A History of New York

by Washington Irving

  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, and sundry other ingenious dutch fantasies. The beaux distinguished themselves by their adroitness in replenishing this pot, from a huge copper tea kettle, which would have made the pigmy macaronies of these degenerate days, sweat, merely to look at it. To sweeten the beverage, a lump of sugar was laid beside each cup—and the company alternately nibbled and sipped with great decorum, until an improvement was introduced by a shrewd and economic old lady, which was to suspend a large lump directly over the tea table, by a string from the ceiling, so that it could be swung from mouth to mouth—an ingenious expedient, which is still kept up by some families in Albany; but which prevails without exception, in Communipaw, Bergen, Flat-Bush, and all our uncontaminated dutch villages.

  At these primitive tea-parties the utmost propriety and dignity of deportment prevailed. No flirting nor coquetting—no gambling of old ladies nor hoyden chattering and romping of young ones—No self satisfied struttings of wealthy gentlemen with their brains in their pockets—nor amusing conceits, and monkey divertisements of smart young gentlemen, with no brains at all. On the contrary, the young ladies seated themselves demurely in their rush-bottomed chairs, and knit their own woollen stockings; nor ever opened their lips, excepting to say yah Mynher, or yah, ya Vrouw, to any question that was asked them; behaving in all things, like decent, well educated damsels. As to the gentlemen, each of them tranquilly smoked his pipe, and seemed lost in contemplation of the blue and white tiles, with which the fire-places were decorated; wherein sundry passages of scripture, were piously pourtrayed—Tobit and his dog figured to great advantage; Haman swung conspicuously on his gibbet, and Jonah appeared most manfully bouncing out of the whale, like Harlequin through a barrel of fire.

  The parties broke up without noise and without confusion—for, strange as it may seem, the ladies and gentlemen were content to take their own cloaks and shawls and hats; not dreaming, simple souls! of the ingenious system of exchange established in modern days; by which those who first leave a party are authorized to choose the best shawl or hat they can find—a custom which has doubtless arisen in consequence of our commercial habits. They were carried home by their own carriages, that is to say, by the vehicles nature had provided them, excepting such of the wealthy, as could afford to keep a waggon. The gentlemen gallantly attended their fair ones to their respective abodes, and took leave of them with a hearty smack at the door: which as it was an established piece of etiquette, done in perfect simplicity and honesty of heart, occasioned no scandal at that time, nor should it at the present—if our great grandfathers approved of the custom, it would argue a great want of reverence in their descendants to say a word against it.

  CHAPTER IV

  Containing further particulars of the Golden Age,

  and what constituted a fine Lady and Gentleman in the days

  of Walter the Doubter.

  In this dulcet period of my history, when the beauteous island of Mannahata presented a scene, the very counterpart of those glowing pictures drawn by old Hesiod of the golden reign of Saturn, there was a happy ignorance, an honest simplicity prevalent among its inhabitants, which were I even able to depict, would be but little understood by the degenerate age for which I am doomed to write. Even the female sex, those arch innovaters upon the tranquillity, the honesty, and grey-beard customs of society, seemed for a while to conduct themselves with incredible sobriety and comeliness, and indeed behaved almost as if they had not been sent into the world, to bother mankind, baffle philosophy, and confound the universe.

  Their hair untortured by the abominations of art, was scrupulously pomatomed back from their foreheads with a candle, and covered with a little cap of quilted calico, which fitted exactly to their heads. Their petticoats of linsey woolsey, were striped with a variety of gorgeous dyes, rivalling the many coloured robes of Iris—though I must confess these gallant garments were rather short, scarce reaching below the knee; but then they made up in the number, which generally equalled that of the gentlemen’s small clothes; and what is still more praiseworthy, they were all of their own manufacture—of which circumstance, as may well be supposed, they were not a little vain.

  These were the honest days, in which every woman staid at home, read the bible and wore pockets—aye, and that too of a goodly size, fashioned with patch-work into many curious devices, and ostentatiously worn on the outside. These in fact, were convenient receptacles, where all good housewives carefully stored away such things as they wished to have at hand; by which means they often came to be incredibly crammed—and I remember there was a story current when I was a boy, that the lady of Wouter Van Twiller, having occasion to empty her right pocket in search of a wooden ladle, the contents filled three corn baskets, and the utensil was at length discovered lying among some rubbish in one corner—but we must not give too much faith to all these stories; the anecdotes of these remote periods being very subject to exaggeration.

  Beside these notable pockets, they likewise wore scissars and pincushions suspended from their girdles by red ribbands, or among the more opulent and shewy classes, by brass and even silver chains—indubitable tokens of thrifty housewives and industrious spinsters. I cannot say much in vindication of the shortness of the petticoats; it doubtless was introduced for the purpose of giving the stockings a chance to be seen, which were generally of blue worsted with magnificent red clocks—or perhaps to display a well turned ankle, and a neat, though serviceable foot; set off by a high-heel’d leathern shoe, with a large and splendid silver buckle. Thus we find, that the gentle sex in all ages, have shewn the same disposition to infringe a little upon the laws of decorum, in order to betray a lurking beauty, or gratify an innocent love of finery.

  From the sketch here given it will be seen, that our good grandmothers differed considerably in their ideas of a fine figure, from their scantily dressed descendants of the present day. A fine lady, in those times, waddled under more clothes even on a fair summer’s day, than would have clad the whole bevy of a modern ball room. Nor were they the less admired by the gentlemen in consequence thereof. On the contrary, the greatness of a lover’s passion seemed to encrease in proportion to the magnitude of its object—and a voluminous damsel, arrayed in a dozen of petticoats, was declared by a low-dutch sonnetteer of the province, to be radiant as a sunflower, and luxuriant as a full blown cabbage. Certain it is, that in those days, the heart of a lover could not contain more than one lady at a time; whereas the heart of a modern gallant has often room enough to accommodate half a dozen—The reason of which I conclude to be, either that the hearts of the gentlemen have grown larger, or the persons of the ladies smaller—this however is a question for physiologists to determine.

  But there was a secret charm in these petticoats, which no doubt entered into the consideration of the prudent gallant. The wardrobe of a lady was in those days her only fortune; and she who had a good stock of petticoats and stockings, was as absolutely an heiress, as is a Kamschatka damsel with a store of bear skins, or a Lapland belle with a plenty of rein deer. The ladies therefore, were very anxious to display these powerful attractions to the greatest advantage; and the best rooms in the house instead of being adorned with caricatures of dame nature, in water colours and needle work, were always hung round with abundance of homespun garments; the manufacture and property of the females—a piece of laudable ostentation that still prevails among the heiresses of our dutch villages. Such were the beauteous belles of the ancient city of New Amsterdam, rivalling in primæval simplicity of manners, the renowned and courtly dames, so loftily sung by Dan Homer—who tells us that the princess Nausicaa, washed the family linen, and the fair Penelope wove her own petticoats.

  The gentlemen in fact, who figured in the circles of the gay world in these ancient times, corresponded in most particulars, with the beauteous dams
els whose smiles they were ambitious to deserve. True it is, their merits would make but a very inconsiderable impression, upon the heart of a modern fair; they neither drove in their curricles nor sported their tandems, for as yet those gaudy vehicles were not even dreamt of—neither did they distinguish themselves by their brilliance at the table, and their consequent rencontres with watchmen, for our forefathers were of too pacific a disposition to need those guardians of the night, every soul throughout the town being in full snore before nine o’clock. Neither did they establish their claims by gentility at the expense of their taylors—for as yet those offenders against the pockets of society, and the tranquillity of all aspiring young gentlemen, were unknown in New Amsterdam; every good housewife made the clothes of her husband and family, and even the goede vrouw of Van Twiller himself, thought it no disparagement to cut out her husband’s linsey woolsey galligaskins.

  Not but what there were some two or three youngsters who manifested the first dawnings of what is called fire and spirit. Who held all labour in contempt; skulked about docks and market places; loitered in the sun shine; squandered what little money they could procure at hustle cap and chuck farthing, swore, boxed, fought cocks, and raced their neighbours’ horses—in short who promised to be the wonder, the talk and abomination of the town, had not their stylish career been unfortunately cut short, by an affair of honour with a whipping post.

  Far other, however, was the truly fashionable gentleman of those days—his dress, which served for both morning and evening, street and drawing room, was a linsey woolsey coat, made perhaps by the fair hands of the mistress of his affections, and gallantly bedecked with abundance of large brass buttons.—Half a score of breeches heightened the proportions of his figure—his shoes were decorated by enormous copper buckles—a low crowned broad brimmed hat overshadowed his burley visage, and his hair dangled down his back, in a prodigious queue of eel skin.

  Thus equipped, he would manfully sally forth with pipe in mouth to besiege some fair damsel’s obdurate heart—not such a pipe, good reader, as that which Acis did sweetly tune in praise of his Galatea, but one of true delft manufacture and furnished with a charge of fragrant Cow-pen tobacco. With this would he resolutely set himself down before the fortress, and rarely failed in the process of time to smoke the fair enemy into a surrender, upon honourable terms.

  Such was the happy reign of Wouter Van Twiller, celebrated in many a long forgotten song as the real golden age, the rest being nothing but counterfeit copper-washed coin. In that delightful period, a sweet and holy calm reigned over the whole province. The Burgomaster smoked his pipe in peace—the substantial solace of his domestic house, his well petticoated yffrouw, after her daily cares were done, sat soberly at her door, with arms crossed over her apron of snowy white, without being insulted by ribald street walkers or vagabond boys—those unlucky urchins, who do so infest our streets, displaying under the roses of youth, the thorns and briars of iniquity. Then it was that the lover with ten breeches and the damsel with petticoats of half a score indulged in all the innocent endearments of virtuous love, without fear and without reproach—for what had that virtue to fear, which was defended by a shield of good linsey woolseys, equal at least to the seven bull hides of the invincible Ajax.

  Thrice happy, and never to be forgotten age! when every thing was better than it has ever been since, or ever will be again—when Buttermilk channel was quite dry at low water—when the shad in the Hudson were all salmon, and when the moon shone with a pure and resplendent whiteness, instead of that melancholy yellow light, which is the consequence of her sickening at the abominations she every night witnesses in this degenerate city!

  CHAPTER V

  In which the reader is beguiled into a delectable walk, which

  ends very differently from what it commenced.

  In the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and four, on a fine afternoon, in the mellow month of October, I took my customary walk upon the battery, which is at once the pride and bulwark of this ancient and impregnable city of New York. I remember well the season, for it immediately preceded that remarkably cold winter, in which our sagacious corporation, in a spasm of economical philanthropy, pulled to pieces, at an expense of several hundred dollars, the wooden ramparts, which had cost them several thousand; and distributed the rotten fragments, which were worth considerably less than nothing, among the shivering poor of the city—never, since the fall of the walls of Jericho, or the heaven built battlements of Troy, had there been known such a demolition—nor did it go unpunished; five men, eleven old women and nineteen children, besides cats, dogs and negroes, were blinded, in vain attempts to smoke themselves warm, with this charitable substitute for firewood, and an epidemic complaint of sore eyes was moreover produced, which has since recurred every winter; particularly among those who undertake to burn rotten logs—who warm themselves with the charity of others—or who use patent chimnies.

  On the year and month just designated, did I take my accustomed walk of meditation, on that same battery, which, though at present, no battery, furnishes the most delightful walk, and commands the noblest prospect, in the whole known world. The ground on which I trod was hallowed by recollections of the past, and as I slowly wandered through the long alleys of poplars, which, like so many birch brooms standing on end, diffused a melancholy and lugubrious shade, my imagination drew a contrast between the surrounding scenery, and what it was in the classic days of our forefathers. Where the government house by name, but the custom house by occupation, proudly reared its brick walls and wooden pillars; there whilome stood the low but substantial, red tiled mansion of the renowned Wouter Van Twiller. Around it the mighty bulwarks of fort Amsterdam frowned defiance to every absent foe; but, like many a whiskered warrior and gallant militia captain, confined their martial deeds to frowns alone—alas! those threatening bulwarks had long since been sapped by time, and like the walls of Carthage, presented no traces to the enquiring eye of the antiquarian. The mud breast works had long been levelled with the earth, and their scite converted into the green lawns and leafy alleys of the battery; where the gay apprentice sported his sunday coat, and the laborious mechanic, relieved from the dirt and drudgery of the week, poured his septennial tale of love into the half averted ear of the sentimental chambermaid. The capacious bay still presented the same expansive sheet of water, studded with islands, sprinkled with fishing boats, and bounded by shores of picturesque beauty. But the dark forests which once clothed these shores had been violated by the savage hand of cultivation, and their tangled mazes, and impracticable thickets, had degenerated into teeming orchards and waving fields of grain. Even Governors Island, once a smiling garden, appertaining to the sovereigns of the province, was now covered with fortifications, inclosing a tremendous block house—so that this once peaceful island resembled a fierce little warrior in a big cocked hat, breathing gunpowder and defiance to the world!

  For some time did I indulge in this pensive train of thought; contrasting in sober sadness, the present day, with the hallowed years behind the mountains; lamenting the melancholy progress of improvement, and praising the zeal, with which our worthy burghers endeavour to preserve the wrecks of venerable customs, prejudices and errors, from the overwhelming tide of modern innovation—when by degrees my ideas took a different turn, and I insensibly awakened to an enjoyment of the beauties around me.

  It was one of those rich autumnal days which heaven particularly bestows upon the beauteous island of Mannahata and its vicinity—not a floating cloud obscured the azure firmament—the sun, rolling in glorious splendour through his etherial course, seemed to expand his honest dutch countenance into an unusual expression of benevolence, as he smiled his evening salutation upon a city, which he delights to visit with his most bounteous beams—the very winds seemed to hold in their breaths in mute attention, lest they should ruffle the tranquillity of the hour—and the waveless bosom of the bay presented a polished mirror, in which nature beheld herself
and smiled!—The standard of our city, which, like a choice handkerchief, is reserved for days of gala, hung motionless on the flag staff, which forms the handle to a gigantic churn; and even the tremulous leaves of the poplar and the aspen, which, like the tongues of the immortal sex, are seldom still, now ceased to vibrate to the breath of heaven. Every thing seemed to acquiesce in the profound repose of nature.—The formidable eighteen pounders slept in the embrazures of the wooden batteries, seemingly gathering fresh strength, to fight the battles of their country on the next fourth of July—the solitary drum on Governor’s island forgot to call the garrison to their shovels—the evening gun had not yet sounded its signal, for all the regular, well meaning poultry throughout the country, to go to roost; and the fleet of canoes, at anchor between Gibbet Island and Communipaw, slumbered on their rakes, and suffered the innocent oysters to lie for a while unmolested, in the soft mud of their native banks!—My own feelings sympathized in the contagious tranquillity, and I should infallibly have dozed upon one of those fragments of benches, which our benevolent magistrates have provided for the benefit of convalescent loungers, had not the extraordinary inconvenience of the couch set all repose at defiance.