Goodyear disposed of this island to the four gentlemen already named. This shows us that the causes which led to the settlement of this island were altogether different from those which led to the settlement of New England.

Concerning the four gentlemen who purchased this island, I have been able to gain the following: they were all engaged in the West India sugar industry, perhaps partners in the business. This doubtless accounts for the purchase price of the island being sixteen hundred pounds of good merchantable muscovado sugar, a commodity which Mr. Goodyear, being a merchant, could easily dispose of. As Mr. Thomas Middleton is mentioned first, he may have been the oldest. He is spoken of as Captain. Mr. Middleton did not make the island his home. The second of the four gentlemen, Mr. Thomas Rouse, is said to have hailed from the neighborhood of Southwold, England, from whence he went to Barbadoes, where he became a wealthy sugar planter and united with the Quakers. The remaining two of the company, Nathaniel and Constant Sylvester, were brothers, the sons of Giles Sylvester, of England. They too had gone to the Barbadoes, and there engaged in the sugar business. Before going, however, to Barbadoes, they emigrated with their father to Holland, where the elder Sylvester passed away. This fact coupled with others to be mentioned would indicate that the Sylvesters were not in sympathy with the Established Church. Upon the death of the father in Holland, the family, consisting of the widow, four sons, Nathaniel, Constant, Giles and Joshua, and two daughters, moved to Barbadoes, where Nathaniel and Constant at least became prominent merchants, the latter being in time a member of the Governor's Council, and remaining there until his death in 1671. A fifth son, Peter, remained in London.

Nathaniel Sylvester soon changed his place of abode to Shelter Island, being the only one of the four to do so. He was followed later on by two of his brothers, Giles and Joshua, Giles remaining but a few years, after which he returned to England, where he married and died, while Joshua, after living with his brother a few years moved to Southold. I am told that the name of the vessel in which Nathaniel Sylvester came from the West Indies to Shelter Island was the "Golden Parrot." This was in the year 1652, the year after the purchase of the island from Mr. Goodyear, hence the date of the first white settlement on Shelter Island.

Upon coming here to live Nathaniel Sylvester brought with

him a young lady in the person of Grissel Brinley, whom he had lately married. This young lady was the daughter of Thomas Brinley, Esq., of Datchett, in County Bucks, the parish so well known to the million of readers of Shakespeare's play, "The Merry Wives of Windsor." Her father was auditor under Charles the First and Charles the Second, also keeper of the accounts of the dower of Henrietta Maria, positions implying great friendship of the royal family. In the middle aisle of the church at Datchett, near Windsor, lies a tombstone after English fashion bearing this inscription: "Thomas Brinley, Esq., Auditor General of the Revenues of King Charles I and II. Born in the city of Exon, married Anna Wade of Pettsworth in Sussex, by whom he had five sons and seven daughters. He was born in 1591, died 1661. One of his daughters married Nathaniel Sylvester, Esq. Francis, one of his sons, accepted a grant of land for his father's services and went to Newport, R. I." Because of his friendly offices to the king Mr. Brinley's estate was confiscated and a warrant issued for his arrest. He managed, however, to escape to the continent, where he was obliged to live in exile until the death of Oliver Cromwell and the return of Charles the Second to England, when he also returned and died shortly after. During his exile his family had been scattered, his daughter Grissel, at the early age of sixteen, having married Nathaniel Sylvester in 1652. Upon their marriage the young couple went to America, touching on their way at Barbadoes, where they were handsomely entertained at the home of Mr. Constant Sylvester. After leaving Barbadoes, and while nearing the coast of New England, they were shipwrecked, losing much of their goods which they had brought with them for their new home on this island. It was indeed an eventful journey, a brave undertaking for the young wife. of sixteen. At last they reached this place and began to lay the foundation of a family career that may well be the pride of every Shelter Islander.

They were not long on the island before the Indians disputed their title and made complaint to the Commissioners of the United Colonies of New England assembled at Hartford. One of their number, called Checkanoe, appearing before that body on the 2d of September, 1652, to enter a protest, as the following record will show: "Whereas we were informed by Checkanoe, an Indian of Menhansick Island, on behalf of the Indian inhabitants of said island, that they are disturbed in their possession by Captain Mid

dleton and his agents, upon pretense of a purchase from Mr. Goodyear, of New Haven, who bought the same of one Mr. Forrett, a Scotchman, and by vertue thereof, the said Indians are threatened to be forced off the said island, and to seek an habitation where they can get it; the said Indians deny that they sold the said island to the said Forrett, and that the said Forrett was a poor man, not able to purchase it, but the said Indians gave to said Forrett some part of the said island, and marked it out by some trees; yet never that themselves be deprived of their habitation there, and therefore they desired that the Commissioners (they being their tributaries) to see they have justice in the premises, the Commissioners therefore, in regard the said Mr. Goodyear is not present, and at their court, to hear the complaint of the said Indians, and to satisfy the said Indians if they can, if not to certify the Commissioners at the next meeting, the truth of the promises, that some further order may be taken therein as shall be meet." As a result of this protest Capt. Middleton and his associates had to purchase Shelter Island a second time from the Indians, the deed of which second purchase appears among the records of Easthampton bearing date of Dec. 27th, 1652. Also a confirmatory paper of this second purchase is on file among the Southold Town records, and reads as follows:

"Wee whose names are here underneath subscribed doe hereby testify and declare that Yokee, formerly Sachem of Manhansick Ahaquatawamock, now called Shelter Island, did on the three and twentieth of March, 1652, give full Possession unto Capt. Nathaniel Silvester and Ensigne John Booth of the aforesaid island. of Ahaquatawamock, with all that was belonging to the same. And hee the said Yokee, delivered unto the aforesaid Captaine Nathaniel Silvester and Ensign John Booth one turfe and twige in their hands according to the usual custome of England; after which delivery and full possession given, the said Yokee with all his Indians that were formerly belonging to said island of Ahaquatawamock did freely and willingly depart the aforesaid island, leaving the aforesaid Captaine Nathaniel Silvester and Ensigne Booth in full possession of the same. Unto which we Witness our hands the date as above being the 23d of March, 1652.

"JOHN HERBERT of Southold.

"CAPT. ROBERT SEELEY of New Haven. "DANIEL LANE of New London.

"GILES SILVESTER."

From the date of this paper it would seem that this transaction took place early in the year of 1652, prior even to the protest lodged with the Commissioners at Hartford, in consequence of which this second purchase from the Indians had to be made. But we need to remember that at that time the year began either after the 10th or with the 25th of March and not on the 1st of January. This made the first part of March to belong to the old year and the latter part to the new year. Hence the date of the above paper, being before the 25th of March, namely, the 23d of March, it belonged to the old year as indicated, 1652, though according to our method it would be 1653. We do not know what was the purchase price of this second sale, but with this sale the Indians agreed among other things to put away all their dogs; these dogs, it may be interesting to know, are believed to have been young wolves which the Indians had caught and trained to do them service, but which in spite of their training continued to be very ravenous, a frequent source of annoyance to the white settlers.

You will notice that in the confirmatory paper just read, it is stated that shortly after the second conveyance the Indians left this Island. If so, they dispersed among the Montauks, Shinnecocks and Corchaugs. Perhaps they scattered because of their Sachem's death, for Yoco, their chief, and the supreme chief of all the Long Island Indians, passed away to the happy hunting grounds in 1653. At least, such is the opinion of certain writers. In the Chronicles of East Hampton, by the late David Gardiner, there is an interesting account of the funeral of our noted Chief Yoco, which reads as follows: "His remains were transported for burial from Shelter Island to Montaukett, where was the burying ground of the Indians. In removing the body, the bearers rested the bier by the side of the road leading from Sag Harbour to Easthampton, near the third mile stone, where a small excavation was made to designate the spot. From that time to the present, more than 190 years, this memorial has remained, as fresh, seemingly, as if but lately made. Neither leaf nor stone, nor any other thing, has been suffered to remain in it. The Montauk tribe, though reduced to a beggarly number of some ten or fifteen drunken and degraded beings, have retained to this day the memory of the event, and no one individual of them now passes the spot in his wanderings without removing whatever may have fallen into it. The place is to them holy ground, and the exhibition of this pious act does honor to the finest feelings of the human

heart. The excavation is about 12 inches in depth and 18 inches in diameter, in the form of a mortar." As late as 1845 the Rev. N. S. Prime, author of "An Ecclesiastical History of Long Island," being acquainted with the foregoing fact, examined the place anew and found it in its original form and freshness as above described. When the turnpike between Sag Harbor and Easthampton was laid out about 1860, the spot was plowed up and the sacred memorial of over two hundred years' standing was obliterated. One of Sag Harbor's respected citizens told me this past week, while speaking of this matter, that she remembered very well the very spot, and had seen with her own eyes the reverence that was paid to it by the Indians. She spoke of an Indian in particular, known in Sag Harbor as Stephen Pharaoh, or Talkhouse, who would get down by that spot whenever he passed and clean it out reverently, following the custom of his forefathers. This Indian died in 1882. That spot was known as "Whooping Boys' Hollow," so called because the Indians who bore the body of Yoco gave a parting whoop as they resumed their funeral march.

Before leaving the aborigines of this place, so interesting in their history, I wish to call your attention to another member of the Manhansett tribe, brother-in-law to Yoco, the chief, an Indian who played a most important part in the various transactions between the English and the Indians, acting as their interpreter and notary public. He has already been mentioned in this paper, for he was the representative of the Manhansett tribe before the commissioners at Hartford, when the protest was made, upon the strength of which Captain Nathaniel Silvester and his associates. had to pay a second time for this island. He is there called "Checkanoe, an Indian of Manhansick Island." Just a year ago Mr. William Wallace Tooker, of Sag Harbor, issued a work entitled "John Eliot's First Indian Interpreter, Cockenoe-de-Long Island," an exceedingly interesting essay on this very Indian of Shelter Island. I have read and re-read this book with great interest, and believe with Mr. Tooker that this "Checkanoe, an Indian of Manhansick Island," was the young Indian who was so helpful to John Eliot, the great apostle to the Indians, both in acquiring the Indian language, in preaching to the Indians, and also in his translation of the Bible into the Algonquian tongue, which was the language of the Indians. I have not the time to dwell longer upon this unique character, who for nearly fifty years was such an important