The Von Toodleburgs Or, The History of a Very Distinguished Family

Excerpt

CHAPTER I.

ANCIENT HEADS OF THE FAMILY.

Not more than a mile from the brisk little town of Nyack, on the Hudson river, and near where the road makes a sharp turn and winds up into the mountain, there lived, in the year 1803, an honest old farmer of the name of Hanz Toodleburg. Hanz was held in high esteem by his neighbors, many of whom persisted in pronouncing his name Toodlebug, and also electing him hog-reef every year, an honor he would invariably decline. He did this, he said, out of respect to the rights of the man last married in the neighborhood. It mattered not to Hanz how his name was pronounced; nor did it ever occur to him that some of his more ambitious descendants might be called on in a court of law to explain the circumstances under which their name was changed. I speak now of things as they were when the old settlers around Nyack were honest and unsuspecting, before Fulton had astonished them with his steamboat, or those extravagant New Yorkers had invaded the town, building castles overlooking the Tappan Zee, and school-houses where the heads of honest Dutch children were filled with wicked thoughts.

Hanz Toodleburg was short and stout of figure, had a full, round face, a large blunt nose, and a small gray eye. Indeed, there was no mistaking his ancestors, in whose language he spoke whenever the Dominie paid him a visit, which he did quite often, for Hanz had always good cheer in the house; and a bed for a stranger. In short, it was a boast of Hanz that no traveller ever passed his house hungry, if he knew it. And it increased his importance with his neighbors that he raised more bushels to the acre than any of them, and sent better vegetables to the New York market. More than that, he would tell all the big folks in the village, with a nod of his head, that he owed no man a stiver he could not pay before the sun set, and in such a way as to convey a sly hint that it was more than they could do. The neighbors consulted Hanz concerning their worldly affairs, and, indeed, received his opinions as good authority. In fine, Hanz and the Dominie were called in to settle nearly all the disputes arising between the country folks for miles around. And it was said by these simple minded people that they got their rights quicker and less expensively in this way than when they went to law in the village and trusted to the magistrate and the lawyers for justice.

As, however, there always will be idle and gossiping people everywhere to say unkind things of their neighbors, especially when they are more prosperous than themselves, so there were gossips and mischievous people in the settlement who, when engaged over their cups, would hint at suspicious enterprises in which Hanz's ancestors were engaged on the Spanish Main. Indeed, they would hint at times that it was not saying much for his family that his father had sailed with Captain Kidd, which would account for the doubloons and Mexican dollars Hanz could always bring out of a "rainy day." That Hanz had a stock of these coins put safely away there could not be a doubt, for he would bring them out at times and part with them, declaring in each case that they were the last. But how he came by them was a mystery not all the wisdom of the settlement could penetrate. It was conceded that if there was any man in the settlement who knew more than Jacques, the schoolmaster, it was Titus Bright, who kept the little inn near the big oak; and these two worthies would discuss for hours over their toddy the question of how Hanz came by his dollars and doubloons. But they never came to a decision; and generally ended by sending their listeners home with their wits worse perplexed than ever. It was all well enough for old Jacques and the inn-keeper to show their knowledge of history; but the gossips would have it that if Hanz's father had sailed with Captain Kidd he, of course, knew where that bold pirate had buried his treasure, and had imparted the secret to his son. Here was the way Hanz came possessed of the doubloons and dollars. Indeed, it was more than hinted that Hanz had been seen of dark and stormy nights navigating the Tappan Zee, alone in his boat, and no one knew where he went....