The accumulations of discarded shells around its shores testify to the activity of the coinage industry, and the wealth thus created flowed naturally to Manhattan, and found its way into the pouches of traders up the Hudson, to the distant homes of the Wappinger and the Mohawk, or along the Sound shore to the villages of the Siwanoy and the Pequot. In addition to their position of advantage in regard to this line of production at the great wampum-making stations of the Canarsee, that chieftaincy controlled its export by reason of its situation on the main line of travel, and by its close relationship with the Manhattan chief-

INDIAN NOTES

MANHATTAN

taincy. It looks very much as though this powerful group at the one end of the island of Manhattan and the aggressive Weckquaesgeek at the upper end had so entrenched themselves as to control on the one hand the flow of the money, and on the other hand the goods of the north and east that were purchasable with it.

The narrow space and the rugged character of the lower part of the Island of Manhattan lent itself but poorly to the support of any considerable population, except in its trading facilities. There could have been but little wild life in its restricted area of woodlands, and no such broad and level acreage suited to cultivation as in the flat lands of Long Island.

The tidal movement in the two estuaries of North and East rivers, around its rocky shores, probably provided good opportunity for the spearing and netting of the swarming inhabitants of the waters, and from the nearby shores of New Jersey and of Long Island abundant supplies of oysters could be obtained by canoe. Chiefly by