Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete eBook
Washington Irving
Others claimed to themselves the appellation of Conquerors,
from their gallant achievements in New Sweden and
their victory over the Yankees at Oyster Bay.
Such was that list of warlike worthies heretofore enumerated,
beginning with the Van Wycks, the Van Dycks, and the
Ten Eycks, and extending to the Rutgers, the Bensons,
the Brinkerhoffs, and the Schermerhorns; a roll equal
to the Doomsday Book of William the Conqueror, and
establishing the heroic origin of many an ancient aristocratical
Dutch family. These, after all, are the only
legitimate nobility and lords of the soil; these are
the real “beavers of the Manhattoes;” and
much does it grieve me in modern days to see them
elbowed aside by foreign invaders, and more especially
by those ingenious people, “the Sons of the Pilgrims;”
who out-bargain them in the market, out-speculate them
on the exchange, out-top them in fortune, and run
up mushroom palaces so high, that the tallest Dutch
family mansion has not wind enough left for its weathercock.
In the proud days of Peter Stuyvesant, however, the
good old Dutch aristocracy loomed out in all its grandeur.
The burly burgher, in round-crowned flaunderish hat
with brim of vast circumference, in portly gaberdine
and bulbous multiplicity of breeches, sat on his “stoep”
and smoked his pipe in lordly silence; nor did it
ever enter his brain that the active, restless Yankee,
whom he saw through his half-shut eyes worrying about
in dog day heat, ever intent on the main chance, was
one day to usurp control over these goodly Dutch domains.
Already, however, the races regarded each other with
disparaging eyes. The Yankees sneeringly spoke
of the round-crowned burghers of the Manhattoes as
the “Copper-heads;” while the latter,
glorying in their own nether rotundity, and observing
the slack galligaskins of their rivals, flapping like
an empty sail against the mast, retorted upon them
with the opprobrious appellation of “Platter-breeches.”
CHAPTER II.
From what I have recounted in the foregoing chapter,
I would not have it imagined that the great Peter
was a tyrannical potentate, ruling with a rod of iron.
On the contrary, where the dignity of office permitted,
he abounded in generosity and condescension.
If he refused the brawling multitude the right of
misrule, he at least endeavored to rule them in righteousness.
To spread abundance in the land, he obliged the bakers
to give thirteen loaves to the dozen—a
golden rule which remains a monument of his beneficence.
So far from indulging in unreasonable austerity, he
delighted to see the poor and the laboring man rejoice;
and for this purpose he was a great promoter of holidays.
Under his reign there was a great cracking of eggs
at Paas or Easter; Whitsuntide or Pinxter also flourished
in all its bloom; and never were stockings better filled
on the eve of the blessed St. Nicholas.
New Year’s Day, however, was his favorite festival,
and was ushered in by the ringing of bells and firing
of guns. On that genial day the fountains of
hospitality were broken up, and the whole community
was deluged with cherry-brandy, true hollands, and
mulled cider; every house was a temple to the jolly
god; and many a provident vagabond got drunk out of
pure economy, taking in liquor enough gratis to serve
him half a year afterwards.
