situate along the North river in New Netherland, to the effect that the^ Freedoms which were granted to whomsoever should plant any Colonies in New Netherland being drawn up and made public in print in the year 1630, by the Assembly of the Nineteen of the Incorporated West India Company ; Kiliaen 516 Digitized by Microsoft® 'A Digitized by Microsoft® Digitized by Microsoft® An Old Dutch Town 519 -van Rensselaer did, in the same year 1630, purchase from the owners and proprietors, and them paid for a certain parcel of land, extending up the river South and North off from Fort Orange unto a little besouth of Moeneminnes Castle; and the land called Semesseeck lying on the East bank opposite Castle Island, up unto the aforesaid fort. Item, from Petanoch the millstream North unto Negagonse, in extent about three leagues, "with all the timber, appendices and dependencies thereof. And, accordingly, being entered into possession of said lands, he had there, at his great cost, established a considerable Colonic and from time to time so improved it that a village or hamlet was founded there, first called de Fuyck, afterwards Beverswyck and now Willemstadt, whereabouts the aforesaid Fort Orange was formerly built. That said Rensselaer and afterwards the Peti- tioners, had also exercised there High, Middle and Low Juris- diction, and accordingly appointed the necessary officers and Magistrates and enjoyed all the Freedoms, Rights and Privileges which were granted by said Company and you. High and Mighty, to him Rensselaer and other Patroons of Colonies; that after- wards, the aforementioned West India Company's Director had indeed disquieted the Petitioners in the possession of the afore- said hamlet or village, leaving in the meanwhile the Petitioners only in the possession of the remainder of their aforesaid Colonic. That in the year 1664, New Netherland and consequently the Colonic aforesaid fell and remained in the hands of his Majesty the King of Great Britain, when the name of Albany was given to the aforesaid Fort Orange which is situate in the Petitioners' aforesaid Colonic Rensselaerswyck, with said Colonic and other lands lying thereabout, until they were again recovered by their High Mightinesses' glorious arms. The first patroon of Rensselaerswyck has been the WiUiam the Conqueror of Dutch New York. All ancient famihes trace their descent from him, and poor indeed is the upstart who cannot claim him for an ancestor. Digitized by Microsoft® 520 The Hudson River In the days when that "great, armed, mercantile monopoly," as Mrs. Lamb called the West India Com- pany, was exploring and exploiting distant countries, was making alliances with something of the assump- tion of independent sovereignty, and commissioning its admirals for foreign conquest, a member of its govern- ing body, one of the all-powerful Nineteen, was Kiliaen Van Rensselaer. He was a pearl merchant, wealthy and well born, who sent over several of his own ships with agents to select territory for him. Three tracts of land were chosen, one in Delaware, one in New Jersey (at Pavonia), and the third in the immediate neighbourhood of Fort Orange. The last-named tract became in time the site of sev- eral thriving cities and villages, among which Albany, Troy, and Lansingburg are the most important. Under the act of 1629, styled a "Charter of Freedoms and exemptions," Van Rensselaer secured his title as pa- troon and proceeded to send colonists to settle his land. Previous to that time the settlers had been traders, but not colonists. The early history of Beverwyck, or A4bany, does riot furnish us with any of the thrilling stories of Indian cruelty and Dutch retaliation that we read in the chronicles of New Amsterdam. While the settlers near the mouth of the river suffered from the arrow and the tomahawk, their brethren a hundred and forty miles to the north were serenely planting, building, and rais- Digitized by Microsoft® An Old Dutch Town 521 ing families. The scriptural injunction to be fruitful and multiply was not neglected, and as every child was expected to set out a sapling to mark its birthday, in course of time the town became a vernal bower. There was something very modern in the way that Van Rensselaer built up his domain. While other colonies were either maintaining an apathetic silence or else complaining bitterly of the hardships of their lot and the difficulty of sustaining life without aid from the company or government that planted them, the long reports of the great advantages and rich fertility of Rensselaerswyck stirred the imagination of many a seventeenth-century Boer. Other ships might bring provisions and encouragement for those already on the ground, but those of our patroon brought colonists, with implements for the farm, the forest, and the mill. The documents that have been preserved would put to shame most modem