USA > New York > Monroe County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Allegany County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming > Part 63
USA > New York > Livingston County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Yates County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Ontario County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Wyoming County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Steuben County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Genesee County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Wayne County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
USA > New York > Orleans County > History of the pioneer settlement of Phelps and Gorham's purchase, and Morris' reserve; embracing the counties of Monroe, Ontario, Livingston, Yates, Steuben, most of Wayne and Allegany, and parts of Orleans, Genesee, and Wyoming. To which is added, a Supplement, or Extension of the pioneer history of Monroe county > Part 63
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NATHANIEL ROCHESTER.
Identified with the Pioneer history of the city of Rochester, far more than in name, was the late Col. Nathaniel Rochester. The acting resident co- proprietor of the "100 Acre Tract" - the principal germ of village and city - we may well consider him the Patroon and Founder of the prosper- ous City of the Genesee Valley. Thus blended with the most prominent ยท locality embraced in these annals, a brief biography of him demands a place in them; and especially as in other precedent instances, it may be made to embrace, not only interesting reminiscences of our own local region, but those of the Revolutionary period. He was one of the founders of an em- pire of freemen - our glorious Union - and also one of the founders of settlement in one of its most prosperous localities.
Col. Rochester was a native of Westmoreland, Virginia, the son of John Rochester, whose father was an emigrant from the county of Kent in Eng- land. When thirteen years of age, his family removed to Granville county in North Carolina. Two years afterwards he entered the mercantile estab- lishment of James Monroe, in Hillsborough, N. C., as a clerk, becoming after a few years a partner in the concern; a third partner at the time, being Col. John Hamilton, who was Consul for the British government, in the middle States, after the close of the Revolution. Soon after the break- ing out of the Revolution, Col. Rochester was appointed a member of the
NOTE. - Many transfers took place soon after purchase. Lot 1, was present Eagle Tavern lot; 26, site of Pitkin's Block; 23, partly site of Burn's Block and Arcade ; 25, Arcade ; 32, S. O. Smiths Corner ; 18, 19, partly Gould's Block.
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committee of safety for Orange county ; the duty of said committee having been, to use his own language: - " To promote the Revolutionary spirit among the people, procure arms and ammunition, make collections for the city of Boston, whose harbor was blocked up by a British fleet, and to pre- vent the sale and use of East India teas." In August, 1775, he attended as a member, the first Provincial convention in North Carolina. Among the measures adopted was the raising of four regiments of troops; the or- ganization of a militia system, and enrolling of minute men; and the adop- tion of a resolution for an adjourned meetingin May following, to frame and adopt a constitution, During the setting of the convention he received a Major's commission, and was appointed a Justice of the Peace.
At the meeting of the convention in May, he was appointed Commissary General of military stores and clothing for the North Carolina line, which was then made to consist of ten regiments. As a member of the conven- tion he participated in the organization of a State government for North Carolina.
On the adjournment of the convention, he entered upon the active duties of providing food and clothing for the army ; the fatigues incident to which, accompanied by unusual exposure in unhealthy districts of the country, brought on disease so permanent in its character as to cause the resignation of his office in accordance with medical advice. He was not destined to remain idle in these stirring times. Returning to Hillsboro', he found that he had been elected a member of the Legislature, in which he soon took his seat; thus becoming a member of one of the earliest legislative bodies organized and assembled in defience of British claims to dominion. It was at this time, and in this same convention of Pioneer legislators, that Nathan- iel Mason, then just graduated from college, commenced his long career of usefulness.
About this period Col. Rochester was appointed a Lieut. Col. of militia, and clerk of Orange county; in which last office he was the successor of Gen. Nash, who was killed at the battle of Germantown. In 1777, he was appointed a commissioner to establish and superintend a manufactory of arms at Hillsboro'; the iron necessary for which he transported upon wagons, from Pennsylvania, a distance of 400 miles. He was next appointed one of the board of auditors of public accounts. In 1778, he engaged in busi- ness with Col. Thomas Hart, the father-in-law of Henry Clay, and James Brown, who was afterwards minister to France. Col. Hart was then a resident near Hillsboro', where he was a large land holder, miller and man- ufacturer; being an active whig his tory neighbors depredated upon his property to an extent that induced him to take the advice of Gen. Gates, then in the command of the southern army, and remove to Hagerstown, Maryland, after a disposition ofhis large estate. In 1781, Col. Rochester also removed to Hagerstown and settled on a farm.
In 1783, the war having been brought to a close, Col. Rochester went into the mercantile business with Col. Hart at Hagerstown; their business embracing the manufacture of flour, a nail and rope factory. The part- nership continued until 1792, when Col. Rochester went into business on his own account. He after that, filled successively the offices of a member of Assembly of Maryland, P. M. at Hagerstown, a Judge of the county court, sheriff of the county, elector of President and Vice President in 180S,
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President of the Hagerstown Bank. In all this time he had not only been carrying on extensive manufacturing establishments in Hagerstown, but had in operation two mercantile establishments in Kentucky.
In 1800 he first visited the Genesee country, in company with Cols. William Fitzhugh, Hilton, and Major Charles Carrol. The measures taken by Mr. Williamson to attract the attention of Marylanders to this region, have already been noticed. Col. Peregrine Fitzhugh who had not yet re- moved, was the neighbor of Col. Rochester at Hagerstown, was active in promoting emigration in this direction, and it is presumed, the party were induced to take the journey by him. They bore from him a letter of intro- duction to Mr. Williamson; though Major Carrol had previously made his acquaintance. The writer informs Mr. Williamson that the fever and ague is generally prevalent in Maryland, but hopes that this country is exempt from it, " inasmuch as a few pale faces generally makes an unfavorable im- pression upon strangers." Before they left the country, Messrs. Carrol and Fitzhugh made their large purchase near Mount Morris, and Col. Roch- ester the mills, water power, and a portion of the lands upon which he afterwards resided at Dansville. In 1802, the three revisited the Gen- esee country, and while here, purchased the " 100 Acre," or " Allan Mill Tract," in what is now Rochester, then called "Falls Town."
In 1810, Col. Rochester having closed up his business in Maryland, re- moved to Dansville, and occupied his purchase there; erecting a paper mill, the first in all the Genesee country, and making other improvements.
Disposing of that property in 1814, he purchased the large farm of the late Col. Ashier Saxton, in East Bloomfield, upon which he resided until 1818, when he removed to the locality that had already assumed his name.
The subject of our sketch has already been hurried through a long, busy and eventful career; a life of activity, of public employment, and private enterprise, that has few paralels ; and yet a new field of enterprize - a vast, successful one it has proved to be - was just opening before him. At an age when most men are retiring from the active duties of life, he was re- engaging in them.
Soon after settling at Dansville, he had taken some initiatory steps for the commencement of operations upon the 100 Acre Tract; in August I811, had surveyed a few lots and was offering them for sale; and while residing at Bloomfield, had usually an agent upon or near the property, making fre- quent visits to it himself. All that was done, was under his immediate supervision, until 1817, when the interests of the proprietors were separated by a division of the property, each of them assuming the management of his own interest.
In 1816, Col. Rochester was for the second time an Elector of President and Vice President. In 1817 he attended the Legislature at Albany as an agent of the petitioners for the erection of what is now Monroe county; which consumation was delayed until 1821, at which time it had the bene- fit of his active personal exertions. He was the first clerk of the new county, and its first representative in the legislature, in 1821, '2. In 1824 he was one of the commissioners for taking subscriptions and distributing the capital stock of the Bank of Rochester, and upon the organization of the institution was unanimously elected its President; which office was accepted upon a condition dictated by a sense of the increasing infirmities
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of age, and an impaired physical constitution, that he should resign the place as soon as the institution was in successful operation. He resigned in December following. This was the last of the numerous public and cor- porate trusts of his protracted and active life. The remainder of his days were rather those of a retired Patriarch, aiding by his counsels and his matured judgment, all in matters of local concern; manifesting a deep interest in the prosperity of the then thriving and prosperous village; in works of charity and benevolence; in a contemplation of, and preparation for the final close of his earthly career. Sustained by an implicit religious faith - that of the Episcopal church, of which he had been a liberal pat- ron, and at whose altar he knelt, "an humble recipient of its holy symbols," he bore with patience and fortitude, protracted and painful disease, which terminated in his death, on the 17th of May, 1831, in the 79th year of his age.
If personal eulogy had been within the scope and design of this work, at every step in its progress - when reminiscences of the Pioneers of all this region were passing rapidly in review - there would have been occasions for its iudulgence; seldom a more fitting one than the present. Starting in life with but few advantages, as we must infer from the fact that he was thrown upon his own resources at the early age of fifteen, with energy and integrity of purpose, a fearless self reliance, he had a long carcer of useful-
ness. When but fairly under way in private enterprise, his country de- manded his services and he obeyed its requisitions; alternating in its financial, military and legislative affairs. It exigencies terminating, he was as zealous a co-worker in all that related to the beneficial uses of free gov- ernment, as he had been in its attainment. Almost constantly filling im- portant public stations, he was at the same time the founder of business es- tablishments, the promoter of local prosperity ; and after having in advanced life sought and secured a quiet rural life, he broke out from it and became the patroon of new settlement ; THE FOUNDER OF A CITY! i here are few examples of a so varied and active life. What in his case, especially in- vites remark, is the fact, that he was well educated as the manner in which he discharged his public duties, and transacted his private business, fully proves -- and yet, the reader will have observed, that his school days ended before he had arrived at the age of fifteen years! All beyond that period, was self education and self reliance.
The late Wm. B. Rochester was his eldest son. Educated at Charlotte Hall, in Maryland, he prosecuted the study of law, first at Hagerstown, and afterwards in the office of Adam Bently, Esq., in Maysville, Ky. He opened an office in Bath, Steuben county, in 1809; in the war of 1812, he was the aid of Gen. M'Clure, was a volunteer under Smyth's proclamation, and participated in the sortie of Fort Erie. At the period of the adoption of the new State Constitution, he had been elected to Congress from the Steuben district, which office he resigned, accepting the office of Circuit Judge of what was then the 8th circuit, which office he continued to fill until he was put in nomination for the office of Governor, in 1826. Although contending against the strong current of popularity then running in favor of Mr. Clinton. the " Young Lion of the West," as he was then termed by his ardent and zealous supporters, came within 1200 votes of an election. He was soon after appointed Secretary of the American delegation to the Congress of Nations at Panama; and afterwards, in succession, was Secre-
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tary of the American Legation to Mexico, and Charge D'affaires to Guate- mala.
Previous to these latter events of his life, he had removed from Bath to Rochester. Upon the location of a Branch Bank of the U. S. in Buffalo, he was appointed its President, and removed to Buffalo. He spent the winter of 1837 at Pensacola, closing up the affairs of the Branch Bank located there ; and returning in the month of June, was one of the passengers of the ill- fated Pulaski, that was burned off the cost of North Carolina. He was drowned by the swamping of a boat, in which, with the mate of the vessel and others, he was endeavoring to reach the land. James and William B. Rochester, of Buffalo, are his sons; a married daughter resides in Chicago.
The surviving sons of Col. Nathaniel Rochester, are, Thomas H. Roches- ter, President of the Rochester City Bank, Nathaniel T., and Henry E. Rochester; daughters became the wives of Harvey Montgomery, Dr. An- son Coleman, Jonathan Childs, William Pitkin, Wm. S. Bishop. Of the daughters, but Mrs. Pitkin and Mrs. Bishop survive. John Rochester, the 2d son of Col. Nathaniel Rochester, was a captain in the regular ser- vice in the war of 1812, attached to the 29th Regiment, of which the pre- sent Gen. Wool was Major. Retiring from the army, he was connected with Mr. Montgomery in early mercantile establishments in Rochester and Parma. He emigrated to Missouri in 1818, where he died in 1831.
The brothers, Dr. Mathew, Francies, and David Brown, were originally from Western, Mass. Dr. Brown emigrated in early life to Rome, Oneida county, where he remained many years in the practice of his profession. Francis Brown, in early life, resided at Detroit, with an uncle, Wm. Brown, who was engaged in the Indian trade. Soon after 1800 he was shipwrecked on a voyage over Lake Erie, was picked up on the shore, exhausted and nearly lifeless. On recovering he continued his journey eastward, purchasing a canoe at Niagara, with which he coasted along the south shore of Lake Ontario. Passing the mouth of the Genesee River he was driven in by a storm, and while waiting for it to subside, walked up and viewed the Upper Falls and the site of Rochester, and became sanguine of the prospective value of the locality.
Thomas Mumford was from New London, Conn. ; a graduate of Yale College; studied the profession of the law with Judge Samuel Jones. In 1794 settled in his profession in Aurora, Cayuga county. In 1800 removed to Cayuga Bridge.
In 1810, the Messrs. Browns, Mumford, and John M'Kay, of Cal- adonia, had became by purchase of Charles Harford, Oliver Phelps and Samuel Parkman, the owners of the 200 acres north of and adjoining the Hundred Acre Tract, embracing the main or Upper Falls. Mr. Mumford soon purchasing the interest of Mr. M'Kay, he became the owner of the south 100 acres, and the half owner with the Messrs. Browns, of the north 100 acres. In 1812 Benjamin Wright, for the proprietors, surveyed a portion of it into village
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lots, and made a few sales before the commencement of the war. Previous to acquiring this interest Mr. Mumford had became the owner, by purchase of Augustus and Peter B. Porter, of a twelfth of the 20,000 acre tract, and over 2000 acres in Brighton ; and the purchase of the Messrs. Browns of Charles Harford had included a considerable tract of wild land of the 20,000 acre tract. The sep- arate and joint purchases of the Messrs. Browns and Mumford, was named Frankfort.
The advent of the Messrs. Browns was in the winter of 1812. The two brothers came by sleighing, to view their new purchase, bringing a mill-wright with them to assist in projecting some im- provements. There was on the Frankfort tract the small grist mill of Mr. Harford, with one run of stones, and a saw mill, a block house in which Mr. Harford resided, a plank house in which his son Benedict resided, and there was one or two occupied log shanties on the River road before reaching Handford's Landing. A son and son-in-law of Mr. Harford had just penetrated the interior of the 20,000 acre tract, and made small openings in the forest. Upon the Frankfort tract, there was hardly an opening enough to let the sun in, and but a wood's road that ran along near the river bank. The whole tract was a dense forest, the soil wet and miry ; a " dismal looking place," says one who saw it at that period.
In the spring of 1812, Francis Brown came from Rome, bringing mill wrights, mill irons, a small stock of goods, and commenced im- provements. What has been known as Brown's race, was con- structed, and the old Harford mill was repaired and three run of stones added. Artemas Wheelock lived in the plank shantee, built by the Harfords, and kept the boarding house; and the Browns soon added a small plank house for Ezra Mason, who brought in his family and went into their employ. The improvements named were about all that were undertaken during the war. In 1814 how- ever, Francis Brown gave Chubb, of Pittsford, a yoke of oxen for cutting out the timber and grubbing the stumps to make a three rod road, where State street now is. The saw and grist mill were kept in operation, the latter drawing customers from as far as Niagara county on the Ridge road, and from a wide region in other directions. The Browns kept up a small mercantile business, in a log store they built on the site of Frankfort market. The clerk in the store was Gaius B. Rich, who became an early merchant in Attica, Genesee county, and is now a well known banker in Buffalo.
Francis Brown continued to reside in Rochester until 1821, when upon account of an asthmatic affection he emigrated to Mobile, taking charge of an estate that belonged to his father-in-law, Daniel Penfield. He died in 1824. His surviving sons are, Daniel P. Brown, a merchant in Toledo, Francis Brown, a merchant in Roch- ester ; a married daughter resides at Toledo. The author could relate numerous instances remembered by the Pioneers of Roches-
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ter, of the generous acts of Francis Brown. " To his strict integ- rity and honor, in all his dealings," says Ezra Mason, ("his refusal to receive another man's money, when he could get nothing of me but the promise of labor,) I am indebted for my farm."
Dr. Mathew Brown continued to reside in Rome, making frequent visits to the property until soon after the war, when he became a per- manent resident of Rochester. He still survives at the advanced age of 86 years. Infirm in health, he lives in retirement, enjoying a large share of the esteem and veneration of the dwellers of the crowded city with which he has been so long and so prominently identified; one whose founders he may truly be said to have been. His surviving sons are, Mathew Brown, of Toledo, Henry H. Brown, of Detroit ; daughters became the wives of Wm. Barron Williams, who was connected with some of the earliest mercantile operations in Lockport, now among the enterprising business men of Rochester ; another, the wife of Fletcher M. Haight, formerly of Rochester, now of St. Louis. Of the third brother, David Brown, the author has no information, beyond the fact that he resided in Rochester in early years, prosecuting business in connection with the brothers Mathew and Francis.
The elder Mr. Mumford never became a resident of Rochester. His resident representative, as early as 1818, was his son William Mumford. Philip Lisle, who purchased an interest in the Mumford tract, managed sales previous to 1818. A partition between Mum- ford and the Browns,of the original Harford tract, occurred soon af- ter improvements were commenced. Silas Deane Mumford, a brother of Thomas Mumford, also purchased an interest in early years. Thomas Mumford died at his residence at Cayuga in 1831, aged 61 years. Wm. W. Mumford died in Rochester in 1848. Elihu H. S. Mumford, from whom Mumfordville derived its name, was killed by the bursting of a steam boiler, in New York, in 1844. Geo. H. Mumford, of Rochester, is the surviving son. A daughter became the wife of Dr. John G. Vought, an early physician of Roch- ester, who removed to New York, where he died during the first cholera season ; another daughter is the wife of Samuel D. Dakin, of N. York.
Thomas Mumford was in an early day proprietor of lots 46 and 47, below Frankfort, which he sold to the late chancellor Jones, and subsequently the late James L. Graham, of New York, acquired an interest in it. Its sale and improvement have been principally under the agency and management of Dr. Alexander Kelsey.
Ezra Mason, who has already been named, went into the employ- ment of the Messrs. Browns soon after they had commenced opera- tions, and remained with them until 1817. He gives a graphic ac- count of Rochester in early days ; the war alarms, flights and prep- aration for flights, the rattle snakes, and the ague and fever. At one period an idle rumor came that the British had landed "in 40
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boats at the mouth of the Oak Orchard ; " pits were dug to bury all valuable effects, and in a few instances, they were used. At anoth- er time the flour was all taken from Messrs. Browns mills and hid in the woods. When news of peace came, there was a jubilee ; every thing brightened up and began to move on briskly. There was a rattle snakes den on the east side of the River, below Falls Field, and they used frequently to visit the west side of the River. On one occasion, Mrs. Mason found an infant daughter attempting to pet a large rattle snake who was giving "notice of intention" to strike. Mr. Mason and Mrs. Mason resides upon the farm on the Lisle Road, they commenced on in 1817; and where they have seen the roughest features of pioneer life, but where they are now surrounded with smiling and productive fields. They have eleven children, all of whom have arrived at adult age.
Hamlet Scrantom was from Durham, Conn .; in 1805 emigrated to Lewis county in this State, where he remained until 1812. In 1811, he visited Geneseo, and having heen acquainted with the Wads- worths in Durham, they named to him Genesee Falls, as a locality where a town was likely to grow up. Henry Skinner who had pur- chased the Eagle Tavern corner, resided at Geneseo, and to encour- age Mr. Scrantom to locate at the Falls, proposed to erect for him a log house upon it. Men were sent down for that purpose, they erected the body of a log house, but before covering it they were at- tacked with the fever and ague, and obliged to quit. Mr. Scran- tom arriving with his family soon after, was allowed a shelter in a shantee belonging to Enos Stone, on the site now occupied by the dwelling of Anson House, where he resided until August, when he moved into the log house on the Eagle corner. Mr. Scrantom be- ing by occupation a miller, soon went into the employ of the Messrs. Bissell and Elys. He purchased two lots, one of them being the site of the store of O. L. Sheldon, and the other, the site of the old tan- nery of Mr. Graves. He built a dwelling on the Buffalo street lot. In 1814 he purchased a farm, now the Hanks property near Mount Hope, for $4 per acre, erected a log house and went there to reside, to have his family less exposed in case of British invasion ; becoming the first neighbor of D. K. Carter. He removed back to the village at the close of the war, and became the miller of the Messrs. Browns. In late years he was an agent of Culver and Maynard, in the con- struction of the first locks at Lockport, where the author knew him as a highly esteemed and worthy man. He was a trustee of the first school and school district, organized in Rochester and was an efficient helper in early religious organizations ; one of the founders of St. Luke's church.
He died in April, 1850, aged 77 years ; his wife still survives. His surviving sons are, Henry Scrantom, merchant, Elbert Scran- tom, late city Treasurer, Edwin Scrantom, an early printer and editor, and now a successful auction and commission merchant,
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and Hamlet Scrantom, a clerk of canal superintendent; all of Rochester. Daughters became the wives of Jehiel Barnard, a Pioneer in Rochester, now a resident of Ogden; another, the wife of Martin Briggs of Rochester ; and there is an unmarried daughter.
Abelard Reynolds was from Pittsfield, Mass., his occupation that of a saddler. In 1811, he travelled through this State and the north- ern portion of Ohio, and made up his mind to settle in Warren, Trumbull county. Returning to Pittsfield, in the spring of 1812, he was on his way there to make arrangements for removing his fam- ily and effects, when in remaining over night at Bloomfield, he met Col. Hopkins, of Pittsford, and several other gentlemen, who recom- mended him to visit Charlotte, at the mouth of the Genesee River, which they said, "being at the outlet of the rich products of the valley of the Genesee, with its commercial advantages, was des- tined at no distant period, to become a place of unrivalled impor- tance." He diverged from his route, enquired the way to the with him, newly heard of locality, come to the Genesee Falls, finding in the woods Enos Stone, also "from Berkshire," who interested him in his relation of what Col. Rochester had been doing towards start- ing a village. The most he saw in the way of improvement how- ever, or signs of civilization, was some remains of the old Allan mill, the cabin that the miller had occupied, and the unfinished bridge over the River. " The whole aspect and appearance of the place," says Mr. Reynolds, "was then the most undesirable and forbidding that language can describe. Yet it was evident in the reflecting mind, that the natural elements of future greatness were here combined, and lay concealed amid this chaotic confusion." Mr. Stone, as the agent of Col. Rochester, importuned him to be- come the purchaser of a lot ; but he made up his mind to see Char- lotte first. Taking directions from Mr. Stone how to ford the Riv- er; and especially that he must make for the "large sycamore tree on the opposite bank," his reliable horse carried him safely over, though he remembers that the story Mr. Stone had just told him of a man who with his horses and wagon, had but a few days before been carried over the Falls, predominated in his mind .*
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