In another instance, during the same year, in the month of October, in the town of Bushwyck, a man named Urian Hagell, was imprisoned for having said, on a training day, speaking jestingly of the soldiers, “Let us knock them down, we are three to their one.” The justices called these “mutinous, factious, and seditious words;” which, with the like, appear to have been favourite terms with them. Again, in the same month and year, Hendrick Claes Vechte, of the town of Brooklyn, was imprisoned by the justices, on a charge of “raising of dissension, strife, and mutiny, among their majesties subjects.” And May 8, 1694, two women of Bushwick were indicted at the sessions, for having beat and pulled the hair of Captain Peter Praa, whilst at the head of his company of soldiers on parade. One of them was fined £3, and the cost, £1 19_s._ 9_d._; and the other 40_s._ and the cost, £1 19_s._ 9_d._ In the last mentioned year, (1694) Volkert Brier, constable of Brooklyn, was fined £5, and the costs of court amounting to £1, by the sessions, “for tearing and burning an execution directed to him as constable.”[18] Brier afterwards petitioned the governor to have the fine remitted; a copy of which petition is in the appendix, marked C. This town with respect to legal matters was under the jurisdiction of the court of sessions held at Gravesend, for the West Riding of Yorkshire, upon Long-Island,[19] until the year 1683; when an act was passed by the first legislative assembly of this colony, dividing the province into counties, by which the ridings were abolished. The court however continued to be held at Gravesend until 1686, when it was removed to Flatbush, in conformity to an act of the colonial assembly, passed in the year 1685. This town continued under the jurisdiction of that court, and the court of common pleas, which was afterwards established, until the close of the revolutionary war. At the close of the war the courts were re-organized, and this town still continues under their jurisdiction. PRESENT GOVERNMENT. In 1816 the village of Brooklyn was erected out of the town, and constituted a distinct government; thereby forming an _imperium in imperio_. The present government both of the town and village, approach as near a pure democracy as that of any other place in this state. No business of importance is undertaken without first having the sanction of a public meeting. Here these sterling principles, that all power emanates from the people, and that public officers are but public servants, are fully recognized, and acted upon. This head the compiler will divide into two divisions, in order to avoid confusion: First, the Town Government, and second, the Village Government. _First--the Town Government._ The government of the town is administered by