As soon as it was known, at Plymouth and Boston, that the Dutch had taken formal possession of the valley of the Connecticut, Governor Winslow hastened to confer with the Massachusetts Governor respecting their duties. As it was doubtful whether the region of the Connecticut was embraced within either of their patents, they decided not to interfere. But through diplomatic policy they assigned a different reason for their refusal.

"In regard," said Governor Winthrop,

"that the place was not fit for plantation, there being three or four thousand warlike Indians, and the river not to be gone into but by small pinnaces, having a bar affording but six feet at high water, and for that no vessel can get in for seven months in the year, partly by reason of the ice, and then the violent stream, we thought not fit to meddle with it."[4]

Still Governor Winthrop looked wistfully towards the Connecticut. Though he admitted that the lower part of the valley was "out of the claim of the Massachusetts patent," it could not be denied that the upper part of the valley was included in their grant. In the summer of 1633, John Oldham, with three companions, penetrated the wilderness, through the Indian trails, one hundred and sixty miles to the Connecticut river. They were hospitably entertained in the many Indian villages they passed through by the way.

They brought back early in the autumn, glowing accounts of the beauty of the region, and of the luxuriant meadows which bordered the stream. Governor Winthrop then sent a vessel on a trading voyage, through Long Island Sound, to Manhattan, there to inform the Dutch authorities that the king of England had granted the Connecticut river and the adjacent country to the subjects of Great Britain.

In most of these transactions the Dutch appear to great advantage. After five weeks' absence the vessel returned to Boston to report the friendly reception of the Massachusetts party at Manhattan, and bearing a courteous letter to Governor Winthrop, in which Van Twiller, in respectful terms, urged him to defer his claim to Connecticut until the king of England and the States-General of Holland should agree about their limits, so that the colonists of both nations, might live "as good neighbors in these heathenish countries." Director Van Twiller added, with good sense, which does him much credit:

"I have, in the name of the States-General and the West India Company, taken possession of the forementioned river, and, for testimony thereof, have set up an house on the north side of the said river. It is not the intent of the States to take the land from the poor natives, but rather to take it at some reasonable price, which, God be praised, we have done hitherto. In this part of the world there are many heathen lands which are destitute of inhabitants, so that there need not be any question respecting a little part or portion thereof."

At the same time the Plymouth colony made a move to obtain a foothold upon the Connecticut. To secure the color of a title, the colony purchased of a company of Indians who had been driven from their homes by the all-victorious Pequods, a tract of land just above fort Hope, embracing the territory where the town of Windsor now stands. Lieutenant Holmes was then dispatched with a chosen company, in a vessel which conveyed the frame of a small house carefully stowed away, and which could be very expeditiously put together. He was directed to push directly by fort Hope, and raise and fortify his house upon the purchased lands. Governor Bradford, of Plymouth, gives the following quaint account of this adventure:

"When they came up the river the Dutch demanded what they intended, and whither they would go? They answered, 'up the river to trade.' Now their order was to go and seat above them. They bid them strike and stay or they would shoot them, and stood by their ordnance ready fitted. They answered, they had commission from the Governor of Plymouth to go up the river to such a place, and if they did shoot they must obey their order and proceed; they would not molest them but go on. So they passed along. And though the Dutch threatened them hard yet they shot not. Coming to their place they clapped up their house quickly, and landed their provisions, and left the company appointed, and sent the bark home, and afterward palisaded their house about, and fortified themselves better."

Van Twiller, informed of this intrusion, sent a commissioner, protesting against this conduct and ordering Holmes to depart, with all his people. Holmes replied, "I am here in the name of the king of England, and here I shall remain."

Matters soon became seriously complicated. A boat's crew was robbed and murdered by some vagabond Indians. The culprits were taken and hung.

This exasperated against the Dutch the powerful Pequods who had the supremacy over all that territory. Open war soon ensued. The Pequods sent an embassy to Boston, and entered into a treaty of alliance with the Massachusetts colony, in which they surrendered to that colony the Connecticut valley.

In the meantime, Van Twiller having received instructions from the home government, dispatched a force of seventy well armed men to drive Lieutenant Holmes and his men from their post. The English stood firmly upon their defence. The Dutch, seeing that a bloody battle must ensue, with uncertain results, withdrew without offering any violence. In many respects the Dutch colonies continued to enjoy much prosperity. Mr. Brodhead gives the following interesting account of the state of affairs at the mouth of the Hudson, in the year 1633:

"Fort Amsterdam, which had become dilapidated, was repaired, and a guard-house and a barrack for the newly arrived soldiers were constructed within the ramparts, at a cost of several thousand guilders.

"Three expensive windmills were also erected. But they were injudiciously placed so near the fort that the buildings, within its walls, frequently intercepted and turned off the south wind.

"Several brick and frame houses were built for the Director and his officers. On the Company's farm, north of the fort, a dwelling-house, brewery, boat-house and barn were erected. Other smaller houses were built for the corporal, the smith, the cooper. The loft, in which the people had worshipped since 1626, was now replaced by a plain wooden building, like a barn, situated on the East River, in what is now Broad street, between Pearl and Bridge streets. Near this old church a dwelling-house and stable were erected for the use of the Domine. In the Fatherland the title of Domine was familiarly given to clergymen. The phrase crossed the Atlantic with Bogardus, and it has survived to the present day among the descendants of the Dutch colonists of New Netherland."

The little settlement at Manhattan was entitled to the feudal right of levying a tax upon all the merchandise passing up or down the river. The English were, at this time, so ignorant of this region of the North American coast that a sloop was dispatched to Delaware Bay "to see if there were any river there." As the Dutch had vacated the Delaware, the English decided to attempt to obtain a foothold on those waters. Accordingly, in the year 1635, they sent a party of fourteen or fifteen Englishmen, under George Holmes, to seize the vacant Dutch fort.

Van Twiller, informed of this fact, with much energy sent an armed vessel, by which the whole company was arrested and brought to Manhattan, whence they were sent, "pack and sack," to an English settlement on the Chesapeake.

The Plymouth people had now been two years in undisturbed possession of their post at Windsor, on the Connecticut. Stimulated by their example, the General Court of Massachusetts encouraged emigration to the Connecticut valley, urging, as a consideration, their need of pasturage for their increasing flocks and herds; the great beauty and fruitfulness of the Connecticut valley, and the danger that the Dutch, or other English colonies, might get possession of it. "Like the banks of the Hudson," it was said, "the Connecticut had been first explored and even occupied by the Dutch. But should a log hut and a few straggling soldiers seal a territory against other emigrants?"[5]

Thus solicited, families from Watertown and Roxbury commenced a settlement at Wethersfield in the year 1635. Some emigrants, from Dorchester, established themselves just below the colony of the Plymouth people at Windsor. This led to a stern remonstrance on the part of Governor Bradford, of Plymouth, denouncing their unrighteous intrusion.

"Thus the Plymouth colonists on the Connecticut, themselves intruders within the territory of New Netherland, soon began to quarrel with their Massachusetts brethren for trespassing upon their usurped domain."

In November of this year, Governor Winthrop dispatched a bark of twenty tons from Boston, with about twenty armed men, to take possession of the mouth of the Connecticut. It will be remembered that the Dutch had purchased this land of the Indians three years before, and, in token of their possession, had affixed the arms of the States-General to a tree. The English contemptuously tore down these arms, "and engraved a ridiculous face in their place."

The Dutch had called this region, Kievit's Hook. The English named it Saybrook, in honor of lords Say and Brook, who were regarded as the leading English proprietors. Early the next year the Massachusetts people established a colony at Agawam, now Springfield. Thus, step by step, the English encroached upon the Dutch, until nearly the whole valley of the Connecticut was wrested from them.

About this time Van Twiller issued a grant of sixty-two acres of land, a little northwest of fort Amsterdam, to Roelof Jansen. This was the original conveyance of the now almost priceless estate, held by the corporation of Trinity Church. The directors, in Holland, encouraged emigration by all the means in their power. Free passage was offered to farmers and their families. They were also promised the lease of a farm, fit for the plough, for six years, with a dwelling house, a barn, four horses and four cows. They were to pay a rent for these six years, of forty dollars a year, and eighty pounds of butter.

At the expiration of the six years the tenants were to restore the number of cattle they had received, retaining the increase. They were also assisted with clothing, provisions, etc., on credit, at an advance of fifty per cent. But notwithstanding the rapid increase of the Dutch settlements, thus secured, the English settlements were increasing with still greater rapidity. Not satisfied with their encroachments on the Connecticut, the English looked wistfully upon the fertile lands extending between that stream and the Hudson.

The region about New Haven, which, from the East and West rocks, was called the Red Rocks, attracted especial attention. Some men from Boston, who had visited it, greatly extolled the beauty and fertility of the region, declaring it to be far superior to Massachusetts Bay. "The Dutch will seize it," they wrote, "if we do not. And it is too good for any but friends."

Just then an English non-conformist clergyman, John Davenport, and two merchants from London, men of property and high religious worth, arrived at Boston. They sailed to the Red Rocks, purchased a large territory of the Indians, and regardless of the Dutch title, under the shadow of a great oak, laid the foundations of New Haven. The colony was very prosperous, and, in one year's time, numbered over one hundred souls.

And now the English made vigorous efforts to gain all the lands as far west as the Hudson river. A village of fifty log huts soon rose at Stratford, near the Housatonic. Enterprising emigrants also pushed forward as far as Norwalk, Stamford and Greenwich. The colony at Saybrook consisted in 1640, of a hundred houses, and a fine church. The Dutch now held, in the Connecticut valley, only the flat lands around fort Hope. And even these the English began to plough up. They cudgelled those of the Dutch garrison who opposed them, saying, "It would be a sin to leave uncultivated so valuable a land which can produce such excellent corn."

The English now laid claim to the whole of Long Island, and commenced a settlement at its eastern extremity. In the meantime very bitter complaints were sent to Holland respecting the incapacity of the Director Van Twiller. It was said that he, neglecting the affairs of the colony, was directing all his energies to enriching himself. He had become, it was reported, the richest landholder in the province. Though sustained by very powerful friends, he was removed.

William Kieft was appointed in his stead, the fifth Director. He was a man of very unenviable reputation, and his administration was far from successful. Mr. Brodhead gives the following true and very interesting account of the abundant natural resources of the Dutch settlements on the Hudson at this time:

"The colonists lived amid nature's richest profusion. In the forests, by the water side, and on the islands, grew a rank abundance of nuts and plums. The hills were covered with thickets of blackberries. On the flat lands, near the rivers, wild strawberries came up so plentifully that the people went there to lie down and eat them. Vines, covered with grapes as good and sweet as in Holland, clambered over the loftiest trees. Deer abounded in the forests, in harvest time and autumn, as fat as any Holland deer can be. Enormous wild turkeys and myriads of partridges, pheasants and pigeons roosted in the neighboring woods. Sometimes the turkeys and deer came down to the houses of the colonists to feed. A stag was frequently sold by the Indians for a loaf of bread, or a knife, or even for a tobacco pipe. The river produced the finest fish. There was a great plenty of sturgeon, which, at that time, the Christians did not make use of, but the Indians ate them greedily. Flax and hemp grew spontaneously. Peltries and hides were brought in great quantities, by the savages, and sold for trifles. The land was very well provisioned with all the necessaries of life."[6]

Thus far, as a general rule, friendly relations had existed between the Dutch and the Indians. But all sorts of characters were now emigrating from the old world. The Indians were often defrauded, or treated harshly. Individuals among the natives retaliated by stealing. When caught they were severely punished. Notwithstanding the government prohibited the sale of muskets to the Indians, so eager were the savages to gain these weapons, so invaluable to them on their hunting-fields, that they would offer almost any price for them. Thus the Mohawks ere long obtained "guns, powder and bullets for four hundred warriors."

Kieft endeavored to tax the Indians, extorting payment in corn and furs. This exasperated them. Their reply, through one of their chiefs, would have done honor to any deliberative assembly. Indignantly the chief exclaimed:

"How can the sachem at the fort dare to exact a tax from us! He must be a very shabby fellow. He has come to live in our land when we have not invited him; and now he attempts to deprive us of our corn for nothing. The soldiers at fort Amsterdam are no protection to us. Why should we be called upon to support them? We have allowed the Dutch to live peaceably in our country, and have never demanded of them any recompense. When they lost a ship here, and built a new one, we supplied them with food and all other necessaries. We took care of them for two winters until their ship was finished. The Dutch are under obligations to us. We have paid full price for everything we have purchased of them. There is, therefore, no reason why we should supply them with corn and furs for nothing. If we have ceded to them the country they are living in, we yet remain masters of what we have retained for ourselves."

This unanswerable argument covered the whole ground. The most illiterate Indian could feel the force of such logic.

Some European vagabonds, as it was afterwards clearly proved, stole some swine from Staten Island. The blame was thrown upon the innocent Raritan Indians, who lived twenty miles inland. The rash Director Kieft resolved to punish them with severity which should be a warning to all the Indians.

He sent to this innocent, unsuspecting tribe, a party of seventy well armed men, many of them unprincipled desperadoes. They fell upon the peaceful Indians, brutally killed several, destroyed their crops, and perpetrated all sorts of outrages.

The Indians never forget a wrong. The spirit of revenge burned in their bosoms. There was a thriving plantation belonging to DeVrees on Staten Island. The Indians attacked it, killed four of the laborers, burned the dwelling and destroyed the crops. Kieft, in his blind rage, resolved upon the extermination of the Raritans. He offered a large bounty for the head of any member of that tribe.

It will be remembered that some years before an Indian had been robbed and murdered near the pond, in the vicinity of the fort at Manhattan, and that his nephew, a boy, had escaped. That boy was now a man, and, through all these years, with almost religious scrupulousness, had been cherishing his sense of duty to avenge his uncle's unatoned death.

A very harmless Dutchman, by the name of Claes Smits, had reared his solitary hut upon the Indian trail near the East river. The nephew of the murdered savage came one day to this humble dwelling, and stopped under the pretence of selling some beaver skins. As Smits was stooping over the great chest in which he kept his goods, the savage, seizing an axe, killed him by a single blow. In doing this, he probably felt the joys of an approving conscience,—a conscience all uninstructed in religious truth—and thanked the great spirit that he had at length been enabled to discharge his duty in avenging his uncle's death.

Kieft sent to the chief of the tribe, demanding the murderer. The culprit Indian sent back the reply:

"When the fort was building some years ago, my uncle and I, carrying some beaver skins to the fort to trade, were attacked by some Dutchmen, who killed my uncle and stole the furs. This happened when I was a small boy. I vowed to revenge it upon the Dutch when I grew up. I saw no better chance than this of Claes Smits."

The sachem refused to deliver up the criminal, saying that he had but done his duty, according to the custom of his race, in avenging the death of his kinsman, murdered many years before. Kieft was exceedingly embarrassed. He was very unpopular; was getting the colony deeper and deeper into difficulty, and was accused of seeking war with the Indians that he "might make a wrong reckoning with the Company."

In this emergency, that others might share the responsibility with him, he reluctantly sought the counsel of the community. Twelve "select men" were chosen to consider the propositions to be submitted to them by the Director. To them the question was propounded:

"Is it not just, that the murder lately committed by a savage, upon Claes Smits, be avenged and punished? In case the Indians will not surrender the murderer, is it not just to destroy the whole village to which he belongs? In what manner, when, and by whom ought this to be executed?"

The result of their deliberations was, in brief, as follows:

"Our harvest is still ungathered; our cattle are scattered in the woods. Many of the inhabitants, unsuspicious of danger, are at a distance. It is not best to precipitate hostilities. In the meantime let two hundred coats of mail be procured in preparation for the expedition. Let our friendly intercourse with the savages be uninterrupted, to throw them off their guard. When the hunting season commences, let two armed bands be sent out to attack the Indians from opposite directions. Let as many negroes as can be spared, be sent on this expedition, each armed with tomahawk and half-pike. Still let messengers be sent once, twice and even a third time to solicit the surrender of the murderer."

The Governor had the reputation of being an arrant coward. It had often been said, "It is very well for him to send us into the field, while he secures his own life in a good fort, out of which he has not slept a single night in all the years he has been here." They therefore shrewdly added, "The Governor himself ought to lead the van in this attack. We will follow his steps and obey his commands."

The hunting season soon came. Still it was decided to delay hostilities. The savages were on their guard. A very general feeling of unfriendliness pervaded the tribes. The Dutch settlers were widely scattered. A combination of the Indians against the colonists might prove an awful calamity. Thus, for a time, the war which was evidently approaching was averted.



CHAPTER V.



WAR AND ITS DEVASTATIONS.



Approaching Hostilities.—Noble Remonstrance.—Massacre of the Natives.—The War Storm.—Noble conduct of DeVrees.—The Humiliation of Kieft.—Wide-Spread Desolation.—The Reign of Terror.—State of Affairs at Fort Nassau.—The Massacre at Stamford.—Memorial of the Select Men.—Kieft Superseded by Peter Stuyvesant.

The year 1643 was a year of terror and of blood in nearly all of the American colonies. New England was filled with alarm in the apprehension of a general rising of the Indians. It was said that a benighted traveller could not halloo in the woods without causing fear that the savages were torturing their European captives. This universal panic pervaded the Dutch settlements. The wildest stories were circulated at the firesides of the lonely settlers. Anxiety and terror pervaded all the defenceless hamlets.

DeVrees, rambling one day with his gun upon his shoulder, met an Indian "who was very drunk." Coming up to the patroon, the Indian patted him upon the shoulder, in token of friendship, saying,

"You are a good chief. When we come to see you, you give us milk to drink. I have just come from Hackensack where they sold me brandy, and then stole my beaver skin coat. I will take a bloody revenge. I will go home for my bow and arrows, and shoot one of those rascally Dutchmen who have stolen my coat."

DeVrees endeavored in vain to soothe him. He had hardly reached his home ere he heard that the savage had kept his vow. He had shot and killed an innocent man, one Garret Van Voorst, who was thatching the roof of a house. The chiefs of the tribe were terror-stricken, through fear of the white man's vengeance. They did not dare to go to the fort lest they should be arrested and held as hostages. But they hastened to an interview with DeVrees, in whom they had confidence, and expressed a readiness to make atonement for the crime, in accordance with the custom of their tribe, by paying a large sum to the widow of the murdered man.

It is worthy of notice that this custom, so universal among the Indians, of a blood atonement of money, was also the usage of the tribes of Greece We read in Homer's Iliad, as translated by Pope,

"If a brother bleed, On just atonement we remit the deed; A sire the slaughter of his sons forgives, The price of blood discharged, the murderer lives."

At length, encouraged by DeVrees and accompanied by him, the chiefs ventured to fort Amsterdam. They explained to Kieft the occurrence, and proposed the expiatory offering to appease the widow's grief. Kieft was inexorable. Nothing but the blood of the criminal would satisfy him. In vain they represented that he was the son of a beloved chief, and that already he had fled far away to some distant tribe. Our sympathy for these men is strongly excited as we read their sorrowful yet noble remonstrance: "Why," said they,

"will you sell brandy to our young men? They are not used to it. It makes them crazy. Even your own people, who are accustomed to strong liquors, sometimes become drunk and fight with knives. Sell no more strong drink to the Indians, if you will avoid such mischief."

While this question was being agitated, the Mohawks from the upper part of the Hudson, came down in strong military bands, armed with muskets, upon the lower river tribes, attacked them with great ferocity, killed quite a number of their warriors, took the women and children captive, and destroyed their villages.

The lower river tribes all trembled before the terrible Iroquois. Large numbers of these subjugated tribes fled from the river banks, and from the region of Westchester, to Manhattan and to Pavonia, where Jersey City now stands. Here, stripped and panic-stricken, they encamped, "full a thousand strong."

The humane and judicious patroon, DeVrees, in whom the Indians seem to have reposed great confidence, had a beautiful estate several miles up the river, at a place called Vreesendael. It was a delightful spot of about five hundred fertile acres, through which wound a fine stream affording handsome mill seats. The meadows yielded hay enough spontaneously for two hundred head of cattle.

DeVrees, finding his house full of fugitive savages, on their retreat to Pavonia, at the mouth of the river, paddled down in a canoe through the floating ice to fort Amsterdam, to confer with Director Kieft upon the emergency. He urged upon the Director that these poor Indians, thus escaping from the terrible Iroquois and grateful for the protection which the Dutch had not denied them, might easily be won to a sincere friendship. On the other hand, some of the more fiery spirits in the colony thought that the occasion furnished them with an opportunity so to cripple the Indians as to render them forever after powerless. They sent in a petition to Kieft, saying,

"We entreat that immediate hostile measures may be directed against the savages. They have not yet delivered up the assassins of Smits and Van Voorst, and thus these murders remain unavenged. The national character of the Dutch must suffer. God has now delivered our enemies into our hands. Let us attack them. We offer our services, and urge that united parties of soldiers and civilians assail them at several points."

These views were in entire harmony with the wishes of the sanguinary Kieft. He was delighted with the prospect of a war in which victory seemed easy and certain. Disregarding the remonstrances of DeVrees, and of the Christian minister Bogardus, he made efficient preparation for the slaughter of the helpless savages.

He sent his secretary and a military officer across the river to reconnoitre the position of the Indians. There were two bands of these trembling fugitives, one at Pavonia, on the Jersey side of the river, and one at Corlaer's Hook, on the Island of Manhattan, just above fort Amsterdam. Secretly, at midnight of the 25th of February, 1643, the armed bands advanced against their unsuspecting victims. They were sleeping in fancied security when the murderous assault commenced.

"The noise of muskets," writes Brodhead, "mingled with the shrieks of the terrified Indians. Neither age nor sex were spared. Warrior and squaw, sachem and child, mother and babe, were alike massacred. Daybreak scarcely ended the furious slaughter. Mangled victims, seeking safety in the thickets, were driven into the river. Parents, rushing to save their children whom the soldiers had thrown into the stream, were driven back into the waters and drowned before the eyes of their unrelenting murderers."

"I sat up that night," writes DeVrees,

"by the kitchen fire at the Director's. About midnight, hearing loud shrieks, I ran up to the ramparts of the fort. Looking towards Pavonia, I saw nothing but shooting, and heard nothing but the shrieks of Indians murdered in their sleep."

With the dawn of the morning the victorious Dutch returned from their scene of slaughter, bearing with them about thirty prisoners, and the heads instead of the scalps of many warriors. Kieft welcomed these blood-stained men with "shaking of hands and congratulations." The tidings of this outrage spread far and wide among the Indian tribes in the valley of the Hudson and on the Long Island shore.

Private enterprise, relying upon the protection of Kieft, had sent out a foraging expedition upon Long Island. Kieft assumed that he saw signs of hostility there. The unsuspecting savages were plundered of two wagon loads of grain. These Indians, who had thus far been the warmest friends of the Dutch, were now justly roused to the highest pitch of indignation. They immediately made common cause with the river tribes, who were almost frenzied with the desire to avenge the midnight massacres of Pavonia and Manhattan. The storm which thus burst upon New Netherland was sudden and awful. The savages, in their rage, developed energy and power totally unanticipated.

Eleven tribes combined in the most furious and merciless attacks upon the lonely farm-houses. Everywhere the war-whoop resounded, and the plumed and painted savages emerged from swamps and thickets, and assailed every unprotected dwelling. The farmer was shot in the field, his dwelling burned, and his wife and children were thrown into the flames. Many women and children, their lives being spared, were carried into captivity worse than death. Houses, haystacks and granaries were fired. Cattle were slain or driven off, and crops destroyed.

Terror held high carnival. From the banks of the Raritan to the valley of the Housatonic, over a region of hundreds of square miles, not a plantation was safe. Men, women and children, haggard with hunger, exposure and woe, fled from their deserted homes to fort Amsterdam. Despairing of ever again finding peaceful residence in this new world, with one voice they demanded a return to the fatherland. The Dutch colonies were threatened with immediate and entire depopulation.

Kieft himself was terrified in view of the frightful storm he had raised. He was compelled to enlist every able-bodied man as a soldier. There was an end to all traffic, to all agriculture, to all the arts of industry. Even the plantation of the humane DeVrees did not escape the undiscriminating wrath of the savages. The outhouses, cattle and crops were utterly destroyed. Quite a number of the terrified colonists had taken refuge in the manor house which DeVrees had prudently built very strong, and constructed with loopholes for musketry.

The Indians were besieging the place, when one of their tribe came, whom DeVrees had assisted to escape from the massacre at Manhattan. He told the story of his escape and said that DeVrees was a good chief whom they ought to respect. The Indians held a short consultation, and then the grateful savages deputed one of their number to advance within speaking distance of the manor house. This man, whom we call a savage, cried out:

"We are very sorry that we have destroyed the outhouses, the cattle and the crops. We now know that chief DeVrees is a good chief and our friend. If we had not destroyed his property we would not do so. We will not harm the brewery, though we all greatly need the copper kettle to make barbs for our arrows."

These noble red men, for we must think they exhibited a noble spirit, then departed. DeVrees was, at the time, in the manor house. He hastened down the river to fort Amsterdam and indignantly addressing the governor, said: "Has it not happened just as I foretold, that you are only helping to shed Christian blood? Who will now compensate us for our losses?"

The wretched Kieft had not one word to reply. He however, made a weak and unavailing attempt to appease the wrath of the Long Island Indians. But the roaring tornado of savage vengeance could not thus be divested of its terrors. The messengers he sent, approaching a band of Indians, cried out to them, "We come to you as friends." They shouted back contemptuously, "Are you our friends? You are only corn thieves." Refusing all intercourse they disappeared in the forest.

During all these scenes the infamous and cowardly Kieft ensconced himself securely within the walls of the fort. The bewailings of ruined farmers, and of widows and orphan children rose all around him. To divert public clamor, he fitted out several expeditions against the Indians. But these expeditions all returned having accomplished nothing.

"The proud heart of the Director," writes Brodhead,

"began to fail him at last. In one week desolation and sorrow had taken the place of gladness and prosperity. The colony entrusted to his charge was nearly ruined. It was time to humble himself before the Most High, and invoke from heaven the mercy which the Christian had refused the savage.

"A day of general fasting and prayer was proclaimed. 'We continue to suffer much trouble and loss from the heathen, and many of our inhabitants see their lives and property in jeopardy, which is doubtless owing to our sins,' was Kieft's contrite confession, as he exhorted every one penitently to supplicate the mercy of God, 'so that his holy name may not, through our iniquities, be blasphemed by the heathen.'"

The people still held the Director responsible for all the consequences which had followed the massacres of Pavonia and Corlaer's Hook. They boldly talked of arresting and deposing him, and of sending him, as a culprit, back to Holland. The Director, panic stricken, endeavored to shift the responsibility of the insane course which had been pursued, upon one Adriansen, an influential burgher, who was the leading man among the petitioners who had counselled war.

Adriansen was now a ruined man. His own plantation had been utterly devastated. Exasperated by his losses, he had no disposition to take upon himself the burden of that popular odium which had now become so heavy. Losing all self-control, he seized a sword and a pistol, and rushed into the Director's room, with the apparent intention of assassinating him, exclaiming, "what lies are these you are reporting of me."

He was disarmed and imprisoned. One of his servants took a gun, went to the fort and deliberately discharged the piece at the Director, but without hitting him. The would-be assassin was shot down by a sentinel and his head exposed upon the scaffold. Adriansen was sent to Holland for trial.

After terrible scenes of suffering, a temporary peace was restored through the heroic interposition of DeVrees. He was the only man who dared to venture among the exasperated Indians. They watched over him kindly, and entreated him to be cautious in exposing himself, lest harm might befall him from some wandering Indians by whom he was not known. But the wrongs which the Indians had experienced were too deep to be buried in oblivion. And there was nothing in the character of Kieft to secure their confidence. After the truce of a few weeks the war, without any imaginable cause, broke out anew.

All the settlements at Westchester and Long Island were laid waste. Scarcely an inhabitant, save the roving Indian, was to be found in those regions. The Dutch were driven out of the whole of New Jersey. The settlers on Staten Island were trembling in hourly expectation of an assault. War's devastating surges of flame and blood swept nearly the whole island of Manhattan. Bold men ventured to remain well armed, upon a few of the farms, or boweries as they were called, in the immediate vicinity of the fort, but they were continually menaced with attack, night and day. A bowery was a farm on which the family resided. A plantation was one of those extended tracts of land, which was partly cultivated but upon which no settler dwelt. There was no protection anywhere for the trembling population, save in and directly around fort Amsterdam. Mr. Brodhead, alluding to these scenes of terror, writes,

"The women and children lay concealed in straw huts, while their husbands and fathers mounted guard on the crumbling ramparts above. For the fort itself was almost defenceless. It resembled rather a mole-hill than a fortress against an enemy. The cattle, which had escaped destruction, were huddled within the walls, and were already beginning to starve for want of forage. It was indispensable to maintain a constant guard at all hours, for seven allied tribes, well supplied with muskets, powder and ball, which they had procured from private traders, boldly threatened to attack the dilapidated citadel with all their strength, now amounting to fifteen hundred men.

"So confident had the enemy become, that their scouting parties constantly threatened the advanced sentinels of the garrison. Ensign Van Dyck, while relieving guard at one of the outposts, was wounded by a musket ball in his arm. All the forces that the Dutch could now muster, besides the fifty or sixty soldiers in garrison, were about two hundred freemen. With this handful of men was New Netherland to be defended against the implacable fury of her savage foe."

For a time the war which had desolated the region of the lower valley of the Hudson, did not reach fort Nassau, now Albany. The tribes resident there were at war with the lower river tribes. As these Indians still maintained apparently friendly relations with the whites, the patroon, Van Rensselaer, allowed his agents freely to sell to them fire arms and powder.

This distant and feeble post at this time consisted only of a wretched little fort built of logs, with eight or ten small cannon or swivels.

A hamlet of about thirty huts was scattered along the river. A church, thirty-four feet long by nineteen wide, had been erected in a pine grove within range of the guns of the fort. Nine benches accommodated the congregation. A very faithful pastor, Domine Megapolensis, ministered to them.

The red men were often attracted to the church to hear the preached gospel, and wondered what it meant. Megapolensis writes:

"When we have a sermon sometimes ten or twelve of the Indians will attend, each having in his mouth a long tobacco pipe made by himself, and will stand awhile and look. Afterwards they will ask me what I was doing, and what I wanted, that I stood there alone and made so many words and none of the rest might speak.

"I tell them that I admonish the Christians that they must not steal or drink, or commit murder, or do anything wrong, and that I intend, after a while, to come and preach to them when I am acquainted with their language. They say that I do well in teaching the christians, but immediately add, 'Why do so many christians do these things?'"

This was several years before John Eliot commenced preaching the gospel to the Indians near Boston. Kieft very earnestly applied to the English colony at New Haven for assistance against the Indians. The proposal was submitted to the General Court. After mature deliberation, it was decided that the Articles of Confederation between the New England colonies prohibited them from engaging separately in war; and that moreover "they were not satisfied that the Dutch war with the Indians was just."

The Dutch Director, thus disappointed in obtaining assistance from the English, was roused to the energies of desperation. The spirit of the people also rose to meet the emergency. It was determined to commence the most vigorous offensive measures against the savages.

We have not space to enter into the details of this dreadful war. We will record one of its sanguinary scenes, as illustrative of many others. The Connecticut Indians, in the vicinity of Greenwich, had joined the allied tribes, and were becoming increasingly active in their hostility. Ensign Van Dyck was dispatched with one hundred and fifty men in three vessels. The expedition landed at Greenwich. The Indian warriors, over five hundred in number, were assembled in a strongly palisaded village in the vicinity of Stamford.

It was midnight in February, 1644, when the expedition approached the Indian village. All the day long the men had toiled through the snow. It was a wintry night, clear and cold, with a full moon whose rays, reflected by the dazzling surface of hill and valley, were so brilliant that "many winter days were not brighter."

The Dutch, discharging a volley of bullets upon the doomed village, charged, sword in hand. The savages, emboldened by their superior numbers, made a desperate resistance. But in a conflict like this, arrows are comparatively powerless when opposed to muskets. The Indians, unable to reach their foes with their arrows, made several very bold sallies, recklessly endeavoring to break the Dutch lines. They were invariably driven back with great loss. Not one of them could show himself outside the palisades without being shot down.

In less than an hour the dark forms of one hundred and eighty Indian warriors lay spread out upon the blood-crimsoned snow. And now the Dutch succeeded in applying the torch. The whole village, composed of the most combustible materials, was instantly in flames. The Indians lost all self-possession. They ran to and fro in a state of frenzy. As they endeavored to escape they were, with unerring aim, shot down, or driven back into their blazing huts. Thus over five hundred perished. Of all who crowded the little village at nightfall but eight escaped. Only eight of the Dutch were wounded; but not one fatally.

The conflagration of an hour laid the bark village in ashes. Nothing remained. The victors built large fires and bivouacked upon the snow. The next day they returned to Stamford, and two days afterward reached fort Amsterdam.

War is generally ruin to both parties. In this case neither of the combatants gained anything. Both parties alike reaped but a harvest of blood and woe. Scouting parties of the savages prowled beneath the very walls of fort Amsterdam, ready at a moment's warning, to dart into the wilderness, where even the bravest of the Dutch could not venture to pursue. For the protection of the few cattle which remained, all the men turned out and built a stout fence, "from the great bowery or farm across to Emanuel plantation," near the site of the present Wall street.

During the whole summer of 1644, the savages were busy carrying the desolating war into every unprotected nook and corner. The condition of the colony became desperate, being almost entirely destitute of food, money and clothing. The utter incompetency of Kieft was daily more conspicuous. He did nothing. "Scarce a foot was moved on land, or an oar laid in the water." The savages, thus left in security to fish and gather in their crops, were ever increasingly insolent and defiant. One of the annalists of those times writes:

"Parties of Indians roved about day and night, over Manhattan island, killing the Dutch not a thousand paces from fort Amsterdam. No one dared to move a foot to fetch a stick of firewood without a strong escort."

Kieft, in his overwhelming embarrassments, had found it necessary to convene eight select men to advise him and to aid in supporting his authority. These select men decided to demand of the home government the recall of Kieft, whose incapacity had thus plunged the once-flourishing colony into utter ruin. They also urged the introduction into New Netherland of the municipal system of the fatherland.

In their brief but touching memorial they write,

"Our fields lie fallow and waste. Our dwellings are burned. Not a handful can be sown this autumn on the deserted places. The crops, which God permitted to come forth during the summer, remain rotting in the fields. We have no means to provide necessaries for wives or children. We sit here amidst thousands of savages from whom we can find neither peace nor mercy.

"There are those among us who, by the sweat and labor of their hands, through many long years and at great expense, have endeavored to improve their land. Others have come with ships freighted with a large quantity of cattle. They have cleared away the forest, enclosed their plantations, and brought them under the plough, so as to be an ornament to the country and a profit to the proprietors after their long and laborious toil. The whole of these now lie in ashes through a foolish hankering after war.

"All right-thinking men here know that these Indians have lived as lambs among us until a few years ago, injuring no man, offering every assistance to our nation, and when no supplies were sent for several months, furnishing provisions to the Company's servants until they received supplies. These hath the Director, by several uncalled-for proceedings from time to time, so estranged from us, and so embittered against the Netherlands nation, that we do not believe that anything will bring them and peace back, unless the Lord, who bends all hearts to his will, propitiate their people.

"Little or nothing of any account has been done here for the country. Every place is going to ruin. Neither counsel nor advice is taken."

After giving an account of the origin and progress of the war, they warn the home government against relying upon the statements which the Director had sent over to them. "These statements," they said, "contain as many lies as lines." The memorial was concluded with the following forcible words:

"Honored Lords; this is what we have, in the sorrow of our hearts, to complain of. We shall end here, and commit the matter wholly to our God, praying that he will move your lordships' minds, so that a Governor may be speedily sent to us with a beloved peace, or that we may be permitted to return with our wives and children, to our dear fatherland. For it is impossible ever to settle this country until a different system be introduced here, and a new Governor sent out."

In response to this appeal Kieft was recalled. Just before he received his summons peace was concluded with the Indians, on the 31st of August, 1645. The war had raged five years. It had filled the land with misery. All were alike weary of its carnage and woes. A new governor was appointed, Peter Stuyvesant. The preceding account of the origin of the Dutch colony and its progress thus far is essential to the understanding of the long and successful administration of the new governor, whose name is one of the most illustrious in the early annals of New York.

It may be worthy of brief remark that a few weeks after the arrival of Governor Stuyvesant, Kieft embarked in the ship Princess for Holland. The vessel was wrecked on the coast of Wales Kieft and eighty-one men, women and children sank into a watery grave. Kieft died unlamented. His death was generally regarded as an act of retributive justice.



CHAPTER VI.



GOVERNOR STUYVESANT.



New Netherland in 1646.—Early Years of Peter Stuyvesant.—Decay of New Amsterdam.—The Germs of a Representative Government.—Energetic Administration.—Death of Governor Winthrop.—Claims for Long Island.—Arrogance of the Governor.—Remonstrance of the Nine Men.—The Pastoral Office.—Boundary lines.—Increasing Discontent.—Division of Parties.—Dictatorial Measures.

It is estimated that the whole population of New Netherland, in the year 1646, amounted to about one thousand souls. In 1643, it numbered three thousand. Such was the ruin which the mal-administration of Kieft had brought upon the colony. The male adult population around Amsterdam was reduced to one hundred. At the same time the population of the flourishing New England colonies had increased to about sixty thousand.

On the 11th of May, 1647, Governor Stuyvesant arrived at Manhattan. He was appointed as "Redresser General," of all colonial abuses. We have but little knowledge of the early life of Peter Stuyvesant. The West India Company had a colony upon the island of Curacoa, in the Caribbean Sea. For some time Stuyvesant had been its efficient Director. He was the son of a clergyman in Friesland, one of the northern provinces of the Netherlands.

He received a good academic education, becoming quite a proficient in the Latin language, of which accomplishment, it is said that he was afterwards somewhat vain. At school he was impetuous, turbulent and self-willed. Upon leaving the academy he entered the military service, and soon developed such energy of character, such a spirit of self-reliance and such administrative ability that he was appointed director of the colony at Curacoa. He was recklessly courageous, and was deemed somewhat unscrupulous in his absolutism. In an attack upon the Portuguese island of Saint Martin, in the year 1644, which attack was not deemed fully justifiable, he lost a leg. The wound rendered it necessary for him to return to Holland in the autumn of 1644, for surgical aid.

Upon his health being re-established, the Directors of the West India Company, expressing much admiration for his Roman courage, appointed him Governor of their colony in New Netherland, which was then in a state of ruin. There were also under his sway the islands of Curacoa, Buenaire and Amba. The Provincial Government presented him with a paper of instructions very carefully drawn up. The one-man power, which Kieft had exercised, was very considerably modified. Two prominent officers, the Vice-Director and the Fiscal, were associated with him in the administration of all civil and military affairs. They were enjoined to take especial care that the English should not further encroach upon the Company's territory. They were also directed to do everything in their power to pacify the Indians and to restore friendly relations with them. No fire-arms or ammunition were, under any circumstances, to be sold to the Indians.

Van Diricklagen was associated with the Governor as Vice-Director, and ensign Van Dyck, of whom the reader has before heard, was appointed Fiscal, an important office corresponding with our post of Treasurer. Quite a large number of emigrants, with abundant supplies, accompanied this party. The little fleet of four ships left the Texel on Christmas day of 1646. The expedition, running in a southerly direction, first visited the West India islands. On the voyage the imperious temper of Stuyvesant very emphatically developed itself.

Holland was then at war with Spain. A prize was captured and the question arose respecting its disposal. Fiscal Van Dyck claimed, by virtue of his office, a seat at the council board and a voice in the decision. The governor rudely repulsed him with the words,

"Get out. Who admitted you into the council. When I want you I will call you."

When they arrived at Curacoa, Van Dyck again made an attempt to gain that place in the Council to which he thought his office legitimately entitled him. Stuyvesant punished him by confining him to the ship, not allowing him to step on shore. All the other officers and soldiers were freely allowed to recruit themselves by strolling upon the land.

Upon reaching Manhattan, Stuyvesant was received by the whole community with great rejoicing. And when he said, "I shall reign over you as a father governs his children," they were perhaps not fully aware of the dictatorial spirit which was to animate his government. With wonderful energy he immediately devoted himself to the reform of abuses. Though he availed himself of absolute power, taking counsel of no one, all his measures seem to have been adopted, not for the advancement of his own selfish interests, but for the promotion of the public good.

Proclamations were issued against Sabbath desecration, intemperance and all quarrelling. No intoxicating liquors were to be sold to the savages under a penalty of five hundred guilders. And the seller was also to be held responsible for any injury which the savage might inflict, while under the influence of strong drink. After the ringing of the nine o'clock bell in the evening, intoxicating drinks were not to be sold to any person whatever.

To draw a knife in a quarrel was to be punished with a heavy fine and six months imprisonment. If a wound was inflicted the penalty was trebled. Great faults accompanied this development of energy. The new governor assumed "state and pomp like a peacock's." He kept all at a distance from him, exacted profound homage, and led many to think that he would prove a very austere father. All his acts were characterized by great vigor.

New Amsterdam, at that time, presented a very dilapidated and deplorable appearance. The fort was crumbling to ruins. The skeleton of an unfinished church deformed the view. The straggling fences were broken down. The streets were narrow and crooked, many of the houses encroaching upon them. The foul enclosures for swine bordered the thoroughfares.

A system of taxation upon both exports and imports was introduced, which speedily replenished the treasury. Governor Stuyvesant was a professing christian, being a devout member of the Reformed Church of the fatherland. He promptly transferred his relations to the church at fort Amsterdam. He became an elder in the church, and conscious that the christian religion was the basis of all prosperity, one of his first acts was the adoption of measures for the completion of the church edifice. Proprietors of vacant lots were ordered to fence them in and improve them. Surveyors of buildings were appointed to regulate the location and structure of new houses.

The embarrassments which surrounded the governor were so great that he found it necessary to support his authority by calling public opinion to his aid. "Necessity," writes Brodhead, "produced concession and prerogative yielded to popular rights. The Council recommended that the principle of representation should be conceded to the people. Stuyvesant consented."

An election was ordered and eighteen "of the most notable, reasonable, honest and respectable persons" in the colony were chosen, from whom the governor was to select nine persons as a sort of privy council. It is said that Stuyvesant was very reluctant to yield at all to the people, and that he very jealously guarded the concessions to which he was constrained to assent. By this measure popular rights gained largely. The Nine Men had however only the power to give advice when it was asked. When assembled, the governor could attend the meeting and act as president.

Governor Stuyvesant, soon after his arrival at fort Amsterdam, addressed courteous letters to the governors of all the neighboring colonies. In his letter to Governor Winthrop, of Massachusetts, he asserted the indubitable right of the Dutch to all the territory between the Connecticut and the Delaware, and proposed an interview for the settlement of all difficulties.

An Amsterdam ship, the Saint Benino, entered the harbor of New Haven, and for a month engaged in trade without a license from the West India Company. Stuyvesant, ascertaining the fact, sent a company of soldiers on a secret expedition to New Haven, seized the vessel on the Lord's day, brought her to Manhattan, and confiscated both ship and cargo.

Emboldened by success, Stuyvesant sent a letter to the authorities at New Haven claiming all the region from Cape Henlopen to Cape Cod as part of the territory of New Netherland, and affirming his right to levy duties upon all Dutch vessels trading within those limits.

Governor Eaton, of the New Haven colony, sent back a remonstrance protesting against the Dutch governor as a disturber of the public peace by "making unjust claims to our lands and plantations, to our havens and rivers, and by taking a ship out of our harbor without our license."

Three deserters from Manhattan fled to New Haven. Governor Eaton, though bound by treaty obligations to deliver them up, yet indignant in view of what he deemed the arrogant claim of Governor Stuyvesant, refused to surrender them, lest the surrender should be deemed as "done in the way of subordination." The impetuous Stuyvesant at once issued a retaliatory proclamation in which he said:

"If any person, noble or ignoble, freeman or slave, debtor or creditor, yea, to the lowest prisoner included, run away from the colony at New Haven, or seek refuge in our limits, he shall remain free, under our protection, on taking the oath of allegiance."

This decree excited strong disapprobation at home as well as in the other colonies. The inhabitants of Manhattan objected to it as tending to convert the province into a refuge for vagabonds from the neighboring English settlements. After a few months the obnoxious proclamation was revoked. But in the meantime Governor Stuyvesant had bribed the runaways, who had been taken into the public service at New Haven, to escape and return home.

As a precaution against fire, it was ordered that if a house were burned through the owner's negligence, he should be heavily fined. Fire-wardens were appointed to inspect the buildings. If any chimney was found foul, the owner was fined and the sum was appointed to purchasing fire-ladders, hooks and buckets. As nearly one-fourth of the houses were licensed for the sale of brandy, tobacco or beer, it was resolved that no farther licenses should be granted. It was ordered that cattle and swine should be pastured within proper enclosures. And it was also ordained that, "from this time forth, in the afternoon as well as in the forenoon, there shall be preaching from God's word." Many of the Indians were employed as servants or day laborers. They were often defrauded of their wages. A decree was issued, punishing with a fine those who neglected to pay these debts.

In January, 1649, Charles I., of England, was beheaded in front of his own banqueting hall, and England became nominally a republic. The event created the most profound sensation throughout all Christendom. The shock, which agitated all Europe, was felt in America. The prince of Wales and the duke of York, escaping from England, took refuge in Holland with their brother-in-law, the stadtholder, William, prince of Orange. A rupture between England and Holland appeared imminent. The Puritans in America were well pleased with the establishment of a republic in their native land. A war between the two European nations would probably bring all the Dutch colonies under the control of England. The West India Company, in view of these perils, urged Stuyvesant "to live with his neighbors on the best terms possible."

On the 24th of March, of this year, the venerable Governor Winthrop, of Massachusetts, died, at the age of sixty-one. Governor Eaton, of New Haven, proposed to Stuyvesant a meeting of the Governors, at Boston, to discuss the affairs of the colonies. The meeting was held in August. It was not harmonious. The Dutch were forbidden from trading anywhere with the Indians within the territory of the English colonies, and Stuyvesant was very emphatically informed that the English claimed all the territory between Cape Cod and New Haven.

Lady Stirling, widow of Lord Stirling, determined to maintain her title to the whole of Long Island. She sent an agent, who announced himself to the English settlers at Hempstead, on the northern portion of the island, as governor of the whole island under the Dowager Countess of Stirling. Intelligence of this was speedily sent to Stuyvesant. The Dutch Governor caused his immediate arrest, ordered him, notwithstanding his "very consequential airs," to be examined before the council, took copies of his papers, and placed him on board ship for Holland. The ship put in at an English port, the agent escaped and was heard of no more.

The council, much displeased with the absolutism assumed by Stuyvesant, resolved to send one of their number, a remarkably energetic man, Adrien Van Der Donck, to Holland to seek redress from the home government. The movement was somewhat secret, and they endeavored to conceal from the governor the papers which were drawn up, containing the charges against him. The spirit of Stuyvesant was roused.

He went in person, with some officers, to the chamber of Van Der Donck, when he was absent, seized his papers, and then caused him to be arrested and imprisoned.

The Vice Director, Van Diricklagen, accompanied by a delegation from the people, protested against these proceedings, and demanded that Van Der Donck should be released from captivity and held on bail. Stuyvesant refused, saying that the prisoner was arrested, "for calumniating the officers of government; that his conduct tended to bring the sovereign authority into contempt." Van Der Donck was punished by banishment from the council and from the board of Nine Men.

Just before this, two prominent men, Kuyter and Melyn, demanded an appeal to the people in reference to some act of Kieft's reckless administration. Stuyvesant took the alarm. If the people could judge of Kieft's administration, his own might be exposed to the same ordeal. Convening a special council, he said,

"These petitioners are disturbers of the public peace. If we grant their request, will not the cunning fellows, in order to usurp over us a more unlimited power, claim even greater authority against ourselves, should it happen that our administration may not square in every respect with their whims. It is treason to petition against one's magistrate whether there be cause or not."

The unfortunate petitioners were now arraigned on various charges. The Governor and his subservient Council acted both as prosecutors and judges. The prisoners were accused of instigating the war with the savages, of counselling the mortgaging of Manhattan to the English, and of threatening Kieft with personal violence. The case was speedily decided and sentence was pronounced. Stuyvesant wished Melyn to be punished with death and confiscation of property. But the majority of the Council held back the Governor's avenging hand. Still he succeeded in sentencing Melyn to seven years' banishment, to a fine of three hundred guilders, and to forfeit all benefits derived from the Company. Kuyter was sentenced to three years' banishment and to a fine of one hundred and fifty guilders. They were also denied the right of appeal to the fatherland.

"If I were persuaded," said the Governor, "that you would divulge our sentence, or bring it before their High Mightinesses, I would have you hanged at once, on the highest tree in New Netherland."

Again he said, with characteristic energy, "If any one, during my administration, shall appeal, I will make him a foot shorter, and send the pieces to Holland and let him appeal in that way."[7]

Melyn and Kuyter being sent to Holland as criminals, did appeal to the home government; their harsh sentence was suspended; they were restored to all the rights of colonists of New Netherland, and Stuyvesant was cited to defend his sentence at the Hague. When Melyn returned to Manhattan with these authoritative papers, a great tumult was excited. Anxious that his triumph should be as public as his disgrace had been, he demanded that the Acts should be read to the people assembled in the church. With much difficulty he carried his point. "I honor the States and shall obey their commands," said Stuyvesant, "I shall send an attorney to sustain the sentence."

The Indians loudly, and with one accord, demanded the right to purchase fire-arms. For years they had been constantly making such purchases, either through the colonists at Rensselaerswyck, or from private traders. It was feared that the persistent refusal to continue the supply, might again instigate them to hostilities. The Directors of the West India government therefore intimated that "it was the best policy to furnish them with powder and ball, but with a sparing hand."

Stuyvesant ordered a case of guns to be brought over from Holland. They were landed openly at fort Amsterdam and placed under the care of an agent of the governor. Thus Stuyvesant himself was to monopolize the trade, which was extremely lucrative; for the Indians would pay almost any price for guns, powder and shot. This increased the growing dissatisfaction. The Indians would readily exchange skins to the amount of forty dollars for a gun, and of four dollars for a pound of powder.

"The governor," it was said,

"assumes to be everything. He establishes shops for himself and does the business of the whole country. He is a brewer and has breweries. He is a ship-owner, a merchant, and a trader in both lawful and contraband articles."

The Nine Men persisted in their resolve to send a remonstrance to the fatherland. The memorial was signed and forwarded the latter part of July. In this important document, which first gave a brief account of the past history of the colony, the administration of Stuyvesant was reviewed with much severity.

"In our opinion," said the remonstrants,

"this country will never flourish under the present government. The country must be provided with godly, honorable and intelligent rulers, who are not very indigent, and who are not too covetous. The mode in which this country is now governed is intolerable. Nobody is secure in his property longer than the Director pleases, who is generally strongly inclined to confiscating. A good population would be the consequence of a good government. Many would be allured here by the pleasantness, situation, salubrity and fruitfulness of the country, if protection were secured."

Three of the signers were deputed to convey the remonstrance to the Hague and lay it before the authorities there. The pastor of the church at Manhattan, Domine Backerus, returned to Holland with the commissioners. He was greatly dissatisfied with the regime of the governor, and upon his arrival in Holland, joined the complainants.

Domine Megapolensis, who had been pastor of the church at Rensselaerswyck, having obtained letters of dismission from his church, was also about to sail to the fatherland. The colonists, generally religiously disposed, were greatly troubled, being threatened with a total loss of the gospel ministry. By the earnest solicitation of Stuyvesant, he consented to remain at Manhattan, where he was formally installed as pastor of the church, upon a salary of twelve hundred guilders, which was about four hundred dollars. At the same time the energetic governor manifested his interest in education by writing earnestly to Amsterdam, urging that a pious, well-qualified and diligent schoolmaster might be sent out. "Nothing," he added, "is of greater importance than the right, early instruction of youth."

The governor was sorely annoyed by the action of the States-General, reversing his sentence against Melyn and Kuyter. He wrote that he should obey their decision, but that he would rather never have received their commission as governor, than to have had his authority lowered in the eyes of his neighbors and friends.

The three commissioners, bearing the memorial of the Nine Men, reached Holland in safety. The States-General received their memorial, and also listened to the reply of the agent, whom Stuyvesant had sent out to plead his cause. The decision of the States was virtually a rebuke of the dictatorial government of Stuyvesant, and several very important reforms were ordered. This decision displeased the West India Company. Those men deemed their rights infringed upon by this action of the States-General. They were therefore led to espouse the cause of the governor. Thus strengthened, Stuyvesant ventured to disregard the authority of the States-General.

The Dutch at Manhattan began to be clamorous for more of popular freedom. Stuyvesant, hoping to enlist the sympathies of the governors of the English colonies in his behalf, made vigorous arrangements for the long projected meeting with the Commissioners of the United Colonies.

On the 17th of September, 1650, Governor Stuyvesant embarked at Manhattan, with his secretary, George Baxter, and quite an imposing suite. Touching at several places along the sound, he arrived at Hartford in four days. After much discussion it was agreed to refer all differences, of the points in controversy, to four delegates, two to be chosen from each side. It is worthy of special remark that Stuyvesant's secretary was an Englishman, and he chose two Englishmen for his delegates.

In the award delivered by the arbitrators, it was decided that upon Long Island a line running from the westernmost part of Oyster Bay, in a straight direction to the sea, should be the bound between the English and the Dutch territory; the easterly part to belong to the English, the westernmost part to the Dutch. Upon the mainland, the boundary line was to commence on the west side of Greenwich bay, about four miles from Stamford, and to run in a northerly direction twenty miles into the country, provided that the said line came not within ten miles of the Hudson river. The Dutch were not to build any house within six miles of said line. The inhabitants of Greenwich were to remain, till further consideration, under the Government of the Dutch. It was also decided that a nearer union of friendship and amity, between England and the Dutch colonies in America, should be recommended to the several jurisdictions of the United Colonies.

Stuyvesant reported the result of these negotiations to the Chamber at Amsterdam but, for some unexplained reason, did not send to that body a copy of the treaty. Upon his return to Manhattan he was immediately met with a storm of discontent. His choice of two Englishmen as the referees, to represent the Dutch cause, gave great offence. It was deemed an insult to his own countrymen. There was a general disposition with the colonists to repudiate a treaty which the Dutch had had no hand in forming. Complaints were sent to Holland that the Governor had surrendered more territory than might have formed fifty colonies; and that, rejecting those reforms in favor of popular rights which the home government had ordered, he was controlling all things with despotic power.

"This grievous and unsuitable government," the Nine Men wrote,

"ought at once to be reformed. The measures ordered by the home government should be enforced so that we may live as happily as our neighbors. Our term of office is about to expire. The governor has declared that he will not appoint any other select men. We shall not dare again to assemble in a body; for we dread unjustifiable prosecutions, and we can already discern the smart thereof from afar."[8]

Notwithstanding these reiterated rebukes, Stuyvesant persisted in his arbitrary course. The vice-director, Van Diricklagen, and the fiscal or treasurer Van Dyck, united in a new protest expressing the popular griefs. Van Der Donck was the faithful representative of the commonalty in their fatherland. The vice-director, in forwarding the new protest to him wrote,

"Our great Muscovy duke keeps on as of old; something like the wolf, the longer he lives the worse he bites."

It is a little remarkable that the English refugees, who were quite numerous in the colony, were in sympathy with the arbitrary assumptions of the governor. They greatly strengthened his hands by sending a Memorial to the West India Company, condemning the elective franchise which the Dutch colonists desired.

"We willingly acknowledge," they wrote,

"that the power to elect a governor from among ourselves, which is, we know, the design of some here, would be our ruin, by reason of our factions and the difference of opinion which prevails among us."

The West India Company, not willing to relinquish the powers which it grasped, was also in very decided opposition to the spirit of popular freedom which the Dutch colonists were urging, and which was adopted by the States-General. Thus, in this great controversy, the governor, the West India Company and the English settlers in the colony were on one side. Upon the other side stood the States-General and the Dutch colonists almost without exception.

The vice-director was punished for his protest, by expulsion from the council and by imprisonment in the guard-room for four days. Upon his liberation he took refuge with the Patroon on Staten Island. The notary, who had authenticated the protest, was dismissed from office and forbidden any farther to practice his profession. In every possible way, Stuyvesant manifested his displeasure against his own countrymen of the popular party, while the English were treated with the utmost consideration.

In the treaty of Hartford no reference was made to the interests of the Dutch on the south, or Delaware river. The New Haven people equipped a vessel and dispatched fifty emigrants to establish a colony upon some lands there, which they claimed to have purchased of the Indians. The governor regarded this as a breach of the treaty, for the English territory terminated and the Dutch began at the bay of Greenwich. The expedition put in at Manhattan. The energetic governor instantly arrested the leaders and held them in close confinement till they signed a promise not to proceed to the Delaware. The emigrants, thus discomfited, returned to New Haven.

At the same time Governor Stuyvesant sent a very emphatic letter to Governor Eaton of New Haven, in which he wrote: "I shall employ force of arms and martial opposition, even to bloodshed, against all English intruders within southern New Netherland."

In this movement of the English to get a foothold upon the Delaware river, Stuyvesant thought he saw a covert purpose on their part, to dispossess the Dutch of all their possessions in America. Thinking it not improbable that it might be necessary to appeal to arms, he demanded of the authorities of Rensselaerswyck a subsidy. The patroons, who had been at great expense in colonizing the territory, deemed the demand unjust, and sent a commissioner to remonstrate against it. Stuyvesant arrested the commissioner and held him in close confinement for four months.

The Swedes were also making vigorous efforts to get possession of the beautiful lands on the Delaware. Stuyvesant, with a large suite of officers, visited that region. In very decided terns he communicated to Printz the Swedish governor there, that the Dutch claimed the territory upon the three-fold title of discovery, settlement and purchase from the natives. He then summoned all the Indian chiefs on the banks of the river, in a grand council at fort Nassau. After a "solemn conference" these chiefs ceded to the West India Company all the lands on both sides of the river to a point called by them Neuwsings, near the mouth of the bay.

The Swedes were left in possession only of a small territory surrounding their fort, called Christina. As Stuyvesant thought fort Nassau too far up the river and inconvenient of access, he demolished it. In its seclusion in the wilderness it had stood for twenty-eight years. A new fort called Casimir was erected, on the west side of the river near the present site of New Castle, four miles below the Swedish fort Christina. Having thus triumphantly accomplished his object, Stuyvesant returned to Manhattan.



CHAPTER VII.



WAR BETWEEN ENGLAND AND HOLLAND.



Action of the Patroons.—Settlements on the Hudson.—Alarm of the Home Government.—Recall of Stuyvesant.—His Escape from Humiliation.—Difficulties between England and Holland.—The Breaking out of War.—Directions to Stuyvesant.—The Relations of the Colonies.—Charges against the Dutch Governor.—Their Refutation.—Efforts of Stuyvesant for Peace.—Noble Conduct of the Massachusetts Government.—The Advocates for War.

Governor Stuyvesant having removed the obnoxious vice-director, had another, Johannes Dyckman, who he thought would be more subservient to his wishes, appointed in his stead. The commissary of the patroons, whom he had imprisoned at Manhattan, secreted himself on board a sloop and escaped up the river to Beaverwyck. The enraged governor seized the skipper of the sloop on his return, and inflicted upon him a heavy fine.

The patroons were now fearful that the governor would fulfill his threat of extending his authority over the extensive territory whose jurisdiction the Charter of Privileges had entrusted exclusively to the patroons. They therefore, on an appointed day assembled the freemen and householders who bound themselves, by an oath, "to maintain and support offensively and defensively the right and jurisdiction of the colony against every one."

Among the persons who took this oath we find the name of John Baptist Van Rensselaer. He was the younger half-brother of the patroon, and probably the first of the name who came to New Netherland. It was now reported that Governor Stuyvesant himself was about to visit fort Orange, and that a new gallows was being prepared for those who should attempt to thwart his wishes. The governor soon arrived and, with his customary explicitness, informed the authorities there, that the territory by the Exemptions, allowed to the patroon, was to extend sixteen miles on one side of the river, or eight miles if both banks were occupied. He called upon them to define their boundaries, saying that he should recognize the patroons' jurisdiction only to that extent. These limits would include but a small portion of the territory which the patroons claimed by right of purchase from the Indians.

The authorities were not prepared to act upon this question without instructions from Holland. Stuyvesant would admit of no delay. He sent a party of fourteen soldiers, armed with muskets, to the patroon's house, who entered the enclosure, fired a volley, and hauled down the flag of the patroon. He then issued a decree that Beaverswyck, which included the region now occupied by the city of Albany, was independent of the patroon's government, and was brought under the jurisdiction of the colony of fort Amsterdam.

Van Slechtenhorst, the patroon's bold and efficient Commissary at Rensselaerswick, ordered the governor's placards, announcing this change, to be torn down, and a counter proclamation, affirming the claims of the patroon to be posted in its stead. The governor arrested him, imprisoned him for a time in fort Orange, and then removed him to New Amsterdam, where he was held in close custody, until his successor, John Baptist Van Rensselaer, was formally appointed in his place.

At this time, 1652, there were no settlements, and but a few scattered farmhouses between the island of Manhattan and the Catskill mountains. Thomas Chambers had a farm at what is now Troy. With a few neighbors he moved down the river to "some exceedingly beautiful lands," and began the settlement of the present county of Ulster.

Stuyvesant returning to Manhattan, forbade any persons from buying lands of the Indians without his permission. The large sales which had been made to prominent individuals were declared to be void, and the "pretended proprietors," were ordered to return the purchase money. Should they however petition the governor, they might retain such tracts as he and his council should permit.

By grant of the governor several new settlements were commenced on Long Island, one at Newton, one at Flatbush. The news had now reached the Directors of the Company in Holland, of the governor's very energetic measures on the Delaware, supplanting the Swiss, demolishing fort Nassau and erecting fort Casimir. They became alarmed lest such violent measures might embroil them with the Swedish government. In a letter addressed to Stuyvesant, they wrote:

"Your journey to the South river, and what has passed there between you and the Swedes, was very unexpected to us, as you did not give us before so much as a hint of your intention. We cannot give our opinion upon it until we have heard the complaints of the Swedish governor to his queen, and have ascertained how these have been received at her court. We hope that our arguments, to prove that we were the first possessors of that country, will be acknowledged as sufficient. Time will instruct us of the design of the new-built fort Casimir. We are at a loss to conjecture for what reason it has received this name. You ought to be on your guard that it be well secured, so that it cannot be surprised."

The States-General were more and more dissatisfied with the measures of Governor Stuyvesant. The treaty of Hartford was severely censured. They said that the Connecticut river should have been the eastern boundary of New Netherland, and that the whole of Long Island should have been retained. Even the West India Company became convinced that it was necessary to make some concessions to the commonalty at Manhattan. They therefore communicated to Stuyvesant their consent that the "burgher government" should be established, which the committee of Nine had petitioned for in behalf of the commonalty, in 1649, and which the States-General had authorized in 1650.

By this arrangement the people were to elect seven representatives, who were to form a municipal court of justice, subject to the right of appeal to the Supreme Court of the province. The sheriff was also invested with new powers. He was to convoke and preside at the municipal court, to prosecute all offenders against the laws, and to take care that all the judgments of the court should be executed. The people at Manhattan had thus won, to a very considerable degree, the popular government which they had so long desired.

Quite to the amazement of the Directors of the West India Company, the States-General recalled Stuyvesant, ordering him to return immediately to Holland to give an account of his administration. He had been in the main the faithful agent of the Company, carrying out its wishes in opposition to popular reform. They therefore wrote to him, stating that the requirement was in violation of their charter, and requesting him "not to be in too much haste to commence his voyage, but to delay it until the receipt of further orders."

It so happened, however, that then the States-General were just on the eve of hostilities with England. It was a matter of the first importance that New Netherland should be under the rule of a governor of military experience, courage and energy. No man could excel Stuyvesant in these qualities. Yielding to the force of circumstances, the States-General revoked their recall. Thus narrowly Stuyvesant escaped the threatened humiliation.

The English government was angry with Holland for refusing to expel the royalist refugees, who, after the execution of Charles I., had taken refuge in Holland. The commerce of the Dutch Republic then covered every sea. England, to punish the Dutch and to revive her own decaying commerce, issued, by Parliamentary vote, her famous "Act of Navigation," which was exultantly proclaimed at the old London Exchange "with sound of trumpet and beat of drum."

This Act decreed that no production of Asia, Africa or America should be brought to England, except in English vessels, manned by English crews, and that no productions of Europe should be brought to England, unless in English vessels, or in those of the country in which the imported cargoes were produced. These measures were considered very unjust by all the other nations, and especially by the Dutch, then the most commercial nation on the globe.

The States-General sent ambassadors to London to remonstrate against such hostile action; and at the same time orders were issued for the equipment of one hundred and fifty ships of war. The States-General had not yet ratified Stuyvesant's treaty of Hartford. The ambassadors were instructed to urge that an immovable boundary line should be established between the Dutch and English possessions in America.

The reply of the English Government was not conciliatory. The English, it was said, had always been forbidden to trade in the Dutch colonies. The Dutch ought therefore to find no fault with the recent Navigation Act, from which measure the Council did not "deem it fitting to recede." As to the colonial boundary, the ungracious reply was returned,

"The English were the first settlers in North America, from Virginia to Newfoundland. We know nothing of any Dutch plantations there, excepting a few settlers up the Hudson. We do not think it necessary at present, to settle the boundaries. It can be done hereafter, at any convenient time."

A naval war soon broke out. England, without warning, seized the ships of Holland in English ports, and impressed their crews. The Dutch war fleet was entrusted to Admiral Tromp. He was enjoined to protect the Dutch vessels from visitation or search by foreign cruisers, and not to strike his flag to English ships of war. The instructions of the commanders of the British men of war, were to compel the ships of all foreign nations whatever, to strike their colors to the British flag. England thus set up its arrogant claim to "its undoubted right to the dominion of the surrounding seas."

The English fleet, under Admiral Blake, met the Dutch fleet in the Strait of Dover, on the 29th of May, 1632, and a bloody but undecisive battle ensued. A series of terrible naval conflicts followed, with victory now on the one side and now on the other. At length Blake, discomfited, was compelled to take refuge in the Thames. Admiral Tromp, rather vain-gloriously, placed a broom at his masthead to indicate that he had swept the channel of all English ships.

In this state of affairs the Directors wrote to Governor Stuyvesant, saying,

"Though we hope that you have so agreed with the colonists of New England about boundaries that we have nothing to fear from them, still we consider it an imperious duty to recommend you to arm and discipline all freemen, soldiers and sailors; to appoint officers and places of rendezvous; to supply them with ammunition; and to inspect the fortifications at New Amsterdam, fort Orange and fort Casimir. To this end we send you a fresh supply of ammunition.

"If it should happen, which we will not suppose, that New Englanders incline to take part in these broils, then we should advise your honor to engage the Indians in your cause, who, we are informed, are not partial to the English. You will also employ all such means of defence as prudence may require for your security, taking care that the merchants and inhabitants convey their property within the forts.

"Treat them kindly, so that they may be encouraged to remain there, and to give up the thought of returning to Holland, which would depopulate the country. It is therefore advisable to inclose the villages, at least the principal and most opulent, with breastworks and palisades to prevent surprise."

Looking into the future with prophetic eyes, which discerned the future glories of the rising republic, the Directors added,

"When these colonies once become permanently established, when the ships of New Netherland ride on every part of the ocean, then numbers, now looking to that coast with eager eyes, shall be allured to embark for your island."

This prophecy is now emphatically fulfilled when often one or two thousand emigrants, from the old world, land at the Battery in a day. When the prophecy was uttered, New Amsterdam was a small straggling village of one story huts, containing about seven hundred inhabitants. The whole island of Manhattan belonged in fee to the West India Company. A municipal government was soon organized, which about the year 1653, gave birth to the city of New Amsterdam.

Holland and England were now in open and deadly warfare. It will hardly be denied by any one, that England was responsible for the conflict. The New England colonies wished to avail themselves of the opportunity to wrest New Netherland from the Dutch, and to extend their sway from Stamford to the Chesapeake. Governor Stuyvesant perceived his danger. He could be easily overpowered by the New England colonies. He wrote very friendly letters to the governors, urging that, notwithstanding the hostilities between the mother-countries, commercial intercourse between the colonies should continue on its former peaceful footing. At the same time he adopted very vigorous measures to be prepared for defence should he be assailed.

Rumors reached New Amsterdam of active military preparations in progress in New England. It was manifest that some hostile expedition was contemplated. Fort Amsterdam was repaired. The city was enclosed by a ditch and palisade, with a breastwork extending from the East river to the North river. The whole body of citizens mounted guard every night. A frigate in the harbor was ready at any moment to spread its sails, and its "guns were kept loaded day and night." The citizens without exception, were ordered to work upon the defences, under penalty of fine, loss of citizenship and banishment.

Thus barbaric war came again to mar all the prosperity of the colony, and to undermine all its foundations of growth and happiness. The Mohican Indians, on the east side of the North river, and whose territory extended to the Connecticut, were allies of the English. Uncas, the chief of this tribe, declared that Governor Stuyvesant was plotting to arm the Narragansetts against New England. At the same time nine chiefs from the vicinity of Manhattan, sent a messenger to Stamford, who said:

"The Dutch governor has earnestly solicited the Indians in these parts, to kill all the English. But we have all refused to be hired by him, for the English have done us no harm."

The New England colonists were by no means satisfied that these charges were true. Veracity was not an Indian virtue. Cunning was a prominent trait in their character. An extraordinary meeting of commissioners was held in Boston, in April, 1653. Two messengers had been previously sent by the Massachusetts council, to interrogate three of the principal Narragansett chiefs, respecting the conduct of Governor Stuyvesant. They reported at the meeting, that the Narragansett chiefs utterly denied that Governor Stuyvesant had ever approached them with any such proposition. One of them, Ninigret, said:

"It was winter when I visited the Dutch governor. I stood the great part of a winter's day, knocking at his door. He would neither open it nor suffer others to open it, to let me in. I found no proposal to stir me up against the English, my friends."

Mixam, another of these chiefs, replied, "I do not know of any plot that is intended by the Dutch governor against the English, my friends."

The third of the chiefs, who was conferred with, Pessacus, was still more emphatic in his denial. "Though I am far away," he said, "from the governor of the Dutch, I am not willing for the sake of pleasing the English, to invent any falsehood against him."

The result of these investigations led some to suppose that individuals among the English had originated these rumors, and had bribed some of the Indian chiefs to false charges that they might instigate the governors to send out an expedition for the capture of New Netherland.

Still the Council was unsatisfied, and retained its suspicions. Governor Stuyvesant. hearing of the charges against him, wrote at once to the governors of Massachusetts and New Haven, unequivocally denying the plot, and offering to come himself to Boston "to consider and examine what may be charged, and his answers." Should the Council prefer, he would send a delegate to Boston, or they might send delegates to Manhattan to investigate the whole affair.

The Council decided to send three commissioners, men of note, to Manhattan. At the same time an army of five hundred men was ordered to be organized "for the first expedition," should "God call the colonies to make war against the Dutch."

The New England agents were hospitably received at New Amsterdam. They urged that the meeting should be held in one of the New England colonies, where Stuyvesant "should produce evidence to clear himself from the charges against him." He was to be regarded as guilty until he proved himself innocent.

The Puritan agents appear to great disadvantage in the conference which ensued. "They seem to have visited the Dutch," writes Mr. Brodhead,

"as inquisitors, to collect evidence criminating the Dutch and to collect no other evidence. And, with peculiar assurance, they saw no impropriety in requiring the authorities of New Netherland, in their own capital, to suspend their established rules of law in favor of those of New England."

Governor Stuyvesant repressed every expression of impatience, and urged the most friendly overtures. It may be said that it was manifestly for his interest to do so, for the Dutch colonies were quite powerless compared with the united colonies of New England. The New England agents ungraciously repelled his advances, and at length abruptly terminated the conference without giving the governor an opportunity to prove his innocence. At nine o'clock in the evening they suddenly took leave of New Amsterdam, declining the most friendly invitations to remain, and "cloaking their sudden departure under pretence of the day of election to be held this week at Boston." They left behind them the following menace:

"The Commissioners conclude their negotiation by declaring that if you shall offer any injury to any of the English in these parts, whether by yourselves or by the Indians, either upon the national quarrel, or by reason of any differences depending between the United English Colonies and yourselves, that, as the Commissioners will do no wrong, so they may not suffer their countrymen to be oppressed upon any such account."

The morning after this unfriendly retirement of the agents, Governor Stuyvesant dispatched a messenger to Boston, with a letter containing a very full reply to the grievances of which the New England colonists complained. In this letter, which bears the impress of frankness and honesty, he says,

"What your worships lay unto our charge are false reports and feigned informations. Your honored messengers might, if they had pleased, have informed themselves of the truth of this, and might also have obtained more friendly satisfaction and security, concerning our real intentions, if they had pleased to stay a day or two with us, to have heard and considered further of these articles."

On their way home, the New England agents stopped at Flushing, Stamford and New Haven, to collect all the evidence they could against Governor Stuyvesant. The hearsay stories of the Indians they carefully picked up. Still the only point ascertained, of any moment was, that Governor Stuyvesant had told an Englishman, one Robert Coe, that if the English attacked him, he should try to get the Indians to come to his aid; and that he had said the same to William Alford.

This was all the evidence the agents could find against the governor. He had made these declarations without any purpose of concealment. He had been instructed to pursue this course by the Amsterdam Directors. The New England colonists had in their Pequod war, set the example of employing Indian allies. This repulsive feature in the British colonial administration continued until the close of the war of the Revolution.

Captain John Underbill, an Englishman, who had obtained considerable renown in the Pequod war becoming dissatisfied with some ecclesiastical censure which he had incurred, petitioned Governor Stuyvesant for permission to reside, with a few other families in New Netherland, under the protection of the Dutch, offering to take the oath of allegiance which was required of all foreigners. His request was promptly granted. It was the liberal policy of the Dutch government not to exclude foreigners from any privileges which the Hollanders themselves enjoyed. Underhill was now residing at Hempstead, Long Island. His restless spirit, ever eager for change, seized upon the present moment as a fitting opportunity to wrest from the Dutch their portion of Long Island, and pass it over to his countrymen. In violation of his oath he issued a treasonable proclamation, in which he said,

"You are called upon to abjure the iniquitous government of Peter Stuyvesant over the inhabitants residing on Long Island. His rule is too grievous for any brave Englishman and good Christian to tolerate any longer. All honest hearts that seek the glory of God and his peace and prosperity, are exhorted to throw off this tyrannical yoke. Accept and submit ye then to the Parliament of England; and beware of becoming traitors to one another for the sake of your own quiet and welfare."

This proclamation did not meet with a cordial response. Underbill fled to Rhode Island. Here he received from Boston a commission, "to take all Dutch ships and vessels as shall come into his power, and to defend himself from the Dutch and all enemies of the commonwealth of England."

The report of the agents who had visited Manhattan was such that the General Court at Boston voted that they were not "called upon to make a present war with the Dutch."

There were eight commissioners from the New England colonies in Boston. Notwithstanding this decision of the General Court, six of them were in favor of instant war. They sent back to Governor Stuyvesant an abusive and defiant reply, in which they said,

"Your confident denials of the barbarous plot with which you are charged will weigh little in the balance against the evidence, so that we must still require and seek due satisfaction and security."

The Connecticut colonists were ever looking with a wistful eye to the rich lands west of them. The Court at New Haven and that at Hartford sent messengers to Massachusetts to urge that "by war if no other means will serve, the Dutch, at and about the Manhattoes, who have been and still are like to prove injurious, may be removed." The General Court nobly replied, "We cannot act in so weighty a concernment, as to send forth men to shed blood, unless satisfied that God calls for it. And then it must be clear and not doubtful."

"In speaking of these events Mr. Brodhead says,

"At the annual meeting of the Commissioners, Massachusetts maintained her proud position with a firmness which almost perilled the stability of the confederation. A bitter altercation, between the representatives of the other colonies and the General Court, was terminated by an ambiguous concession which nevertheless averted hostilities.