a buzz and a bustle like a hive in swarming time. Houses were turned
inside out, and stripped of the venerable furniture which had come from
Holland; all the community, great and small, black and white, man, woman,
and child, was in commotion, forming lines from the houses to the water
side, like lines of ants from an ant-hill; everybody laden with some
article of household furniture; while busy housewifes plied backwards and
forwards along the lines, helping everything forward by the nimbleness of
their tongues.

By degrees a fleet of boats and canoes were piled up with all kinds of
household articles; ponderous tables; chests of drawers, resplendent with
brass ornaments, quaint corner cupboards; beds and bedsteads; with any
quantity of pots, kettles, frying-pans, and Dutch ovens. In each boat
embarked a whole family, from the robustious burgher down to the cats and
dogs and little negroes. In this way they set off across the mouth of the
Hudson, under the guidance of Oloffe the Dreamer, who hoisted his standard
on the leading boat.

This memorable migration took place on the first of May, and was long
cited in tradition as the grand moving. The anniversary of it was piously
observed among the "sons of the pilgrims of Communipaw," by turning their
houses topsy-turvy, and carrying all the furniture through the streets, in
emblem of the swarming of the parent hive; and this is the real origin of
the universal agitation and "moving" by which this most restless of cities
is literally turned out of doors on every May-day.

As the little squadron from Communipaw drew near to the shores of
Manna-hata, a sachem, at the head of a band of warriors, appeared to
oppose their landing. Some of the most zealous of the pilgrims were for
chastising this insolence with the powder and ball, according to the
approved mode of discoverers; but the sage Oloffe gave them the
significant sign of St. Nicholas, laying his finger beside his nose and
winking hard with one eye; whereupon his followers perceived that there
was something sagacious in the wind. He now addressed the Indians in the
blandest terms, and made such tempting display of beads, hawks's bells,
and red blankets, that he was soon permitted to land, and a great land
speculation ensued. And here let me give the true story of the original
purchase of the site of this renowned city, about which so much has been
said and written. Some affirm that the first cost was, but sixty guilde