| CHAPTER V. |
1609—1640.
SETTLEMENT OF NEW NETHERLAND.
Henry, Hudson—Enters the service of the Dutch—Discovers and explores the River now called by his name—His conduct to the natives—His fate—Dutch East India Company—Block's explorations—New Netherland—The Walloons—Purchase of Manhattan Island—Trade the principal object—Plan of Colonization—The patroons and their purchases—Swaanendael—Difficulties of this plan—Minuit recalled—Van Twiller governor—Disputes with the English—Attempts of the Swedes at colonization on the Delaware—Their success.
About two years after the settlement of Jamestown, and nearly at the same point of time that Champlain was making explorations in northern New York, a famous navigator, named Henry Hudson, entered the service of the Dutch East India Company. He was by birth an Englishman, and an intimate friend of the illustrious Captain John Smith. He had already made two voyages in the employ of London merchants, in search of a north-west passage to India, but not meeting sufficient encouragement at home, he went to Holland, and, early in April, 1609, was placed in command of a small vessel of eighty tons' burden, called the Half-Moon, for a third voyage. Impeded by the ice in the northern seas, he ran along the coast of Acadie, entered Penobscot Bay, made the land of Cape Cod, entered the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays, and on the 2d of September discovered and entered Sandy Hook Bay. On the 11th, he passed through the Narrows, and on the 12th began his voyage up that noble river which now justly perpetuates his fame, pronouncing the country along the river's banks "as beautiful a land as one can tread upon." Hudson ascended the river with his ship as far as where the present city of Albany stands, and thence sent a boat which probably explored somewhat beyond Waterford. Mr. Hildreth stigmatizes Hudson's conduct towards the natives on several occasions, as marked by "reckless cruelty," which is hardly borne out, we think, by the facts on record.[1] Descending the river, Hudson, on the 4th of October, set sail for home,[2] and in little more than a month
- ↑ See Cleveland's "Life of Henry Hudson," ch. iv.
- ↑ Mr. Bancroft's language, after narrating Hudson's departure for Europe, will interest those who would like to know something about "New York as it was:"—"Sombre forests shed a melancholy grandeur over the useless magnificence of nature, and hid in their deep shades the rich soil which the sun had never warmed. No axe had levelled the giant progeny of the crowded groves, in which the fantastic forms of withered limbs, that had been blasted and riven by lightning, contrasted strangely with the verdant freshness of a younger growth of branches. The wanton grape vine, seeming by its own power to have sprung from the earth and to have fastened its leafy coils on the top of the tallest forest tree, swung in the air with every breeze like the loosened shrouds of a ship . . . . . Reptiles sported in stagnant pools, or crawled unharmed over piles of mouldering trees. The spotted deer crouched among the thickets; but not to hide,
