THE BURGHERS
In the earliest days of New Netherland there were no burgers because,
as the name implies, burghers are town-dwellers, and for a number of
years after the coming of the Dutch nothing worthy to be called a town
existed in the colony. In the middle of the seventeenth century a
traveler wrote from New Netherland that there were only three towns on
the Hudson--Fort Orange, Rondout, and New Amsterdam--and that the rest
were mere villages or settlements.
These centers were at first trading-posts, and it is as idle to judge
of the manners, customs, and dress prevailing in them by those of
Holland at the same epoch, as to judge San Francisco in the mining days
of 1849 by Boston and New York at the same date. These early traders
and settlers brought with them the character and traditions of home;
but their way of life was perforce modified by the {103} crude
conditions into which they plunged. The picturesque farmhouses of Long
Island and the crow-gables of New Amsterdam were not built in a day.
Savages must be subdued and land cleared and planted before the
evolution of the dwelling could fairly begin. Primitive community life
lingered long even on Manhattan Island. As late as 1649 the farmers
petitioned for a free pasturage between their plantation of Schepmoes
and the fence of the Great Bowerie Number One. The City Hall Park
region bounded by Broadway, Nassau, Ann, and Chambers Streets continued
very late to be recognized as village commons where the cattle were
pastured. The cowherd drove the cows afield and home again at
milking-time, and it was his business to sound his horn at every gate
announcing the safe return of the cows. Correspondingly in the morning
the harsh summons called the cattle from every yard to join the
procession toward the meadows.
When Tienhoven, Stuyvesant's secretary, sent out information for the
benefit of those planning to take up land in New Netherland, he
suggested that those who had not means to build at first might shelter
themselves by digging a pit six or seven feet deep as large as needed,
covering the {104} floor and walls with timber and placing over it a
roof of spars covered with bark or green sods. Even with this rude
housing he suggests planting at once a garden with all sorts of
pot-herbs and maize, or Indian corn, which might serve as food for man
and beast alike. Naturally these pioneer conditions of living lasted
longer in the farming region than at New Amsterdam, where as early as
1640 we see simple but comfortable little houses clustered in the
shelter of the fort, and gathered close about the stone tavern, the
West India Company's stores, and the Church of St. Nicholas. The
gallows and pillory, in full view, seemed to serve notice that law and
order had asserted themselves and that settlers might safely solidify
their houses and holdings.
In 1648 the building of wooden chimneys was forbidden, and roofs of
reed were replaced with more solid and less inflammable material. The
constant threat of fire led to drastic regulations for the cleaning of
chimneys. It was ordered that "if anyone prove negligent he shall,
whenever the Firewardens find the chimneys foul, forthwith without any
contradiction, pay them a fine of three guilders for every flue found
on examination to be dirty, to be expended for fire ladders, hooks and
{105} buckets, which shall be procured and provided at the earliest and
most convenient opportunity."
The early settlers found much difficulty in enforcing public
sanitation, for, in spite of the world-wide reputation of the Dutch for
indoor cleanliness, we find the burghers in 1658 bitterly reproached
for throwing their rubbish, filth, dead animals, and the like into the
streets "to the great inconvenience of the community and dangers
arising from it." The burgomasters and _schepens_ ordained that all
such refuse be brought to dumping-grounds near the City Hall and the
gallows or to other designated places. Failure to observe this rule
was punishable by fines or severer penalties.
As prosperity increased, all conditions of living improved. Many ships
from Holland brought loads of brick and tiles as ballast, and the
houses began to assume the typical Dutch aspect. They were still built
chiefly of wood, but with a gable end of brick facing the street. The
steep roofs seldom had eave-troughs, at least in the early days, and
mention is made in deeds of "free-drip."
The house was supplied, as the chronicler tells us, with "an abundance
of large doors and small windows on every floor, the date of its
erection was curiously designated by iron figures on the front, {106}
and on the top of the roof was perched a fierce little weather-cock to
let the family into the important secret which way the wind blew." The
front doors were usually divided, as in the old houses in Holland, into
an upper and lower half hung on heavy hinges. The door opened with a
latch, and bore a brass knocker wrought frequently in the device of an
animal's head.
Only on formal occasions was this door thrown open or the fore-room to
which it gave access used, for the life of the family, as in all
primitive communities, was centered in the kitchen. Here in winter
roared the great fires up the wide-throated chimneys. Here children
and negro servants gathered in groups and told stories of the old home
and the new. Here the women knit their stockings and here the burghers
smoked when the day's work was done. But the fore-room, or _voorhuis_,
though seldom occupied, was dear to the soul of the vrouw of New
Netherland. Here stood all the treasures too valuable or too fragile
for daily use: the least, or chest, stored with household linen, the
cabinet filled with Delft plates from Holland, and generally the carved
four-poster covered with feather beds of prime goose-feathers and hung
with gay chintz.
{107}
A shrewd observer has said that luxury implies waste while comfort
lives in thrift. We are safe in assuming that comfort rather than
luxury prevailed in New Netherland and that the highly colored pictures
of elegant life on the shores of the Hudson represent a very late
phase, when the Dutch influence still prevailed under English
protection. The earlier settlers were a far simpler people, whose
floors were scrubbed and sanded instead of carpeted, who used
hour-glasses instead of clocks, and who set their four-poster beds in
the rooms where visitors were formally received.
It was of course the "great burghers" who set the social as well as the
official tone in New Amsterdam.[1] It was they who owned the finest
houses, {108} who imported tables and chests of ebony inlaid with
ivory. It was they whose wives were bravely fitted out with
petticoats, over which an upper garment was looped to display the
velvet, cloth, silk, or satin which marked the social position and
material wealth of the wearer. The burgher himself went clad,
according to his wealth, in cloaks of cloth or velvet, embroidered or
silk-lined; but he always wore wide boots and wide breeches and a coat
adorned with an abundance of buttons, the whole topped by a
broad-brimmed hat adorned with buckles and feathers and seldom removed
in the house. The dress of the farmers was simpler than that of the
town-dwellers or burghers. It consisted generally of wide breeches, a
_hemdrok_ or shirt-coat made of wool or cotton, an overfrock called a
_paltsrok_, a low flat collar, the usual wide-brimmed hat, and shoes of
leather on Sundays, and of wood on week-days for work on the
_bouwerie_. The children of burghers and farmers alike were clad in
miniature copies of the garb of their elders, doubtless in many cases
wearing the same garments {109} made over by removing the outworn
portions. It was a question of warmth rather than fashion which
confronted the settlers and their children.
To those of us who believe that the state exists for the protection of
the home and the home for the protection of the child, it is neither
futile nor frivolous to consider at some length what life had to offer
to the small colonists. Little Sarah Rapaelje, "the first-born
Christian daughter in New Netherland," was soon surrounded by a circle
of boys and girls. Cornelis Maasen and his wife came over in 1631, and
their first child was born on the voyage. Following this little
Hendrick came Martin, Maas, Steyntje, and Tobias. We have already
noted the two little motherless daughters of Domine Michaelius who were
so hard put to it for a nurse. A little later came Domine Megapolensis
with his children Hellegond, Dirrick, Jan, and Samuel, running from
eight to fourteen years in age. The patroon had directed that they be
furnished with clothing "in such small and compact parcels as can be
properly stowed away on the ship."
With the era of permanent settlers in New Netherland, cradles came to
be in demand. In the region of New Amsterdam the familiar hooded
variety was brought from Holland, while farther {110} up the river and
especially among the poorer folk birch bark was fashioned into a
sleeping-place for the babies. For the older children trundle-beds
fitting under the big four-posters of the elders and rolled out at
night were much in use, since the difficulty of heating made economy of
bedroom-space a necessity. This _treke-bed_ and its protecting
four-poster, however, probably came later than the built-in
_sloep-bank_, little more than a bunk in the side of the wall concealed
by a curtain and softened by thick feather-beds.
However rude the sleeping-place of the babies, the old home lullabies
soothed them to slumber. Dearest and most familiar was the following:
Trip a trop a tronjes,
De varken in de boonjes,
De koejes in de klaver,
De paaden in de haver,
De eenjes in de water plas,
De kalver in de lang gras,
So goed myn klein poppetje was.
Thus to pictures of pigs in the bean patch and cows in the clover,
ducks in the water and calves in the meadow, the little ones fell
peacefully to sleep, oblivious of the wild beasts and wilder men
lurking in the primeval forests around the little {111} clearing where
the pioneers were making a home for themselves and their children.
When the babies' eyelids unclosed in the morning they opened on a busy
scene, for whatever anxious vigils the father and mother might have
kept through the night, toil began with the dawn. The boys were set to
gathering firewood and drawing water, while the _goede vrouw_ was
busily preparing a substantial morning meal of suppawn and sausage
before her husband began the day's work of loading beaver-skins or
tilling the ground or hewing timber. A pioneer life means hard work
for children as well as for their elders, and in the early years there
was little time for play on the part of the youthful New Netherlander.
As prosperity advanced and as negro servants were introduced, the
privileges of childhood were extended and we find accounts of their
sliding on their _slees_ or sleds down the hills of Fort Orange and
skating at New Amsterdam on the Collect Pond, which took its name from
the Dutch _kalk_, or lime, and was so called from the heaps of
oyster-shells accumulated by the Indians. The skates were of the type
used in Holland, very long with curves at the front and rear, and, when
metal could not be obtained, formed of ox-bone.
{112}
With an appetite bred of out-of-door work and play, and a breakfast
hour at five or six in the morning, the children were hungry for the
homely and substantial dinner when it eventually appeared at early
noon. Whatever social visits were planned took place at the supper,
which occurred between three o'clock and six. The tea-table, the
chronicler tells us,
was crowned with a huge earthen dish, well stored with slices of fat
pork and fried trout, cut up into morsels and swimming in gravy. The
company, being seated round the genial board and each furnished with a
fork, evinced their dexterity in launching at the fattest pieces in
this mighty dish in much the same manner as sailors harpoon porpoises
at sea, or our Indians spear salmon in the lakes.
Sometimes the table was graced with immense apple pies, or saucers full
of preserved peaches or pears; but it was always sure to boast an
enormous dish of balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog's fat and
called doughnuts or _olykoeks_.... The tea was served out of a
majestic Delft tea-pot ornamented with paintings of fat little Dutch
shepherds and shepherdesses tending pigs, with boats sailing in the air
and houses built in the clouds.... To sweeten the beverage a lump of
sugar was laid beside each cup and the company alternately nibbled and
sipped with great decorum.
In the houses of the richer colonists, as prosperity advanced,
shell-shaped silver boxes for sugar, called {113} "bite and stir"
boxes, were set on the table and, according to one authority, the lumps
of sugar were of the nature of toffy with molasses added to the sugar.
The feast ended, the young folk went their homeward way lighted by the
moon, or, late in the century, on dark nights by a lantern hung on a
pole from every seventh house. When the curfew rang from the belfry
"eight o'clock," lights were put out and all was made fast for the
night, while the children's minds were set at rest by the tramp of the
_klopperman_, who shook his rattle at each door as he passed from house
to house through the dark hours, assuring the burghers that all was
well and that no marauders were about.
If winter offered sports and pastimes, spring, summer, and autumn had
each its own pleasures, fishing and clam digging, shooting and
trapping, games with ball and slings, berry picking, and the gathering
of peaches which fell so thickly that the very hogs refused them. The
market days in New Amsterdam offered a long procession of delights to
the young colonists. But merriest of all were the holidays which were
observed in New Netherland after much the same fashion as in the old
home.
{114}
I do not know how to account for the fact that while the struggle of
the Dutch people with the Papacy had been as bitter as that of England
and the throwing off of the yoke by the Dutch fully as decided, they
still retained the holidays which the Puritans eschewed as dangerous
remnants of superstition. Perhaps it was on the principle of robbing
Satan of his hoofs and horns but keeping his cheerful scarlet costume,
or perhaps they thought, as Rowland Hill remarked, that "it was poor
policy to leave all the good times to the Devil." In any case it was
all grist to the children's mill.
On the 1st of January all was arranged for the greeting of the New
Year. Mighty bowls of punch were brewed, cordials prepared from
long-cherished family recipes were brought out, and the women, in their
best apparel, seated themselves in the seldom-used _ontvangkamer_,
where wine was handed to their callers to be received with the wish of
a "Happy New Year!" While these stately ceremonies were in progress
the young people amused themselves with turkey-shooting, sleigh-riding,
skating, and dancing.
After New Year's Day the most characteristic national and local holiday
was _Pinkster_, coming in the seventh week after _Paasch_, or Easter,
and {115} falling generally in late May or early June. The orchards
were then white with blossoms and the grass thick with dandelions and
spring flowers. Children set out early to gather boughs from the green
woods. These boughs they sprinkled with water and left over the doors
of late sleepers that the sluggards might be drenched on opening the
door. At first all was innocent merriment, gathering of Pinkster
flowers, and picnicking; but for some unexplained reason this festival
was gradually relegated to the negroes. Apple-jack was freely
consumed, barbaric dances began, and fun so far degenerated into
license that the white people and their children shunned the festivity.
The _Kermis_, an Old World festival, was one of those early introduced
at New Amsterdam. It originated centuries before and had taken its
name from the _kerk mis_ or church mass. In the olden days it was
celebrated with pomp and solemnity, but it early developed a more
festive character. Booths and stalls were erected for a market, and
dances and processions were organized. The first stroke of the clock
at noon opened at the same moment the market and the first dance. The
last stroke saw white crosses nailed on all the bridges across the
canal and on the market place. It was {116} indeed a festive
appearance that the market presented, with its double stalls filled
with eggs and gherkins, its booths hung with dried fish, its
_poffertjeskraam_ dispensing the tempting batter-cakes, and its
_wafelkraamen_ offering the more costly and aristocratic waffles. The
youths and maidens were given full license to parade arm in arm along
the streets singing "Hossen, hossen, hossen!" and making the town ring
with their mirth and laughter. The first _Kermis_ held at New
Amsterdam was in October, 1659. Booths were arranged on the parade
ground, and barter and sale and merrymaking went on gaily for six
weeks, to the unspeakable joy of the little Hendricks and Jans and
Annetjes who wandered from booth to booth.
But keen as the delight of the Dutch children may have been, there was
in their minds the hope of even better things to come a few weeks
later, at their own especial, particular, undisputed feast of St.
Nicholas, the beloved Santa Claus, patron saint of children in general
and of young Netherlanders in particular. The 6th of December was the
day dedicated to this genial benefactor, and on the eventful night a
white sheet was spread on the floor. Around this stood the children
singing {117} songs of welcome, of which the most popular was the
familiar
Saint Nicholaes, goed heilig man,
Trekt uw'besten tabbard aan,
En reist daamee naar Amsterdam,
Von Amsterdam naar Spanje.
If the Saint would ride forth thus accoutered and if he would do what
they asked of him, the children explained that they would be his good
friends, as for that matter they always had been, and would serve him
as long as they lived. At last the fateful moment arrived. A shower
of sweets was hurled through the open door and amid the general
scramble appeared the Saint in full vestments attended by a servant
known as _Knecht Ruprecht_, and, after the Dutch settlements in
America, a black man, who added much to the fascination and excitement
of the occasion. He held in one hand an open sack into which to put
particularly ill-behaved children, while in the other hand he carried a
bunch of rods, which he shook vigorously from time to time. The good
Saint meanwhile smilingly distributed to the children the parcels that
he had brought, and, after these had all been opened and the presents
had been sufficiently {118} admired, the children dropped into their
trundle-beds to dream of all the glories of the day.
When the dust-sheet and litter of wrappings had been removed, the older
people gathered around a table spread with a white cloth and set out
with chocolate punch and a dish of steaming hot chestnuts, while the
inevitable pipe, ornamented with a head of St. Nicholas, made its
appearance and the evening ended with dancing and song in honor of the
"goed heilig man."
Besides these stated anniversaries, home life had its more intimate
festivities such as those celebrating the birth of a child, whose
christening was made quite a solemn event. Every church owned its
_doop-becken_ or dipping bowl from which the water was taken to be
dropped on the baby's head. One beautiful bowl of silver dating from
the year 1695 is still in existence in a New York church. About a week
after the birth of the little New Netherlander, the neighbors were
summoned to rejoice with the proud father and mother. In the early
days of the colony and in the farming region, these gatherings were as
rude and simple as they were under similar conditions in Holland. The
men were invited at noon to partake of a long pipe and a bottle of gin
and bitters. The women arrived {119} later to find spread for their
entertainment dishes of rusks spread with aniseed and known as muisjes
or mice, accompanied by eggnog. As society grew more sophisticated in
the colony, these simple gatherings gave place to the elaborate caudle
parties, where the caudle was served in silver bowls hung about with
spoons that each guest might ladle out for himself into a china cup the
rich compound of lemons, raisins, and spiced wine. It is evident that
there was no lack of material good cheer among the colonists of New
Netherland, and we may be sure that the boys and girls secured their
share of substantials and dainties. I fear they were rather rough and
rude, these young burghers, for all the reports which we have of them
show them always in conflict with law and order. The boys especially,
owing to deficient schooling facilities, were quite out of hand. They
set dogs upon the night watchman at New Amsterdam and shouted
"Indians!" to frighten him in his rounds. They tore the clothes from
each other's backs in the schoolroom where the unfortunate master was
striving to keep order. In Fort Orange sliding became so fast and
furious that the legislators were obliged to threaten the confiscation
of the _slees_, and it was no doubt with a keen realization of the
{120} behavior of their offspring that the inhabitants of Flatbush
inserted these words in the articles of agreement with the new
schoolmaster: "He shall demean himself patient and friendly towards the
children and be active and attentive to their improvement."
However little learning from books entered into the lives of the young
colonists, much that was stimulating to the imagination came to them by
word of mouth from the _wilden_, from the negroes, and from their
elders as they sat about the blazing fire in the twilight, or
_schemerlicht_. Then the tales were told of phantom ships, of ghosts
walking on the cliffs of the Highlands, and of the unlucky wight who
found his death in the river where he had sworn to plunge in spite of
the Devil, a spot which still bears the name of Spuyten Duyvil in
memory of the rash boast.
We may find it hard to reconcile the reputation of the Dutch as a
phlegmatic and unimaginative people with the fact that they and their
children endowed the Hudson with more glamour, more of the supernatural
and of elfin lore than haunts any other waterway in America. Does the
explanation perhaps lie in the fact that the Dutch colonists, coming
from a small country situated on a level {121} plain where the
landscape was open as far as the eye could see, and left no room for
mystery, were suddenly transplanted to a region shut in between
overhanging cliffs where lightning flashed and thunder rolled from
mountain wall to mountain wall, where thick forests obscured the view,
and strange aboriginal savages hid in the underbrush? Was it not the
sense of wonder springing from this change in their accustomed
surroundings that peopled the dim depths of the _hinterland_ with
shapes of elf and goblin, of demons and super-human presences?
At any rate the spirit of mystery lurked on the outskirts of the Dutch
settlements, and the youthful burghers along the Hudson were fed full
on tales, mostly of a terrifying nature, drawn from the folklore of
three races, the Dutch, the Indians, and the Africans, with some few
strands interwoven from local legend and tradition that had already
grown up along the banks of the Hudson.
It was a simple but by no means a pitiable life that was led in those
days by burghers and farmers alike on the shores of this great river.
Never does the esteemed Diedrich Knickerbocker come nearer the truth
than when he says: "Happy would it have been for New Amsterdam could it
always {122} have existed in this state of blissful ignorance and lowly
simplicity; but alas! the days of childhood are too sweet to last.
Cities, like men, grow out of them in time and are doomed alike to grow
into the bustle, the cares and the miseries of the world."
[1] In 1657 the burgomasters and _schepens_ were authorized to create a
great _burger-recht_ the members of which should be in a sense a
privileged class. It was set forth that "whereas in all beginnings
some thing or person must be the first so that afterward a distinction
may take place, in like manner it must be in establishing the great and
small citizenship." For which reason the line of great burghers was
drawn as follows: first, those who had been members of the supreme
government; second, the burgomasters and _schepens_ of the city past
and present; third, ministers of the gospel; fourth, officers of the
militia from the staff to the ensign included. The privileges of this
caste were open to the male descendants of each class; but as they
could be secured by others outside the sacred circle on payment of
fifty guilders it is difficult to understand wherein the exclusiveness
lay. The small burghers were decreed to be those who had lived in the
city for a year and six weeks and had kept fire and light, those born
within the town, and those who had married the daughters of citizens.
A payment of twenty guilders was exacted of all such. This effort to
promote class distinctions was soon abandoned. In 1668 the distinction
was abolished and every burgher, on payment of fifty guilders, was
declared entitled to all burgher privileges.
{123}