Apart from the erection of this dwelling, and of mills for the benefit of his existing and prospective tenants, Van Cortlandt acOn the 17th of complished little in the way of developing his estate. and Manor of Lordship the as ed establish June, 1G9T, the whole was a quitFletcher, Governor from patent letters royal Cortlandt, bv rent of " forty shillings current money " to be paid annually to the governor " on the feast day of Annunciation of our Blessed Virgin Mary," " in lieu and stead of all other rents, services, dues, duties, Tan Cortlandt died at the early age of and demands whatsoever." after the issuance of this manor one-half and fifty-seven, three years Judging from the well-known character of the man, it may :.rant. of readily be believed, in the words of the historian of the " Manors Westchester County," that " had he lived to be seventy-five or eighty n, years old, like so very many of his descendants in every generatio instead of dying at fifty-seven, leaving a large family, mostly minors, g and it is probable that he would have left his manor as flourishin the same as populous in proportion as that of EensselaerswyckNewat York City date " The great distance of Cortlandt Manor from from and its surrounding settlements, as well as its difficulty of access preon obstructi the of account on the country immediately below n of its sented by the Croton, delayed for many years the occupatio1734 that lands- and so meagre was its population that it was notuntil the in conferred privilege the of itself availed the Manor of Cortlandt The first orant of sending a representative to the general assembly. The settlements were in the neighborhood of Croton and Peekskill. , peaceable part most the for though Indians continued numerous, until an advanced period in the eighteenth century. at Stephanus had fourteen children,1 of whom eleven were living il Johannes, married Anne Sophia Van Schaaek and eft one child, Gertrude, who 'n „ Verplanck, grandson of AbraZm Tsaacsen Verplanck, the first of that name fn America 2.