hatred and animosity, which, for a long time after, greatly embarrassed the public affairs of the colony. When Albany declared for the Prince of Orange, there was nothing else that Leisler could properly require; and, rather than sacrifice the public peace of the province to the trifling honor of resisting a man who had no civil designs, Albany ought to have delivered the garrison into his hands, until the king's orders were received; but while Leisler was intoxicated with his new-gotten power, Bayard, Courtland and Schuyler, on the other hand could not brook a submission to the authority of a man, mean in his abilities and inferior in his degree. Animated by these feelings both sides prepared for hostilities. Mr. Livingston, a principal agent for the convention, retired into Connecticut to solicit aid for the protection of the frontier against the French. Leisler, suspecting that these forces were to be used against him, endeavored to have Livingston arrested as an aider and abettor of the French and the deposed King James.

Upon

The son-in-law of Leisler, Jacob Milborne, was commissioned for the reduction of Albany. his arrival before the city, a great number of the inhabitants armed themselves and repaired to the fort, then commanded by Mr. Schuyler, while many others followed the members of the convention to a conference with him at the city hall. In order

to win the crowd over to his side, Milborne declaimed much against King James, popery and arbitrary power; but his oratory was lost upon the hearers, who, after several meetings, still adhered to the convention. Milborne drew up a few of his men in line of battle and advanced to within a few paces of the fort with bayonets fixed. Mr. Schuyler had the utmost difficulty to prevent both his own men and the Mohawks, who were then in Albany, and perfectly devoted to his service, from firing upon Milborne's party, which consisted of an inconsiderable number. Under these circumstances, he thought proper to retreat, and soon after departed from Albany. A second expedition in the Spring proved more successful, for he gained possession of the city and fort. No sooner was he in possession of the garrison, than most of the principal members absconded, upon which, their effects were arbitrarily seized and confiscated, which so highly exasperated the sufferers, that their posterity, for a long time, hurled their bitterest invectives against Leisler and his adherents.

It was during these intestine troubles and the threatened Indian wars, that Governor Leisler's daughter was in Salem out of the way of danger. The New Englanders were keeping up a petty warfare with the Owenagungas, Ourages and Penocooks.

Between these and the Schakook Indians,

there was a friendly communication, and the same was suspected of the Mohawks, among whom some of the Owenagungas had taken sanctuary. This led to conferences between commissioners from Boston, Plymouth, Connecticut and other places, for it was essential to the peace of the English colonists to preserve peace and general amnesty with the powerful Five Nations, and hold them as allies against the hostile French in Canada and the Indians of the east.

Colonel Henry Sloughter had been commissioned governor of New York, January 4, 1689; but he did not arrive to take possession until 1691, over two years after his commission, when the vessel bearing the new governor, The Beaver, arrived in the harbor.

Fair historians have acquitted Mr. Leisler of any blame in what others have been pleased to call his usurpation. He was a man not wholly without ambition, yet he was honest and did what he thought right. He had much of the stubbornness as well as honesty of the Netherlands in his composition, and believing himself in the right, determined to persist in it. Jacob Milborne, his English son-in-law, was the more ambitious of the two, and had guided and directed the affair. Leisler was sitting in his house when informed by Milborne that a vessel called The Beaver had arrived,

bearing Colonel Sloughter, who purported to have a governor's commission.

"Then we will greet him as our governor," said

the honest Leisler.

"Wait until you know he is not an impostor, and that this is not a trick to seize our fort," cautioned Milborne. Then Leisler, reconsidering the matter, decided to wait.

The Beaver brought with it one Ingoldsby, who had a commission as captain. When Ingoldsby appeared, Leisler offered him quarters in the city:

"Possession of his majesty's fort is what I demand," Ingoldsby replied, and he issued a proclamation requiring submission. The aristocratic party, which had long been chafing under the rule of the republican uprising under Leisler, thus obtained as a leader one who held a commission from the new sovereign. Leisler, conforming to the original agreement made with his fellow-insurgents, replied that Ingoldsby had produced no order from the king, or from Sloughter, who, it was known had received a commission as governor, and, promising him aid as a military officer, refused to surrender the fort. The troops as they landed were received with all courtesy and accommodation; yet passions ran high, and a shot was fired at them. The outrage was severely reproved by Leisler, who, on March 10th, the day of the landing of the troops

issued proclamations and counter proclamations, promising obedience to Sloughter on his arrival.

It was on the evening of March 19th, that this profligate, needy, and narrow-minded adventurer, who held the royal commission, arrived in New York, and Leisler at once sent messengers to receive his orders. Leisler's messengers were detained, and next morning he sent the new governor a letter asking him to whom he should surrender the fort. His letter was unheeded, and Sloughter, who had already come to hate the republican Leisler, ordered Ingoldsby to arrest him and all the persons called his council.

The prisoners, eight in number, were promptly arraigned before a special court, constituted for the purpose by an ordinance, with inveterate royalists as judges. Six of the inferior insurgents, who made their defence, were convicted of high treason and reprieved. Leisler and Milborne denied to the governor the power to institute a tribunal for judging his predecessor, and appealed to the king. In vain they plead the merit of their zeal for King William, since they had so lately opposed his governor. Leisler in particular attempted to justify his conduct from the standpoint that Lord Nottingham's letter entitled him to act in the capacity of lieutenant-governor; but through ignorance, or sycophancy, the judges, instead of delivering their