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, P'ish-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 Sotauket, and Patchogue, Peconic, 
Montauk, and Ronkonkoma, which are Indian, Avith many more 
like them ; Flushing, Flatbush, GoAvanus, Breuckelen or Brook- 
lyn, and Wallabout, are Dutch ; Hempstead, Oyster Bay, Near 
RockaAvay, Shelter Island, Far RockaAvay, Gravesend, Bay Side, 
Middle Village, and Mount Misery, are colonial ; Centreville, East 
New York, Mechanicsville, Hicksville, Avith others to match, arc 
clearly Yankee ; Jerusalem, we haA^e ahvays believed to be Jew- 
ish ; Jericho, is Canaanitish, and Babylon, Ave understand to be 
Assyrian. 
There is less excuse for the pompous folly committed by giving 
absurd names, when Ave remember that we are in fact no more 
Avanting in good leading ideas for such purposes, than other peo- 
ple. After the first duty of preserving as many Indian Avords as 
possible, and after allowing a portion of the counties and toAvns 
for monuments to distinguished men, cither as local benefactors 
or deserving Avell of the country generally, there would no doubt 
still remain a large number of sites to be named. But Ave need 
not set off on a Avild goose chase in quest of these. Combina- 
21 * 
