Tablecloths and napkins, woven in diamonds and squares, were as smooth and glossy as satin, while the sheeting was fine, even-threaded and most durable. Every farm had a wood-lot, in which the men-servants exercised their thews in preparing the immense logs for the gaping fire-places that daily swallowed fuel by the cord. They also cut chestnut rails for the zigzag fences that took the place of stone walls in regions where trees were more numerous than boulders.

Most of the farm labor was performed by negro and Indian slaves, between whom and their masters the kindliest relations existed, as a rule. These bondsmen identified themselves with the families in which they were raised, and exhibited a pride and importance scarcely excelled by their masters.' " It is not

' The Dutch settlers in Westchester County obtained their first .\fri- I can slaves under the "Freedoms and Exemptions" granted by the n West India Company in 1629, which promised that to all planters of col- I onies in the New Netherlands '* the Company will use their endeavors I to supply the Colonists with as many Blacks as they Conveniently Can ; | in such manner, however, that they shall not be bound to do it for a J longer time than they shall think proper.'' In 1G44 Nicholas Toorn, at I Rensselaerwyck, acknowledged the receipt of a young black girl -- to be ' returned at the end of four years, "if yet alive," to the director-genei-al or his successor. The average price of slaves was one hundred dollars in our money each for men and two hundred dollars for women. The treatment of them was, on the whole, humane. In 1644 an ordinance was passed which emancipated those who had served the company eighteen or nineteen years on condition of a yearly small payment in wheat, peas, beans and hogs, but a failure to comply with the conditions