Open Road — Guides — Railroads — Canals — Bridges 



settled for the last eighteen miles. The road tolerably good. 1808 

 Limestone and chert all the way. The country is very level, and ' ' 

 as well fitted for a Batavian as any I know of. 



Batavia contains two taverns, (another is fitting up in the court 

 house) two stores, and about a dozen houses. One of them is 

 the land office of the Holland company for the disposal of the 

 three millions of acres purchased of the late Robert Morris. 

 This is under the care of Joseph and Benjamin Ellicot, brothers 

 to Andrew Ellicot of Lancaster, one of whose sons has a mill 

 here in the town upon the Tonnewanta creek. 



All the Holland company's lands hereabouts (ninety-four 

 miles one way by about as much in the broadest part the other 

 way) have been accurately surveyed under the direction of the 

 Ellicots, who have laid down connectedly on a large scale every 

 tract, on one large map divided into three parts. Each part is 

 attached to rollers and inclosed within a glass sash frame, so that 

 by turning backward or forward the roller containing the survey 

 required, you find in a minute's time any particular tract, its 

 courses and distances, and a reference to the field notes containing 

 the quality of the land and its timber. All the field books are 

 half bound and numbered, and the notes appear to be judiciously 

 taken; so as to enable the company to judge of the comparative 

 value of each tract. The rollers appear to me to be about eight 

 or ten feet long each, and the tracts very neatly and accurately 

 laid down. . . . 



The common selling price of land in the Holland purchase is 

 from two to four dollars an acre, long credit. At first they took 

 payment of the instalments in wheat, at present they demand cash. 

 Mr. Joseph Ellicot, I hear, means to remove his office to Buffaloe, 

 recently named Newamsterdam. The company has erected, at 

 their own expense, at Batavia, a court house, a gaol, and a hotel, 

 all under one roof. The outside is airy and neat, but the inside 

 is neither elegantly nor commodiously distributed for any of the 

 purposes intended. They make good beer in Batavia, at five 

 dollars the thirty-three gallons; chiefly from wheat. 



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