"Your last description may contain the secret of the whole movement. The love of property may be so strong as to induce them to do a great many things they ought not to do. I certainly do not apprehend that any direct attempt is about to be made, in New York, to divide its property; nor do I fear any open, declared agrarian statute; for what I apprehend is to come through indirect and gradual innovations on the right, that will be made to assume the delusive aspect of justice and equal rights, and thus undermine the principles of the people, before they are aware of the danger themselves. In order that you may not only understand me, but may understand facts that are of the last importance to your own pocket, I will first tell you what has been done, and then tell you what I fear is to follow. The first difficulty--or, rather, the first difficulty of recent occurrence--arose at the death of the late Patroon. I say of recent occurrence, since Dunning writes me that, during the administration of John Jay, an attempt to resist the payment of rent was made on the manor of the Livingstons; but _he_ put it down _instanter_." "Yes, I should rather think that roguery would not be apt to prosper, while the execution of the laws was entrusted to such a man. The age of such politicians, however, seems to have ended among us." "It did not prosper. Governor Jay met the pretension as we all know such a man would meet it; and the matter died away, and has been nearly forgotten. It is worthy of remark, that _he_ PUT THE EVIL DOWN. But this is not the age of John Jays. To proceed to my narrative: When the late Patroon died, there was due to him a sum of something like two hundred thousand dollars of back-rents, and of which he had made a special disposition in his will, vesting the money in trustees for a certain purpose. It was the attempt to collect this money which first gave rise to dissatisfaction. Those who had been debtors so long, were reluctant to pay. In casting round for the means to escape from the payment of their just debts, these men, feeling the power that numbers ever give over right in America, combined to resist with others who again had in view a project to get rid of the rents altogether. Out of this combination grew what have been called the 'manor troubles.' Men appeared in a sort of mock-Indian dress, calico shirts thrown over their other clothes, and with a species of calico masks on their faces, who resisted the bailiffs' processes, and completely prevented the collection of rents. These men were armed, mostly with rifles; and it was finally found necessary to call out a strong body of the militia, in order to protect the civil officers in the execution of their duties." "All this occurred before we went to the East. I had supposed _those_ anti-renters, as they were called, had been effectually put down."