48 DUTCH AND ENGLISH ON THE HUDSON

still in use. Farther up the river lay the Living-
ston Manor. In 1685 Robert Livingston was
granted by Governor Dongan a patent of a tract
half way between New York and Rensselaerswyck,
across the river from the Catskills and covering
many thousand acres.

But the estate of which we know most, thanks
to the records left by Mrs. Grant of Laggan in her
Memoirs of an American Lady, written in the
middle of the eighteenth century, is that belonging
to the Schuylers at "the Flats" near Albany,
which runs along the western bank of the Hudson
for two miles and is bordered with sweeping elm
trees. The mansion consisted of two stories and
an attic. Through the middle of the house ran
a wide passage from the front to the back door.
At the front door was a large stoep, open at the
sides and with seats around it. One room was
open for company. The other apartments were
bedrooms, a drawing-room being an unheard-of
luxury. "The house fronted the river, on the
brink of which, under shades of elm and sycamore,
ran the great road toward Saratoga, Stillwater,
and the northern lakes." Adjoining the orchard
was a huge barn raised from the ground by beams
which rested on stone and held up a massive oak