Wyandotte | Page 5

for he was too familiar with the woods, not to
understand the value of such a thing.
"No destroy--stand up yet--good as ever.--Nick dere, last season."
"Why, then, do you tell of it? Are not the beaver of more value to you,
than any price you may receive for the land?"
"Cotch him all, four, two year ago--rest run away. No find beaver to
stay long, when Indian once know, two time, where to set he trap.
Beaver cunninger 'an pale face--cunning as bear."
"I begin to comprehend you, Nick. How large do you suppose this pond
to be?"
"He 'm not as big as Lake Ontario. S'pose him smaller, what den? Big
enough for farm."
"Does it cover one or two hundred acres, think you?--Is it as large as
the clearing around the fort?"
"Big as two, six, four of him. Take forty skin, dere one season. Little
lake; all 'e tree gone."
"And the land around it--is it mountainous and rough, or will it be good
for corn?"
"All sugar-bush--what you want better? S'pose you want corn; plant
him. S'pose you want sugar; make him."
Captain Willoughby was struck with this description, and he returned
to the subject, again and again. At length, after extracting all the
information he could get from Nick, he struck a bargain with the fellow.
A surveyor was engaged, and he started for the place, under the

guidance of the Tuscarora. The result showed that Nick had not
exaggerated. The pond was found, as he had described it to be,
covering at least four hundred acres of low bottom-land; while near
three thousand acres of higher river-flat, covered with beach and maple,
spread around it for a considerable distance. The adjacent mountains
too, were arable, though bold, and promised, in time, to become a
fertile and manageable district. Calculating his distances with judgment,
the surveyor laid out his metes and bounds in such a manner as to
include the pond, all the low-land, and about three thousand acres of
hill, or mountain, making the materials for a very pretty little "patent"
of somewhat more than six thousand acres of capital land. He then
collected a few chiefs of the nearest tribe, dealt out his rum, tobacco,
blankets, wampum, and gunpowder, got twelve Indians to make their
marks on a bit of deer-skin, and returned to his employer with a map, a
field-book, and a deed, by which the Indian title was "extinguished."
The surveyor received his compensation, and set off on a similar
excursion, for a different employer, and in another direction. Nick got
his reward, too, and was well satisfied with the transaction. This he
afterwards called "sellin' beaver when he all run away."
Furnished with the necessary means, Captain Willoughby now "sued
out his patent," as it was termed, in due form. Having some influence,
the affair was soon arranged; the grant was made by the governor in
council, a massive seal was annexed to a famous sheet of parchment,
the signatures were obtained, and "Willoughby's Patent" took its place
on the records of the colony, as well as on its maps. We are wrong as
respects the latter particular; it did not take its place, on the maps of the
colony, though it took a place; the location given for many years
afterwards, being some forty or fifty miles too far west. In this
peculiarity there was nothing novel, the surveys of all new regions
being liable to similar trifling mistakes. Thus it was, that an estate,
lying within five-and-twenty miles of the city of New York, and in
which we happen to have a small interest at this hour, was clipped of its
fair proportions, in consequence of losing some miles that run over
obtrusively into another colony; and, within a short distance of the spot
where we are writing, a "patent" has been squeezed entirely out of
existence, between the claims of two older grants.

No such calamity befell "Willoughby's Patent," however. The land was
found, with all its "marked or blazed trees," its "heaps of stones," "large
butternut corners," and "dead oaks." In a word, everything was as it
should be; even to the quality of the soil, the beaver-pond, and the
quantity. As respects the last, the colony never gave "struck measure;"
a thousand acres on paper, seldom falling short of eleven or twelve
hundred in soil. In the present instance, the six thousand two hundred
and forty-six acres of "Willoughby's Patent," were subsequently
ascertained to contain just seven thousand and ninety-two acres of solid
ground.
Our limits and plan will not permit us to give more than a sketch of the
proceedings of the captain, in taking possession; though we feel certain
that a minute account of the progress of such a settlement would
possess a sort