed to follow naturally from the public conduct,
in secret must be such, are such as to leave but little
doubt that it is impossible for a woman who has respect
for herself to be an actress, or to follow the stage for
a livelihood; and these ideas are confirmed by every
printed life of women of this class to be found. Ought,
then, such a place to be encouraged as a resort? The
brothel of infamy should be preferred to the stage, which
is alone prostituted to show off bawds, drunkards, and
gambling sharpers. And do not those who encourage impurity
by resorting to the home of charlatry, soon feel the
ill effects:—it is the rock whereon youth is wrecked oftener
than any other that can be shown; it leads to drunkenness,
gaming, and every other wickedness. There have been
formed societies to suppress vice; they will persecute the
poor wretch who steals for his bread, and yet the very
root of crime is maintained, the abode of sharpers, dissipation
and ruin; for there is an enchantment about the
theatre—beauty that is to be bought, and riot that can be
pursued; the apprentice will rob his master, the child his
parent; the husband hath taken the labour of the day to
gain him admission, while at home his family are wanting
food; a few years beholds the first an inmate of a
prison; the second a poor lost wretch, discarded from
his home, and begging for money to obtain liquor, that
all reflection may be drowned in its overwhelming influence;
the last the pander of some brothel, while
the sod covers the broken heart of his wife, and his
innocent and unfortunate offspring are scattered on the
bosom of the cold and pitiless world. Nor in addition to
the theatre, is there much obtained by the visiting of
public places, and festal routs and dances, in the manner
which they are now conducted; where lascivious
coquetry, is termed an innocent flirtation—where to be
in perfect mode and full dress, for a female, is to be attired
in unblushing indecency, that attracts the wanton
gaze of the multitude—where every thing between the
sexes appears an easy familiarity—where practice supercedes
persuasion, and prudence gives way to a wish
to be admired—where, rather than not be noticed, an
indelicate display of figure, and a flagrant violation of
decorum, may be resorted to, without attracting an indignation
on the audacious exhibition, but rather a flood
of praise, at either the grace, ease or agility, with which
the being who degrades herself for such celebrity, performs
her part, the only merit of which is, the gross exposure
of her person, at which modesty shudders, and
the feelings revolt in shame and sorrow, but which is
alone felt by the timid spectator: but it is needless—it is
a mere waste of labour, to speak on subjects which there
is neither care nor inclination to reform, and which,
though vices, are admired, are patronised, and reckoned
virtues; which it is the fortune of their possessors to
practise, and which, ere the mind, so besotted is it, can
be weaned from, and modesty come in fashion, an entire
new race must arise, with different examples, and different
principles, as their standards of action. Such are
the effects of modern fashions, and improved and polished
customs—far otherwise were those of the days
which are treated of in the pages of this narrative;
however wickedness lurked concealed in the heart, it
dared not boldly rush on the gaze; and although it
must be confessed, the practices of villany were not
uncommon, yet honest virtue was admired, and sometimes
showed its face, a thing now rare and unremembered.

It was early on the evening of the day which the
traveller parted from his companions and preservers,
that a throng of persons were assembled in the principal
apartment of the governor's house, which was situated
in the interior of Fort Willem Hendrick, or as it was then
most properly called, Fort Orange, or Aurania, the principal
defence of the city of New-Yorke: this building was
one not only ancient but of considerable splendour and
size—and although in the present time, its low walls and
pannelled wainscot would have been derided as scarce
comporting with the dignity fit for the dwelling of a man
whose notions were the least extensive, or who bore his
head among the dashing part of the community, yet at the
period written of, this same house was considered a complete
palace—a wonder of architecture—and together with
the new City Hall and prison, which was situated at Coenties
Slip, the ornament of the great city; it was a broad
square building of stone, painted yellow, with fine gravel
walks the whole length of the house, and a huge wide
entry, with a double door, and a brazen, snake-twisted,
and lion-headed knocker, lustrous with cleaning; its
situation was commanding; it was placed on the brow of
the hill, on whose rugged sides the white washed walls
of the wooden bastions, bristling with demi sacker, falcon
and culverin, ran like an encircling serpent almost to the
edge of the water, where in sight its white sails trembling
in the early twilight, glided along some fleeting periauger

bound on its northern river voyage, or where lay at silent
anchor on the undulating waves, their black masts shadowing
the surface, a whole fleet of yatchen that had made
the port, and were hastening to moor beside the Capsey[8]
and the protecting docks and Rounduyten,[9] like a brood of
young wild fowl hieing to nestle beneath the sheltering
wing of the parent bird. On one side, at a distant point,
the dusk and vapour of the night, whose shadows were
fast spreading around, bounded the prospect, so that the
wide river and the dark clouds were mingled as it were
in one element. At another view, yet nearer to the eye,
were spread the bleak, rugged and desolate land of Pavonia,
its hills chequered with tracks of snow, and the
bare brown soil which the bright rays of the day, that
was now fleeting, had uncovered; and close under the
shadow of the beach could be seen the long dark lines of
ice that skirted its shores, like the chain about a captive,
looking stern, cheerless and wintry, unmoved by the departing
beams of the light that lingered longest on them,
and played on the cold and frozen visage of the gelid
waters, like the faint smiles that cross the brows of the
dying ere the last departure; while, yet nearer, almost in
the centre current of the stream, borne by the quick and
nervous tide, floated onwards with a noise like the hissing
of a serpent, huge fragments of the frozen wave, that
often in their instant-shaped masses bore pieces of bark
that had been peeled by the wind from off the lichen or
the fir that waved on the stern and rocky sides of the
stoney point, or on the towering heights of the pallisadoes,
and which, ere another morning's brightness was born,
were dashed about, atoms on the foaming and giant waves
of the ocean, or were weltering amid the breakers that wash
the beach of the last island that stands the uttermost link
between the world of waters and the huge continent; even
like the race of life—for how incredible doth it seem that
the infant nurtured in the soft luxury of the tropics should
moulder in death, after the storm of existence, amid the
snows of some polar region. On the other side, close
under the battlements of the fort, lay the city; its dark
and crowded houses; its close, narrow streets; its wharfs;
its magazines, all huddled in one mass, like some great
hive, filled with life and riches. A strange diversity, however,
did that hill (from whence the ancient governors of
the province looked on their metropolis) still stand would
present itself to the sight, now street on street, spire on
spire, to the very stretch of vision, would have burst on
the sight; the smoke of thousands of dwellings would
have been seen curled in the blue sky; the masts of
mighty shipping pennon on pennon; the hum of commerce,
which then to have been dreamed of would have
been believed a tale of magic; the rolling and rattling of
numerous vehicles, like sounds of distant thunder, would
have broke upon the ear, and the thought and eye would
have been lost in the vastitude of all on which it turned;
while, then one might have counted every dwelling, and
have repeated the names of the inmates; for at one gaze
every principal object was apparent. Here rose the belfries
of the churches, built in the true Duch taste, and
shaped after the fashion of the oil jars of Zwannerdam;
there was the tiled roof of the Stadhuys, the grandest
building in the colony, and, by the best informed worthy
of the Manahadoes, said to be only exceeded in the world
by the building devoted to the same purpose at Amsterdam;
there was, also, the wooden spire of the Borse, an
edifice likewise in great estimation, being indisputably the
finest of its kind, except the house of the Hanse Towns,
the glory of the Osterlingen traders of Antwerp, having a
tin weather-cock at the top, by which every New Amsterdammer
corrected his wind when he had gone astray in
the calculation thereof, and then the long bridge, which
ran out in the public dock could be distinguished, crowded
with the groodt Burgerrecht, in their red flannel vestcoats,
calico morning-gowns and cocked hats, haggling
and chaffering with the swearing skippers of the Albanisch
yatchen, remarkable for their worsted caps, the
manufacture of the knitting vrouws of Ohnewalagantle,[10]
and their greasy leathern breeches; while not far distant
the skirts of the town were perceptible, with its wooden
block houses and palisadoes, its gates, slaughter-house,
and taverns; and then there lay the country around,
studded interchangeably with hills, commons, and swampy
kolcks that were crossed by slight plank bridges, and
bounded by innumerable wind-mills, whose huge arms
were continually waving in the wind, and the Bowerische
Laening, and gay plantagnies from the Crown point[11] as far
as sight could reach.

The room in the great house, in which were the characters
who are about to be described, was large and spacious,
partaking at once of the dignity and grandeur befitting
the audience chamber of the ruler of the mighty province
of New-Yorke: having great chimney places, with china
jambs, decorated with the ancient story of Abraham and
Isaac, and marvellously illustrative of other parts of scripture;
the walls were lined with pannelled wainscoat, of
an antique fashion, whose oaken surface shone lustrous
with wax; the ceilings were low and dark, and the windows
wondrous wide and short, like embrasures, and the
casements were filled with small square panes of glass, of
a greenish cast, which had been brought from Bummel, in
Guilderland, for the purpose; around were hung numerous
paintings, most of which partook of the different tastes
that had swayed the various persons who had been masters
of this sumptuous residence: there were portraitures
of fish, and fruit, and game; of the planting and decorating
of May trees; there were country frolics, card playings,
and other drolleries of the low countries; the copies of
Gerard Dow, Jan Steen, Teniers, and Wouvermans, and
also in splendid frames shone forth the family likenesses
of most of the former Governors; the ladies in court
dresses, and tall stately caps and trim bodices, with hoop
petticoats, and waists like hour glasses, with roses in their
hands and birds on their jewelled fingers, often representing
fair smiling eyed sheperdesses, with crooks and

ribands at their feet, and large gold pendants in their ears,
and having boys on their laps, intended for cupids, but
dressed, in spite of pinions, quiver, and darts, in ample
jerkins, with laced ruffles and points, bag wigs, and blue
silk small clothes, having also high heeled shoes, with
points curling upwards at the toe, like the prows of the
canoe of a South-Sea islander, and paste buckles, both at
the instep and the knee; while the gentlemen themselves,
with stern brows and monstrous mustachios almost hanging
down to their starched ruffs, clad with steel cuirasses
and breast-plates, and surrounded with all the harness of
war, frowned grimly forth from the canvass; on a raised
settle in one corner, flourishing in an earthen pot, were
several beautiful tulips, from Alemaer, and some other
flowers, that were in those times the Hollander's passion;[12]
tables with huge claw feet holding balls, were set out in
different parts of the well sanded floor, and a brisk fire
crackled on the clean hearth, about whose immediate
neighbourhood, partly induced by the severity of the season,
and partly by the attraction of its being the station of
the entertainers, most of the occupants of the apartment
had placed themselves, and the hosts themselves, seemingly
proud of being the objects of universal attention, (for,
as is always in such cases, the guests like gay butterflies,
fluttering in the perfume of lordly flowers, hovered about
them) appeared greedily to devour the gratifying flatteries
that they were busied in pouring in their ears; and truly
they were two stately personages, bearing about them
every mark of their dignity, both in apparel and demeanour,
and but scantily wanting in confidence of their own
worthiness; they had equally that assumed air of greatness,
of lofty carriage, of solemn bearing, and that pompous
utterance, that in modern instances is so common,
that marks our mud-born, dirt-bred, wealth-elated, and
self-created gentry, whose greatest accomplishments and
virtues consist in their living high, and keeping a splendid
equipage; and about these there was that strained
condescension in address, that awkward affectation of
humility, and that self-sufficient, supercilious air, which
we see daily enacted in some mongrel, who, lifted up by
the ignorance of popular favour and fortuitous chance,
rather than his own deserts, puts on the garment of authority,
and would seem all meekness to his equals, while
his very soul is o'errun with pride and overbearing
tyranny; and indeed such had been the fortunes of
Leisler;—his unexpected rise and success, his want of cultivation
of mind, while his wife, unused to the place in
which she found herself, and but ill adapted to play the
part which she was forced to act, that both studious to
bear the investitures of state in a becoming fashion, naturally,
at times, too far forgot what they had been, in contemplating
(what every body else seemed to do) that which
they were; and if this feeling was carried to an extreme
in the bosom of one more than the other, it was in that of
the female, who was in her every action a very daughter
of Eve; and there was no lack of foundation in the general
rumour, that she was a very devil incarnate of pride,
and where her helpmate was deficient, she, like a dutiful
spouse, was ever ready to assist him—albeit, the dame's
garb was a type of her nature, and at once bespoke her
character, for so loaded and bowed down with dress and
decoration was she, that she might have been likened to
some sumpter caparisoned steed in the pageant, bowing
and nodding his head at every step beneath the loads of
drooping plumes and embroidered ribands that adorned
it—but for a likeness, one need but look in the crowd of
these times, and we find that most of our ladies appear to
believe that every thing they need possess, are gew-gaws
and finery, and when so decked out they will be more
admired than if they had no other attractions than modesty,
virtue and good sense, things, that with many of the sex
are now of less moment than a brilliant head-dress and a
rich wreath. How little do they judge the brightest jewel
fair woman boasts, is in her purity of heart: and then
what need of art—can it excel that which heaven itself
hath made? those diamonds in her eyes, her teeth of
pearl, and lips of living rubies—so soft, so sweet, formed
alone to breathe love's own peculiar eloquence of bliss,
and enchain in wilful bondage all that listen to the music,
that gathers a deeper witchery from the pass that shapes
it. But while treating on this subject dame Leisler
is disregarded: a want of respect and a degree of inattention
which it is well are committed under the present circumstances,
for had it happened otherwise, and in the days of
the matron, it would have been long ere forgiveness was
granted to a crime which she would have considered of the
greatest magnitude, and which it would have gone far did
she not resent with a withdrawal of all her good graces and
favour from the presumptuous offender. But ere that homage
of description is rendered unto her appearance
that it so well demanded, it behoves for the information
of the reader to premise, lest he be startled at what he
might deem incongruous, if not ridiculous in the fashion
of the times whereof this is written, that it should be remembered
that those days were not as now, when scarce
an hour passes ere with indifferent eye we behold the dark
prow of some foreign bark laden with the silks, and
cloths, and furs of countries which are divided from us by
a thousand leagues of ocean, seeking our wharves; when
the gaudy mantles and the lace-trimmed dress, the very
likeness of those which hung on the white shoulders of
the luxurious beauties of the European capitals but a few
days before, are to be obtained from the hands of our own
tradesmen, who need not encouragement in their extravagance
or their wanton profuseness of expense, however
adverse to the boasted simplicity of our manners, which a
few uninformed, prejudiced fools trumpet alike with the
purity of our government and institutions, which are all the
same, cankered and rotten. For what lack we in corruption
more than the ancient world? younger we are, it is true, but
not the less matured in vice, although we want the means
—the unbounded riches that are possessed by the hereditary
courtiers and titled sycophants, against whose sumptuousness
of living, whose idle debaucheries, whose wanton
waste of wealth we are inveighing so bitterly; yet, is
not our crowd made up of the same materials, if not of a
worse kind? Doth not our petty dignitary of a day,
though rank with native littleness of soul, in all except the
gratification of his own desires, ape in furniture, in show,
the pride, the habit, and, as far as able, the prodigal expenditures
of the most vile and lavish of the old metropolises?
We read, as if in wonder, of the gaudy finery of
some foreign gala; the brilliant and costly garbs; the
jewelled head dress whose purchase were a fortune; and
many say,—thank God, we have not such extremes of unmeasured
possession and abject poverty. Ye are blind
—ye are besotted—ye are ignorant of your own natures;
for look at home—look to yourselves, behold the staring
finery of your wives, your daughters. You are not rich
—can you afford this? the soft carpets, cushioned and
gilded couches, magnificent dwellings, with all their priceless
decorations which surround you, and which so plainly
speak that, were there an ability with you to carry things
to the same extent that you have appeared to contemn,
there were no need of desire. And then it should be recollected
that if some expend in the great cities (to which
our eyes are always bent, in spite of our pretended consequence
in our own superiority) their countless gold in
banquets, follies, riots and eccentricities, there are many
blessed from birth with education, liberal views and tastes,
(things that, from our very situation, our great men being
but a part of the dregs of society, narrow in principle, devoted
to dishonesty and their own interests, are very
rare among us;) who extend the open hand unto the deserving;
who foster talent and encourage virtue, and
whose pride seems to be that of exalting to merited praise
the land which they inhabit? Let us not talk of freedom,
of virtue beyond our fellows—we have no real freedom,
no real virtue. Man is the same, though born in the
splendid and luxuriant chambers of a kingly palace, or
drawing breath in the cities of the new world; the same,
I mean, in ambition, in pride, in weakness; though the
first hath the advantage of being accustomed from the
cradle to a lofty station, while the latter carries in his
place the ignorant vanity and assumption of superiority,
natural to little minds suddenly elevated, together with
all the despicable ignorance of early education. And further,
what do we see so heinous in the actions of the
young or old of the nations from whence came our ancestors.
Are the women of Gaul more given to looseness of
manners, or to actual immodesty and lasciviousness than
our own? there may be with us less openness of character,
more disguise, more cloaked hypocrisy, but there is little
difference as to true virtue, where the very churches are
the concerted places of criminal design. Are the men of
England more given to the gambling table, the race course
or the wassail than our own; it is true from our situation,
fortunes cannot be sported at a single cast of the dice,
for fortunes are but rare; but are there not hosts of
sharpers, jockeys and drunkards in every sphere of our
society. Look at the flushed cheek, the feverish lip, the
blood-shot eye, yea, the premature old age of our youth,
their early graves, if proof be wanted of dissipation. Go to
the brothel, the stews, the tavern and the play-house, they
are crowded with reckless, beardless boys, rioting and
drinking; rushing onwards, unrestrained by their weak
guardians, to embrace loathsome disease and death. But
it was otherwise in the olden day of the province; there
were then but few chances of imitation of the grandeur of
the European; for often six long and wearying months
would slowly take their flight, and, many times, a year
has gone by without one adventurous vessel laving her
sides in the waters of the Hudson, having crossed the far
sea from the mother country; and when she did come
crowds, nay, the whole town would assemble, and look
on her hardy navigators in astonishment; question on
question would be sought from the master down to the
cabin boy, and all would be mad with rumour and news,
from the fort of Aurania to Herman Rutger's brew house;
the very mariners themselves were gazed on as strange
men—beings of another species; who had seen distant
countries, who had eat and drank beyond seas, and who,
above all, had seen the king. From the discourse of
such, from rude description and the ventures brought by
these, were the fashions of the province set; which, first
being sported by the dames of the big house in the fort,
went from them by degrees to the damsels of the Holy
Land, and, now and then, would intrude in the house of
some Dutch burgher, and mix with the old, unvarying,
established habits, which had been left to ya vrouw by her
moeder, who probably had inherited them from her moeder's
moeder; so that it was in nowise uncommon on
great occasions to behold the matrons of Nieuw Amsterdam
decked out in garments that liberally partook of the
fashions of Holland, England, France, and Spain, all united
in motley assemblage on the shoulders of one person,
and very seldom did these parts, as it may be supposed,
agree either in colours, or were they of the same century,
and although this incongruity would not be inapplicable
to the dress worn by ladies at present, which
often, so they be very showy and fine, have but little
regard to being suitable to the modesty, figure, or character
of the wearer—how these remarks are relative to
the attire of Dame Leisler, which I was about to treat on,
the reader himself will be the best judge; for truly she
was decorated up to the eyes in all that was then considered
splendid, and as is now termed `respectable among
the fashionables,' that is, she looked as if she was somebody;
for she was a woman on whom almost any thing
might be put, and it would be `vastly becoming, and
amazingly genteel;' indeed, as is vulgarly said, she was
an armful: built like a herring hoy, or a Dutch dotkin,
measuring more round the waist than she appeared to
have in height, with a little red nose, as brilliant as a
ruby, small sparkling eyes, and cheeks shining like a
kitchen maid's, and a chin hanging like a bladder, while,
to increase such charms, on her head she wore a huge,
monstrous, crisped and curled powder tower, which
supported as it was, looked like a lighthouse built
upon a mile stone, or rather a church steeple on the
top of a hogshead; her face, moreover, after the style
(ludicrous enough; but what will not fashion do?)
that had, but a short period before, reigned generally
among the ladies of the English Court, was literally seamed
and depatched with sundry pieces and strips of black
sticking plaister, representing in varied forms, coaches
and horses, half-moons and stars, all placed, however, by
her tirewoman in an artful manner, to set off the sly darts
cast by Cupid, by means of winning smiles and dimples,
that, with the most delightful expression, always, (except
in certain moments, which usually chanced when
she and her husband were undisturbed with the presence
of a third person,) lighted up her jovial visage; added to
what has been already particularized, was a gown of flame
coloured brocade, somewhat faded it is true, but amply
figured and flowered with monstrous tulips, Dutch pinks,
and staring roses; and then her waist was set off with an
enormous stomacher, and although her sleeves scarcely
reached to her elbows, yet the richly laced and highly
worked ruffles that depended therefrom, hung nearly to the
end of her fingers, while there was not a portion, however
diminutive, of her attire, but was flaunted with gay
furbelows and ribands of a bright calico colour—thus decorated
and adorned, it is no wonder that her husband,
poor man, on this occasion as in many others, sunk in the
scale of comparison, for though there was not much difference
in similitude of figure, he being a broad backed,
heavy moulded looking man, yet in movement she had
comparatively the advantage, for she glided about her
room of audience, among the swarm of Dutch damsels
assembled, like a shining gold fish, swimming round
his glass prison; nevertheless, it must be confessed,
she forgot not her elevation for a moment, for she bore
her body in such action with the true air of condescension
and grandeur and indeed carried her head loftily,
with a neck, as is vulgarly described, as stiff as a poker
—On the other hand, Jacob Leisler, as it should have
been before remarked, amid all his strained authority,
wore to the inquiring eye, a certain look of care and
uneasiness, that in spite of the inflated mightiness with
which he acted, and which he doubtless supposed necessary
to create respect among his followers evidently tortured
him; and labouring under such feelings his heavy
countenance showed his mind abstracted, and often his
thoughts wandered from the scene before him to the hopes
on which he lived, and to the gathering clouds which were
rolling towards him: the disappointments and defection of
his partizans, that hourly were increasing; the obstinacy
of the country, the steady manner with which Schuyler,
the Mayor of Albany, refused his offers of alliance,
and the encouragement and protection he granted to
the fugitives and bitter enemies of his name, Van Kortlandt,
Bayard, and Graham; the coolness which subsisted
between the people of the country and his son-in-law Milborne,
who, on entering Albany, had rashly and arbitrarily
confiscated the property of many of the principal inhabitants,
who had absconded at his approach; all these pressed
like a weight of lead upon his heart, and he unfortunately
possessed too little of the self-confidence and command of
visage necessary for a statesman to conceal his anxiety.
He was a stout, brawny, square shaped man, having a
stolid and unmeaning set of features; thick eyebrows
shaded his dull and inexpressive blue eyes, and his hair
was of a dark brown hue, cut close to his forehead; he
had short mustachios on his upper lip, and a strait peaked
beard grew unshorn from his chin; he was arrayed in the
solemn and dignified habit of a substantial burgher, with
dark grey stockings rolled over his knees, and immense
buckles and buttons, the last neither inconsiderable in number
or size, a profusion also of the same ornaments graced,
in triple rows, a vest of scarlet velvet, the flaps of which
came to his knee buckles; to complete this dress, a stout
degen, of the true Williamstadt manufacture, with a great
ivory hilt, was girded to his side, while ready for use, at
the wall near at hand, hung a huge three cornered beaver,
and a tortoise shell cane, with a china head and silken
tassels.

On the day, the evening of which is now referred to,
the city had been much disturbed with riot and turmoil
that seemed nearly to threaten an open insurrection:
some of the citizens, who had heretofore expressed a
quiet submission to the authority of Leisler, had suddenly
been stirred up, and apparently without cause, had demanded
a change of the council, while on the other hand,
the steady adherents of the government had strenuously
opposed the measure—the business had been carried to

such high excitement, that large bodies of men had
assembled together, often armed with clubs and offensive
weapons, and every public place was swarmed
with persons who were violently canvassing the merits of
the disputation, inflaming with seditious words their own
anger and that of their hearers; together with this, reports
were currently circulated that a new governor, unfavourable
to the Leisler faction, had been appointed, and
might be momently expected to arrive, and it was even
said that Bayard and Nichols, the latter as bitter a foe as
the former to the present power, had been seen among
the people urging them against their opponents and irritating
the passions of the multitude; and although Milborne
had gone forth and declaimed loudly at every point
which appeared to be disturbed, yet much of his words
were lost on his listeners, who had often received them
in a manner that at once bespoke impatience and dissatisfaction;
however, as it grew later in the day, the exertions
of Leisler's friends were apparently more successful,
and the feelings of the burghers allayed, so that things
had again resumed their former aspect of security, and
the repose becoming an honest Dutch city, once more
reigned in the narrow streets, which was more palpably
evinced by the afternoon's audience; whereat, (and
the fashion of holding a levee had been usual with the
other rulers of the province, once every half year,
a custom which Leisler had thought proper to follow,
as by giving a public reception to the principal citizens,
he might probably inspirit or increase his party,)
there were congregated a great number of the inhabitants,
some induced to attend the audience by their
political sentiments, but by far the greater herd, as is often
equally remarkable in our own times, by no care for the
cause or the giver of the feast, but merely for their own
sakes—for what they could get; indeed, the very pride
of the Dutch youth and beauty of New Yorke were present
in that audience chamber, and it was with no mean
display of gallantry that many a doughty Mynheer, with his
hands in his breeches pockets, strutted beside his favourite
damsel, who, clad in all her beauty, her red calico short
gown, her yellow ear drops, and her necklace of beads of
bright amber as large as marbles, her scarlet kirtle, hood
and wimple, a neat, buxom, bouncing deity, fit for a Hollander's
admiration, simpered and blushed as she was gallanted
through the muddy paths of Petticoat Lane, down
the long hill of der Warmoes-straet,[13] to the heeren gracht
up the hill to the Governor's; where, entering at the
kitchen door, for the great hall entrance was never known
to be unclosed, except upon a marriage or burial, as hath
ever been an invariable Dutch custom, and which was
brought over by the groodt Francois Rombout from
Brock, they strided lovingly into the grand chamber of
reception, which has been described; where, leaving the
object of his attention in the crowd of her own sex there
convened, who were industriously engaged in knitting and
talking scandal, Mynheer sought his own male acquaintances,
with whom he lighted his pipe, drank raspberry wine
and eat cookies, trolled a low Dutch love song, or talked
with the schepin, the knostabel, or the hoofdt schout, on
the affairs of the day, until the hour of departure, which
was duly and seasonably announced by the city bell, which
rang loudly from the steeple of the Gereformeerde Kerck,
(a spire, which, by the way, was believed to be superior to
the handsome one on the cathedral of Utrecht and whose
bell always tolled the hour except when the ringer over-slept
himself in an afternoon's siesto, which he was accustomed
to indulge in after drinking a plentiful draught of
genever;) a half an hour before the tat-too beat at the fort,
when the city gates were closed, and every honest burgher
put on his night cap and crept between his warm striped
woollen blankets, making himself as comfortable as possible,
and consigned himself at once to sleep and dreams
of Butter-vlict cheese, and all the luxuries of his Vaderlandt.

The hour for returning had come, and each stately
Mynheer sought from the assemblage his own charge, and
taking ya vrouw by the arm, and enfolding himself up
from the clear frosty night, he hastened his way homeward,

leaving the dogter under the care of her liefhebber
to follow his footsteps, which, though not long, far, as it
may be supposed, outstripped those of the jongvrouw
and her chosen, who both, perhaps, unconsciously enwrapt
by sweet discourses of Low Dutch, musical and mellifluous,
of mingled vows and tales of eternal constancy, had
wandered away in the loveliness of the night, to enjoy the
lonely solitudes of Vlatten Barrack, and the Green lane,
e'er the city gates were shut and the guard set; making,
in the old saying, the longest way round the shortest
home. Party after party slowly prepared to separate
from the gay group they had heretofore commingled
with; every body was on the move, and the crowd momently
lessened, leaving only those behind at last, who
love to be the longest, or who lingered round the comfort
of a foreign hearth, from an experience of the uncomfortableness
of that at home. Here might be seen a careful
dame, tucking up her fardingales, or wrapping beneath
her cloak sundry cribbed cookies destined for the
children, who, as she remarked, poor things, were at
home, no doubt, looking for Sante-claus, and they ought
not to be neglected; there was her helpmate, buttoning
his jerkin close under his chin and tying his handkerchief
round his ears, waiting ya vrouw's leisure, who had a
thousand remembrances to whisper her acquaintances,
and was an hour at least in taking leave of the entertainers,
while her impatient lord stood fidgetting, fuming, and
worrying himself sick at her delay, but which seemed to
move her not one jot; and while his visage grew as sour
as a cucumber, she wisely gave his humour full time to
change, and whatever heat, that might have invaded the
equanimity of a usual placable temper, in his impatience
a sufficient opportunity to cool, a thing not likely in a
phlegmatic Nieuw Nederlander to happen in a moment,
except when brought to such utter extremity by kicking
his heels unattended to, and waiting for a spouse who
spurned his honest control in an exposed and wind swept
hall on a winter's evening.

SECTION I.—Concluded.

—Crabbe.

Though now the apartment had become thinned of its
guests, and in proportion to the former number who had
througed it, deserted, yet there still lingered about the
tables, which now were only defaced with the scattered
remnants of their late luxurious loads, emptied jars that
had foamed with rich beer from Wappinger's Creek,
flasks half drained smoked out pipes, with the ashes in
heaps at their sides, and seas of liquor that had been spilled
by the revellers; a few persons, some of whom actively
engaged in wrangling on some disputed topic, while
others dozing on their seats from want of better employment,
or sleeping o'er the dull prosing of some endless,
long-winded, talking Hollander, who had taken under his
especial care the safety of the whole universe, and who
decided on the propriety of every political movement
of moment that had been lately made in Europe as well
as the Nieuw Nederlandts, were heedless of the weariness
of their hosts, and appeared to make no preparation
for quitting their seats, although every body around them
was on the move for speedy departure. Characters of
this description are to be found in every situation of society;
men, forgetful of the cheer extended them, who
bear down, and fairly wear out hospitality, imposing on
decency and good manners, and who may be fairly classed
under that denomination of personages whom the house-wives
describe as wearing at a visit their `sitting breeches.

The very type of this long anchored species, were two
individuals, who had taken their places, probably for the
sake of observing those who withdrew from the room,
on a long settle that stood a few paces from the door:
the one of these was a man of such towering stature, that
when he stood, even with an inclination of the head, the
crown of his beaver came unsociably in contact with the
low and smoky ceiling of the apartment; while the other
was a clear reverse of figure to his companion, being one
of those short-necked, pudding-headed, double-bodied
fellows, who have not an inch of limb to spare, and whose
flesh is comfortably rolled round them like the warm
fleece round the unshorn sheep; the taller was a broad,
leathern faced looking character, with a swearing stare,
and a nose that predominated over the rest of his features
in the shape of a punch ladle, and bearing at the
extremity a deep copper tinge; his hair was of an iron
grey colour, and his appearance bespoke him a man of
some consequence, and indeed he was no less a personage
than schepin Jacobus Kip, Roymeester, and candidate
for the place of der heer officier, while the little man, who
sat beside him, an almost silent listener, was a Dutch
apothecary and doctor of medicine, bred at the schools
of Hoorn, where he became, as his comfortable person
bespoke, a proficient in the delicious study of fat beef,
good butter, and `groene kaas;' he was called Hans
Kierstede, and truly he was a most appropriate companion
for schepin Kip; for he had on that evening, as was
his custom at all good opportunities, given his predominant
propensity of eating its full range and sway, and he was
at its close situated somewhat as the monstrous constrictor
of the East, who after his bloody banquet, stretches
himself out in the shade, listless and incapable of action;
and much so it fared with honest Hans, who being what
is commonly termed brimful of the feast, and stuffed like
a tick with good fare, was in an excellent mood of patient
hearing, while his associate, who was one who had from
his station, a fair opportunity of an extensive acquaintance,
both among the groodt und klien Burgerrecht von
Nieuw Yorck, and was withal greatly given to the uncharitable
propensity of reflecting on the characters and
actions of his neighbours with ungodly virulence when
once set out, between the arduous discussion of a half
emptied pipe, took the whole conversation to himself,
uninterrupted by his half dozing hearer, except when,
after some long and minute scrutiny of all about him, in
an interval of wakefulness, occasioned by the violent gestures
and utterance of Mienheer Kip, there was enforced
on his sight the rapid demolition of the viands that had
been prepared for the company, and the scraps that now
remained in their places; then, as roused by such destruction,
the doughty Kierstede edged in some proper culinary
stricture, and forgetful of his own avidity at their
consumption, he deprecated the fashion of the cookery
that had been used, and sometimes where he praised, (for
some few of the dishes he admitted were commendable,
though not more than to pass,) he added a lugubrious lamentation,
that from want of appetite and weakness of
digestion, he had not been enabled to do justice to that
which had been set before him. From where these worthies
sat, all who departed from the room were conspicuous
to their observation, and it will not be wondered at,
that the remarks of schepin Kip on his fellow burghers
partook largely of his spleenful and cynical disposition.

“Mien goodt mans, Hans Kierstede,” quoth the schepin,
familiarly clapping his hand on his neighbour's thigh,
and puffing his pipe through one corner of his mouth,
while he directed the apothecary's attention to a little
man with a bald head and a hitch in his gait, who was
bowing and scraping, and wriggling and smiling, and holding,
with all the apparent warmth of friendship and of an
attached heart, the hand of the Lieutenant Governor, as
he paid him his obeisance at departure, while Leisler
seemed to reciprocate his kindness, as conscious of his
worth and faithfulness—“Mien goodt man, Hans Kierstede,”
said Jacobus Kip in low Dutch, to the doctor of
medicine, (though his words are here translated for the
benefit of the reader;) “I tell you this, my friend, and I
promise you the truth when you listen to what I tell you:
you see that man with his bow and his smile, his ready

hand and bending head, like a Chinese mandarin; you
know him as you would know a bad stuyver, my friend
Hans; then I tell you this, he is as big a rogue as you will
see with your eyes between Nieuw Amsterdam and Dort,
from which my grandfather came I tell you this, he will
cut his own mother's throat for a bad dotkin—what do
you say to that, my man, Hans Kierstede?”

“Dat vas a vat kapoen, a ver vine pird,” muttered
the auditor, who with thoughts intent on a more generous
subject, had heard but little of the invective of his
querulous companion; “tish drue,” said Hans, “dat
pird wash tesberate pad tressed; dey do dings betters at
Hoorns.”

“My mans, Hans Kierstede,” continued schepin Kip,
unconscious in his warmth, to the lack of the apothecary's
attention to his discourse, “I tell you this, Dirk Von
Rikketie is a great knave; he that trusts to him may venture
on the ice in the Overslaugh in spring weather;
see how he bows and grins, as if his back was as crooked
as the Y; you think from his looks he is the friend of
Leisler; for all that, you see, I tell you this, Hans Kierstede,
he is no more the friend of Leisler than he is that
of Claus Bayard; he is his own friend alone—one man is
up on the ladder, the other is at the foot; Dirk contrives
to keep place with all—this morning he followed Orloffe
and Claus; the evening comes, he is with Leisler, and
to-morrow if Bayard stands where Leisler now stands, I
tell you this, Dirk bows and grins to Claus, as at all times
he had been his stoutest follower—see there, he limps
away with himself,” pursued Mienheer Kip, as the person
whose merits he had descanted on disappeared from
the apartment, “so the devil limps. I wonder whether
with all his bad deeds, his sycophancy and hypocrisy, if
Dirk sleeps like an honest man—his head is bald and venerable;
but what think you of his heart, Hans Kierstede?”

“Dat gans—mien zeil! Burgomaster Brezier eat dat
gans, Ik had nien a morzhel do but mit mien deeth,” responded
Kierstede, “but twash padly kooked doo; Mienheer
Kip, I vill deach you der ding, you kan dell beople's

py de way dey tress der gans, niet te nien, der gans if
stewed closh mit zourgrout, would nien pe zo pad zdill;
dey kooks gans at Hoorn in dat vashion, Mienheer
Kips.”

Mienheer Jacobus impatiently shrugged up his shoulder
at the abrupt and untimely remarks of the little doctor
of medicine, and he drew a long whiff from his pipe
at the unrelenting stupidity of his companion, and for the
moment determined to waste on his dull ear no farther
words; but he was not able to hold good his resolution,
as there sailed past him to the door, in all the pomp of
importance, a huge, lusty, black-browed man, upon whose
arm hung, in amorous fondness, a plain little Dutch woman,
her small grey eyes simpering from under her crimped
Flemish cap upon her massy protector.

“Mien man, Hans Kierstede,” broke forth the schepin,
as he beheld the fond couple move by him, “you
see that man with his wife, who is just gone through the
door;—'tis Doctor Kindermeester, that has married the
rich widow of our old burgher—what a strut and splutter
he makes! but he is all strut and splutter, puff and blaze,
while his great carcass and brains are hollow and empty—
plenty of room in his skull for the wind he sends forth—
I tell you my friend, he looks like an ox, and his brains
are like an ox's brains. By my trow, heavy and dull
enough; though, Hans Kierstede, he deserves credit for
his ingenuity, when he imposed on the Burgomasters at
Leyden, and sold them for a vast quantity of guilders, a
stinking cabbage patch, advising the besotted purchasers
to make it a public physic garden, like the Felix Meretis.
Ho! ha!” and the schepin chuckled as he spoke, “what
think you, Hans Kierstede? he purposed to read lectures!
well, I'll tell you then, he pockets the pay and the lectures
remain in the books from whence he steals all his lectures;
for, Hans, it is convenient for such men who want
minds to steal it from the works of others; and while he
dissipated a fortune got by such fraud, the stink weed
and the pudding stone are the most flourishing plants that
adorn his famous physic garden; and that is not all let me
tell you, my man, Hans Kierstede, this great bladder of

a fellow, would have had the burgomasters believe him a
very Boerhaave; but let me tell you the truth, my friends
den Hogen Mogenheid of Vaderlandt, are not such fools;
and when they doubted doctor Kindermeester's pretensions,
he kicked and huffed in a great dudgeon; and now
out of pure spite, and mortification, he hath come to the
Nieuw Nederlandts to set up a school of medicine that
will make the professors in the low countries die with
envy and spleen, and this, my man Hans, he promises to
do without a guilder from the stadt. Let me tell you my
friend, it is very well for men when they have no credit
with their high mightinesses, having once imposed on
them like this doctor Kindermeester, to say they do not
want a guilder to assist their vain projects from the public
pocket—the truth is, let the offer be made, or let there
be a chance of getting something from the stadt, and then
see whether these boasters would not snap at it as greedily
as a hungry cur would at a kitchen bone—I tell you
the truth, Hans Kierstede, this fat doctor of medicine is
all vapour and conceit: he pokes his nose in the first
places to make the credulous burghers believe him a
great man; but I tell you my man Hans, it can do an ass
no good to pass for a lion, for the more he moves the
more you see his tail; and the truth is as to Doctor Kindermeester,
that of one half he meddles in he knows as
little as the salmon fish that bounces in the Maes—”

“Zalmon, schepin Kip? mien hertz!” said doctor Hans
Kierstede, rubbing his eyes as if just awakened, and having
only heard the last words addressed to him: “Zalmon!
dish ish as vone vine vish ven dey kooks him as
you sall zee zerved on a burgomaster's tinner dable—
mien hertz, how dey kooks him mit budder and kreens at
Hoorn—Got! mien moud vaders at der dought op him
tressed mit Zauce—mien zeil, dat Hoorns de blace mit
der kokwinkels, Mienheer Kip.”

Mienheer Kip turned in evident vexation from his companion,
and petulantly for a while employed himself in
silence to the finishing of his pipe, as he could not but
perceive from the little apothecary's manner, that he had
scarcely understood a word with which he had honoured

him, and until startled by the mention of an eatable, had
fairly been nodding in a short dose; but however offended
he was for the moment with his chuckle-pated listener,
such temptation to invade the reluctant taciturnity of the
schepin was not to be withstood, as presented itself in the
dress, assumed airs of importance, and well known characters
of the guests who passed him, as they flitted from
the apartment like shadows by a glass, which reflected
their form and shape, nor concealed a deformity; but in
truth it is but justice to the memory of the schepin (who,
by the by, lies buried in the churchyard of Garden-street
Church, not far from burgomaster Peachy Prauw
Van Zandt,) to state that with a small allowance to his
splenetic temper, which in later years had been increased
by the Vroedschap's rejecting all his plans for public improvement,
as they were so disinterested and economical
that they would not, if put in operation, have yielded a
farthing by way of speculation or contract to any dignified
burgomasters, whether he was a tailor or a dirt
contractor, that in his description of such as fell under
his perview, he did not greatly exaggerate the fact; and
therefore it can be judged from those attributed by
schepin Jacobus Kip to their forbears, what virtues the
descendants of the honest, staunch, and thrifty burghers
of Nieuw Amsterdam in der Nieuw Nederlandts, have
inherited and improved on; and although mankind, it may
be asserted, progresses slowly in most matters of civilization
in many parts of this habitable world, the province of
New-York is certainly not one of them; for the quick intellect
of the Yankee, and the steady bottom of the Dutchman,
being well grafted together, have produced a stock
whose fruitfulness in all arts, (fas et nefas,) may bid defiance
for comparison to the whole globe. Vain were it
to give an accurate outline of the multifarious remarks on
the many rich subjects of sarcasm that flowed from the
lips of the worthy schepin, and were unheard by the dull
hearing (or rather when he was listening and awake, passed
in one ear and went out of the other) of the excellent
doctor of medicine, his companion, by whose evidence the
assailed never could have convicted Mienheer Kip of slander;
(for truth in slander and libel, by some learned civilians,
and most particularly Dirk Von Rikketie, when it
affected men in power, and of course his friends, was
reckoned inadmissable and very criminal, and always received
from his immaculate judgment, severe animadversion,
and a committal to the Rasphuis;) for doctor Hans
Kierstede was a veritable and patient being, who never
in his whole life contrived to remember a word of the
shortest story he ever heard, and his memory was never
burthened beyond a recipe for cookery of some kind or the
other, and that he conned for weeks, as a student doth his
exercise; he was indeed a creature that took the world
easy, and lived for nothing but eating Group after
group moved on in their departure, and but few slipped
away unobserved by the keen eye and sharp tongue
of the honest Mienheer, who was seldom in his strictures
known to be more lenient to an ass though covered
with gold, than had he but worn a shabby packsaddle;
for he was a sad enemy of those who, swollen with
new gotten wealth, assume airs of grandeur and consequence,
and forgetful of their own origin, would be
thought of a race superior to their fellow burghers, the
very matter of their pride showing their ignorance,—because,
who that boasted sense, would suppose that either
high living, drinking, or dressing; can elevate one piece
of worthless clay beyond another, or make the blood and
body of the grandson of a footman and washerwoman better
than his ancestors.—No; there is much in the Italian
proverb when applied to the fair and gorgeous garments,
and the boasted family of so vain a coxcomb: that a
white glove often covers a dirty hand; certainly it ought
to be apparent to such pieces of pampered insignificance,
that Providence, when it modelled the form of the veriest
vagrant that begs along the public streets, took as much
pride and care as in the making of a prince. Mienheer
Kip, in his survey, did by no means spare this sort of
gentry; for their conceit and impudence was a thing of
singular mirth to him—and he chuckled heartily at his
own conception as a young burgher and his new married
bride sallied past him, with an excess of airs and
affectation; scarce deigning in their haughtiness of
pride to recognise, even by a nod, the honest schepin,
who had smoked many a pipe and drank many a pot of
beer with their father, who had been an honest Dutch
cooper, and got himself a comfortable fortune, which
was all his children seemed to have inherited from him;
for no sooner did they possess his money than they
endeavoured to shut from remembrance the means
whereby he acquired it, and could not bear the sight of a
hoop or a stave; while, to impose on others and make it
believed their descent was beyond reality, having heard
such were the fashions in the old countries they got an
ingenious painter to compose a coat of arms, but such a
one it was as would have puzzled a herald to have read:
it was surmounted by a cap, purporting to be a ducal coronet,
and many other rare and magnificent devices, of
which the bearers were extremely proud, and which, when
recognised by schepin Kip on sundry corners of their apparel,
he marvelled first greatly thereat; for the painter,
being a native born Nieuw Nederlander, and having never
seen the coronet of a duke, had thereon exercised his fancy
and shaped it rather clumsily, so that the ready eye of
Mienheer Kip at first took it to be no other than the representation
of half a butter firkin (such as the honest cooper
used to fashion for the goed vrouws of Goshen) after it had
been sawed in twain, as was often the custom of the saving
citizens of Nieuw Amsterdam, and which hath been even
handed down to these days, the separate halves making
two excellent tubs; but on the schepin's taking a more certain
sight, (and he laughed hugely at the idea) he in his
own mind determined the coronet was no other than a
representation of old Schermerhorne's of Schenectadie,
(with whom the cooper's family had become related by
intermarriage,) red worsted nightcap, which the Dutchman
(for he was dogwhipper, as is related somewhere before
in this veritable historie, to his native town,) used to
clap on his head when his beaver was mislaid, when he
rushed out of his homestead in pursuit of some noisy cur,
the terror of boys and dogs. At the same time there occurred
from the incident to the memory of schepin Kip,
his having been terrible put out to understand the meaning
of a shield with a bar or cheveron, that Mienheer
Walton, the rich barber, had placed over his street door in
the large new house he had just erected; and the thought
struck the schepin forcibly, that it was an act of great
humility in the barber, who, although he had become an
immense rich man, would not forget his original mean
occupation, but wished to remind the world of what he
had been and how he had made his money; for the ingenious
Kip construed the shield into a representation of a
barber's basin, flattened by the unskilfulness of the
carver, and the cheveron into an open razor. And indeed
the schepin was an admirer of humility in all persons, and
it is not suprising that his very bowels rose within him in
bitterness at the many airs of mock greatness that passed
under his observation; but he was most particularly angered,
and that almost beyond control, when he was rather
rudely and bearishly rubbed against, (as if he had been a
nobody,) and his pipe nearly knocked from him in passing,
by a little, stout, squab built personage, so vastly distended
with his own magnitude as scarce to be able to see any
one except his own all-important figure, and at the same
time taking room to make a most significant gesticulation
and shrug, as he closed one eye and with a manner
the most portentous, ejaculated to a lean, trembling
looking man at his elbow, the words `you know,' which
seemed to make the poor fellow shrink into himself with
terror; without ceremony, as if it had not been in the
way, this worthy trod on the foot of schepin Kip, till it
made him wince again with the weight, and then moved
out of the room without apologizing by a word to the
poor burgher, who could not speak for the pain inflicted
so ruthlessly on him, but kept shaking up and down the
aching limb, now putting it on the floor, then raising it up,
all the while groaning, and moaning, and twisting, and
drawing up with many ludicrous and lugubrious contortions
his long features, while tears of agony rolled down his
stout visage.

“Confound the usurer—tuyvil! dirty dousand dams!
oh my corns! he's broke my toe”—growled, with the

very tone of a wounded mastiff, the injured schepin, interlarding
every broken sentence with the flourishes of a
dozen High Dutch oaths, that made all around stare at
him; “Myn Got! his foot's like a horse's; no wonder,
he was bred in a stable—tuyvel und dunder! he's crushed
the worst corn I had. One would have believed he never
handled corn in the crib of the stable where he
first began the world, he has so little mercy on mine—
Oh my corns! oh my toe!”

“Mien hertz! dish is nien der zeazen vor korns;
dough dey are goot poiled mit vleesh;” quoth Hans Kierstede,
wakening from a long nap in surprise, and not at first
perceiving the wry faces of schepin Kip, which, however,
when he beheld, he added in a tone of pity and condolence:
“Mienheer Kip, mien hertz! vats de madders
mit u?”

It may well be supposed when the schepin had, by long
and tender assiduities, somewhat lulled the biting sharpness
of his pain, that he launched out rather virulently
against the cause of his anguish, and ran the burgher
most violently down behind his back, and called him by
many hard names, and related at every twinge of his toe,
some tough story concerning the way he had attained
great wealth, from being at first an ostler in the stables of a
burgher of Ostend; and how, even out of the sweepings of
his master's stables, he had made money; and that from
only looking at the back of the Dutch bible instead of the inside,
when he said his prayers, he had now the assurance
to assert it was no harm to take as many per cent for
loans that he had made, under good security, to the necessitous
as he pleased, and therefore the dominie was
never able to persuade him to obey the law of Holland as
to interest, because he did not think it allowed sufficient
profit; so that his interest very soon, in most cases, was as
great as the principal he first advanced. But in the midst
of his invectives against this cause of his torture, the worthy
schepin could not but laugh to himself, as nearly
to forget his hurt, at the recollection of the burgher's
being once finely tricked in his own way, by a sharp

witted Yankee, who sold him a horse; and the schepin
considered it a prime, first rate, capital joke, that he who
had skinned so many in his time, should have been at
last caught by the false skin of an animal he was bred up
with. “His hand,” said Mienheer Kip, “must certainly
have been out with the curry-comb, or it could not have
been possible, my mans, Hans Kierstede, to have so
nicely shut his eyes with the blinds.”

Mienheer Kip continued his censures on others of the
guests at great length, after the pain of his toe had fairly
departed, and he considered himself so fully revenged on
the uncivil inflictor of the injury, as to turn his attention
to those who followed him from the apartment on their
way homewards.

“My mans, Hans Kierstede,” said Mienheer, and his
very words are used, there not being the same necessity
to make them good English as induced me before to render
them as far as ability allowed, for the edification of
the reader; “my mans, Hans Kierstede,” quoth he, in a
broken Low Dutch, half English and half Hollandt, “and
der Ik dells u ish oud Jan Van Schraper Vander Blasbull,
der Schilder, der bainder mensch—dat bainds his
mensch's hoeds vlad like der dimber dat is gut vor
poards at Zwoll in der Vaderlandt, and dere Ik dells u
is der groodt vendu meester dat was a bakkerjongen—
his kopt is as high as der Koning—Ik dells u—der
mensch has dravelled, und mit der zites dat he's zeen, his
kopt has raiszed lik pread ven tish lighdt as a veader—
der liddel bubble dat has noding in it altyg zwims on der
dop op der rivier—Ik dells u dis, Hans Kierstede.”

“Ja!” replied his hearer, “dat brandewynt is goot
vor niets—Mienheer Jakopus Kip, u shoud daste der
brandewynt at Hoorn; mien hertz, dats brandewynt—
Mienheer, Ik dakes und drinks do your brosberity mit
mine brosberity.”

“Dank you, mien mans, Hans Kierstede,” returned
the schepin, “I dells u dis—mien ogten! dere goes Gelyn
Verplancke and Stopher Hoagland, and Bay Croe Svelt—
mien ogten! dere de tap toe peads, and we sall be shud

in der kates; Ik had nien a dought dat id vas zo ladte,
mien mans, Hans Kierstede—tis dime wy gets on—Ik sall
lend u mien arms drou Bridge-straadt—zo leds gaan mit
der resdt von dem.”

And as he spoke, having knocked the ashes from his
pipe, followed by his associate, he hastened with mighty
strides towards the door, which they had scarcely attained
ere their further progress was arrested by a crowd of
persons whose entrance in the apartment by the outlet
which they were seeking, opposed and prevented their
leaving it. The drum, whose sound had invaded the
quiet flowings of Mienheer Kip's remarks, and which he
had supposed was the usual warning for retirement to all
honest and peaceable citizens, had, however, on this
evening been beaten for entirely another purpose—it was
an alarm, and in a few minutes was followed by the hoarse
and heavy clangor of the city bells, whose doleful tongues
pealed forth in notes of terror to the awakened and startled
burghers of Nieuw Amsterdam—who in the memory of
man had heard the like but twice before, once while stout
old Stuyvesant prepared for the approach of his conqueror,
Colonel Nichols, and lastly when the news came that the
dastard Manning had surrendered to Evertse and Benkes,
and that their fleet was coming down the Narrows with
all sail set for the city of the Manahadoes. As the sound
continued, its dread voice swept over the deep and massy
heap of crowded buildings, and invading the close and
heavy defiles that composed the darksome streets, burst
on the ear of the slumbering inhabitants. The tardy Nederlander
turned on his couch, and shook his wearied
limbs, and rubbed his eyes, and stared about him astonished
as the noise struck his ear; the wary trafficker,
whose storehouses were filled with merchandise, leaped
from his couch in a moment—and the light rest of the
lover was driven from eyes where it scarce had lingered.
An instant past the city had appeared like some serpent
coiled harmless in his dusky ring, stirless as though his
fangs were palsied in death,—the brief space of time is
fled, his repose hath been disturbed, his barbed tongue
darts fire, and his very skin glitters in his anger,—so,

through every corner of the late midnight which had
slept upon the city, lights break and flash vividly, as stars
shooting in the firmament, from casement to casement
they flare; and heads yet in their nightgear were thrust
from the half opened door and unclosed window forth
into the streets, and voice after voice hailed those who
came within reach of the cry, but who, scarce attending
to the call, passed onwards—eager yet fearful to inquire
the rise of the disturbance.

Soon all were in motion; those who had been hurrying
home belated, joined the throng, and those who had but
so lately quitted the scene of revelry at the fort, and who
were wandering off on their separate ways, turned back
their steps, seeking as they went, at their neighbours and
those whom they met, the sudden cause which all alike
were hastening to learn: and, although the truth was to
them unknown, there were not wanting veracious wiseacres,
as is usual at such times, who started a hundred wild
and groundless suggestions, which, however palpably preposterous
and remote from the slightest foundation, were
satisfactorily sworn to by their authors, and lacked no
small number of believers. Some cried that the Indians,
having fired Beverwyck and Schenectady, had come down
the river, massacreing, burning, and scalping men, women,
and children; sparing neither the head of the aged, nor
the feeble bodies of the helpless infant and its tender
mother—that they had landed at Vredendaal, and were
now at Golden Hill, ready to rush upon the strengthless
palisades of the city. Some had seen them frightfully
painted and armed—others had been deafened with their
savage war whoops. Some had another tale of terror,
which they anxiously sought to force on the credence of
their ready hearers: that the ancient foemen, the French,
had a fleet riding at Naijarlij; that Nottens island was in
their possession; that they had erected batteries, which
were ready at a word to sweep the whole town to ashes;
that unless the council, which was understood to be convened
for the purpose, instantly surrendered, that the
flames of their dwellings would light the march of the unrelenting
and ruthless enemy, and that all would indiscriminately

be given to the slaughtering knife—while
others yet more timid, trembled at the monster they themselves
conjured, reported that the danger that threatened
was even nearer at hand—it was within their own homes—
there was, they told an insurrection among the negroes,
who had set the city on fire at several different quarters,
and were running about like devils, cutting the throats of
all they found; and that although the flames spread terrifically
that on account of the vast quantities of smoke,
the light of the ascending blaze was obscured from the
eyes of those who looked in the directions pointed out as
the places where the destructive element was raging—and
lastly, there were not a few who whispered about, serious
in tone and visage, that the time was arrived foretold
by the ill-treated Yokup Van Veltzlear, who had a few
years previous, pretending to be divinely inspired, made a
terrible hue and cry in the streets, crying on the bridge
and before the houses of the Hon. Stenwyck and John
Lawrence, “wo, wo to the crowne of pride and the drunkearts
of Ephreim! Two woes past and the third coming,
except you repent, repent—repent, as the kingdome of
God is at hand;” and for which solemn prophecy, he
had been most unceremoniously and soundly flogged by
the common hangman, Anthonie De, who being a proper
long-limbed, close-fisted, New-England man, always took
good care to let every body who came under his thumb
by means of the law, know him so well as to steer clear
of his fingers thereafter; and after said flagellation,
Yokup was kicked out of the colony by order of the reprobate
Dutch Governor who then reigned, and who, it
was said, never repented, except over a brandy bottle
when it was emptied of its contents—all this persecution
it was now remembered that Yokup had endured patiently
and meekly; proving perfectly the old saw, that a prophet
is never respected in his own country. Stirred by
these several rumours, the free-hearted patriot, who
had heretofore, at every public opportunity, offered his
fortune and his life to the service and protection of his
native land, began to wish in spite of himself, that his
property was in a safe place, and took more than one serious
thought of how in the confusion he might convey
away his person unharmed. The gallant leader of the
enrolled citizens, who the day before had manfully swaggered
and strutted at the head of his followers, and courageously
flourished his thirsty steel, anxious for its trial
on the carcasses of any who dared front him, now was
seized, most unfortunately for the display of his valor, by
an unaccountable weakness in the knees and eyesight;
the latter being brought to so poor a state that he was
unable to find the deadly weapons of his defence
—so, feeling unfit for duty, yet troubled for the welfare
of the city, while departing therefrom for the benefit
of country air, he sent word to the next in command,
who, however, (for one misfortune never comes
alone) was not to be heard of, for being a tailor, (it is the
fashion for tailors to be great military characters) he had,
in the phrase of his trade, taken with his goose and thimble
long stiches, and was snugly buttoned in his cellar pantry
—while the pompous Burgomaster on the other hand, was
started to such activity, that he actually ran to the Council
Chamber, determined that no time should be lost ere he
gave his vote that the commander of the foe (if such was
arrived) should be received with all due honours;
that a Committee should be deputed to wait on him with
a congratulatory address, and escort him to a public dinner,
to which, nevertheless, orders were specially to be
given that none but the private friends of the members
of the corporation should be invited—a maxim since
come to universal adoption, the public being taxed and
their name used to fatten a whole herd of aldermen and
their families, while they themselves, the public, who
pay for these feasts, have not the eating of a mouthful,
being literally situated like a man who gives a splendid
dinner or merry making in his own house, yet is obliged
by his guests to remain without doors during the entertainment;
or if, as it had been otherwise stated by the
rumour, that the town was already on fire, the burgomaster
resolved, that efficient measures should be
taken to turn the tide of the flame, if it chanced to come
in the direction of his property, to that of certain neighhours
who resided in an adjoining street, for although
these persons were respectable and industrious enough,
yet they were too peaceable in public matters to be good
citizens, scarcely having been known to give their suffrage
at an election for members of the Council, or if they
had, the votes had been against the burgomaster in question,
therefore, they were assuredly dangerous to society, and
the sooner they were denounced and got rid of the better—and
then withal, the boastful recreant, who hourly
had jeered virtue among his abandoned fellows, and had
cried out that he recked not, cared not for the amends
an ill spent life demanded, who reviled God and man in
his boldness, whose thoughts of after life were drowned
in the enjoyment of the present, who mocked at honesty
and despised innocence, with whom religion had been a
jest and honour a blasphemy to pleasure, who founded his
tenets on the saying of the King of Israel, “as the tree
falleth, so it lieth—who knoweth the soul of the man
goeth upwards, or the soul of the beast that goeth downwards?”
he too began to feel an irksome load within his
breast; his philosophy was weakened, and in vain he
strived to rally it to his aid; he would have hid, but he
knew not where. However, when these inquirers commingled
with those who had thronged before them at the
moat that encircled the fort, they found the gates closed,
the drawbridge raised, the sarazine dropped, and sentinels
posted on the walls, who most uncourteously seemed
to deny both ingress and egress, and to the anxious seeking
of the numerous questioners, were unwilling, or what
appeared equally probable, were unable to return any satisfactory
answers. The noise still continued: the hollow
beat of the alarm drum at intervals, and the increased
and unceasing tollings of the bell, sent their deep and
mournful notes in the night air, that had before wafted its
currents as peaceful as an infant slumbering on the bosom
of its careful and tender nurse; the sounds rolled along
the mountainous and rocky banks of the sterile shores of
Weehawken, which trembled with the echo; the forest
animal, who slept in the mazes of the woods that lined
the declivities of Hobouk, leapt from his lair, awakened
as by the startling shout of the pursuing huntsman, and as
the long reverberations floated to the heights of Breukelin,
those who dwelt in its sound looked abroad, and while
the moonlight, with its fickle beam gleamed for an instant
and broke through the cold clouds and fell on the bleak
earth beneath, like the changeful smile of beauty, that
seeks a face it loves, yet doubts to gaze upon, and rendered
visible the black shadow of the stirring and distant city
as they cast their eyes in wonderment towards it and
hearkened to the echoes which seemed like the roaring
of afar off thunder.

And now the reader, if he has any curiosity thereto,
arising from the effect which has been here described,
or otherwise, on examining the section which immediately
adjoins this, which is now fast concluding, will not remain
long in doubt concerning the cause of all this dire distress,
and in much less period of time than the crowd who had
collected therefor received the same information.

SECTION II.

The Ancyent Chronycle of the Proude Captyve.

THE PRISONERS AND THE COUNCIL.

“See that strict guard be had with the prisoners,” said
a voice sternly at the entrance of the audience chamber,
whose natural tone was elevated in command, if not swelled
beyond its accustomed height by conscious authority;
“and beware lest their bonds slip the tythe of an inch; an
they stir or raise hand for flight, be ye not back with
your steel or shot, nor fail to discharge your pieces home,
so that their deadly contents seat in their vile hearts.
Look to your charge I say, an ye love the house of Jacob
Leisler, ye will not care to hew in atoms a dog of the
name of Bayard.”

As the person who spoke these words uttered them,
he crossed the threshold and strode into the apartment.
He was a man of slender and effeminate appearance, arrived
at that middle era of human existence when the
character becomes settled, the mind hath its full vigor,
and the passions, whose violence deform, ambition and
revenge, are lasting, quick, and pursuing, and do even
engross the soul, a business of life more than at any other
period. Youth starts like the wild horse; but having
flashed forth its fiery qualities, grows calm; age runs
cold; but it is manhood, when every resolution is long,
during, and determinate. Nevertheless, from the first
glance on the visage of this person; there was not that

which gave strength of expression or would induce a belief
that it was often moved from the apparent gentleness that
always seemed to rest on it; but the first impression of the
countenance of man is often deceptive, and this was one
of those formations of congregated features that delights
the superficial observer, and passes current with the
world at large; a face, a vizard rather, enmasking deformity,
such as is worn by the smooth hypocrite whose virtue
is outward show, and who, by politic public charities,
renders it hard if not impossible for him to be exposed in
his true shape, which is only shown in his seizing every
secret and private opportunity to put in force his meanness
and crime. This man's complexion was fair, with heavy
brows and knotted forehead; his hair was glossy, and at
once tastefully and accurately divided in front, so that it fell
in long thick curls to his neck; while a small line of beard,
cut with the most exquisite skill, wavering on his upper lip,
exhibited the neat trimmed mustachio, and it was in that
feature, his swelling lip, that there lurked in its changeful
curve a movement which elicited in part its owner's character,
boastful and overbearing haughtiness and insolence
of demeanour; and there was an evidence in his
actions against him, for in spite of his hurried steps and
the strong excitement by which he appeared agitated,
there was an affectation of manner and a studied air with
which he carried himself, that at once bespoke his self-opinion
and consequence; the very art with which he
threw from his shoulders his rich cloak, lined with Venetian
velvet, and discovered a dress beneath fit for the
gayest court gallant, having silk swashes with deep gold
fringe at the end in his doublet, embroidered vest, and
silver garters edged with lace, omitting none of the numerous
knots, ruffles, tassels, and other fripperies, peculiar
to the then reigning fashion, had something in it that
laid bare to the observer the pride and superiority, which
over those about him, he evidently claimed. No sooner
had this personage placed his feet fairly in the room, than
he was surrounded by its occupants, who eagerly striving
by every means, to attract his attention, thrust on him question
after question, each seeking to be heard first, and at
the same moment, by the number and rapidity of their inquiries,
giving him neither time or chance, if he so willed,
to answer or even hear them—however, they might have
all been satisfied by a few words, for all tended to one
point, the cause of the hubbub without. He whom they
addressed, nevertheless, noticed not their solicitations,
but with a strong arm made way for himself through all
obstructions, until he approached Leisler near enough
to hold communication with him; and indeed the Governor
in their alarm had met heretofore with little ceremony
from his guests, for all respect had been forgotten
to persons, every one having acted for himself, and pushed
before his neighbour to the doorway; in their eagerness,
jostling and elbowing each other without regard to consequence
or dignity; the eyck meester having, in the conflict
to get forward, rubbed most unceremoniously his
lean sides against the fat ribs of the city goaler, a character
and officer in those days as in this, of infinite magnitude,
having risen from the office of burgomaster, for it
was a salaried station, and such places in the city it is well
known are never given to any person who is not in some
way related, or is in propria persona a veritable member
of the Corporation; and this official dignitary, who had
together with the conducting of the whipping post, also
that of the wooden horse and the gallows, in his anxiety
had bolted on the rear of the receiver general of the revenue,
who with his enormous weight nearly stove in the
goodly round paunch that ornamented in advance the presence
of a lordly and puissant echevin. In truth, all
was rushing, struggling, tugging, treading on heels,
and many sore pushings behindwards; every body being
desirous of having a foot in front of his neighbour, as
if such advantage would afford a moment's speedier
knowledge, and losing more time, nathless, in the heat and
labour of the contest than such satisfaction might have
been attained.

“Father, I bear you news that will make your heart
leap like the blood in the veins of youth,” said the stranger,
taking Leisler by the hand, “for be the other when
it will, there never set sun on so prosperous an hour for
our fortunes as but now it hath done.”

“By myn trouwe, zon Yaakoop Milbourne?” inquired
the Governor with a vacant stare; “what geschreeuw is
dis, hey?”

“For heaven's sake what is the matter?” broke out a
dozen voices at one breath, each speaker unmindful of
every thing but his own impatience.

“Goot heer! sbeak, Mienheer Milbourne, ish myn huis
mit vuer?” cried a rich burgher, whose soul was enwrapt
in his possessions.

“Mienheer, dell me vor der heer zakes, ish mien neger
prokes on myn frauw, und der kind,” ejaculated another.

“Der Fransch, der Indiaan, der neger, der vuer,”
burst in one broken and distracting yell from the lips of
the bystanders.

“Give me your compassion, kind masters,” vainly
strove Milbourne, forced to explain, “I lack but time to
your bidding—hear me; there is—”

“Oprizing of dem togs, der zlaaf,” interrupted one.

“Der shitty, der stadt ish as vone prite vlame,” pursued
another, in a note as dismal as an owl.

“Den every podies mill hab his drote kut mit his oor,”
echoed a third in a transport of despair.

“For your own sakes, masters, let me but have the
chance of a word,” cried Milbourne entreatingly, “I assure
ye all there is nought ye should fear.”

“Mien goot Got! is it zo?” quoth one.

“Tish a wonderful ding den,” cried another.

“Teer, mien hertz! who'd dort now,” continued a
third, raising his hands in amazement.

“Yes, masters,” pursued Milbourne, at length finding
an opportunity to speak uninterrupted, “those doubtful
bells should change their chime from alarm to rejoicing,
for albeit, treason may have been busied near us—
his disguise hath been torn to rags. Good father-in-law,
your honour, and perhaps life, this night hath been preserved—a
cur hath been found creeping unnoted towards
us, whose lip was fraught with venom and with death—
his taking were worth the jewels of Loretto.”

“Mien hernel! Ik zoud guain zyne meening weeten,”
responded Leisler, with a look that bespoke how little
he comprehended the words of his son-in-law.

Merciful Jaacob! Mienheers, don't worry the poor
young man; he looks quite worn out;” here interposed
dame Leisler, pushing herself towards Milbourne, and
with tender solicitude raising her smelling bottle: “why
he looks fainting, poor creature—dear, after your fatigue
will you have some cowslip wine, or poppy water? Indeed
this will—”

“What is this alarm? tell us if you can,” impolitely
interrupted those around; drowning the offers and anxiety
of the dame in their vociferous inquiries.

“I am not backwards in answering, for there is not
cause;” said Milbourne, ` there are those in durance
with us, whose name, howe'er it hath been a terror, shall
be now no more than a jest; yes, the very tongue of dissension
hath been plucked by its baleful roots. What
think ye, friends, of Jacob Leisler and of the liberating
revolution that on the British throne hath placed the glorious
William? our bitter foes are chained captives in our
hands—the Lord hath delivered our enemies up, bound
hand and foot—the traitors, Nicholas Bayard and Walter
Nichols, are both prisoners in this house.”

The anouncement of an event so interesting and important
to every inhabitant of the province, seemed to electrify
the hearers: there were some who turned pale,
as though stricken with the breath of the deadly fiery
wind of the Scripture—the eyes of some roved around,
sparkling with delight, seeking countenances that reflected
an index of their own, which were brightened by
gratified triumph and revenge—and there were some
who incredulously shook their heads, and ventured to whisper
doubtingly to those who were nearest, as though
scarce induced to grant faith to that which they had heard
—and there were still others, whose visages darkened
and whose countenances fell like the black shade of the
cypress tree at evening over a tomb—indeed, in that assemblage,
although not many, being as heretofore shown,
thinned of its numbers, there were but few men indifferent,
and who were not affected by the intelligence; nevertheless,
most were silent, nor gave voice to their
thoughts, albeit here and there some retainer of the government

and the Leisler family, some hired placeman,
violent partizan or pensioner, attuned his throat to rejoicing,
and shouted, as in duty bound joyous and lustily,
and cries rang through the wide apartment from many a
lip pliant to all occasions, and ready to bellow as loud for
the conquered, had the victory been theirs.

“Ik ver blyd 'er my over; Ik heb geluck!” quoth
Leisler with eager rapture `dat is, Ik is vortunute,
Hab mien gounshil been zend vor? zay, mien zon Yaakoop,
zay, vor Ik ver blyd 'er my over.”

The officers of the Council, sir, have all been duly summoned,
and now await directions; therefore it is best that
the room be cleared,” returned the person he addressed.

“Regt! drue, das is drue,” said the Governor.

“It is necessary that you depart, my masters, awhile,”
said Milbourne to those who were pressing at his side,
“seeing that it is not our custom, that in a period so rife
with dangers as this, the passages of the Council should
be spread abroad—meaning no hurt to you friends, who
I doubt not are trusty and affectionate unto us; but ye
cannot blame, when wisdom lies in secrecy, and safety
follows caution—that a request be made that forthwith
ye leave us; but ere ye go, bear with ye in your minds
that we are grateful for your loves and kind adherence,
and be no man loth to report among the worthy burghers
of the city that Fort William contains their foes; it will
doubtless be of pleasant savour to their hearing.”

At this bidding, slowly and with lingering steps those
who had no authority to remain departed, for however
respectful the order to leave the place had been worded,
still it was a direct order, and one neither, from circumstances
attached to the person who gave it, to be disobeyed
or questioned; the reluctance with which it was
fulfilled, therefore, was plainly evident, for it had in one
instant, destroyed expectant curiosity, it had put to flight,
at a breath, the hopes of some and the greedy malignancy
of others; and besides, the desire to learn what would be
going forward in the Council was excited and increased
by the knowledge of the fact that it was a secret proceeding—there
were those who had set their hearts at gaining

a sight of the prisoners and of their bearing, of hearing
what would be their fate, and how other matters that
might be broached would be settled; and there were
those who had already planned all that was to take place
and be said on every subject, and were only anxious to behold
the confirmation of their work—to all these, quitting
the objects on which their hearts were fairly set, was
peculiarly hard; as severe as rending a sculptor from his
favourite statue, the model of all he deemed perfect; the
painter from his prize picture, or the dashing at one fell
swoop to earth, the loved day dreams of the youthful enthusiast—on
the females who had been present in particular, it
had fallen harshly, and as they went, like Eve driven from
the gates of Eden, they cast many a lingering look behind;
yet in their disappointment they soon found consolation in
determining, with the usual fervour of the sex, that they
would still ere long taste the forbidden fruit; and true such
resolves more than once had heretofore proved—for it was
a most extraordinary thing how the acts of the legislators
of the Nieuw Nederlandts were published as they were,
almost as soon as formed: and although many a burgomaster,
who was taciturn in his seat in the redschap, was put to
his wit's end to avoid the queries of his helpmate, yet the
next day, or even sooner, after deliberations charged as
the most secret, they were in the mouths of every body
—from the hay-scales to the baardschreeder's winkel,—
yet there was no one who had been entrusted but what
denied his having been faithless; and so it may well be
supposed, that many a curtain lecture in the instance that
is treated of was threatened, and among those of the most
consequence was one in embryo in the bosom and fast
swelling tongue of dame Leisler—who considered herself
ill treated on all sides—first in the little deference
that had been paid her by the company, and to her smelling
bottle, cowslip wine, and poppy water, by her son-in-law—and
lastly, in what appeared to her ideas of etiquette,
her being fairly turned out of a room in her own
house; but although in this last matter her passion raged
loftily, she had made up her mind to the inconvenience,
on reflecting that there was an excellent situation for
listening in a neighbouring chamber, the key-hole of the
door of which was of such advantageous dimensions, that
necessarily all that was enacted must be overheard.

All having retired except those whose presence was
allowed by virtue of their offices, the chosen advisers of
the ruler of the puissant colony of New Yorke, took
their several places,—and to them Milbourne related more
minutely in circumstance, that having suspicions that the
morning's disturbance arose from interested instigators,
who must have been in person sowing disaffection among
the people, who had heretofore been submissive to Leisler's
authority—by judicious stratagems he had been enabled
to trace the steps of the two most inveterate foes
of his family, unsuspected by them until too late;—in
short, by a well devised operation, he had, assisted by
his partisans, surrounded those discordant rousers of rebellion
at a moment when they had expected they were
in the full tide of success, and had arrested them with
a warrant on a charge of high treason—they had been
conducted as captives in a public and ignominious way
from the house of one of their followers, and in their progress
to the fort there had been a desperate though vain
attempt for their rescue, and this last had caused the
almost always tranquil city of Nieuw Amsterdam to have
its peace disturbed in the manner heretofore set forth.
As Milbourne concluded, exultation sat on the grim and
gloomy faces of the Councillors. A brief silence followed;
each seemed to wait, fearful to break the deadly
pause, as if depending on an expression of the sentiments
of another, to confirm the dark intentions of his own soul.

“He hath said we were but dirt; not worth the trampling
of his boot heel,” muttered Peiter De Lanoy, a leader
of the Council, sternly compressing his lips as he spoke,
“out on his pride; how will he do now when the dirt
hath closed about his throat—an it may be he'll sink beneath
it like one in the quicksands of the sea.”

“He hath said the scum of the people have thrust
themselves in all places of trust and power,” echoed
another.

“He hath called us hounds, not fit to lick his kitchen

trenchers—he hath loaded us, young and old, with contumely
and scorn,” followed a venerable looking man,
who was named Edsell, of Queens county.

“Who but he opposed our march, and forced us to
fight our road step after step? Who but he stirred up
against us Dirk Wessels and Claes Ripse, and Schuyler,
the Albanians? Hath he not hardened the proud Van
Kortlandt against our overtures? Hath he not been like
the leper's sore, that hath widened like a death mark
among us?” cried Milbourne, who had watched his opportunity
and now malignantly sought to increase the
force of the gathering tempest: “but there is a change
in the swift and smooth flowings of his fortunes; he is in
our hands.'

“Aye, the best blood that riots in his veins would not
go far to repay the injuries he hath done our cause,”
quoth Gerardus Beekman, of Kings county, his dark brows
meeting in a threatening frown.

“His blood! his blood! he would have taken ours an
he could; but we hold him, so let him look to his head,”
burst forth from several, who added determinate gestures
to their words.

A stern deep hum of assent and approbation ran from
lip to lip.

“Myn beszer vreints, I dink so; dou dink doo,” advised
the governor himself, addressing his associates with
a look of wise prudence and moderation, “By myne
trouwe! derevor, I pelieves dat is goot, dis duegenuit
dalk mit his taal vor hish drote vor ont hond wat Ik zeg;
ven his drote is gut droo his kopt daar is geen helpen
aan, op myne vord, I dink wat I zay.”

“Let the prisoners be brought before us,” said several
of the Council.

“Ho! who waits there? drag the culprits to their
judgment seat,” called out Milbourne passionately.

There was a stirless and solemn silence for the space
of a minute throughout the apartment,—at the sharp voice
of Milbourne's imperious command, there was a sudden cessation
of speaking even among such as were holding with
their friends or coadjutors a secret consultation of what

course was the most profitable to pursue in the momentous
affair before them; as the captive's guard showed
himself at the doorway and announced their coming, at
once all discussion ceased, and so deep was the pause that
one might have heard the wood worm's death watch in
the oakened and pannelled wainscot. All looked anxiously
and with dark and expectant visages towards that
door; by and by, there came the heavy and harsh
clank of chains, and the quick trampling, and clash of
the footsteps of armed men; it came near, and both the
captives having a hardy looking and whiskered soldier of
the adelborsten at his side, armed and fully accoutered,
with his long traphaan and his bandelier girded about him,
were conducted before the Council of their foemen. The
first was a tall, thin, sallow man, with a high pile of forehead,
and large and prominent features; his head was
somewhat bald and bare, yet the few locks that kept their
place were of a dark hue untouched by years; his dress
was very plain, indeed it might have been accounted
mean for one of his lofty bearing, for though in the servitude
of irons, his eagle eye glanced around with as
haughty a gaze as a leader urging on the pursuit, and his
tread was as stately and as firm as though in that hall he
strode to meet the greetings of victory instead of the derision
of his conquerors; his brow was faintly wrinkled,
though his person was unbent and straight as a turret, so
that he might have been compared to one of those ancient
monuments, which time's half shadows half displays;
—this was Bayard, the proud Bayard—close behind him
stood the other, his companion in misfortune, of a younger
look and prepossessing countenance, though scarce attracting
the eye which was irresistibly fixed, from the moment
of his entrance, on the unbowing figure at his side.

“Nicholas Bayard and Walter Nichols,” said De Lanoy,
“you are arraigned before this Council, composed
of the chosen representatives of the province of New-Yorke,
and the true supporters of the glorious revolution,
charged with levying arms against the king, and that,
instigated by a vile and wicked spirit of opposition, you
have obstructed the faithful authorities and subjects of

the realm from rendering their just allegiance to the protestant
successor of the throne, and have withal, traitorously
joined in rebellion against the people. What answers
have you to make? Dare you, can you, sirs, disown
these high crimes?”

“Sirs, before your questions be satisfied,” replied Bayard,
“I do demand at whose command, by what authorized
power, nay, I would say, by what law, have you erected
this pretended tribunal? where is your charter for it?
and on what legal warrant am I detained here, in bonds
fitted alone for the culprit robber, or murderer? Why, I
say again, is a burgher, free and born among you, dragged
felon-like, as guilty of some lawless crime, from the peaceful
dwelling of his friends into this presence? Behold
these ignominious chains, alike upon my comrade there;—
Who is the man that dares thus violate the dearest privilege
of life, liberty? I repeat it, sirs, by what right am I
thus held?”

“Do your words seek us in scorn, or is your demand
serious, Nicholas Bayard?” inquired De Lanoy sternly.

“Ye can take it, sirs, even as ye are most willing to use
it,” responded the other in a firm though sneering tone.

“Hear him; he despises us! hear him; he contemns
our power!” cried several of the Council in anger.

Milbourne started threateningly from his seat, “Down
with his overweening pride. Nicholas Bayard, you do
forget yourself,” said he in a voice of rage, “we are no
more your slaves—bethink ye, haughty sir, whose manacles
you wear.”

“Speak to those who'll hear you, sir,” replied Bayard
scoffingly, “for I am used to mate with my equals; not
such as thou art.”

“By all the pains of hell!” thundered the other, “I'll
rip thy—”

“Peace, brother Milbourne, peace! calm thine anger,
however just,” quoth De Lanoy, restraining his upraised
arm; “this doth offence unto the dignity of this sitting;
let us pursue our duty with the prisoner.”

“'Tis well, Nicholas Bayard, that you are a bondsman,
or I had robbed the hangman of his office,” said Milbourne,

as he resumed his place. Bayard smiled, but
answered not a word.

“Prisoners, you stand before the Lieutenant Governor
of his Majesty's province of New Yorke,” continued De
Lanoy, “aided by his sworn and tried Council; in the
absence of the former constituted rulers, by commission
from the lords Carmarthen,Halifax,and others, Jacob Leisler
is empowered to take care for preserving the peace
and for administering the laws, until our high and mighty
sovereign, William of Orange, King of England, with further
and other orders—”

“I bow most humbly to thy swelling preamble of my
judge's titles, Peiter DeLanoy,” returned Bayard ironically;
yet with such sufficient command of features, that his
feelings were scarcely discoverable. “But I am an ignorant
man—therefore mayhap to enlighten me on my
darkness of mind, the wise and potent counsellor who
hath addressed me, will explain to me from whence his
excellency derived his commission once again; albeit
I am growing old—my ear may have deceived me; was
it said commissioned Governor?”

“Ah, Bayard!” said Milbourne quickly, “he did say
commissioned—and what dare you say against it?”

“Oh nothing—nothing,” replied Bayard carelessly,
“when it is backed by a bravo's dagger.”

“Sirs! is this insolence to be tolerated?” cried Milbourne,
choaking with passion.

“For shame Captain Milbourne! restrain this violence,”
said De Lanoy temperately.

“He has insulted one and all present—let him be remanded,”
said several of the council speaking tumultuously
at one breath.

“Nay Sirs!” answered De Lanoy, “it were not well
we should thus lose temper at his gibes—we are a calm,
deliberating court and by this conduct the accused criminal
doth but enlarge his guilt; yet, it is fit we should go
on with his examination, keeping his own rash words as
evidences against him—`for out of his mouth,' as it is
said, `let his judgment come.' Prisoners, listen to what
charges are preferred at you!”

“One word,” interrupted Bayard, “pardon for my
stopping you. You have termed us prisoners—I do allow
it—these irons speak the truth of such term; but ere you
proceed, I repeat, that I will not answer to one sentence
that you put to me, unless, as once before I intimated,
you do solve to me your master's commission—which
neither have I heard, nor do I believe exists;—and, what
is more than all, I'll wage my right hand that no such
hath been given by the king. To whatsoever legal dignity
Jacob Leisler boasts, I will cheerfully submit; but to
any self-assumed office, as a loyal subject, I cannot—nay,
by the living heavens! I will not subscribe the least
knowledge.”

“I am struck dumb by his unparalleled impudence—
who hath heard the like!” said the voice of the council,
after a pause of astonishment.

“Colonel Bayard, do you know you are throwing away
life as it were a thing not worth keeping,” pursued De
Lanoy.

“He is a madman—give him to the tortures! the provost-marshal's
thong will cool in short count his hot-headed
pride,” quoth divers of the members in great wrath.

“Nicholas Bayard, you and your companion have despised
us,” outspoke Milbourne loudly, and rising in his seat
with vehement gestures, “have questioned the stations
we hold with a degree of scorn that becomes your other actions;
and that, plain as the hand writing on the wall, hath
shown your hearts. It were needless, as are the feelings
of this tribunal of your judges, to go on and hear you defend,
or trouble ourselves to prove your crimes—suffice
it to say ere I give my vote, which you may well believe
is for death on all traitors, that you well know that in this
room there sits not a man who is not more than your equal.
We are your peers, haughty Sir! and I would advise, an
you desire to show sense, that you no more carry your
head higher than it can well bear. Remember, Sir, an
your loftiness can so far reflect, that the most soaring
branch of the forest, is the most like to be swept to earth
—and the hangman's cord hath tightened round a nobler
neck than thine, Nicholas Bayard.”

“Methinks I hear the busy anger and the puny hum of
an insignificant and spiteful wasp,” exclaimed Bayard,
calmly and proudly turning from Milbourne, “you see,
Sirs, his sting is venomous; but I am not ruffled by an
insect.”

“By my soul's welfare!” roared the other, nearly
bursting with uncontrollable rage, “but I'll rive that
tongue of thine from its roots.”

As he shouted these words he was about to rush upon
the captive, but many of the Council arose from their
places and withheld him, foaming with revenge and ire.

“Mien vriends, 'tis to nien burbose dat dis mensch ish
sbeak mit,” quoth the governor, “vor you zee zo as I
zee dat he maaks mien zon Yakoop kill himzel mit hish
gramschap; derevor tis regt dat you laat hem met
vreede.”

“Tis said true, that this cavilling doth ill become us,”
responded De Lanoy, “and the prisoner doth provoke
his own hurt.”

“Nay, dost think I fear a thing such as him?” said
Bayard with a smile of contempt, “let him alone—I am
rather old and chained, but that's no matter—I do not
tremble at him. Sirs, do not think I would descend to
make myself so low as to bandy more words with such a
tricked ape:—'sdeath! I should have fallen indeed were
it so. I will not, therefore, seek his malice—though I
despise it—I have nothing to do with him. But sirs,
to you of this self-constituted council I speak now, for I
do consider that by this my detention you do grievously
offend against the acknowledged rights of an English
subject; and mark you, knowing you have neither privilege
for the outrage that in my person you have committed,
nor the seal or signature of any one except your own besotted
ambition for thus forming yourselves into a court of authorized
powers, as ye wish to appear—I do caution you
how you proceed in any further violence against my friend
in durance and myself, so you may go through what forms,
trickeries, and make-game of trial you please, I shall no
more oppose you; and if you are bent on my blood I
care not—take it, I will not flinch from the axe that you

may guide against my head; deeming from my bold opposition
to what in your pursuit of power I term treason, I
have to expect little mercy from men who, to effect their
unlawful purposes have openly and wantonly leagued
with pirates and cut-throat robbers, and who are no better
themselves than vile, disloyal traitors.”

“Tis not worth our time to answer you; but from
you we must not listen to another sentence,” said De
Lanoy, “Secretary, read over the charges against
Nicholas Bayard and William Nichols.”

“Nicholas Bayard and William Nichols, hearken to
me,” read Abraham Gouverneur, for such was the name of
the governor's secretary, “you, Nicholas Bayard, it is here
laid unto you, have vilely and with selfish cupidity sought
and monopolized, in the late government of this province,
every office of honour and profit; that you have avariciously
and dishonestly used the emoluments of such
places, and indeed the public monies that have passed in
your hands, to enrich your own private purse, to maintain
your relations and partizans, and have turned that
very wealth so obtained against the colony; that you
have, with those arch traitors Van Kortlandt, Schuyler,
French, Wanham, Wessels, and others equally malignant,
disturbed the peace of this his Majesty's province of
New-Yorke, and have encouraged them, if not borne
arms yourself against the established authority; and have
acted otherwise in these matters most seditiously: in all of
which enormities, you, William Nichols, have wantonly
aided and abetted him; and for which you are now both
in custody, under warrant of high treason. And unless
you have withal to prove your innocence instantly, such
is the dreadful state to which your rebellious plans have
convulsed the province, that the council have commanded
me to announce to you, that without further trial or
inquiries they consider there is proof sufficient to condemn
you to death:—how say you?”

Both Bayard and his companion were silent, and returned
not a motion in answer, but stood firm and composed.

“I do not wonder at this conduct,” said De Lanoy,

partly addressing the Council and partly the prisoners,
“it is but natural for one of such an ambitious nature to
act, even at such a moment as this, as he has ever borne
himself; though loaded with guilt, though conscious of
the people's indignation, he has a pride to tower amid
crimes like the rebel angel. Speak Bayard, acknowledge
that you have been alone guided by ambition and the most
pitiful envy in your actions; for while you have been grinding
the colony of its very marrow, revelling in the profits
of the numerous offices you wrested by sycophancy and
intrigue from more deserving men; while you held yourself
above your fellow burghers with a pride insufferable,
catering, spaniel-like, to the libidinous pleasures, that in
their eyes you might have favour, of the licentious tyrants
that a bigotted monarch had deputised to rule over us;
hath not Jacob Leisler, our worthy compeer, and his
friends, strove and laboured with the very strength of
their bodies and their fortunes for the weal of the province;
seeking at every moment of life to unlock the fetters
such as you and yours were rivetting upon us? and
we have done it; and urged by that wicked idea, that
since you could not equal you would destroy, have you
not afterwards gone on?—shame! was it not too late after
the fight was ended, the victory won, for you to step forward
and tell that your heart had been ever with the good
cause; (why then not act?) but that you despised its
leaders, because we were not of such descent as you considered
the nobility of the land, the patentees of governors,
the Livingstons, the Schuylers, the Rombouts,
and such who had more pride and money than honour or
honesty. Have you not, recreant, on such foundation for
hatred, pursued the path of a false traitor? Have you
not opposed the progress of the protestant revolution?
Have you not scattered rebellion in every furrow you
could lay open to receive it? Have you not now been
taken in the very act for which you are arraigned? Answer—Have
you and your abettors, such as this tool
Nichols here, not done this and more than this I have
accused you of, and plainly, from what motive,—to gratify
disappointed pride; to thrust yourself in power for
which you had neither claims nor desert.”

“It were almost needless for me to say what you
must perceive, that as well as Colonel Bayard, I neither
recognize your powers here as a Court, nor do I deem it
necessary to seek your mercy,” replied William Nichols,
“therefore you but spend your breath, and may at once
as well do your worst.”

“They do not deny their guilt,” pursued De Lanoy,
“your voices, sirs; shall we proceed to pass sentence of
death upon the traitors?—Secretary, fill the warrant.”

One or two members hesitated, but the majority of the
Council bowed their heads at the words of De Lanoy in
token of approbation: for a moment among all, there was
a stern and solemn silence, unbroken except by the slight
sound of the pen with which the Secretary was swiftly
filling up the death warrant. The captives, with arms
enfolded, unbent, unmoved, gazed without the quivering
of a nerve upon the solemn preparation, in whose procedure
their lives appeared so intimately concerned. At
this important juncture, the door of the chamber was opened
of a sudden, and an officer of the hoofdwagt stood in
the entrance.

“Whence is this intrusion, Sir,” exclaimed Milbourne
angrily, “at a time when the Council are sitting with
closed doors? How now, Sir?”

“Pardon, good Sirs,” answered the officer, “I would
not have presumed, but there are two without, an Indian
and a boy, who urge to be introduced, being bearers as
they say of intelligence, at once of moment, alarming, and
important.”

“Keep silence! for your tongue's too free;” ejaculated
Milbourne, sternly: “Whatsoever it may be, they must
wait. See you not, Sir, we are engaged—busied, I say—
begone! though see they depart not till here we end.”
The soldier however lingered, “How now, Sir, why do
you stay? is there ought for you to do?”

“These persons tell me, Sir, that the matter must be
instantly known to the Governor, which they seek to
communicate, and so momentous is it, they say, that
unless instantly acted on, the cause may be destroyed and
our enemies triumphant.”

“Ha! what can this mean?” exclaimed many of the
Council, “they had best be heard.”

“Not until Bayard's death warrant is signed—sealed
irrevocably!” cried Milbourne impetuously.

“Zon, Yaakoop Milbourne,” said Leisler, “myn vreints
zay dese mensch must sterven, dat is, die—I must zay
zo. By myne trouwe dough, I dinks 'tis well to be kool
in de matters, zo I dink de Indiaan and der jongen must
inkoomen, und het most noodzaaklyk zoo zyn.

“You may admit these importunate strangers,” said
De Lanoy.

The officer withdrew, but in a few seconds returned,
accompanied by the Indian and the boy, who have before
filled so conspicuous a part in this narrative.

“Well, stripling, for the attainment of what object,”
sought Milbourne, “at an hour so unseasonable, have you
intruded on us?”

“My business was with the Governor, and with him
alone. I entered here not thinking to meet all these who
set around me.”

“Boy, this is but idle,” exclaimed De Lanoy impapatiently,
“if your reports are of a nature that interests
the public welfare, to one and all here it should be known
without evasion; if it is, after all, but some private communication,
you have done wrong—you have highly trespassed
on our patience, and richly deserve punishment
for your audacity in thus thrusting yourself and follower
on us at a time when we were debating on life and death.”

“On life and death?” repeated the boy in a voice
thrilling and anxious, and directing his eyes on the prisoners,
“then I have come in time. I see it now,—forbear,
I do forbid you to imbrue your hands in the blood of those
men who stand manacled before you; touch not a hair of
their heads draw not an angry sword against them; for
your own safety forbear them; harm them not as you wish
for life yourselves.”

“Rash youth! how dost thou dare—what hath sent
thee here?” exclaimed De Lanoy in amazement.

“How hath this thing of idiocy been allowed to come
within this presence?” ejaculated Milbourne.

“The prisoners should have been withdrawn, nor have
met the sight of this strange madman,” echoed another.

“Nay, friends of Jacob Leisler, think me not mad, nor
look on me as a foe, for there is not among you one who
loveth in his heart you aged man, whom you have dressed
in robes of power, like unto me, and soon ye will know
it,” said the boy, “for even in what I now advise, that
the lives of Bayard and his associate be spared; I speak
for the good of all—hear what I have to say, then judge
me—but first let your prisoners be withdrawn, for what I
have to tell is not as yet for their hearing.”

“The ragged losel speaks far above his condition,”
said De Lanoy, “shall it be granted, Sirs?”

A consent to their being removed having been obtained,
Bayard and Nichols were conducted out of hearing.

“Now you have your wish,” said Milbourne hastily,
after the departure of the prisoners, “be quick and explicit
in what you have to say, and see it be of consequence,
that you would fain have it, for the doings of
men are not put off, nor their resolutions tampered with,
unpunished. So at once let us know all you have to inform
this Council of—speak boy!”

“Angerous sir, did not my kindness for your father
outweigh the insults of your unmannered haste,” returned
the youth calmly, “I might be tempted to remain in silence,
nor give a satisfaction to what you seek; but
though from you I lack encouragement, yet I want not
care for others who are here, and therefore intend not to
keep secret my knowledge. Sirs, it is well ye learn that
last night there landed on this island an officer from England,
deputed by the king as governor of this province
—supplied with all necessary powers, papers and authorities,
to rule the people of this distracted colony.”

It would be difficult to describe the varied feelings of
those present at this information. Astonishment, doubt,
fear and dread were depicted in every visage. Some
started from their seats, not knowing what they were doing—others
fell back on their settles, pale and amazed—
the eyes of all were on the boy.

“Can this be certain,” inquired one at length.

“I swear most true; as heaven is my judge I speak
not false,” answered the stripling, “and here is one—
this Indian, who can confirm what I have told to you.”

“And who are you,” questioned Milbourne at the
savage.

“I am one who, like a lingering ember of the council
fire, lives through loving not life after my race hath expired,”
replied the red man in a voice of sorrow, low and
mournful, “I am one who, like the last stalk that remains
in the field after the tempest is past, hath no joy that it is
spared, to be a lonely emblem of desolation. The grave
I seek will soon be my habitation, for with grief hath the
strength of my arm grown to decay, and I feel my feet
will no more serve me in the chace—yet I know the
truth of the brave youth who hath spoken with you of
the Corlear.[14] Brothers, the White Skinned Beaver tells
not a lie, his lips have ever been white with truth.”

“This is most strange intelligence—have none heard
of this before?” sought De Lanoy.

“In coming hither it had almost slipt my memory, so
little credence gave I to the story,” said one of the counsellors;
“there was placed in my hand, in a most soiled
and wretched state, a paper: an epistle purporting to be
from one who styles himself Tribulation Wholesome, and
signifies himself as my protestant friend and well wisher,
who states, that last night, towards the city he journeyed
in company with one who he has reason to believe was a
person of consequence, albeit a man from beyond sea.
In his language he calls him a `crowned Saul, anointed
to rule over our Israel.' Deeming it the effusion of some
busy madman—though lucre, for what in his opinion
seems most valuable information, appears to be his object,
I scarce perused it; but its contents have returned
upon my mind in confirmation of what is now told
us. Natheless at its reception I was fain to pass it, unable
to fathom its sense or bearing.”

“An this be as is said, there will be clouds above us,”
said one.

“Clouds! rather say a tempest hath begun which will
sing our dirge,” exclaimed another.

“The hounds upon our coast must have grown weary
of the scent of blood,” muttered a third.

“Or who knows but the other party may have paid
heaviest, and promised more than we have,” whispered
a fourth, “robber, pirate, devil, all he thinks or seeks for
is gold, gold.—What is to be done?”

“Sirs, ye seem struck with amaze,” cried Milbourne
impatiently, “what matters all this; shall it save Bayard?
have we not voted his death—shall he not die?”

“We should be cautious, Captain Milbourne, in what
we do,” quoth one or two of the council.

“As we have not notice of this new governor's coming
may it not be that he is favourable to Bayard and his
friends,” joined others.

“We must do nothing rash, it is not safe nor prudent;
nay, it becomes us to do nothing rash,” echoed many of
the members.

“By heaven, sirs! this would wreck the patience of
virtue itself,” cried Milbourne, rising exasperated from
his settle, “what means this change among you? Do I
hear you aright? are you men of soul and heart, or are
you like the craven, who boasts that he fears not dangers
—but when they confront him he trembling hides his recreant
head? What hath wrought this change among
you? Admit the truth of what these persons tell us—
what doth it avail to us? Are ye heart stricken at the
step of a man of whose authority we yet know nothing?
How if these here, who have so busied themselves, are
hired by our enemies to hatch this tale? What, are you
palsied—are you stricken to slaves at the sound of an approach
of a tyrant—are you ready to throw down your
freedom, and like the timorous spaniel crouch at your
master's feet before you see him? Is it this we have
toiled and laboured for—at an alarm to surrender at discretion
all our rights? On my soul ye are a noble set,
startled by a shadow—slain by a trumpet blast—conquered

by the description of a lance! It frets me to hear and
see you act thus:—have you no firmness—no resolution
to dare and die—no spirit except such as actuates a wanton
child, who after his mischief eager snaps at the first
moment of repentance? If it be true that King William
hath been so far misled, either by our enemies or by the
false faith of our envoy, Jost Stoll, to bestow the government
of this province on other than my father, ungratefully
forgetting his services towards the success of the revolution
to which he owes his throne—I say for one, let
us be well assured of our own safety—our lives—our
dearest liberties, ere we tamely deliver up our present
power and sovereignty; if we have been dealt unfairly
by, we can guard ourselves from further wrong—and we
have about us, in arms and means, enough to show those
who wish us ill, that we are able to bid them to their
teeth defiance. And to show the firmness of our intentions,
let the bloody heads of those two attainted and condemned
traitors be placed at once upon the ramparts towards
the city, so that their partizans may learn that
every step they take against our established rule, is with
the executioner's axe ready at their seditious throats.”

“Jacob Milbourne, I must speak for my own part, and
I may, I am assured, say, for that of most here present,”
said Edsell, shaking with age as he spoke, “there is none
of us who are wont to depart from the cause we pledge
ourselves to support, nor do I think such is the intention
now, and yet, under all circumstances, I have given it
more thought, I cannot assent to the death of these men;
nay frown not, nor look on me with flashing eye—you are
a younger man than I am, you want experience, Sir, the
world is not learnt in a day; my head is white, quite
white, I lack a year of fourscore, and you see I tremble,
but mark, I affirm it, it is neither for fear of your haughty
looks or living man; but age—age, Sir, hath a wondrous
knack at unsettling a man's steadiness of limbs;
still it gives what want of years hath not, prudence, Sir,
and mayhap wisdom. I repeat it, I do not consider it
proper at this time to put in force our late determination
with respect to Nicholas Bayard and Walter Nichols.”

“And I answer you, passing your touches on youth and
inexperience, which is a chorus worn out by sly old
dotards to conceal their duplicity,” replied Milbourne
fiercely striking his hand upon the haft of his rapier;
“Albeit, youth be hot, stirring, and headstrong, age is
more in its cool reflection akin to rank cowardice—I do
proclaim it, nor will I recall the word, that he that backs
not the late decision, he that gainsays the resolve of Bayard
and Nichols' execution, is not more than a lukewarm
friend, or rather a rank foe to the cause and the house
of Jacob Leisler, and as well deserves to grace the provost
marshal's rope as the worst rebel that hath plotted with
Van Kortlandt against us; and now you have heard my
thoughts, where is the man that likes them not?” The
Council rose from their seats.

“If we are to be browbeat into opinions, we had better
dissolve,” said one.

“If we are to have our voices forced from us by threats,
we may as well depart at once,” exclaimed another.

“The oldest man among us to be treated so? we had
as well be ruled by Bayard,” added several.

“Our master's wish is to be crammed down our throats
—we are to have no will,” followed others.

“For the love of Heaven, Sirs; for our own sakes,
Milbourne, Edsell, hear me, Sirs, hear me,” interposed
De Lanoy, “what are you about? will you destroy yourselves?
Will you, like the Eastern bird, suck your own
blood? What are you about to do? Anger is of a moment's
birth, but of years in life—this is wild, wild! Do
not for this idle bickering sacrifice the dearest interests
of us all. Edsell, you know Milbourne is quick and taketh
fire like the dried leaves of the last winter—Milbourne,
though you may suppose wrong hath been, there is something
due to age. Do not act like madmen; this is a time
you should forget all fueds; a time when things like this
should be far from our assemblage. If it be so that an
armed enemy approaches from without, is it politic that
within our walls we raise sharp weapons against our own
bosoms, and give, by our own hands, victory without the
levelling of an adverse spear.”

“Mien vreints, dis iz pad; dis dosh kreib mien zeil
do hish gore, by myne trouwe,” entreated the governor,
“Myne zon, Yaakoop Milbourne, mien regt hand is gut,
mien vreint, Edsell, be gool; mien vreints, I ish gilt mit
dis und't staat in u lieder magt me te behouden.”

Although both Leisler and De Lanoy anxiously exerted
themselves to soothe the wounded feelings of the exasperated
assembly, and heal the breach which had so
imprudently been made by the fiery and unreflecting
Milbourne, it was some time ere matters were adjusted,
so that the members resumed their places: and even
then in most bosoms there had come a change of heart
towards their leader. Like a drop of spreading and virulent
poison in the wholesome liquor of the goblet, had
been the words that had dropt from the disputants' lips;
and, unmindful of every consequence, actuated by the
fiery torch that lighted their breasts, they gazed at each
other with scornful eyes; and the sharp look of contempt
and hate alternately moved their swelling features: indeed,
the hearts of many were weaned from the cause
they might have heretofore ardently espoused—the blade
was unsheathed, the deadly and parting blow had been
given, and low, dark whispers passed between Edsell and
his friends; and besides, there were some, on whom the
conduct of Milbourne had no impression, and these were
by far of the greatest number present, who sat as friends
of Leisler for the last time, although now their hearts, (if
they had such things,) were harassed by hopes and fears,
waiting but for a certainty of the intelligence that had
been communicated, to fly the party which they now,
in their interested calculations, deemed must inevitably
fall; and among these were many who had been nothing
but for Leisler; who, from the base dunghills of their
birth, had warmed themselves to influence in his smiles;
yea, those, as in the like cases, on whom the greatest
favours had been heaped—who had really sworn to live
and die by the fortunes of their patron, with faith and
oath as light as the dip of the rower's oar, striking the
water, fickle as lovers' anger, and as quickly forgot,—
were the first to plan his destruction, and the first to prepare

to desert him in his adversity, even before that
adversity was fairly at his side, with her lean and iron
hand to pull him to the earth. Yet it must be said, there
were some, (though these were few,) who if not grateful
for former protection, felt that their chance hung on the
faction to which they had attached themselves; for so zealous
had been their faith, that little mercy was for them to be
looked for, should their opponents succeed: and with the
resolute ambition of the condemned criminal, who, at the
scaffold's brink puts on the look of unconcern and courage,
unwinking of eye and untrembling in step, ambitious
even in wrong—they were firm and resolved in purpose
to brave the worst, in very despair. In a short time, the
attention of the Council was again engrossed with the
Indian and his youthful companion. “Stripling,” inquired
Beekman of the boy, “were you aware of what consequence
was this that you have told us? For what reason
have you made yourself so officious and interested in
this business? Have you been stimulated by an expectancy
of reward?—or beware how you attune your young
lip to falsehood!—have you lent yourself to forward the
designs of others?”

Hast thou wantonly lied, child, confess;” fiercely
spoke Milbourne, “for an thou deceivest on this
matter, by my soul, thy shrift shall be short, and thy
gallows as high a one as ever stood on the commons.”

“It were better for thee, youngster, an thou hast been
employed by the adherents of the unfortunate and condemned
men who have been remanded hence at thy
coming, under sentence of death, by this as a stratagem to
save them, that thou tellest true; for thou hast put thyself
within the serpent's den, and if it prove not as thou hast
said, albeit, thy life hast thou thrown away, as it were, a
pebble, worthless, and to be picked from the ground as
soon as cast there,” sternly added De Lanoy.

“Thou seed of ill! who art thou? As I do look upon
thee, there is something that striketh me I have beheld
thee, ere now;—where has it been?” cried Milbourne
again, suddenly and abruptly speaking before the boy could
answer the questions that had been asked of him, at the

same time approaching close to him, and strongly grasping
his shoulder,—“by the life of me, thou seemest like
one I should know, yet I doubt; though sooth wert thou
an angel that hast stepped between Bayard and destruction,
it shall not save him.”

“White man, the claw of the panther is too heavy
for the neck of the gentle fawn,” exclaimed the savage,
as he struck the arm of Milbourne roughly from its
hold on the youth. “If you love the blood that
sports round thy heart, harm not the brave youth
by thy touch of anger; for did Quider[15] himself lay
the weight of the wild bird feather on him, and the White
Skinned Beaver was at hand, he would put the chain of
friendship with the nation in the ground forever, and his
tomahawk should drink his life as greedy as the wolf laps
the waters of the spring.”

“What, would the Indian dog slay me?” ejaculated
Milbourne, retreating in surprise. “Why,—ho!—who
stands on guard?

As Milbourne uttered these words with something like
alarm in his motion, he repeated his call in summons to
the attendants who might be in waiting without the apartment,
to secure this unexpected and determined adversary,
lest his dangerous threat should be put in force.
The youth, however, interposed in favour of his wild and
dauntless friend.

“Be not in such haste, Jacob Milbourne,” said he,
“thou hast started without cause; there is no need of
fear nor of the presence of a myrmidon at thy side, to
lend thee an arm's defence. I trust from us thou shalt
have no harm; in sooth, I have been most ready to accord
to thy seeking all that I were able; albeit, rude forms
and ruder words are not wont to obtain speedy answers.”

“On my soul, youngster, methinks thou carriest a
most lofty guise that doth belie thy ragged jerkin,” said

De Lanoy, regarding the stripling with a look of wonder
and inquiry, “either thou hast little deference for the
presence thou art in, or, as your language,—your looks
declare, and as before I shrewdly have suspected, thou
art other than thou seemest.—Speak, sir, without prevarication,
for such here shall not serve your design—who
are you, and why thus disguised? We are not to be
played with; be brief, and let us know your meaning?”

“Ja! mien mensch—dat's mien goot klein mensch
sbeak,” eagerly added Leisler himself, who for some
time had been gazing on the boy with evident and increasing
emotion, and was apparently moved by a doubtful
and uncertain interest, attracted by the familiar looks
of the object of his observation. He anxiously leaned
forward to catch the reply, and to scan more minutely,
the features of the stripling. “Mien zeil! I ish in der
groot berblexidy: I ish in twyfel staan; dou sdardles
mien hertz mit dien stem, dien vace, mien got, nien!
het is niet zo. Om God's wille sbeak mien klein mensch.”

“It is not in vain sirs, that you have called on me to
unfold the character I bear,” replied the boy; “for with
you it seems most questionable; yet you that thus seek
at me have stood even in your own light, for had the
chance heretofore been free, I had not been backward in
my relation—howbeit, the words have swelled unto my
lips from the moment of my entrance, and I do confess,
so eager have I been, that my heart yearned against the
suppression that my utterance hath received; nor do I
now refuse to answer you; for I am one of all that wanton
fortune hath ever frowned on most to meet your commiseration.
You look on me in wonder; your eyes gaze
with strange glances upon me, as though even on the
onset you would doubt that which I would tell. Yet
believe me, though thus young of years, smooth of brow,
and tender of form, my short life hath been too poor a
sacrifice to appease with its unceasing misery the inveterate
malice of unrelenting misfortune. He that liveth
on in sorrow without change, forgets the name of happiness,
becomes inured—yea, gloats in pleasure in his
wretchedness, and finds enjoyment in his melancholy
course of tears—another state to such who never counted

on it, were to lose an accustomed companion; for
the death and danger that had clogged his weary steps
had engrafted with existence. But he who plunged in
trouble, hath his soul ever wrapt in hope, builds on the
hour of his release, and with pleased imagination, feasts
on the expected presence of the happiness to come;
—whose only shadow brings more joy than all the substance
of the world besides. And then think ye of his
wild despair, when he hath toiled unto the gates of his
high-wrought paradise, and sees them shut, even at the
moment he prepares to enter. His hope of day is gone;
night, irremediable night is on him—the chord on which
his being hung is snapt in twain:—like the mother, who
inconsolable, hath raised the death song over the carved
gravestone of her first born, all that he doted on hath departed
forever. Nay, sirs, you bend dark brows upon
me, and your lips mutter with impatience: bear with me but
awhile, for this is not an idle allegory to dally with your time
—hear my tale, then judge me:—for a few brief months
have scarcely flitted away unto the devouring bosom of the
past, since bliss and pleasure was my portion—bliss, rather
such as is the envied lot of those who dwell in Elysian
bowers, than the chance of persecuted humanity; (what
can exceed?) wealth and luxury were mine, fond and
anxious parents, and troops of admiring friends surrounded
my course of life, like the gay clouds, that tinged with
ethereal glory, hang in many coloured masses about the
path of the day god. But this hath not lasted; it is
gone by and left its memory alone, faint, though beautiful
as marble, seen but by the moonlight ray. Fate so appointed,
that to perfect the interest of my family, I left
my home, to seek beyond the dark and dangerous seas, a
ruling clime to which that of my birth was tributary. I
left my home, and returned, but worn and wasted by the
passages through which I had gone. Think then of my
misery, when having escaped the most fearful and unheard
of dangers, the repetition of which alone would
freeze the blood, I stood within the hall where I parted
from my family's arms, glowing with affection; albeit, in
that very hall and presence I was unknown, unrecognised,
a stranger unmeet for greetings of love.”

“Mien Got! mien groot got!” cried Leisler, starting
in great agitation from his seat; “ish mien eysh regt,
—does ik zee regt—mien kind!—mien schildt!—mien zon!”

During the time that the youth had been speaking, the
stout frame of the Governor shook with emotion; now
he passed his trembling hands across his brows as if to
awaken recollection, while his quick and eager sight read
with fast recognition through the changes that hardship
had wrought on the well known countenance of the stripling;
and now he drew back irresolute, for doubt at times
usurped, for could he believe that squalid garb robed the
frame of his favourite offspring? could he trace in those
hollow and wan features darkened by the exposures to
wind and sun, the white and tender lily of his garden?
that voice so sweet, so thrilling, like the notes of wanton
birds carolling as they swim in the summer's downy atmosphere,
had changed to a tone deeper and manlier than
he had been accustomed to hear it; and in truth but few,
in that feeble and emaciated child, a sapling, in its green
and growing years, over which the hurricane had went in
anger, could have remembered the gay and sportive boy,
whose eye shone in pleasantry, and whose cheek glowed
with health; indeed suffering and toil had worked such
difference in both form and face, that it would have taken
time, yea, for the mother that had borne him, to have
known the altered features of her child; but ere he had
heard him through, with outstretched arms and panting
heart, Leisler rushed forward from the place where he
had been seated—

“Father! dear father!” cried the boy, and parent and
child tottered in each other's arms.

“Mien Arnyte! mien kind! van ieder be minde,” said
Leisler, folding the youth in a long and close embrace,
“mien vlower von mien hertz! Art dou here in mien arm?
laat my zee in dien sveed vace, mien schildt.”

“Dear father! this is payment for all I have suffered;
your heart beats against mine—you did not forget your son.”

“Vorgets! mient Got! vorgets dee? nien, nien, Arnyte;
buts Ik did nien dink to zee dee, and dou beest
altered in dien vace, mien kind. Vorget! I weenen,—

mien tears comsh vrom mien ogten at dien ward vorget—
Arnyte, dou makes de vrouw mit mien ogten.”

“Good parent,” said the stripling, pressing Leisler's
hand to his bosom, “pardon my idle, foolish, weak disguise;
let it not give thee pain. That which I have
borne from others had made me act the child even with
thee; think not of it—I am you know as yet but a mere
thoughtless boy—I would not grieve thee for a moment,
or drive the slightest thorn into thy breast, so help me
heaven, to save my limbs from rack. Father, thy tears
are hot upon my forehead; let me kneel, and at thy feet
do penance for my rude, ungenerous conduct.”

“Op zyne knien, mien kind; nien, nien, mien arm shall
geeb dee virst at mien hertz.”

And again and again the parent and the child were
held and entwined in each other's arms, and it was long
ere the unbounded raptures of this unexpected meeting
had subsided, so that the bystanders could interfere with
their gratulations, which, though many times sincere and
at least well meant from all, were but cold formalities to
the overflowing joy of Leisler and his son, who, for a considerable
time after their very strength had become exhausted
by their embraces, gazed with eyes sparkling
and swimming in tears on each other, and their hands
clasped together, scarce heeding aught around them; nor
did their full hearts find relief until both had wept like
infants: however, after some time their minds became
more composed, and the boy was addressed by others
who were present.

“I am glad, right glad, to see thee, brother-in-law, Arnyte,”
quoth Milbourne, “howbeit, somewhat surprised,
for we had deemed thee now at Whitehall, furthering
with the new king our father's interest, though having
not heard from or of you, since first you sailed on such
important embassy; albeit, as I have always said, unmeet
for one so young—there were those who went far to whisper
a suspicion that you had as little care for the cause
as it was thought of ensign Jost Stoll who was sent out
before you, and who spent his time, instead of intriguing at
Hampton Court, among the rank pannels and canvass of
daubing limners.”

“Ever rude, ever unkind and harsh,” retorted Arnyte
upraidingly “was it well to taunt me with such unfounded
accusations, which have their rise alone in your own
jealous and fretful brain, Jacob Milbourne;—at a time like
this too? for shame! and still I thank you, for I will at
once to all here relate that which hath befel me, and show
that the business on which I was dispatched was hindered
me by the hand of fate alone; for although the vessel
in which I embarked, at first rode the cleaving tide
proud and safely as a warrior bestrides his noble charger,
yet we had scarce left the coast behind, ere the face of
the treacherous and smiling ocean changed, and soon a
dreadful tempest drove our bark to pieces and whelmed
all the life that had peopled its ribbed frame, except myself,
within the yawning deep; a scatterling of the wreck
to which, in my despair, I clung, bore at the mercy of the
destructive element my frame, until, almost but for this
restoration, I would say better had I perished than to be
so reserved, from the waters I was rescued by the rude
hand of a barbarous corsair—in his bondage have I lived,
for having learnt my real name and rank, he considered
me a valuable hostage for the protection of his flag, and
in his hands I have endured to the full extent all that life
could bear: blows, wounds have I received, and performed
for savage murderers the most menial offices; the
more cruel was the tasker's usage, as they believed me
harmless, wanting the most useful faculties of life, while
with hopes of escape, I encouraged their mistake, and of
such loss, when taken from the sea, my dreadful and
speechless state had given them a proof. I cannot tell
all that I have suffered: under the Indian sun, the midnight
storm, the tornado of other climes, suffice, I have
dragged through all and yet am here. Late the marauders'
route of plunder bent towards this, my own country,
and last night, on a secret enterprise, a select party landed
from their floating den of blood and crime; I was taken
with them—at the destined spot, the accustomed haunt
of Kid upon this island, this noble forester, journeying,
as I understand, after having slain a vile and deadly foe,
towards the river, craved the pirate's shelter; expecting

no hindrance in their purposes from one of his appearance
it was not denied—the object of the landing was
known to all the band, and relying on their error as to
my situation, they freely discussed their horrid intentions
before me, and I learned that a king's messenger, bearing
despatches to this province, with orders known to be destructive
to the prosperity of the freebooters and their
upholders, had been early in the twilight set ashore at
Harleam, from a vessel that had arrived from England
and lay off the sound. By a planned stratagem, a person
in their interest guided the officer to the murderous hands
of the desperado, and whilst they were busied about his
capture, I found my Indian friend here was willing to assist
me if the opportunity offered for escape.”

“But this man! this messenger! speak! what of him?
what became of him?” hastily interrupted De Lanoy.

“From an incautious companion the rover had cause
to suspect him a person of some standing, and therefore
determined not to wet his steel with his blood, but to
bear him to some wild and desolate key in the Caribbean
Ocean, and there leave him to perish with a cruise of
water and a day's subsistence; for so the robber argued,
that as long as the life of a powerful man was not directly
taken by him, he should have little to count for, if it
should chance that justice should o'ertake him in his
wicked path. But Providence, through my weak means,
had ordered against the freebooter's designs, and ere
they searched him I managed to wile from his mistrustful
charge the documents the officer carried, and kept them
safe for him; while his disappointed captors urged against
him every brutal cruelty in their rage. And to convince
you that his rank was such as I have said, and which the
bandit had supposed, and that for my father's sake it was
well he was preserved, while in my possession a document
loosened by accident from the package, and was so
forced on my observation: it contained directions of a
private nature from the Prime Minister of England to the
bearer, who was addressed by the name and title of Colonel
Henry Sloughter, Governor of his Majesty's Province
of New-Yorke, in North America, and therein he

was requested on his arrival in this colony, to proceed
secretly and forthwith to the residence of Nicholas
Bayard, who was termed their Majesties' worthy and loyal
subject, and to consult with him on the surest method of
calming the disturbed and distracted province, and bringing
peace to all parties”

“What, peace! he, Bayard, bring peace in the colony
—ay, it would be such peace as wolves keep with lambs
—signed in the best blood of his opposers,” cried Milbourne
furiously.

“Are you sure the paper was as you relate, Arnyte
Leisler,” sought many of the council.

“I am not deceived in its purport, and am confirmed
by the conduct of Colonel Sloughter after our release
from the murderous grasp of Kid, that—”

“Then he has escaped clear, unhurt from the rover's
ball and steel—safe did you say,” inquired De Lanoy.

“Thus far, Peiter De Lanoy, I am assured—that the
credentials of Colonel Henry Sloughter, as Governor of
this province of New-Yorke, were publicly announced and
acknowledged by the adherents and followers of the
Bayard party, more than an hour past, and Governor
Sloughter himself hath placed his head quarters at
Bayard's Bouwerie for the present.”

“And this man, this Sloughter,” pursued De Lanoy,
“hath by you slipped through the nets that Kid wove
for him:—rash hairbrained boy, what have you done,—
by heaven, by your means we are destroyed, utterly
destroyed.”

“If thou believest, urged by a vexed and thwarted
spirit,” returned Arnyte, firmly, “that I, Peiter De Lanoy,
in lending my feeble aid to providence in the rescue
of Colonel Sloughter from those bloody and cruel men
in whose chains we both were suffering, have acted
wrong and unwise—I answer, that though foolish, I may
have done, ill, I have not—for if situated as we were,
there is a human being who would have taken another
course in existence, then let him declare it. It is well
my breast holds not a kindred with such, for an I thought
it did, I would tear this casement of flesh apart, anddrag

the foul secret forth, that it might meet the spurning tread
of all men—that the stony heart might wither in the dust,
nor disgrace the tenement that had held it.—I am young,
and may to the cold statesman's ear talk wild; and in his
selfish calculations, that in which I have been an instrument
of heaven's mercy, I may be deemed to have been
most indiscreet: be it so—my own conscience doth acquit
me of all evil; and yet I judge, that even on the
score of policy, the preservation of Colonel Sloughter's
life by me were not of such little moment, or of bad
augury,—for can he that was saved from the assassin's
thirsty knife, by the son of Liesler detest or seek to injure,
although so tried by enemies, the parent of his deliverer.
Yet, be it as it will, let the worst come—the dripping
axe of the headsman, and the bloody block of the
scaffold for us all—wantonly I would not dip my hands in
human blood; for had I tamely stood by, having the
power to preserve, I were not better than the murderer
—yet as it is, Sirs, hear me, though I know you may say
and think that I speak bold and forward for one so brief
of years, so young as I am,—yet believe me, (and pardon
my warmth, for your words wound me deeply,) I have
the soul, though as you know, in other matters, a weak
and childish one—still in this, to bear all the malevolence
of fortune and wordly affliction, yea, very racks and tortures,
beyond life's endurance, rather than aid by my forbearance,
as ye do seem to have desired,—a crime so
vile and rank, accursed by man and God—and this I speak
for truth.” When Arnyte finished speaking, there was
a short pause.

“To waste time thus, in a contention of words, helps
not;” spoke out with petulent haste, one of the council.
“What has happened cannot be now reversed;—this we
know, that a person has landed and is among us, claiming
the authority of a ruler from the king. Its certainty is
not for us to dispute, I fear: therefore if we mean to
act, it doth straitway become us to prepare therefor—
what is to be done ought to be proceeded on without delay.
I demand your opinions, sirs;—what say ye should be
our course?”

There was for awhile a deep and momentous silence,
each one awaiting, anxious and breathless, to hear what
would be said by the others, and fearful and hesitating to be
the first to break the doubtful and somewhat awful stillness
that reigned in the council, or become a leader in any
measure which the importance of the occasion demanded.
It were a study of the worldly nature of man to have viewed
the countenances of that assemblage, whose feelings
were painted thereon, to the accurate observer, as strongly
as the reflective mirror exhibits the very self of the person
who gazes into its smooth and glittering visage.
Here was the vacillating spirit, ready to change, and
quick to steer any course pointed out at the instant, seeking
with inquiring eye, the face of some prudent leader,
whose tract its owner had been accustomed to follow:—
and here were the deep brows drawn in contact, and the
hard and obstinate features set in unbending form, of
such as had determined their own course, let that come
which would; and who only refrained from breaking
forth at once, that they might be the more confirmed in
the right of their own minds, from the opposition of
others: and there were some, whose curled and scornful
lips, and sneering look, as they glanced at the disturbed
countenances around, bespoke their impatience of many,
and the malignity with which they viewed and were set to
receive, all that came from those to whom they felt disaffected;
and, lastly, among all these there were those
(and of these there were but few) upon whose calm collected
fronts, like on a smooth pillar of marble, there
was no sign or mark to read that which passed within—
these were such whom long career of days had robbed
of all outward appearance of passion—whom experience
had taught command of every index of their thoughts, and
who, cold and prudent, uninterested in all except themselves,
patiently awaited that which should come, cautious,
and without betrayal of their sentiments—it was, in
truth, an interesting and agitated interval.

“Will it please ye, Sirs, for me to deliver that which
I have thought to advise,” at length said Samuel Edsell,
rising from his place slowly, after having waited sometime,

and resting his wrinkled band on the back of his
seat as if to support more firmly his aged and trembling
frame, and then looking on the faces of those about him
as if at once to read in their returning glances their assent
and accordance of sentiments to his own, and in a strong
tone, which, however, from the falling in of his lips, and
the loss of the teeth by age that had supported them, gave
to his words a peculiar and whispering enunciation, he
pursued: “I have lived too long in this world, and seen
too much of its vanities and changes, as you may all well
know, to make up my mind and give that which I hold as
my opinion rashly and unreflected on, or for the sake of
hearing that which others may have to say, better that I
may quit the ground that I had taken—having only advanced
my word that I might snap at another's—but let
that pass; that the advance which I shall make may not
suit either the temper of some or even the judgment of all
here present, I am somewhat aware—I may be wrong,
for we are all liable to errors, yet it is natural, though it
may be ill of me to say so, that one who hath experienced
something, and hath much at stake, honour, fortune, and
family, should be less prone to advise or be ready to lead
an evil way than such as are foreign in birth and but blustering
adventurers among us, who have nothing but their
blood to part with, which were not worth the draining—
nay, interrupt me not; no person here can be harmed by
my remarks: all know I mean no disrespect to any honourable
member who hath a place with us—nay, I will
say it was but a passing observation—well, no matter, let
it go for nought, my intention was to show how much I
held the interest of the province at heart—and that were
needless for me to repeat here, where those who are my
friends are assembled. In this province have I lived
since birth; I am a yeoman of Queen's county, and so was
my father before me—he was one of the first settlers, and
his bones are laid there, God assoilzie him, and I hope
that this withered body of mine may rot in this my native
land, without a curse from my posterity; leaving them an
honest name, such as my ancestors have left to me—beshrew
me, ye may well suppose I wish not to court disgrace—albeit,
I am not envious of a traitor's title, nor has
this neck of mine supported this head, scanty of locks and
bald as it is, mayhap worthless in more youthful eyes,
for the executioner's mark to whet his skill by severing
it from the parent body, as is the fate of rebels to their
liege sovereign, and opposers to his will—no, let disobedient
servants suffer such deserved penalties; but for us,
Sirs, of this Council, be a different pursuit:—at once let
the gates of this place be opened, and in a body let us go
forth and meet the favoured subject of King William, Colonel
Henry Sloughter, Governor of the province of New
Yorke, and for the furtherance of this desired object, I hope
that measures for his honourable reception will be taken,
and that immediately Jacob Leisler, as in duty bound, prepare
to vacate the station which he hath so faithfully held in
trust for this expected moment, and for which he deserves,
for the excellent discharge of duties assigned him heretofore,
the united thanks of the whole colony; and that the
course is simple, a deputation from among us set out to
deliver our tender congratulations to his excellency, and
learn his wishes concerning our offices.” Edsell resumed
his seat, while something like applause and approval
went through the Council, but which, although a sign of
the feelings of many, was somewhat repressed by expectancy
of what might be further said.

“Methinks I have heard aright, and yet natheless, I
count not on threescore years,” cried Milbourne, starting
abruptly on his feet, nearly as soon as his opponent had
concluded, while, as he spoke, his eye flashed like fire,
his lip grew white and trembling with the fierce emotions
of his disturbed breast, which, as he strove to restrain
from bursting forth in their fury, affected his utterance.
At first, a sneering, spiteful smile, if so it could be termed,
sat on his flushed visage, and his voice and words were
in accordance; but as he proceeded, his rage seemed to
overleap the bounds of its confinement, and his tones
grew harsh, thick, and in the end, almost unintelligible;
“Yes! yes! thank God I have not the hypocrisy of age
to plead with! I have not grey locks to call in witness—
nor can I prate of coolness or experience on the score of

years; but this I can do, and for it I have lived in this
world long enough, I can, at a glance, see through the
borrowed mask of disinterestedness, with which vile,
black-hearted men seek to cover their traitorous and selfish
designs. I am young—nay, not so young neither, but
what I can detect a specious villain, and know when the
winter-frozen adder feels the heat, that he is the first to
sting the foolish peasant who hath nursed him—yea, the
breast that hath warmed his iced frame will he destroy.
I am frank; I do not cloak my words when I mean them
—I wish to be understood; I do not say one thing with
my heart and deny it with my lips, as some do; for I repeat,
I can descry, even let his vizard be of iron, the
hoary ruffian, who, to save his own blood and shield his
worthless body from hurt, would sacrifice—betray, as
though they were but cattle to be slaughtered for his pleasure,
the lives of all that were in his keeping. Do you
understand me, Samuel Edsell?”

“For heaven's sake, be calm—this will not do,” interrupted
several; “be calm—restrain this personal invective.”

This interference, however, was in vain; the anger of
the speaker was raised, and the abortive attempts to allay
and smother his voice, seemed rather to increase its
fury—for shaking off from his sleeve the hands that had
officiously been stretched forth to pull him in his seat, like
the baited bull stung and goaded to very madness by the
repeated attacks of the dauntless blood hounds, his efforts
to be heard strengthened with the busy hum of words
that the members of the council endeavoured to drown
it in, and became like a peal of thunder above the storm,
clear, loud, distinct, and almost uninterrupted by his own
exhaustion of breath.

“By the eternal heaven!” he shouted, with brows set
in deadly wrath, and striking his hand upon the table before
him so that it rang with the violence of the blow,
“who bids me be calm? who will dare still me when I
wish to be heard? By hell! have I not been insulted,
and ought I not to avenge it? insulted, grossly insulted!
a child would not bear it; and by an old and deceitful villain

who thirsts to deceive us—who hungers after the favour
of the new hauble that the king hath set up for us
to worship—who already hath put out his lean and grasping
hand for the crumbs of this fresh tyrant that hath
been sent to suck the marrow of this land and to oppress
us, who cares not so he is enriched, if we, the people,
starve;—and doth not this old villain, who here would
seem all virtue, speak of our tame submission to this cast
off debauchee of court favour—this parasite, who unfit for
aught but the purlieus of a palace, hath been deputed to
trample on the settlers of the forest. And even this were
nought to hear but to laugh at, had he not, I mean the
spy who sits among us, yon aged whiner, set his mark
upon me, branding my fair name as a foreign adventurer,
blustering and passionate, without honour, fortune or
family to lose or care for, a very bravo whose blood was
to be sold to any that sought it. Now let him hear me—
though not born on this soil, yet from adoption, from
marriage it is mine, and more than he will do, I am ready
to die for it;—then as to my name, there is no blemish on
my coat, let him show it an he can:—but as to him, but
scan his crimped, thievish visage, disgusting with age—
that which in youth must have been ill, are they not the
very features of some jesuitical priest of Alsatia, some
cut throat bloated pimp, who seeketh safe neck from the
hangman in the windings of that city of refuge—and do I
judge from nature? his boasted ancestor should have
been some done over knave, who took this country for
his dwelling in preference to an airing on the Tyburn
tree; and his descendant is the very mirror of himself,
long since worthy of the knightly collar of hemp that is
hatcheld at Newgate. What doth he say, upon no assurance
but the advisers, go forth and meet and give ourselves
into this Sloughter's hands! What! like whipped
curs, lick the leash that cuts us—cast the weapons of
safety from our hands, and await the fiat of a foe! No!
let such tame, coward spirits as his do that; go, let him
grovel in his native kennel, and kiss the boot heels of
power—but for us, let us show ourselves men of pith and
nerve, and act the deeds of men.”

As Milbourne sat down there was a whispering in the
apartment, and the stern looks of some betokened the
taking of some momentous resolution, and many scarce
drew their breaths, in eager anxiety of that which would
follow—the dark and angry glances of others, and their
burning cheeks, bespoke that had ought yet attached
them to their companions, that the bonds of friendship
were broken in twain for ever; the breach had been widened
beyond all reconciliation, and it was plain there
now wanted but the bold hand to make the first movement
and unsheath the sharpened steel, for all to take the
dagger from their belts, and quench the insults received,
and the bitter hatred of their respective leaders, in the
heart's blood of their former co-mates. Indeed, there
were those who marked out, should such signal be given,
their adversary with their eye, measuring his strength
with their envious gaze, and the place even on their bodies
where advantageously the most fatal blow could be
given.

In this stress Leisler endeavoured to interpose.—
With sorrowful accent he bewailed the untimely difference
that had been made, and laboured by every means
he was master of, to recall the ancient league that had
existed between all present; and strove, but in vain, to
sooth to calm, the unruly tempest of their heated breasts.
Many appeared scarce to hear him—others seemed to
hearken to that which he said, but with unbending countenances
and in gloomy silence; his words fell like a momentary
rain on the parched bosom of a sunburnt and
sandy region—sinking and drying away even as it touched
the burning earth, but giving no refreshment. And as
he finished speaking, Edsell rudely pushed from him his
seat and stood up, as did all who were attached to him.

“I have borne much, and that I have so borne such
base contumely, doth even surprise me,” quoth he, “yet
I have borne it. Beshrew these aged limbs, twenty years
ago, ere the defamer could have spoken half his slander,
I had struck him dead, stone dead at my feet; but most
unwittingly time cools one's blood for instant action—so
he hath said, and it is true, or why stands he living to look

me in the face? and yet so it runneth within this brain of
mine, that scarce bearded boys were wont to have reverence
for old men; but mayhap since my youth times are
altered—age keeps not pace with fashions—yet sooth had
I stood by, and saw a grey head treated as this of mine
hath been—God! I had seized the villain by the throat
and choaked his life from out his venomous body. Yet
even as it is, these limbs are not so palsied, albeit the
years I have past through are weakeners of stouter ones
than I, yet I do think thou foul tongued knave, I can yet
chastise thee, and carve upon that coxcomb hide of thine
such work that thou shalt rue the hour thou didst awake
my wrath. But down, down old heart! it doth ill become
thee to swell thus at a mongrel's barking; no, I will not
lose my temper with thee, it befits not for thee to so
triumph. Let the boaster vaunt on his superior strength,
the gift of youth, and overawe such cowards as may suppose
it bravery, an old man's arm will not disgrace him—
no, I'll not measure swords with one whose courage,
judging from his conduct, consists of words—aye, the
flight from Albany gives no light proof of warlike qualities;
but let that pass, and some other rumours with it
that have reached me, for I arose not to exchange scurrile
jests with thy vain relative, but to speak with you, Jacob
Leisler. It grieves me much, old friend, for thy sake,
and for our past affinity, that matters should so befall;
our many years of kindness ought not to be lightly rent
or forgotten. Yet so it is; together in this place longer
we cannot sit: there hath sprung up that between our
names that must for ever divide, like with an iron wall,
our courses of life; that must make the steps I take adverse
to thine; yea blood cannot erase what hath passed
this night. And—nay, it is to ill purpose you would explain,
for as I am a breathing man, it is not in the power of the
living to blot from out the blistering calender of memory
the injuries that fret me; natheless, me and mine, and all
that think well of me, from this hour are strangers to
yours—albeit, ere I leave you, for ancient fellowship, it
were but right in me to say as by caution, that an you
keep about your elbows cut-throat champions, to bully
those who are your truest well-wishers, it will not be long
ere you lack all but such a bravo's head for counsel, and
his murderous hand for defence.” So having said, he
paused for a moment, and folding his arms, gazed sternly
in the countenance of Milbourne, who returned his proud
glance with a look of hatred as mortal and unrelenting as
that which he received, then turning from his enemy, he
waved his hand to his adherents and stalked with a
haughty stride, unshaken by his advanced years, to the
door of the apartment, followed by such as were of his
party, yet ere he departed he drew in his breath and
compressed his lips, to stifle the overflowing gall that burthened
him as he cast back another and a last look of rage
and defiance; while all apparently expected, as it might
have been, were struck powerless with the movement he
had made, and none rose to intercept or oppose his withdrawal.
Milbourne was the first to break forth—

“There let him go, I say,” cried he exultingly, “well
rid are we of a traitor and a hypocrite.”

“Nien mien zon,” said Leisler, “dat is niet wel; dou
art haastig, heethoofdig, mien zon.”

“Thou art wrong, father,” replied Milbourne, “we
want him not; such as him we can well spare, and all
that have gone with him. He would within our counsel
have played the spy; he could have stung us to the
quick, but now he hath lost his power and his venom.
Yes, let him go and fawn for a smile about the path of
Sloughter; we are well rid of such dirt that but clogged
our way—yea, I wish Sloughter and Bayard all such
friends, who will not take long to ruin him, while we,
though few in numbers have the faithful and devoted
hearts that are now around us; so let him do his worst,
we can defy him. And now since these false hearted partizans
have fled our ranks, and by their kind desertion
have left us free to act, unopposed by their vile efforts
to thwart our just designs, for the best interest of our
cause, how stands your minds, Sirs, that we return unto
the matters from which we have been so led by their seditious
artifices, and lose not in urging the immediate fulfilment
of the warrant that lies before us, which condemns

to immediate death the base convicts, Bayard and his associate.”

“Nay, my good friend, Milbourne, on this matter permit
me to be heard, and be not ruffled at my opinion,”
exclaimed De Lanoy, in a voice soothing and temporising:
“yet I need not fear anger where even if I am deemed
misjudging, that my heart is steel to the cause we espouse
is truly known; and although than, even yourself, there is
no one here more thirsting on these criminals to inflict
the severities they have merited, natheless, taking time
and circumstance, which doth, from the pregnant danger,
demand more important considerations—for be it as it may,
Edsell doth carry with him in his anger a vast power, his
native Queens, besides the other counties of the island
will at this, his disaffection, bow to the rising star, the
new comer;—all this and that, it were policy for the present
to spare life and watch the tide's flowing, doth the
more impress me that to act over hasty in this matter
were rash; very, very rash.”

“Now, by the blood of this right arm,” interrupted
Milbourne warmly, “my choler choaks me, to listen to a
man who boasts of sense parle thus timid and weak.
What, have you too caught the ditty's tune, that I brow-beat
this council—that I hector as I please within this
chamber? sooth, it is pleasant: ye propitiate my rage,
ere you say forth your honest sentiments:—by heaven, I
wish not to smother the words of any man—let him have
his say, and yet, I think I too should be listened to, in
answer, when I believe it proper; for I am touched with
surprise, Peiter De Lanoy, to see you thus panic struck—
thus pallid and aghast with affright!—and for what?—a
housewife's dream—a nightmare—a New-England witch's
prophecy—a baseless, shadowless creation of thy misled
mind—a harmless and threatening monster of thy heated
brain. 'Sdeath! Edsell will thin our party, say you: let
him take every sycophant like himself—I answer, we
are the better for it; and let this Sloughter gorge himself
with numbers.—But look to the walls that protect us—
here let him pause; thus far shall he go, but one step
farther shall be his destruction. We have the ammunition

and the iron tubes of death within this fortress, that shall
sweep in dust his hopes, however fed by the breaths of
lying traitors: yea, sooner than yield an atom of our
present power to this deputed knave, I, for one, would
have the walls that encircle us, the bulwarks that part us
from, and yet command the town below us, levelled to the
sea, and carnage and death wanton within this chamber's
self: albeit, adverse to me, there are some of other mind
—to treat with this new ruler. If such are of the greater
number, sooth, I must give way; yet I would ask, what
have we to hope from him who hath been directed to
counsel with Nicholas Bayard? I cry your mercy, an
it be that you will bend the lowly knee and seek forgetfulness
of the past, and, like tamed and subjected urchins,
with covered heads and sorrowful visages, follow your
master's train, content to bear his blows, his burthens
and his scorn; an there be such coward spirits, such abject
wretches, such paltry, grovelling souls among ye—I am
silent; but death be my portion, as a man should die! I
take none of your council, but shall go forth alone and
dare the worst; and if I fall, shame be the lot,—the
shame of dastards be with those, who, in the trying hour,
catered for their safety. Natheless, I yet mistake, ye are
true friends I misdoubt not, and will stand by the fate
of Leisler to the last; and if the worse should come, (I
repeat it,) an we should be driven to that dire needcessity,
we have the means of triumph with us, our slaves have
been ever ripe for plunder, revolt and massacre; but let
the hell hounds loose upon our foes, put the knife in their
hands, and wave the torch for havoc,—and, as I live, we
shall kindle a funeral pyre, that shall light this land from
the rolling ocean to the howling wilderness, and shall at
once consume within its bloody and burning bosom, even
with our own ashes, the hated names of our enemies.”

“Cuerpo de todas los santos, senores, caballeros, an
you carry on your bonaventure such heavy sheets,
damme, I should think your mizzen would be after dipping
salt water,” broke in sudden and abruptly a strange
voice while the speaker, with a bold and confident air,
trode into the very centre of the apartment.

The whole council rose in surprise, and some even in
alarm, at this unexpected and unlooked for intrusion.
The hands of several grasped instinctively their weapons;
and their uneasiness was by no means quieted by
the manner and appearance of the personage who had so
boldly and uninvited thrust himself upon their deliberation.
“Who,—what are you, that hast thus dared
insolently to come among us,” exclaimed several, their
voices raised loud and threatening with anger.

“We are betrayed, treason hath glided in unseen upon
us,” cried others, at once in tones of wonder and alarm.

“Are there none sentry at the door—but are our
counsels in the open street,” sternly inquired others.

“What seek ye, rash regardless man, that within our
secret conclave unbidden you have made thus free,”
thundered Milbourne, advancing with furious gesture as
he spoke, with sword bared upon the intruder, “come
you as friend, or are you hostile to our plans? what hast
thou heard, base eavesdropper? how long within the
echo of our words have you stood unmarked? by what
sorcerers art hast guiled our watchful guard?—deliver
master the very truth, if from the reach of this sharp
steel untouched you would escape.”

“Straight tell the tale, albeit art an enemy—a spy upon
this council; an so may the curse of Cromwell blast thee,
dog—thou hast seen thy last; an I say thou hast not a clear
account, thy blood is sold unto the drinking of our
swords,” shouted De Lanoy, and in a moment the glittering
and deadly points of a score of blades, were thrust
within an inch of the defenceless breast of the daring offender:
he, however, recoiled not a whit before the direful
array that met his further advance.

“Por el amor de dios, poco a poco, speak me fair and
softly senores; carja! be ye wanting me to palaver, see
ye drop your bristles and let me have sea room,” quoth
the stranger, folding his arms cool and unconcerned, and
gazing undaunted in look and unmoved in posture on the
fierce preparation about him; “d'ye see, I take this as
queer greeting to a caballero—for curse me but I am of
good breeding. Yvenger quiniento soeldas, as the hidalgo

says on the Main, so its damned rough in you to go this
quartering when a messmate moors water shot in your
harbour—and as for boarding you without letting you
know, how the devil should I when there is not a man
above decks from poop to windlass, and the hatches
amidship are all open.”

“Nay, parley not a word with the vile ruffian, but
beat the craven slave to earth with your stout steels,” exclaimed
Arnyte Leisler, with eyes flashing and gesture
rapid with animation, as he rushed from his father's side,
where a breathless and silent spectator he had remained
of all that had heretofore passed, the varied emotions of
his mind vividly marked on his expressive countenance,
alternate pale with fear, then flushed with hope—and
now his breast heaved and his limbs trembled as it were,
with indignant rage, at the sight of an old and oppressive
foe—“why hold you back, good friends, know you not the
murderous marauder? it is the bloodiest and most cruel
of Kid's savage crew—drag down the vile buccaneer.”

“Voto a dios! are you there, master,” returned Eumet,
for it was he, “and found thy tongue, prate a-pace
valgame dios! thou hast steered a pretty course, youngster,
a fine mess hast thou made of it—curse me if thou
dost not deserve marooning worse than ever poor devil
that has been left on the Keys in my days.”

“What then, thou comest from Kid?” said De Lanoy,
“what says the treacherous rover? and what meanest
thou that no one hast stopped thy advance within the
gates of this fortress?”

A fe Cabellero, I spin no tough yarns d'ysee “replied
the rover boldly,” El capitan del barco hath put out his best
hawser to help you, but damn it, it wont do, the ship heaves
in too strong a current for to hold; thof, had it not been for
the fingers of yon meddlesome urchin, madre santa de
dios! but ere this watch you had been ridden of all we
had to count for fear, le misericordia asi—a dry voyage
hath no help—so dy'see I have just by the old man's orders
steered hitherward, to let you know the sharks are
playing about your timbers already, carja, this new governor
has run up his bunting at the old Stadt-huis, and is,

as fast as the glass drops, out swelling the number of his
followers, as the thinning of your own crew shows.

“We are lost, there is no help for us,” interrupted one
of the council, in accents of despair. “I wonder not, now
this fellow came on us without obstacles, our very guard
hath joined the general desertion, and fled with the traitorous
Edsell.”

“By heaven he speaks truth,” exclaimed several others
rushing in the apartment tumultuously and alarmed, after
having been forth and examined the certainty of their
situation, “alas for us—treachery hath prevailed, our
gates stand ajar, deserted—our cannon hath had foul play,
and lay dismounted by their carriages, while here and
there, alone of all that heretofore espoused our party, wanders
a solitary friend, amid the desolation of our cause.”

“I fear me this man hath brought us no false news,”
quoth another, rushing in with terror depicted on his
pallid countenance, “for as I went forth, and stood upon
the rampart that overlooks the town, a deep and busy
hum broke on mine ear in the distance, and light after
light shot and flared through the darkness, as of a gathering
multitude, along the rondels and about the bazaar,
and methought, my eyes so read it in the night, there was
something hoisted on the Stadt huis, that moved, curled,
floated, and seemed like a flag.”

“We are undone, we are undone, save yourselves, save
yourselves, there is no help for us”—cried one rushing
wildly into the very centre of the chamber. He had gone
forth the first, and had stayed the longest, and now returned
with irresolute step, haggard countenance, and almost
breathless; all with pale and anxious visages gathered
about him.

“For mercy sake, how is it, let us hear the worst,” inquired
the terrified council.

“We are ruined, we shall be destroyed we are utterly
ruined,” replied the person questioned, after a moment's
pause of gloomy expectation, “I have found the evil all
confirmed, a rage, a wild rage, hath seized the people,
all rush to follow the wake of this new governor, our
hired soldiery fly the barracks, no orders, no authority
withholds them, and the new tyrant already wantons in

his conquest; surrounded and advised by the Bayard
party, he swears our destruction, unless instantly we surrender
to his power at discretion; and supplied by means
of the false Edsell, with artillery from the rondels, if
we submit not he prepares to fire upon our defenceless
walls.”

“Well let him nor croak thy unhallowed dirge, messenger
of ill, as if it were our death song; silence, raven, silence,
nor with thy black omened tidings, make women of garbed
men,” said Milbourne sternly,
a deep frown darkening
his lowered brow, “how say you now, what bring you of
our foeman, that thus your cheeks should blanch to the
livid coloring of the grave, and your limbs palsy, as stricken
in the winter of age;—sdeath let us hear no more of
these wind gathered rumours, or bear them like sea rocks
do tempests, for what rain drops fall from these dark
clouds, but such as men might shake from off their mantles,
nor feel the heavier for the wet;—yet even so it is,
when the yellow leaf sears and drops the tree is but worth
the firing; yea, men crowd in its summer foliage, and rest
in its shade, as though they dwelt in the circle of a fostering
spirit, and now the storm is up, and strips us barkless,
and bare—the coward sycophants fly our vicinity, as
one would a pestilence, nor gaze back, but to direct home
the axe's blow to our roots!—ah well! ah well! that my
stout heart should fail:—And you old man, my sire by marriage,”
continued he addressing Leisler, “how like you this
the falling off of these cursed dogs, that have fed from out
your trenchers, that have lived upon your bread and wine;
that but a brief past of time, you would have deemed
you had but to have bid them pour forth the filthy current
of their veins, at your command, and their blood had
flowed as water;—no matter,—I could wish the period back
that, but what would it help, the world hath been ever
the same,—and yet old man, in me you shall not be deceived.
At times I may have been a rough friend, and done
thee harm, by my quick spirit, yet I am ready to expiate
such crimes, for well I know there is no help for us once
in the Bayard's power—father the block be mine, that
holds that hoary head—to the last, even death, will I be
with thee Jacob Leisler.

“Mien son Yaakoop, ik dinks niet, but zo as dou ish,”
replied Leisler, taking him affectionately by the hand,
sdill ik hoops vor besser dimes, dings are niet zo
kwaade.

Alas, believe it not, “answered Milbourne,” I did indeed
think that about us, there were some few who would
dare cling to us in adversity, who would an it should have
so came to swords, with their bodies, have taught this
proud stranger, who is now to rule this province, that the
wild settlers of America, were of as bold a mettle, as ever
fluttering courtier of Whitehall; but such thought is over,
who can gaze upon these faces about us, whitened with
lily livered fear, and think there is ought left for us, but
to kiss this Sloughter's feet.

“Voto a dios! I swear by the bread and the wine,”
exclaimed Eumet, “they have much belied thee, Captain'
Milbourne. There have been those who told that you
were a spark that made more smoke than fire; but damn
them, d'ye see they foully lied: he viajádo por tierra, y
por mar, as they say on the main, á la Espagnola, and I
have never seen the man whose colours I would sooner
sail under than yours, Captain Milbourne; and curse me,
thof these here are thrifty of their lives, d'ye see here's
the boy that'll stand by you against wind and tide as long
as a plank sticks together, or there is a steel cutlass to
be handled. Carja! a rover's word is cutter's law, and
may I be keel hauled an I break faith with thee.”

Before Milbourne could return an answer to this voluntary
tribute and offer of services from the pirate, he
was interrupted by the long, shrill blast of a trumpet,
whose warlike note was heard to sound loudly without.
It was a summons from the new governor, that those
who held the fort should straitways come forth and deliver
it up peaceably to his possession; otherwise they
should be held as traitors to the king, and when taken
should suffer the punishment of death by the laws decreed
to rebels who dispute the authority of their liege
lord and sovereign.

“What course shall we pursue?” said one of the
council hesitatingly, after having heard the threatening

message. “Had we not best submit at once, nor give
by our obstinacy in a vain defence, cause for our utter
destruction?”

“With the few that is left with us it were idle to suppose
we could long hold out,” quoth another, “and yet
we should not—nay, it becomes us not to surrender at
discretion. Yet in this stress, whatever is best for the
common weal, doubtless should be followed by all without
a murmur.”

“Ay, ay, cut and carve your paths even as ye list—
think but for yourselves,” exclaimed Milbourne in a bitter
tone, “if ye can ride the waves in safety care not who is
wrecked; what boots a loss of time when it is already determined?
go at once, and open the gates, and sue at
this courtier's feet for pardon; go, I say, nor pause to
think you have abandoned some to death.”

“Nay, Captain Milbourne,” responded De Lanoy, “I
must say that it doth appear to me that often, although
it may be from honest zeal, you are too hasty, and many
times interpret intentions and words fallen from your
friends, both wrong and strangely. I will vouch there
are but few here deserve the evil you would believe of
us—nor is there one who would cater basely for his own
life, while our good leader Jacob Leisler and our associates
are at stake. No, I will say there is not one who
would save his own blood by selling that of another's.
Yet it must be confessed that our situation is dangerous
at least, if not desperate. What have we to count on in
a rash defence of this fort? we have not the means nor
the provision to hold out long—and by doing so we would
but increase the inveteracy of our enemies, and give,
perhaps, to this new governor, a just cause for persecution,
as well as a pretext for using against us the direst
means of punishment, when at last we should be compelled
to yield to his power. Now thus, on calm and deliberate
survey of the matter, would I advise:—that certain
of us go to the quarters of Colonel Sloughter, since
he has formally called us to admit his authority—it will
be politic methinks so to act, and thereby under cover of
treating with him and learning that which it were well

we now should pretend to doubt, the truth of his pretensions
and commission—we may be enabled to creep into
his designs, at least so far as respects his intentions towards
us. Now we may have much mistaken him as for
evil; but an it turn out so, let our foes beware—this fort
may yet prove a bane to them; the tiger at bay in his
covert yields not with life, nor till, in his mad and desperate
struggles, he dies the jungle deeply with the best
blood of his pursuers.”

“De Lanoy speaks well, at this juncture a better plan
we cannot adopt,” said one of the council, “let it be
agreed that he and Milbourne forthwith proceed upon
the matter.”

“It is determined,” said De Lanoy, as a unanimous assent
to the measure was expressed, “and hear, to quicken
our departure, there hath come from this eager courtier
a second messenger.”

And as he spoke, another blast of the trumpet, with
its harsh and hollow notes, rung on the outer drawbridge,
and with its loud and fearful voice, seemed to make the
very walls around tremble with the stern echo. Several
went forth to receive the messenger, and parley with him
from the gateway.

“I like not greatly this your resolve my masters,” quoth
Milbourne, “doubt me but it seems unwise, and at once
puts us in this Sloughter's hands, but you have willed it,
albeit it appears in good faith for our common cause,
and I—an you desire my service, will not be the one to
shrink from the part assigned me, natheless though it be
that of danger, for it glads me to see that you have plucked
spirit in distress, you have robbed the nettle of its
sting, for he that boldly looks in the grim and iron front
of danger, grows accustomed to its frowns, and thinks little
of it. So friend De Lanoy, at once let us on our mission;
be firm of soul, good comates till our return, and an I
mistake not, we shall bring ye news of this Sloughter,
that will make you think less of the lion's roar—” then turning
to Eumet he added “be at hand, brave master, there
may be need of thy stout arm, to carve a passage for our
return, and a light heart like thine, I know betokens a
bold hand.

They departed on their adventure, while from the period
they quitted the apartment, the members of the
council appeared disturbed, and agitated with expectant
suspense; some with hasty steps silent and in anxious
thought paced the boundaries of the chamber, which
seemed narrow to their eager flight of mind. Others
gathered in groups and whispering their fears, were startled
by every blast of wind that swept around the building
that held them. Some gazed forth with strained eyes,
through the small window panes in the dark night, and
strove to descry aught that might stir in the city below,
while others cast themselves upon the long settles by the
door, that they might be ready to receive the first rumour
of the event of the embassy, and avail themselves of any
favorable opportunity at the outset; not one was unmoved,
but all partook alike, of the deep and fearful interest
of the moment. And now more than at any period of
the scene, habitual ceremony and respect appeared
disregarded, for Leisler untended, except by the careful
solicitude of Arnyte, remained in his place, solitary and
deserted, a prey to the anguish that racked his mind as
he reflected on the dire straits of his fallen fortunes—
meanwhile, the savage protector of his son stood mutely
by, leaning on his gun and looking anxiously in the grief
expressive countenances of the hapless parent and his
child, as though he would fain participate in the sorrow
that rent their breasts. Slow flew the laggard time;
hour after hour heavily wore away, and yet there came
no news from those that had gone forth. There is no
time so wearisome as that wherein the mind is tortured
to learn the event of any thing that deeply concerns the
personal safety; suspense is terrible—a serpent who
hangs to the heart strings with thirsty tongue, and momently
draws blood—the rack whereon the criminal is
impaled, tears not the body to agony, as its sufferance;
naturally as it protracts, gloom and shadow darken the
imagination, and busy thought had painted in the minds
of Leisler and his adherents; long ere it had happened,
the misfortunes that had befallen their legates, and which
the reader will find detailed in the next section.

SECTION III.

Dryden's Aurengzebe.

With a step doubtful, and as though distrusting the purpose
for which it was used, a mind undetermined and a
heart that beat heavily with a painful foreboding of anticipated
misfortune, Milbourne accompanied by his associate,
De Lanoy, and followed closely by the daring freebooter,
who had enlisted himself in his service, proceeded
on the errand, rather for reconnoitre than for the sake of
forming a treaty for amicable adjustment, which, in the
state of the Leisler faction, was so adviseable. Slowly
they descended to the outlet of the fort, which was now
indeed the last hold of their party's power, whose vaunted
strength in danger had seemed to crumble to dust like an
exposed corse from the touch, when disinterred after long
resting in the solitude of the grave—indeed their glory
had been brief; it was now fast expiring, like the quick
and brilliant flash of a dying light. As they went along,
the two leaders for awhile spoke not a word in converse
with each other; for now the excitement which had stirred
the spirit in the council unsupported by the presence
of others, and the momentary cause which had enkindled
the fierce temper of the one and called forth all the calmness
of deliberation in the other, had passed away like
the smoke of a funeral pyre when they quitted the chamber
wherein their comrades had assembled; and disturbed
with like feelings of distress at the disasters which evidently
thickened around them, they instinctively for a
while, both hesitating to break silence, avoided discourse,

but each strode on his way, wrapt in his own deep meditation.
The night wind blew thrilling, sharp, and cold,
and the crusted snow and crisped ice, worn by the passage
of the past day, crackled beneath their tread, and
yet the vast heaven, strown as it were with hosts of living
drops of silver, looked calm and beautiful, while the
moon, glittering with radiant lustre, walked the broad
sky and smiled on the earth, whose whitened bosom,
glowing in the light, gleamed like innumerable spangles
on the robes of beauty; all around was visible, and the
long line of parapets cast their deep shadows like frowns
upon the snow clad ground; the path of Milbourne and
his associates was uninterrupted, except when hailed by
the eager and troublesome questions and inquiry of the
sleepless and despairing partizan who now and then met
them, and who strove to catch from their brief replies the
least spark of hope; yet as he pursued his way, the quick
eye of Milbourne marked the solitary and deserted state
of the garrison: shorn of half the former numbers that
had composed it, and with those left all was disorder and
confusion; where centinels should have been, their post
was deserted, and the men were gathered in groups distant
from their duty, and there were dark whispers with
some, while the countenances of many in the moonlight
looked pallid and aghast as palsied with terror, and the
brows of others wore gloomy discontent, the murmurs of
which often broke forth unrestrained like the muttering
growls of some angered beast of prey, as hungered and
disappointed of food he retraces his track to his darksome
den—the heavens, it is true, wore the sweet look
of peace; yet the mind of man as it is ever in this weary
life of ours, was wrathful and tempestuous and swelling
with bleak storms; indeed, as Milbourne gazed about him
and beheld the truth of what had been announced to his
disheartened comrades in the Council, the too palpable
desertion of Leisler's former strongest, and as supposed,
most faithful retainers, and the apparent neglect of every
appearance of preparation to oppose the stern approach
of Sloughter, which ought to have been now momently
expected, and his hostile guise met with suitable reception,
he felt his spirit sink lower within him dampened at
the sight, and the thought struck heavy to his heart that
neither the forlorn state nor danger to which they were
now reduced had been magnified, and yet even more than
all, there cut deep unto the core that all had been
brought on by those who had been most trusted, who had
been most counted friends; ingratitude had thinned the
ranks that should have circled round and made a wall
through which no power of man could break; yet so it was,
even like the flower that adorns the bush in summer-tide
and sucks its strength for life; at the first touch of winter,
it yellows and drops away, leaving that stalk which had delighted
in its beauty naked and defenceless, to be swept
away by the wind; and yet nature parts these, the flower
and its supporter, while here no cause existed for desertion
except the baseness of men's hearts; and the haughty
and fiery soul of Milbourne as he thus reflected felt that
could he but have an hour's revenge upon the traitors
who had thus quitted and sold the cause of their patron
for their selfish interest, he would quaff without repining
the bitterest poison of his fate, even to its last dregs—
though when the drawbridge rose behind him, and the
chains of the portcullis rattled as they dropt down the
weight they had lifted up, while he and his associates
passed under, and when he stood beyond the moat and saw
nothing above the bastions but the high steep roofs of the
kerck, the gevangen huis and the governor's residence, a
fear arose within him that he had done rash to depart on an
errand to the foe, leaving dissatisfaction and almost terror
with those who still remained, and exposing his own safety
at the mercy of a man to whose faith he was a stranger, and
who as of course was infuriated by the show of resistance
that had been returned to his summons to yield; and how
such was likely to receive him and his companions,
questioning his authority, even at the moment they came
to treat with him, he was ignorant; albeit, he was not
at ease concerning the manner they might be treated by
one haughty and confident in success, and doubtless irritated
by as yet an almost unbending opposition, even were
this man one, contrary to the usual nature of mankind, of
otherwise mild and forgiving disposition; and a hope, a lingering
hope like a plank that the drowning mariner strives
to catch at, even though floating far beyond his grasp—in
spite of all depicted by the stern reality that, had stared him
in the face, would grow on his mind and cling to his heart
loth to quit him, that had he not left the walls of the fort,
his activity might, in the despairing souls around him,
have sown his own unquenchable fire, and the drooping
spirit of the remaining partisans might have still been
raised; and so strong at times did this deceiving feeling
come upon him, that he was nearly tempted to retrace
his steps, nor sue for one atom of kindness from the new
governor, nor descend to the meanness of searching for
his plans against them until the ordnance of the fort gave
out its last breath of death, and the ramparts could no
longer be made good for want of a man to defend them.
“God's wo on Egypt light heavily upon the white hearted
and unmanly knaves,” quoth he involuntarily, as the
darkest side of the picture of a sudden obtruded its gloomy
yet true and faithful images upon his mind, and for a time
suppressed all trust and dependance on more pleasing
forms: “There is nought in them, not a child's courage;
the sick man's ague hath chilled them, frozen them powerless.
'Sblood! I had as soon make good a breach with
a herd of deer as trust them; aye it were better, for a hart
at bay oft gives fatal wounds to the hunter, while these war
accoutred girls tremble too much to raise a hand gun—
and yet with half the number of those we muster behind yon
gallant breastwork, think you not De Lanoy, were they but
men resolved to stand to the worst, though their blood
ran for it, this servile journey of ours had not been spared?
God! it frets me sorely; ere I could crouch to take
this Sloughter's hand and cry in his train, methinks my
flesh should kiss his dagger.”

“Sooth Captain Milbourne” replied his comate, “my
thought and resolution is akin to yours, for I feel it were
a degradation to give way one atom, to this commissioned
tool of Bayard, and Van Kortlandt; I go to him with
as little wish for favor at such hated hands, as even you,
and had there been bold hearts and determined steels behind

us, by heaven with any living man, I had not stirred
a step upon such embassy as this, but when my voice enforced
this counsel, you must be aware of my motives,—policy
dictated the course we now pursue, for indeed it was
plain, had this not been indulged our fear stricken adherents,
there had been nathless all reason an open rebellion,
and we who might oppose ere this had changed place with
Bayard and Nichols, in their condemned dungeons; but
as it is, we must bring them back so sore a tale as would
rouse them were they dead, and the shroud upon their
limbs,—the harness of battle is not yet laid aside, the cuirass
is on their breasts, and if I judge right of the nature
of men, they can be deluded to the frenzy of despair;
when there is no hope of safety for life or limb left them,
cowards become brave men; and mark me we can, an I mistake
not, provoke this Sloughter to send with us a message
that though they be palsied to statues, shall make the
blood run flames within their veins; but take my advice
Milbourne, be not too hasty with this man, dive into him
first, read his heart if we can, he may not be so weak as
we have heard, to yield to Van Kortlandt's guidance, as he
were a senseless boat rowed by the oar; albeit as matters
are, let us use caution, and I build on this errand of ours,
as one from which much good to Leisler and our friends may
come, and if fortune in this time of need, stands at our
side, if not by force, at least by stratagem, we may ensnare
this court parasite, in toils that he will find it
hard to break.

“Nay, De Lanoy, believe me you are in error,” returned
the other, “no guile with all the diplomatic art of which you
are master will avail; the villain Edsell is with him,
and will watch our words as a lynx would his prey, ere this
the accursed greybeard, (I regret he tasted not my steel)
hath his ear; and think you not where the snake couches,
he drops no poison? Therefore I disagree with your advice—let
our course I say be bold; even if with our swords
we hew a retreat, it will serve us better, as you have well
devised, to inflame the dogs we leave in the shelter of
the fort,—it will awaken in them that fear for themselves,
until which is aroused few men are stirred on; an we meet a
scurvy greeting I repeat, it will try to the last their mettle,

and if they change not, poltroons as they are, they
shall survive to see us die, and learn that a brave man's
death, is a coward's shame. But hold, I am too loud? here
are some who I should be unwilling to have heard our
converse.”

At the end of the causeway, which from the western gate
led down the hill, whose top the fort crowned, was a long
clear space, or rather plain of ground, smooth and level, and
though now one desolate sheet of snow, sullied in whiteness
by numerous crossed and trampled pathways to and from
the fort and streets that opened on it, yet it was often the
scene of hilarity and pleasure in summer days, for here
the burghers held an annual cattle fair, and sometimes a
market; and the choicest products of Staaten Eylandt
and Mattouwacs on this place tempted the appetite, taste,
and purchase of the epicure—whose eagerness had at
least one good effect, that of rewarding the industrious
yeoman. However, this piece of almost vacant ground
had more probably been left so that the fire of the fort
in a land attack might not interfere with the houses of the
city, rather than for the purpose of any agricultural display;
nevertheless, there had been so little danger from
this quarter, that most of the cannon on this side of the
fort had been removed, and about the centre of the marktvelt,
(for such was the name given to the open ground,)
a small building, or more properly a shed of rough-hewn
boards, had been raised mostly for the accommodation of
the burgomasters and other prominent dignitaries, who
came to see that order was kept among the quarrelsome
slaves, who were wont here to tend their masters' market
truck, and who, while all went on right, quietly and comfortably
in the public service, smoked and dozed away
their time without fear of disturbance or interruption;
for the presence of great men alone is sufficient to awe
the vulgar in silence. The steps of Milbourne and
De Lanoy, during the brief interchange of words above
detailed, had wended so rapidly towards the burgomasters'
place of respect and retirement, which stood immediately
in their path, that Eumet had been left several
paces in their rear, either from his having been accustomed

from his mode of life to a slower pace on land,
(for it is to be remarked in the manner of the mariner,
that his walk on shore appears as though he trod in an
element which was not congenial to his nature:) or from
a conscious feeling that the two leaders might have communications
to make with each other on the subject of
their present pursuit, which they might not care to be
heard by a third person; and so, with a delicacy unusual
to one of his barefaced and insolent spirit, (but which
arose from his careless and reckless soul; for he thought
not who led the way, so there were blows to be met with
and plunder to be fought for:) the pirate's footsteps lagged
behind his companions some considerable distance,
yet within a moment's call and sight.

“Santa Trinidada, thou hast rode the peak truly,” said
the marauder, in somewhat of a repentant humour to
himself, as he thought on the little likelihood of profit in
his new employ; “carra, thy soul has run away with thy
reason—thou hast taken up with poor wage—curse me,
but banyan days will increase an I make such cruises
where there seems more likelihood of blows than marvedis—despacio!
I had forgot the proverb, `Habla poco y
piensa bien;' but hang care, I am in for it, and blast me if
I take to the long boat, thof the ship's sinking.”

At this period he was suddenly aroused from his reverie
by beholding Milbourne and De Lanoy abruptly pause
in their progress; and he lost not a minute, ere he was at
their side: for as the former spoke the exclamation of
caution, which has been narrated, they had unconsciously
drawn within a pace or two of the shed above described,
from under the concealment of which started several
figures, whose long shadows as they rose in the moonlight,
discovered them in time for Milbourne and his companion
to start at their approach, and to keep off with their
swords, for an instant's parley, the barrels of the levelled
arquebuses of the city patrouille, for such they were who
now barred the further procedure of the legates of the
Leislerian faction. The group consisted of about twenty
persons, whose singularity, not to say somewhat ludicrous,
disagreement of dress and accoutrements, in some measure,
bespoke them honest and placable burghers, somewhat

emulous of military fame, and who, driven by the
fervour of patriotism, for awhile had laid down their
peaceable callings and in the alarm of the times, had metamorphosed
themselves into the stern followers of war.
As might be expected from their haste of preparation,
which was commensurate with their zeal, they sat but
small store on equality of size or figure and similarity of
attire in their enrolment; and there seemed also little
preference in the manner of their death-weapons, the
choice being evidently that of the readiest; for one wore
a massive and heavy breastplate of iron, and bore in his
hand a rusty partisan, which doubtless he inherited as the
armour of his ancestors, who, from the age and looks of
the warlike appurtenance, were in all probability servitors
of the `priviledged Wes-India companie,' under the
rule of Christianse and Eelkees:—another had girded to
his side a ponderous broadsword, and although proud in
bearing so tried and deadly a steel, yet being short from
the trunk to the heel, (which is vulgarly called duck legged,)
this son of Mars evidently had more trouble in
the disagreeable rencontres, which, on account of his briefness
of figure and the sword's length, ensued every now
and then between the weapon and his ankles, than possibly
his enemies might have received from its sharpness and his
dexterity of using it: however, as supporters to these important
personages, one or two there were of the patrouille,
lusty and strongly limbed, the flower of the youth of the
Nieuw Nederlandts, proud of going to war, decorated with
the favours of Dutch love—mighty bunches of ribbons at
the knee, and defended by immense buttons on their jerkins,
whose solidity and circumference were almost shields in miniature;
and they were well supplied with fire arms, the
contents of which they were reckless how eager they
were discharged as the death warrants of a foe.

“Stand for your lives, and tell who and what ye are,”
exclaimed several of the patrouille at one voice.

“Speak—are you for the rebel Leisler, or the king?”
echoed others, their words bursting from their lips in a
shout at nearly the same breath, each one appearing the
most desirous to be attended to and heard, so that their
speech was almost a confused and tumultuous jargon.

“Hold back thy officious arm,” cried De Lanoy, drawing
down the savage Eumet's upraised hand, which threatened
to fall heavy on the head of one of the stout burghers
of the patrouille and cool the ardour of his gallantry
for ever, and at the same time withholding the buccaneer
from rushing on the other opposers of their progress, and
dealing the destruction his vengeful eyes threatened;
for no sooner had he beheld the pointed weapons that had
stopped the way, ere, like the trained bloodhound when
in sight of the chace, he thirsted for the death, and was
ready for the onset. “And you, fellow-burghers of
Nieuw Oranje,” continued De Lanoy, “seek not our
lives so hastily with adverse hands, for we have trespassed
on your guard not with the deadly guise of foemen,
but, albeit, an there bide among ye not those who by rash
and selfish bearing contemn our offerings—we come with
the budding branches of the olive; yea, we have now
sought ye as men desirous of settling all difference, and of
giving peace to the aching wounds of this distracted province.
For this purpose, Captain Milbourne and myself,
(your ancient townsman, Peiter De Lanoy,) with this our
faithful follower, request safe conduct from you, my
masters, to the presence of him who is said to hold the
king's commission as our new appointed ruler;—I mean
the person men term Colonel Henry Sloughter.”

“Gad's mercy, and is it you, Meinheer Peiter De Lanoy?
blood o' me! which I deem a fierce and becoming
oath, and savours a warrior's lip,” quoth in reply a voice
at once slender and squeaking, and which was produced
by the delicate organ of the throat of a lean, thin, shrivelled
little personage, whose pallid visage looked sallow
and healthless in the moonlight; which alike shone on
attire at once conceitedly and daintily disposed upon the
wearer:—so that with gorgeous profuseness of garment
and consequential demeanour, he laboured with the air of
one who supposed himself of the utmost importance in
the patrouille, and thereon verily swelled with martial
dignity, “right gladsome am I, as an I were ordered to
trim a dozen body coats with fine Flanders for a ready

customer, that in peace you have thus unfolded your errand,
and of such an honest nature it prove; for stitch my
carcass, had your object been hostile—stop my trust!
but your doublet (and by this light it is of cloth, I were
loth to spoil,) would have been cut in as many squares,
bits, and ends, as a Merry Andrew's pantaloons, or as
there are running seams in a gallant's jerkin. Gads service!
I repeat it, right gleesome am I that you so soon
announced yourself, Meinheer De Lanoy, for had it been
another man, thof o' your quarters, seeing how much I
respect thee, having oftentimes to my profit and delight,
had both the making and fitting of thy wearing apparel—
blood o' me! but he had tasted death at our hands in as
short space as ever thread pierced a bodkin's eyelet.”

“Troth, truly says the snyder,” said a ragged looking
fellow, with a dirty leathern apron and a red flannel skull
cap, the centre of which was crowned with a large tassel
of worsted, “may I never soak the soal of a pantoufle
again, but there are some among us, Mienheer, that
would have waxed you throughly; snooks! I think it
would have been shorts ere your upper leather had been
sadly tanned.”

“Py myn vaders baard mien vreint De Lanoy, he dells
as drue as dat I dell, py Got!” added he of the mighty
breast plate, putting on a fierce and courageous manner,
“had dou been oder mensch as dat dou prove, I had daken
mien hallebaard, and mit mien hallebaard I did leavsh
dou no mores eyesh in dien kopt as dere vas den dou vas
poorn, py Got!”

“Yes, may I never blow bellows again,” echoed another,
whose party coloured visage bore ample correspondence
with his black and dusted linen, for he was without jerkin,
and had his sleeves rolled up above his elbow, exposing
to view his hairy, broad, muscular and sinewy
arms; while in one hand he held a massy iron bar, which
he wielded as a player would the quarter staff, while the
round flat cap, that scarcely hid his coarse, shaggy, and
russet coloured locks, peculiar to the artizan of the time,
bespoke his following, “by the flames of my furnace,
hadst thou met us as an enemy, Peiter De Lanoy, sturdy

Peiter as thou art, I'd made thy brain fly like sparks from
hot iron. The Bayard cause for ever—haro and battle!
Body o' me, give old Stevens but a fair stroke, those fair
visages of yours, Mienheers, had been little better than a
rotten cinder such as I cast way in the Smidt Vly, before
Asseer Leevy's tan vats.”

“Good sirs, we doubt ye not, or that as things are, ye
carry stout hearts to war for the factions ye have espoused,”
said De Lanoy with wily caution, at the same
time as he proceeded, assuming a soothing and insinuating
tone of voice, which at once calmed the angry and party-heated
feelings of those he spoke with, weaning their
minds from antipathy and ill will, till they were carried
away in sympathy of the words of him who addressed
them; “yet trust me, masters; in good faith I speak it, ye
are too eager for the blood of old comrades and friends;
and for why?—to urge a stranger's interest, to push the
triumph of a man, who but yesterday ye scarce knew
breathed life: sooth, it is, methinks, somewhat unnatural
that thus soon ye should forget the sweet intercourse of
neighbourship. Yet green in its passage, does not
memory show we have been a handful in this desolate
land, a few christian men amid a desert and surrounded by
hosts of savages, from whose bloody trails yet unavenged,
the voices of the butchered call on us to give over unnatural
feuds, and turn upon the common foe—the murthering
red man and his base ally, the cursed dogs of
Canada, whose crimes the smouldering ruins of Schenectadie
must for ages keep fresh. Yes, my friends, forget
not that our fathers drove back from the very spot whereon
our dwellings stand, the raging panther and the howling
wolf. And heretofore in unison, we have tilled this wilderness;
yea, time out of mind have there been kindly
interchanges of friendship between us, that bespoke good
will; nay, there are even here many who by me have been
called by name from childhood, upwards; remember you
not our boyish sports together? and for what reason meet
we thus with ireful eyes and hands ready to deal blows of
death upon each other? Let not the early day be renewed,
when blood smoked from earth, and sought at the
gates of heaven vengeance on a fratricide—let not the

mark of wrath be set upon us as that which the seared
brow of the first murtherer fostered. Bethink ye, burghers;
is it not most horrible, thus Cain-like, to be arrayed
in arms—a brother thirsting for the draught which is to be
drained from the veins,—yea, from the heart of a brother!”

The honest burghers seemed evidently touched with
this appeal.

“There is somewhat in De Lanoy's words,” murmured
one in a whisper to him who stood at his side, “it is hard
to forget bygones; ay, many are the wildsome pranks
we, that is De Lanoy there and myself, have had in hand,
as Flattenburgh hill and the commons, from the swamp to
the holy ground, can bear strait witness.”

“In warhied dat is all dyne, mien vrients,” said the
warrior in the cuirass, taking up the subject as it reached
his ear; “I have had zum little vun mit him in my days
mienzelf; und a menschadagt and a frauwadagt[16] —py Got,
in der Nieuw Nederlandts dere was nien jongmen dat
dare dans mit him and I in a zhuffle zhuffle, dough dere
hipsey saw bleased der vrauws besser—ho, ho, de jongmen
now are niet zich as dat dey were den, py got.”

“Ay, in my day,” returned one, “De Lanoy has been
with us to pluck the goose; by gad he is a merry blade,
though a rare hand at nine pins.”

“Yes,” joined in another, “when we were boys it was
jovial pastime. It appears but as yesterday when we had
the cherevallie, wherein I blew the ram's horn before old
Ruckel Depeyster's door, when he married Helligunt,
the young widow of Mangle Minthorne of the Bouwerie
Laneng, De Lanoy was one who helped to plant the maypoles
that we hung with ragged stockings under the bridegroom's
window.”

“Troth, those were pleasant days, those were pleasant
days,” murmured many of the burghers, as their eyes
glistened with the pleasures of the recollection.

“And what claim to tear asunder the ties that hath

bound ye, boasts this man,—this Sloughter?” burst unrestrainedly
from the lips of Milbourne, with tone at once fiery
and impetuous; gathering a vehement and frantic force as
he spoke, he appeared borne away with a spirit furious
and bitter, o'ermastering discretion by the violence of
his feelings:—“by heaven's wrath! deeply it galls me
to see men like ye act as ye have borne yourselves, with
maugre faith to man and God. I tell ye, most dastardly
have ye done;—would honest men pursue your course,
and desert in need, old and tried friends to cling to the
cloak of favour? And can you give reason for such conduct?—Ye
would say this Sloughter is Protestant;
and on that forsooth, ye build—a sandy foundation
surely is it. But, let me ask, are not we of that
church? To establish the most glorious revolution,
has not my father-in-law, Jacob Leisler,—who has been
a burgher of Nieuw Yorke from infancy,—yea, while
like drones ye have wallowed in idleness and fattened
on the ease he made in his toils for you,—has he not, I repeat
it,—labored supported by us his faithful adherents,
who in the winter of adversity forgot not summer friends;—
has he not I repeat it, sacrificed his wealth, spent his time,
and shed his very blood for the good cause. And what is
the reward, to find ye, as ye are, lying sycophants, coward
traitors, who having sucked the marrow of his liberal
hand, fly him when you find the source from whence he
fed you dried, and turn hissing like horned adders upon your
benefactor But what gain hath your treachery,—have the
miseries you suffered under Andross passed away, so that
no scar of the wounds he inflicted remains, yea do you no
longer remember the vile tyrant who oppressed you, have
you no thought of the chains and the prison house, have you
no memory who o'erthrew the despot, who trampled on his
power and his mandates as though one was as dust, and
the other an idiots words, who stood rocklike against the intrigues
of Jesuits, and the machinations of the base emissaries
of the Catholics, and the deposed James Stuart. Who
I seek in defiance of the slavish tools of that bigoted monarch,
cast Nicholas Renslear in prison, and who quailed not
in a dungeon to the tyranny of the arbitrary sycophant? Who
I ask made ye free, and taught ye that ye were men, no
worms to crawl innoxious about the spurner's foot; and
where in those dark days, those hours of sorrow and distress,
where were those you now exalt as leaders?—where
was the office holding Bayard, whose name you shout
with hoarse throats, where was the rich Van Kortlandt,
and the proud Graham, where but at the sleeve of the
tyrant Andross, fit instruments for a character so odious—
but go to—go to—I waste breath on reptiles, who crawl
in the paths which will yield them the most prey. I see
in your sullen visages ye are wedded to the route ye have
chosen, and are emulous of the vile name ye have achieved:—ye
have fled your liberator, ye have quitted the side of
Jacob Leisler, to attach yourselves to this Sloughter; and
yet what warrant have ye that he is a better man than
the craven Sir Edmund Andross.”

Although apparently there had been a slight, yet favorable
impression made on the burghers, who composed the
patrouille, by De Lanoy's artfully bringing back to their
minds, the days of ancient league, and intimacy, so that the
hearts of some began to be changed with renovated kindness,
and the stern grasp with which they held their weapons,
unconsciously relaxed as they bethought themselves
of youthful pranks and boyish hopes, and dangers, in which
all mutually suffered or delighted, yet at the imperious invectives,
and ill timed and injudicious reflections, on their
own conduct, as well as of those under whose banners they
were now enlisted, and whose purposes they were the avowed
partizans, by at once reviving in all its pristine ferocity,
the political hatred and struggles for ascendancy, and all the
individual and petty virulence of the times, banished instantaneously
all that the finer feelings had been likely to cherish;
and although Milbourne for a short period, was lost as it
were in the torrent of words, which ran like the rush of waters
over the rocks of a stream, from his lips, and whose
flow he found it impossible to control, for it seemed as if the
flood gates of his heart had burst asunder, and a gathered
store of gall sprung from heaped up wrongs, had poured
out overwhelming every barrier which caution should
have held guard upon, yet as his concluding words plainly

intimated, ere he had finished speaking, the miscalculated
and unadvised rashness of his advancing at such a
time, and place, and before such an audience, the sentiments
and remarks he had used, presented itself forcibly
to his thoughts; for while warmed and fired by the fruitful
matter that filled his imagination, the story of the
injurious returns received for the labors of himself and
friends, for the public weal, he could hear, see, nor think
of aught about him, and was absent from all but the cause
that had awakened his feelings; but no sooner had he found
a moments breathing space to gaze about, his bosom
filled with an expectant hope, even amid the bitter indignation
that swelled it, that he had shamed the opposers
of the Leisler party into repentance, and submissions, ere
he became fully aware of his imprudence, by the stern and
unopposing silence, by which his words were received,
and the dark and chilling aspect of the burghers. And in
the moment of fretful anger, that sprung from such disappointment,
he added the last sentence, which partaking
the feeling of the moment, fell from his lips like the last
drop of poison, drained from the venomous tooth, of the
expiring rattlesnake. There was a dead and speechless
interval, when the son-in-law of Leisler paused, and the
latest tone of his voice was borne away in the night breeze.
There motionless for awhile stood the patrouille, like dusky
and fixed statues; but this lasted not long, it was but
an instant space such as when the tiger draws in his breath,
and strengthens his limbs for a bound, upon the body of
the hunter's elephant. At first there arose a deep murmur,
like the groan of some mighty oak, ere the tempest
is raised, or like the distant roar of artillery, heard from
afar on the ocean, it was the vengeful interchange of an
angered crowd, urging and encouraging those who composed
it, to deeds of violence.

“And was such the aim of your peaceful embassy,” exclaimed
one in a tone of fierce and bitter irony, “came ye
then to raise sedition among us?”

“Accursed slanderer?” cried the artizan, in a voice
hoarse with rage, “did you but seek our lines to throw firebrands
of revolt amid our ranks, and to light up the coals
of rebellion, in a band of loyal subjects.”

“Foul tongued defamer,” quoth another angrily,
“bring you to us naught but insult, for what dare you use
words of shame, to those within the reach of whose poniards
ye stand.”

“For the sake of heaven friends hear me, indeed
ye have mistaken that which my comrade hath spoke,”
said De Lanoy, in vain striving to retrieve the ground,
that had been so wantonly lost by Milbourne's impetuosity;
but needless were his endeavours at interposition; the
attempt appeared merely to have an effect of increasing
the tumult of the incensed burghers against Milbourne,
and likewise to awake its fury towards himself, for such is
the blinded nature of the passions of humanity, that a
weak and failing interference, is more likely to cater fresh
food for excitement, than to allay its force, as some feeble
barrier built against the current of some rushing
mountain stream, serves but awhile, to stop the falling
of the waters, whose violence congregated, and whose
mass raised with unmeasured height, at length o'ertops
the puny obstacle, that had withheld the running tide, and
in its might bears it in scattered fragments, in its roaring
race, until every particle is lost in the dashings of the multitudinous
waves.

“And for this did De Lanoy use his smooth tongue?”
said one eyeing the person he spoke of, with a look of
rage, “we'll listen no more to his cunning lies, we should
have remembered that this is not the first time, he has
beguiled us to ruin.”

“He hath spoken of our ancient days, next he will persuade
us of Leisler's kindness and humanity,” echoed
another with scowling brow, “but for that, let him go look
at my houseless and despoiled family, my lands barren and
untilled, confiscated as he would term them, not however
by an Andross, but by the accursed and arbitrary edict of
Jacob Leisler.”

“Who prates of that man's services to the colony,” thundered
a stern tone, “I grant him active in driving the cattle
from the homesteads of honest yeomen—ah! in his
wrath he has laid desolate my hearth and home, because
forsooth, I chose to adhere to the fortunes of such as
were born my superiors, and jested at the rule of one
sprung from the kennel.”

“Ay, talk ye knaves of justice and ingratitude,” spoke
loudly others, “go to your dungeons and see if their bare
and dank walls, confine not men, such as from your births,
ye had been honored to clear the doorway for their steps,
hold not your chains Nicholas Bayard, and the worthy
descendant of Governor Nichols.”

“Haro, cry down with James Stuart, the Jesuits, and the
whore of Babylon,” shouted many, “their sway was a
hundred times better than these dirt bred rulers, these
offspring of lowest earth, Milbourne and Leisler.”

The resentment of the irritated burghers, appeared as
it were quickened by the reproaches that had burst in
outcries from their angry lips, and could their menacing
looks and ireful brows, have been seen as in the daylight,
they would have spoken a language, at once fearful and
warning to the rash offender, who had thus heedless of
consequence, touched the avalanche that tottered, but for
a breath to fall in overwhelming ruin,—yea as it were franticly
thrust his naked and uncovered hand in the den of
the cockatrice; yet there was sufficient for alarm, in the
manner in which the patrouille had slowly closed upon
Milbourne and his companions, and by which movement
the burghers almost encompased their enemies, and approached
so near, that their adverse weapons wanted but
a slight impetus, to strike at their opposing bodies; and
again there was that in the startling sound of their advance,
the hollow noise of their heavy footsteps, and the
clattering of their arms, that gave to their opponents a
sudden, although a certain insight, of the danger which
surrounded them on every side, and made the more apparent
the weakness of their array, and the defence which
it was possible to offer to such a body of men, infuriated
and superior in force and numbers. The mind of Milbourne
however, was not in a frame to bear the contumelious
attacks that had alike been made on his own character, and
that of his faction; blinded by a mad zeal for power, and an
unchecked pride of spirit, that had grafted on a nature
genial from birth, grown from a late unbounded sway, it
would have been worse than death, for him to bend his
haughty soul, and seek peace or give way in the least, to

those who even yet he considered as a herd beneath
him; indeed he was not one to beseech, or tamper with
the vexed and resentful, for rather than sooth the tempest
to a calm, he joyed in braving its might; and however for
an instant the chilling aspect of the situation of himself,
and the friends who accompanied him, may have presented
itself to his thought, and checked his ardour and boldness,
it was but as a brief fall of water, on some raging
flame, that dampens and beats down the bickering light,
with its momentary weight, but which in the end only
causes an increase of the streaming blaze; yea even the
very knowledge of the hazard in which he stood, seemed
an addition to the food of his passionate resistance: “Dastard
losels, dare ye parley thus to me,” cried he in a tone
whose energy was strengthened by the ire that pervaded
him, so that although his lips trembled and grew white, yet
his blood ran as it were a liquid of molten lead in his veins,
and fire flashed from his eye hate and defiance on his adversaries,
“dare ye dishonest mongrels breathe your venomous
lies and wag your noxious tongues in my presence and hearing,
may God's curse on Egypt light upon ye all, consuming
and scathing your false hearts to ashes. What, do you press
upon my guard?—back curs; dogs, back I say,—or, by
the power that made me, ye will raise a destroyer among
ye that ye little wot of withal:—ay, I will rip with this
good steel your foul breasts apart, and wash out with the
best blood ye have, your latest life's blood, the accursed
calumnies ye harbour and have presumed to prate against
those who have been unjust to themselves, that ye are
now free to utter the scandal.”

“Poco-a-poco, and is it come to that, santissama Espirito!
messmate, give us a fair sweep with my toledo,
ere you bear down,” exclaimed Eumet, eagerly flourishing
his hanger, after having been a silent, though not an
inattentive observer of what had passed; “carja, we've
a flota against us, but here's the hand that'll stem the
tide—we'll try these landsmen's mettle; thof I've
known 'em to speak bold enow; yet no nos concoenios,
as we say on the main—the lubbers turn as white as the
mainsheet, at the sight of the galerdeta of a true marinero—so,
hard ahelm, hearties, and lay 'em aboard.”

For an instant the sturdy burghers were overawed, and
gave back in their advance, daunted by the bared and
glittering steels that flashed before them and confronted
their approach upon their opposers; but it was but for a
single step they retreated, for reanimated by a sense of their
strength and the fewness of their foes, they quickly regained
their vantage, threatening with ferocious haste to
overwhelm their antagonists.

“What, are we braved by such as these!” roared the
artizan in a hoarse and brattling tone, and furiously
shaking aloft the bar which his hand held with a powerful
grasp, as if it had been a billet of the lightest wood;—
“nay, neighbours, shame not yourselves by a retreating
step, but drive the hounds, as though they were but ashes
to scatter by the wind.”

“On them, burghers,—on them,” cried one; “beat
them down to dust;—we are ten to one, and will teach
the rogues better counsel than they have yet born.”

“Nay, masters, let me but have a moment to explain;
—ye are all acting madly, and will rue these angry steps;”
said De Lanoy, striving to no purpose, for an opportunity
to prevent the direful consequence that evidently was
about to ensue and follow the fearful breach of amity that
had so unwisely been made.

“List him no word, but onwards—tear them in atoms!”
thundered, or rather yelled, a dozen voices, drowning in
the fierce outcry, the efforts of pacification: “on to the
death, and spare no life!” was shouted by others in tones
that made the very air ring with the sound, as if it was
shaken by the sharp report of a cannon.

And in all probability it would have taken but a short
time, judging from the frightful resolution by which the
patrouille were actuated, and the terrific thirst for retribution
for the scornful language they had received, that
pervaded their bosoms, to have executed their purpose
of destruction, for adjoined to the other infinite advantages
possessed by the burghers over the slender weapons
of their adversaries, was that a moment's unfortunate
indecision, or rather wonder at the frenzy of their
opponents on the part of Milbourne and his fellows, who,
as it were, startled at the screams of insatiable revenge,

that deafened them from every side, (as one having
thrust, in wantonness or by accident, the match in some
loaded magazine, would be astounded at the terrible explosion,
surpassing in its loudness all he had ever pictured,)
had afforded the burghers of the patrouille a
chance unscathed to crowd so near upon them that there
was no room for a sweep of the swords, which, in a manner
became useless, borne down by the weight of pikes,
clubs, and the other rude though powerful arms of the citizens;
indeed so tight was the struggle, that Eumet abandoning
his trusty steel, sought in haste to level his arquebuss
with deadly aim, but he had scarce loosened it from the
supporting bandalier ere a dozen hostile hands had grasped
it firmly, and strove to wrench it from his hold, which,
in spite of his furious endeavours at defence was soon effected,
and he himself beaten down almost senseless amid
the trampling feet of the combatants, while in vain also
were the desperate strivings of Milbourne and De Lanoy
to contend in the unequal conflict, for although many of
the sturdy burghers were unused and awkward in the
wielding of their offensive weapons, and their strokes
readily parried, making their part of the fight attended
with more ludicrous noise and clatter than serious risk or
danger, yet there were those whose strength of arm was
death bearing, and the splintered rapiers of their opponents
appeared a speedy omen of the enforcement of the
threats of utter annihilation, that was hoarsely shrieked
above the tumult of the contest.

“Death to the hated miscreants!” was echoed in fierce
cry from mouth to mouth, as the assured issue of the combat
became momently the more evident.

“Aye, tear them in pieces!” cried the artizan, maddened
by success, “hear no call for life, but leave the
dogs not an atom of flesh, that shall not be a gout of
gore.”

This last horrid encouragement was received by a tremendous
shout of assent, that spoke as with a voice of
despair to the hearts of the failing partizans of the Leislerian
faction, whose fate now looked inevitable, and to
whom it appeared as if there was no means of preservation

or escape from death left; yet at the very instant
the fatal result so surely to be anticipated, was about accomplishment,
at the very moment as it were, the suspended
blow of destruction was about to fall,—for at the
time of the artizan's denunciation, Milbourne and his companions
were completely at the mercy of their foemen,
and above their unguarded and now defenceless heads,
waved halberd, musquetoon, pike, and club, ready to descend
and scatter blood, brain, and life to dust,—at that
last stress, other voices than those engaged in fight, rang
with cries of forbearance on the breeze, and the uplifted
weapons simultaneously were withdrawn harmless from
their direful threatening, as by the hand of enchantment.

“Hold! hold this disturbance!” exclaimed the strangers,
“here comes the burgerwagt.”

“The burgomasters! the burgomasters! back, Mienheers,
back!” said those of the patrouille, one to the
other: “yet keep an eye on the captives—back! masters,
back!”

As the patrouille divided and gave way, through the
opening left thereby, between the adverse parties, the
new comers advanced: they were a considerable body of
armed citizens headed by two magistrates, who having
been alarmed by the noise of battle and tumult had quickly
departed the city for the scene of contest on the Marktvlet,
and although their steps had been lighted by flambeaux
of blazing pine splinters, making their path as day,
yet such had been the eagerness and engrossed minds of
those engaged in the fray, that these had not been perceived,
although a considerable distance had to be crossed
from the beaver gracht, the street from whence the
burgomasters and their followers entered on the plain to
attain the spot where the combat was carried on; where
having arrived, the two important dignitaries who took
the lead, strode forward with solemn, slow, and becoming
gait and bearing, and gazed in wonderment on the ireful
adversaries. They were both short, squabby looking men
of unwieldy shape, the one apparently in size but little
superior to the other, and both resembling cushions well
stuffed; they wore huge three cornered cocked hats,

with monstrous bunches of yellow ribbons stuck in the
place of cockades, as insignias of their faithful adherence
to the prince of Orange, William the Third, King of England,
and their approbation of the protestant revolution;
the one was close wrapped in a monstrous night gown of
staring red flannel, well tucked round his throat to keep
out the cold, while the other, more hardy in the city's
service, no way concealed his under dress by outward
cloak or wrapper, but shown in his lead coloured jerkin,
with mettle buttons, his yellow breeches, and paste shoe-buckles,
all of which were sufficiently visible in the torch
light. These personages bore in their hands, the more
as emblematical of their station than as assistance to
their steps, a tall mahogany stick, the top of which was
crowned by a carved acorn blazing in Dutch mettle; this
was called a burgomaster's wand, and even unto this day
hath the custom come for the chosen rulers of the city to
bear on momentous occasions a like emblem of their
consequence.

“Pugh! pugh! what is the—pugh! pugh! I have lost
my—pugh!—breath!” spoke the last described character,
with thick and hasty utterance, puffing and blowing with
the fatigue he had just endured in bringing, or rather rolling,
his mighty carcass to the place of disturbance;
“What in the fiend's name's the matter? pugh! what a
race I have had!—pugh! pugh!—who the devil has had
the audacity—pugh!—to kick up such a dust; pugh!—
breaking the peace of his highness' loyal subjects, and—
pugh!—that of the puissant burgomasters of the honest
city of Nieuw Yorke? Here is some one, brother Gelyn—pugh!—that
is desirous of the stocks, the wooden
horse, or the—pugh!—cucking stool.”

“Ja, Mienheer Filkins,” replied the other dignitary
pompously, “dis is most lyk dis is zo; ja, Mienheer
Filkins.”

“Sirs, a most grievous and violent breach of faith, hath,
by these men of yours, been committed against us,” said
Milbourne hastily, stepping forward and addressing the
potent burgomasters, “we came from Jacob Leisler to
have an interview and treat for terms whereby peace

might be restored to all, with Colonel Sloughter; but disregarding
the sacred character we bear, and which even
De Frontenac's salvages would have respected, as you
behold, they have met us with the sword's point, and, but
for your timely presence, even now we had been foully
butchered by their villanous hands.”

“How now? pugh! how now?” exclaimed burgomaster
Filkins, “what's this? pugh! what's this I hear?”

“The false-tongued hound lies—basely lies!” cried
the artizan: “body o' me! under pretence of friendly
errand they came; I grant his say so; but they forgot
that pretext, when, with poisonous lip they strove to
wind us from our duties—but they found true steel, not
to be bent;—and it was to retaliate the slurs he cast on us
in disappointment that we would have slain him, and his
dogs who follow at his heels. May I never screw an
anvil more if I could not now beat to death the treacherous
knaves.”

“Thou worm!” said Milbourne, shaking in defiance
his shattered steel; “thou talkest brave; but had I to
meet thee on equal ground, palsy wither my arm but I
would make thee change thy boastful vaunt.”

“How! speak ye that—speak ye that?” returned the
artizan, raising his bar as about to strike down his opponent;
“by the breath o' me, thou shalt rue thy words,
master.”

“Huti-tuti! Mienheers, do you forget who's present?
pugh! here's a todo, a hubbub, to be sure—pugh!” quoth
Alderman Filkins, interposing his authority between the
disputants: “a fine riot here, brother Verplank.”

“Mienheer Filkins, ja,” said burgomaster Verplank,
“dis is besser sbordt dan to zee der haanekamp in
vrouw Schakerly's haanemat, at der Old Slib. I'll bet
you, Mienheer, dree dotkin on smidt Stevens; don't let's
sboil der sbort, Mienheer Filkins.”

“It wont do, it wont do, brother Verplank; it would be
a blot on the laws of the Council of this city—pugh!” answered
burgomaster Filkins, “ye had better make it up,
Mienheers, ye had better make it up.”

“What, shall they go unharmed and free?” exclaimed
several of the patrouille, indignantly.

“Shall we not trample down these friends of Leisler?”
muttered others.

“Huti-tuti, masters! who is the judge of the best, you
or I?—pugh!” quoth the burgomaster, drawing himself
up; “would you take the law in your own hands?—
pugh!—for what was I elected burgomaster?—pugh!—
to be dictated to?—pugh!—I tell you ye had better make
it up—pugh!—for if you don't, as sure as my name's Filkins,
I'll have you all whipped in the rasp huis yard, for
lasæ majestatis; which means, not obeying my commands—
pugh!”—

The patrouille remained doggedly silent, which was,
however, favourably construed into acquiescence on their
part by the lordly and puissant burgomaster, who now,
in his turn, most courteously extended an offer of safe
escort to the rescued Milbourne and his companions to
the presence of Colonel Sloughter, which, of course was
eagerly accepted by them. And after numerous admonitions
from the burgomasters to the patrouille to restrain
their impetuosity at aggression, though at the same time
to keep watchful guard, the partizans of Leisler departed
in company of the magistrates towards the city,
leaving the patrouille at their stations, gazing on their retiring
forms with unsatiated hatred and vowing revenge.

“There let them go!” said the artizan, glancing on
their fading forms a look as spiteful as that with which
the fretted and caged hyena scares the spectator from his
sight, fearing that the iron bars of his prison may be too
weak to hold the enraged beast: “There let them go, in
the fiend's name,” said he, “their good fortune hath it
been that now they were not stiff and cold before us—
yet body o' me, the time shall yet be when this arm of
mine shall yield the dogs death.”

“Nay, Smidt Stevens, an Sloughter act the man;”
said one—“more fitting hands for them will do the office
you seek; the rope and the hangman's kiss be their portion.”

“Death, to the hated miscreants!” murmured in stern
accord the whole patrouille.

In the meanwhile, safe from the anger of their ruthless
enemies, the objects of these menaces proceeded with
their doughty conductors across that part of the marktvliet
that separated them from the city, and passing the
narrow entrance of the marktvelt-steegje,[17] they pursued
their way towards the great dyke which ran in the centre
of the town. As they moved along, the torches that were
borne in the train flashed with strong red blaze upon the
dark and night shadowed houses of the burghers of Nieuw
Amsterdam, lightening for an instant with fitful ray, the
gay painted brick and heavy rock stone of which they
were built; and often the green glass of some hastily
opened casement, gave back, alike with the glazed tiles
of the steep roofs, from whence the snow had slid away,
and whose smooth surface shone like mirrors of polished
steel, the trembling reflection of the passing flambeaux;
although, when they first entered the dark lane, whose
rough path of half frozen mud and snow they were obliged
to thride, to gain the thicker settled part of the city, all
seemed dark, still, and solitary, unbroken by voice or
step of passenger, and the long line of buildings, whose
gable ends fronting the way, frowned on them as they
went beneath, without sign of living thing inhabiting them,
and looking like rows of funeral mounds, so stirless and
desolate they were; yet as they hastened onwards, the
scene changed: the tumult of afar off crowds was heard,
the trampling of many feet and cries of people rushing to
and fro; soon was seen lights, and groups of men hurrying
confusedly along or collecting in throngs as if in discourse;
and then came blasts of martial music on the air,
the sound of trumpets and of kettle drums; the windows
of many dwellings were thrown open, and by the blaze
of their night lamps, the masters looked forth on the busy
gathering of their neighbours—every body appeared anxious
and stirring.

“By mine office,—pugh!—this hath been a restless
and fatiguing night—pugh!—for the city authorities,”

quoth burgomaster Filkins, “in the saints name, brother
Gelyn,—pugh!—I think they had better make matters
up—pugh!”

“Ja, Mienheer Filkins,” replied the other dignitary,
“dere is no vun in dis—ja, I wants beace, for I have bet
mine dwo year golt to run against Mienheer de Witt's merrie
vor dwo bushel of seawant. Mienheer Filkins, I bet you
your dotkins on mine golt; dere ish not his lyk dis zide
of Bestavers Killetje: he will drot out Peiter de Witt's
merrie. If you can zettle dings mit der stadtwogd, Mienheer
Delanoy, you will zee mien golt on der gorse, and I
will bet mit dee.”

“Sincerely, burgomaster,” answered De Lanoy, “do
I desire that such may happen, and that friendship
once again may be the bond between us, and that in our
native sports and exercise we may alike meet in amity;
and if such luck fall, Mienheer Verplank, I will not retreat
from your challenge, and stand ready to wager.”

The burgomasters and their companions having now
crossed one of the light wooden bridges that was thrown
across the canal that led up the heeren gracht, began to
wend their way down the hoog street;[18] here the throng
increased, and it seemed as if the inhabitants of the whole
place had poured towards this one quarter, a motley group
of every sort and calling; striplings and grown men.
Here was the mean clad mechanic, and there the rich
attired shopman, all girt, however, with such arms as they
could procure, and mustering by the light of many torches
as it were a time of deadliest need and danger. The
character of Milbourne and his two associates was soon
made known to these, and their reception from the rabble
was such as to show the resentful hate which was felt
towards them: groans, hisses, and cries assailed them
from every side: “down with Leisler, down with Milbourne
and De Lanoy, their reign is over—a new time
hath come!” was fiercely shouted around them; some
had even the hardihood to confront them in their path,

and shake their pikes and clubs in their faces, by way of
insult; others threw balls of ice at them as they walked
by, and huzzaed and threw up their caps for Sloughter
and his new Council. The light foam stood on the lips
of Milbourne, and his visage was convulsed with passion,
as he returned the angry glances of his enemies with a
look of spite and rage equal to their own, and had it not
been for the judicious conduct of the magistrates, his fury
would soon have broken bounds, and he would have burst
in some act of open violence on those who had so grievously
assaulted him: but the burgomasters, finding their
authority exerted in vain, to quell the attacks of the crowd,
turned quickly and precipitately into a by-way, and in a
short time with rapid pace left the aggressors behind them,
the rabble forbearing to follow their retreating steps.
The path they had now taken was called by the Dutch
sleyk steeg.[19] or mire lane, and led in the rear of the stadt
huis, and passing by that building, opened on Coenties
slip, whereon the stadthuis fronted; ere entering on the
slip, however, they paused a moment to take breath from
their hasty flight, and gave a quick glance on the scene
before them, while the puissant burgomasters sought to
renovate their wearied frames and recover their lost
wind, ere they ushered themselves in the presence of his
excellency, Colonel Henry Sloughter, Governor of their
Majesties' loyal province of New-Yorke.

The whole slip, from the wooden step of the stadthuis
to the tall masted skippers that lay moored at water's
edge, under the breastwork of the rondell, seemed a
moving mass of men, of burghers and schutters indiscriminately
mixed, and all apparently busied in warlike preparation;
all was alive with torch and flambeaux—here
was heard the clattering of the artizan's hammer, as the
drake or pedero was mounted on its carriage and levelled
at the direction of the walls of the fort, whose white
bulwarks on the distant hill looked like drifts of snow,—
and again were repeated from others words of marshalling
and array; yet the proceedings of the persons who composed

what appeared to be the principal group, were
such as mostly engaged the attention of those who looked
on the stirring scene; for although the eye found for
awhile amusement in the labours and movements of the
busied and industrious burghers, and drew a faithful conclusion
from their actions of the motives that inspired
their conduct; (for here was one zealous and single souled
with the spirit of party, and there was another at his
side, toiling alike in forwarding the purpose of his fellow,
though actuated by a very different feeling, selfish to provide
for his own safety and interest, nevertheless, apparently
emulous of hazard in the cause he had espoused,
as if for its own sake;) yet last, the observer rested solely
on that chief point of attraction, from which all the objects
that engaged the attention of the commoner had
seemed to emanate, or at any rate took direction, the station
of such, who, from their manner and bearing, claimed
authority of those who thronged within the presence, the
spot where the Governor himself stood, attended by such
who had already felt the sunshine of his favour, and were
installed in power near his person. In very different
guise and appearance from what the narration left him,
was Henry Sloughter. Recruited by a lapse of several
hours, food, rest, sleep, and many comforts had his wornout
frame enjoyed; renovated by these somewhat of its
ancient freshness had been restored to his cheek, and the
brightness of the eagle glance to his hazle eye, late dim
and faded as by the palsied touch of age; the faintness and
sickness of his weary travel were gone, and he strode firm
and proud in manly strength, yet there was a paleness and
haggard cast upon his countenance, but whether the hue
was such as sprung from a life of wassail and debauchery,
and was no stranger to his visage, (for such a life he was
said to have passed from his earliest youth upwards,) or
was the effect of the sufferings he had so late endured, a
dying mark such as the plague leaves on the brow of the
rescued victim of its rage, was hard to determine; albeit
his voice was deeply toned, commanding and martial, and
his fine though sallow features darkened, by locks whose
sable die vied with the black-bird's wing, and hung over
his forehead like the dank and drooping foliage of a
weeping willow, gave him the bold frank look of a warrior;
and such indeed he was, but unfortunately for the
province whose destinies he for awhile was appointed to
direct, and whose sole government he possessed, his looks
were his greatest virtue; his appointment to the office,
whose duties he was about entering on, was an unhappy
one, considering the turbulent and disorderly state committed
to his will.

To direct the helm of power at the time of this history,
there was wanting a man peculiarly talented, of conciliating
disposition, yet active and determined in his resolutions;
one who at this critical conjuncture, was able by his
influence, as well to reconcile a divided people, as to
defend them against the wiles of a cunning adversary;
the implacable foe of the English, DeFrontenac. Though by
nature Colonel Sloughter was a man of energetic and
thinking mind, capable of much; yet from an habitual indolence,
a wayward and idle spirit, this quality was of
but little worth to him, and except in times of the utmost
need its possessor seldom brought it in play, and even
then too often, the better capacities lay dormant,
deadened by the effects of riot and dissipation: there were
indeed certain periods when as if stung by a scorpion, recollection
darting through him, conscience was alive, and
he felt that he misused the blessing he possessed, and that
he had been created for better things than he had accomplished,
yet this reflection was but of brief duration, like
wells of sparkling water in the barren desert, few and
wide wastes between; so that the space of his administration
was weak, short, and troublous, as might from his
character have been expected, for he wasted that time
which should have been passed in the public service, in
the pursuit of libidinous pleasures, the thirst for which
had been instilled as it were, into his very being, by
the fashion of the dissipated and luxurious court of
Charles the Second, to whom in his boyhood he had been a
page, and he became a ready instrument in the hands
of the ambitious and designing, who in his new advancement
had attached themselves to his interest

and by his own reckless conduct, went far to prove the
dark outlines given by the historian of his character,
for in speaking of him, it is said, “that either in the
hurry of the king's affairs, or the powerful interest
of a favourite, a man was sent over, utterly destitute of
every qualification for government, licentious in his
morals, avaricious and poor.” However, at the present
introduction of this personage, he appeared alive to the
stirring spirit of the time; there was neither the inertness
or imbecility of indolence about him, and he strove to implant
on the minds of those who surrounded him, an
impression of his activity, favourable to his first essay
in his new government. But unfortunately, the latent fire
within him was awakened, rather by the opposition that
had been offered to his explicit demand of submission, and
the acknowledgement of the high authority and commission
with which he was invested, than by a stern sense of
the fulfilment of his duty; and, indeed, the misguided
obstinacy of Leisler and his partisans had a strong influence
on a temper by nature quick and revengeful—
arousing the worst passions, confirming the dislike which
the Anti-Leislerian factionists, (who had gained his ear,)
had with wily insidiousness instilled into his ready reception,
into a bitter hatred; so that he now superintended,
and urged forward the preparations of hostility against
the infatuated Hollander and his partisans, with the emulation
of one devoted to the interest of the inveterate
foes of the Nieuw Nederlander, more than with the calm
decision and deliberate procedure behoving him, who,
from the lofty place he held, and considering the circumstances
of the period, should rather have sought, by even
absolute sacrifices, in some instances, (but which would
have been merely temporary,) to have soothed the wounded
feelings, and healed the breaches that the disorders of the
revolution had made in the bosom of the oppositionists; or
at any rate, have forborne all violent exigency, should the
chance have presented itself, than to have pursued matters
to the utmost measure of the sword. But even had there
been an opportunity for such better principle,—there were
those at his hand who would not have allowed it sway; their
endeavours being alone at strengthening and inflaming the
frame of mind in which he was:—nor were such efforts
thrown away. Within the circle of his step was to be
seen the haughty form of Van Kortlandt, returned, as it
were by magic, from his exile, called by the sudden and
scarce to be expected change of affairs that was taking
place, and by his presence, showing how long digested
was the powerful movement that had been made against
his enemy, and how deep, yet how covered, were the
pitfalls that had been dug in the path of the blinded Leisler.
And there too, anxiously prying into every whispered
secret, and peering through the crowd of his fellows,
rose the thin, harsh features of Graham, while his
wily eye darted, like the piercing orbs of a snake, on all
about him: and close to his side stood the heavy and
brawny form, and stolid and unmoved visage of Richard
Ingoldsby, while the long white locks of the fugitive
Edsell waved in the thronging crowd of fawners, who
sought the attention of their new master. Such was the
unfavourable and unpropitious aspect that Milbourne and
De Lanoy were about to brave in the parlance they had
sought;—advancing, as it were, to an encounter with a
host of ruthless and unforgiving foes, rendered more
inveterate by the opening prospect of success that lay
before them, and keenly alive to the recent injuries
they had received.

Favoured by the obscurity of Coentjes Alley, (in which
they stood,) to whose gloomy and narrow-mouthed entrance
unpierced by the lights in front, two huge buttonwood
trees, (one of which rested its branches on the eaves of
the roof of the stadthuis itself, and afforded in summer
an umbrageous retreat to hundreds of swallows and martins
who built their nests undisturbed in its sacred
branches, and round whose body near the ground, were
fastened benches for the accommodation of the burghers
who felt inclined to sit thereon and smoke their pipes, and
listen to the news that might be stirring of a summer eve;
for the place was a resort for politicians and all such idle and
windy characters;) added additional darkness: and not
being distant many yards from where Sloughter and the

group about him were; (for although by means of a wooden
railing that girted the stoeb of the stadthuis, they were
forced to make a considerable circuit to attain the governor's
presence,) yet from the alley, Milbourne and his
companions were so near him, that they had an uninterrupted
sight, and even could hear all that was going on,
at once distinguishing the forms and attitudes and voices
of the speakers. Sufficient time also was granted their
curiosity, from the tardiness of the worthy burgomasters
under whose protection they were thrown. For these
dignitaries, foreseeing no small exertion would be necessary
for them to make their way, even when backed by
their magisterial influence, through the numbers that
intervened ere they could get to the presence they desired
and wished to conduct their convoy, and being also
not a little wearied by the labour already undergone,
appeared by no means desirous of being in a hurry to
adventure their comely persons in the perils of the jostling
throng, but wisely took a brief space to make up their
minds and prepare their bodies for the hazard, and watched
an auspicious moment to commence their progress.

In the meanwhile, the bosoms of the adherents of
Leisler beat indignant as their eyes scanned with ireful
glances the heart-galling scene that was passing within
their view; for what dagger, though driven to the heart,
can give more pain;—what poisonous liquid in the
chymist's calendar can deeper seeth the soul, as it were
with burning flame, than to hearken to faithless lips pouring
out their ingrateful tales;—yea, listen to the words of the
hypocrite—the fly, that lived in the warmth of our chamber
unharmed, and fostered by our succour—in congratulation
of the triumph of a mortal enemy over our
miseries;—to mark the flowings of the self-same fable,—
the specious falsehood that beguiled our confidence,
used for the purpose of gaining place in the favour of
another, and those vows that we believed savoured of a
sole devotion, readily transformed in attachment to our
deadliest enemies; and worse than this,—subservient to
the new alliance, the very favours received from our
cheated friendship become the theme of mockery and

derision—a banquet catered by the time-serving sycophants
on whom they had been heedlessly bestowed, to
gratify the malignancy of the new object of their dissimulation;—and
such was now the case; for Sloughter, at
the moment, was receiving the joyous greetings of a herd
of courtiers, who moved as well by the appearance of
success that favoured the speedy issue of the conflict, with
the stubborn deniers of his authority that the time presented,
as by sanguine hopes of advancement, by early
declaration of amicable sentiments on his entrance on the
first step of his office;—and among these might be noticed
not a few, who, on the former part of the evening,
hovered in the sphere of Leisler's influence, and appeared
at his call the most strenuous of his servants and advocates.
The reader most probably has some slight remembrance
of Mienheer Jacobus Kip's pointed though brief
remarks, in the conclusion of the first section of this book
of the narrative, for the personage among these latter worthies,
who was most conspicuous in thrusting himself in
the eye of the Governor was the same character, the outlines
of whose virtues, the shrewd schepen remarked on
in a manner which was not only forcible but true;—for
foremost in the troop came Dirk Van Rikketie, than
whom no man was more indebted to Leisler for promotion
and fortune, and than whom from unsteadiness
of faith, none was more undeserving, and who disregarding
every honourable tie, no sooner could form an
accurate judgment of the flowing of the tides than he
sought the very first chance proffered to lend his assistance
to the destruction of his patron; nay, not content
with utter desertion, with the eager avidity of a long injured
and determined foe, Dirk sought to pull down to
dust the idol by whose pedestal he had hung in worship,
and strove as though his life depended on it to overwhelm
in ruin the man who, worthless as he was, had
placed him high in office; for Leisler, on the dereliction
of Bayard, had bestowed on Dirk the two important public
places of the colony, the one known as Geheim Schryver,
or Recorder of Secrets, the other as Receiver General of
the Revenues; and these stations Dirk had now for some
time filled with considerable profit to himself, and with an
excellent eye to his own interest; and being withal much
used to the duties of the offices, he had no desire to resign
them, and this, together with what appeared to be the
popular voice, for that, no matter how adverse to justice,
was solely Dirk's guiding star, were most probably the motives
for the present conduct which he pursued; for he is
to be acquitted of all inveteracy of heart, for he was one
who would not harm a worm if he thought he could gain
nothing by his inhumanity.

The looks of this creature bespoke but little of his
origin, as well as the contamination of the world of intrigue
in which he had for many years been engaged, had
altered his feelings. His father was a good substantial
yeoman, who industriously tilled his fruitful acres at Newtown,
(a little Yankee settlement on the Mattouwac,) and
had designed his son to the same following, when he (the
old man) was gathered to his fathers; for the child bespoke
not in infant years aught beyond common faculties; nevertheless
Dirk was an adventurous spirit, and not to be tied
down to such honest livelihood, for he soon found it took
small knowledge or tact to become a knave, and his first
lessons of experience were reaped from pilfering water melon
patches and orchards, in which essays he always had the
address to escape detection, or turn by artful falsehood punishment
on the heads of his innocent playmates. Emboldened
by his young operations, he soon hit on the line of his
abilities, and was articled to some pettifogging Connecticut
attorney, (a species of animals that were fast collecting
in the new colonies of America, like the maggot, who
soon calls his armies where'er there is fresh carrion to
feed on.) From his master, Dirk learnt more lessons of
sheer villany than even his own ingenious brain had heretofore
believed existing, but what he was taught was not
wasted, but rather improved by his fertile mind, and perfected
to an adept he entered on his practice in New-Yorke;
there it was not long ere by dint of his accommodating
temper, which of course fitted itself to all occasions,
he brought himself into notoriety, and from one degree
to another he was lifted to the favour he enjoyed.

Dirk was, in personal appearance, little, mean, and insignificant,
though studiously habited, with eye dull, unmeaning
and vacant by nature, but which was lighted up by a
wild and habitual quickness and condescension of countenance,
which was alike extended to Mienheer de Heer,
the burgomaster, or to Corneljse the fisherman, which
nominal applied to a well known dirty losel, but who
was uncommonly meddlesome in the politics of the period,
and thereby often from his free expression of sentiments,
was elevated to the exercise of the whipping post or the
dignity of the stocks; yea, the same smile that with affable
kindness lit up Dirk's visage beamed on the prosecutor
and the culprit whom he sentenced in the course of
his office, which gave him a place on the bench in der
hoofdt scout hof, (a sort of court held by the mayor and
burgomasters, in the rasp huis hall, for the purpose of
trying and awarding summary punishments to drunken
Indians, thieving negroes, and other petty delinquents, and
in some measure answering to the court formerly called
Mayor's Court, by which name the records of the time in
some instances term the one in question, although the
authority of the court of burgomasters appears in certain
cases to have extended to denouncing on criminals the sentence
of death, or having their tongues perforated with red
hot iron.) Yet there was no convict so low, or whose crime
was so atrocious, but Dirk addressed with the words,
“mien zeer vreint,” and was ready to shake hands with
him under the rope and wish him well through his punishment;
nevertheless, be it confessed, Dirk was sometimes
very severe and inflexible, but in such cases, the hue and
cry of the populace directed his manner, and from such judicious
bearing there is no reason to suppose that Dirk did
not deserve the appellations which were universally ceded
as his due, of a smart, cunning fellow, and `an independent
and upright judge;' indeed Dirk was the adoration of all
the city of Nieuw Amsterdam, for he was ready to help any
one in difficulty with his advice, and to give any body a
good character, so as it was not contrary to public feeling
or his own peculiar advantage; in truth he was one
whose equanimity was a source of admiration: he was
always like the surface of a mirror, smooth, clear, and
unruffled;—but not like the glass was he to be looked into;
he was, nevertheless, patient under insult, and if he
thought it of moment, would kiss the foot that spurned
him, and beat down by his courtesy all enmity, for the
veriest contempt was received by him as one would receive
a favour, came it from the hand of one in power; he was
albeit, a true doglicker, a thorough broken spaniel;—although
it behoves to mention here, that the chronicle
notes there was one brief and momentous period of his
life that Dirk's actions did not adhere so strictly to the
tenets whereon the latter portion of his existence appears
to have been directed, and as if forgetful of his accustomed
sound policy, in no matter whatever to endanger his
person,—whether it was he thought if he escaped the hazard
the better for his interest, or that he was unawares
drawn in an ebullition of temper, an experiment, from
whose manifest folly he derived much after experience,
in shunning the same rock; he was unadvisedly betrayed
into ire, so far as to run in risk his precious limbs: the
spirit of party at the period alluded to, as usual in the
province, rose uncommonly high, so that a chivalric rage
seized on those who attached themselves to any of the
disputing sides; each man called out his antagonist, and
either with the hand gun, lance, or stave, laid him at his
feet, or lost his own life in the fierce encounter. It so
happened in those irascible days, that Dirk fell foul of
a rough, long shanked, raw boned, giant of a fellow, who
was bullying and ripping out oaths against all that were
of a different mind with himself; in the matter, Dirk,
though fain to retreat, was so entangled that he found
there was no getting clear without a mortal combat;—so
with a sad heart, Dirk met his opponent, who having
been a leader of the train bands at Paulus Hook, (in
which latter delightful spot, he was a resident, his employment
being, with three long limbed, strapping brothers,
all fighting bullies like himself, that of a cowfeeder
and grazier on the salt marshes of Pavonia, while his
visits to New-Yorke were for the profitable purpose of
disposing of cheap milk to the households of the prudent
Dutch citizens,) in the affair in question was armed with
a tremendous andrea ferrara, the unexpected sight of
which, so terrified the valorous Dirk, that his legs, for
fear, verily slipt from under him, so that he fell backwards
towards the earth, which received him unkindly,
for the rearward extremity of his body in his descent
struck with such force the butt end of an old musquetoon,
which had first dropt from his hand, that he bore the
mark of the tender contact ever after, and halted to his
grave; and whether it was from this cause, his limping,
or from the instability of his principles, and the little dependance
to be placed on his honour or his faith, that the
surname of Van Rikketie was given him is uncertain,
however, taking all things into consideration, it could not
have more truly been applied. With the unsteadiness of
gait that hath been mentioned, though with a face smirking
with smiles, pleasant and winning, Dirk advancing
made his way past those who intervened between him
and the Governor, overaweing with his superior effrontery
less barefaced flatterers, and abashing, for very
shame at his extraordinary priority of talent, the host of
his fellow sycophants, who were assembled for similar
purposes, and who were unable to compete with him in
his career of dissimulation, but shrunk in his rear as
humble followers and admirers; though Dirk took the
precedence of every one, yet most courteous was his progress,
bowing and grinning to every eye he caught; this
fashion Dirk had learnt from some popular character or
other, finding it took vastly with the greater portion of
the multitude, who, it is well known, are most gratified when
they have it in their power to boast that they are on an intimate
footing with men in office, that they talked of such
an affair with such a one, the koopman of the stores, who
said so and so, or that they had just received a profound obeisance
from such a one, the Roymeester, who, of course, is
an extremely fine fellow:—nevertheless, Dirk's imitation
of affability was but second hand, praise worthy as it was,
yet as all second hand imitations, it was open to censure,
for there were those who inviduously revenged their
spleen on Dirk's advancement to fortune by terming him
the ape of the worthy, whose manners he had adopted.
Neglecting nothing, however minute, in respect to the
personage to whose notice he was about recommending
himself, Dirk took care, notwithstanding the chill night
air, to uncover his bald head, and thrust his doffed cap
beneath one arm, while the other supported a crowded
bundle of papers, and one or two well bound (in neat calf
covers and with brass clasps) treatises on the laws of the
world, and the honest province of New-Yorke; nor was
Dirk unwise in such display, for he discovered thereby
at once his anxiety, even in the midst of his multitudinous
duties of station, to be among the very first to salute and
tender his adherence to his excellency, and it likewise
showed with what increasing diligence he applied himself
to the demands of the public, that he could not stir
abroad a moment without bearing with him the fruits of his
application. In truth, Dirk had just been deeply pondering,
weighing, and considering on all points a critical case
that he was to decide, and which he had just concluded
on, and was so elated with what he deemed his own
cleverness, or rather, as he supposed, his having as is
vulgarly said `hit the right nail on the head,' in his making
up his mind, that he could not in his heart separate
himself from the paper whereon he had drawn out his
opinion; indeed he has some little intention, if chance favored
to sound the Governor on the point, and learn whether
what he had determined on was acceptable; if not, he
would have time to reverse and accommodate his sentiments,
to an accordance with those he found most popular.
The thing was this, it happened from Dirk's being
receiver general of the revenues, that all matters of mulct
and penalties, were to be cognizable before him; and thereby
there came under his especial purview, an examination
wherein one Simon Jantz, a thick headed market boor, entered
his complaint against a person in office, named Myndert
Van Schayck, the son of old Levinus Van Schayck, the
public vendu meeter; of the said Van Schayck's having infamously
tricked him, the said Simon Jantz, and also, of his
having made a purchase with false measures, or rather not
according to the standard, kept for the example of all fair
traders at the public wharf, by the eyckmeester, and like
wise at the pack-huysen, or stores of the colony; now the
latter was an offence, and answerable to fine, while the former
came out to be, that Myndert having an old negro who
died from very age, and seeking to get rid of the expense
of his burial, hit on an expedient therefor, by going to
the market in Dock-Street, where Jantz had a large quantity
of eggs for sale, and made a barter to the purpose, that
for as many eggs as he, Van Schayck, could support by
placing his hands close to hips, and stretching out his
fingers, which were by no means small, the eggs as Jantz
understood it, being heaped thereon against his body, between
his hands as mentioned and his chin, that he Van
Schayck, would sell him the said Jantz, a capital negro fellow,
if not without fault, at least without one fault that was
common to any black alive. It happened that the bargain
was artfully brought on, by Van Schayck's leading Jantz to
inveigh against the slaves he possessed, who were an obstreperous,
noisy, riotous, drunken set, who wasted every
thing, and who were out night and day, which gave the
other an opportunity to mention he had one he would part
with cheap, who was a sober steady dog, by no means
riotous, wasted nothing, and would never give an insolent
word, say or do what you would, and what was better,
never showed any inclination to stir from any place he
was set. Misled by these recommendations, and believing
that Van Schayck could not hold many eggs in the position
agreed on, at the motive for which proposition Jantz
did seriously marvel, the arrangement was gladly made
by the witless churl; who to his surprise at the fulfilment
of the bargain, beheld the wily Van Schayck, seize on two
monstrous baskets, which contained all his eggs, and making
a place therein to take a firm clinch, by dividing the rushes
at the bottom, Van Shayck being a stout fellow was able
to raise the baskets to his body, and planting a broad flat
chin, like a horse shoe, on the upper rim of both baskets,
which by this manœuvre were brought close together and
steadied, he walked out of the market, leaving the barterer
thunderstruck at the contrivance, surrounded by gaping
boors, and grinning burghers, and the laughing-stock of
a herd of breechless urchins, who well knowing Van
Schayck, had gathered to see the sport; but this was not
the worst, for no sooner had Myndert deposited his burden
at his house, which was adjacent to the scene of action,
than taking the dead negro, and setting him upright
in one of the baskets he had obtained, and which of course
not having been mentioned in the exchange, he considered
ought to be returned, he had him conveyed to the
anxious and expecting Jantz, who would not receive him,
but being furious at the deception practised, carried the
matter before a burgomaster, who wisely deeming `a bargain,
a bargain, all the world over' decided against Simon,
who thereon was forced to take and bury the negro. But
Jantz being a true obstinate determined character, made
up his mind not to sit under his injuries quietly, but to get
redress if such was to be obtained, and therefore in conjunction
with one De Witt, an ingenious descendant of the
great pensionary who followed the law, and who was always
at Jantz's elbow, spiriting him on, he entered an information
against the vendu meeters son, for buying the
eggs without being measured according to the edicts of
mienheers the burgomasters council on that subject;
thinking by taking this new ground, that he would effectually
revenge his own wrongs as he was advised, by
means of a public punishment and prosecution,—for Jantz
felt like many of his modern prototypes, that it was much
more safe, convenient and certain, under the cloak of an
anxiety for the enforcement of the criminal law, as a good
citizen, to proceed against Van Schayck, wherein the public
had the benefit of his own impartial testimony, than to
risk the uncertainty of a civil inquest, wherein both sides
were equally admitted to a hearing. Not in the least adverting
to the subject expressed, whether Van Schayck or
Jantz was right or in error, it is impossible to think without
detestation of the abuses that are practised in the manner
just mentioned, whereby honest men are at the
mercy of every craven rogue; for what safety is there
for innocence—how little are some men bound where
their feelings are wrought on, where their interest is at
stake, by the sanctity of truth, by that which in the present
times is but the mock solemnity of an oath; how
much more true justice is there even in the bloody custom
of the savage, who with the simaugan and tomahawk
as next of kin, pursues the slayer of his tribe with unceasing
foot to death; the heart of the Indian in such
matters, is not more thirsty for revenge than the white man,
nor is it often that the last is deterred by that which might
sooth the noble and untrained passions of the first; although
civilization boasts of taking the knife from bad men's
hands—of allaying the fire of hate by the wholesome regulations
of social existence, and the difficulties of attaining
sudden or unmeasured retribution for petty and insignificant
offences, and of tempering punishment to crime;
yet what doth all amount to, when in reality it but sanctions
the arts of the designing knave—but affords him the
means of defending himself by legal influence from all attack
to perfect the blackest schemes;—he alone being heard, his
adversary kept silent by the unjust barriers of form; the
one unable to assert his defence and probably provocation,
while the other sets in motion a hundred engines of
destruction to assist his fell purposes.

As the matter of the eggs was plainly proved, that they
were unmeasured in the basket, Jantz merely meting out a
quantity as he sold them, Dirk Van Rikketie felt himself, as
has been set forth, in a profound quandary; now his doubts
it behoves to mention, arose not so much as to any obscurity
in the edicts, but rather as to what manner according to
the expressed words of the law, he could reasonably decide
in favor of the vendu meester's son; for this same
Myndert was an influential character, being son-in-law to
a great man, a burgomaster or some how or the other
very powerful by connexions, so that from the instant
he knew who was concerned as defendant, he, Dirk, was
inclined in his favor, although before he attained such
knowledge, he swore to Jantz, that he would ruin the
losel; however, the decision he prepared amounted
nearly to this; that howbeit it might be penal to sell without
measuring, yet the edict did not state it so to buy;
therefore this case was not within the meaning of the
law, which Dirk learnedly proved from numerous Dutch

legal authorities, of which he had always a number in readiness
on all occasions, and for every view he chose to adopt
of the subject under discussion before him; but it is most
grievous to state that this wonderful faculty—this admirable
research possessed by the worthy Dirk, had begotten
him the sneers of the invidious, who although it was
perfectly well known that Dirk never used any references
but genuine ones, yet his ill-wishers (and the very
best men have them) went so far as to say, that not one
out of twenty of the decisions which he repeated as confirmatory
to those made by him, were to be found in the
authors whose names he tacked to them; but to the
question decided—for among other convincing arguments
to the purport, Dirk remarked, that the whole procedure
on the part of Myndert, the negro sale, and delivery,
with the manner of getting the eggs “was nothing but a
petty fraud, and held out by the custom of merchants;” and
the information was therefore dismissed as falsely laid. The
sagacity of this judgment cannot be sufficiently applauded,
suffice it, that it has met the admiration and even
adoption of later times.

From all that has been related of Dirk Van Rikketie,
it is not to be wondered at, that Sloughter received a man
of his importance, effrontery and astonishing acquirements
with at once a degree of pleasure and distinguished
attention, and after a very brief conversation, was fully
convinced that Dirk was a person proper to receive
emoluments and office for his faithful attachment during
all his life to the strongest side; for there was no dark
spot in his character which Dirk was not ready to palliate
and excuse, in a manner that did him singular honor in
the eyes of his excellency; and as the chronicle records,
Dirk with a fulness of fortune unequalled, not only
under Sloughter, but Ingoldsby, Bellamont and many
succeeding rulers, kept his place, exercising at all times
that judicious courtesy, which went so far to raise him conspicuous
above those of more common abilities, and which
in the expressive language of the Apostle, “made him
all things to all men;” yet who would believe the saying
of the ascetic Mienheer Jacobus Kip, is remembered even

in these days before all his virtues, “dat besser mens
dan him were hanged.”

The interval devoted as is above stated by the burgomasters,
to whom it is now full time to return, to recruit
at once body and resolution, having passed, the worthies
with those accompanying, set out to encounter the bustling,
jostling and unceremonious elbowing of the motley
crowd that thronged before them; and it was not without
much pushing and thrusting, motions very grievous
and disagreeable to the portly magistrates, who drew breath
hard from fatigue, and with great entreaty, the exercise of
authoritative demand, and the frequent use of the burgomasters
wand athwart the bare breech or rough head
of some surly ragamuffin, who took vantage of the general
confusion to show out in all the pride of native stubbornness,
and scarce sooner would stir for a heer than a
fellow-boor, way was at last made, the rather that the
populace recognised the Leislerian partizans, and were
desirous to learn what was to follow, than even for the
dignified appearance of Mienheers Filkins and Gelyn
Verplancke their conductors; for to the latter they were
usually forced to obey and succumb, and therefore
with natural doggedness, delighted in every opposition
however slight to power, in the same spirit that the rabble
in these days drive in the centinels who are stationed
to keep the crowd back from pressing on a line of soldiery
on parade; while another impression was made by
the sight of Milbourne and his associates, that excited at
once attention, surprise and curiosity; and instinctively
with eyes rivetted on them, they gave back as they would
were the adverse factionist culprits passing onwards to
trial or to execution.

On arriving within a few paces of Sloughter, Mienheer
Gelyne Verplancke, addressed him, and announced the
apparent object of those he escorted. “Heres ish may
id bleaze your axgellenge,” said the doughty burgomaster
in a pompous style, such as is used by a herald proclaiming
the entrance of a knight in the lists, “dis mans Mienheer
Jacobus Milbourne, and dis mans Mienheer Pieter
De Lanoy, and dis mans Mienheer, what der tuyvils hish

name, gome do make a gontract mit your axgellenge mit
beace—and do gongradulade your axgellenge on your
zafe goming do dis gundry mit your gommission, Got zafe
your axgellenge and Mienheer der king.”

“What seek ye sirs of me,” said Sloughter, sternly
casting (while his brows gathered above them) his quick
eyes on the adherents of the man, against whom ill will
was already sown in his heart, as they approached him
as if by his look he would have pierced them through,
“what seek ye sirs I say of me,” he repeated—

“We have come Colonel Sloughter,” replied De Lanoy
for his companions in a tone of voice mild yet firm, `to
bear from your own lips, how far the unfortunate differences
that hath subsisted in this unhappy country can be settled—
to learn your feelings towards ourselves and friends—
whom we have been taught to believe, you suppose the
aggressors against their majesties' will; in such supposition
Sir, I must be permitted to tell you, you have been misled,
grossly misled—for although twice to your demands
have the fort's gates been closed—though twice this night
we have refused you entrance therein or submission, can
you if you are a reflective man condemn; you are a
stranger—your whole procedure since your first landing
in the province hath been a questionable one, and
even now we are unconvinced by what authority you
have proceeded, to take the name and right of governor
of this land;—and for this too have we sought you Sir,
that you may as in reason and in truth you are strictly
bound, give us satisfaction on this head, and exhibit to us
the sanction that you boast of his majesty king William,
of whom we as well as yourself, profess to be loyal and
liege subjects; and this we request you to do forthwith,
as if such be the case that your commission is genuine, it
would indeed be wrong for us to oppose your will, but if
otherwise as in duty he is bound, Jacob Leisler will spend
the last blood drop in his heart, ere he yields one stone
up to your possession.”

Sloughter hesitated a moment ere he answered, apparently
as if he debated whether he should speak or not,
or at once break the conference: significant looks, as the

countenance of the governor darkened, passed between the
bystanders, and the withered features of Edsell, as he
listened and gazed on the ominous expression of Sloughter's
visage, lightened with a half suppressed smile of
triumph.

“Ye have come late to question sirs,” quoth Sloughter
cold and sneeringly, “and judging from your modest
demands, ye are conquerors and we the craven bondsmen,
made by your doughty lance and bow.”

“It may be that we are not the first to greet you Col.
Sloughter,” abrupt and warm broke in the voice of Milbourne,
his quick feelings stung by the Governor's manner,
“but lack that service.—As good protestants, are we to cry
cap in hand to every vagabond, who sets up the staff and
claims sovereignty. Who vouches for every man, that
may take mind to impose on public credulity?—No, Sir,
Jacob Leisler called to the high office he exercises, by
the voice of this colony, sees not fit to lay down the investure,
without knowing well to whom he resigns his
powers,—shall he take any man's say so?—rather I think
it would have become one bearing an undisputed title to
govern this land, to have sought the Lieutenant Governor,
and exhibited to him his document and seal, than to
have skulked in the hiding places of the disaffected, and
the fastnesses of lurking rebels, sucking in the malignant
fables of such who envious and revengeful, sought to
heat his breast to equal hatred with their own, and it would
seem he was not loth, but like the wolf lapping blood,
eagerly feasted on the banquet of scandal.—I am a bold
plain-spoken man, Col. Sloughter, and wither my tongue
when I speak not what I feel; your present reception of us,
your conduct confirms, nay your own breast may answer,
to the truth of what I have said; and were it the last word I
shall ever breathe, I would repeat you have not dealt openly
with us.”

As he listened to this rash speech, the eyes of
Sloughter glared like balls of fire upon the headstrong
speaker, and he bit his nether lip in anger, till the blood
and froth that hung upon it mingled, but yet keeping
down his ire for awhile, he heard him through, nor offered

to interrupt him, while those who stood beside Sloughter,
and read the signal for their motions, in the index of
their master's countenance, awaited with anxious expectation
in readiness to execute the stern mandates, which it
was likely he would give, and denounced the fate of the
son-in-law of Leisler, and his followers in their hearts.

“Then I read ye aright Sirs,” said the Governor with
an assumed calmness of utterance, “ye have come hither
to rate me, as ye would some arrant school boy for disobedience;
forsooth I sought not this Leisler, and in humble
guise waited his leisure to receive and acknowledge
me, or rather till he chose to use me as his passive instrument,
to forward his vilo ambition? 'Tis well Sirs,
'tis mighty well—and possibly I should have had the
benefit of your sober guidance and experience, and I wot
not what else honors I might have attained. Good Sirs, I do
confess me, that in my joining with these men around, I
have done most wrong, acted most criminal, albeit you having
so high a claim on my first attention, natheless it is not
late to repent, or make you reparation therefor.—It
shall be done, and you shall have leisure to examine my
commission: But dogs” continued he, changing the ironical
tone in which he had spoken to one loud and fierce,
“it shall be in the dank dungeon; fools, that ye are—what
think ye of me, that ye beard me thus, that ye brave me
as it were in the very pitch of my power? wot ye not it
is dangerous to tamper with the javelin's sharp point, that
it is death to press the poison bag of the serpent;—out on
ye, for besotted blinded knaves, whose madness hath endangered
your necks—ho! there master Mayor, where
are your lackies,” added he turning to Van Kortlandt,
“let them take these fellows and clap them in close custody,
the crime is high treason, that is charged against
them, and an your hounds look not to their watch Master
Mayor, peril my head, but they will be like to ride a
worse horse than the wooden one.”

Van Kortlandt joyous and eager as he received the
Governor's intimation, beckoned the guard who attended
him by virtue of his office of mayor of the city; for in
his old dignity he had been speedily re-installed, the friend
of Leisler, who had for awhile fulfilled the duties of the

station, having taken refuge in the fort; the soldiers hastily
advanced at the sign.

“Beware sir, ere you enter on the risk you have commanded,
pause Colonel Sloughter, ere you commit a crime
black and infamous,” hastily ejaculated De Lanoy, “a
crime that will damn your memory for ever, a crime against
all faith, adverse to honour and the laws of nations; you
have forgotten sir, the character we have came hither in,
the envoy, no matter what his offence, is sacred from all
hurt; the vilest barbarian that ever lived, respected such
as sought him in that garb. There is no excuse for wanton
aggression on that sacred and holy bond of virtue, that
hath bound nations at war; the sword's point sinks to the
earth before the white flag; dismiss us therefore unharmed,
since you will not hear our offers or treat with us; as a
man, as a soldier, it is your duty to give us safe conduct to
our friends.”

There was a moment's silence after De Lanoy ceased,
ere answer was returned, and when the pause was broken,
other lips than Sloughter's gave reply.

“Ye waste words on idle air,” quoth Edsell as if glad of
the chance to vent his malevolence, “the Governor will
not condescend to speak further with traitors, yet to relieve
you on the head of faith, I answer, that the customs
which are extended between belligerent powers, are of
non-effect, when applied to committers of treason,—you
are not here recognised as aught but rebels in arms against
the commissioned servant of their majesties; the lawless
keepers, probably the murtherers also, of two distinguished
and worthy burghers of this province, Colonel Nicholas
Bayard and Walter Nichols, and so ye are attainted; so
preach ye not sirs, of law or virtue, but bethink ye of
atonement, for the high misdemeanours laid at your charge.
Burghers,” addded he to the guards “forward, it is the
Governor's pleasure that these knaves be disarmed, and
bound neck and heels.”

From the lips of several hundred bystanders, rose a
terrific shout of triumph, long hollow and dreadful, that
echoed in the midnight, like the burst of a tornado, as in
an instant De Lanoy, who stood more unguarded than his

companions, was overpowered and stript of the weapons
of defence, that he had in vain strove to use with effect;
but though he was borne down in strength and arms, yet
he was not so in spirit, for his soul was roused to
its utmost by Sloughter's conduct, and like the chained
mastiff raving with anger, and thirsting for revenge,
he could have bit in twain the rude bonds wherewith he
was hastily girt;—the conquest however of his companions
was not so easily accomplished, for being alert and aware
of the danger that approached, the buccaneer shook off
with a sudden jerk, the hand of the soldier that was first
placed on his garb, and seizing the momentary opportunity
so afforded, by a spring he freed himself from the presssing
throng, that encompassed him, and made his way to the
stoel of the stad-huis, where planting himself firmly against
the wall, he fronted his foes with stern visage and levelled
handgun, which from his elevation on the step, had a
fair sweep for effect.

At the same time, nearly simultaneous with the action of
his bold follower, Milbourne taking advantage of the fluctuation
of the crowd caused by Eumet's unexpected
movement, tore from the man who advanced nearest upon
him, the heavy partisan with which the soldier was
armed, and hurling its weight before his step, forced
from the path those who immediately pressed upon him,
and dashing with sudden force through the opening thus
made, he cleared the space that was between, and seeking
the same object, stood in an instant at the rover's side.

“Santo Espirito! ye hungry Dutch sharks,” roared
Eumet with a voice shrill and dissonant; “an ye press
me so stoutly, your gunwales shall such blood, carja!
thof I go by the board—voto a madre de dios, more than
one pilot o' ye shall heave the same lead 'fore I touch bottom:”—and
as he spoke, he pointed the arquebuse among
the throng of his enemies. It is a true remark, that there
are but few things of more effect for the brief moment,
even on a wild, enraged and confident assemblage, than a
determined bearing on the part of the weak and attacked,
showing the desperate formed resolution of selling life at
its dearest rate; such as the swelling breast of Milbourne

and his flashing eye indicated to be the decision he
had made; added to this was the reckless and fearless
ferocity of his companion, who, accustomed to bear down
odds by boldness, and to woo death in every shape, scarce
reflected on what must be the positive end of such unequal
battle.

The courage and spirit of the pirate of the time is too
well known to descant on. Careless of numbers or
dangers that it would seem madness to brave, these men
fought in their daring adventures with a fury and success
truly wonderful, and with a fierce hardihood and strength
that overcame every thing before them—entering in spite
of their defences, rifling and sacking with sword and
flame fortified towns and guarded places, defying in their
search for booty, as it were, all mortal power—braving
storm and ball, climbing from their low and sinking barks
the main chains, and sweeping from all opposers the
decks of the tallest ships, careless, like devils incarnate,
of fire or steel,—were their daily habits. In such actions
and frequent conflicts had Eumet been inured to every
stress; therefore, although to both their desolate situation
and hopelessness of escape were apparent, yet with
grim frowns they gazed upon their foes, and neither as
they looked did a cheek blanch, or a limb tremble; but,
with the front of entoiled lions, they stood undaunted
and unmoved.

Those who have pursued with unrelenting and unabated
heat the rapid and timorous flight of the chase, when
they meet the furious animal at his last struggle, give
back in wonder at the creature's mad desperation, and
hesitate ere they brave his death thrall; even so was it
now with the throng; the threatening attitudes and ready
weapons of Milbourne and Eumet had their brief effect;
for amid the wildest and unrestrained rabble there are
few so rash as it were, to be the first to commence violence
and throw away their lives, for the gratification of their
companions. Though, indeed, after the first blood is spilt
there are none who will withhold their hands from the
slaughter, yet there are seldom those who delight in
yielding themselves as the first victims: still, the smallest

incident was sufficient to free them from restraint, and to
unbridle to the utmost the sanguinary tempers of the
burghers; yet they felt the slight advantage of the station
ofthe others, and even the clamour and cries for death, with
which all hearing for awhile had been drowned, sunk so
low for a moment as the buccaneer glanced his quick,
sharp eye around to search him out an object for his
ball, that his wild cry and hoarse shout of defiance rang
high above the uproar of his adversaries.

“Ha! that voice is not young in my hearing, nor do I
see that face for the first time;” cried Sloughter, animatedly,
his peculiar attention drawn to the marauder
by the loud, fierce utterance of his braggart threats, and
the hesitation of the crowd; and recognising the ruffian
mate of Kid and one of his late persecutors—“murthering
dog! is it thee,—pirate, robber,—yield thy forfeit
body to the law.”

“Base, treacherous hound!” answered Milbourne to
Sloughter's cry, shaking aloft the halbert with which he
was armed;—“we spit at thee, and spurn thy orders as
we would thy neck beneath our feet; for cursed be this
hand of mine—palsied, I say be it, ere I crouch to word
of thine: thou mayst triumph, cur, but it shall be when
Jacob Milbourne can neither hear nor see thy smile of
conquest.”

The rumour of what was passing in front of the stadt-huis
seemed to have spread abroad with astonishing velocity,
and from great distances every one that could bear
themselves, uncrippled by age or disease, had hurried along
in bands to that quarter. The populace had now collected
in a promiscuous crowd on the slip, amounting to several
hundreds, and were incessantly increasing by new arrivals,
each one seeking the spot, desirous of bearing a part in
the scene about enacting, or urged by curiosity as well as
interest, strove to thrust themselves forward in the throng.
The mob momently grew closer wedged, those behind
pressing to get in advance, scarce suffering the persons in
front to bear back a step from the ground whereon they
stood; as the numbers enlarged, the more deep and vehement
were the muttered menaces that passed from their

lips, which were fast growing to cries of hatred and inveteracy,
that were now strengthened by the brave
uspect of the factionists; and with fierce looks like the
mastiff that has been driven back in his first attempt on the
baited bull, they gazed on their devoted foemen.

The narrow windows of the Dutch houses, the roofs
of buildings, and the masts of the yatchen became
places for spectators, and were filled with people,
who with clamorous outcries and savage gesticulations,
urged those below and within hearing of their words
to the commission of outrage, which they, from their
situations, to participate in were unable. The intimidation
caused by the gallant front borne by Milbourne and
Eumet was but momentary, and to such fearful height had
the feeling of the burghers arisen, that during the brief
yet fierce passage of invective between the parties above
detailed, their speech could scarce be heard above the
terrific imprecations that filled the air; and at the very
moment the bold voice of Milbourne was exerted to its
stretch in proud defiance, he had but closed the utterance
of his determination to die ere he would submit,
when there was hurled from some powerful yet unknown
hand from among the crowd, a missile, weighty and sharp
as the head of some javelin; its aim was certain and it
had been sent with care; with tremendous force, that gave
back a sound, hollow and fearful, it struck the unprotected
bosom of the unfortunate partizan of Leisler; as he
felt the blow, he sprang upwards in the air a foot or more,
while the halbert that he held dropt from his loosened
grasp, and he flung his arms out with a motion like the
swimmer; at the same moment, there gushed in a stream,
blood, thick and dark, from both mouth and nostril, while
with a last long faint and smothered shriek of bitter agony,
he tottered and sank upon his face; as he lay upon the
ground, there ran through his limbs a slight shivering like
one that is touched with sudden chillness of blood, and
then the fierce Milbourne lay motionless. No sight had
beheld from whose hand death had been given; yet it was
marked that the direction from whence the missile came
was that whereat Edsell stood, and it is said that his aged

features when his enemy dropt down, wore a grim smile of
joy, but that it flitted in an instant, leaving no trace upon
his visage; and although his hand trembled with age and
there was apparently too little vigor in his old arm to
give so fatal a blow, in after times when men's minds
were changed, and the hot zeal that now heated them
with blind rage, was cooled and passed away, he was not
seen, even till the day of his death,—but dark whispers
and hints were dropped among such as looked on him;
few held communion with him; he lived a solitary life,
and died, it is reported, though stricken as he was in years,
by his own hands. Panic and consternation at the deed
for an instant overwhelmed the crowd; surprise at the
length to which their own audacity had carried matters
was succeeded by a doubting and sullen silence; but this
was not to last;—Eumet saw his associate fall, and expecting
the next moment to share his fate, hastily discharged
his arquebuse with deadly effect amidst those nearest him;
the ball buried itself in the breast of a burgher, who rolled
with a piercing groan, weltering in his heart's blood,
at the feet of his companions; those who stood by uttered
a cry of sorrow, and as they beheld the blood that had
spirted upon their garments, the relenting feeling that had
possessed their hearts at Milbourne's fall was extinguished
and a yell of rage and vengeance burst from every lip,
in one wild outcry, terrible as that with which the tigress
mourns its young;—the former fury of the multitude redoubled;
a hundred pikes and clubs were extended to satiate
the thirst of their hearts; shrieks, groans and hisses
of execration filled the air; with merciless power the weapons
of the pirate were rent from his hands, and he himself
felled upon the ground beside the senseless form of Milbourne;
not one but a hundred hands had stricken him
down—the passions of the infuriated crowd now knew no
bounds—the voice of the governor was unheard amid
the uproar; in vain were endeavours to quell the riot;
the destitute and defenceless state of the objects of their
hate availed not to satisfy them; no single voice of expostulation
could rise amidst the storm; at one moment a
hundred hands had grasped the bodies of the fallen adherents
of Leisler, while numbers, unsatisfied, fought to
attain the hold from those who had seized on the inanimate
victims; with tumultuous screams, with horrid exultation
the disfigured trunks were dragged along the earth,
and pulled to and fro, and dashed, with wanton brutality,
on every side; handsful of mud and dirt were cast upon
them; on the bruised limbs heartless blows were showered,
and fierce feet trampled them down; soon was every
shred of garb that covered the mangled flesh torn in rags,
and the breathless corses looked not of humanity, but rather
shapeless and disgusting masses of filth and gore, for
which numerous madmen were contending; it was not
long ere the trembling limbs were torn apart and hurled
in the air while yet palpitating with life, and as though
they were priceless, the livid and discoloured remains
were caught up by the struggling populace as they fell
among them, who followed every new act of savage cruelty
with hoarse shouts of applause and gratification; like
the wild dogs who battle over the bodies of the slain for
a mouthful, they snatched from hand to hand bits of
flesh that they stripped from the bones, reeking with
gouts of blood, and he that could obtain a strip of skin,
peeled from the scalp with the hair yet clinging to it, or
a piece of flesh, however small, to hang upon the end of
his pike, gloried as in a deed of praise. In a very short
time almost every particle of the dead had suffered such
division, and was borne aloft upon the weapons of the
throng as trophies of triumph, while alone here and there,
scattered upon the earth were deep thick pools of blood,
or beside some stone, unregarded, yet clung a shred of
brain that had stuck there when the corse had been dragged
away. Suddenly, as when a wind changes on the
sea, and takes the current in a different course from that
in which late it had flowed, a new idea took possession
of the minds of the brutal populace; a cry was heard
among them that gathered strength as it went, and with
gestures of menace, and fearful clamours they pointed towards
the fort, and in an instant to that direction the
whole crowd turned and poured forward, like a host of
mountainous waves rolling up the beach, bearing in front
of their path, upon two pikes, the torn and mangled heads
of Milbourne and Eumet: the gory visages presented a
horrible and ghastly spectacle, as the quick lights of the
flambeaux flashed upon them; no eye could recognise the
pallid and convulsed features: the skull of one was clove
asunder, and the scalp hung loose and lacerated; the
eyes of the other had been rent from their sockets as
though plucked out by the beak of a raven, and the
lower jaw was torn from its seat; with such terrific
ensigns did they march)—onward they went, waving
the bleeding trunks on high with malicious triumph.—All
was tumult and commotion in their way, and their tread
sounded louder than the lashing of the angry surfagainst an
iron-bound coast. Many with fearful yells joined in the
train of the frantic mob, while others terror struck, fled
their path; and there were women and wailing children,
with pale looks and dishevelled hair, that with wandering
eyes and beating hearts, gazed forth upon the rout, as
the horrid uproar assailed their ears, startling the sweet
visitation of sleep from their night couches, and filling
their astonished bosoms with consternation and with
awe. The fate of their embassy however, reached
Leisler and his confederates, together with a warning of
the approach of the enraged populace, before they gained
the gates of the fort: as the murmurs of their coming
indistinct and doubtful like the gathering of an army, were
heard, terror and horror blanched the boldest cheek,
and for awhile, struck powerless every listener of the
tragedy;—each held his breath, like the stag, driven in
some dell that is girt round with woods and hath no outlet
but the entrance, and indecisive and despairing, they gazed
one ach other; then as of one accord, there rose from every
lip a wild outcry of sorrow and of mourning; some stood
like frozen statues unmoved, to await the death they
could not fly;—others beat their breast in agony, and
strewed their hair with dust, in womanish affright.
Soon brief and fearful was the debate they held;—the
alarm of the coming host was already given—the imminent
danger was at the press—the outcries of relentless
foes were borne upon the night, and with their
slender force it appeared madness to contend; and ere
the throng had thundered on the oaken gates for admittance,
Leisler and his companions had sought such safety
as flight could yield; and when the doors crashed beneath
their blows and fell inwards in splintered atoms,
the blood-thirsty mob found as they took possession,
(though they sought with savage eagerness in every suspected
hiding place for food to prey upon,) no living man
whereon to glut their deadly appetite for death and slaughter.
And yet though safe from the butchering hands of the
lawless burghers—though he heard far behind him their
cries sink in distance, yet his footsteps were tracked, and
the life of Jacob Leisler was spared but for wo and
mourning, for the next dawn rose on him a deserted and
solitary captive, in the prison-house of his fierce and
unsparing enemies.