Document: Answer to the protest of Hendrick van Elswyck

towards my lords-superiors, the obedient servant of the director-general and high council; and was signed: Hend[ rick van ] Elswyck, factor of the honorable South [ Company ]; below was written: The honorable notary[221] will[ please to deliver this ] protest to the honorable general in the presence of both witnesses and bring me a receipt for it; in the margin was written: Done in New Amsterdam, New Netherland, 1654, 17/27 October; below was written: Agrees with the original; and was signed: Cornelis van Ruyven, secretary.

Answer to the preceding protest:

We reply to the unfounded protest of Mr. Elswyck, factor on behalf of the South Company of the Kingdom of Sweden, that although his honor claims that he made land in this river through carelessness or wanton malice of his pilot, and had sent his men "as to good friends and neighbors," we have yet to perceive this in the hostile acts of Director Rysingh, who arrived under guise of friendship before our Fort Casimier on the South River of New Netherland, fired two shots in salute, then sent thirty men ashore, who