He did nothing.

"Scarce a foot was moved on land, or an oar laid in the water." The savages, thus left in security to fish and gather in their crops, were ever increasingly insolent and defiant.

One of the annalists of those times writes: "Parties of Indians roved about day and night, over Manhattan island, killing the Dutch not a thousand paces from fort Amsterdam.

No one dared to move a foot to fetch a stick of firewood without a strong escort." Kieft, in his overwhelming embarrassments, had found it necessary to convene eight select men to advise him and to aid in supporting his authority.

These select men decided to demand of the home government the recall of Kieft, whose incapacity had thus plunged the once-flourishing colony into utter ruin.