ard Alexander,
and Hugh West, of the said County of Fairfax, Gentlemen, and Philip
Alexander of the County of Stafford, Gentleman, and their successors in
trust for the several purposes hereinafter mentioned."[11]

These same gentlemen were "constituted and appointed directors and
trustees, for designing, building ... the town"[12] and the trustees and
directors or any six of them were to have the power to "Meet as often as
they shall think necessary, and shall lay out the said sixty acres into
lots and streets not exceeding half an acre of ground in each lot; and
also set apart such portions of the said land for a market place, and
public landing as to them shall seem convenient; and when the said town
shall be so laid out, the said directors and trustees shall have full
power and authority to sell all the said lots, by public sale or
auction, from time to time, to the highest bidder so as no person shall
have more than two lots."[13] The money arising from the sale was to be
paid to the two Alexanders and to Hugh West, the proprietors.

It was further enacted that purchasers of every lot or lots should
"within two years next after the date of the conveyance for the same,
erect, build and finish on each lot so conveyed, one house of brick,
stone or wood, well framed of the dimensions of twenty feet square, and
nine feet pitch, at the least or proportionably thereto if such grantee
shall have two lots contiguous, with a brick or stone chimney ... and if
the owner of any such lot shall fail to pursue and comply with the
directions herein prescribed for the building and finishing one or more
house or houses thereon, then such lots upon which such houses shall not
be so built and finished shall be revested in the said trustees, and
shall and may be sold and conveyed to any other persons whatsoever, in
the manner before directed, and shall revest and be sold as often as the
owner or owners shall fail to perform, obey and fulfill the directions
aforesaid, and the money arising from the sale of such lots as shall be
revested and sold applied to such public use for the common benefit of
the inhabitants of the said town as to them shall seem most proper; and
if the said inhabitants of said town shall fail to obey and pursue the
rules and orders of the said directors in repairing and mending the
streets, landing, and public wharfs, they shall be liable to the same
penalties as are inflicted for not repairing the highways in this