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impossible for me (however necessary at this conjuncture) to detach eight or ten men to garrison and defend as far as possible the post of Moruca, which will, I fear, see trouble. All that I can do is, with the aid of the Carib nation, whose flight from Barima I daily expect, to cause all possible hindrance to the undertaking; but then I should want ammunition. and food and have none of either.

I have the honor to assure you that I shall not slumber in this matter, but shall do everything in my power, and meanwhile await your orders, at the earliest moment, as also the so long sought definition of frontier, so that I may go to work with certainty. (Is not this regulated by the Treaty of Münster?)

There are also Swedish emissaries (as I understand) arrived at Surinam to examine Barima, so that this old matter begins to revive again; but I am not so much disturbed about this as about the other matter.

Extract from letter from Storm van's Gravesande, Director-General in Essequibo, to the West India Company, September 11, 1754.

The Council having met and Mr. Persik having appeared, he handed over his letters (under promise of secrecy as to the writer's name). Having seen from these that according to all human reckoning we are threatened with an invasion, we thought of every means of defense possible to us. We have ordered the Captains to make lists without delay of their men and ammunition, to warn the Caribs and other Indians at the earliest opportunity, to make ready as soon as possible ships to serve as outlying posts, and to send a messenger to Orinoco with a letter from me to the Commandant there, of which a copy herewith. To-day I also write all the postholders to use the necessary precautions.

Extract from letter from Adriaan Spoors, Secretary in Essequibo, to the West India Company, October 11, 1754.

[Reprinted from U. S. Commission, Report, Vol. 2, pp. 350-351.]

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On September 10 last we were put in extreme disquietude by certain

No. 148.

advices (of which the Council, and especially the Director-General, circumstantially inform you) that it was the intention of the King of Spain to invade this colony with many boats and numbers of men, and if possible completely to occupy it and take it in possession. But, thank God, on the 8th of this month, on the return of the messenger sent to the Orinoco, I myself was informed through the letters, above all [through one] to Mr. Salomon Persik (the colonist best known and dealing most with the Spaniards), that those rumors were absolutely unfounded, as seems to me clear, and more than clear, from a comparison of the reports. In the meantime these reports have, besides the consternation, caused considerable expense to the colony in general and the Company in particular, especially to the latter, since all the messages and post expenses must be paid for by it; and, there being on hand not a grain of powder, except what you sent by the Essequeebsche Vriendschap, a barque was hired and sent to Barbados for powder. Moreover, all the slaves, men and women, of all three plantations of the Company, have these three weeks been gathered here at Fort Zeelandia, and I do not know when this will end. You can easily see what a delay and loss this will cause, both to the sugar-grinding and otherwise.

Extracts from letter from Storm van's Gravesande, Director-General in Essequibo, to the West India Company, October 12, 1754.

[Reprinted (with corrections) from Blue Book, No. 3, pp. 100–101.]

All the Caribs have also been warned to keep themselves ready and armed, but I find this warning in no instance was necessary, since I have learned from one of their Headmen who came to me last week the nation is furious with the Spaniards because they have located a Mission in Cayuni between them and the nation of the Panacays, and hereby try to hinder their communication with that nation, and entirely to prevent their whole Slave Trade on that side; already, too, they have impressed and taken away some.

Wherefor they have made an alliance with the Panacays aforesaid, who were as malcontent as themselves.

And both together surprised the Mission, massacred the priest and ten or twelve Spaniards, and have demolished the buildings; after which they have sent knotted cords to all persons of their nation (as is their custom) for a general summons to both together to deliberate on what further remains for them to do.

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23d of this month I have received this information from Mr. C. Boter, who thereupon told me the common rumour was that one of our colonists had been near by there, and upon further inquiry, having found that that person had been about the same time up the Cayuni, I caused him to be apprehended and brought to the fort. Because such a matter would be of consequence, and would afford the Spaniards real and well-founded reasons for complaint, I have always taken punctilious care therefor.

However, this sad accident for the Spaniards has covered us on that side, so that we have nothing to fear from that direction; on the contrary, if luck will have it that we are to be attacked, these nations will make plenty of play on their side for the Spaniards.

The negroes of your Honours' plantation Pilgrim, when the Director told them to keep good watch, so that at the first alarm they might retire up1 the creek, have replied that in such a case they request the Director to be good enough to retire with their wives and children, but that they were not inclined to yield a foot, that they would station themselves on both sides in the forest, and then they would see if any Spaniards would come through the creek and to the plantation.

While busy in writing this there comes to me a trusty Indian bringing me a letter from Oronoque with a circumstantial account concerning the intention of the Spaniards. This informs me that their intention is to attack this Colony and Berbice; that the General-in-chief will be in Oronoque on the 20th September; that in Cumana twenty, and in Orenoque eight, vessels were being made, which must be in readiness by the last of November, the intention being to come down upon us in the end of December or beginning of January; that they were busy with all their energy to recruit and press people, and the corps was to consist of 3,000 or 4,000 men.

As the matter becomes more serious as time goes on, we have to-day resolved to send a vessel to Barbadoes on the 30th September, and to order thence a lot of ammunition and cartridge cases, because it is impossible without these to make proper resistance.

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1 Note by Prof. Burr.-For this word up the Blue Book has above.

" Note by Prof. Burr.-For the words both sides the Blue Book has the other side.

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No. 150.

Extract from letter from Storm van's Gravesande, Director-General in Essequibo, to the West India Company, October 27, 1754.

Since the departure of Captain Tikrey, who, on the 16th October, took his course for the sea outside the Demerara, I have learned no particular news from Oronoque except alone that three barques and nine large canoes have arrived there, and have sailed up to the fort, and that the Surinam wanderers and most of the Carib Indians have retired from Barima, and have departed to the Wayne.

We shall still be in uneasiness here for the period of about three months. Before the end of January they must discover everything, because, by the middle of February, the time for navigating up the Oronoque River will have expired.

Extract from letter from Storm van's Gravesande, Director-General in Essequibo, to West India Company, November 26, 1754.

The spies sent by me, both to the Oronoque and to the Cayuni, have not yet come back, but the Indians above in Cayuni have still this week caused me to be assured that they will well guard the passage, and that I had nothing to fear from that side.

Extracts from Minutes of the Court of Policy in Essequibo, 1754-1755.

Having seen the petitions of the captains of the militia for the establishment of a post on this side of Moroco, for the purpose of preventing the desertion of slaves, the counsellor, E. Pypersberg, is commissioned to

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make a personal visit, together with the aforementioned gentlemen, to the proposed spot, and further arrangements will be made after having received their report.

The respective officers of the militia, having presented a petition with a certain plan by means of which they believe that by moving the trading post of the Company at Moroco, the slaves deserting from this river might be prevented from passing so easily to the Orinoco, and since the Colony will bear the expenses of the same, it has been resolved to discuss with the captains of the militia the means by which they believe that the necessary slaves may be procured from the Colony for this purpose, the Company meanwhile to defray the expenses of the "post-holder" and contributing, as far as may be convenient and to the purpose, to the building of the houses.

Extract from letter from West India Company (Zeeland Chamber) to Storm van's Gravesande, Director-General in Essequibo, January 6, 1755.

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[Reprinted from U. S. Commission, Report, Vol. 2, pp. 357-358.]

We would we were able to give you an exact and precise definition of the proper limits of the river of Essequibo, such as you have several times asked of us; but we greatly doubt whether any precise and accurate definition can anywhere be found, save and except the general limits of the Company's territories stated in the preambles of the respective charters granted to the West India Company at various times by the States General, and except the description thereof which is found in the respective memorials drawn up and printed when the well-known differences arose concerning the exclusive navigation of the inhabitants of Zeeland to those parts, wherein it is defined as follows: "That region lying between those two well-known great rivers, namely, on the one side, that far-stretching and wide-spreading river, the Amazon, and, on the other side, the great and mightily-flowing river the Orinoco, occupying an intermediate space of ten degrees of north latitude from the Equator, together with the islands adjacent thereto." For neither in the Treaty of

1 Note by Prof. Burr.-This quotation is from the memorial of the Zeeland Chamber in 1751 in support of the Zeeland monopoly of the Essequibo trade. The passage occurs in a description, not of the Dutch colonies, but of all Guiana. The document is printed in full in the Nederlandsche Jaerboeken for 1751 (pp. 1079-1135).