tiement, under the penalty of five shillings for every tree; and forbid strangers cutting any timber, within the limits of the town, under the like penalty.

In 1660 the town of Oysterbay passed a similar resolution. In 1664 the town of Southampton voted that no timber should be made into pipe staves, to be carried out of the town, under the penalty of twenty shillings a tree.

In 1668 the town of Newtown voted that no one should carry any timber to the water side for transportation, under the penalty of ten shillings a load.

The trees in the woods were so thin and sparse, that they abounded with feed, and the settlers depended on them for pasture for such cattle as were not needed for domestic purposes.

In 1658 the town of Hempstead employed a herdsman to attend their cattle. There are various resolutions of this town for a series of years, to the same effect. They drove their cattle as far as Cow-Neck to pasture, and it is supposed to have taken its name from that circumstance.*

In 1665 the town of Huntington, by a vote of town meeting, ordered that all the young and dry cattle belonging to the town, should be driven to Horse-Neck, to pasture, after the second day of June ensuing.

In 1666 the town of Gravesend employed a herdsman to attend their cattle that run at large, during the summer season. By neglecting the Indian practice of annual burnings, in a few years young timber and underbrush increased so as to injure the feed in the woods.

In 1668 the town of Huntington, at town meeting, voted that every male over sixteen, should assemble when warned. by the men who were appointed for that purpose, to cut down brush or underwood, when it should be thought a fit time to destroy it, under the penalty of five shillings a day for neglect.

7th October, 1672. The Governor and court of assize, by an order, after stating that the feed for horses and cattle in the woods on Long-Island, had decayed by the increase of brush and underwood, directed the inhabitants from sixteen to sixty, to turn out four days in every year, under the direction of the

The openness of the country was very favorable to the increase of stock, and the great plain around the town of Hempstead is peculiarly so, and their cattle became quite numerous within a few years after the settlement of the town.

In 1658, the people of Hempstead had 84 cows, which brought them 82 calves that year.

In 1659, the town consisted of 62 families, and it appears from the accounts of their herdsmen for that year, that they had 629 head of cattle of all sorts.

town officers, to cut out the brush and underwood, under the penalty of five shillings for every day's neglect.

In 1674, the town of Jamaica, by a vote of town meeting, resolved that every male upwards of sixteen, should go out two days in the year, at the time appointed for that purpose, to cut down brush about the town, under the penalty of five shillings for every day's neglect.

By similar evidence, it appears that the pine plains were also at the time of the first settlement of the Island, in a great measure unincumbered with underbrush.

This state of the country was of immense advantage to the first settlers. Had they been obliged to encounter thick forests of large timber, and to wait the tardy returns of heavy clearings, the first emigrants would probably have perished by famine. The openness of the country-the quantity of land left unoccupied by the sparseness of the Indian population and the rapid growth and nutritive quality of the corn found among the Indians, contributed essentially to the preservation, growth, and prosperity of the first settlers on LongIsland.

Of the interfering claims of the English and the Dutch to

Long-Island.

The English and the Dutch both claimed Long-Island, onthe ground of prior discovery.

On the discovery of America, it seems to have been adoptted by the maritime nations of Europe, as a part of the conventional law of nations, that new discoveries should enure to the nation under whose authority they were made.*

North America from 30 to 58 degrees of north latitude, was discovered in 1497, by Sebastian Cabot in the service of the English, and various voyages were made to different parts of the coast by English navigators previous to the year 1606.

In 1606, King James by letters patent, granted all that part

The Pope gave Spain and Portugal all the countries inhabited by infidels which they should discover. The other nations of Europe claimed the enjoyment of the same privilege, and for a long time the naked discovery of a country without occupation or settlement, furnished the ground of an exclusive claim to an indefinite portion of the discovered country. The inconvenience and injustice of this doctrine by degrees Jessened its force, till it has, by common consent, fallen into oblivion. In 1790, when the Spaniards, in pursuance of the old doctrine, had seized the ships of Great Britain at Nootka Sound, the ministry proposed an immediate resort to force for redress Mr. Fox, in support of the proposed measure, observed, "That in the present enlightened age, the absolute claims of territory, by a grant from the Pope, is done away, as is the right of territory by discovery without absolute settlement. The taking possession by fixing up a cross, or any such mark of ceremony, is by the good sense of the present time not admitted, and that the only ground of right is absolute occupancy."

If this doctrine had prevailed in 1664, it might have altered the destiny of the Dutch province of New-Netherland.

of the continent which lay between 34 and 45 degrees of north latitude, to Sir Thomas Gates and others, with permission to divide themselves into two companies, the first to be called the London company, and the second the Plymouth company.

In 1607, The London company commenced a settlement in Virginia.

In 1609, the King granted a separate patent to the first company, extending from Point Comfort two hundred miles each way, and in length from sea to sea.

In 1620, The same King granted a separate patent to the second company by the name of " the council established at Plymouth in the co inty of Devon for the planting, ruling, and governing of New England in America," for all that part of the continent lying between 40 and 48 degrees of north latitude, and extending from sea to sea. In virtue of this charter which is usually called the New England patent, the council of Plymouth issued all the subordinate patents of the several colonies which were granted before it was surrendered to the crown, to wit, the Plymouth patent in 1623, that of Massachusetts in 1628, and that of Connecticut, 1631.*

The same company, by order of Charles the first, on- the 22d of April, in the 11th year of his reign, issued letters patent to William, Earl of Stirling, "Secretary of the Kingdom of Scotland," for the whole of Long-Island.

April 20, in the 12th year of Charles I, the Earl of Stirling executed a power of attorney to James Farret, to sell and dispose of lands on the Island, and the earliest purchases made by the English on the Island, were made or confirmed by authority derived from him. A certified copy of this power of attorney, taken from the record of Massachusetts, is among the papers in the office of the clerk of the town of Southampton.

* In June, 1635, the Plymouth company surrendered their charter to the Crown, and recommended that the whole country embraced by it should be divided into a number of provinces, each to be under the government of some Lord, and the whole to be under a Governor General, to be appointed by the crown But the plan was not adopted. Shortly after the dissolutiou of the company, the King appointed the Archbishop of Canterbury, and some of the great officers of the crown, a board of Commissioners to regulate the affairs of the colonies; it does not appear that the board ever proceeded to execute their trust, and the different parts of the country that had not been patented by the Plymouth company, were after that period granted by letters patent of the King or his Governors.

William Alexander was born in Scotland in 1580, was knighted by James the 6th, of Scotland, and 1st of England 1614, obtained letters patent for Nova Scotia in 1621 was made secretary of the Kingdom of Scotland in 1626, Peer of Scotland in 1630, and was created Earl of Stirling in 1633. He obtained a grant for Long-Island in 1635 and died in 1640. He was succeeded by his grand-son, who died a few months afte him, who was succeeded by his uncle Henry, who relinquished the grant of Long-Islan to the crown or to the Duke of York, before the patent to him in 1664, in which it wa inserted The grant of Long-Island to Lord Stirling, and the relinquishment of it the crown or to the Duke of York by his heirs, is recognized in the patent of Gov. Nicoll to Constant Sylvester and Nathaniel Sylvester, for Shelter-Island, 31st May,

1666.

In 1609, Henry Hudson, an Englishman in the service of the Dutch, visited and explored the harbor of New-York, and the river which has since been called by his name.*

In 1611, the merchants of Amsterdam sent out some ships with goods, and opened a trade with the natives.

In 1613 the Dutch were visited by the English from Virginia, and submitted to pay an acknowledgment to the crown of England.

In 1614, They received a reinforcement from Europe, erected a fort and refused to submit to the English. The English in America, did not think proper, or were not in a condition to renew their efforts to reduce or restrain the Dutch.

In 1615, they sailed up the North River and erected a fort on a small island, a short distance below Albany, and in a short time afterwards erected Fort Orange at Albany, on the spot as is supposed, where the mansion house of Simeon De Witt, the Surveyor General of the state of N. York now stands.

In 1621, the States General granted the Dutch West India Company an exclusive right to trade to America for twentyfour years, with various other privileges.

The Dutch seem at their first arrival, and for many years afterwards, to have had no other views in visiting the country than to engross the trade with the natives. It does not appear

that they had then adopted any plan for the settlement and improvement of the country. No serious attempt at colonization appears to have been made till the latter part of Van Twiller's administration, who arrived in 1629, and was succeeded by Kieft in 1638.

The first purchase of the Indians on Long-Island that has been discovered, was in 1635, and the earliest deed for land to individuals, is a patent from Governor Van Twiller to Andries Hedden and Wolphert Garritsen, for a tract of land in Amers-. fort or Flatlands, bearing date of 6th June 1636.

In 1643, Governor Kieft states that the Dutch settlements at that time, only extended 10 miles east and west, and seven miles north and south.

The first mention made of cattle, is a distribution made by Van Twiller in 1638.† Before this period the Dutch establish

*According to De Laet, Adrian Block, in 1614, sailed from New Amsterdam, now New-York, through the Sound to Cape Cod, and visited the intermediate coast and Islands. If so, he was the first who ascertained that Long-Island was separated from the main. In 1619, Thomas Dermer in sailing from New England to Virginia, passed through the Sound and confirmed the discovery of Adrian Block. In his journal he states "we found a most dangerous cataract amongst small rockey Islands, occasioned by two unequal tides, the one ebbing and flowing two hours before the others."

June 4th, 1638, Governor Van Twiller let George Rapelje have two Cows for four years, then to be returned with half their increase, with the exception of a heifer which he consented should be retained as a present to one of the daughters of Rapelje. This seems to have been a common mode of furnishing the settlers with stock.

ments seem to have been principally, if not purely commercial, and were probably under the superintendence of a factor or commercial agent.

It seems that the claims of the Dutch were not limited to any definite portion of the country, and that they extended their claim with their purchases and settlements.

In 1661, Governor Stuyvesant complains to the directors of the West India Company, that they were without a patent to support their claim. The Dutch in order to extend their claims to as much of the country as possible, at an early period made a purchase on the Delaware, and in 1633 on Connecticut river, and claimed the whole country between those two rivers.

The English a few months afterwards, also made a purchase on Connecticut river, and erected a house a few miles above Fort Hope, which had shortly before been erected by the Dutch. The English commenced a settlement at Saybrook in 1635, at Hartford in 1636, and at New-Haven in 1638, and continued to extend their settlements westward until they met the Dutch in Stamford in 1640.

Of the settlement of the Island.

Both powers endeavoured to strengthen their respective claims to the Island by extending their settlements there.

The two extremities of the Island were first settled; the west end under the Dutch and the east end under the English.

The several settlements under the two powers were nearly cotemporary, and were all commenced within the compass of forty years.

Both the Dutch and English territories on Long-Island, were settled by villages or towns, nor was there any combination of these into counties before the conquest of the English in 1664.

The extent of the towns in the English territory, and of the English towns in the Dutch territory, was regulated by the extent of their Indian purchases. The extent of the Dutch Towns was probably regulated by the extent of their grants from the Governor.

In the Dutch towns it seems that the lands were generally purchased by the Governor, and were by him granted to individuals. In the English towns in the Dutch territory, the lands were generally purchased of the natives by the settlers, with the consent of the Dutch Governor; and in the Towns under the English, the lands were purchased of the natives