his son-in-law, Senator James A. Bayard, the first. Herman was the
principal historic personage about the head of the Chesapeake, and was
Peter Stuyvesant's diplomatist to New England as well as Maryland. The
argument he made for the priority of the Dutch settlement on the
Delaware was the basis of the independence of Delaware State. The
legend of his escape from New York is told in several local books and
newspapers, and it was the subject of one of his paintings, as he was
both draughtsman and designer. G. A. T.]

In 1876 I visited the relics of Herman on the Manor, and observed the
topography and foliage. I then undertook to put this legend into
verse, but struck a short, ill-accommodating stanza, in which I
nevertheless persevered until the tale was told. I found that Herman
had bought, in 1652, "the Raritan Great Meadows and the territory
along the Staten Island Kills from Ompoge, or Amboy, to the Pechciesse
Creek, and a tract on the south side of the Raritan, opposite Staten
Island" (see Broadhead, page 537). It at once occurred to me to put
the seat of Herman's capture by squatters on this property, and to
take Staten Island's bold scenery as a contrast to that of the head of
the Chesapeake, whence Herman had ridden. He could, besides, more
reasonably swim the Kills than the North River with a horse, as a
gentle prelude to swimming the Delaware.

One year before buying the above property (see Broadhead's "History of
New York," page 526), Peter Stuyvesant vindictively persecuted Herman,
Lockerman, and others, who retired to Staten Island to brood. These
men belonged to "the popular party." I therefore had a hint to make
Stuyvesant himself the incarcerator of Herman in a fort, and the most
available period seemed to be subsequent to the capture of Dutch New
York by the English, but before the Dutch settlements on the Delaware