Swedes are a God-fearing people,’ said William Penn; ‘they are industrious and contented, and much attached to the customs and manners of the mother-country. They live by agriculture, and the breeding of cattle; the women are good housewives, spin and weave, take care of their families, and bring up their children well.’” All historians agree that the Swedes who thus became amalgamated into the general population introduced into it a sound element of moral life, by which it has been improved. The dominion of the Dutch seemed now firmly established in the New World; and the worth of such a colony began to be appreciated at home; its great extent—from New England to Maryland, from the sea to the great river of Canada and the remote north-western wilderness—was a subject of boast. Emigration to the banks of the Hudson was encouraged. Merchants now were beginning to be allured to Manhattan, and all presented an aspect of promise for the future. Stuyvesant, who, seeming to have a high idea of the prerogatives of governor, was inclined to rule with an arbitrary hand, was kept under control by the directors at home; who, when he took it upon himself to inspect the merchants’ books, checked him with the reproof that “it was an unprecedented act in Christendom, and that he must behave well to the merchants;” and when—himself a violent Calvinist—he inclined to persecute the Lutherans, and imitating Massachusetts, began to imprison and banish “the abominable sect of Quakers,” he received the injunction, “Let every peaceful citizen enjoy freedom of conscience; this maxim has made our city the asylum for fugitives from every land; tread in its steps, and you shall be blessed.”