KILDERMEESTER'S LONG TAIL.

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orders for cropping the hair of both officers and men throughout the garrison. Now it came to pass, that among his officers was one Kildermeester a sturdy veteran, who had cherished through the course of a long life a rugged mop of hair, not a little resembling the shag of a Newfoundland dog, terminating with an immoderate queue like the handle of a frying-pan, and queued so tightly to his head, that his eyes and mouth generally stood ajar, and his eyebrows were drawn up to the top of his forehead. It may naturally be supposed that the possessor of so goodly an appendage would resist with abhorrence an order condemning it to the shears. On hearing the general orders, he discharged a tempest of veteran, soldier-like oaths, and dunder and blixums-swore he would break any man's head who attempted to meddle with his tail-queued it stiffer than ever, and whisked it about the garrison as fiercely as the tail of a crocodile.

The eel-skin queue of old Kildermeester became instantly an affair of the utmost importance. The commander in chief was too enlightened an officer not to perceive that the discipline of the garrison, the subordination and good order of the armies of the Nieuw-Nederlandts, the consequent safety of the whole province, and ultimately the dignity and prosperity of their High Mightinesses the Lords States-general, but above all, the dignity of the great General Von Poffenburgh, all imperiously demanded the docking of that stubborn queue. He therefore determined that old Kilder

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WHY HE HAD A HOLE IN HIS COFFIN.

meester should be publicly shorn of his glories in presence of the whole garrison-the old man as resolutely stood on the defensive—whereupon the general, as became a great man, was highly exasperated, and the offender was arrested and tried by a court martial for mutiny, desertion, and all the other list of offences noticed in the articles of war, ending with a "videlicet, in wearing an eelskin queue, three feet long, contrary to orders." Then came on arraignments, and trials, and pleadings; and the whole country was in a ferment about this unfortunate queue. As it is well known that the commander of a distant frontier post has the power of acting pretty much after his own will, there is little doubt but that the veteran would have been hanged or shot at least, had he not luckily fallen ill of a fever, through mere chagrin and mortification-and most flagitiously deserted from all earthly command, with his beloved locks unviolated. His obstinacy remained unshaken to the very last moment, when he directed that he should be carried to his grave with his eel-skin queue sticking out of a hole in his coffin.

This magnanimous affair obtained the general great credit as an excellent disciplinarian, but it is hinted that he was ever after subject to bad dreams, and fearful visitations in the night-when the grisly spectrum of old Kildermeester would stand centinel by his bed-side, erect as a pump, his enormous queue strutting out like the handle.

BOOK IV.

CONTAINING THE SECOND PART OF THe reign of pETER THE HEADSTRONG AND HIS GALLANT ACHIEVEMENTS ON THE DELAWARE.

CHAPTER I.

In which is exhibited a warlike portrait of the great Peter-and how general Von Poffenburgh distinguished himself at Fort Casimir.

HITHERTO, most venerable and courteous reader, have I shown thee the administration of the valorous

Stuyvesant, under the mild moonshine of peace, or rather the grim tranquillity of awful expectation; but now the war-drum rumbles from afar, the brazen trumpet brays its thrilling note, and the rude clash of hostile arms speaks fearful prophecies of coming troubles. The gallant warrior starts from soft repose, from golden visions, and voluptuous ease; where, in the dulcet, "piping time of peace," he sought sweet solace after all his toils. No more in beauty's siren lap reclined, he weaves fair garlands for his lady's brows; no more entwines with flowers his shining sword, nor through the live-long lazy summer's day chants forth his lovesick soul in madrigals. To

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PETER GOES FORTH TO BATTLE.

manhood roused, he spurns the amorous flute; doffs from his brawny back the robe of peace, and clothes his pampered limbs in panoply of steel. O'er his dark brow, where late the myrtle waved, where wanton roses breathed enervate love, he rears the beaming casque and nodding plume; grasps the bright shield, and shakes the ponderous lance; or mounts with eager pride his fiery steed, and burns for deeds of glorious chivalry!

But soft, worthy reader! I would not have you imagine that any preux chevalier, thus hideously begirt with iron, existed in the city of New-Amsterdam. This is but a lofty and gigantic mode, in which heroic writers always talk of war, thereby to give it a noble and imposing aspect; equipping our warriors with bucklers, helms, and lances, and such-like outlandish and obsolete weapons, the like of which perchance they had never seen or heard of, in the same manner that a cunning statuary arrays a modern general or an admiral in the accoutrements of a Cæsar or an Alexander. The simple truth then of all this oratorical flourish is this that the valiant Peter Stuyvesant all of a sudden found it necessary to scour his trusty blade, which too long had rusted in its scabbard, and prepare himself to undergo those hardy toils of war, in which his mighty soul so much delighted.

Methinks I at this moment behold him in my imagination or rather, I behold his goodly portrait, which still hangs up in the family mansion of the Stuyvesants-arrayed in all the terrors of a

HIS CHIVALRIC PORT.

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true Dutch géneral. His regimental coat of German blue, gorgeously decorated with a goodly show of large brass buttons, reaching from his waistband to his chin. The voluminous skirts turned up at the corners, and separating gallantly behind, so as to display the seat of a sumptuous pair of brimstone-coloured trunk breeches a graceful style still prevalent among the warriors of our day, and which is in conformity to the custom of ancient heroes, who scorned to defend themselves in rear. His face rendered exceeding terrible and warlike by a pair of black mustachios; his hair strutting out on each side in stiffly pomatumed ear-locks, and descending in a rat-tail queue below his waist; a shining stock of black leather supporting his chin, and a little but fierce cocked hat, stuck with a gallant and fiery air over his left eye. Such was the chivalric port of Peter the Headstrong and when he made a sudden halt, planted himself firmly on his solid supporter, with his wooden leg inlaid with silver a little in advance, in order to strengthen his position, his right hand grasping a gold-headed cane, his left resting upon the pummel of his sword; his head dressing spiritedly to the right, with a most appalling and hard-favoured frown upon his brow-he presented altogether one of the most commanding, bitterlooking, and soldierlike figures that ever strutted upon canvas. Proceed we now to inquire the cause of this warlike preparation.

The encroaching disposition of the Swedes on