or bay, to anybody who would establish a colony of fifty persons above
the age of fifteen. If on a river, the domain was to be sixteen miles
along one bank or eight miles along each bank, and run back into the
country as far "as the situation of the occupiers will admit." The
proprietor of the land was to be called a "patroon," [1] and was absolute
ruler of whatever colonies he might plant, for he was at once owner,
ruler, and judge. It may well be supposed that such a tempting offer did
not go a-begging, and a number of patroons were soon settled along the
Hudson and on the banks of the Delaware (1631), where they founded a
town near Lewes. The settlements on the Delaware River were short-lived.
The settlers quarreled with the Indians, who in revenge massacred them
and drove off the garrison at Fort Nassau; whereupon the patroons sold
their rights to the Dutch West India Company.[2]

[Footnote 1: The patroon bound himself to (1) transport the fifty
settlers to New Netherland at his own expense; (2) provide each of them
with a farm stocked with horses, cattle, and farming implements, and
charge a low rent; (3) employ a schoolmaster and a minister of the
Gospel. In return for this the emigrant bound himself (1) to stay and
cultivate the land of the patroon for ten years; (2) to bring his grain
to the patroon's mill and pay for grinding; (3) to use no cloth not made
in Holland; (4) to sell no grain or produce till the patroon had been
given a chance to buy it.]

[Footnote 2: Lodge's _English Colonies_, pp. 295-311; Winsor's
_Narrative and Critical History_, Vol. III., pp. 385-411; Bancroft's
_History of the United States_, Vol. I., pp. 501-508.]

%29. The Struggle for the Delaware; the Swedes on the Delaware.%--And
now began a bitter contest for the ownership of the country bordering