In these pages the story of old Westchester County is to be told; and whenever the county as a whole is mentioned without specific indication of the present limits, the reader will understand that the original county, including those portions which have actually passed under a new political jurisdiction, is meant. Westchester County, thus considered in its primal extent, is something more than five hundred square miles in area, and lies centrally distant some one hundred miles from Albany. From its northwestern point, Anthony's Nose, at the entrance to the Highlands of the Hudson, to its southeastern extremity, Byram Point, on the Sound, it is entirely surrounded bythe waters of the Hudson River, Spuy-

EN DUYVIL

ten Duyvil ('reek, the Harlem River, and LongIsland Sound, forming a shore line more than one hundred miles in length Llowance is made for the

-- considerably more, indeed, if scrupulou windings of the coast along the Sound. The Hudson River, completing its narrow and tortuous course through the Highlands at the northern boundary of Westchester County, runs thence to the sea in an almost due south direction. For

a short distance below Anthony's Nose, however, it continues decidedly narrow, until, at the very termination of this portion of its course, a place called Verplanck's Point, its banks approach quite close together, being only one mile apart. Here was located the famous King's Ferry of the Revolution, an extremely important line of inter-

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DESCRIPTION

COUNTY

communication between the patriot forces of the East and the West; and on the opposite bank stood the fortress of Stony Point, the scene of Wayne's midnight exploit. Just below Verplanek's the river suddenly widens, forming the magnificent Haverstraw Bay. This, in