40 KUYP VAN KAARTEN, 



heirs with increase ; and in 1734, Kuyp was able to look about him 

 with complacency, and congratulate himself on possessions, which 

 were the envy of his neighbours, and a source of much satisfaction to 

 himself. Never backward to relieve the deserving or undeserving, 

 always jovial, familiar, and good-hearted, he was, as he ought to 

 have been, extremely popular in the village : to him, as the most 

 influential amongst them, were his neighbours accustomed to look 

 for the administration of executive and distributive justice; to his 

 opinion all were accustomed to defer ; and representative and legis- 

 lator of the little commonwealth, he might with justice have 

 reckoned himself, had he been acquainted with the name, a Solon on 

 a small scale. 



His age was about forty-five; and, though stout, he was tall, and 

 of a goodly presence : endowed with strong capabilities of supporting- 

 fatigue, and a mind not easily terrified by danger, it was often his 

 practice to make long and extensive excursions into the surrounding 

 country. A South American woodman has resources in himself, 

 calculated to surmount obstacles, and obviate what to others would 

 appear insuperable inconveniences. When preparing for expeditions 

 of this description, he would fit himself out in a species of Robinson 

 Crusoe fashion ; carrying, besides rifle, couteau, and powder-horns, 

 an axe to cut passages through brushwood, a bag containing pro- 

 visions, a quilted cloak of ample volume to sleep upon, a flask of 

 spirits, and sundry other necessaries of similar kind. Attended by a 

 dog of superior breed, that he called Maurice, after the Dutch 

 worthy of that cognomen, and which was apparently as well pleased 

 with these sallies as his master, was Kuyp accustomed to range the 

 forests and savannahs of that part of America; traversing long tracts 

 of woodland, under the scorching beams of a tropical sun ; swimming 

 rivers, and crossing ridges of seemingly inaccessible mountains. 



It happened that Kuyp had occasion to visit a Mynherr Bom- 

 styck, an offset from the colony, at a distant point ; and this coming 

 in to add to his rambling disposition, he prepared for his journey. 

 One tempting morning, properly accoutred, he set out, and walked 

 stoutly forwards : masses of forest trees began to close round him, 

 until the greater part of the lower country was shut in from view. 

 On the brow of a grassy eminence, that sloped gently downwards, 

 which he had now attained, Kuyp turned, and for the last time 

 caught a far glimpse of the village he had left behind him. .. It lay 

 vaguely reposing in the early sunlight ; its antique church-tower 

 peeping from the dark foliage that seemed to sheathe it in solitary 

 peacefulness, and its few gilded roofs gracefully contrasted with the 

 blueness of the country beyond. 



Calling his dog to his side, Kuyp turned round, and strode 

 valiantly forwards. Soon all traces of cultivation or inhabitants 

 faded from his eye. A monotonous repetition of the same colour, 

 green in all tints, from rich autumnal brown to the deepness of the 

 olive, or the freshness of the emerald, seemed calculated to tire the 

 eye. Forest succeeded forest in never-euding succession ; and no 

 sound broke the melancholy stillness of the scene, but now and tru n 



