44 DUTCH AND ENGLISH ON THE HUDSON

each year he was to cut, split, and bring to the
waterside two fathoms of firewood; and he was
further to deliver yearly to the Director as quit-
rent two bushels of wheat, twenty-five pounds of
butter, and two pairs of fowls.

It was the difficult task of the agent of the colony
to harmonize the constant hostilities between the
patroon and his "people." Van Curler's letter to
Kiliaen Van Rensselaer begins: "Laus Deo! ' At
the Manhattans this 16th June, 1643, Most honor-
able, wise, powerful, and right discreet Lord, my
Lord Patroon—." After which propitiatory
beginning it embarks at once on a reply to the
reproaches which the honorable, wise, and power-
ful Lord has heaped upon his obedient servant.
Van Curler admits that the accounts and books
have not been forwarded to Holland as they should
have been; but he pleads the difficulty of securing
returns from the tenants, whom he finds slippery
in their accounting. "Everything they have laid
out on account of the Lord Patroon they well know
how to specify for what was expended. But what
has been laid out for their private use, that they
know nothing about."

If the patroon's relations with his tenants were
thorny, he had no less trouble in his dealings with