t, with an old stone house, said to be next in
antiquity to the old Van Rensselaer House, opposite Albany. It is also
a fact that this property passed directly to the ancestors of the
present family, the only property in this vicinity never owned by the
lord of the manor. Opposite the old stone house, the point on the west
bank is known as Parda Hook, where it is said a horse was once drowned
in a horse-race on the ice, and hence the name Parda, for the old
Hollanders along the Hudson seemed to have had a musical ear, and
delighted in accumulating syllables. (The word pard is used in Spenser
for spotted horse, and still survives in the word leopard.)

The Castleton Bar or "overslaugh," as it was known by the river
pilots, impeded for years navigation in low water. Commodore Van
Santvoord and other prominent citizens brought the subject before the
State legislature, and work was commenced in 1863. In 1868 the United
States Government very properly (as their jurisdiction extends over
tide-water), assumed the completing of the dykes, which now stretch
for miles along the banks and islands of the upper Hudson. Here and
there along our route between Coxsackie and Albany will be seen great
dredges deepening and widening the river channel. The plan provides
for a system of longitudinal dykes to confine the current sufficiently
to allow the ebb and flow of the tidal-current to keep the channel
clear. These dykes are to be gradually brought nearer together from
New Baltimore toward Troy, so as to assist the entrance of the
flood-current and increase its height.

* * *

Where Hudson winds his silver way
And murmurs at the tardy stay,
Impatient at delay.

_William Crow._

* * *

The engineers report that the greater part of the material carried in
suspension in the Hudson river above Albany is believed to come from
the Mohawk river, and its tributary the Schoharie river, while the
sands and gravel that form the heavy and obstinate bars near Albany
and chiefly between Albany and Troy, come from the upper Hudson.

The discharge of the Hudson between Troy and Albany at its lowest
stage may be taken at about 3,000 cubic feet per second. The river
supply, therefore, during that stage is inadequate in the upper part
of the river for navigation, independent of tidal flow.

The greatest number of bars is between Albany and Troy, where the
channel is narrow, and at least six obstructing bars, composed o