From the Discovery to the Revolution. -- The most celebrated of American historians says, " To the enterprise of proprietailes New Netherlands was to owe its tenants," and he lays great stress upon the fact that the Dutch West India Company insisted that the Indian title should first be extinguished before any of the Dutch settlers could obtain permanent rights in the soil.* Though Henry Hudson was the first discoverer of Hudson's River and Spuyten Duyvil Creek in 1609 ; though Adrian Block, in his yacht, the " Onrest," in 1613-14, made the first white man's cruise to the east of the ancient township that has given its name to a county ; and though Christiansen had established his trading post on the site of the future Fort Orange or Albany about the same time, we have no record by government, republic or company of what was formerly known as, and still forms a part of, the town of Westchester for many years after the discovery of New Netherlands by the Dutch. The natives belonging to the tribe of Weekquaesgeeks were the sole patroons or lords of the soil, and from their movements we obtain our earliest knowledge concerning Westchester township. In 1616 all the southermost part of Westchester County and as far north as the Saw-Mill or Nepperhan River, at what is now known as Yonkers, was in possession of that tribe ; and in 1626 - one of the tribe with his nephew, crossed Harlem River and got as far south as the " Kolck Pond, or Canal Street, on New York Island, for the purpose of trading his beaver skins. Governor Minuit's servants met them both and stole the skins and murdered the uncle. The