114 Staten Island Association of Arts and Sciences 



The minutes of the meeting of January 15, 1915, were read and approved. 



Dr. Artliur Hollick presented and commented upon two old woodcuts 

 representing local weather conditions twenty and forty years ago, respec- 

 tively. 



1. New York World, Saturday, February g, i8gS- — The Staten Island 

 ferry boat Westfield, caught in an ice pack in the East River from 2 p. m. 

 until 5 p. m. on the preceding day. 



2. Harper's Weekly, March 13, 1875- — View of Staten Island Sound op- 

 posite Elizabethport, showing people sleighing and skating between the 

 Staten Island and New Jersey shores. In connection with this picture the 

 following entry in my diary, under date of February 22, 1875, may be of 

 interest: , 



" One result of our recent long spell of cold weather was a fine day's 

 skating on the Kills and Staten Island Sound. For some time past the 

 waters have been frozen into an unbroken sheet of ice from Port Rich- 

 mond to Tottenville and throughout Newark Bay. Skated around Shoot- 

 er's Island and the Elizabethport shore until about 12 o'clock and then, as 

 the ice was good, started down the Sound toward Tottenville. Got as far 

 as Kreischerville by about i o'clock and within sight of Tottenville ; but 

 the ice was beginning to get soft, so returned and arrived back at Elm 

 Park about 2.30. Hundreds of people were skating; a number of horses 

 and sleighs were passing to and from the New Jersey shore, and several 

 home-made ice boats were trying to move about, but the wind was too 

 light. The area between the Staten Island shore and Elizabethport pre- 

 sented the appearance of a fair or carnival." 



Announced Program 



Mr. Arthur A. Michell gave a descriptive address on Interpretations 

 of Certain Old English Legal Documents Dated between the Thirteenth 

 and Eighteenth Centuries, illustrated by a number of the original docu- 

 ments, and explained the characteristics and meanings of the parchment, 

 seals, writing, wording, abbreviations, etc., in connection with them, and 

 the laws and customs to which they referred. 



The meeting then adjourned. 



Regular Meeting, March 19, 191 5 



The meeting was held in the assembly hall of the Museum, 154 Stuy- 

 vesant Place, New Brighton. 



President Howard R. Bayne in the chair and thirty-two persons present. 



The minutes of the meeting of February 19, 1915, were read and 

 approved. 



Mr. William T. Davis exhibited and commented upon a work just issued 

 entitled "The Indians of Greater New York," by Alanson Skinner. (See 

 this issue, p. 104.) 



