Knickerbocker's History of New York, Complete eBook
Washington Irving
or being disturbed at his breakfast. Having listened
attentively to the statement of Wandle Schoonhoven,
giving an occasional grunt, as he shoveled a spoonful
of Indian pudding into his mouth—either
as a sign that he relished the dish or comprehended
the story—he called unto his constable,
and pulling out of his breeches proper a huge jack-knife,
dispatched it after the defendant as a summons, accompanied
by his tobacco box as a warrant.
This summary process was as effectual in those simple
days as was the seal ring of the great Haroun Alraschid
among the true believers. The two parties being
confronted before him, each produced a book of accounts,
written in a language and character that would have
puzzled any but a High Dutch commentator, or a learned
decipherer of Egyptian obelisks. The sage Wouter
took them one after the other, and having poised them
in his hands, and attentively counted over the number
of leaves, fell straightway into a very great doubt,
and smoked for half an hour without saying a word;
at length, laying his finger beside his nose, and
shutting his eyes for a moment, with the air of a
man who has just caught a subtle idea by the tail,
he slowly took his pipe from his mouth, puffed forth
a column of tobacco smoke, and with marvelous gravity
and solemnity pronounced—that having carefully
counted over the leaves and weighed the books, it was
found that one was just as thick and as heavy as the
other—therefore, it was the final opinion
of the court that the accounts were equally balanced—therefore,
Wandle should give Barent a receipt, and Barent should
give Wandle a receipt—and the constable
should pay the costs.
This decision being straightway made known, diffused
general joy throughout New Amsterdam, for the people
immediately perceived that they had a very wise and
equitable magistrate to rule over them. But its
happiest effect was, that not another lawsuit took
place throughout the whole of his administration—and
the office of constable fell into such decay, that
there was not one of those losel scouts known in the
province for many years. I am the more particular
in dwelling on this transaction, not only because
I deem it one of the most sage and righteous judgments
on record, and well worthy the attention of modern
magistrates, but because it was a miraculous event
in the history of the renowned Wouter, being the only
time he was ever known to come to a decision in the
whole course of his life.
CHAPTER II.
In treating of the early governors of the province
I must caution my readers against confounding them,
in point of dignity and power, with those worthy gentlemen
who are whimsically denominated governors in this
enlightened republic—a set of unhappy victims
of popularity, who are in fact the most dependent,
henpecked beings in the community, doomed to bear
the secret goadings and corrections of their own party,
and the sneers and revilings of the whole world beside—set
