NAMES. 
489 
add a few taken from the older counties of this State : Coldspring, 
the Stepping-Stones, White Stone, Riverhead, West-Farms, 
Grassy Point, White Plains, Canoeplace, Oakhill, Wading River, 
Old Man's, Fireplace, Stony Brook, Fonda's Bush, Fish-house, &c. 
Long Island shows an odd medley of names ; it is in itself a sort 
of historical epitome of our career in this way ; some Dutch names, 
some Indian, others English, others Yankee, with a sprinkling of 
Hebrew and Assyrian. Long Island was the common Dutch 
name. The counties of Kings, Queens, and Suffolk came, of 
course, from England, after the conquest of the colony under 
Charles II. ; then we have Setauket, and Patchogue, Peconic, 
Montauk, and Ronkonkoma, which are Indian, with many more 
like them ; Flushing, Flatbush, Gowanus, Breuckelen or Brook- 
lyn, and Wallabout, are Dutch ; He-mpstead, Oyster Bay, Near 
Rockaway, Shelter Island, Far Rockaway, Gravesend, Bay Side, 
Middle Village, and Mount Misery, are colonial ; Centreville, East 
New York, Mechanicsville, Hicksville, with others to match, arc 
clearly Yankee ; Jerusalem, we have always believed to be Jew- 
ish ; Jericho, is Canaanitish, and Babylon, we understand to be 
Assyrian. 
There is less excuse for the pompous folly committed by giving 
absurd names, when we remember that we are in fact no more 
wanting in good leading ideas for such purposes, than other peo- 
ple. After the first duty of preserving as many Indian words as 
possible, and after allowing a portion of the counties and towns 
for monuments to distinguished men, either as local benefactors 
or deserving well of the country generall}^, there would no doubt 
still remain a large number of sites to be named. But we need 
not set off on a wild goose chase in quest of these. Combina- 
21* 
