This founding of Schenectady was an event of deep interest to the Mohawks of Gandawague. It brought the dwellings of the white race closer than ever before to their own stronghold, almost in fact to the very door of the Kanonsionni, or People of the Long House. The settlers began at once to rear their wonderful wooden palaces, for such they must have seemed to the simple children of the forest. The wild banks of the Maquaas Kill had hitherto shown no prouder architecture than the long bark houses of the Mohawks, which nevertheless were much in advance of the wigwams or tents of the roving Algonquin tribes. The Indians of Gandawague must have hastened down in their canoes to watch the building of Schenectady, and listened with interest and curiosity to the strange buzz of the newly erected sawmill. These were already familiar sights and sounds, however, to Tekakwitha's uncle, for he had long been in the habit of trading with the Dutch and knew their ways. He often journeyed as far as their trading-house at Fort Orange. Let us follow in the footsteps of this Mohawk chief as he starts once again on the trail that leads eastward from Gandawague with furs he has been hoarding for some new purchase. Let us pass hurriedly on beyond the new abode of his friend Corlaer, and we shall then see the sights that greet him as he approaches the homes of the traders who dwell beside the Hudson,—or Cahotatea, as the chief of the Turtle Castle would call the great North River in his own language. He has other Indians of his nation with him. These Mohawks, says the first Dutch dominie, in the account he gives of them, have good features, with black hair and eyes, and they are well proportioned; they go naked in summer, and in winter they hang loosely about them a deer's, bear's, or panther's skin, or else they sew small skins together into a square piece, or buy two and a half ells of duffels from the Dutchmen. Some of them wear shoes and stockings of deer's skins; others of plaited corn-leaves. Their hair is left growing on one side of the head only, or else worn like a cock's comb or hog's bristles standing up in a streak from forehead to neck; some of them leave queer little locks growing here and there. Their faces are painted red and blue, so that they "look like the devil himself," continues the worthy Megapolensis. They carry a basket of bear's grease with which they smear their heads, and in travelling they take with them a maize-kettle and a wooden spoon and bowl. When it is meal-time they get fire very quickly by rubbing pieces of wood together; and they cook and devour their fish and venison without the preliminary cleaning and preparing considered necessary among civilized folks. When they feel pain they say, "Ugh! the devil bites," and when they wish to compliment their own nation they say, "Really the Mohawks are very cunning devils." They make no offerings to their good genius or national god, Tharonyawagon; but they worship the demon Otkon or Aireskoi, praying in this way, "Forgive us for not eating our enemies!" and in hot weather, "I thank thee, Devil, I thank thee, Oomke, for the cool breeze." They laugh at the Dutch prayers, the dominie tells us, and also at the sermon. They call the Christians of Fort Orange cloth-makers (assyreoni) and iron-workers (charistooni).
These uncouth travellers from Gandawague, among whom is the uncle of Tekakwitha, are fast nearing the homes of these same cloth-makers and iron-workers. Let us hasten to overtake them, and find our way with them into the settlement of Rensselaerwyck. You who dwell in New York State and you who travel through it, come with us now to visit old Fort Orange and the little town of Beverwyck! You above all who love to trace your lineage to the staid old Dutchmen of New Netherlands, come! Let us see the homes of these grandsires whose names appear so often in the record and ancient annals of our oldest chartered city. Come, too, you sons of English colonists, and see the flag of England float strangely in the Hudson River breezes while they are still loaded with the cumbrous sounds of the Low Dutch language! We will stay and see the laws of England put an end to queer old wordy wars between the stately Dutch patroon Van Rensselaer and Peter Stuyvesant, the doughty old Director-general, last and greatest of the four Dutch governors,—the one called "Wooden Leg" by Indians, and "Hard-headed Pete" by Dutchmen; though the poets say he had a silver leg, and the artists love to paint him with a gallant flourish as he stumped it down the street beside some pretty, quaintly dressed colonial belle. His were the days of knee-breeches and gigantic silver buckles, of ruffles and queues, of broad, short petticoats bedecked with mighty pockets, and of scissors and keys that hung from the belt,—the days of demure tea-parties and hilarious coasting-parties, of negro slaves and of sugar-loaf hats. As for weapons of war, the muskets they carried were strange and clumsy arms, with long, portable rests and "two fathoms of match," which the soldier must needs have with him, besides the heavy armor and the queer tackle for ammunition. No wonder that the wearers of such gear dreaded wars with the nimble savages!
Rip Van Winkle, after sleeping twenty years, awoke to painful changes; he was sadly out of date. It would surely then be cruel, even if we had the power, to wake old Peter Stuyvesant and the people of his day from full two hundred years of slumber in our graveyards just to criticise their dress and talk. Let us rather go to sleep ourselves and dream about them. Take a good strong dose of unassorted, crude, colonial history interspersed with annals, and the necessary drowsiness will surely follow. Have you tried it? Are you sure the spell is not upon you now, having stopped to look at Stuyvesant, and heard the dominie describe the Mohawks? The smoke of pipes and chimneys is at hand, for here we are at old Fort Orange in the times of Tekakwitha. Let us look about, before the power to do it fails us out of very sleepiness. We find ourselves within a wall of stockadoes. The chief and his friends from Kaghnuwage are undoing their packs of furs near the northern gate of the town. We stand in Albany, at the corner of Broadway and State Street,—but no! those names are not yet in vogue. We are in Beverwyck, at the point where the long, rambling Handelaer Street, running parallel with Hudson's River, crosses the broad, short Joncaer Street, which climbs some little distance up the hill. Before us is the old Dutch church. It stands by itself, at the intersection of the two streets, fronting south. It is a low, square, plain stone building, with a four-sided roof rising to a central summit surmounted by a small cupola or belfry containing the famous little bell just sent over from Holland by the Dutch West India Company; on this belfry is upreared a saucy little weathercock. The south porch or vestibule is approached by a large stone step before the principal door. If the church were not locked, we might take a look inside at the carved oaken pulpit with its queer little bracket for the dominie's hourglass. The burghers subscribed twenty-five beaver-skins to buy that pulpit, and a splendid one it was. It soon came sailing over the sea in a plump Dutch ship. The patrons of the colony finding the beaver-skins much damaged when the package was opened at Amsterdam had added seventy-five guilders themselves towards the purchase, besides presenting the bell outright. When Dominie Megapolensis first arrived in the colony, "nine benches" were enough to seat the whole congregation; but that was a generation ago. Now it has increased; and the church, which was then a wooden structure near the old fort by the river, has been rebuilt. The Van Rensselaers, the Wendels, the Schuylers and the Van der Blaas have the leading pews; they have already sent to Europe for stained glass windows blazoned with their family arms. Having seen the church, let us walk up Joncaer (State) Street to the dominie's. We pass through the market-place, which is out in the middle of the open, grassy space, on a line with the church. We stop a moment to look at the house of Anneke Janse, the heiress, and then move on to Parrell (Pearl) Street. There, on the northeast corner of Parrell and Joncaer Streets, gable end foremost, stands the comfortable abode of Dominie Schaats, which is the pride and envy of the town. Every part of this, the first brick house in the New World, is said to have been imported from Holland,—bricks, woodwork, tiles, and also the ornamental irons with which it is profusely adorned,—all expressly for the use of the Rev. Gideon Schaets (or Schaats), who came over in 1652. The materials of the house arrived simultaneously with the bell and pulpit in 1657.[20]
From Schaats' house we see, instead of a solitary "old elm-tree" on the opposite corner, many trees of different kinds, one in front of each of the straggling houses on either side of Joncaer Street; and by the age of the tree one can tell pretty well the order in which the different settlers arrived and began to domesticate themselves. This was no sooner done than the inevitable shade-tree was planted to overshadow the dwelling, and beneath this tree they bring the cow each evening to be milked. Around every house is a garden with a well; and the stoop at the front door is supplied with wooden seats or benches. There old and young gather in the evening when the day's work is over.
The upper half of the front door remains open all day in summer, while the lower half bars out the stray chickens and dogs. It is opened now and then, however, to let the children in and out, and once in a while a buxom vrouw leans out to chat with a passer-by, or perhaps to scold the little ones or to bid them beware of straying near the trading-house for fear of encountering a tipsy Indian. This trading-house is outside the wall of stockadoes, or upright posts, encircling the town. The traders of Beverwyck are all obliged "to ride their stockadoes,"—that is to say, to furnish the pine posts, thirteen feet long and one foot in diameter, for repairing the wooden wall. This duty falls alike on every inhabitant, at the command of the burgomasters and schepens. They are furthermore bound to take turns in drawing firewood to the trading-house for the use of the Indians when they come there from the Maquaas country loaded with packs of furs.
OLD ALBANY.—DOMINIE SCHAATS' HOUSE.
(Corner of Joncaer and Parrell Streets.)
Above Dominie Schaats' house and on the same side of Joncaer Street is the Corps de Garde, a small block fort where a few soldiers are stationed. There the progress of our walk is checked by the stout wall of stockadoes. One of the six gates or openings, however, is near at hand, leading out on to the road to Schenectady. We wish to see more of the place, and are at a loss to find our way; so we accept the kindly offered guidance of a little Schuyler lad, named Pieter, who stands talking to one of the soldiers. Already in his boyish days this public-spirited Albanian takes an active interest in the military defence of the place. He knows where all the cannon are placed, and can tell us how they propose to improve the fort and barracks on Joncaer Street. He takes us out by the Parrell Street gate to a road leading southward toward the hamlet of Bethlehem. After the boy has shown us the mills on the Bever Kill (Buttermilk Creek) from which the village of Beverwyck was named, he takes us down to old Fort Orange by the river-side.[21] It has been a snug little fort in its day, built of logs with four bastions, each mounted by two guns for throwing stones, while in the enclosure stands a large cannon on wheels close to the old trading-house of the West India Company. Since the new one has been built, this is used as the vice-director's house. It is twenty-six feet long, two stories high, constructed of boards one inch thick, with a roof in the form of a pavilion covered with old shingles. The space on the second floor is one undivided room directly under the roof without a chimney, to which access can be had by a straight ladder through a trap-door.[22] Here the magistrates administer justice. This is for the time being the court-house of Beverwyck.
Fort Orange at the time of our visit is falling to decay; Fort Willemstadt, on the contrary, the military post at the head of Joncaer Street, is increasing in importance. Near Fort Orange is the great pasture or common where the cows of the burghers are grazing, and there, a short distance below the fort, we see the ferry-boat travelling slowly across the river to Greenbosch. We have caught sight of several deer and wild turkeys on the outskirts of the town, and we have passed several patriarchal "negers" (as the magistrates of Fort Orange spell the word): and here comes the special property of Pete Schuyler in the shape of a black boy of his own age, who is followed by a troop of sturdy children, some of whom are the brothers and sisters of our young guide. There, to be sure, are Guysbert, and Gertrude (who is destined to wed Stephanus van Cort) Alida (who will add to her own name of Schuyler the name of Van Rensselaer and afterwards Livingston);[23] while toddling after these juvenile belles of Fort Orange come Brant and Arent, their brothers, and still there are others to come. These are the numerous children of Philip Pietersen Schuyler, who came over in 1650, and of his fair vrouw Margritta van Slichtenhorst. This good couple were married with great formality before Dominie Schaats arrived, by Antoni de Hooges, the secretary of the colony, whose nose has been immortalized in the Highlands of the Hudson. Their son Pieter, our little guide, is to be the first mayor of the city of Albany; while the distinguished Philip of a later date will carry the name of Schuyler to a height of glory that will linger round the shaft of the Saratoga monument at Schuylerville for ages to come, and make it glow with an added beauty!