Earlier in the same year he loaned money to Director Kieft, a transaction which probably helped to pave the way for the prompt bestowal upon him of landed rights upon the termination of his official connection with Rensselaerswyck. In the Dutch grant to Van der Donck, the territory of which he was made patroon was called Nepperhaem, from the Indian name of the stream, the Nepperhan, which empties into the Hudsou at Yonkers, where stood at that period, and for perhaps a quarter of a century later, the native Village of Nappeckamack (the " Rapid Water Settlement"). The whole extensive patroonship, styled at first Colen

DR. ADRIAN

VAN DER DONOK

Donck, soon came to be known also as 'k De Jonkkeer's land," or " De Jonkkeer's," meaning the estate of the jonkheer, or young lord or gentleman, as Van der Donck was called. Hence is derived the name Yo'nkers, applied from the earliest days of English rule to that entire district, and later conferred upon the township, the village, and the city. To the possibilities of this magnificent but as yet utterly wild property Van der Donck gave a portion of his attention during the three years following the procurement of his patent. In one of his papers he states that before 1649 he built a sawmill on the estate, besides laying out a farm and plantation; and that, having chosen Spuyten Duyvil as his place of residence, he had begun to build there and to place the soil under cultivation. His sawmill was located at the mouth of the Nepperhan Kiver, and from its presence that stream was called by the Dutch " De Zaag Kill," whence comes its present popular name of the Sawmill River. Van der Donck's plantation, " a flat, with some convenient meadows about it," was located about a mile above Kingsbridge, near where the Van Cortlandt mansion now stands.