h such tremendous outset, such a delectable quaver, and such a
triumphant cadence, that it was enough to make one's heart leap out of
one's mouth only to be within a mile of it. Like as a war-worn charger,
grazing in peaceful plains, starts at a strain of martial music, pricks up
his ears, and snorts, and paws, and kindles at the noise, so did the
heroic Peter joy to hear the clangor of the trumpet; for of him might
truly be said, what was recorded of the renowned St. George of England,
"there was nothing in all the world that more rejoiced his heart than to
hear the pleasant sound of war, and see the soldiers brandish forth their
steeled weapons." Casting his eye more kindly, therefore, upon the sturdy
Van Corlear, and finding him to be a jovial varlet, shrewd in his
discourse, yet of great discretion and immeasurable wind, he straightway
conceived a vast kindness for him, and discharging him from the
troublesome duty of garrisoning, defending, and alarming the city, ever
after retained him about his person, as his chief favorite, confidential
envoy, and trusty squire. Instead of disturbing the city with disastrous
notes, he was instructed to play so as to delight the governor while at
his repasts, as did the minstrels of yore in the days of glorious
chivalry; and on all public occasions to rejoice the ears of the people
with warlike melody, thereby keeping alive a noble and martial spirit.

But the measure of the valiant Peter which produced the greatest agitation
in the community was his laying his hand upon the currency. He had
old-fashioned notions in favor of gold and silver, which he considered the
true standards of wealth and mediums of commerce, and one of his first
edicts was that all duties to government should be paid in those precious
metals, and that seawant, or wampum, should no longer be a legal tender.

Here was a blow at public prosperity! All those who speculated on the rise
and fall of this fluctuating currency found their calling at an end;
those, too, who had hoarded Indian money by barrels full, found their
capital shrunk in amount; but, above all, the Yankee traders, who were
accustomed to flood the market with newly-coined oyster-shells, and to
abstract Dutch merchandise in exchange, were loud-mouthed in decrying this
"tampering with the currency." It was clipping the wings of commerce; it
was checking the development of public prosperity; trade would be at an
end; goods would moulder on the shel