HISTORY OF BROOKLYN. 161

persons and estates, if found; if not sufficient, however, they were directed to make a new rate upon the town.1

This year, also, Breuckelen, with five other towns in the West Riding, petitioned the Court of Sessions “for liberty to transport wheat.” Their petition was referred to the Governor.

In the year 1673, however, by an event as sudden as it was unexpected, the whole of New Netherland passed again under the control of the States-General. Early in that year, news was received that England and Holland were again involved in war. Orders were also forwarded to Gov. Lovelace to put the province in a proper state of defence; but so lacking was he in the means necessary to fortify the city of New York, that a Dutch fleet, under Captains Binckes and Evertsen, returning from a predatory excursion against the French and English West India trade, entered the harbor on the 30th of July, and captured the place without firing a gun. Captain Anthony Colve was appointed Governor of the province by the naval commanders, and immediately began to reinstate the Dutch government. The city was denominated New Orange and the fort William Hendrick, in honor of the Staadt Holder. On the 14th of August, 1673, the new Governor issued a proclamation requiring each of the Long Island towns to send two deputies to the city, with full powers to tender their submission to the States-General and the Prince of Orange. The five Dutch towns, rejoiced to find themselves once more under their old masters, submitted with alacrity; but the other towns showed an inclination to evade the order and to seek the protection of their former ally, the English Colony of Connecticut; and eventually, in spite of Gov. Colve's efforts to the contrary, Southampton, Easthampton, and Southold succeeded in joining themselves to the jurisdiction of that colony. In Breuckelen and the adjoining hamlets, fifty-two out of eighty-one men took the oath of allegiance, and the remainder were ordered to comply.2

In October following, a code of “Provisional Instructions” was received from the new governor, for the guidance of the magistrates in the future government of their towns, although in some minor

1 General Entries, iv. 12.

2 N. Y. Col. MS., xxiii. 14, 40, 51; N. Y. Col. Doc., ii. 573, 580, 586, 589, 596.