For Lockport, see Bullock's Sketch, in our volume xix, p. 151, note 21.—Ed.
[196] Rochester, Perinton, and Fairport, all in Monroe County, on the canal, were settled before the route was laid out. The first permanent settlement at Rochester was not until 1803, although saw and grist mills had been built some years earlier, and worked intermittently. The name given to the village in 1811 was in honor of Nathaniel Rochester, of Maryland, an early purchaser of lands. The village incorporation took place in 1811.
Perinton, named for its first settler, Glover Perrin (about 1790), had little growth until the opening of the canal; the name is now applied to the township in which Fairport is situated. The first settler of the latter town came in 1810; there were but nine houses there, seven of which were log-cabins, at the opening of the canal (1822). It numbered in 1900, 2,439.
Irondequot Creek was an early highway into Iroquois territory. It was the rendezvous (1687) of the expedition led by Denonville, governor of Canada, against the marauding Seneca. See Thwaites, Lahontan's Voyages in North America (Chicago, 1904), i, pp. 123-130.—Ed.
[197] Clyde, in Wayne County, New York, had its first permanent settlers in 1811. It was at first called Lauraville; later, the river was, by a Scotch settler, named Clyde, and upon incorporation (1836) this was applied to the settlement.
Montezuma marshes, in southwest Cayuga County, were called by the aborigines Tiohero.—Ed.
[198] This part of the country is remarkable for the number of fine lakes, all of which have very harmonious names, taken from the old Indian language, such as Canandaigua, Cayuga, Seneca, Onega, Ontario, Oswego, Onondago, &c. From the immense Lake Superior, the area of which is estimated at 30,000 square miles, to the small lakes only a few miles in length, their forms differ entirely, and are in part highly picturesque. These lakes and rivers have been judiciously suffered to retain their ancient harmonious Indian names; whereas the Americans have, in general, transferred the names of European towns and districts to this land, where we often meet with excessively dissonant, inappropriate names, which frequently call forth a smile, as Dr. Julius very justly observes, Vol. I. p. 420.—Maximilian.
Comment by Ed. Nicolaus Heinrich Julius, author of Nordamerikas sittliche zustande, nach eigener Enshauungen in den jahren 1834-36 (Leipzig, 1839).
[199] For the Onondaga, see Croghan's Journals, in our volume i, p. 60, note 23.—Ed.
[200] The site of Syracuse had been that of an Indian village, where Ephraim Webster, coming from New England, built a trading post in 1786. It was included in the salt reservation established in 1797 and offered for sale by the state in 1804. The first purchaser was Abraham Walton, who built a mill upon the site the following year. Walton intended to found a village, but not until the establishment of the canal did Syracuse outgrow its embryonic stage. Meanwhile several names had been in use; Milan was suggested in 1809; South Salina was used for three years (1809-12); Corinth was desired, but a Corinth post-office already existing, Syracuse was suggested, because of a certain resemblance to the site of the famous Sicilian city. Organized as a village in 1825, Syracuse finally became a city in 1847.—Ed.