were events to be anticipated with dread and remembered with horror. Hidden under a modern post-office designation we freqviently find half a dozen earlier place-names, as the geologist discovers in a river-bed successive deposits. "I am surprised to find," said a gentleman of an en- quiring mind, " that Esopus had at one time a larger trade than Albany; yet I do not find Esopus on my map or on the time-table. Where was it?" Esopus has disappeared from the map, as have Wiltwyck, Atkarkarton, and Rondout, but all these old names, that are folded down and put away, like old garments in camphor and lavender, are covered by the corporate body of Kingston. Two hundred and fifty years of eventful history be- long to this very Dutch borough, where Ten Broeks and Van Gaasbeeks, Schoonmakers and Swartwouts, sat under the spiritual rainistrations of Domine Blom, or joined with that excellent and valiant divine in driving away the Indian invaders that occasionally swooped down on the almost defenceless settlement. But truth compels the admission that the first notable proprietor of land at Kingston (or Atkarkarton) was not a Dutch- man. This is on the authority of the Rev. I. Mega- polensis, the third stated minister of the Collegiate Dutch Church of New York, who, in 1657, wrote: Thomas Chambers and a few others removed to Atkarkarton or Esopus, an exceedingly beautiful land, in 1652, and began the actual settlement of Ulster County; it was also known among the savages as " the pleasant land." Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® Rondout and Kingston 447 This Thomas Chambers, for services rendered the country during Indian troubles, was rewarded in the time of Governor Lovelace by having his house (near Kingston) erected into the Manor of Foxhall. This grant was confirmed by Dongan in 1686. The name of Foxhall subsequently disappeared. The Dutch church of Kingston had a settled pastor as early as 1660, in which year Domine Hermanus Blom commenced his labours. His salary was payable in wheat, and his accounts for the same are still pre- served in the county records. The name Wiltwyck signified the Indian (or wild) district, yet even then the little church, worshipping in a rude building of logs, had a membership of sixteen souls. Two other edifices succeeded each other on the ground where the first one stood, and from the tower of the last the Hol- land bell, imported in 1794 from Amsterdam, used formerly to' ring three times a day to notify the good people of their meal hours. In those far-ofE days sober and respectable people did things in an orderly and customary way. It required unheard-of temerity to break away from the honoured traditions of a neighbourhood, and breakfast, dine, or sup at unheard- of hours. The church sanctioned the established order and lent its bell for the promotion of sobriety and regular habits. A writer in 1826 notes a modern in- novation when he says that "at present the town clock regulates the kitchen." A custom observed among the fathers of the church Digitized by Microsoft® 448 The Hudson River deserves to be kept in remembrance, like a quaint Dutch picture. Between the sounding of the first and last bell for church service the grey-haired sexton hobbled from door to door, carrying an iVory-headed cane, with which he rapped loudly three times and cried, "Church time!" For this he was paid by each householder a yearly fee of two shillings. Notices of all kinds, whether of funerals, weddings, or christenings, were given to the sexton, who took them to the clerk ; and the latter, having a bamboo rod with a split end kept for that very purpose, stuck the paper in the slit and passed it up to the domine, who was perched overhead in a half-globe pulpit, canopied by a sounding board. " The minister wore (out of the pulpit) a black silk mantle, cocked hat, and a neck- band with linen cambrick beffy on his breast; for cravats were then uncanomcal." The first psalm, we are informed, " used to be set with moveable figures, suspended on three sides of the pulpit, so that all, as they entered, might prepare for the lofty notes. " At the end of the service the deacons took the contribution bags, which were fixed on the ends of poles, and made their rounds to collect the coppers of the congregation. It is a significant fact that besides the bag there was an alarm bell on the end of each pole, as though to notify the soundest sleepers that the sermon had come to an end. Tokens, stamped by the church and redeemable at stated times, were received instead of money, which was a scarce Digitized by Microsoft® Rondout