in 1842, left it to his nephew. The town of Yonkers
grew up around it, and on May 1, 1868, purchased it for municipal use.
The fewest possible alterations were made in it. These are mainly in
the north wing, the part added by the second lord of the manor in
1745. On the first floor, the partition between dining-room and
kitchen was removed, and the whole space made into a court-room. On
the second floor, the space formerly divided into five bedrooms was
transformed into a council-chamber, the garret floor overhead being
removed. The new city hall of Yonkers leaves the old manor-house less
necessary for public purposes. May the old parlors, where the besilked
and bepowdered gentry of the province used to dance the minuet before
the change of things, not be given over to baser uses than they have
already served.

Allusion has been made, in different chapters of this narrative, to
the Hessians who daily patrolled the roads in the vicinity of the
manor-house. This duty often fell to Pruschank's yagers, the troop to
which belonged Captain Rowe, whose love story is thus told by Bolton:
"Captain Rowe appears to have been in the habit of making a daily tour
from Kingsbridge, round by Miles Square. He was on his last tour of
military duty, having already resigned his commission for the purpose
of marrying the accomplished Elizabeth Fowler, of Harlem, when,
passing with a company of light dragoons, he was suddenly fired upon
by three Americans of the water guard of Captain Pray's company, who
had ambuscaded themselves in the cedars. The captain fell from his
horse, mortally wounded. The yagers instantly made prisoners of the
undisciplined water guards, and a messenger was immediately despatched
to Mrs. Babcock, then living below, in the parsonage, for a vehicle to
remove the wounded officer. The use of her gig and horse was soon
obtained, and a neighbor, Anthony Archer, pressed to drive. In this
they conveyed the dying man to Colonel Van Cortlandt's. They appear to
have taken the route of Tippett's Valley, as the party stopped at
Frederick Post's to obtain a drink of water. In the meantime an
express had been forwarded to Miss Fowler, his affianced bride, to
hasten without delay to the side of her dying lover. On her arrival,
accompanied by her mother, the expiring soldier had just strength
enough left to articulate a few words, when he sank exhausted with the
effort." The room in which he died is in the well-known mansion in Va