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NOTE I, p. 1. New York.

NOTES.

What is now called New York was once the home of the famous Iroquois Indians.

In 1609, the great English navigator, Hendrick Hudson, in the service of the Dutch East India Company, came sailing up the Mohican River (now bearing Hudson's name), in quest of a northwest passage to China. He explored in his ship called the Half-Moon as far as the present site of Albany. ("Knickerbocker's History of New York," Book II., Chap. 1.)

Many Dutch trading-posts were soon set up along the river by the Dutch West India Company. These Dutch called their province New Netherland, and its chief city New Amsterdam, in memory of the province and its capital city far across the Atlantic. The most northern trading-post was called New Orange, in honor of the famous Prince of Orange of the old Netherlands.

In 1664 the English forced the Dutch, then under the brave "silverlegged" Peter Stuyvesant (cf. p. III), to surrender their settlements, declaring them to be theirs by right of discovery, through the Pilgrims in 1620, and even through the Cabots as far back as in 1497.

The English took possession in the name of the Duke of York and Albany, afterward James II. In honor of this duke, New Netherland and New Amsterdam were renamed New York, and New Orange became Albany.

Once only did the Dutch regain their power (1672-1674). Then the English again got control and held it until the close of the American Revolution.

NOTE 2, p. 1. Lord Cornbury. Of all the tyrannical English governors in the earlier times of the province of New York, not one, perhaps, was a bigger tyrant than Lord Cornbury. (1702-1708.)

LORD CORNBURY.

The whole

NOTE 3, p. 2. little old city of the Manhattoes.

city then lay below the present Wall Street. The map facing page 1 may be helpful in emphasizing this "littleness."

As an early specimen of Irving's taking humor, the following account of the founding of the city may be quoted from his "Knickerbocker's History of New York (Book II., Chaps. 6-8).

“The name most current at the present day, and which is likewise countenanced by the great historian, Vander Donck, is MANHATTAN, which is said to have originated in a custom among the squaws, in the early settlement, of wearing men's hats, as is still done among many tribes. 'Hence,' as we are told by an old governor who was somewhat of a wag, and flourished almost a century since, and paid a visit to the wits of Philadelphia, 'hence arose the appellation of Man-hat-on, first given to the Indians, and afterward to the island' ·a stupid joke!· but well enough for a governor.

...

"The name Manhattoes is also said to be derived from the great Indian spirit Manetho, who was supposed to make this island his favorite abode on account of its uncommon delights. For the Indian traditions affirm that the bay was once a translucid lake, filled with silver and golden fish, in the midst of which lay this beautiful island, covered with every variety of fruits and flowers; but that the sudden irruption of the Hudson laid waste these blissful scenes, and Manetho took his flight beyond the great waters of the Ontario.

...

"Yet is there another name which I particularly delight in, as at once poetical, melodious, and significant,—and which we have on the authority of Master Juet, who in his account of the great Hudson, calls this MANNA-HATA— that is to say, the island of Manna — or, in other words, a land flowing with milk and honey."

"To the pleasant island of Manna-hata, it was solemnly resolved that the seat of Empire should be removed from the green shores of Pavonia. This memorable migration took place on the first of May, and was long cited in tradition as the grand moving. The anniversary of it was piously observed among the 'sons of the pilgrims of Communipaw' by turning their houses topsy-turvy and carrying all the furniture through the streets, in emblem of the swarming of the parent hive; and this is the real origin of the universal agitation and 'moving' by which this most restless of cities is literally turned out of doors on every May day."

"As the little squadron from Communipaw drew near to the shores of Manna-hata, a sachem, at the head of the band of warriors, appeared to oppose their landing. Some of the most zealous of the pilgrims were for chastising this insolence with powder and ball, according to the approved mode of discoverers; but the sage Oloffe Van Kortlandt gave them the significant sign of St. Nicholas, laying his finger beside his nose and winking hard with one eye; whereupon his followers perceived

that something sagacious was in the wind. He now addressed the Indians in the blandest terms; and made such a tempting display of beads, hawks' bells, and red blankets, that he was soon permitted to land, and a great land speculation ensued. And here let me give the true story of the original purchase of the site of this renowned city, about which so much has been said and written. Some affirm that the first cost was but sixty guilders. The learned Dominie Heckwelder records a tradition that the Dutch discoverers bargained for only so much land as the hide of a bullock would cover; but that they cut the hide in strips no thicker than a child's finger, so as to take in a large portion of land, and to take in the Indians into the bargain. This, however, is an old fable, which the worthy Dominie may have borrowed from antiquity. The true version is, that Oloffe Van Kortlandt bargained for just so much land as a man could cover with his nether garments. The terms being concluded, he produced his friend, Mynheer Tenbroeck, as the man whose breeches were to be used in measurement. The simple savages, whose ideas of a man's nether garments had never expanded beyond the dimensions of a breechclout, stared with astonishment and dismay as they beheld this bulbous-bottomed burgher peeled like an onion, and breeches after breeches spread forth over the land, until they covered the actual site of this venerable city. . . .

...

"The land being thus fairly purchased of the Indians, a stockade fort and trading-houses were forthwith erected on an eminence in front of the place where the good St. Nicholas had appeared in a vision to Oloffe the Dreamer; and which was the identical place at present known as the Bowling Green."

"Around this fort a progeny of little Dutch-built houses, with tiled roofs and weathercocks, soon sprang up, nestling themselves under its walls for protection, as a brood of half-fledged chickens nestle under the wings of the mother hen. The whole was surrounded by an inclosure of strong palisades, to guard against any sudden irruption of the savages. Outside of these extended the corn fields and cabbage gardens of the community, with here and there an attempt at a tobacco plantation; all covering those tracts of country at present called Broadway, Wall-street, Williams-street, and Pearl-street."

NOTE 4, p. 5. Peter de Groodt. This name was borrowed from that given to the last of the Dutch dynasty, Peter Stuyvesant, after his subjugation of New Sweden by the capture of Fort Christian. "I must not omit to mention,” says Irving in his "Knickerbocker's History,' "that to this far-famed victory, Peter Stuyvesant was indebted for another of his many titles-for so hugely delighted were the honest

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burghers with his achievements, that they unanimously honored him with the name of Pieter de Groodt, that is to say, Peter the Great; or, as it was translated into English by the people of New Amsterdam, for the benefit of their New England visitors, Piet de pig—an appellation which he maintained even unto the day of his death." "Knickerbocker's History of New York," VI., 9.

NOTE 5, p. 6. Varlet. This word has become degraded in its use: first, it meant merely a servant, then any inferior, then a low, mean person, a rascal; here it is used in a good-humoured, half reproachful way.

NOTE 6, p. 8. Dr. Knipperhausen reappears in a rather more favorable light in the story of Wolfert Webber, in the "Tales of a Traveller,” Irving's next publication after "Bracebridge Hall."

NOTE 7, p. 9. folio. Take one leaf of an ordinary newspaper and fold it once, and you will get a fairly good idea of the folio, with its two leaves and four pages. Fold it twice, and you have a quarto, with its four leaves and eight pages. An unabridged dictionary is a quarto volume. Fold the newspaper leaf three times and you have an octavo, with its eight leaves and sixteen pages.

NOTE 8, p. 10. mysterious compounds . in the preparing and administering of which . . . he always consulted the stars. A reference to the practice of both Alchemy and Astrology. Both these arts are very ancient, but they reached their height during the Middle Ages. The Astrologers believed in a knowledge of the stars as a means of foretelling and influencing human events. Even to-day there are those who stand ready to extract money from the simple and superstitious by pretending to read their destinies in the stars "casting their horoscopes," as they call it.

It is not surprising that the strange notions of these two arts, through the elements of magic and mystery peculiar to them both, should gradually become mixed; so that the alchemists were sometimes supposed to get their knowledge by consulting the stars.

NOTE 9, p. 14. boor. Another word degraded in meaning. From simply a countryman, a farmer (like the South African Boers, burghers), hence one lacking the refinements of city life, it came to mean any uneducated or ill-mannered person.

NOTE 10, p. 15. umbrella. When Irving wrote “Bracebridge Hall ” (1822), umbrellas were very common. But in 1705, about the time of this story, it is probable that even the noted Dr. Knipperhausen carried an umbrella only on state occasions. Indeed he may never have owned one; for we find that Jonas Hanway, born in 1712, was "the first man to walk the streets of London with an umbrella over his head,

to protect his person from the rain." Umbrellas were known to the ancients, but it is somewhat surprising that they did not come into general use until after the middle of the 18th century.

NOTE 11, p. 20. spleen. The ancients used to believe that the spleen was the seat of anger, just as the heart was the seat of the affections, and of the understanding. Hence arose the expressions, "to give vent to

one's spleen," "to learn by heart," "to love with all one's heart."

NOTE 12, p. 19. the Hartz Mountains. The Brocken, the highest of the Hartz Mountains, was supposed to be haunted by evil spirits. This old belief is shown by the names still clinging to several oddshaped rocks, such as the Devil's Pulpit, the Witches' Altar, the Witches' Lake, and the like. According to the legend, once a year all the evil spirits in the world assemble on the Brocken to worship their master, the Devil.

NOTE 13, p. 22. the Dutch dynasty. Wouter Van Twiller (1629), William Kieft (1634), and Peter Stuyvesant (1647–64), “the peaceful reign of Walter the Doubter, the fretful reign of William the Testy, and the chrivalric reign of Peter the Headstrong.” (“Knickerbocker's History of New York," VII. 13.) See p. 111.

NOTE 14, p. 22. Devil's Stepping-stones. Half-submerged, rocky

islands which used to choke the channel of East River at Hell Gate. They have since been removed by blasting. They were so called because once, it is said, the Devil made his escape by them from Connecticut to Long Island, across the Sound. "The conduct of the expedition ("The Great Oyster War," under William the Testy) was intrusted to a valiant Dutchman, who for strength of arm was named Stoffel Brimkerhoff; that is, Stoffel the Head-breaker. This sturdy commander made good his march until he arrived in the neighborhood of Oyster Bay. Here he was encountered by a host of Yankee warriors, headed by Preserved Fish, and Habakkuk Nutter, and Return Strong, and Zerubbabel Fisk, and Determined Cock; at the sound of whose names Stoffel Brimkerhoff verily believed the whole parliament of Praise-God Barebones had been let loose upon him. He soon found, however, that they were merely the “selectmen " of the settlement, armed with no weapon but the tongue, and disposed only to meet him on the field of argument. Stoffel had but one mode of arguing; that was, with the cudgel. But he used it with such effect that he routed his antagonists, broke up the settlement, and would have driven the inhabitants into the sea, if they had not managed to escape across the Sound to the mainland by the Devil's Stepping-stones, which remain to this day monuments of the great Dutch victory over the Yankees." ("Knickerbocker's History of New York,” IV. 6.)