The Life and Times of Kateri Tekakwitha Part 3

The influx of liquor to the Iroquois castles led to reckless debauches, fast following in the track of the small-pox, which stalked with unchecked violence through the Long House in 1660. During the course of the following year an important transaction took place between the white settlers on the Hudson and the Indians along the Mohawk, or Maquaas Kill. "A certain parcel of land," to use the words of the old deed, "called in Dutch the Groote Vlachte (Great Flatt), lying behind Fort Orange, between the same and the Mohawk country," was sold by Mohawk chiefs--Cantuquo (whose mark was a Bear); Aiadane, a Turtle; Sonareetsie, a Wolf; and Sodachdra.s.se--to Sieur Arent van Corlaer, July 27, 1661. "A grant under the provincial seal was issued in the following year, but the land was not surveyed or divided until 1664." The Indian name of the Great Flatt was Schonowe, and the new village of white settlers which soon sprang up on the south bank of the Mohawk was called Schenectady by the Dutch and English; though the French, who did not for some time learn of its existence, first knew this little outpost of Fort Orange by the name of Corlaer,[19] the earliest settler.

This founding of Schenectady was an event of deep interest to the Mohawks of Gandawague. It brought the dwellings of the white race closer than ever before to their own stronghold, almost in fact to the very door of the Kanonsionni, or People of the Long House. The settlers began at once to rear their wonderful wooden palaces, for such they must have seemed to the simple children of the forest. The wild banks of the Maquaas Kill had hitherto shown no prouder architecture than the long bark houses of the Mohawks, which nevertheless were much in advance of the wigwams or tents of the roving Algonquin tribes. The Indians of Gandawague must have hastened down in their canoes to watch the building of Schenectady, and listened with interest and curiosity to the strange buzz of the newly erected sawmill. These were already familiar sights and sounds, however, to Tekakwitha's uncle, for he had long been in the habit of trading with the Dutch and knew their ways. He often journeyed as far as their trading-house at Fort Orange. Let us follow in the footsteps of this Mohawk chief as he starts once again on the trail that leads eastward from Gandawague with furs he has been h.o.a.rding for some new purchase. Let us pa.s.s hurriedly on beyond the new abode of his friend Corlaer, and we shall then see the sights that greet him as he approaches the homes of the traders who dwell beside the Hudson,--or Cahotatea, as the chief of the Turtle Castle would call the great North River in his own language. He has other Indians of his nation with him.

These Mohawks, says the first Dutch dominie, in the account he gives of them, have good features, with black hair and eyes, and they are well proportioned; they go naked in summer, and in winter they hang loosely about them a deer's, bear's, or panther's skin, or else they sew small skins together into a square piece, or buy two and a half ells of duffels from the Dutchmen. Some of them wear shoes and stockings of deer's skins; others of plaited corn-leaves. Their hair is left growing on one side of the head only, or else worn like a c.o.c.k's comb or hog's bristles standing up in a streak from forehead to neck; some of them leave queer little locks growing here and there. Their faces are painted red and blue, so that they "look like the devil himself," continues the worthy Megapolensis. They carry a basket of bear's grease with which they smear their heads, and in travelling they take with them a maize-kettle and a wooden spoon and bowl. When it is meal-time they get fire very quickly by rubbing pieces of wood together; and they cook and devour their fish and venison without the preliminary cleaning and preparing considered necessary among civilized folks. When they feel pain they say, "Ugh! the devil bites," and when they wish to compliment their own nation they say, "Really the Mohawks are very cunning devils."

They make no offerings to their good genius or national G.o.d, Tharonyawagon; but they worship the demon Otkon or Aireskoi, praying in this way, "Forgive us for not eating our enemies!" and in hot weather, "I thank thee, Devil, I thank thee, Oomke, for the cool breeze." They laugh at the Dutch prayers, the dominie tells us, and also at the sermon. They call the Christians of Fort Orange cloth-makers (_a.s.syreoni_) and iron-workers (_charistooni_).

These uncouth travellers from Gandawague, among whom is the uncle of Tekakwitha, are fast nearing the homes of these same cloth-makers and iron-workers. Let us hasten to overtake them, and find our way with them into the settlement of Rensselaerwyck. You who dwell in New York State and you who travel through it, come with us now to visit old Fort Orange and the little town of Beverwyck! You above all who love to trace your lineage to the staid old Dutchmen of New Netherlands, come! Let us see the homes of these grandsires whose names appear so often in the record and ancient annals of our oldest chartered city. Come, too, you sons of English colonists, and see the flag of England float strangely in the Hudson River breezes while they are still loaded with the c.u.mbrous sounds of the Low Dutch language! We will stay and see the laws of England put an end to queer old wordy wars between the stately Dutch patroon Van Rensselaer and Peter Stuyvesant, the doughty old Director-general, last and greatest of the four Dutch governors,--the one called "Wooden Leg" by Indians, and "Hard-headed Pete" by Dutchmen; though the poets say he had a _silver leg_, and the artists love to paint him with a gallant flourish as he stumped it down the street beside some pretty, quaintly dressed colonial belle. His were the days of knee-breeches and gigantic silver buckles, of ruffles and queues, of broad, short petticoats bedecked with mighty pockets, and of scissors and keys that hung from the belt,--the days of demure tea-parties and hilarious coasting-parties, of negro slaves and of sugar-loaf hats. As for weapons of war, the muskets they carried were strange and clumsy arms, with long, portable rests and "two fathoms of match," which the soldier must needs have with him, besides the heavy armor and the queer tackle for ammunition. No wonder that the wearers of such gear dreaded wars with the nimble savages!

Rip Van Winkle, after sleeping twenty years, awoke to painful changes; he was sadly out of date. It would surely then be cruel, even if we had the power, to wake old Peter Stuyvesant and the people of his day from full two hundred years of slumber in our graveyards just to criticise their dress and talk. Let us rather go to sleep ourselves and dream about them. Take a good strong dose of una.s.sorted, crude, colonial history interspersed with annals, and the necessary drowsiness will surely follow. Have you tried it? Are you sure the spell is not upon you now, having stopped to look at Stuyvesant, and heard the dominie describe the Mohawks? The smoke of pipes and chimneys is at hand, for here we are at old Fort Orange in the times of Tekakwitha. Let us look about, before the power to do it fails us out of very sleepiness. We find ourselves within a wall of stockadoes. The chief and his friends from Kaghnuwage are undoing their packs of furs near the northern gate of the town. We stand in Albany, at the corner of Broadway and State Street,--but no! those names are not yet in vogue. We are in Beverwyck, at the point where the long, rambling Handelaer Street, running parallel with Hudson's River, crosses the broad, short Joncaer Street, which climbs some little distance up the hill. Before us is the old Dutch church. It stands by itself, at the intersection of the two streets, fronting south. It is a low, square, plain stone building, with a four-sided roof rising to a central summit surmounted by a small cupola or belfry containing the famous little bell just sent over from Holland by the Dutch West India Company; on this belfry is upreared a saucy little weatherc.o.c.k. The south porch or vestibule is approached by a large stone step before the princ.i.p.al door. If the church were not locked, we might take a look inside at the carved oaken pulpit with its queer little bracket for the dominie's hourgla.s.s. The burghers subscribed twenty-five beaver-skins to buy that pulpit, and a splendid one it was. It soon came sailing over the sea in a plump Dutch ship.

The patrons of the colony finding the beaver-skins much damaged when the package was opened at Amsterdam had added seventy-five guilders themselves towards the purchase, besides presenting the bell outright.

When Dominie Megapolensis first arrived in the colony, "nine benches"

were enough to seat the whole congregation; but that was a generation ago. Now it has increased; and the church, which was then a wooden structure near the old fort by the river, has been rebuilt. The Van Rensselaers, the Wendels, the Schuylers and the Van der Blaas have the leading pews; they have already sent to Europe for stained gla.s.s windows blazoned with their family arms. Having seen the church, let us walk up Joncaer (State) Street to the dominie's. We pa.s.s through the market-place, which is out in the middle of the open, gra.s.sy s.p.a.ce, on a line with the church. We stop a moment to look at the house of Anneke Janse, the heiress, and then move on to Parrell (Pearl) Street. There, on the northeast corner of Parrell and Joncaer Streets, gable end foremost, stands the comfortable abode of Dominie Schaats, which is the pride and envy of the town. Every part of this, the first brick house in the New World, is said to have been imported from Holland,--bricks, woodwork, tiles, and also the ornamental irons with which it is profusely adorned,--all expressly for the use of the Rev. Gideon Schaets (or Schaats), who came over in 1652. The materials of the house arrived simultaneously with the bell and pulpit in 1657.[20]

From Schaats' house we see, instead of a solitary "old elm-tree" on the opposite corner, many trees of different kinds, one in front of each of the straggling houses on either side of Joncaer Street; and by the age of the tree one can tell pretty well the order in which the different settlers arrived and began to domesticate themselves. This was no sooner done than the inevitable shade-tree was planted to overshadow the dwelling, and beneath this tree they bring the cow each evening to be milked. Around every house is a garden with a well; and the stoop at the front door is supplied with wooden seats or benches. There old and young gather in the evening when the day's work is over.

The upper half of the front door remains open all day in summer, while the lower half bars out the stray chickens and dogs. It is opened now and then, however, to let the children in and out, and once in a while a buxom _vrouw_ leans out to chat with a pa.s.ser-by, or perhaps to scold the little ones or to bid them beware of straying near the trading-house for fear of encountering a tipsy Indian. This trading-house is outside the wall of stockadoes, or upright posts, encircling the town. The traders of Beverwyck are all obliged "to ride their stockadoes,"--that is to say, to furnish the pine posts, thirteen feet long and one foot in diameter, for repairing the wooden wall. This duty falls alike on every inhabitant, at the command of the burgomasters and schepens. They are furthermore bound to take turns in drawing firewood to the trading-house for the use of the Indians when they come there from the Maquaas country loaded with packs of furs.

Above Dominie Schaats' house and on the same side of Joncaer Street is the Corps de Garde, a small block fort where a few soldiers are stationed. There the progress of our walk is checked by the stout wall of stockadoes. One of the six gates or openings, however, is near at hand, leading out on to the road to Schenectady. We wish to see more of the place, and are at a loss to find our way; so we accept the kindly offered guidance of a little Schuyler lad, named Pieter, who stands talking to one of the soldiers. Already in his boyish days this public-spirited Albanian takes an active interest in the military defence of the place. He knows where all the cannon are placed, and can tell us how they propose to improve the fort and barracks on Joncaer Street. He takes us out by the Parrell Street gate to a road leading southward toward the hamlet of Bethlehem. After the boy has shown us the mills on the Bever Kill (b.u.t.termilk Creek) from which the village of Beverwyck was named, he takes us down to old Fort Orange by the river-side.[21] It has been a snug little fort in its day, built of logs with four bastions, each mounted by two guns for throwing stones, while in the enclosure stands a large cannon on wheels close to the old trading-house of the West India Company. Since the new one has been built, this is used as the vice-director's house. It is twenty-six feet long, two stories high, constructed of boards one inch thick, with a roof in the form of a pavilion covered with old shingles. The s.p.a.ce on the second floor is one undivided room directly under the roof without a chimney, to which access can be had by a straight ladder through a trap-door.[22] Here the magistrates administer justice. This is for the time being the court-house of Beverwyck.

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD ALBANY.--DOMINIE SCHAATS' HOUSE.

(_Corner of Joncaer and Parrell Streets._)]

Fort Orange at the time of our visit is falling to decay; Fort Willemstadt, on the contrary, the military post at the head of Joncaer Street, is increasing in importance. Near Fort Orange is the great pasture or common where the cows of the burghers are grazing, and there, a short distance below the fort, we see the ferry-boat travelling slowly across the river to Greenbosch. We have caught sight of several deer and wild turkeys on the outskirts of the town, and we have pa.s.sed several patriarchal "negers" (as the magistrates of Fort Orange spell the word): and here comes the special property of Pete Schuyler in the shape of a black boy of his own age, who is followed by a troop of st.u.r.dy children, some of whom are the brothers and sisters of our young guide. There, to be sure, are Guysbert, and Gertrude (who is destined to wed Stepha.n.u.s van Cort) Alida (who will add to her own name of Schuyler the name of Van Rensselaer and afterwards Livingston);[23] while toddling after these juvenile belles of Fort Orange come Brant and Arent, their brothers, and still there are others to come. These are the numerous children of Philip Pietersen Schuyler, who came over in 1650, and of his fair _vrouw_ Margritta van Slichtenhorst. This good couple were married with great formality before Dominie Schaats arrived, by Antoni de Hooges, the secretary of the colony, whose nose has been immortalized in the Highlands of the Hudson. Their son Pieter, our little guide, is to be the first mayor of the city of Albany; while the distinguished Philip of a later date will carry the name of Schuyler to a height of glory that will linger round the shaft of the Saratoga monument at Schuylerville for ages to come, and make it glow with an added beauty!

But while our thoughts are thus running away with us from Fort Orange, a farmer, Teunis van Vechten, coming from Greenbosch with supplies for the Beverwyck market, offers the children a ride into the town, which they accept with a shout. This rouses us from our reverie, and we follow the merry load as they jog along the country road from Fort Orange to the nearest gate in the stockade (about where the street now called Hudson Avenue crosses Handelaer Street, or Broadway). With a crack of the farmer's whip they drive rapidly down into a sort of ravine, cross the Rutten Kill[24] on a bridge, and ascend the opposite slope. The farmer soon pa.s.ses the door of the Dutch Reformed Church, where our ramble began, and turning into Joncaer Street pulls up his horses at the market-place. The children scamper back across the Rutten Kill to the Schuyler store on Handelaer Street, opposite Beaver Street, and pa.s.s on down to the gra.s.sy river-side behind it, where a sloop is moored. Their father is there overseeing the men who are loading it with beaver-skins and other goods. The day's work is nearly over. The sunlight is fading from the hill-tops across the river. All will soon go in to supper. If we were not too tired we might in a few moments walk the whole length of Handelaer Street towards the north gate. In that case we would have a peep now and then through the half-open curtains of the scattered houses; for see! they are beginning to light up for the evening meal. In pa.s.sing along we would probably startle the dogs from their kennels in the gardens, and hasten the farewells of the lovers who linger on the front stoops in the gathering dusk. Then issuing by the north gate (where Steuben Street comes into Broadway), we might go by moonlight to the Patroon's house, between which and Beverwyck are corn-fields where the burghers grow corn for their slaves and also for their horses, pigs, and poultry. We would then be not far from the Patroon's mills, where all the settlers are in duty bound to go, and not elsewhere, to have their sawing and grinding done. These mills are on the Fifth, or Patroon's Kill, counting from the Norman's Kill near Kenwood.

We must not leave the neighborhood of Fort Orange and Beverwyck until we have been to a trading-house just outside of the stockade (Pemberton's was used for such a purpose at one time, and also the Glenn House).

There we shall have an opportunity to listen to some such conversation as the following between a Dutch trader and an Indian.[25] Let us suppose that the trader on this occasion is one of the enterprising burghers whom we encountered during our walk on Joncaer Street, and the Indian a Mohawk warrior in the company of Tekakwitha's uncle, who, as we have seen, travelled from Gandawague for the purpose of bartering his furs at Beverwyck.

"_Indian._ Brother, I am come to trade with you; but I forewarn you to be more moderate in your demands than formerly.

"_Trader._ Why, brother, are not my goods of equal value with those you had last year?

"_Indian._ Perhaps they are; but mine are more valuable because more scarce. The Great Spirit, who has withheld from you strength and ability to provide food and clothing for yourselves, has given you cunning and art to make guns and provide scaura (rum), and by speaking smooth words to simple men, when they have swallowed madness, you have by little and little purchased their hunting-grounds and made them corn-lands. Thus the beavers grow more scarce, and deer fly farther back; yet after I have reserved skins for my mantle and the clothing of my wife, I will exchange the rest.

"_Trader._ Be it so, brother; I came not to wrong you, or take your furs against your will. It is true that the beavers are fewer and you go farther for them. Come, brother, let us deal fair first and smoke friendly afterwards. Your last gun cost fifty beaver-skins; you shall have this for forty; and you shall give marten and racc.o.o.n skins in the same proportion for powder and shot.

"_Indian._ Well, brother, that is equal. Now, for two silver bracelets, with long pendent ear-rings of the same, such as you sold to Cardarani in the sturgeon month last year,--how much will you demand?

"_Trader._ The skins of two deer for the bracelets and those of two fawns for the ear-rings.

"_Indian._ That is a great deal; but wampum grows scarce, and silver never rusts. Here are the skins.

"_Trader._ Do you buy any more? Here are knives, hatchets, and beads of all colors.

"_Indian._ I will have a knife and a hatchet, but must not take more. The rest of the skins will be little enough to clothe the women and children, and buy wampum. Your beads are of no value; no warrior who has slain a wolf will wear them.[26]

"_Trader._ Here are many things good for you which you have not skins to buy; here is a looking-gla.s.s, and here is a bra.s.s-kettle in which your woman may boil her maize, her beans, and above all her maple sugar. Here are silver brooches, and here are pistols for your youths.

"_Indian._ The skins I can spare will not purchase them.

"_Trader._ Your will determines, brother; but next year you will want nothing but powder and shot, having already purchased your gun and ornaments. If you will purchase from me a blanket to wrap around you, a shirt and blue stroud for under-garments for yourself and your woman, and the same for leggings, this will pa.s.s the time, and save you the great trouble of dressing the skins, making the thread, etc., for your clothing, which will give you more fishing and hunting time in the sturgeon and bear months.

"_Indian._ But the custom of my fathers!

"_Trader._ You will not break the custom of your fathers by being thus clad for a single year. They did not refuse those things which were never offered to them.

"_Indian._ For this year, brother, I will exchange my skins; in the next I shall provide apparel more befitting a warrior. One pack alone I will reserve to dress for a future occasion. The summer must not find a warrior idle.

"The terms being adjusted and the bargain concluded, the trader thus shows his grat.i.tude for liberal dealing.

"_Trader._ Corlaer has forbid bringing scaura to steal away the wisdom of the warrior, but we white men are weak and cold; we bring kegs for ourselves, lest death arise from the swamps. We will not sell scaura; but you shall taste some of ours in return for the venison with which you have feasted us.

"_Indian._ Brother, we will drink moderately.

"A bottle was then given to the warrior by way of a present, which he was advised to keep long, but found it irresistible.

He soon returned with the reserved pack of skins, earnestly urging the trader to give him beads, silver brooches, and above all scaura, to their full amount. This, with affected reluctance at parting with the private stock, was at last yielded. The warriors now, after giving loose for a while to frantic mirth, began the war-whoop, and made the woods resound with infuriate howlings.... A long and deep sleep succeeded, from which they awoke in a state of dejection and chagrin such as no Indian had felt under any other circ.u.mstances. They felt as Milton describes Adam and Eve to have done after their transgression."

The news of a ma.s.sacre of white settlers at Esopus (Kingston), by the River Indians or Mohegans, June 7, 1663, when Tekakwitha was seven years old, caused great excitement both at Gandawague and at Beverwyck. Fort Orange was put in a thorough state of defence, the treaty with the Mohawks was renewed, and three pieces of artillery, loaned by Van Rensselaer for the protection of Beverwyck, "were placed on the church."

"Nevertheless so great was the alarm that the out-settlers fled for protection to the fort called Cralo, erected on the Patroon's farm at Greenbush, where they held night and day regular watch."

A year later, in 1664, at the time when the juvenile betrothal of Tekakwitha, already mentioned, took place at Gandawague,--that having occurred, as we are told, when she was eight years old,--an entirely new order of things was brought about in the Dutch colony. The new settlement of Arent van Corlaer at Schenectady, the house where her uncle traded at Fort Orange, and the hamlet of Beverwyck, together with the whole of the New Netherlands, pa.s.sed over into the hands of the English. Henceforth, instead of appealing to their High Mightinesses the Lords States General of Holland for redress of grievances, the settlers of the State of New York were to bow to the decisions of his Majesty King Charles II., who then sat securely on the throne of England, four years having elapsed since the downfall of the Commonwealth.

This change in the colony from Dutch to English rule was accomplished quietly and peaceably, to the great disgust and indignation of the warlike governor, Peter Stuyvesant, who was ready to buckle on his heavy armor, take up his sword, and fight the "malignant English," were they as ten to one. But the settlers were matter-of-fact farmers and traders, lovers of peace, caring little for glory and not overmuch for their far-away fatherland. So long as their commercial, domestic, and religious rights were respected, they were willing enough to do homage to King Charles. So in 1664, New Amsterdam, into whose harbor, said a boastful inhabitant, as many as fifteen vessels were known to have anch.o.r.ed in the course of one year, became New York, taking its name from the t.i.tle of the king's brother, afterward James II. Beverwyck, which had grown up under the guns of Fort Orange, was henceforth to be called Albany; and an English governor took the reins of colonial government from the hands of Peter Stuyvesant. The British flag floated gayly over fort and vessel, and before many years had pa.s.sed it was found necessary to employ an English schoolmaster in Albany, and later to build an English church[27] on Joncaer Street.

When young Pieter Schuyler was still learning his lessons in Dutch at Fort Orange, and the little Tekakwitha was stringing her wampum beads at Gandawague,--while her uncle journeyed frequently back and forth from the Mohawk castle to the trading-post on the Hudson, stopping sometimes at Schenectady to see his friend Corlaer, and taking his family with him now and then to fish at the mouth of the Norman's Kill (near the place called Tawasentha[28]),--unsuspected preparations for a surprise were going forward in Canada. A war-cloud was gathering in the north, soon to break with terrible effect on the three Mohawk castles, and to startle the Governor of the Province of New York into a protest against the advance of armed troops of King Louis XIV. of France into the colonial dominions of his Majesty Charles II. of England. These dominions had been so recently acquired by the English King that the French at Quebec thought they still belonged to the States General of Holland.

FOOTNOTES:

[19] Corlaer, or Van Curler, a brave and worthy man, was the most influential settler at Schenectady, and on excellent terms with the Mohawk Indians. He had visited them in 1642, on purpose to secure, if possible, the ransom of Father Jogues, and had manifested great sympathy for him in his captivity.

[20] See Annals of Albany, vol. i. p. 288. The dominie's house here mentioned has since given place to the shop which is on the north-east corner of Pearl and State Streets. The house used by Megapolensis, who was at Beverwyck from 1642 to 1649, and who concealed Father Jogues from the Indians, was where Shield's tobacco-factory now stands, close to the site of old Fort Orange, and a little south of it. It was built entirely of oak, and was purchased on the arrival of Megapolensis for a hundred and twenty dollars.

The patroon's first dominie wearied of his frontier work at Fort Orange, and went to live at New Amsterdam in 1649. Dominie Schaats was appointed to succeed him in the ministry of the church at Beverwyck, where he officiated from 1652 to 1683.

[21] Fort Orange stood on Broadway, close to the modern steamboat landing of the "People's Line." A bi-centennial tablet, surrounded with iron pickets, marks its northeast bastion. It extended back (across the freight-tracks that now mar its site) to Church Street.

[22] See O'Callaghan's History of New Netherland, vol. ii.

[23] Alida married Robert Livingston, who was "secretary of Albany"

under Pieter Schuyler, the first mayor; she was the great-grandmother of Robert R. Livingston, the first Chancellor of New York State.

[24] This creek, with its ravine, has entirely disappeared in the grading of the modern street.

[25] The dialogue here given is from Mrs. Grant's "Memoirs of American Lady." Mrs. Grant describes a later period of Albany history; but the way of trading with the Indians was about the same her day as at the time of Tekakwitha.

[26] "The Indians have a great contempt, comparatively, for the beads we send them, which they consider as only fit for those plebeians who cannot by their exertions win anything better. They estimate them, compared with their own wampum, as we do pearls compared with paste."