Within the house were huge fireplaces adorned with blue or pink tiles on which were Bible scenes or texts, a huge moon-faced clock, a Dutch Bible, spinning wheels, cupboards full of Delft plates and pewter dishes, rush- bottom chairs, great chests for linen and clothes, and four-posted bedsteads with curtains, feather beds, and dimity coverlets, and underneath a trundle-bed for the children. A warming pan was used to take the chill off the linen sheets on cold nights. In the houses of the humbler sort the furniture was plainer, and sand on the floors did duty for carpets. [Illustration: FOUR-POSTED BED, AND STEPS USED IN GETTING INTO IT. In the Van Cortland Mansion, New York city.] TRADE AND COMMERCE.--The chief products of the colony were furs, lumber, wheat, and flour. The center of the fur trade was Fort Orange, from which great quantities of beaver and other skins purchased from the Indians were sent to New Amsterdam; and to this port came vessels from the West Indies, Portugal, and England, as well as from Holland. There was scarcely any manufacturing. The commercial spirit of the Dutch overshadowed everything else, and kept agriculture at a low stage. THE ENGLISH SEIZE NEW NETHERLAND.--The English, who claimed the continent from Maine to Florida, and from the Atlantic to the Pacific, regarded the Dutch as intruders. Soon after Charles II came to the throne, he granted the country from the Delaware to the Connecticut, with Long Island and some other territory, to his brother James, the Duke of York. In 1664, accordingly, a fleet was sent to take possession of New Amsterdam. Stuyvesant called out his troops and made ready to fight. But the people were tired of the arbitrary rule of the Dutch governors, and petitioned him to yield. At last he answered, "Well, let it be so, but I would rather be carried out dead." NEW YORK.--The Dutch flag was then lowered, and New Netherland passed into English hands. New Amsterdam was promptly renamed New York; Fort Orange was called Albany; and the greater part of New Netherland became the province of New York. [6] GOVERNMENT OF NEW YORK.--The governor appointed by the Duke of York drew up a code of laws known later as the Duke's Laws. No provision was made for a legislature, nor for town meetings, nor for schools. [7] Government of this sort did not please the English on Long Island and elsewhere. Demands were at once made for a share in the lawmaking. Some of the people refused to pay taxes, and some towns to elect officers, and sent strong protests against taxation without their consent. But nearly twenty years passed before New York secured a representative legislature. [8]