Sailing from Amsterdam in the ship Half-Moon in 1609, he first landed near Portland, [fn] Me., on July 19th. Thence he sailed south to Chesapeake Bay, thence north to Delaware Bay, and thence to Sandy Hook, anchoring, probably off Coney Island, September 3d. Here and on the New Jersey coast Indians came to the ship in canoes, and bartered green corn and dried currants for knives, beads and articles of clothing. He wrote that they behaved well, but when he sent out a boat on the 6th to explore the Narrows, his men were attacked by twenty-six natives in two canoes, who killed one of his crew with an arrow and wounded two others. On September 11th he sailed through the Narrows and found a good protected harbor. Here his ship was again visited by many natives, who brought Indian corn, tobacco and oysters for barter, and displayed copper pipes, copper ornaments, and earthen pots for cooking.

[fn] To avoid circumlocution present names will be generally used to indicate localities.

Hudson started on his voyage up the river September 12th, and began his return September 22d. His ship stopped near the present city of Hudson, but he proceeded much farther in a small boat—as far, it is supposed, as Albany. About 25 miles below Albany an aged chief entertained him hospitablv, and the Indians offered in barter tobacco and beaver skins. Here the Indians of the Hudson, and probably of all North America, first tested the white man's liquor. Hudson gave them some to see how they would act under its influence. Only one drank enough to become intoxicated, and when he fell down in a stupor the others were alarmed, but after he became sober the next day their alarm ceased, and they manifested a friendly spirit. This was on the east side of the river. Below the Highlands on the west side the natives were of a different disposition, and shot arrows at the crew from points of land. For this they were punished by Hudson's men, who returned their fire and killed about a dozen of them. Hudson's journal says that above the Highlands "they found a very loving people and very old men, and were well used." One of his anchoring places had been the bay at Newburgh, and here he wrote prophetically: "This is a very pleasant place to build a town on," and the handsome and prosperous City of Newburgh shows that he judged well. At this point many more Indians boarded the ship, and did a brisk business in exchanging skins for knives and ornamental trifles.

At several anchorages the Indians brought green corn to Hudson's ship, and it was one of the agreeable surprises of the crew at their meals. Corn was generally cultivated by the Hudson River tribes, and grew luxuriantly. Ruttenber says it was long supposed to be native, but investigation shows it was transplanted from a foreign shore. It is certain that the early explorers knew nothing of it until it was brought to them by the Indians, and that it had been cultivated by the latter from immemorial times.

Hudson wrote that some of the Indians whom he met along the river wore mantles of feathers and good furs, and that women came to the ship with hemp, having red copper tobacco pipes and copper neck ornaments. Verrazano, who sailed along the North American coast 33 years after Hudson's expedition, said the Indians were dressed out in feathers of birds of various colors. He mentioned "two kings" who came aboard his ship in Narragansett Bay as "more beautiful in stature than can possibly be described," and characterized them as types of their race. One wore a deerskin around his body artificially wrought in damask colors. His hair was tied back in knots, and around his neck was a chain with stones of different colors. The natives who accompanied the chiefs were of middle stature, broad across the breast, strong in the arms and well formed. A little later Roger Williams was welcomed as a friend by an old chief, Canonnieus, and his nephew, and he described the Indians who accompanied them as of larger size than the whites, with tawny complexions, sharp faces, black hair, and mild, pleasant expressions. The women were graceful and beautiful, with fine countenances, and of modest appearance and manner. They wore no clothing, except ornamental deer skins, like those of the men, but some had rich lynx skins on their arms, and various ornaments on their heads composed of braids of hair which hung upon their breasts. These Indians were generous in their disposition, "giving away whatever they had."

Later the Indians were classed from language into two general divisions—the Algonquins and the Iroquois—terms given them by the Jesuit missionaries. The Iroquois occupied central and western New York, including the Mohawk River, the headwaters of the Delaware, the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence River. The Algonquins included all the Indians of Eastern New York, Eastern Canada, New England, New Jersey, Eastern Pennsylvania, and Eastern Virginia. Several tribes in the west Hudson River counties constituted the Lenni-Lenape nation, which held its council fires on the site of Philadelphia. Some of their names were Waoranecks, Haverstroos, Minisinks and Waranawonkongs. When Hudson came the Lenapes were the head of the Algonquin nations, but wars with the Iroquois and the whites so weakened them that they became the subjects of the Iroquois confederacy for eighty years previous to 1755. Then they rebelled, allied themselves with other tribes, became the head of the western nations and successfully contested nearly all the territory west of the Mississippi. During the period of their subservience they were known as the Delawares. The Mohawks were the most eastern nation of the Iroquois, and were called Maquas by the Dutch, and a branch on the Delaware, Minquas. The Iroquois, first known as the Five Nations, later received the Tuscaroras of North Carolina, who removed to New York, and with the Cherokees and other southern Indians became the sixth nation of that great Indian confederacy, to which they also were related by language.

Both the Algonquin and Iroquois confederacies were divided into tribes and sub-tribes of families, each with a head who was the father or founder. These combined for mutual defense and the heads elected one of their number chief sachem, regarding themselves as a nation to make laws, negotiate treaties, and engage in wars, the wars being mostly between the Algonquins and Iroquois.

The Esopus Indians occupied parts of Orange and Ulster Counties, and their war dances were held on the Dans Kamer, a high promontory north of Newburgh. Their rule extended to other families east and west of the Hudson, but their territory cannot be clearly defined.

Regarding Indian character, there have been presented by our historians some contrasting but not wholly irreconcilable views. E. M. Ruttenber, in his valuable contribution to the History of Ulster County, edited by Hon. A. T. Clearwater, says:

"When they were discovered the race had wrought out unaided a development far in advance of any of the old barbaric races of Europe. They were still in the age of stone, but entering upon the age of iron. Their implements were mainly of stone and flint and bone, yet they had learned the art of making copper pipes and ornaments. This would rank their civilization about with that of the Germans in the days of Tacitus (about the year 200 A.D.). They had, unaided by the civilization of Europe, made great progress. They had learned to weave cloth out of wild hemp and other grasses, and to extract dyes from vegetable substances; how to make earthen pots and kettles; how to make large water casks from the bark of trees, as well as the lightest and fleetest canoes; had passed from the cave to the dwelling house; had established the family relation and democratic forms of government; their wives were the most faithful, their young women the most brilliant in paint and garments and robes of furs; they carved figures on stone, and wrote the story of their lives in hieroglyphics, of which some of the finest specimens in America are preserved in the senate