bought by Judge Chew in 1763.

Tradition has it that the well was dug in the recess, which could, at short notice, be enclosed with heavy doors, in order to secure a supply of water within the dwelling if it were attacked by Indians.

Mr. Beverly Chew, the scholarly President of the Grolier Club of New York City, and eminent as a book-lover and collector of rare prints and priceless "first editions," is descended from the ancient stock through Joseph Chew, a younger brother of the immigrant, John. Every vestige of the dwelling built by the latter upon the fertile island in the James River has disappeared, but the site is still pointed out to the curious visitor.

HISTORIAN, painter, and poet have made

familiar to us the story of the imprisoned Huguenot, condemned to die from starvation, who was kept alive by the seeming accident that a hen laid an egg daily on the sill of his grated window.

From this French Perot descended Elliston Perot Morris, the present proprietor of the old house on the Germantown Road, which is the subject of this sketch.

It was built in 1772 by a German, David Deshler, long and honorably known as a Philadelphia merchant. A pleasant story goes that the façade of the solid stone mansion would have been broader by some feet had the sylvan tastes of the owner allowed him to fell a fine plum-tree that grew to the left of the proposed

site. The garden was the marvel of the region during his occupancy of the country-seat, and was flanked by thrifty orchards and vineyards.

At Deshler's death in 1792, the Germantown estate passed into the hands of Colonel Isaac Franks, an officer who had served in the RevHe had owned it but a year, olutionary War. when the yellow fever broke out in Philadelphia, then the seat of the National Government. Colonel Franks with his family retreated hurriedly to the higher ground and protecting mountain-barrier of Bethlehem, although Germantown was considered a safe refuge by the citizens of Philadelphia. Shortly after the Franks's flitting, the Colonel received a visit from President Washington's man of affairs, a He was charged with an Germantown citizen. offer to rent the commodious residence on the Old Road for the use of the President and his family. The patriotic cordiality with which the retired officer granted the request did not carry him beyond the bounds of careful frugality. He made minute mention in his expensebook of the cost of sweeping and garnishing the house for the reception of the distinguished guests, also of "cash paid for cleaning my house and putting it in the same condition the