4 1 6 The Story of The Bronx 



nccticut, and was built to mount 318 guns and to accommodate 

 a garrison of 1250 men. The old stone fort has quite outlived 

 its usefulness; and, though it still stands as a picturesque 

 object, with its frowning and half-empty casemates, when 

 viewed from the Sound, and is an object of interest to the 

 landward visitor, the reliance for attack and defence must be 

 in the more modern fortifications and armaments which sur- 

 round it. The development of the defences at the eastern 

 entrance to the Sound at Fisher's Island has rendered Fort 

 Schuyler almost useless, and in the summer of 191 1 the 

 garrison was withdrawn and the fort put in charge of a ser- 

 geant and a small body of picked men to act as caretakers. 



On the south side of Throgg's Neck, west of Fort Schuyler, 

 are estates belonging to T. C. Havemeyer, Mrs. Collis P. 

 Huntington, Alfred Hennen Morris, and others, which are 

 superb in extent and situation and in the care lavished upon 

 them. Upon a part of the Huntington estate, known at 

 various times as the Mitchell, the Ashe, and the Livingston 

 estate, is the finest cedar of Lebanon to be found in the United 

 States. It was planted by Philip Livingston about 1790 and 

 has thriven in a remarkable degree for this latitude. Its 

 height is over forty feet, and its girth about thirteen, while 

 the spread of its branches is over fifty. Mr. Livingston also 

 planted many other trees and plants, one of which, a copper 

 beech, said to have been the finest in the United States, was 

 blown down about twenty years ago. Most of the gentlemen 

 of several generations ago of this section were deeply inter- 

 ested in horticulture and arboriculture, and the Ferris nurs- 

 eries were particularly famous. We are reaping the benefit 

 to-day; for the most striking feature of Pelham Bay Park is 

 the magnificence of its trees, though most of the fine chest- 

 nuts have been killed by the blight that has been affecting 



