l^EW  YORK
 

CHAPTEE I.

DISCOVERY AND FIRST SETTLEMENT.    1609-1626.

Early in September, 1609, the ship "Half-Moon,**
restlessly skirting the American coast, in the vain
quest for a strait or other water route leading to India,
came to the mouth of a great lonely river, flowing
silently out from the heart of the unknown continent.
The " Half-Moon " was a small, clumsy, high-pooped yacht,
manned by a score of Dutch and English sea-dogs, and
commanded by an English adventurer then in Dutch
pay, and known to his employers as Hendrik Hudson.
He, his craft, and his crew were all typical of the age, —
an age fertile in adventure-loving explorers, eager to
sail under any flag that promised glory and profit, at
no matter what cost of hardship and danger; an age
fertile also beyond measure in hardy seamen, of whom
the hardiest and bravest came from England and the
Netherlands. It was a period when the greatest deeds
were done on the ocean by these rough heroes of cutlass
and compass.    They won honour by exploring unknown

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