CHAPTER XX—THE DUTCH KRAEG
The sixth of July had arrived, and little Miss New York was fidgeting nervously in her chair—draped with the Star Spangled Banner and the flaunting colors of the Dutch Republic—placed in line with the hostess and the receiving party of the day. She was a rather startling Miss New York, arrayed as a Goddess of Liberty—she had claimed she was too modern to be a vrouw—with her chair as well as her small person hung with placards of well-known places, streets, and buildings of the metropolis.
By her side stood Madame New Amsterdam—Mrs. Van Vorst—whose multitudinous skirts stood out from her figure with such amplitude that she resembled the quaint little green pincushion that dangled from her waist. Her neat white cap was tied under her chin with formal stiffness, while a large silk apron completed a make-up that transformed the slender, dignified Mrs. Van Vorst into a typical Dutch matron. She too, like her daughter, was hung with tiny white signs from bodice to skirt, which excited curiosity if not admiration.
“Oh, Mother, I do wish they would hurry and come!” cried Miss New York impatiently, craning her neck to see if some one had not yet appeared on the broad stairway leading to the main sitting-room. “Oh, somebody’s coming!” and the little lady, with the weight of a city on her shoulders, drew back as she clapped her hands with delight.
“Ah, here comes the Governor’s lady,” exclaimed Madame New Amsterdam as Madame Stuyvesant—Mrs. Morrow—announced her coming by stopping on the threshold of the low-ceiled room, and bowed with such stately formality that Miss New York’s eyes suddenly stilled, as she stiffened with similar dignity to receive the first guest.
The Governor’s lady was followed by Annetje Jans, her comely little person looking like a blooming Dutch posy, arrayed in a bright green petticoat and a blue waistcoat with yellow sleeves. The brown eyes, ready smile, and brilliant cheeks of Miss Nathalie made her a fitting representative of the little lady who formed so large a part of the history of New Amsterdam, coming over in 1630 in the ship Endracht with her husband and three children from Holland. After the death of her husband, who left her a bouwerie (farm) of sixty acres, a good part of New York, she married Dominie Bogardus, thus becoming with her wealth and influence a dominant character in the colony.
Annetje came a few steps forward, and then bobbed such a low curtsy that the wings of her lace cap flapped out like the sails of a windmill in a greeting to her hostesses. But in a second her old-time pose was forgotten, as her eyes fell on the much “be-signed” person of the lady of the house, and she flew to her aid, declaring that she was losing some of her signs.
“This will never do,” she commented as she hurriedly pinned the sign “Bouwerie” in its place. “Oh, and here’s another old place that’s gone astray!” poking “Der Halle” on a straight line with its neighbor, “De claver Waytie.”
“Will you please inform me why New Amsterdam is thus placarded?” It was the voice of the Governor’s lady, who was curiously watching this adjustment of signs.
“Why, these signs are the Dutch names of the different localities and streets as named in the days of New Amsterdam,” explained Annetje quickly. “See. Broad street means Broad way; Kloch-Hoeck was the site of the first village, as it was all covered with bits of clam and oyster shells, the word means Shell Point. De claver Waytie was a hill leading to a spring covered with grass, where the young maidens used to bleach their linen. The path they wore up the hill came to be known as Maadje-Paatje, Maiden Lane. Der Halle was the name of a tavern near a big tree on the corner of Broad and Wall Street. It took the arms of six men to go round der groot tree.