00 RURAL NEW YORK 



preserved in chests and in deep pits. Vegetables were 

 dried and meats were smoked, but the act of preserv- 

 ing with salt was not known. Many native fruits, in- 

 cluding the wild grape, were used. With the? advent 

 of the white man, the Indians were brought into 

 touch with the European fruits, the apple, peacli, 

 cherry and pear. They were particularly attracted 

 by the apple and developed extensive plantings. 

 They had an orchard on Stockbridge Hill in Madi- 

 son County, and early observers report that in the 

 Seneca Lake region and in the Genesee Valley there 

 were thousands of apple trees, some of which near 

 Geneva were still standing as late as the opening of 

 the twentieth century. Peach Orchard Point, or Au- 

 rora, is suggestive of the growth of peaches there 

 and trees of that fruit were scattered through the 

 later Indian settlement. From certain reports the 

 Indians seem early to have adopted some live-stock, . 

 but the abundance of wild game and fish made do- 

 mestic animals scarcely necessary to their sustenance. 



EARLY SETTLEMENT BY THE WHITE MEN 



The spread of the early population was slow. 

 Fifty years after the first settlement, Schenectady was 

 the most remote organized outpost. During the 

 eighteenth century, settlements spread up the Mohawk 

 Valley, and as late as 1790 in all western jSTew York 

 beyond Cayuga Lake, there were only about one thou- 

 sand white persons. To encourage settlement and 

 develop trade, the Dutch West Indies Company ar- 

 ranged for grants of large tracts of land to persons 



