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T the time of its almost simultaneous discovery by Samuel Champlain, and Henry Hudson, the territory of Northern New York, was the debatable ground of two powerful savage confederacies, the Adirondack at the north, and the Iroquois at the south. At the same time, on its eastern borders dwelt the Schaghticokes and a few scat tered remnants of their affiliated tribes, which once held their council fires at Albany, and ruled this region with undisputed sovereignty from the sources to the mouth of the Hudson. Comprised within the limits of the great triangle, bounded by Lake Champlain, the St. Lawrence, Hudson, and Mohawk rivers, was a vast reach of table land, amid whose tangle of streams and lakes, majestic mountain peaks and rugged ranges, endless swamps and illimitable forests, thronged and herded the elk, moose and deer; their coverts and recesses af forded range and security for the lurking wolf and the stealthy panther, the prowling bear and the subtle lynx. The pursuit of these was the red man's labor and recreation. The products of the chase furnished his food and raiment; its attainment and success constituted his wealth and distinction. These were the loved and frequented hunting grounds of the aborigines, and, as tradition informs us, the scene of many a sanguinary struggle for supremacy, which thinned the warrior ranks, and opened up a pathway of conquest to the descendants of the hardy Viking.
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