ent counties of Albany, Rensselaer, and a part of the county of Columbia. But his was not the only large tract. There were several other extensive grants of land which are mentioned by Lord Bellomont, then governor, in his letter of May 3, 1699, to the Lords of Trade. He said several of these grants were 20 miles square, and some even larger; and in another letter, January 2, 1701, he estimated that 7,000,000 acres had been disposed of in thirteen grants, which he characterized as extravagant.

Many of these large tracts were erected into manors, and the owners were clothed with extensive manorial powers and privileges. This manorial system brought into practice a peculiar policy of colonial development; for instead of opening the country to independent settlers who might soon become owners of the soil, a policy was initiated under which the ownership of the land continued in the proprietor, and the occupants acquired only a leasehold interest, under conditions and with limitations and restrictions which finally were considered so burdensome as to justify every form of resistance to the claims of the proprietors; and these leasehold conditions, developing slowly through two centuries, terminated in a social convulsion and revolution resulting in a radical change of legal and constitutional policy concerning land tenures. It will not be profitable to show here in detail the development of these conditions; the reader will find abundant materials for the study of this subject in various local and family histories, in legislative proceedings, and executive messages. A few incidents showing conditions existing at different stages of this development will be sufficient to illustrate the process of evolution through which the subject was passing towards the complete abolition of the manorial system.

Under the Charter of Freedoms and Exemptions, 1629, the proprietors of these large tracts were encouraged to

plant colonies by the offer of special privileges. Kiliaen Van Rensselaer, immediately on acquiring his land, took steps to establish a colony, and to encourage settlers to occupy portions of the tract. His successors pursued the same policy under varying conditions. A lease of a portion of the Van Rensselaer tract, made in 1646, for five years, required the tenant to erect at his own expense a large farmhouse and barn, which were to be the property of the landlord. The landlord delivered certain stock, and he and the tenant were to share equally in the increase. The tenant was to deliver to the landlord one tenth of the grain raised on the farm, and also twentyfive pounds of butter each year. The tenant might have the land three years longer by paying five hundred guilders annually in addition to the tenths. The feudal character of this lease appears from the provision which required the tenant "punctually to observe the same, under confiscation of all his goods, having and to have, present and future, how much soever they may be, under obligation of renouncing, according to law, all lords, courts, judges, and rulers. Promising, moreover, to be in all obedience subject to all his magistrates; to be true and faithful to them as occasion may demand, as a good subject is bound to be." Another lease, given in 1647, required the tenant to pay as rent one tenth of the grain, five hundred guilders annually, one half the increase of the stock, to cut and clear certain timber lands, perform three days' service with his wagon and horses each year, and also deliver annually one half mud (two bushels) of wheat, twenty-five pounds of butter, and two pairs of fowls. The tenant also submitted himself as a "faithful subject, to all regulations, orders, and conditions made by the patroon, and read before him, regarding dwelling together, and to all the statutes and ordinances to be hereafter made."

In addition to the relations between the owner and the tenant, established by these leases, the patroon was vested with general civil, military, and judicial authority in his manor, and the tenants were his subjects, and took the oath of fealty and allegiance to him. The patroon also had the first right to purchase the tenant's interest whenever it was offered for sale, and if he did not buy it he might require the payment to him of a certain portion of the purchase price. Sometimes this proportion was fixed at one tenth, sometimes at one fifth, and was later established at one fourth.

The legislature, on the 22d of October, 1779, passed a law providing for the punishment of certain loyalists, and the forfeiture of their estates, with a further provision declaring that "the absolute property to all messuages, lands, tenements, and hereditaments, and of all rents, royalties, franchises, prerogatives, privileges, escheats, forfeitures, debts, dues, duties, and services, by whatsoever names respectively the same are called and known in the law, and all right and title to the same,” belonging to the Crown of Great Britain on the 8th of July, 1776, were and are, from and after the 9th, vested in the people of this state.

The reader will recollect that the date fixed in this provision is the day on which the first constitutional convention of New York ratified the Declaration of Independ

ence.

On February 20, 1787, the legislature enacted another important statute, entitled "An Act Concerning Tenures," which substantially re-enacted in modern form the English statute of quia emptores, 18 Edward I., 1290, which gave every freeholder a right to sell a part or all of his lands, and substituted the "purchaser in the place of his vendor in respect to the chief lord of the fee, requiring him to perform the service which had been due from

his vendor." The court of appeals in De Peyster v. Michael (1852) 6 N. Y. 467, 57 Am. Dec. 470, held that the statutes of 1779 and 1787 "put an end to all feudal tenures between one citizen and another, and substituted in their place a tenure between each landholder and the people in their sovereign capacity, and thus removed the entire foundation on which the right of the grantor to restrain alienation had formerly rested;" and that a provision in a lease in fee, made in 1785, reserving to the lessor or grantor a pre-emptive right of purchase, and the right to one quarter of the price received on a sale to any other person, was void. The prohibition against any restraints on the right of alienation contained in these statutes was confirmed and made absolute by the Constitution of 1846.

Early in the history of the Van Rensselaer colony, New Netherland, including Rensselaerwyck, became an Eng. lish province, and the Dutch titles were confirmed by the Articles of Capitulation, in 1664. Notwithstanding this confirmation, a question seems to have arisen concerning the Van Rensselaer title. This question was submitted to the Duke of York, then proprietor, who, in 1674, referred the matter to Governor Andros for investigation, and in 1678 directed him to issue a patent to the proprietors of Rensselaerwyck, confirming the title and rights. which they had acquired prior to the English conquest. The patent itself was issued by Governor Dongan on the 4th of November, 1685. This patent, among other things, erected Rensselaerwyck into one lordship and manor, conferred manorial powers and privileges on the proprietors, including the right to hold a Court Leete (criminal) and a Court Baron (civil), with the jurisdiction incident to those courts as then established. The patent also gave the proprietors authority to distrain for all rents, services, and other sums of money, and reserved

to the Crown an annual rent of fifty bushels of "good winter wheat." This patent was confirmed by another in 1704.

The colony grew rapidly, and with its growth came a spirit of discontent. The tenants were extremely dissatisfied with the conditions imposed on them, and they did not always readily render the obedience which the patroon desired, and which was required by the terms of the leases, or by the laws governing the colony. In a letter written to Lord Chatham from Claverack in June, 1766, the writer says that "for some months past a mob has frequently assembled and ranged the eastern parts of the manor of Rensselaer." There was a battle between the sheriff's posse and the rioters, in which four persons were killed and several wounded. About twenty years after this unfortunate occurrence, Stephen Van Rensselaer 3d, the sixth patroon, reached his majority, and assumed the management of the manor. Under his administration the manor flourished and affairs were generally quiet. It is said that on the advice of his brotherin-law, Alexander Hamilton, he initiated a new form of conveyance, prepared by Hamilton, by which he conveyed an absolute title, and in which the grantee agreed to pay yearly a certain quantity of grain, a specified number of fowls, and perform certain personal services for the grantor. These deeds contained provisions of a feudal character, requiring, among other things, that, on a sale of the land by the grantee, the grantor should have the first right to buy; and in case of a sale to another person, should be paid one quarter of the purchase price.

This Stephen Van Rensselaer, probably the most distinguished of the patroons, was also prominent in public affairs, holding many high civil and military positions. There was little trouble among the holders of land in his manor during his lifetime, but it is evident that the gran