FOUNDING OF FIRST DUTCH COLONY. 25 
and. enthusiastically devoted to the service of 
his country, Van Kiebeck, having, with others, 
represented the advantages to be secured by 
forming a general rendevous at the Cape, for 
the united Chartered East Indian Company of 
Holland, was selected, as the founder of the 
new Colony. On the 23rd of December, 1651, 
he launched on the ocean, in three vessels 
freighted with precious seeds of civilization, 
to the celebrated promontory of the Cape of 
Good Hope; where he arrived about sunset, on 
the evening of the 6th of April, 1652, and 
immediately afterwards commenced his little 
settlement." 
The Colony, thus began, soon spread; and, 
within eight years, a treaty with the natives, 
gave the new possessors a rayon of territory of 
three Dutch miles beyond the original fort. 
Ten years more incorporated the whole penin- 
sula of the Cape, including Saldanah Bay and 
the Hottentot Holland. In 1672, two other 
contracts with the Hottentot chiefs, (signed on 
the 19th of April, and the 5th of May,) witnessed 
the sale, in full, perpetual, and hereditary pro- 
perty, of the land around the Cape. "The 
consent of the chiefs," (says Mr. Moodie, the 
collector of the Cape Records) "and their con- 
tentment with the price paid, was testified, by 
the members of the Cape Government, and by 
