The locatives in Indian deeds and m original patents are the only guide to places of original application, coupled with descriptive features where they are know;i. No vocabularies of the dialects spoken in the lower valley of the Hudson having been preserved, the vocabularies of the Upper- Unami and the M'insi-Lenape, or Delaware tongues on the south and west, and the Natick, or Massachusetts, on the north and east, have been consulted for explanations by comparative inductive methods, and also orthographies in other places, the interpretations of which have been establis;hed by competent linguists. In all cases where the meaning of terms has been particularly questioned, the best expert authority has been consulted. While positive accuracy is not asserted in any case, it is believed that in most cases the interpretations which have been given may be accepted as substantially correct. There is no poetry in them -- no " glittering waterfalls, ' no " beautiful rivers," no " smile of the Great Spirit," no " Holy place of sacred feasts and dances," but plain terms th^t have their equivalents in our own language for a small hill, a hig^h hill, a mountain, abrook, a creek, a kill, a river, a pond, a lake, a swamp, a large stone, a place of small stones, a split rock, a meadow, or whatever the objective feature may have been as recognized by the Indian. Many of them were particular names in the form of verbals indicating a place where the action of the verb was performed ; occasionally the name of a sachem is given as that of his place of residence or the stream on whidh he resided, but all are from generic roots. To the Algonquian dialects spoken in the valley of Hudson's River at the time of the discovery, was added later the Mohawk- Troquorian, to some extent, more particularly on the north, where it appears about 162 1-6, as indicated in the blanket deed given by the Five Nations to King George in 1726.