On Van der Donck's map of 1656 it is written Kats Kill, but he never wrote Kil with two I's. Older than Van der Donck's map it evidently was from the frequent reference to the "Kats Kil Indians" in Fort Orange records. Its origin is, of course, uncertain. Reasonably and presumably it was a colloquial form of Katerakts Kil -- reasonably, because the falls on that stream would have naturally attracted the attention of the early Dutch navigators, as they have attracted the attention of many thousands

of modern travelers. It was the absence of an authoritative explanation that led Judge Benson to inflict upon the innocent streams which now bear them the distinguishing names of Kat's and Kaiiter's, and to relate that as catamounts were probably very abundant in the mountains there and were naturally of the male and female species, the former called by the Dutch Kauter, or "He cat," and the latter Kat, "She cat," the streams were called by those names. His hypothesis isabsurd, but is firmly believed by most of modern residents, w'ho do not hesitate to write Kauter, "He cat," on their cards and on their steamboats, although it is no older than Judge Benson's

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HUDSON S RIVER ON THE WEST, 171

application. He might have found a better basis for his conjecture in the fact that in 1650, on the north side of the Kat's Kil reigned in royal majesty, Nipapoa, a squaw sachem, while on the other side Machak-nimano, "The great man of his people," held sway ; that, as they painted on their cabins a rude figure of a wolf, their totemic emblem, easily mistaken for a catamount, the name of "He cat"^ was given to one stream, and "She cat" to the other. Katarakts Kil, as it is met of record -- now Judge Benson's Kautert Kil -- is formed by the outlets of two small lakes lying west of the well-known Mountain House.