Dutch and English on the Hudson Part 5

The feast ended, the young folk went their homeward way lighted by the moon, or, late in the century, on dark nights by a lantern hung on a pole from every seventh house. When the curfew rang from the belfry "eight o'clock," lights were put out and all was made fast for the night, while the children's minds were set at rest by the tramp of the _klopperman_, who shook his rattle at each door as he pa.s.sed from house to house through the dark hours, a.s.suring the burghers that all was well and that no marauders were about.

If winter offered sports and pastimes, spring, summer, and autumn had each its own pleasures, fis.h.i.+ng and clam digging, shooting and trapping, games with ball and slings, berry picking, and the gathering of peaches which fell so thickly that the very hogs refused them. The market days in New Amsterdam offered a long procession of delights to the young colonists. But merriest of all were the holidays which were observed in New Netherland after much the same fas.h.i.+on as in the old home.

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I do not know how to account for the fact that while the struggle of the Dutch people with the Papacy had been as bitter as that of England and the throwing off of the yoke by the Dutch fully as decided, they still retained the holidays which the Puritans eschewed as dangerous remnants of superst.i.tion. Perhaps it was on the principle of robbing Satan of his hoofs and horns but keeping his cheerful scarlet costume, or perhaps they thought, as Rowland Hill remarked, that "it was poor policy to leave all the good times to the Devil." In any case it was all grist to the children's mill.

On the 1st of January all was arranged for the greeting of the New Year. Mighty bowls of punch were brewed, cordials prepared from long-cherished family recipes were brought out, and the women, in their best apparel, seated themselves in the seldom-used _ontvangkamer_, where wine was handed to their callers to be received with the wish of a "Happy New Year!" While these stately ceremonies were in progress the young people amused themselves with turkey-shooting, sleigh-riding, skating, and dancing.

After New Year's Day the most characteristic national and local holiday was _Pinkster_, coming in the seventh week after _Paasch_, or Easter, and {115} falling generally in late May or early June. The orchards were then white with blossoms and the gra.s.s thick with dandelions and spring flowers. Children set out early to gather boughs from the green woods. These boughs they sprinkled with water and left over the doors of late sleepers that the sluggards might be drenched on opening the door. At first all was innocent merriment, gathering of Pinkster flowers, and picnicking; but for some unexplained reason this festival was gradually relegated to the negroes. Apple-jack was freely consumed, barbaric dances began, and fun so far degenerated into license that the white people and their children shunned the festivity.

The _Kermis_, an Old World festival, was one of those early introduced at New Amsterdam. It originated centuries before and had taken its name from the _kerk mis_ or church ma.s.s. In the olden days it was celebrated with pomp and solemnity, but it early developed a more festive character. Booths and stalls were erected for a market, and dances and processions were organized. The first stroke of the clock at noon opened at the same moment the market and the first dance. The last stroke saw white crosses nailed on all the bridges across the ca.n.a.l and on the market place. It was {116} indeed a festive appearance that the market presented, with its double stalls filled with eggs and gherkins, its booths hung with dried fish, its _poffertjeskraam_ dispensing the tempting batter-cakes, and its _wafelkraamen_ offering the more costly and aristocratic waffles. The youths and maidens were given full license to parade arm in arm along the streets singing "Hossen, hossen, hossen!" and making the town ring with their mirth and laughter. The first _Kermis_ held at New Amsterdam was in October, 1659. Booths were arranged on the parade ground, and barter and sale and merrymaking went on gaily for six weeks, to the unspeakable joy of the little Hendricks and Jans and Annetjes who wandered from booth to booth.

But keen as the delight of the Dutch children may have been, there was in their minds the hope of even better things to come a few weeks later, at their own especial, particular, undisputed feast of St.

Nicholas, the beloved Santa Claus, patron saint of children in general and of young Netherlanders in particular. The 6th of December was the day dedicated to this genial benefactor, and on the eventful night a white sheet was spread on the floor. Around this stood the children singing {117} songs of welcome, of which the most popular was the familiar

Saint Nicholaes, goed heilig man, Trekt uw'besten tabbard aan, En reist daamee naar Amsterdam, Von Amsterdam naar Spanje.

If the Saint would ride forth thus accoutered and if he would do what they asked of him, the children explained that they would be his good friends, as for that matter they always had been, and would serve him as long as they lived. At last the fateful moment arrived. A shower of sweets was hurled through the open door and amid the general scramble appeared the Saint in full vestments attended by a servant known as _Knecht Ruprecht_, and, after the Dutch settlements in America, a black man, who added much to the fascination and excitement of the occasion. He held in one hand an open sack into which to put particularly ill-behaved children, while in the other hand he carried a bunch of rods, which he shook vigorously from time to time. The good Saint meanwhile smilingly distributed to the children the parcels that he had brought, and, after these had all been opened and the presents had been sufficiently {118} admired, the children dropped into their trundle-beds to dream of all the glories of the day.

When the dust-sheet and litter of wrappings had been removed, the older people gathered around a table spread with a white cloth and set out with chocolate punch and a dish of steaming hot chestnuts, while the inevitable pipe, ornamented with a head of St. Nicholas, made its appearance and the evening ended with dancing and song in honor of the "goed heilig man."

Besides these stated anniversaries, home life had its more intimate festivities such as those celebrating the birth of a child, whose christening was made quite a solemn event. Every church owned its _doop-becken_ or dipping bowl from which the water was taken to be dropped on the baby's head. One beautiful bowl of silver dating from the year 1695 is still in existence in a New York church. About a week after the birth of the little New Netherlander, the neighbors were summoned to rejoice with the proud father and mother. In the early days of the colony and in the farming region, these gatherings were as rude and simple as they were under similar conditions in Holland. The men were invited at noon to partake of a long pipe and a bottle of gin and bitters. The women arrived {119} later to find spread for their entertainment dishes of rusks spread with aniseed and known as muisjes or mice, accompanied by eggnog. As society grew more sophisticated in the colony, these simple gatherings gave place to the elaborate caudle parties, where the caudle was served in silver bowls hung about with spoons that each guest might ladle out for himself into a china cup the rich compound of lemons, raisins, and spiced wine. It is evident that there was no lack of material good cheer among the colonists of New Netherland, and we may be sure that the boys and girls secured their share of substantials and dainties. I fear they were rather rough and rude, these young burghers, for all the reports which we have of them show them always in conflict with law and order. The boys especially, owing to deficient schooling facilities, were quite out of hand. They set dogs upon the night watchman at New Amsterdam and shouted "Indians!" to frighten him in his rounds. They tore the clothes from each other's backs in the schoolroom where the unfortunate master was striving to keep order. In Fort Orange sliding became so fast and furious that the legislators were obliged to threaten the confiscation of the _slees_, and it was no doubt with a keen realization of the {120} behavior of their offspring that the inhabitants of Flatbush inserted these words in the articles of agreement with the new schoolmaster: "He shall demean himself patient and friendly towards the children and be active and attentive to their improvement."

However little learning from books entered into the lives of the young colonists, much that was stimulating to the imagination came to them by word of mouth from the _wilden_, from the negroes, and from their elders as they sat about the blazing fire in the twilight, or _schemerlicht_. Then the tales were told of phantom s.h.i.+ps, of ghosts walking on the cliffs of the Highlands, and of the unlucky wight who found his death in the river where he had sworn to plunge in spite of the Devil, a spot which still bears the name of Spuyten Duyvil in memory of the rash boast.

We may find it hard to reconcile the reputation of the Dutch as a phlegmatic and unimaginative people with the fact that they and their children endowed the Hudson with more glamour, more of the supernatural and of elfin lore than haunts any other waterway in America. Does the explanation perhaps lie in the fact that the Dutch colonists, coming from a small country situated on a level {121} plain where the landscape was open as far as the eye could see, and left no room for mystery, were suddenly transplanted to a region shut in between overhanging cliffs where lightning flashed and thunder rolled from mountain wall to mountain wall, where thick forests obscured the view, and strange aboriginal savages hid in the underbrush? Was it not the sense of wonder springing from this change in their accustomed surroundings that peopled the dim depths of the _hinterland_ with shapes of elf and goblin, of demons and super-human presences?

At any rate the spirit of mystery lurked on the outskirts of the Dutch settlements, and the youthful burghers along the Hudson were fed full on tales, mostly of a terrifying nature, drawn from the folklore of three races, the Dutch, the Indians, and the Africans, with some few strands interwoven from local legend and tradition that had already grown up along the banks of the Hudson.

It was a simple but by no means a pitiable life that was led in those days by burghers and farmers alike on the sh.o.r.es of this great river.

Never does the esteemed Diedrich Knickerbocker come nearer the truth than when he says: "Happy would it have been for New Amsterdam could it always {122} have existed in this state of blissful ignorance and lowly simplicity; but alas! the days of childhood are too sweet to last.

Cities, like men, grow out of them in time and are doomed alike to grow into the bustle, the cares and the miseries of the world."

[1] In 1657 the burgomasters and _schepens_ were authorized to create a great _burger-recht_ the members of which should be in a sense a privileged cla.s.s. It was set forth that "whereas in all beginnings some thing or person must be the first so that afterward a distinction may take place, in like manner it must be in establis.h.i.+ng the great and small citizens.h.i.+p." For which reason the line of great burghers was drawn as follows: first, those who had been members of the supreme government; second, the burgomasters and _schepens_ of the city past and present; third, ministers of the gospel; fourth, officers of the militia from the staff to the ensign included. The privileges of this caste were open to the male descendants of each cla.s.s; but as they could be secured by others outside the sacred circle on payment of fifty guilders it is difficult to understand wherein the exclusiveness lay. The small burghers were decreed to be those who had lived in the city for a year and six weeks and had kept fire and light, those born within the town, and those who had married the daughters of citizens.

A payment of twenty guilders was exacted of all such. This effort to promote cla.s.s distinctions was soon abandoned. In 1668 the distinction was abolished and every burgher, on payment of fifty guilders, was declared ent.i.tled to all burgher privileges.

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CHAPTER VII

THE NEIGHBORS OF NEW NETHERLAND

Machiavelli observed that to the wise ruler only two courses were open--to conciliate or to crush. The history of the Dutch in America ill.u.s.trates by application the truth of this view. The settlers at Fort Orange conciliated the Indians and by this means not only lived in peace with the native tribes but established a bulwark between themselves and the French. Under Stuyvesant the settlers at Fort Amsterdam took a determined stand against the Swedes and crushed their power in America. Toward the English, however, the Dutch adopted a course of feeble aggression unbacked by force. Because they met English encroachments with that most fatal of all policies, protest without action, the Empire of the United Netherlands in America was blotted from the map.

The neighbors of the Dutch in America were the Indians, the French, the Swedes, and the English. {124} The earliest, most intimate, and most continuous relations of the Dutch settlers were with the Indians.

These people were divided into a number of independent tribes or nations. The valley of the North River was shared by the Mohawks, who inhabited the region along the west side of its upper waters, and the Mohegans, or Mahicans, as the Dutch called them, who lived on either side of the banks of its lower reaches, with various smaller tribes scattered between. The warlike Manhattans occupied the island called by their name, while the Mohegans raised their wigwams also on the eastern sh.o.r.e of the upper river opposite the Mohawks, and ranged over the land reaching to the Connecticut River.

The Mohawks, with the Oneidas, the Onondagas, the Cayugas, and the Senecas, formed the famous Five Nations, generally known as the Iroquois. Their territory was bounded on the north by Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence River, on the east by Lake Champlain and the North River, on the west by Lake Erie and the Niagara River, and on the south by the region occupied by the Lenni Lenape, or Delaware tribes. But their power extended far beyond these limits over dependent tribes.

They were in a constant state of warfare {125} with their Algonquin neighbors on the north and east, who had been enabled to offer a formidable resistance by the use of firearms furnished them by the French.

When, therefore, the white men appeared among the Mohawks, bearing these strange weapons which had been used with such dire effect against the Iroquois by the Algonquins, the Mohawks eagerly sought the friends.h.i.+p of the newcomers, hoping to secure the same power which had made their enemies triumphant. The Dutch were intelligent enough to make instant use of these friendly sentiments on the part of the natives and hastened to make a treaty with the Iroquois, the Mohegans, and the Lenni Lenapes.

This treaty, which is said to have been signed on the banks of Norman's Kill in the neighborhood of Albany, was concluded with all formalities.

Each tribe was represented by its chief. The calumet was smoked, the hatchet was buried, and everlasting friends.h.i.+p was sworn between the old inhabitants and the new. By this agreement the Dutch secured not only peace with the neighboring Indians--a peace never broken in the north, whatever broils disturbed the lower waters of the river--but at the same time a guard between {126} them and any encroachments of the French and Algonquins in Canada.

On the other boundaries and outskirts of their possessions, the Dutch were less fortunate. They had always claimed all the territory from the South or Delaware River to the Fresh or Connecticut River, but their pretensions were early challenged by the English on the ground of prior discovery and by the Swedes on the argument of non-occupation of the land.

The reports of the wealth to be acquired from the fur trade had quickly spread from Holland to Sweden, and as early as 1624, Gustavus Adolphus, encouraged by William Usselinx, a Dutchman and promoter of the Dutch West India Company, was planning expeditions to the New World. But the entrance of Sweden into the Thirty Years' War in 1630 put a stop to this plan, and the funds were applied to war purposes. Gustavus Adolphus fell at Lutzen in 1632, leaving the kingdom to his little daughter Christina. Her Government was conducted by Oxenstiern, a statesman trained in the great traditions of Gustavus, who felt with him that an American colony would be "the jewel of his kingdom." An instrument for his purpose presented itself in Peter Minuit, who had returned {127} to Holland in 1632, smarting under his dismissal as Director of New Netherland. He offered his services to Sweden for the establishment of a new colony, and they were accepted. In the opening of 1638, he arrived in what is now Delaware Bay with two s.h.i.+ps, the _Griffin_ and the _Key of Kalmar_. From the Indians he bought large tracts of land in what is now the State of Delaware, and on the site of the present city of Wilmington he planted a fort named Christina.

When news was brought to Kieft that Minuit had sailed up the South River and planned to raise the Swedish flag on a fort upon its sh.o.r.es, the Director promptly dispatched the following letter:

I, Willem Kieft, Director-General of New Netherland, residing in the island of Manhattan, in the Fort Amsterdam, under the government of the High and Mighty States-General of the United Netherlands and the West India Company, privileged by the Senate Chamber in Amsterdam, make known to thee, Peter Minuit, who stylest thyself commander in the service of Her Majesty, the Queen of Sweden, that the whole South River of New Netherland, both upper and lower, has been our property for many years, occupied with our forts, and sealed by our blood, which also was done when thou wast in the service of New Netherland, and is therefore well known to thee. But as thou art come between our forts to erect a fort to our damage and injury, which we {128} will never permit, as we also believe Her Swedish Majesty hath not empowered thee to erect fortifications on our coasts and rivers, or to settle people on the lands adjoining or to undertake any other thing to our prejudice; now therefore we protest against all such encroachments and all the evil consequences from the same, as bloodshed, sedition and whatever injury our trading company may suffer, and declare that we shall protect our rights in every manner that may be advisable.

This bl.u.s.tering protest Minuit treated with contempt and continued building his fort. The Swedish colony soon grew so rapidly as to be a serious menace to the Dutch in spite of their stronger fortifications.

In 1642 Johan Printz, a lieutenant-colonel of cavalry, was sent over as Governor of New Sweden with instructions to maintain friendly relations with the Dutch, but to yield no foot of ground. He established several other settlements on the South or Delaware River. So tactlessly, however, did he perform his duties, that conflicts with the Dutch grew more and more frequent. He built two forts on opposite sides of the river and ordered that every s.h.i.+p entering the waters should strike her colors and await permission to pa.s.s. The first vessel on which the new orders were tried carried {129} as a pa.s.senger David de Vries. The skipper asked his advice about lowering his colors. "If it were my s.h.i.+p," De Vries a.s.serts that he answered, "I would not lower to these intruders." But peace at any price prevailed, the skipper lowered his colors, and the s.h.i.+p pa.s.sed on to New Gottenburg, the capital of the colony. Here De Vries was welcomed by Governor Printz, whom the traveler describes as "a brave man of brave size." The evening was spent in talk over a jug of Rhenish wine. Such friendly intercourse and the aggressions of the English against both Dutch and Swedes led to the temporary alliance of these latter in 1651. Indians called in council confirmed the Dutch t.i.tle to all lands except the site of the Swedish fort planted by Minuit, and a peace which lasted for three years was declared between the Dutch and the Swedes.

In endeavoring to understand the relations between the settlements of the different nations in America in the seventeenth century we must realize that the colonies were only p.a.w.ns in the great game being played in Europe between Spain and the Papacy on the one hand and the Protestant countries, England, Sweden, and the United Netherlands on the other. Once apprehending {130} this, we can easily understand why the governor of each colony, though instructed to seize and hold every foot of land which could be occupied, was advised not to antagonize the other friendly nations and thus weaken the alliance against the common enemy. As the power of Spain declined, however, and the estimate of the value of the American colonies increased, the friction in the New World became more acute and the instructions from the home governments grew imperative.

Affairs then came to an open rupture between New Netherland and New Sweden. In 1651 Governor Stuyvesant inaugurated a more aggressive policy against the Swedes by building Fort Casimir near what is now New Castle, Delaware, not far from the Swedish fort. Three years later Fort Casimir fell into the hands of the Swedes. The Dutch Government now commanded Stuyvesant to drive the Swedes from the river or compel their submission. As a result the Director and his fleet sailed into the Delaware in September, 1655, and captured one fort after another, till Rysing, the last of the Swedish governors, was completely defeated. Though the colonists were promised security in possession of their lands, the power of {131} New Sweden was ended, and the jurisdiction of the Dutch was for a time established.

New Netherland had, however, other neighbors more powerful, more persistent, and with more at stake than the French, the Indians, and the Swedes. These were the English colonists, pressing northward from the Virginias and southward from New England. From the beginning of the Dutch colonization, England had looked askance at the wedge thus driven between her own settlements. She had stubbornly refused to recognize the sovereignty of the States-General in the region of New Netherland while at the same time she vainly sought a pretext for the establishment of her own. England put forward the apocryphal claim of discovery by Cabot; but here she was stopped by the doctrine announced in a previous century that in order to give t.i.tle to a new country, discovery must be followed by occupation. When England maintained that, since Hudson was an Englishman, the t.i.tle to his discovery must pa.s.s to his native land, she was reminded that Cabot was a Genoese, and that Genoa might as well claim t.i.tle to Virginia as England to New Netherland.

The Plymouth Company particularly was concerned at the Dutch occupation of this middle {132} region to which the charter granted by King James gave it a claim. It formally protested in 1621 against these "Dutch intruders." Whereupon King James I directed Sir Dudley Carleton, his amba.s.sador at The Hague, to protest against the Dutch settlements; but nothing was accomplished, both parties having their hands too full with European quarrels to carry these transatlantic matters to extremities.

The tension, however, was constantly increased on both sides by a series of encroachments and provocations.

In April, 1633, for example, the s.h.i.+p _William_ arrived at Fort Amsterdam under command of Captain Trevor, with Jacob Eelkens as supercargo. Eelkens had been dismissed by the West India Company from the post of Commissary at Fort Orange, and was now in the service of some London merchants, in whose behalf he had come, as he told the Director, to buy furs on Henry Hudson's River.

"Don't talk to me of Henry Hudson's River!" replied Van Twiller, "it is the River Mauritius." He then called for the commission of Eelkens, who refused to show it, saying that he was within the dominions of the English King, and a servant of His Majesty, and asking the Dutch Council what {133} commission they themselves had to plant in the English dominion. Whereupon Van Twiller replied that it was not fitting that Eelkens should proceed up the river, as the whole of that country belonged to the Prince of Orange and not to the King of England.

After this exchange of amenities, Eelkens returned to his s.h.i.+p, which remained at anchor for several days. At the end of the time, he presented himself again at the fort to ask if the Director would consent in a friendly way to his going up the river; otherwise, he would proceed if it cost his life. In reply, Van Twiller ordered the Dutch flag to be run up at the fort and three pieces of ordnance fired in honor of the Prince of Orange. Eelkens on his part ordered the English flag to be hoisted on the _William_ and a salute fired in honor of King Charles. Van Twiller warned Eelkens that the course which he was pursuing might cost him his neck; but the supercargo weighed anchor and proceeded calmly on his way.

Van Twiller then a.s.sembled all his forces before his door, brought out a cask of wine, filled a b.u.mper, and cried out that those who loved the Prince of Orange and him should follow his example and protect him from the outrages of the Englishman; {134} Eelkens, by this time, was out of sight sailing up the river. The people drank, but only laughed at their governor, and De Vries told him that he had been very foolish.

"If it were my affair," he said, "I would have helped him away from the fort with beans from the eight-pounders."

The _William_, meanwhile, journeyed up the river and Eelkens, who knew the country well, landed with his crew about a mile below Fort Orange and set up a tent where he displayed the wares which he hoped to exchange with the natives for beaver-skins. Very soon reports of this exploit reached the ears of the commissary at Fort Orange, who at once embarked with a trumpeter on a shallop decorated with green boughs.

The Dutch landed close beside the English and set up a rival tent; but the Indians preferred to deal with Eelkens, whom they had known years before and who spoke their language.

In the high tide of success, however, Eelkens was rudely ordered to depart by a Dutch officer who had come up the river in charge of three vessels, a pinnace, a caravel, and a hoy. To enforce the commands came soldiery from both Dutch forts, armed with muskets, half-pikes, swords, and other weapons, and ordered Eelkens {135} to strike his flag. They pulled down the tent, sent the goods on board s.h.i.+p, and sounded their trumpets in the boat "in disgrace of the English." The Dutch boarded the _William_, weighed her anchor, and convoyed her down the river with their fleet, and finally dismissed her at the mouth of the river.