HIS TRIUMPHAL ENTRY.

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were

were carried before him-fifty cart-loads of oysters, five hundred bushels of Weathersfield onions, a hundred quintals of codfish, two hogsheads of molasses, and various other treasures, were exhibited as the spoils and tribute of the Yankees ; while three notorious counterfeiters of Manhattan notes * led captive, to grace the hero's triumph. The procession was enlivened by martial music from the trumpet of Anthony Van Corlear the champion, accompanied by a select band of boys and negroes performing on the national instruments of rattle-bones and clam-shells. The citizens devoured the spoils in sheer gladness of heart-every man did honour to the conquerer, by getting devoutly drunk on NewEngland rum-and the learned Wilhelmus Kieft, calling to mind, in a momentary fit of enthusiasm and generosity, that it was customary among the ancients to honour their victorious generals with public statues, passed a gracious decree, by which every tavern-keeper was permitted to paint the head of the intrepid Stoffel on his sign!

* This is one of those trivial anachronisms, that now and then occur in the course of this otherwise authentic history. How could Manhattan notes be counterfeited, when as yet Banks were unknown in this country?-and our simple progenitors had not even dreamt of those inexhaustible mines of paper opulence.-Print. Dev.

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CHAPTER IV.

Philosophical reflections on the folly of being happy in times of prosperity-Sundry troubles on the Southern Frontiers-How William the Testy had well nigh ruined the province through a cabalistic word-as also the secret expedition of Jan Jansen Alpendam, and his astonishing reward.

Ir we could but get a peep at the tally of dame Fortune, where, like a notable landlady, she regularly chalks up the debtor and creditor accounts of mankind, we should find that, upon the whole, good and evil are pretty near balanced in this world; and that though we may for a long while revel in the very lap of prosperity, the time will at length come when we must ruefully pay off the reckoning. Fortune, in fact, is a pestilent shrew, and withal a most inexorable creditor; for though she may indulge her favourites in long credits, and overwhelm them with her favours, yet sooner or later she brings up her arrears with the rigour of an experienced publican, and washes out her scores with their tears." Since," says good old Boetius, no man can retain her at his pleasure, and since her flight is so deeply lamented, what are her favours but sure prognostications of approaching trouble and calamity?"

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There is nothing that more moves my contempt at the stupidity and want of reflection of my fellow

THE ESSENCE OF WISDOM.

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men, than to behold them rejoicing, and indulging in security and self-confidence, in times of prosperity. To a wise man, who is blessed with the light of reason, those are the very moments of anxiety and apprehension; well knowing that according to the system of things, happiness is at best but transientand that the higher he is elevated by the capricious breath of fortune, the lower must be his proportionate depression. Whereas, he who is overwhelmed by calamity, has the less chance of encountering fresh disasters, as a man at the bottom of a ladder runs very little risk of breaking his neck by tumbling to the top.

This is the very essence of true wisdom, which consists in knowing when we ought to be miserable; and was discovered much about the same time with that invaluable secret, that "every thing is vanity and vexation of spirit;" in consequence of which maxim, your wise men have ever been the unhappiest of the human race; esteeming it as an infallible mark of genius to be distressed without reason-since any man may be miserable in time of misfortune, but it is the philosopher alone who can discover cause for grief in the very hour of prosperity.

According to the principle I have just advanced, we find that the colony of New-Netherlands, which under the reign of the renowned Van Twiller, had flourished in such alarming and fatal serenity, is now paying for its former welfare, and discharging the enormous debt of comfort which it contracted. Foes harass it from different quarters; the city of

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A SWEDISH COLONY.

New-Amsterdam, while yet in its infancy, is kept in constant alarm; and its valiant commander, William the Testy, answers the vulgar, but expressive idea, of "a man in a peck of troubles."

While busily engaged repelling his bitter enemies the Yankees on one side, we find him suddenly molested in another quarter, and by other assailants. A vagrant colony of Swedes, under the conduct of Peter Minnewits, and professing allegiance to that redoubtable virago, Christina, queen of Sweden, had settled themselves and erected a fort on South (or Delaware) River-within the boundaries claimed by the government of the New-Netherlands. History is mute as to the particulars of their first landing, and their real pretensions to the soil; and this is the more to be lamented, as this same colony of Swedes will hereafter be found most materially to affect not only the interests of the Nederlanders, but of the world at large !

In whatever manner, therefore, this vagabond colony of Swedes first took possession of the country, it is certain that in 1638 they established a fort, and Minnewits, according to the off-hand usage of his contemporaries, declared himself governor of all the adjacent country, under the name of the province of NEW-SWEDEN. No sooner did this reach the ears of the choleric Wilhelmus, than, like a true spirited chieftain, he immediately broke into a violent rage, and calling together his council, belaboured the Swedes most lustily in the longest speech that had ever been heard in the colony, since the memorable

POWER OF BIG WORDS.

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dispute of Ten Breeches and Tough Breeches. Having thus given vent to the first ebullitions of his indignation, he had resort to his favourite measure of proclamation, and despatched one, piping hot, in the first year of his reign, informing Peter Minnewits that the whole territory, bordering on the South river, had, time out of mind, been in possession of the Dutch colonists, having been "beset with forts, and sealed with their blood."

The latter sanguinary sentence would convey an idea of direful war and bloodshed, were we not relieved by the information that it merely related to a fray, in which some half-a-dozen Dutchmen had been killed by the Indians, in their benevolent attempts to establish a colony and promote civilization. By this it will be seen, that William Kieft, though a very small man, delighted in big expressions, and was much given to a praiseworthy figure of rhetoric, generally cultivated by your little great men, called hyperbole-a figure which has been found of infinite service among many of his class, and which has helped to swell the grandeur of many a mighty, selfimportant, but windy chief magistrate. Nor can I refrain in this place from observing how much my beloved country is indebted to this same figure of hyperbole, for supporting certain of her greatest characters-statesmen, orators, civilians, and divines; who, by dint of big words, inflated periods, and windy doctrines, are kept afloat on the surface of society, as ignorant swimmers are buoyed up by blown bladders.