Besides the buildings of a public character that have been enumerated here, and others w^hich are omitted for lack of space, there are numberless private residences, some of them quite palatial in extent, that crown the heights or are scattered along the slopes of the shore. Immediately above Riverside Park is the former village known to its residents as Manhattanville. A steel viaduct spans the Manhattan Valley and connects Riverside Drive with the Harlem Speedway. At Man-- hattanville, on 128th Street, near St. Nicholas Avenue, is the celebrated convent school, under the charge of the sisters of the Sacred Heart. The buildings, of brown stone, large enough for the accommodation of several hundred scholars, are situated in the middle of a wooded

152 The Hudson River

park. Here the pu^jils are not confined to those of one creed, though uniformity in dress among the inmates of the school is rec[uired. Overlooking Manhattanville is the old Lawrence homestead, built by John B. Lawrence more than a century ago. Lawrence vStreet, in the vicinity, perpetuates his name. Between the Watkins and Bradhurst houses, a short distance below 148th Street, Alexander Hamilton built his celebrated country seat, the Grange. This was not erected until after the Revolution. Here the statesman and soldier passed the last years of his busy and brilliant career, surrounded by his friends, but not entirely free from the animosities of political life -- enmities that finall}^ culminated in the fatal encounter between himself and Aaron Burr. The thirteen elm trees planted Ijy Hamilton near his house, to celebrate the thirteen original states of the union, were saved from destruction some years ago by Orlando Potter, who paid $140,000 for the ground upon which thc}^ stood. Dr. Samuel Brad hurst built a house north of the Grange, not far from the site of the noted Watkins house on St.