88 DUTCH AND ENGLISH ON THE HUDSON

successful in his mission to the heathen than in
that to the Christians, for he learned the Mohawk
language, wrote a valuable account of the tribe,
and understood them better than he understood
the Lutherans and Quakers of New Amsterdam
and Long Island. In 1664 when Stuyvesant was
in the mood to fire on the British fleet and take the
consequences, Megapolensis, so tradition runs, dis-
suaded him with the argument: "Of what avail
are our poor guns against that broadside of more
than sixty? It is wrong to shed innocent blood."
One wonders if the domine had any room in his
mind for thoughts of the useless sufferings which
had been inflicted on Hodgson and Townsend and.
the Lutheran preachers while he stood by con-
senting.

When Megapolensis arrived at New Netherland
he found the Reverend Everardus Bogardus al-
ready installed as minister of the Gospel at Fort
Amsterdam, his predecessor Michaelius having
returned to Holland. From the beginning Bo-
gardus proved a thorn in the side of the Govern-
ment. He came to blows with Van Twiller and
wrote a letter to the Director in which he called
him a child of the Devil, a villain whose bucks were
better than he, to whom lie should give such a