tion; and without any previous study or experience, became instantly capable of directing all the movements of government. Nor must I neglect to mention a number of superannuated, wrong headed old burghers, who had come over when boys, in the crew of the Goede Vrouw, and were held up as infallible oracles by the enlightened mob. To suppose a man who had helped to discover a country, did not know how it ought to be governed was preposterous in the extreme. It would have been deemed as much a heresy, as at the present day to question the political talents, and universal infallibility of our old "heroes of '76"-and to doubt that he who had fought for a government, however stupid he might naturally be, was not competent to fill any station under it.

But as Peter Stuyvesant had a singular inclination to govern his province without the assistance of his subjects, he felt highly incensed on his return to find the factious appearance they had assumed during his absence. His first measure therefore was to restore perfect order, by prostrating the dignity of the sovereign people in the dirt.

He accordingly watched his opportunity, and one evening when the enlightened mob was gathered together in full caucus, listening to a patriotic speech from an inspired cobbler, the intrepid Peter, like his great namesake of all the Russias, all at once appeared among them with a countenance,

sufficient to petrify a mill stone. The whole meeting was thrown in consternation--the orator seemed to have received a paralytic stroke in the very middle of a sublime sentence, he stood aghast with open mouth and trembling knees, while the words horror! tyranny! liberty! rights! taxes! death! destruction! and a deluge of other patriotic phrases, came roaring from his throat, before he had power to close his lips. The shrewd Peter took no notice of the skulking throng around him, but advancing to the brawling bully-ruffian, and drawing out a huge silver watch, which might have served in times of yore as a town clock, and which is still retained by his decendants as a family curiosity, requested the orator to mend it, and set it going. The orator humbly confessed it was utterly out of his power, as he was unacquainted with the nature of its construction. "Nay, but," said Peter "try your ingenuity man, you see all the springs and wheels, and how easily the clumsiest hand may stop it and pull it to pieces; and why should it not be equally easy to regulate as to stop it." The orator declared that his trade was wholly different, he was a poor cobbler, and had never meddled with a watch in his life. There were men skilled in the art, whose business it was to attend to those matters, but for his part, he should only mar the workmanship, and put the whole in confusion" Why harkee master of mine," cried Peter, turning sud

denly upon him, with a countenance that almost petrified the patcher of shoes into a perfect lapstone" dost thou pretend to meddle with the movements of government--to regulate and correct and patch and cobble a complicated machine, the principles of which are above thy comprehension, and its simplest operations too subtle for thy understanding; when thou canst not correct a trifling error in a common piece of mechanism, the whole mystery of which is open to thy inspection ?-Hence with thee to the leather and stone, which are emblems of thy head; cobble thy shoes and confine thyself to the vocation for which heaven has fitted thee-But," elevating his voice until it made the welkin ring, "if ever I catch thee, or any of thy tribe, whether square-head, or platter breech, meddling with affairs of government; by St. Nicholas but I'll have every mother's bastard of ye flea'd alive, and your hides stretched for drum heads, that ye may henceforth make a noise to some purpose!"

This threat and the tremendous voice in which it was uttered, caused the whole multitude to quake with fear. The hair of the orator rose on his head like his own swine's bristles, and not a knight of the thimble present, but his mighty heart died within him, and he felt as though he could have verily escaped through the eye of a needle.

But though this measure produced the desired effect, in reducing the community to order, yet it tended to injure the popularity of the great Peter, among the enlightened vulgar. Many accused him of entertaining highly aristocratic sentiments, and of leaning too much in favour of the patricians. Indeed there was some appearance of ground for such a suspicion, for in his time did first arise that pride of family and ostentation of wealth, that has since grown to such a height in this city.

Those

who drove their own waggons, kept their own cows, and possessed the fee simple of a cabbage garden, looked down, with the most gracious, though mortifying condescension, on their less wealthy neighbours; while those whose parents had been cabin passengers in the Goede Vrouw, were continually railing out, about the dignity of ancestry-Luxury began to make its appearance under divers forms, and even Peter Stuyvesant himself (though in truth his station required a little state and dignity) appeared with great pomp of equipage on public occasions, and always rode to church in a yellow waggon with flaming red wheels!

In a work published many years after the time of which Mr. Knickerbocker treats (in 1701. By C. W. A. M.) it is mentioned "Frederick Philips was counted the richest Mynheer in New York, and was said to have whole hogsheads of Indian money or wampum; and had a son and daughter, who according to the Dutch custom should divide it equally." EDITOR.

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From this picture my readers will perceive, how very faithfully many of the peculiarities of our ancestors have been retained by their descendants. The pride of purse still prevails among our wealthy citizens. And many a laborious tradesman, after plodding in dust and obscurity in the morning of his life, sits down out of breath in his latter days to enact the gentleman, and enjoy the dignity honestly earned by the sweat of his brow. In this he resembles a notable, but ambitious housewife, who after drudging and stewing all day in the kitchen to prepare an entertainment; flounces into the parlour of an evening, and swelters in all the magnificence of a maudlin fine lady.

It is astonishing, moreover, to behold how many great families have sprung up of late years, who pride themselves excessively on the score of ancestry. Thus he who can look up to his father without humiliation assumes not a little importance-he who can safely talk of his grandfather, is still more vain-glorious, but he who can look back to his great grandfather, without stumbling over a cobler's stall, or running his head against a whipping post, is absolutely intolerable in his pretensions to family -bless us! what a piece of work is here, between these mushrooms of an hour, and these mushrooms of a day!

For my part I look upon our old dutch families as the only local nobility, and the real lords of the