44 HISTORY OF BROOKLYN.

Chambers of the West India Company concerning certain details of the new government of the province, delayed the recall of Kieft from the position which he filled so discreditably to himself and so disastrously to the public interests. His situation at this time was far from agreeable; the commonalty, informed of his intended recall, did not hesitate to express their satisfaction, and the director, irritated by their ill-concealed joy and reproaches, vented his spleen by fining and banishing those who were most outspoken. This was denounced as tyranny, and thereupon arose wranglings between himself and the people. Yet, amid these dissensions, which embittered the remainder of Kieft's term of office, progress was steadily made in the settlement and colonization of the country. On the east side of the North River, above Manhattan Island, in the summer of 1646, Adriaen Vander Donck established a patroonship, which is now represented by the town of Yonkers; and shortly after, Antonissen van Slyck, of Breuckelen, received from Kieft a patent for “the land of Kaatskill,” on the North River, where he established a colony.

As will be seen from the preceding pages, the occupation of land within the limits of the present city of Brooklyn, commencing with the Bennet and Bentyn purchase of 1636, had steadily progressed, until now (1646) nearly the whole water-front from Newtown Creek to the southerly side of Gowanus Bay was in the possession of individuals who were engaged in its actual cultivation. Small hamlets, or neighborhoods, also, seem to have grown up at the original centres of settlement, known respectively as “The Gowanus,“1 “The Waal-bogt,”2 and “The Ferrry.”3 About a mile to the southeast of this latter locality, and lying between the “Waal-bogt” plantations and those at Gowanus, was a tract, spoken of in the early patents as “Mereckawieck, on the Kil (or Creek) of Gowanus,” and which was, undoubtedly, the residence of the tribe of that name. Here were the “maize lands” or planting grounds, which, in 1643 (ante, pages 36 and 37) were so unjustly despoiled by the covetous whites; and of which, during the war which ensued, the

1. See page 23, and note.

2. See page 24, note; also Appendix No. 1.

3. Identical with the present Fulton Ferry, at foot of Fulton street, Brooklyn, p. 35