36               Review  of the   Letter

at the southern base, in a sort of cove, is situated the
city of Hoorn. Both of these cities were, in Mr. Mi¬
chaelius' time, enterprising commercial towns and con¬
siderable seaports. No two places, excepting of course
Amsterdam, are more closely and intimately identified
with the early history of New Netherland. Hoorn, es¬
pecially, had a prominent share in the early fur trade
between Holland and Manhattan, and several of its ships
continued to ply between here and the mother country
long after the fur trade had lost its prime importance.
It is therefore not a mere accident that Manhattan's
first preacher was from this place or its neighborhood.
Nor is it strange that his earliest existing letter was
written to a prominent citizen of Hoorn, who, as a
Diredor of the West India Company for the Northern
Quarter, took a most adive interest in the healthy de¬
velopment of the colony.