University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER II.

Never was a more comprehensive, a
more expeditious, or, what is still better,
a more economical measure devised, than
this of defeating the Yankees by proclamation—an
expedient, likewise, so humane,
so gentle and pacific, there were
ten chances to one in favour of its succeeding;—but
then there was one chance
to ten that it would not succeed:—as the
ill-natured Fates would have it, that
single chance carried the day! The proclamation
was perfect in all its parts,
well constructed, well written, well sealed,
and well published—all that was wanting
to insure its effect was that the Yankees
should stand in awe of it; but, provoking
to relate, they treated it with the
most absolute contempt, applied it to an
unseemly purpose, and thus did the first
warlike proclamation come to a shameful
end—a fate which I am credibly informed
has befallen but too many of its
successors.

It was a long time before Wilhelmus
Kieft could be persuaded, by the united
efforts of all his counsellors, that his war
measure had failed in producing any
effect. On the contrary, he flew in a
passion whenever any one dared to question
its efficacy; and swore that, though
it was slow in operating, yet when once
it began to work, it would soon purge
the land of these rapacious intruders.
Time, however, that test of all experiments
both in philosophy and politics, at
length convinced him that his proclamation
was abortive; and that notwithstanding
he had waited nearly four
years, in a state of constant irritation,
yet he was still farther off than ever
from the object of his wishes. His implacable
adversaries in the east became
more and more troublesome in their encroachments,
and founded the thriving
colony of Hartford close upon the skirts
of Fort Goed Hoop. They, moreover,
commenced the fair settlement of New
Haven (otherwise called the Red Hills),
within the domains of their High Mightinesses—while
the onion patches of Pyquag
were a continual eyesore to the
garrison of Van Curlet. Upon beholding,
therefore, the inefficacy of his measure,
the sage Kieft, like many a worthy
practitioner of physic, laid the blame,
not to the medicine, but to the quantity
administered, and resolved to double the
dose.

In the year 1638, therefore, that being
the fourth year of his reign, he fulminated
against them a second proclamation,
of heavier metal than the former;
written in thundering long sentences, not
one word of which was under five syllables.
This, in fact, was a kind of non-intercourse
bill, prohibiting all commerce
and connexion between any and every
of the said Yankee intruders, and the
said fortified post of Fort Goed Hoop,
and ordering, commanding, and advising
all his trusty, loyal, and well-beloved
subjects, to furnish them with no supplies
of gin, gingerbread, or sour-crout; to
buy none of their pacing horses, measly
pork, apple brandy, Yankee rum, cider
water, apple sweetmeats, Weathersfield
onions, or wooden bowls, but to starve
and exterminate them from the face of
the land.

Another pause of a twelvemonth ensued,
during which the last proclamation
received the same