George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 2, 17th edition.

[299] restless colonists, almost as they landed, and even the

Chap. XV.}

soldiers of the garrison, fled in troops from the dominion of Amsterdam to the liberties of English colonies. The province of the city was almost deserted; the attempt to elope was punishable by death, and scarce thirty families remained.¹

During the absence of Stuyvesant from Manhattan,

1655. Sept.

the warriors of the neighboring Algonquin tribes, never reposing confidence in the Dutch, made a desperate assault on the colony. In sixty-four canoes, they appeared before the town, and ravaged the adjacent country. The return of the expedition restored confidence. The captives were ransomed, and industry repaired its losses. The Dutch seemed to have firmly established their power, and promised themselves happier years. New Netherland consoled them for the loss of Brazil.² They exulted in the possession of an admirable territory, that needed no embankments against the ocean. They were proud of its vast extent, from New England to Maryland, from the sea to the Great River of Canada, and the remote north-western wilderness. They sounded with exultation the channel of the deep stream, which was no longer shared with the Swedes; they counted with delight its many lovely runs of water, on which the beaver built their villages; and the great travellers who had visited every continent, as they ascended the Delaware, declared it one of the noblest rivers in the world. Its banks were more inviting than the lands on the Amazon.

Meantime the country near the Hudson gained by