HISTORY OF BROOKLYN. 39

a peace.’ The chiefs, assenting, ended their orations, and presenting De Vries and his colleague each with ten fathoms of wampum, the party set out for their canoes, to shorten the return of the Dutch envoys. While waiting for the tide to rise, an armed Indian, who had been dispatched by a sachem twenty miles off, came running to warn the chiefs against going to Manhattan. ‘Are you all crazy, to go to the fort,’ said he, ‘where that scoundrel lives, who has so often murdered your friends?’ But De Vries assured them that ‘they would find it otherwise, and come home again with large presents.’ One of the chiefs replied at once: ‘Upon your words we will go; for the Indians have never heard lies from you, as they have from other Swannekens.’ Embarking in a large canoe, the Dutch envoys, accompanied by eighteen Indian delegates, set out from Rockaway, and reached Fort Amsterdam about three o’clock in the afternoon.” A treaty was presently made with these Long Island savages, and, through their aid and influence, with the River tribes. But confidence was not fully restored; and in September following, hostilities again broke out, and the atrocities committed by the savages on the North River struck consternation to the hearts of the Dutch at Fort Amsterdam. Kieft again summoned the people to council, and they elected Eight Men to represent them in the deliberations concerning "the critical condition of the country.” They advised that peace should be maintained with the Long Island Indians, and that they should be encouraged to become allies in war; but, that war should be actively prosecuted against the River Indians; and that a large force of militia should be forthwith enlisted and equipped. Before these preparations could be effected, however, the Indians fell upon the Westchester settlements, Maspeth, and Gravesend, all of which, except the latter, were laid waste. Long Island, in the language of an eye-witness, was “almost destitute of inhabitants and stock;” while from the Highlands of Neversink to the valley of Tappan, the Indian rule became more supreme. Even Manhattan Island was daily threatened; and seven allied tribes, “well supplied with musket, powder, and ball,” hovered menacingly around the insufficient fort at New Amsterdam, where trembling families were closely huddled together, and the cattle were beginning to starve for lack of forage. “Fear coming more