The privy councillors who had long since been brought into as perfect discipline as were ever the soldiers of the great Frederick, knew there was no use in saying a word, so lighted their pipes, and smoked away in silence like fat and discreet councillors.  But the burgomasters, being inflated with considerable importance and self-sufficiency acquired at popular meetings, were not so easily satisfied.  Mustering up fresh spirit, when they found there was some chance of escaping from their present jeopardy without the disagreeable alternative of fighting, they requested a copy of the summons to surrender, that they might show it to a general meeting of the people.

So insolent and mutinous a request would have been enough to have roused the gorge of the tranquil Van Twiller himself—­what, then, must have been its effect upon the great Stuyvesant, who was not only a Dutchman, a governor, and a valiant wooden-legged soldier to boot, but withal a man of the most stomachful and gunpowder disposition?  He burst forth into a blaze of indignation—­swore not a mother’s son of them should see a syllable of it; that as to their advice or concurrence, he did not care a whiff of tobacco for either; that they might go home and go to bed like old women, for he was determined to defend the colony himself without the assistance of them or their adherents!  So saying, he tucked his sword under his arm, cocked his hat upon his head, and girding up his loins, stumped indignantly out of the council chamber, everybody making room for him as he passed.

No sooner was he gone than the busy burgomasters called a public meeting in front of the stadthouse, where they appointed as chairman one Dofue Roerback, formerly a meddlesome member of the cabinet during the reign of William the Testy, but kicked out of office by Peter Stuyvesant on taking the reins of government.  He was, withal, a mighty gingerbread baker in the land, and reverenced by the populace as a man of dark knowledge, seeing that he was the first to imprint New-year cakes with the mysterious hieroglyphics of the Cock and Breeches, and such-like magical devices.

This burgomaster, who still chewed the cud of ill-will against Peter Stuyvesant, addressed the multitude in what is called a patriotic speech, informing them of the courteous summons which the governor had received to surrender, of his refusal to comply therewith, and of his denying the public even a sight of the summons, which doubtless contained conditions highly to the honor and advantage of the province.

He then proceeded to speak of his excellency in high-sounding terms of vituperation, suited to the dignity of his station; comparing him to Nero, Caligula, and other flagrant great men of yore; assuring the people that the history of the world did not contain a despotic outrage equal to the present; that it would be recorded in letters of fire on the blood-stained tablet of history; that ages would roll back with sudden horror