t about forty miles off, and to the N.W. the high
hills by Merrimack, above sixty miles off," The "very high hill" seen by
them for the first time was unquestionably Wachusett.

"On the 20th of October, 1759, the General Court of Massachusetts,
passed an act for incorporating the east wing, so called, of Rutland,
together with sundry farms and some publick lands contiguous thereto,"
as a district under the name of Prince Town, "to perpetuate the name and
memory of the late Rev. Thomas Prince, colleague pastor of the Old South
church in Boston, and a large proprietor of this tract of land." The
district thus incorporated contained about nineteen thousand acres; but
on April 24, 1771, its inhabitants petitioned the General Court, that
it, "with all the lands adjoining said District, not included in any
other town or District," be incorporated into a town by the name of
Princeton; and by the granting of this petition, the area of the town
was increased to twenty-two thousand acres.

The principal citizen of Princeton at this period was the Honorable
Moses Gill, who married the daughter of the Reverend Thomas Prince. He
was a man of considerable note in the county also, holding office as one
of the judges of the court of common pleas for the county of Worcester,
and being "for several years Counsellor of this Commonwealth." His
country-seat, located at Princeton, was a very extensive estate,
comprising nearly three thousand acres. Mr. Whitney appears to have been
personally familiar with this place, and his description of it is so
graphic and enthusiastic, that it may be interesting to quote a portion
of it.

"His noble and elegant seat is about one mile and a quarter from the
meeting-house, to the south. The mansion-house is large, being fifty by
fifty feet, with four stacks of chimneys. The farmhouse is forty feet by
thirty-six. In a line with this stands the coach and chaise house, fifty
feet by thirty-six. This is joined to the barn by a shed seventy feet in
length--the barn is two hundred feet by thirty-two. Very elegant fences
are erected around the mansion-house, the outhouses, and the garden.
When we view this seat, these buildings, and this farm of so many
hundred acres under a high degree of profitable cultivation, and are
told that in the year 1776 it was a perfect wilderness, we are struck
with wonder, admiration, and astonishment. Upon the whole, the seat of
Judge Gill, all the agreeable circumstances respect