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under pecuniary embarrassments, had refused to fur- CHAPTER nish means of defense even against Connecticut. Stuyvesant, a stout old soldier, zealous for his employers, 1664. would willingly have stood a siege; but the Dutch inhabitants were lukewarm, while the English, no inconsiderable portion of the colonists, were secretly, indeed, some of them openly, favorable to the invaders.

After a few days' negotiation with the commissioners, and much warm dispute between the director, who struggled hard to maintain his authority, and the burgomasters and principal inhabitants of New Amsterdam, who were resolved not to run the risk of an attack, through the mediation of Winthrop a liberal capitulation was arranged. The Dutch colonists, besides the privileges of free denizens of the new province, were to be allowed free trade with Holland. The Dutch law of inheritance was to continue in force, assuring an equal distribution to all the children. The Dutch Reformed Church was to enjoy its privileges, and the colonists their freedom of worship.

With this change of masters New Amsterdam changed its name to NEW YORK, a designation bestowed alike on the new province and its capital city. Though much improved under the administration of Stuyvesant, this embryo mercantile metropolis of the western world consisted as yet of but a few narrow streets, near the southern extremity of the Island of Manhattan. There were a few buildings of handsome appearance, covered with tiles brought from Holland; but most of the houses were small thatched cottages, and Nichols complained that it was impossible to find bedding in the town for his soldiers.

While Nichols remained at New York as governor of the new province, Cartwright, another of the commission

CHAPTER ers, with one of the ships and a detachment of troops, XIII. ascended the Hudson; and the colony of Rensselaers1664. wyk, with Fort Orange and the town of Beverswyk, Sept. 29. quietly surrendered. That town, from one of the Duke of York's titles, was presently called Albany. Carr, the third commissioner, entered the Delaware with another vessel, and the surrender of the posts and settlements on that river completed the conquest.

Oct.

1667.

July.

At the treaty of peace between Holland and England some three years afterward, as a compensation for the loss of New Netherland, the Dutch were allowed to retain the colony of Surinam, in Guiana, then lately planted by some English adventurers, but captured by the Dutch during the war.

The policy of this exchange was long doubted by many, who thought colonies within the tropics more profitable than plantations in North America. For the first hundred years Surinam kept pretty equal pace with the colony of New York. Considerable annoyance was experi

enced by the new possessors from a body of refugee negroes, descendants of some who fled to the woods at the period of the conquest; but a treaty was at length effected, by which, in consideration of a certain annual tribute, they agreed to restore all future runaway slaves to the colonists. Surinam, by the aid of Dutch capital and an active slave trade, presently advanced with rapid strides. It was one of the first American plantations into which the cultivation of coffee was successfully introduced. But, about the time of the American Revolution, it received a terrible check in a servile insurrection, resulting, after a destructive war, in the estab lishment of a second independent negro community in the rear of the colony. The cessation of the slave trade having put a stop to increase by importations, the popu

XIII.

lation of Surinam, under the joint influence of slavery CHAPTER and bad government, has ever since been wasting away. With a vast unsettled territory, it now numbers scarce 1667. fifty thousand inhabitants—a striking contrast to the growth of New York.

By the simultaneous treaty with France, the province of Acadie, much to the disgust of the people of New England, was restored to its ancient possessors, without any precise specification of limits, but including by name La Hâve, Cape Sable, Port Royal, St. John's, and Pentagoet, French name for Penobscot. As Temple objected to surrender the province till his interests were provided for, the king agreed to repay his expenditures to the amount of £16,200. Upon the strength of this promise, peremptory orders were sent out to give up the 1669. province to the French. But Temple never received his money. One effect of this surrender was a great curtailment of the eastern portion of the Duke of York's province.

CHAPTER

CHAPTER XIV.

NEW ENGLAND UNDER CHARLES II.

THE Puritan colonists of New England had watched XIV. with no little anxiety the rapid progress of that revolu 1660. tion in Great Britain which restored Charles II. to his July. father's thrones. The same ship that brought to Boston

Oct.

the first news of the Restoration, brought also two of the regicide judges flying for their lives, Whalley and Goffe, high military officers under Cromwell. Courteously received in Massachusetts by Governor Endicott and the magistrates, they remained there for some time without disguise or concealment. The news, indeed, by this arrival, was by no means decisive. The General Court of Massachusetts met at its regular session, and adjourn ed without taking any notice of the changes going on in Nov. 30. England. Some weeks after, full accounts were received of the re-establishment of royalty; of the Act of Indemnity, and the exception from it of all those concerned in the death of the late king; of the execution of Peters and the imprisonment of Vane; with information from Leverett, the colonial agent, of numerous complaints by Royalists, Episcopalians, Baptists, and Quakers, already preferred against the colony.

Dec. 19.

Upon the arrival of this unwelcome news, the General Court, called together in special session, adopted an apologetical address, in which New England was ingenuously personified as the king's "poor Mephibosheth, by reason of lameness, in respect of distance, not until now

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appearing in his presence, kneeling with the rest of his CHAPTER subjects before his majesty as her restored king." This. address was transmitted by the hand of Temple, the pro- 1660. prietary of Nova Scotia, lately a resident in Massachusetts, on whose friendly and favorable representations to the king much reliance was placed. It excused, at considerable length, the capital punishments inflicted on the Quakers, and prayed for the continued and undisturbed enjoyment of the existing civil and religious institutions of the colony. At the same time was sent a similar address to Parliament, and letters to old Lord Say and other Puritan noblemen, whose concurrence in the Restoration might be supposed to give them some present interest at court.

Feb.

The fugitive regicides had already retired to New 1661. Haven, thus escaping a royal order for their arrest which presently arrived at Boston by the hands of some zealous young Royalists, to whom the General Court of Massachusetts intrusted its execution. The magistrates wrote a pressing letter on the subject to Governor Leet, of New Haven. The Commissioners for the United Colonies of New England, at their meeting a few months Sept. afterward, issued their proclamation also against these fugitives. But, with all this show of zeal, there was no intention to give them up, if it could be avoided. By great privacy and the aid of faithful friends, they remained undiscovered, and were presently joined by Colonel John Dixwell, another of the late king's judges. In spite of diligent efforts for their arrest, all three finished their days in New England. Dixwell lived openly at New Haven under a feigned name; the other two remained in concealment, sometimes in Connecticut, sometimes in Massachusetts.

As further evidence of their loyalty, the magistrates of