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Documents Relative to the Colonial History of New York, Vol. I — Passage 155 (part 2)

E.B. O'Callaghan (ed.) (1856) 260 words View original →

[E.B. O'Callaghan (ed.) (1856)] * Here arise divers considerations; for the poor folk that must be sent over for nothing, may, if they come, be conveyed on and for your High Mightinesses' account and the freight be paid here; afterwards when circumstances permit, the money can be repaid from the finances in New Netherland, and the land debited with it. * Consisting of these articles as per invoice : Coarse shoes, Friesland stockings, canvas, coarse linen, kersey, cheap cloth of three and four guilders the ell, farming implements, such as scythes, sickles, hoes, axes, winnowing fans, spades, ploughshares, and coulters, together with collars, traces, lines, halters, etc. These things are absolutely requisite, for an advance of fifty per cent must be charged and credit cautiously given for the supplies, receiving payment as occasion enables the people to bring something in. For it is only in order to assist the people on their first starting, and should any bad debts accrue by death or otherwise, the fifty per cent advance can always richly meet the capital with the interest. ' Until they are over two, three and four years in a way of paying, as, with the help of God, no man will fail of success in New Netherland, who will take his hand out of his mouth and do his best. ' Were those in New Netherland, who sit down in poverty in this country and almost perish of want, yea have need of bread to eat, and suffer from distress and cold, — and were they industrious, they could honestly earn their living.