The roar of the falling waters, and in the breaking up and precipitation of ice, was very distinctly heard at Fort Orange, nine miles distant, and the hills on which Albany now stands trembled under the impact. Primarily the falls were much higher than they are now, the stream having cut its way through one hundred feet of rock which rises on either side in massive wall. Below the falls the water separates in four branches or "Sprouts," the northerly and the southerly one reaching the Hudson five miles apart, at Wf.terford and West Troy respectively.

Wathoiack, of record as the name of "The Great Rift above Kahoes Falls" (Cal. Land Papers, 134, etc.) is also written JVathojax, D'Wathoiack, and DeWathojaaks, means, substantially, what it describes, a rift or rapid. The cis-locative De locates a place "On this side of the rapid," or the side toward the speaker. The flow of water is between walls of rock over a rocky bed, and the rapids extend for a distance of thirty-five or forty feet. (Ses Kahoes.) Niskayune, now so written as the name of a town and of a village in Schenectady County, is from Kanistagionne, primarily located on the north side of the Mohawk, Canastagiozcane (1667) being the oldest form of record. The locative description reads : "Lying at a place called Neastegaione, * * known by the name of Kanistegaione." West of Schenectady the Mohawk is a succession of rapids. At or below Schenectady it makes a bend to the northeast in the form of a crescent, around which the water flows in a sluggish current. At the north point of the crescent was, and prob-