the lands finally became the property of James Donatien, Le Ray de Chaumont, his associates and grantees. "After toils and many troubles, self-exile for many years, Long delays and sad misfortunes, man's regrets and woman's tears, VII. DEATH OF PIERRE PHAROUX. One of the saddest incidents in the story of Castorland is the death of Pharoux at the falls of Watertown, in 1795. In September of that year, after the river had been swollen by heavy rains, Pharoux set out with Brodhead, Tassart and others, on a journey to Kingston, on the St. Lawrence. In passing down the river upon a raft, they were drawn over the falls. Mr. Brodhead and three men were saved, but Pharoux and all the others were drowned. The survivors made unremitting search for Pharoux's body, but it was not found until the following spring. It was washed ashore upon an island at the mouth of the Black River, where it was found by Benjamin Wright, the surveyor, and by him decently buried there. M. Le Ray de Chaumont many years afterward caused a marble tablet to be set in the rock near his grave, bearing this inscription: TO THE MEMORY OF The reader will remember that the year before his death, Pharoux had discovered and named the river Independence in Castorland, and had selected a beautiful spot at its mouth on the Black River, near a large flat granite rock, for his residence. This spot, called by the Desjardines brothers Independence Rock, was ever afterward regarded by them with melancholy interest. They could not pass it without shedding tears to the memory of their long-tried and trusted friend. Under date of May 28th, 1796, Simon Desjardines, the elder brother, recorded in his journal: "Landed at half-past two at Independence Rock, and visited once more this charming spot which had been so beautifully chosen by our friend Pharoux as the site for his house. The azaleas in full bloom loaded the air with their perfume, and the wild birds sang sweetly around their nests, but nature has no longer any pleasant sights, nor fragrance, nor music, for me." And now ancient Castorland may be added to the long list of names once famous in the cities of Europe, and long celebrated in the forest annals of Northern New York, but now forgotten, and found only in history and song. CHAPTER XIX. SISTERSFIELD. That best portion of a good man's life, Of kindness and of love. -Wordsworth. In ancient Castorland, about six miles above the village of Carthage, and on the easterly side of the Black River, there has long been a small deserted clearing, that is now, or but lately was, mostly overgrown with low scrubby pines, sweet ferns, and wild blackberry briars. This little clearing is situated directly opposite the mouth of the Deer River, a western branch of the Black River, which there enters it after tumbling down in a series of beautiful falls and cascades the limestone and slaty terraced hills of the eastern slope of the plateau of the Lesser Wilderness, in whose swamps and wild meadows it takes its rise. Of the falls on the Deer River, the High Falls, about five miles above its mouth, near the village of Copenhagen, in the town of Denmark, are of exceptional height and beauty. The stream there plunges over a perpendicular precipice of one hundred and sixty-six feet in height into a deep, yawning chasm of more than a mile in length, whose perpendicular walls rise, upon one side, to the giddy height of two hundred and twenty-five feet. Two miles below the High Falls are the celebrated King's Falls, so named from the visit of Joseph Bonaparte, the ex-king of Spain, by whom they were much admired. The King's Falls are only about fifty feet in height, but they excel even the High Falls in their wild picturesque beauty. Like many a similar place in the old Wilderness and around its borders, this little old deserted clearing has a long-forgotten history. It was once known as Sistersfield, and was for many years, at the beginning of the present century, the home of a French nobleman who was a refugee from the Reign of Terror in France, and whose name was Louis François de Saint-Michel. Saint-Michel had been forester to Louis XVI. He was a tall, spare man of noble presence and courtly bearing, his dress, his manner, his whole appearance, indicating that he had been bred in the most polished society of Europe. His eye flashed a keen intelligence, but his French vivacity was tempered and softened down by a most fervent piety and a deep thoughtfulness. But his manners, though elegant, were not disdainful, and among his neighbors of the Black River valley, of New England lineage, he had many warm friends. Among them he never exhibited the ostentatious bearing and haughty speech, so often among the characteristics of the old nobility of France. Of those who represented that ancient but dissolving order, Saint-Michel, in an eminent degree, like Le Ray de Chaumont, displayed their virtues and graces unalloyed by their vices. Born and bred among the dazzling splendors of the French Court of the old régime, himself a participator in its most gorgeous pa geants and imposing ceremonies, at the palace of the Tuilleries, in Paris, in the forests of Fontainebleau, and at the castles of Blois, the favorite homes of French royalty, it was the strange fortune of Saint-Michel to pass his declining years in the deep seclusion of this little clearing of Sis tersfield, in Castorland, that has been so long forgotten, on the borders of the old Wilderness. He was accompanied in his exile by an only daughter, Sophie de Saint-Michel, who had been tenderly reared in the schools of Paris. His wife had died in early womanhood, leaving this daughter an only child. After the death of his wife, Saint-Michel placed his daughter at a convent school in Paris. When the Revolution broke out he was obliged to flee from France to save his life. On the eve of his flight he called at the convent gate for his daughter. She was brought to him in disguise, and with her he made. his escape from France and came to Castorland. In their secluded forest home she applied herself to the duties of her father's household with a self-sacrificing spirit that did much to enliven the gloom of their solitude and to lighten the sorrows of their situation. Saint-Michel arrived in New York in 1798, and undertook the management of Sistersfield, which was a tract of twelve hundred acres belonging to three sisters, one named Renée Jeane Louise, another Reine Marguerite, and the third a Mrs. Blake, who were the daughters of Sieur Lambot of Paris. On this tract of land called Sisterfield SaintMichel built an humble log cabin, on the bank of the Black River, where he and his daughter lived for several years in the greatest seclusion. His lonely hut was often the temporary resting place for the hunters and trappers of the region, who were charmed with the exquisite grace and beauty of his daughter, who, in spite of the tenderness with which she had been reared, performed the menial duties of her exiled father's household with a cheerfulness and resignation remarkable for one of her years. After awhile his |