There has been neither design nor desire, in what has been said, to reflect on the character of the Pilgrims, or to detract from the high fame and renown to which they are justly entitled. No one has more appreciation of their virtues or greater veneration for their memories than the writer. A train of thought only has been followed which led in a channel that seems to be altogether reasonable and intelligent. When a genealogist thought to please Napoleon by telling him that his descent could be traced from some ancient line of Gothic princes, he replied that he dated his patent of nobility from the battle of Monte Notte (his first victory.) The Pilgrims inherited their patent of nobility and derived their claim to immortality by the excellence of their example and the beauty and usefulness of their lives. D. W. MANCHESTER. WERE THE DUTCH ON MANHATTAN ISLAND IN 1598? It will admit of but very little dispute that Verrazano in 1524, and Gomez in 1525, anticipated Henry Hudson by several decades in the discovery of New York Bay and the Hudson River. There is also a claim for previous discovery however, put forward in behalf of the Dutch. One confident historian of the Metropolis starts out bravely and unhesitatingly with the assertion that the Dutch were here as early as 1598; but he gives no authorities from whence he had gathered this startling piece of information, yet before one has read thirty pages of such a well-known work as Dr. E. B. O’Callaghan’s, “History of New Netherland,” the source of the statement is plainly indicated, and fortunately, also the opportunity for a careful weighing of the testimony supporting it. [Illustration: MANHATTAN ISLAND IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.] Dr. O’Callaghan refers his readers to a Dutch document in the State Archives at Albany, discovered by Mr. Brodhead at the Hague, copied by him for his collection of documents and translated and published in that invaluable store-house of historical material, the “Documents relating to the Colonial History of the State of New York,” vol. I, pp. 149, _et seq._ Here we read: “New Netherland ... was first frequented [explored] by the inhabitants of this country [Holland] in the year 1598, and especially by those of the Greenland Company, but without making any fixed settlements, only as a shelter [resort] in the winter. For which purpose they erected on the North [Hudson] and South [Delaware] Rivers there, two little forts against the incursions of the Indians. A charter was afterwards, on the 11th of October, 1614, granted by their High Mightinesses to trade exclusively to the newly discovered countries.”