[845] Ibid., 46, 47; Duke of Yorke's Book of Laws, 36, 37. "The father onely of the Children as are begotten in Lawfull Marriage," continues the statute, "is to provide for such Children as shall be adjudged in the Court of Assizes only."
[846] Fernow, Doc. Rel. to Col. Hist. N. Y., XII, 596; mentioned also by Hazard, Annals of Pa., 451, 454, 455. On the same day the local court fined him ten pounds and costs for neglecting his judicial duties: Fernow, loc. cit., 596, 597.
[847] Ibid., 624, 625.
[848] O'Callaghan, Doc. Rel. to Col. Hist. of N. Y., III, 261 (1678); Valentine, Manual of the Corporation, 1851, 453. The year before the bishop of London complains that the Virginia marriage laws are not enforced: O'Callaghan, op. cit., III, 253 (July 17, 1677).
[849] Earle, Col. Days in Old New York, 60.
[850] See O'Callaghan, Hist. of New Netherland, II, 345-55, 450-57. Under the lead of the clerical bigots, Drisius and Megapolensis, the Reformed church in New Netherland banished Lutherans and tormented the Quakers. A number of Friends, expelled from Massachusetts, arrived in New Amsterdam in 1657, and were at once persecuted with fiendish cruelty. Nevertheless, the Quakers grew apace in numbers, settling by preference in Jamaica and Flushing on Long Island. Among them was John Bowne, a recent convert and signer of the petition quoted in the text. In 1662 he was fined for allowing his house to be used as a Quaker conventicle; and in the next year he was banished to Holland. This resulted in calling down upon the head of Stuyvesant a severe and just rebuke from the directors. See also Brodhead, Hist. of N. Y., I, 636, 705; O'Callaghan, op. cit., 338-42, 428; Earle, op. cit., 260; and Waller, Hist. of Flushing, 37-47, 77, note. It is a pity that a writer of such merit as Mr. Waller should have reiterated (46, 47) the baseless and long since exposed slanders against the Quakers in New England.
[851] Fernow, op. cit., XIV, 752, 753; also in New York Colonial MSS., XXIX, 202.
[852] The petition concludes with the following exhortation: "and we earnestly desire ye Lord may perswade your hearts, vnto whome we are now concerned, that ye may remoue ye cause of this our address and open that eye in you that can see vs as we are, who can pray for those thats in authority that vnder them we may live a peaceable holy and Godlike life
Y^e 4th day of y^e 7^{th} mo: 1680
"Henry Willis
John Bowne."
[853] Hallowell, Quaker Invasion of Massachusetts, 99-104.