It was, he wrote, composed of fifty-five houses like the others. 'It stood in a valley evidently, probably on the bank of the creek, as he wrote that the stream (Otsquaga) which 'he had crossed in the morning "ran past" the castle ; that he saw on the opposite (east) "bank" of the stream "a good many houses filled with com and beans," and also extensive flat lands. Further than this topographical description the location of the castle cannot be determined.^ Van Curler's miles to the castle from Onekagonka, ^ In the town of Minclen, four miles south of Fort Plain, on a tongue of land formed by the Otsquaga Creek and one of its tributaries, are the remains of an ancient fortification, showing a curved line two hundred and forty feet in length, inclosing an area of about^ seven acres. The remains are, of course, claimed as belonging to the age of the mound-builders, but with equal probability are the remains of the ancient fort which Van Curler visited.

ON THE MOHAWK. 199

as nearly as can be counted from his Journal, were about six Dutch or about twenty-one English, or as General Clark counted Dutch miles, about eighteen English. As Van Curler traveled "on the ice" for the most considerable part of the way from Onekagoncka, and followed necessarily the bend in the river and diverged at times from the shore line, exact computation of his miles cannot be made. General Clark located the castle at Spraker's Basin, thirteen miles by rail west of Aurie's Creek. Van Curler located it on the west side of Otsqiiage Creek. On Simeon DeWitt's map of survey of patents in 1790 (Doc. Hist. N. Y., i, 420), the direct line from the west side of the mouth of Otsquage Creek to the west side of the mouth of Aurie's Creek is fifteen and three-tenths miles ; following the bend in the Mohaw'k, as Van Curler did, it is seventeen and one-half miles.