of the house of Mr. Duval's place, and enlarged by Col. T. Forrest. In their early days, all the better kinds of houses had balconies in the front, in which, at the close of the day, it was common to see the women at most of the houses sitting and sewing or knitting; at that time the women went to their churches generally in short gowns and petticoats, and with check or white flaxen aprons. The young men had their heads shaved, and wore white caps; in summer they went without coats, wearing striped trowsers, and barefooted; the old Friends wore wigs.

In their day every house was warmed in winter by "jamb stoves," and Mr. Sower, of Germantown, (the printer,) cast the first stoves perhaps thus used in the United States. They were cast in Lancaster; none of them are now up and in use, but many of the plates are often seen lying about the old houses as door steps, &c. A jamb stove was set in the chimney jamb, (or side,) in the kitchen fire-place; it was made something like the box form of the present ten-plate stoves, but without a pipe or oven, and it passed through the wall of the chimney back into the adjoining sitting rooms, so as to present its back end (opposite the fire door) in that room. The plate used to be made sometimes red hot; but still it was but a poor means of giving out heat, and could not have answered but for their then hardy constitutions, and the general smallness of their rooms in that day.

Mr. K. remembers very well, that when he was a lad, there was yet a little company of Delaware Indians, (say 25 or 30 persons,) then hutted and dwelling on the low grounds of Philip Kelley's manufactory ground. There was then a wood there through all the low ground, which now forms his meadow ground and mill race Some of the old Indians died and were buried in Concord burying ground, adjoining Mr. Duval's place. After they were dead the younger Indians all moved off in a body, when Keyser was about 14 or 15 years of age. Indian Ben among them was celebrated as a great fiddler, and every body was familiar with Indian Isaac.

course.

At

In going to the city there was a thick woods on the south-west side of the turnpike below Naglee's hill-where Skerrett's house now stands, called Logan's swamp and woods. The road then went on the low ground to the south-westward of said hill and house. Penn's creek, (or Three-mile run, now Albanus Logan's place,) and at the opposite side on Norris' place, began a deep and lofty wood, which extended on both sides of the road nearly into the suburbs, and from thence the woods continued many miles up the Delaware. There was then no inlet into the city but by the Front street road. The Second and Third streets were not then formed.

On the 20th of October, 1746, a great public fair was held at Ger

mantown.

In 1762, the Paxton boys, from near Lancaster, halted at the Inarket square, preparatory to their intended invasion of Philadelphia,

to kill the friendly Indians sheltered there; they yielded to negotiation and went home. There were several hundred of them.

Rittenhouse, the celebrated philosopher, as well as Godfrey, the inventor of Hadley's quadrant, were of the neighbourhood of Germantown. Captain Miller, who was basely killed at Fort Washington, after its surrender, was of Germantown.

The old road of Germantown continued in a line with the first bank of Germantown, (to the south-west of the present,) ran near the poor house, by S. Harvey's, up through R. Haines' low lands, and came out by the Concord school house, by the Washington, or Abington lane. Some of the logs now lie sound under ground, back of Justice Johnson's, on which the road ran by the swamp.

The quantity of Indian arrow heads, spears, and hatchets, all of flint and stone, and attached to wooden or withe handles, still ploughed up in the fields, is great. I have seen some of a heap of two hundred together, in a circle of the size of a bushel; some of them, strange to tell, are those taken from chalk beds, and not at all like the flint of our country.

The creek on which Wm. L. Fisher's mill stands is the head of Frankford creek, and was called by the Indians Wingohocking. The creek at Albanus Logan's, called Penn's creek, was called Tumanaramaming, and goes out at the upper end of Kensington.

Anthony Johnson, who died in 1823, aged 78, saw, when a lad, a large bear come across the road in daytime from Chew's ground, then a wood; he has seen abundance of wild turkeys, and has often heard the wolves howl at night near his father's house; the one rebuilt at the corner of S. Harvey's lane. The woods then came up near the house. He has seen several deer in the woods, but they were fast going off when he was young. Near the same house, when the old road passed in the swamp behind it, his father told him he once saw six wolves in daytime.

After James Logan's house was built, in 1728, at Stenton, a bear of large size came and leaped over the garden fence.

Jacob Keyser, now 88, tells me that he and others pursued and killed a small bear,' about sixty-five years ago, on one of the back lots; it was, however, then matter of surprise and sport.

Mr. K. remembers that a Mr. Axe, in his time, killed a bear on Samuel Johnson's place, not far from the Wissahiccon. Foxes and rackoons were then quite plenty.

Only about fifty years ago a flock of six wild turkeys came to Enoch Rittenhouse's mill, and remained about there till his family shot the whole of them; and in the winter of 1832 they shot a lynx there.

In 1721 a bear was killed in Germantown, and so published, and two more nearer to Philadelphia.

In the house of Reuben Haines, built by Dirk Johnson, a chief and his twenty Indians have been sheltered and entertained.

Anthony Johnson, when a boy, has seen near two hundred In

dians at a time on the present John Johnson's place, in a woods on the hollow adjoining to the wheelwright's shop. They would remain there a week at a time, to make and sell baskets, ladles, fiddles, &c. He used to remain hours with them and see their feats of agility. They would go over fences without touching them, in nearly a horizontal attitude, and yet alight on their nimble feet. They would also do much at shooting of marks. One Edward Keimer imitated them so closely as to execute all their exploits. Beaver and beaver dams A. Johnson has often seen.

The earliest settlers used to make good linens and vend them in Philadelphia. They were also distinguished, even till modern times, for their fabric of Germantown stockings. This fact induced the Bank of Germantown to adopt a seal, with such a loom upon it. The linen sellers and weavers used to stand with the goods for sale on the edge of the pavement in Market street, on the north side, near to Second street corner. The cheapness of imported stockings is now ruining their business.

Professor Kalm, who visited Germantown in 1748, says: "The inhabitants were so numerous, that the street was always full."

Old Mr. W., in 1718 or '20, shot a stout deer between Germantown and Philadelphia, and the rifle he used is now in possession of his grandson.

John Seelig predicted men's lives when requested, by the rules of nativities; and he had a mysterious cane, or rod, which he commanded to be cast into the Schuylkill in his last sickness, and which, as the tradition goes, exploded therein! Kelpius too kept his diary by noting the signs of the Zodiac.

Doctor Witt left all his property to strangers by the name of Warmer, saying, they had been kind to him on his arrival, in bestowing him a hat in place of his, lost on shipboard.

The tombstone of C. F. Post, the missionary and interpreter, so often named in Proud's history, is in the lower burying ground. He died in 1785, aged 75 years.

The Germantown newspaper, by C. Sower, was printed but once a quarter, and began in the year 1739; and what was curious, he cast his own types and made his own ink! It eventually was printed monthly, but from and after the year 1744, it was printed every week, under the title of the "Germantown Gazette," by C. Sower, Jr., and was not discontinued till some time in the war. A copy of these papers would be a kind gift to the Germantown Library. Sower published first in the United States a quarto Bible, in German.

Germantown was a place of great interest during the war of the revolution, and at the celebrated battle there. It occurred on the morning of the 4th of October, 1777. The main body of the British army, under Gens. Howe, Grey, Grant and Agnew, were attacked by the Americans in the following order: Washington, with the division of Sullivan and Wayne, flanked by Gen. Thomas Conway's brigade, entered the town by Chestnut hill road. Gen. Arm

strong, with the Pennsylvania militia, attacked the left and rear, near Schuylkill. The division of Generals Greene and Stephens, flanked by Gen. M'Dougall's brigade, were to enter by taking a circuit at the market house, and attack the right wing, and the militia of Maryland and Jersey, under Generals Smallwood and Freeman, were to march by the old York road and fall upon the rear of the right. General Sterling, with Generals Nash and Maxwell's brigade, formed a corps of reserve. Admirably as this attack was planned, it failed, from those fortuitous events in warfare, over which Gen. Washington had no possible control. Lieut. Col. Musgrave, of the British army, as the Americans advanced, threw himself, with six companies of the 40th regiment, into Chew's large stone house, which stood full in front of the main body of the Americans. Musgrave, before the battle, encamped back of Chew's house in excellent huts, and Col. Webster's regiment (33d) lay back of John Johnson's in huts also; they were as regular and neat as a town. Gen. Read, it has been said, was for pushing on immediately, and was opposed by Gen. Knox as against military rule, to leave an enemy in a fort in the rear. Any how, in attempting to induce the surrender of Lieut. Col. Musgrave, the precious moments were lost, and gave Generals Grey, Grant, and Agnew, (who dwelt in Germantown,) time to come up with a reinforcement. Much blame, too, was attached to Gen. S.'s division, who was said to have been intoxicated, and to have so far misconceived and broken his orders as to have been afterwards tried and broken. The morning was exceedingly foggy, which would have greatly favoured the Americans, had not those, as well as part of Greene's column, remained thus inactive. Col. Mathews, of Greene's column, attacked with great spirit and routed the parties opposed to him, and took one hundred and ten prisoners; but, through the fog, he lost sight of his brigade, and was himself taken prisoner with his whole regiment, (on P. Kelley's hill) and his prisoners released. Greene and Stephens' division, formed the last column of the retreating Americans. Count Pulaski's cavalry covered their rear. Washington retreated to Skippack creek-his loss amounted to one hundred and fifty-two killed, and five hundred and twenty-one wounded, upwards of four hundred were made prisoners, amongst whom were fifty-four officers.

The cannon which assailed Chew's house were planted in front of the present John Johnson's house; Chew's house was so battered that it took four or five carpenters a whole winter to repair and replace the fractures. The front door which was replaced was filled with shot holes-it is still preserved there.

A cousin of mine, who was intimate with Gen. Washington's aidde-camp, told me that he told him he had never heard the general utter an oath, but on that day, when he seemed deeply mortified and indignant, he expressed an execration at General S

drunken rascal.

as a

The daughter of Benjamin Marshal, Esq., at whose house General

Washington stopped after the battle, told me he reached there in the evening, and would only take a dish of tea, and pulling out the half of a biscuit, assured the family the other half was all the food he had taken since the preceding day.

The general opinion then was, that but for the delay at Chew's house, our army must have been victorious, and we should have been sufficiently avenged for our losses the preceding month at the battle of Brandywine, and would have probably caused the British to evacuate Philadelphia. But Gen. Wilkinson, in his late memoirs, who has described minutely the battle therein, and was but a few years ago here on the spot, examining the whole ground, has published his entire conviction that it was a kind providence, which overruled the disaster for our good: for had we been successful and pushed on for the city, Gen. Howe was coming on with a force sufficient to have captured or destroyed the whole American army. He states, that Washington relied on information from a deserter, that Howe intended a movement of his troops towards Fort Mifflin, which, unknown to Gen. Washington, he had countermanded, and so enabled him to come out in full force. See Appendix, p. 554.

There were as many as twenty thousand British, &c., in and about the town under Gen. Howe. He was a fine large man, and looked considerably like Gen. Washington: he lived some time at Logan's, and also in the present Samuel Morris' house; he walked abroad in plain clothes in a very unassuming manner. Gen. Grant occupied the house now Michael Staiger's, near the lane. The artillery lay on the high ground in rear of the poor house; two regiments of Highlanders half a mile in the rear of Reuben Haines' house and the Hessians lay on the Ridge Hill above Peter Robeson's, near the road; all the infantry were on the commons about where J. Price's seat now is.

In the time of the battle Gen. Howe came as far as the market square, and stayed there giving his commands. Gen. Agnew rode on at the head of his men, and when he came as far as the wall of the Mennonist grave yard, he was shot by Hans P. Boyer, who lay in ambush, and took deliberate aim at his star on the breast: he fell from his fine horse, and was carried to Mr. Wister's house, where he died in his front parlour. He was a very civil and gentlemanly man. The man who killed him was not an enlisted soldier, and died not long since in the poor house.

At that same place is a rising hill, at which the severest of the firing and battle was waged, except what occurred so disastrously for us at Chew's house. The British advanced no farther than the said hill on the road, until after the retreat.

Several have told me, who saw the dead and dying after the action, lying on the ground, that some in their last moments were quite insane: but all who could speak were in great thirst from anguish, &c. In Samuel Keyser's garden many bodies were lying: and in the rear of Justice Johnson's, Gen. Morgan of the rifle corps came up