Miller and Noah Smith, trustees. ^

The settlement also contains a post office, three stores and twenty-five houses. The West Chester Rail Road passes a little east of the place : the Peppeneghek and the Cisqua intersect a mile to the eastward. Previous to the erection of the Croton dam, the shad fish annually ascended the river to Whitlocksville a distance of nearly thirty miles from the Hudson ; trout are taken here in great abundance.

" The several tributaries of the Croton in this town supply a great abundance of mill seats. There is also a small stream that runs north from tfie village of Bedford to Long Island Sound

» Hammond'fi Polilical Hist, of N. Y. vol. ii. 310. b Relig. See. Lib. B. 69.

COUNTY OF WESTCHESTER. 33

(to which we have already alhided,). called the Mahanas river. The mills are numerous and more than equal to the wants of the inhabitants. The general surface of Bedford is elevated, and though broken by small hills, and valleys, has very little of waste ground. The arable, pasture, and meadow lands, are in very just proportion for a good farming country, and the whole is well watered by springs, brooks, and rivulets, the latter of a good size for mills ; the summits of the hills afford many extensive and interesting prospects, but the hills are stony and hard to till though they yield good crops of grain, grass, and all the common fruits."

In the vicinity of Bedford sulpheret of iron, and the oxide of iron occur in beds of sand, also quartz and slate are found in numerous localities.