he took out his pocket handkerchief, and gave a very sonorous blast of the nose, according to the usual custom of great orators. This, in general, I believe, is intended as a signal trumpet, to call the attention of the auditors, but with William the Testy it boasted a more classic cause, for he had read of the singular expedient of that famous demagogue Caius Gracchus, who, when he harangued the Roman populace, modulated his tones by an oratorical flute or pitch-pipe.

...This preparatory symphony being performed, he commenced by expressing a humble sense of his own want of talents-his utter unworthiness of the honour conferred upon him, and his humiliating incapacity to discharge the important duties of his new station-in short, he expressed so contemptible an opinion of himself, that many simple country members present, ignorant that these were mere words of course, always used on such occasions, were very uneasy, and even felt wroth that he should accept an office, for which he was consciously so inadequate.

He then proceeded in a manner highly classic and profoundly erudite, though nothing at all to the purpose, being nothing more than a pompous account of all the governments of ancient Greece, and the wars of Rome and Carthage, together with the rise and fall of sundry outlandish empires, about which the assembly knew no more than their great grand children yet unborn. Thus having,

after the manner of your learned orators, convinced the audience that he was a man of many words and great erudition, he at length came to the less important part of his speech, the situation of the province and here he soon worked himself into a fearful rage against the Yankees, whom he compared to the Gauls who desolated Rome, and the Goths and Vandals who overran the fairest plains of Europe-nor did he forget to mention, in terms of adequate opprobrium, the insolence with which they had encroached upon the territories of NewNetherlands, and the unparalleled audacity with which they had commenced the town of New-Plymouth, and planted the onion patches of Weathersfield, under the very walls of fort Goed Hoop.

Having thus artfully wrought up his tale of terror to a climax, he assumed a self-satisfied look, and declared, with a nod of knowing import, that he had taken measures to put a final stop to these encroachments-that he had been obliged to have recourse to a dreadful engine of warfare, lately invented, awful in its effects, but authorized by direful necessity. In a word, he was resolved to conquer the Yankees by proclamation!

For this purpose he had prepared a tremendous instrument of the kind, ordering, commanding, and enjoining the intruders aforesaid, forthwith to remove, depart, and withdraw from the districts, regions, and territories aforesaid, under pain of suffering all the penalties, forfeitures, and punish

ments in such case made and provided. This proclamation, he assured them, would at once exterminate the enemy from the face of the country, and he pledged his valour as a governor, that within two months after it was published, not one stone should remain on another in any of the towns which they had built.

The council remained for some time silent after he had finished; whether struck dumb with admiration at the brilliancy of his project, or put to sleep by the length of his harangue, the history of the times doth not mention. Suffice it to say, they at length gave a universal grunt of acquiescence--the proclamation was immediately despatched with due ceremony, having the great seal of the province, which was about the size of a buckwheat pancake, attached to it by a broad red riband. Governor Kieft having thus vented his indignation, felt greatly relieved-adjourned the council--put on his cocked hat and corduroy small clothes, and mounting a tall raw boned charger, trotted out to his country seat, which was situated in a sweet, sequestered swamp, now called Dutch street, but more commonly known by the name of Dog's Misery.

Here, like the good Numa, he reposed from the toils of legislation, taking lessons in government, not from the nymph Egeria, but from the honoured wife of his bosom; who was one of that peculiar kind of females, sent upon earth a little after

the flood, as a punishment for the sins of mankind, and commonly known by the appellation of knowing women. In fact, my duty as an historian obliges me to make known a circumstance which was a great secret at the time, and consequently was not a subject of scandal at more than half the tea tables in New-Amsterdam, but which, like many other great secrets, has leaked out in the lapse of years--and this was, that the great Wilhelmus the Testy, though one of the most potent little men that ever breathed, yet submitted at home to a species of government, neither laid down in Aristotle, nor Plato; in short, it partook of the nature of a pure, unmixed tyranny, and is familiarly denominated petticoat government.An absolute sway, which, though exceedingly common in these modern days, was very rare among the ancients, if we may judge from the rout made about the domestic economy of honest Socrates; which is the only ancient case on record.

The great Kieft, however, warded off all the sneers and sarcasms of his particular friends, who are ever ready to joke with a man on sore points of the kind, by alleging that it was a government of his own election, to which he submitted through choice; adding at the same time a profound maxim which he had found in an ancient author, that " he who would aspire to govern, should first learn to obey."

CHAPTER II.

In which are recorded the sage projects of a ruler of universal genius. The art of fighting.by proclamation, and how that the valiant Jacobus Van Curlet came to be foully dishonoured at fort Goed Hoop.

NEVER was a more comprehensive, a more expeditious, or, what is still better, a more economical measure devised, than this of defeating the Yankees by proclamation-an expedient, likewise, so humane, so gentle and pacific, there were ten chances to one in favour of its succeeding,but then there was one chance to ten that it would not succeed as the ill-natured fates would have it, that single chance carried the day! The proclamation was perfect in all its parts, well constructed, well written, well sealed, and well published-all that was wanting to insure its effect, was that the Yankees should stand in awe of it; but, provoking to relate, they treated it with the most absolute contempt, applied it to an unseemly purpose, and thus did the first warlike proclamation come to a shameful end-a fate which I am credibly informed, has befallen but too many of its successors.