HISTORY OF BROOKLYN. 133

But Gov. Stuyvesant was obdurate, and Sheriff Tonneman was instructed “to remind those of Breuckelen, once more, to fulfil their engagement, and to execute their promise relative to the salary of Mr. Polhemus.”1 The good minister, meantime, seems to have been put to much inconvenience, if not absolute suffering, by these quarrels among his parishioners; for on the 14th of December, 1656, he wrote to the Director that his house (at Flatbush) was not yet enclosed, and that, in consequence, himself, wife, and children were obliged to sleep in the cold upon the floor.2 Forced to an unwilling compliance with this order, the people of Breuckelen contented themselves with reasserting, through their magistrates, that the arrangement of 300 guilders for Mr. Polhemus’s salary was made without their consent—that they really were unable to pay it—but, unwilling to resist the Governor and Council, they would endeavor to raise the amount in some way. They took the opportunity, however, of notifying their Honors, that after the expiration of Mr. Polhemus’s first year (on April 7, 1657), they should hold themselves excused from any further payment to him, so long as he should remain there, unless affairs at home, "in the Fatherland," should improve (“which God grant”)—in which event, possibly, they might be willing to make and keep another contract with him.3

The order of the magistrates of Breuckelen, imposing an assessment upon the town to pay this ministerial tax, is especially interesting, on account of its being accompanied by a list of those inhabitants of the town designated as being “in easy circumstances and well off:”

Whereas, the village of Breuckelen is taxed by the Director-General and Council, but finally with our general consent and agreement, with the sum and charge of 300 fl. provisionally for this year, as a supplement of the promised salary and yearly allowance of the Rev. minister De. J. Theodorus Polhemus, therefore have we, of the Court of Brooklyn, to raise said sum of 300 fl. aforesaid in the easiest manner, assessed and taxed each person, inhabitant of Breuckelen and its dependencies, as hereunder is more fully set forth and to be seen; all, according to our conscience and our opinion, in easy circumstances and well off: wherefore, Simon Jooster, our

1 N. Y. Col. MSS., viii. 410. 2 Ibid., viii. 296. 3 Alb. Rec., iv.