Let us in the first place remember that the scholarly men and those whose lives are passed amidst luxurious surroundings seldom make colonists. To strike into the wilderness for anything more than a dash of adventure usually indicates that one has more to gain than to lose, and that his habit is active rather than contemplative. If noble families are represented in any colony, it is apt to be through their needy cadets, and the}' will usuall}- be found in company with those

Haiiy Settlers of the Hudson X'alley 95 who possess the advantage of energy and are unhampered bythe obhgations of pedigree. Oloffe Stevanson Van Cortlandt was in the mihtary service of Holland, and l^ecame afterwards commissary of cargoes for the West India Comi)any. His descent is said to be from a n()l)le Russian family. Su])se(|uentl\' to his employment by the company, which occupied ten years, he amassed a fortune as a brewer. He married a wealth}' wife, and became, by purchase, the proprietor of the \^an Cortlandt Manor on the river. Van Cortlandt 's neighbour, Philipse, began life (according to Chief-Justice John Jay) as a carpenter. The ex|)crts in heraldry have also accommodated him with noble ancestors -- this time of Bohemian blood. By shrewdness and energy he won a fortune, and became not onh' one of the most influential, l^ut also the wealthiest man in the colon v. These able men were sufficiently distinguished by their own remarka]:)le qualities, and it is difficult to comprehend the persistent effort to decorate them with superfluous pedigrees. The Schuylers appear to have been of gentle blood, and Robert Livingston, the father of all the Livingstons, was the son of the Rev. John Livingston, a Scotch dissenting minister, who was banished to Holland for contmnac}- in 1663. The remainder of the colonists, from Patroons to tenants, seem to have been of that race that has always furnished the best colonisers in the world, and they have left a record of pluck and persistence that is part of the