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But who could rely upon the vagaries of an old man, who could do nothing but make memoranda out of his window upon the doings of his neighbors? "If anybody knew more than that Fithian Minuit was an obliging, neighborly man, and a model for mechanics, it must have been the subject of his romance.
In 1638 he sent out a Swedish expedition under Peter Minuit, the late governor of New Netherland, who established a fort on the Delaware near the present Wilmington, and called it "Christina," and the Swedes paid no attention to the protest of Governor Kieft.
Governor Minuit was not held to be the best man in the world for his position, and he was recalled in 1632, and Wouter Van Twiller, who possessed all of his predecessor's faults and none of his virtues, took his place.
But he loved to see the clock-maker come to the cottage, who had never shown partiality for any woman, while popular with all. "'Minuit, he used to say, 'the best man on watch by land or sea, thou North Star; look to my girl as to my chronometer, and I'll pay thee twice the cost of thy time!
He bore in his hand a chronometer, which Minuit recognized in a moment, and he drew his arm for the first time around the maiden's form. "'The Chirpland went down on Five Fathom Shoal, and the captain stood by her. He bade us return his chronometer, and say that he perished in the assurance that his daughter was left to the guidance of another fully as sure.
A few years ago some movement was for the first time made to erect a suitable monument to the memory of Minuit.
"The child whom the neighborhood at that time accused of this act was known in later life as Fithian Minuit, babe of a woman of mixed English and Finnish-Dutch descent, who came from the fishermen's town of Head of Elk, a few hours jog to the southward, to sell fish to the surveying camp.
Stand but to'th fate of this, and if it faile I will sitt downe a Convert and renounce All wanton hope hereafter. Deerest Madam, If you did meane before this honour to me, Let not your loving thoughts freeze in a Minuit. My genius is a prophet. Do. Sir Richard, Madam, Is comeing this way. Fra. Shall I hope agen? La. I wo'not say you shall despaire. Fra. Do.
"It was the captain's delight, while ashore, to have every timepiece, stationary or portable, taken apart in the presence of his daughter and himself, while he told his sailor yarns, and Lois stood ready to serve his punch, or pass to the fat, smooth-faced, cheerful Minuit the pieces of mechanism: brass gimbals, chronometer-boxes, wheels and springs, ship-glasses, compasses, the manifold parts of little things by which men grope their way out of sight of land, hung between a human watch and the crystal shell of the embossed heaven.
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