A late excellent writer, the author of a valuable History of the United States, although a stranger to our country, has spoken in proper terms on this subject; he remarks as follows Founders of ancient colonies have sometimes been deified : '

by their successors. New-York is perhaps the only commonwealth whose founders 'have been covered with ridicule from the same quarter. It is impossible to read the ingenious and diverting romance entitled Knickerbocker's History of New-York, without wishing that the author had put a little more or a little less truth in it and that his talent for ;

humor and sarcasm had found another subject than the dangers, hardships and virtues of the ancestors of his national family. It must be unfavorable to patriotism to connect historical recollections with ludicrious associations.' " To remove the reproach thus thoughtlessly attached to the annals of our State, it is

only necessary to bring to light the true character of its early colonists, whose father-land ranked at that period among the foremost nations of Europe in point of commercial wealth and enterprise, and before all others in the freedom of its government ; a freedom purchased by forty years' struggle against the bloodthirsty myrmidons of Spanish despotism. The traits ascribed by the mock historian to the first settlers of New -York can scarcely be supposed to have characterized such a people on the other hand, the manly virtues they displayed ;

amidst the toils and hardships of colonial life, removed at so great a distance from the scenes of their early associations, deserve a very different commemoration at the hands of their descendants and successors. " The New -York Historical Society -- an institution that has done much to preserve the historical records of our State -- first suggested to the Legislature the propriety of searching the archives of the Netherlands, and other European governments, for documents illustrative of the early history of the State.