The banks of Van Schaick's are steep, a forest of evergreens clothes a large portion of its surface, and only a solitary barn indicates its cognizance by man.

Green Island, the larger of the three, stretches along the upper part of Troy, and is a theatre of industry for a busy population, engaged chiefly in manufactures, or in employments connected with railways. There was the immense establishment of Messrs. Eaton, Gilbert, & Co, (afterward destroyed by fire), the most extensive manufacturers of railway carriages, omnibuses, and stage coaches in the United States, if not in the world.

The scenery about the mouth of the Mohawk, particularly in the vicinity of Cohoes Falls, is exceedingly picturesque, and at some points really grand. A highway bridge, nine hundred feet in length, and a railway viaduct still longer, cross the river over the rapids a short distance below the falls. From tlie former, a fine distant view of the cataract and the rapids below may be obtained ; but the best places to observe them in all their beauty and grandeur, are at and near the Cataract House, in the village of Cohoes, which stands upon the summit verge of a precipice one hundred and seventy feet in height. Down a steep slope of that precipice, for about fifty feet, the proprietor has constructed a flight of steps, and upon the top of a broad terrace at their foot he has planted a flower garden, for the enjoyment of visitors. Around its edge, from which may be obtained a view of the entire cataract, is a railing with seats, and there the visitor may contemplate at ease the wild scene on every hand. On his left, as he gazes up the river, rush large streams of water from the top of the precipice above him, in almost perpendicular currents, from the waste-sluices of a canal, which, commencing at a dam almost two miles