These facts were well known at the time, and therefore, in the Grant to the Council of Plymouth in 1620, of the lands within the 34 and 48 Degrees of North Latitude, on which the Claim of Massachusetts Bay and Connecticut was originally founded, all Lands which were held or Possessed by any other Christian Prince or State are expressly saved and excepted. Hence it appears that the Grant to the Duke of York in 1663-4 of the Lands westward of Connecticut River, was certainly grounded on an opinion, that the Crown had an absolute Right to those Lands, notwithstanding the claim of the New England Colonies ; and that this Grant, which immediately preceded the Conquest of this Province from the Dutch, was intended to include all the Lands which the Dutch held here.

I have not till lately seen an extract of a Report of the Commissioners appointed by the Crown in 1664 to visit the New England Governments, who declare they find " the Limits of Massachusits Bay to be Seconnet Brook on the South west, and Merimack River on the North East and two Right Lines drawn from each of those two places till they come within Twenty miles of Hudsons River," Nor an Extract of a Letter from Colonel Nicholls Governor of New York in November 1665 to the Duke of York in which Speaking of the Agreement made with Connecticut he says, " this Determination was a leading case, of Equal Justice and of great good Consequence in all the Colonies, and therefore we were assured would be an acceptable Service to your Royal Highness, though to the Diminution of your Bounds, so that to the East of New York and Hudsons River, nothing considerable remains to your Royal Highness except Long Island, and about Twenty miles from any part of Hudsons River.