Morrisania 367 



Second, two hundred acres of land at $175 an acre — these 

 were sections 16 to 23 on the Randall map of 18 16. There is 

 a story to the effect that the price was determined as follows : 

 Mott, who was tax assessor, placed so high a valuation on the 

 property as to call forth remonstrances from Morris, who ex- 

 claimed that he would be glad to get a purchaser at the as- 

 sessed value; whereupon Mott replied: "I '11 take it"; and 

 so the sale was effected. 



The second Gouverneur Morris inherited the bluntness and 

 disregard of public opinion of his distinguished father. Upon 

 being asked by an employee of Jordan L. Mott if he had any 

 objection to the newly-purchased section being called Mott 

 Haven, he replied: " I don't care what he calls it; while he is 

 about it, he might as well change the name of the Harlem and 

 call it the Jordan." A friend of the author's attended St. 

 Ann's Church when a boy and remembers seeing the old 

 gentleman guided into church every Sunday morning by his 

 women folks, his hair and cravat awry, and possessed of a 

 great bandanna handkerchief, with which, from time to time, 

 he blew sonorous blasts through his nose that set the young 

 folks off into convulsive giggles. At heart, he was a good, 

 charitable man and exceedingly democratic; and was more 

 often seen dressed like a farmer than like the fine gentleman 

 he really was. It was no unusual sight to see him drive down- 

 to the steamer which carried the business men to the city 

 beside one of his men on the seat of a dump-cart, while his 

 neighbors drove in elegant equipages with their coachmen 

 in livery. 



The Mott Haven canal lies between Third and Park avenues 

 and it allows canal-boats to pass from the Harlem River as far 

 as 138th Street. The lower part of the canal was laid out by 

 Jordan L. Mott, about 1850. It followed the course of a 



