wealthy directors took immediate advantage of the company's action before the other share-holders could avail themselves of its privilege, and at once the most desirable territory was seized by a few. Disagreements and dissensions speedily followed. Intelligent emigrants were afraid to place themselves under the control of such grasping masters. Instead of encouraging the settlement of the country, it greatly retarded it, and probably deferred for fifty years the considerable peopling of Westchester County along the Harlem and Hudson Rivers. Manhattan Island was reserved for the company.

The first purchase of Indian lands north of Harlem River was made by the West India Company in 1G39. Its bounds were poorly defined. White settlers speedily occupied portions of this tract. They made another purchase of land to the east of this tract in 1640. Herr Broux made a purchase along the river that bears his name in the following year. The next purchase was made in 1646 by Adriaeu Von der Donck, who had been educated at the University of Leyden, and had been admitted to practice in the Supreme Court of Holland. He was the first lawyer who came to New Netherland. He at once received a patent from the company, his lands extending for sixteen miles along the Hudson norrh of Manhattan Island, and eastward to the Bronx River. It was called Donck's Colony, and its proprietor, invested with all the rights and privileges contained in the charter of 1629, became a member of the order of Patroons. In 1650 a contract was made by the West India Company, with Van der Donck and others, for the transportation of two hundred persons to New Netherland. Yonkers soon became a place of considerable trade with the Indians, and vessels were here loaded for old Amsterdam.