A ship was built, so the Americans say, of 70 tons in 1699, by the descendants of the Quaker settlers, and less than 100 years later the bold republicans, abandoning the doctrines of peace, engaged and captured an English corvette off the island. It was all along of General How, who landed his troops here and set the people to work on the fortifications he threw up, whether they would or no. A corvette, bound to Halifax, anchored off the island, and an old whaler, who, says the chronicler, must have been smarting under the wrongs he had suffered at the hands of the red-coats, or who possibly regarded the work as he would the capture of a finner or a bottle-nose, imparted to a few trusty friends the idea of "cutting her out." So embarking at night in a couple of boats, they stole down with muffled oars and ran up under the stern of the ship. There was no watch, and through the cabin windows the officers could be seen playing cards. The crews of the boats boarded the corvette simultaneously, seized, overpowered, and bound the officers and men, lowered them into their boats, and, having set the man-of-war on fire, pulled over to the Jersey shore with their prisoners. It is to be hoped that the demeanour and language of the captain have been misrepresented by local tradition; but he is said to have cried bitterly, and to have exclaimed, "To be surprised and captured by two blooming egg-shells is too blasted bad!" There was a long period of neglect before Fashion and the populace found out the attractions of Coney Island. Fishermen, oyster-catchers, and sportsmen visited the sandy beach from time to time; then after a while a few houses were run up of a very inferior class, and these were frequented by the very worst of the scum of New York, so that it was almost dangerous, and certainly disgusting, to go among them, while the scenes on the beach, to which the present proceedings afford such a contrast, were described as being of the most disgraceful character.