Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete eBook
Washington Irving
Ten Broeck completed this junto of adventurers.
It is a singular but ludicrous fact, which, were I
not scrupulous in recording the whole truth, I should
almost be tempted to pass over in silence, as incompatible
with the gravity and dignity of history, that this
worthy gentleman should likewise have been nicknamed
from what in modern times is considered the most ignoble
part of the dress. But, in truth, the small-clothes
seems to have been a very dignified garment in the
eyes of our venerated ancestors, in all probability
from its covering that part of the body which has been
pronounced “the seat of honor.”
The name of Ten Broeck, or, as it was sometimes spelt,
Tin Broeck, has been indifferently translated into
Ten Breeches and Tin Breeches. The most elegant
and ingenious writers on the subject declare in favor
of Tin, or rather Thin, Breeches; whence they infer
that the original bearer of it was a poor but merry
rogue, whose galligaskins were none of the soundest,
and who, peradventure, may have been the author of
that truly philosophical stanza:——
“Then why should we
quarrel for riches,
Or any such glittering
toys?
A light heart and thin pair
of breeches
Will go through
the world, my brave boys!”
The High Dutch commentators, however, declare in favor
of the other reading, and affirm that the worthy in
question was a burly, bulbous man, who, in sheer ostentation
of his venerable progenitors, was the first to introduce
into the settlement the ancient Dutch fashion of ten
pair of breeches.
Such was the trio of coadjutors chosen by Oloffe the
Dreamer to accompany him in this voyage into unknown
realms; as to the names of his crews they have not
been handed down by history.
Having, as I before observed, passed much of his life
in the open air, among the peripatetic philosophers
of Amsterdam, Oloffe had become familiar with the
aspect of the heavens, and could as accurately determine
when a storm was brewing or a squall rising as a dutiful
husband can foresee, from the brow of his spouse,
when a tempest is gathering about his ears. Having
pitched upon a time for his voyage, when the skies
appeared propitious, he exhorted all his crews to take
a good night’s rest, wind up their family affairs,
and make their wills; precautions taken by our forefathers,
even in after times when they became more adventurous,
and voyaged to Haverstraw, or Kaatskill, or Groodt
Esopus, or any other far country, beyond the great
waters of the Tappen Zee.
