porated boroughs, towns, villages, and cities, and accordingly a rush was made to form boroughs, particularly in Bergen County, and had not the legislature hastened to check this rush by amending the school law the whole county would have been carved into boroughs in less than two years. As it was, twenty-six boroughs were created in the county from January 23, 1894, to December 18, of the same year. The amendment which the legislature made to the school act provided that no borough might maintain a school separate from the township unless there should be four hundred children within its limits. This so effectually checked the borough movement that only five have since been formed.

The following table shows the names of the boroughs organized in Bergen County to date, the dates of their organization, and the townships from which they were respectively taken:

EARLY SETTLERS OF HUDSON COUNTY

A great majority of the pioneer settlers of Bergen and Hudson Counties were emigrants from Holland, or descendants of persons who had emigrated from that country and settled on Manhattan Island or Long Island. The rest were English, French, Germans, and Scandinavians. What brought these to the shores of America? What led them to settle in New Jersey? Who were they? The limits of this article will permit of only a brief reference to the two principal causes which impelled them to leave their native land,-overcrowding of population in Holland and the desire to better their condition.

More than a century had elapsed since the Augustinian monk,

Luther, had nailed his ninety-five theses on the church door at Wittenberg. That act had, at last, wakened into activity all the dor mant forces of christendom. During the Middle Ages all learning and religion had been controlled by the Roman hierarchy. All that time the papacy had been a confederacy for the conservation of learning, against the barbarism and ignorance of the times; and so long as the pontiff retained the character of chief clerk of such a confederacy his power remained irresistible. But as soon as he abandoned the rôle of chief clerk in spiritual affairs, and assumed that of secular prince, the great revolution began. His former friends became his enemies. The British schoolmen led the way in the revolt, followed by Wickliff, Huss, Jerome, and others. The breach kept widening, until all the countries of Western Europe started like giants out of their sleep at the first blast of Luther's trumpet. In Northern

The

Europe the best half of the people embraced the Reformation. spark which the monk had kindled lighted the torch of civilization, which was to illuminate the forests of the Hudson in America.

At no time since this terrible contest began had the Catholic monarchs of Europe been more persistently active and relentlessly cruel toward the believers in the new religion than at the beginning of emigration to New Netherland. The bloody conflict known as "The Thirty Years' War" was then raging with all its attendant horrors. Nevertheless, Holland, of all the circle of nations, had guaranteed safety to people of every religious belief, and enforced, within her own

the

borders at least, respect for civil liberty. As a result she had become the harbor of refuge and the temporary home of thousands of the persecuted of almost every country; Brownists from England, the Waldenses from Italy, the Labadists and Picards from France, the Walloons from Germany and Flanders, and many other Protestant sects, all flocked into Holland. Across her borders flowed a continual stream of refugees and outcasts. This influx of foreigners, augmented by the natural increase of her own people, caused Holland to suf fer seriously from overcrowding, particularly in her large cities. A learned Hollander, writing at that time, said of the situation: "Inasmuch as the multitude of people, not only natives but foreigners, who are seeking a livelihood here, is very great, so that, where one stiver is to be earned, there are ten hands ready to seize it. Many are obliged, on this account, to go in search of other lands and residences, where they can obtain a living."

In the few years preceding 1621 several voyages of discovery and adventure had been made by the Dutch to New Netherland, but no colonies had been founded. Letters from these voyagers declared that New Netherland was a veritable paradise--a land "flowing with milk and honey," traversed by numerous great and beautiful rivers,

plentifully stocked with fish; great valleys and plains, covered with luxuriant verdure; extensive forests, teeming with fruits, game, and wild animals; and an exceedingly fertile and prolific soil. These and many similar letters aroused and stimulated many of the discontented and unemployed of Holland to emigrate to New Netherland with their families in the hope of being able to earn a handsome livelihood, strongly fancying that they could live in the New World in luxury and ease, while in the Old they would still have to earn their bread by the sweat of their brows.

In 1621 the "States-General" took steps looking toward relief from the situation, the gravity of which they now fully comprehended. On June 3 they granted a charter to "The Dutch West India Com

pany" to organize and govern a colony in New Netherland; and in June, 1623-4, an expedition under Captain Cornelius Jacobsen Mey, of Amsterdam, carrying thirty families, most of whom were religious refugees, came over to New Amsterdam and began a settlement on the lower end of Manhattan Island. Mey, not liking the job of being director of the new colony, soon returned to Holland, leaving matters for a time in charge of William Verhulst, who was succeeded by Peter Minuit in 1626. This first colony was not a success. The colonists were "on the make." Aside from building a few rude bark huts and a fort, they busied themselves dickering with the savages for skins and furs. They tilled no ground, and for three years were nonsupporting. On the 7th of June, 1629, the "States-General " granted a bill of "Freedoms and Exemptions" to all such private persons as