SETTLEMENTS ON THE DEMERARY, &C. 217 



The Dutch, as I have before stated, generally live in sump- 

 tuous elegant houses, and in other respects, in a manner 

 which fully proves they are set down for life. Having, how- 

 ever, one day, some business to transact with Mynheer Vos, 

 of Essequebo, I was convinced this was not, like many other 

 things, a general rule without an exception. Mynheer V. 

 possesses an unincumbered estate worth twenty thousand 

 pounds, has no other relative in the world, than a natural 

 daughter by an Indian, to leave it to ; he is between sixty and 

 seventy, and came to the colony as a common soldier about 

 1770. He contrived, while in that situation, by buying and 

 selling little articles, to amass so much as to purchase his dis- 

 charge, and to reserve a few hundred guilders to trade on. 

 With them he purchased a sloop boat, hired a negro, and 

 commenced regular hoopman, or huckster, by selling on 

 those estates he went to, such articles as he had ; and after a 

 week or two's cruize, he would return to town and replenish his 

 stock for another trading voyage. This course of life he con- 

 tinued for many years, without having any regular house ; he 

 met with several reverses of fortune, and once or twice was 

 nearly ruined by the loss of his little cargoes, from the vessels 

 getting ashore on the sand banks at the mouth of the Esse- 

 quebo, where, to lighten his boat, he was obliged to throw 

 the cargo overboard. These mishaps did not damp his ardor, 

 but on the contrary, proved a stimulus. He now built him- 

 self a hut on the west coast of Demerary, which was intended 



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