USA > New York > New York City > A history of New-York : from the beginning of the world to the end of the Dutch dynasty > Part 9
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True it is, that the good understanding between our ancestors and their savage neighbours, was liable to occasional interruptions ; and I have heard my grandmother, who was a very wise old woman, and well versed in the history of these parts, tell a long
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story, of a winter's evening, about a battle between the New-Amsterdammers and the Indians, which was known by the name of the Peach War, and which took place near a peach orchard, in a dark glen, which for a long while went by the name of the Murderer's Valley.
The legend of this sylvan war was long curren among the nurses, old wives, and other ancient chroniclers of the place ; but time and improvement have almost obliterated both the tradition and the scene of battle ; for what was once the blood-stained valley is now in the centre of this populous city, and known by the name of Dey-street.
The accumulating wealth and consequence of New-Amsterdam and its dependencies at length awakened the tender solicitude of the mother coun- try ; who, finding it a thriving and opulent colony, and that it promised to yield great profit, and no trouble, all at once became wonderfully anxious about its safety, and began to load it with tokens of regard, in the same manner that your knowing people are. sure to overwhelm rich relations with their affection and loving kindness.
The usual marks of protection shown by mother countries to wealthy colonies were forthwith mani- fested-the first care always being to send rulers to the new settlement, with orders to squeeze as much revenue from it as it will yield. Accordingly, in the year of our Lord, 1629, Mynher WOUTER VAN TWILLER was appointed governor of the province of Nieuw-Nederlandts, under the commission and con-
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trol of their High Mightinesses, the Lords States General of the United Netherlands, and the privileged West India Company.
This renowned old gentleman arrived at New- Amsterdam in the merry month of June, the sweetest month in all the year; when Dan Apollo seems to dance up the transparent firmament-when the robin, the thrush, and a thousand other wanton songsters, make the woods to resound with amorous ditties, and the luxurious little boblincon revels among the clover blossoms of the meadows-all which happy coinci- dence persuaded the old dames of New-Amsterdam, who were skilled in the art of foretelling events, that this was to be a happy and prosperous administration.
But as it would be derogatory to the consequence of the first Dutch governor of the great province of Nieuw-Nederlandts, to be thus scurvily introduced at the end of the chapter, I will put an end to this second book of my history, that I may usher him in with more dignity in the beginning of my next.
BOOK III.
IN WHICH IS RECORDED THE GOLDEN REIGN OF WOUTER VAN TWILLER.
CHAPTER I.
Of the renowned Walter Van Twiller-his unparallel- id virtues-and likewise his unutterable wisdom in the law case of Wandle Schoonhoven and Barent Bleecher-and the great admiration of the public thereat.
GRIEVOUS and very much to be commiserated is the task of the feeling historian, who writes the his- tory of his native land. If it fall to his lot to be the sad recorder of calamity or crime, the mournful page is watered with his tears-nor can he recall the most prosperous and blissful era, without a melancholy sigh at the reflection, that it has passed away for ever! I know not whether it be owing to an im- moderate love for the simplicity of former times, or to that certain tenderness of heart incident to all sen- timental historians ; but I candidly confess that I can- not look back on the happier days of our city, which I now describe, without a sad dejection of the spirits. With a faltering hand do I withdraw the curtain of oblivion, that veils the modest merit of our venerable ancestors, and as their figures rise to my mental vis- ion, humble myself before the mighty shades.
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Such are my feelings when I revisit the family mansion of the Knickerbockers, and spend a lonely hour in the chamber where hang the portraits of my forefathers, shrouded in dust, like the forms they re- present. With pious reverence do I gaze on the countenances of those renowned burghers, who have preceded me in the steady march of existence --- whose sober and temperate blood now meanders through my veins, flowing slower and slower in its feeble conduits, until its current shall soon be stop- ped for ever !
These, say I to myself, are but frail memorials of the mighty men who flourished in the days of the pa triarchs ; but who, alas, have long since mouldered in that tomb, towards which my steps are insensibly and irresistibly hastening ! As I pace the darkened chamber, and lose myself in melancholy musings, the. shadowy images around me almost seem to steal once more into existence-their countenances to as- sume the animation of life-their eyes to pursue me in every movement ! Carried away by the delusions of fancy, I almost imagine myself surrounded by the shades of the departed, and holding sweet converse with the worthies of antiquity ! Ah, hapless Died rich ! born in a degenerate age, abandoned to the buffetings of fortune-a stranger and a weary pilgrim in thy native land-blest with no weeping wife, nor family of helpless children ; but doomed to wander neglected through those crowded streets, and elbow- ed by foreign upstarts from those fair abodes where once thine ancestors held sovereign empire !
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Let me not, however, lose the historian in the man, nor suffer the dating recollections of age to over- come me, while dwelling with fond garrulity on the virtuous days of the patriarchs-on those sweet days of simplicity and ease, which never more will dawn on the lovely island of Manna-hata !
The renowned Wouter (or Walter) Van Twiller, was descended from a long line of Dutch burgo- masters, who had successively dozed away their lives, and grown fat upon the bench of magistracy in Rot- terdam ; and who had comported themselves with such singular wisdom and propriety, that they were never either heard or talked of-which, next to being universally applauded, should be the object of ambi- tion of all sage magistrates and rulers.
His surname of Twiller, is said to be a corruption of the original Twijfler, which in English means doubter ; a name admirably descriptive of his delibe- rative habits. For, though he was a man shut up within himself like an oyster, and of such a pro- foundly reflective turn, that he scarcely ever spoke except in monosyllables, yet did he never make up his mind on any doubtful point. This was clearly accounted for by his adherents, who affirmed that he always conceived every object on so comprehensive a scale, that he had not room in his head to turn it over and examine both sides of it, so that he always remained in doubt, merely in consequence of the as- tonishing magnitude of his ideas !
There are two opposite ways by which some men get into notice-one by talking a vast deal and think®
-
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ing a little, and the other by holding their tongues and not thinking at all. By the first, many a vapour- ing superficial pretender acquires the reputation of a man of quick parts-by the other, many a vacant dunderpate, like the owl, the stupidest of birds, comes to be complimented by a discerning world with all the attributes of wisdom. This, by the way, is a mere casual remark, which I would not for the universe have it thought I apply to Governor Van Twiller. On the contrary, he was a very wise Dutchman, for he never said a foolish thing-and of such invincible gravity, that he was never known to laugh, or even to smile, through the course of a long and prosperous life. Certain, however, it is, there never was a matter proposed, however simple, and on which your common narrow-minded mortals would rashly determine at the first glance, but what the renowned Wouter put on a mighty mysterious, vacant kind of look, shook his capacious head, and having smoked for five minutes with redoubled earn- estness, sagely observed, that "he had his doubts about the matter"-which in process of time gained him the character of a inan slow in belief, and not easily imposed on.
The person of this illustrious old gentleman was as regularly formed, and nobly proportioned, as though it had been moulded by the hands of some cunning Dutch statuary, as a model of majesty and lordly grandeur. He was exactly five feet six inches in height, and six feet five inches in circumference. His head was a perfect sphere, and of such stupen-
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dous dimensions, that dame Nature, with all her sex's ingenuity, would have been puzzled to construct a neck capable of supporting it ; wherefore she wisely declined the attempt, and settled it firmly on the top of his back-bone, just between the shoulders. His body was of an oblong form, particularly capacious at bottom ; which was wisely ordered by Providence, seeing that he was a man of sedentary habits, and very averse to the idle labour of walking. His legs, though exceeding short, were sturdy in proportion to the weight they had to sustain ; so that when erect he had not a little the appearance of a robustious beer-barrel, standing on skids. His face, that infal- lible index of the mind, presented a vast expanse, perfectly unfurrowed or deformed by any of those lines and angles which disfigure the human counte- nance with what is termed expression. Two small gray eyes twinkled feebly in the midst, like two stars of lesser magnitude in the hazy firmament ; and his full-fed cheeks, which seemed to have taken toll of every thing that went into his mouth, were curiously mottled and streaked with dusky red, like a Spitzen- berg apple.
His habits were as regular as his person. He daily took his four stated meals, appropriating exactly an hour to each ; he smoked and doubted eight hours, and he slept the remaining twelve of the four-and- twenty. Such was the renowned Wouter Van 'Twiller-a true philosopher, for his mind was either elevated above, or tranquilly settled below, the cares and perplexities of this world. He had lived in it for
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years, without feeling the least curiosity to know whether the sun revolved round it, or it round the sun ; and he had watched, for at least half a century, the smoke curling from his pipe to the ceiling, without once troubling his head with any of those numerous theories, by which a philosopher would have per- plexed his brain, in accounting for its rising above the surrounding atmosphere.
In his council he presided with great state and so- lemnity. He sat in a huge chair of solid oak, hewn in the celebrated forest of the Hague, fabricated by an experienced timmerman of Amsterdam, and cu- riously carved about the arms and feet, into exact imitations of gigantic cagle's claws. Instead of a sceptre, he swayed a long Turkish pipe, wrought with jasmin and amber, which had been presented to a Stadtholder of Holland, at the conclusion of a treaty with one of the petty Barbary powers. In this stately chair would he sit, and this magnificent pipe would he smoke, shaking his right knee with a constant motion, and fixing his eye for hours together upon a little print of Amsterdam, which hung in a black frame against the opposite wall of the council chamber. Nay, it has even been said, that when any deliberation of extraordinary length and intricacy was on the carpet, the renowned Wouter would ab- solutely shut his eyes for full two hours at a time, that he might not be disturbed by external objects-and at such times the internal commotion of his mind was evinced by certain regular guttural sounds, which
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, this admirers declared were merely the noise of con- fict, made by his contending doubts and opinions.
It is with infinite difficulty I have been enabled to collect these biographical anecdotes of the great man under consideration. The facts respecting him were so scattered and vague, and divers of them so ques- tionable in point of authenticity, that I have had to give up the search after many, and decline the. ad- mission of still more, which would have tended to heighten the colouring of his portrait.
I have been the more anxious to delineate fully the person and habits of the renowned Van Twiller, from the consideration that he was not only the first, but also the best governor that ever presided over this ancient and respectable province ; and so tranquil and benevolent was his reign, that I do not find throughout the whole of it, a single instance of any offender being brought to punishment-a most indu- bitable sign of a merciful governor, and a case un- paralleled, excepting in the reign of the illustrious King Log, from whom, it is hinted, the renowned Van Twiller was a lineal descendant.
The very outset of the career of this excellent magistrate was distinguished by an example of legal acumen, that gave flattering presage of a wise and equitable administration. The morning after he had been solemnly installed in office, and at the moment that he was making his breakfast, from a prodigious earthen dish, filled with milk and Indian pudding, he was suddenly interrupted by the appearance of one Wandle Schoonhoven, a very important old burgher
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of New-Amsterdam, who complained bitterly of one Barent Bleecker, inasmuch as he fraudulently refused to come to a settlement of accounts, seeing that there was a heavy balance in favour of the said Wandle. Governor Van Twiller, as I have already observed, was a man of few words ; he was likewise a mortal enemy to multiplying writings-or being disturbed at his breakfast. Having listened attentively to the statement of Wandle Schoonhoven, giving an occa- sional grunt, as he shovelled a spoonful of Indian pudding into his mouth-either as a sign that he rel- ished the dish, or comprehended the story-he called unto him his constable, and pulling out of his breeches · pocket a huge jack-knife, despatched it after the de- fendant as a summons, accompanied by his tobacco- box as a warrant.
This summary process was as effectual in those simple days as was the seal-ring of the great Haroun Alraschid among the true believers. The two par- ties being confronted before him, each produced a . book of accounts, written in a language and character that would have puzzled any but a High Dutch com- mentator, or a learned decipherer of Egyptian obe- lisks, to understand. The sage Wouter took them one after the other, and having poised them in his hands, and attentively counted over the number of leaves, fell straightway into a very great doubt, and smoked for half an hour without saying a word; at length, laying his finger beside his nose, and shutting his eyes for a moment, with the air of a man who has just caught a subtle idea by the tail, he slowly took
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his pipe from his mouth, puffed forth a column of tobacco-smoke, and with marvellous gravity and so- lemnity pronounced-that having carefully counted over the leaves and weighed the books, it was found, that one was just as thick and as heavy as the other -- therefore it was the final opinion of the court that the accounts were equally balanced-therefore Wan- dle should give Barent a receipt, and Barent should give Wandle a receipt-and the constable should pay the costs.
This decision being straightway made known, dif- fused general joy throughout New-Amsterdam, for the people immediately perceived, that they had a very wise and equitable magistrate to rule over them. But its happiest effect was, that not another law-suit took place throughout the whole of his administration -and the office of constable fell into such decay, that there was not one of those losel scouts known in the province for many years. I am the more par- ticular in dwelling on this transaction, not only be- cause I deem it one of the most sage and righteous judgments on record, and well worthy the attention of modern magistrates, but because it was a miracu- lous event in the history of the renowned Wouter ---- being the only time he was ever known to come to a decision in the whole course of his life.
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CHAPTER II.
Containing some account of the grand council of New- Amsterdam, as also divers especial good philo- sophical reasons why an alderman should be fat- with other particulars touching the state of the province.
IN treating of the early governors of the province, I must caution my readers against confounding them, in point of dignity and power, with those worthy gentlemen, who are whimsically denominated gov- ernors in this enlightened republic-a set of unhappy victims of popularity, who are in fact the most de- pendent, henpecked beings in the community : doom- ed to bear the secret goadings and corrections of their own party, and the sneers and revilings of the whole world beside ;- set up, like geese at Christmas holy- days, to be pelted and shot at by every whipster and vagabond in the land. On the contrary, the Dutch governors enjoyed that uncontrolled authority, vested in all commanders of distant colonies or territories. They were in a manner absolute despots in their little domains, lording it, if so disposed, over both law and gospel, and accountable to none but the mother country; which it is well known is astonish- ingly deaf to all complaints against its governors, pro- vided they discharge the main duty of their station- squeezing out a good revenue. 'This hint will be of importance, to prevent my readers from being seized
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with doubt and incredulity, whenever, in the course of this authentic history, they encounter the uncom- mon circumstance of a governor acting with inde- pendence, and in opposition to the opinions of the multitude.
To assist the doubtful Wouter in the arduous busi- ness of legislation, a board of magistrates was ap- pointed, which presided immediately over the police. This potent body consisted of a schout or bailiff, with powers between those of the present mayor and sheriff-five burgermeesters, who were equivalent to aldermen, and five schepens, who officiated as scrubs, subdevils, or bottle-holders to the burgermeesters, in the same manner as do assistant aldermen to their principals at. the present day; it being their duty to fill the pipes of the lordly burgermeesters-hunt the markets for delicacies for corporation dinners, and to discharge such other little offices of kindness as were occasionally required. It was, moreover, tacitly un- derstood, though not specifically enjoined, that they should consider themselves as butts for the blunt wits of the burgermeesters, and should laugh most heartily at all their jokes ; but this last was a duty as rarely called in action in those days as it is at present, and was shortly remitted, in consequence of the tragical death of a fat little schepen-who actually died of suffocation, in an unsuccessful effort to force a laugh at one of the burgermeester Van Zandt's. best jokes.
In return for these humble services, they were per mitted to say yes and no at the council board, and to have that enviable privilege, the run of the public
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kitchen-being graciously permitted to eat, and drink, and smoke, at all those snug junkctings and public gormandizings, for which the ancient magis- trates were equally famous with their modern succes- sors. The post of schepen, therefore, like that of assistant alderman, was eagerly coveted by all your burghers of a certain description, who have a huge relish for good feeding, and an humble ambition to be great men in a small way-who thirst after a little brief authority, that shall render them the terror of the alms-house and the bridewell-that shall enable them to lord it over obsequious poverty, vagrant vice, outcast prostitution, and hunger-driven dishonesty- that shall give to their beck a hound-like pack of catch-poles and bum-bailiffs-tenfold greater rogues than the culprits they hunt down !- My readers will excuse this sudden warmth, which I confess is unbe- coming of a grave historian-but I have a mortal antipathy to catch-poles, bum-bailiffs, and little great men.
The ancient magistrates of this city corresponded with those of the present time no less in form, mag- nitude, and intellect, than in prerogative and privi- lege. The burgomasters, like our aldermen, were generally chosen by weight-and not only the weight of the body, but likewise the weight of the head. It is a maxim practically observed in all honest, plain- thinking regular cities, that an alderman should be fat-and the wisdom of this can be proved to a cer- tainty. That the body is in some measure an image of the mind, or rather that the mind is moulded to
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the body, like melted lead to the clay in which it is cast, has been insisted on by many philosophers, who have made human nature their peculiar study-for ' as a learned gentleman of our own city observes, "there is a constant relation between the moral character of all intelligent creatures, and their physi- cal constitution-between their habits and the struc- ture of their bodies." Thus we see, that a lean. spare, diminutive body, is generally accompanied by a petulant, restless, meddling mind-either the mind wears down the body, by its continual motion ; or else the body, not affording the mind sufficient house- room, keeps it continually in a state of fretfulness, tossing and worrying about from the uneasiness, of its situation. Whereas your round, sleek, fat, un- wieldly periphery is ever attended by a mind like itself, tranquil, torpid, and at ease; and we may al- ways observe, that your well-fed robustious burghers are in general very tenacious of their ease and com- fort ; being great enemies to noise, discord, and dis- turbance-and surely none are more likely to study the public tranquillity than those who are so careful of their own. Who ever hears of fat men heading a riot, or herding together in turbulent mobs ?-- no- no-it is your lean, hungry men, who are continually worrying society, and setting the whole community by the ears.
The divine Plato, whose doctrines are not suffi- ciently attended to by philosophers of the present age, allows to every man three souls-one immortal and rational, seated in the brain, that it may over- VOL. I. 0
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look and regulate the body-a second consisting of the surly and irascible passions, which, like bellige- rent powers, lie encamped around the heart-a third mortal and sensual, destitute of reason, gross and brutal in its propensities, and enchained in the belly, that it may not disturb the divine soul, by its raven- ous howlings. Now, according to this excellent theory, what can be more clear, than that your fat alderman is most likely to have the most regular and well-conditioned mind. His head is like a huge, spherical chamber, containing a prodigious mass of soft brains, whereon the rational soul lies softly and snugly couched, as on a feather bed ; and the eyes, which are the windows of the bed-chamber, are usually half closed, that its slumberings may not be disturbed by external objects. A mind thus comfort- ably lodged, and protected from disturbance, is mani- festly most likely to perform its functions with regu- larity and ease. By dint of good feeding, moreover, the mortal and malignant soul, which is confined in the belly, and which, by its raging and roaring, puts the irritable soul in the neighbourhood of the heart in an intolerable passion, and thus renders men crusty and quarrelsome when hungry, is completely pacified silenced, and put to rest-whereupon a host of honest good fellow qualities and kind-hearted affections, which had lain perdue, slyly peeping out of the loop- holes of the heart, finding this Cerberus asleep, do . pluck up their spirits, turn out one and all in their holyday suits, and gambol up and down the dia- phragm-disposing their possessor to laughter, good
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humour, and a thousand friendly offices towards his fellow-mortals.
As a board of magistrates, formed on this model, think but very little, they are the less likely to differ and wrangle about favourite opinions-and as they generally transact business upon a hearty dinner, they are naturally disposed to be lenient and indulgent in the administration of their duties. Charlemagne was conscious of this, and therefore (a pitiful meas- ure, for which I can never forgive him) ordered in his cartularies, that no judge should hold a court of jus- tice, except in the morning, on an empty stomach --- a rule, which, I warrant, bore hard upon all the poor culprits in his kingdom. The more enlightened and humane generation of the present day have taken an opposite course, and have so managed, that the al- dermen are the best-fed men in the community; feasting lustily on the fat things of the land, and gorging so heartily oysters and turtles, that in pro- cess of time they acquire the activity of the one, and the form, the waddle, and the green fat of the other. The consequence is, as I have just said, these luxu- rious feastings do produce such a dulcet equanimity and repose of the soul, rational and irrational, that their transactions are proverbial for unvarying mo- notony-and the profound laws which they enact in their dozing moments, amid the labours of digestion, are quietly suffered to remain as dead letters, and never enforced, when awake. In a word, your fair round-bellied burgomaster, lilze a full-fed mastiff, dozes quietly at the house-door, always at home, and
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