 under
the patents of the Royal Governors, confirmed by an act of our own State
Legislature, and no court in the country can affect my title.«
    »Doubtless, sir, your title is both legal and equitable,« returned the
youth, coldly, reining his horse back, and remaining silent till the subject was
changed.
    It was seldom Mr. Jones suffered any conversation to continue, for a great
length of time, without his participation. It seems that he was of the party
that Judge Temple had designated as his surveyors; and he embraced the
opportunity of the pause that succeeded the retreat of young Edwards, to take up
the discourse, and with it a narration of their further proceedings, after his
own manner. As it wanted, however, the interest that had accompanied the
description of the Judge, we must decline the task of committing his sentences
to paper.
    They soon reached the point where the promised view was to be seen. It was
one of those picturesque and peculiar scenes, that belong to the Otsego, but
which required the absence of the ice, and the softness of a summer's landscape,
to be enjoyed in all its beauty. Marmaduke had early forewarned his daughter of
the season, and of its effect on the prospect, and after casting a cursory
glance at its capabilities, the party returned homeward, perfectly satisfied
that its beauties would repay them for the toil of a second ride, at a more
propitious season.
    »The spring is the gloomy time of the American year,« said the Judge; »and
it is more peculiarly the case in these mountains. The winter seems to retreat
to the fastnesses of the hills, as to the citadel of its dominion, and is only
expelled, after a tedious siege, in which either party, at times, would seem to
be gaining the victory.«
    »A very just and apposite figure, Judge Temple,« observed the Sheriff; »and
the garrison under the command of Jack Frost make formidable sorties - you
understand what I mean by sorties, Monsieur; sallies, in English - and sometimes
drive General Spring and his troops back again into the low countries.«
    »Yes, sair,« returned the Frenchman, whose prominent eyes were watching the
precarious footsteps of the beast he rode, as it picked its dangerous way among
the roots of trees, holes, log-bridges, and sloughs, that formed the aggregate
of the highway. »Je vous entend; de low countrie is freeze up for half de year.«
    The error of Mr. Le Quoi was not observed by
