"He 'm not as big as Lake Ontario. S'pose him smaller, what den? Big
enough for farm."

"Does it cover one or two hundred acres, think you?--Is it as large as
the clearing around the fort?"

"Big as two, six, four of him. Take forty skin, dere one season. Little
lake; all 'e tree gone."

"And the land around it--is it mountainous and rough, or will it be
good for corn?"

"All sugar-bush--what you want better? S'pose you want corn;
_plant_ him. S'pose you want sugar; _make_ him."

Captain Willoughby was struck with this description, and he returned to
the subject, again and again. At length, after extracting all the
information he could get from Nick, he struck a bargain with the
fellow. A surveyor was engaged, and he started for the place, under the
guidance of the Tuscarora. The result showed that Nick had not
exaggerated. The pond was found, as he had described it to be, covering
at least four hundred acres of low bottom-land; while near three
thousand acres of higher river-flat, covered with beach and maple,
spread around it for a considerable distance. The adjacent mountains
too, were arable, though bold, and promised, in time, to become a
fertile and manageable district. Calculating his distances with
judgment, the surveyor laid out his metes and bounds in such a manner
as to include the pond, all the low-land, and about three thousand
acres of hill, or mountain, making the materials for a very pretty
little "patent" of somewhat more than six thousand acres of capital