164 BOOXETTT.LE TO S.U?ATO0A. 



sou-iu-law of Jobu Brown of Provideuce, Kliode Island, 

 after wliom ' " John Brown's Tract "' is named. Brown, in 

 1793. purchased '.210,1 00 acres of the wiUl h\nds lying about 

 the head-waters of Moose River, llerreshoff cleared about 

 '.2000 acres, erected man}- buildings, gathered there thirty or 

 forty families, built a dam and constructed a forge, under- 

 took the manufacture of iron, which effort proved a costly 

 failure — and blew his brains out. The wilderness is now 

 claiming its own and slowly creeping in upon the two 

 thousand acres once torn from it. The last house is in 

 ruins, itself the scene of a lirutal murder; and only the 

 familiar swallows hovering about the deserted barns, or 

 skimming over the grass-grown tields. with happy twitter, 

 in the bright sunshine, pleasantly remind the passer-by of 

 the life and activity and homes once existing there. 



It was a delightful change of scene that met our eyes as 

 we let down the bars and passed through the garden en- 

 closure back of •• Old Forge Hotel," a little way down the 

 river below First Lake. As our modest cavalcade wheeled 

 around in front of the hotel, the 'old, old" smudge met 

 our gaze, a party of Rochester sportsmen nodded pleasantly 

 to us from the rude verandah, the small boy. of the place, 

 with hands in his pockets, approached and stared at Ned 

 as being an unaccustomed visitor and a congenial spirit, 

 and at length our host, Comstock himself, emerged from 

 the kitchen where supper was brewing, and greeted his 

 newly arrived guests. The splint-bottomed arm-chairs on 

 the verandah invited us to rest, and we sank into them with 

 the accumulated emphasis of our fom"teen miles of pedestrian 



