made by three Columbia County men, Isaac Van
Wyck, Talmage Hall and John Kinney, as in that year the state granted
to these men the exclusive right "to erect, set up, carry on and drive
stage-waggons" between New York and Albany on the east side of
Hudson's River, etc., fare limited to 4 pence per mile, trips once a
week. Right here it is interesting to note that in 1866 Lossing wrote
of the Hudson River Railway that "more than a dozen trains each way
pass over portions of the road in the course of twenty-four hours."

[Sidenote: _NEVIS--CLAREMONT--BLUE STORE._]

Nevis is little more than a cross-roads. Claremont a straggling
village of no moment; further on the road crosses the Roeloff Jansen
Kill over a bridge that looks as though it must have heard the rumble
of many a stage coach.

Some newspaper antiquarian says:--

"Kill seems to be a Low Dutch word of American coinage. I have never
found the word kill for brook in Low Dutch or Low German writings. I
think they originally pronounced it 'kuell' (cool), and to a people
transplanted from a low country to a mountainous one, where the water
of the brooks was cool even in midsummer, the suggestion may be
plausible. The Low Dutch have 'vliet' (fleet) for stream. The German
for streaming is 'stroemen.' Hamburg has its numerous fleets or canals.
The Low German of the Luenenburger Helde calls a brook a streak or a
'beek.' Note the word 'Beekman.'"

A hundred years or more ago, when they were naming things in these
parts, Blue Store was blue store, and they keep up the tradition
faithfully to-day. Everything except what nature tints is the favorite
color. This was one of the principal stopping places on the Post Road,
but it has sadly dwindled since the old days.

[Sidenote: _JOHNSTOWN--RACE PLACE._]

Johnstown contains three Livingston houses, built by various members
of this omnipresent family. The one north of the village stands on a
commanding hill, and looks from the road like a handsome place. In
1805 there were twenty public houses in this place, even members of
the reigning family consenting to take in the sheckels over the bar.

It has been interesting to see the chickens scurry for cover whenever
a noisy flock of blackbirds passes overhead on its way to the
southland. They seemed to think, if chickens think, that all the hawks
in christendom were swooping down on their devoted heads, and stood
not on the order of their going.

[Sidenote: _COLD NIGHT._]