The people of New-England left the mother country, as banished from it by what they considered oppression; came over foaming with religious and political fury, and narrowly missed having the most artful and able of demagogues, Cromwell himself, for their leader and guide. They might be compared to burning lava, discharged by the force of internal combustion, from the bosom of the commonwealth, while inflamed by contending elements. This lava, every one acquainted with the convulsions of nature must know, takes a long time to cool, and when at length it is cooled, turns to a substance hard and barren, that long resists the kindly influence of the elements, before its surface resumes the appearance of beauty and fertility. Such were the almost literal effects of political convulsions, aggravated by a fiery and intolerant zeal for their own mode of worship, on these self-righteous colonists. ------- CHAP. XXI. Distinguishing characteristics of the New-York colonists, to what owing—Huguenots and Palatines, their character. BUT to return to the superior moral and military character of the New-York populace; it was, in the first place, owing to a well-regulated piety, less concerned about forms than essentials; next, to an influx of other than the original settlers, which tended to render the general system of opinion more liberal and tolerant. The French protestants, driven from their native land by intolerant bigotry, had lived at home, excluded alike from public employments and fashionable society. Deprived of so many resources that were open to their fellow-subjects, and forced to seek comfort in piety and concord, for many privations, self-command and frugality had been, in a manner, forced upon them—consequently they were not so vain or so volatile as to disgust their new associates; while their cheerful tempers, accommodating manners, and patience under adversity, were very prepossessing.