THE TOWN OF LEWISBORO. 407 



Brown and William Smith should be as follows, in my opinion, in the 

 warrant to the Surveyor General. 



Four thousand acres of land or so much of that quantity as the Petitioners 

 shall think convenient for them to be laid out in several parts or parcels not ex- 

 ceeding four parts or parcels within that tract called the Equivalent Land, lately 

 surrended by the Colony of Connecticut to this Colony of New York and within 

 such parts of the said Equivalent Lands, consisting of about eleven thousand 

 acres of lands which were not included in or granted by Letters Patent bearing 

 date the eighth day of June, one thousand seven hundred and thirey-one to 

 Thos. Hawley and others, nor to other person or persons by Letters Patent 

 under the great seal of the Province of New York since that time. 

 Mr. Ban yak: 



Please to mould the above Description in the usual form of a warrant retain- 

 ing the above or substance in the same or other words and favor me with the 

 right of the Draft before it is copied fair, and 



You'll oblige your humble servant, Wm. Smith. 



19 Nov., 1751. 

 endorsed note to Mr. Banyar inserting description of 4000 acres of land in war- 

 rant to surveyor general. 



In the order or minutes of Council in a little before J une, 1723, directing any 

 explanatory Declaration of the King's reservation if any to be inserted in Letters 

 Patent, « 



About one month after the date of the petition of Brown and Smith 

 occurred a release and quit-claim deed from Joseph Keeler and nineteen 

 others, (thirteen of whom were grantees under the East Patent in 1731,) 

 to the first Presbyterian or Independent minister, "that should be set- 

 tled and ordained" in the town of Salem, consisting of two tracts of tand 

 lying on the Lower released ten miles of the Oblong or Equivalent Lands, 

 which is yet undivided, cW. & 



The signatures of William Smith and James Brown, the Petitioners 

 for the Patent, are wanting to this document and only one of the names 

 among the four surrounding proprietors, mentioned in the deed, is at- 

 tached. 



It appears as if these claimants of the Lower portion of the Oblong 

 were fearing the result of Smith and Brown's second Petition to the 

 crown on the 19th of November, 1751. Surely there can be no ques- 

 tion whether the above conveyance would be good for any fractional 

 portion, if an undivided moiety of an undivided territory. But as we 

 shall have more to say about this remarkable transaction in its proper 

 place, we pass on to the granting of the Royal Letters Patent to Wil- 

 liam Smith of New York and James Brown of the County of Westches- 



a N. T. Col, MSS., vol. xix, p. 121, 1T44-1T52. 



b The original document is indorsed on the bacK " Proprietor's Deed," was witnessed to, 

 twenty-three years after the signing but never recorded, 



