CHAPTER VII.
THE DISCOVERY OF NEW YORK.
The author will now refer to the discovery of the Hudson River and the town of New York via Fort Lee and the 125th Street Ferry.
New York was afterwards sold for twenty-four dollars, the whole island.
When I think of this I go into my family gallery, which I also use as a swear room, and tell those ancestors of mine what I think of them. Where were they when New York was sold for twenty-four dollars? Were they having their portraits painted by Landseer, or their deposition taken by Jeffreys, or having their Little Lord Fauntleroy clothes made?
Do not encourage them to believe that they will escape me in future years. Some of them died unregenerate, and are now, I am told, in a country where they may possibly be damned; and I will attend to the others personally.
Twenty-four dollars for New York! Why, my Croton-water tax on one house and lot with fifty feet four and one-fourth inches front is fifty-nine dollars and no questions asked. Why, you can't get a voter for that now.
Henry or Hendrik Hudson was an English navigator, of whose birth and early history nothing is known definitely, hence his name is never mentioned in many of the best homes in New York.
In 1607 he made a voyage in search of the Northwest Passage. In one of his voyages he discovered Cape Cod, and later on the Hudson River.
This was one hundred and seventeen years after Columbus discovered America; which shows that the discovering business was not pushed as it should have been by those who had it in charge.
Hudson went up the river as far as Albany, but, finding no one there whom he knew, he hastened back as far as 209th Street West, and anchored.
He discovered Hudson Bay and Hudson Strait, and made other journeys by water, though aquatting was then in its infancy. Afterwards his sailors became mutinous, and set Hendrik and his son, with seven infirm sailors, afloat.
Ah! Whom have we here?
It is Hendrik Hudson, who discovered the Hudson River.
Here he has just landed at the foot of 209th Street, New York, where he offered the Indians liquor, but they refused.
How 209th Street has changed!
The artist has been fortunate in getting the expression of the Indians in the act of refusing. Mr. Hudson's great reputation lies in the fact that he discovered the river which bears his name; but the thinking mind will at once regard the discovery of an Indian who does not drink as far more wonderful.