THE DUTCH OCCUPY THE BANKS OF THE DELAWARE. 277 XV. Yet the period of the due organization' of the com- CHAP. pany was the epoch of zealous efforts at colonization. The name of the southern county and cape of New 1623. Jersey still attests the presence of Cornelius Mey, who not only visited Manhattan, but entering the bay, and ascending the River of Delaware, known as the South River of the Dutch, took possession of the territory. On Timber Creek, a stream that enters the Delaware a few miles below Camden, he built Fort Nassau.3 The country from the southern shore of Delaware Bay, to New Holland' or Cape Cod, became known as New 1623. Netherlands. This is the era of the permanent settlement of New York.5 Round the new block-house on Manhattan, the cottages of New Amsterdam began to cluster; the country assumed the form of a colony, and Peter Minuits, the commercial agent of the West India 1624. Company, held for six years the office of governor." In 1625, there was certainly one family on Long Island, and a child of European parentage was born." Reprisals on Spanish commerce were the great object of the West India Company; the North American colony was, for some years, little more than an 1 Wagenaar, x. 431. De Laet, L. iii. c. xi. Wsselinx in Arg. Gust. 41. 43. Compare Moulton's New York, p. 363. 2 Porey, in Purchas, vol. v. calls the Delaware by the Dutch name, the South River. 3 The early authority is abundant. Albany Records, xviii. 467. "The South River occupied by the Dutch more than 36 years." This was written Sept. 20, 1659. Still further, De Vries' voyages. So too Beschrijving, &c. in S. Hazard's Register of Pennsylvania, i. 4. Compare also Rudman, in Clay's Annals of the Swedes, 15, 16; Lambrechtsten's Korte Beschrijving, &c. 278 XV. EMBASSY FROM MANHATTAN TO PLYMOUTH. CHAP. inconsiderable establishment for trade, where Indians, even from the St. Lawrence, exchanged beaver-skins for European manufactures. The Spanish prizes, taken by the chartered privateers, on a single occasion in 1628, were almost eighty fold more valuable than the whole amount of exports from New Netherlands for the four preceding years. 1627. In 1627, there was a first interchange of courtesies with the Pilgrims. De Razier, the second in comOct. 4. mand among the Dutch, went as envoy to Plymouth. On the south of Cape Cod, he was met by a boat from the Old Colony, and "honorably attended with the noise of trumpets." A treaty of friendship and commerce was proposed. The Pilgrims, who had English hearts, questioned the title of the Dutch to the banks of the Hudson, and recommended a treaty with England; the Dutch, with greater kindness, advised their old friends to remove to the rich meadows on the Connecticut. Harmony prevailed. "Our children after us," said the Pilgrims, "shall never forget the good and courteous entreaty, which we found in your country; and shall desire your prosperity forever." Such was the benediction of Plymouth on New Amsterdam; at the same time, the Pilgrims, rivals for the beavertrade, begged the Dutch not to send their skiffs into the Narragansett.' to These were the rude beginnings of New York. Its 1620 first age was the age of hunters and Indian traders; 1638. of traffic in the skins of otters and beavers; when the native tribes were employed in the pursuit of game, and the yachts of the Dutch, in quest of furs, penetrated every bay, and bosom, and inlet, from Narragansett to 1 Bradford, in Mass. Hist. Coll. i. 51-57. Morton's Memorial. Compare Baylies' Plymouth, and CHARTER OF FEUDAL AND COMMERCIAL LIBERTIES. 279 XV. the Delaware. It was the day of straw roofs, and CHAP. wooden chimneys, and windmills. in feudal institutions followed. The experiment While the company of merchant warriors, conducting 1629. their maritime enterprises like princes, were conquering the rich fleets of Portugal and Spain, and, by their successes, pouring the wealth of America into the lap of the Netherlands, the States General' interposed to subject the government of foreign conquests to a council of nine; and the College of Nineteen adopted a charter of privileges for patrons who desired to plant colonies in New Netherlands. The document is curious, for it was analogous to the political institutions of the Dutch of that day. The colonies in America were to resemble the lordships in the Netherlands. To every one who would emigrate on his own account, as much land as he could cultivate was promised; but emigration was not expected to follow from the enterprise of the cultivators of the soil. The boors in Holland enjoyed as yet no political franchises, and were equally destitute of the mobility which is created by the consciousness of political importance. To subordinate proprietaries New Netherlands was to owe its tenants. He that within four years would plant a colony of fifty souls, became Lord of the Manor, or Patron, possessing in absolute property the lands he might colonize. Those lands might extend sixteen miles in length; or, if they lay upon both sides of a river, eight miles on each bank, stretching as far into the interior as the situation. might require; yet it was stipulated that the soil must 1 Lambrechtsten, Korte Besch. 2 See the charter in Moulton, 389–398. It is to be regretted that Moulton has not continued his 280 XV. 1629. CHARTER OF FEUDAL AND COMMERCIAL LIBERTIES. CHAP. be purchased of the Indians. Were cities to grow up, the institution of their government would rest with the patron, who was to exercise judicial power, yet subject to appeals. The schoolmaster and the minister were praised as desirable; but no provision was made for their maintenance. The selfish spirit of monopoly forbade the colonists to make any woollen, or linen, or cotton fabric; not a web might be woven, not a shuttle thrown, on penalty of exile. To impair the monopoly of the Dutch manufacturers was punishable as a perjury! The company, moreover, pledged itself to furnish the manors with negroes; yet not, it was warily provided, unless the traffic should prove lucrative. The Isle of Manhattan, as the chosen seat of commerce, was reserved to the company. This charter of liberties was fatal to the interests of the corporation; its directors and agents immediately appropriated to themselves the most valuable portions of the territory. Three years before the 1629. concession of a charter for Maryland, Godyn purchased of the natives the soil from Cape Henlopen to the mouth of Delaware River; this purchase of a territory 1630. more than thirty miles long, was now ratified by a deed, July and duly recorded. This is the first deed for land in Del June 1. 15. aware, and comprises the soil of the two lower counties of that state. The opposite shore in New Jersey was May. also bought by Godyn and Bloemart, while Pauw beJuly. came the proprietor of Pavonia, the country round Aug. Hoboken, and Staten Island. At the same time, five Indian chiefs, in return for parcels of goods, conveyed the land round Fort Orange, that is, from Albany to the mouth of the Mohawk, to the agent of Van Ren 1 Charter, &c. Article xxix. in Moulton, p. 398. FIRST COLONY ON THE DELAWARE. 281 selaer; and a few years afterwards, the purchase was CHAP. extended twelve miles farther to the south.1 XV. The company had designed, by its charter of liber- 1636. ties, to favor colonization, and yet retain the trade of the province; under pretence of forming settlements, individuals had acquired a title to all the important points, where the natives came to traffic. Colonial jars were the consequence, and the feudal possessors were often in collision with the central government.2 12. The tract of land acquired by Godyn and his associates was immediately colonized. The first settlement 1630. in Delaware, older than any in Pennsylvania or New Jersey, was undertaken by Godyn, Van Renselaer, Blomaert, and the historian De Laet. De Vries, the historian of the voyage, was its conductor, and held an equal share in the enterprise, which was intended to cover the southern shore of Delaware Bay with fields of wheat and tobacco. Embarking from the Texel, Dec. in vessels laden with store of seeds, and cattle, and agricultural implements, he soon reached the bay, and 1631. on the soil of Delaware, near Lewistown, planted a colony of more than thirty souls. The voyage of De Vries was the cradling of a state. That Delaware exists as a separate commonwealth is due to the colony of De Vries. According to English rule, occupancy was necessary to complete a title to the wilderness. 1632. The Dutch now occupied Delaware; and Harvey, the Mar. governor of Virginia, in a grant of commercial privileges to Clayborne, recognized "the adjoining plantations of the Dutch." De Vries ascended the Delaware as far 1 See Dutch Book of Patents, ff. at Albany. Compare Moulton, 401, 402, 403; N. York Hist. Coll. iii. 323, 324. 2 Albany Records, iv. 26, 32, 46, 36 VOL. II. 47, &c. &c. So too compare viii. 3 Chalmers, 207, 209. Com- |