The tribe on
the island were called Manhattans, and from that tribe came the name of
the Island of Manhattan. All the Indians, no matter which tribe they
belonged to, looked very much alike and acted very much the same. Their
eyes were dark, and their hair long, straight, and black. When they were
fighting, they daubed their skins with colored muds--war paint the white
men called it--and started out on the "war-path". They loved to hunt and
fish, as well as to fight, and they fought and murdered as cruelly and
with as little thought as they hunted the wild animals or hooked the
fish. They held talks which were called "councils," and one Indian would
speak for hours, while the others listened in silence. And when they
determined upon any action, they carried it out, without a thought of
how many people were to be killed, or whether they were to be killed
themselves.
[Illustration: Earliest Picture of Manhattan.]
CHAPTER II
THE FIRST TRADERS on the ISLAND
For several years after the return of Hudson, Dutch merchants sent their
ships to the Island of Manhattan, and each ship returned to Holland
laden with costly furs which the Indians had traded for glass beads and
strips of gay cloth.
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