Now there were two banks in the city, both of which were under the control of the party to which Alexander Hamilton belonged.  Aaron Burr determined that his party should have a bank, too.  The citizens were prejudiced against banks, and did not want a new one.  But Burr determined to establish one, and set about it in a most peculiar way.  All at once the report got about that the small-pox had been caused by the well-water.  This was about all there was to drink in the city, except that which came from a few springs and was said to be very impure indeed.  So Aaron Burr and his friends secured a charter for a company that was to supply clear, pure water.  This pleased the citizens very much.  But there was a clause in the charter to the effect that as all the money might not be needed for the bringing of water into the city, that which remained could be used for any purpose the company saw fit.  Only those in the secret understood that the money was to be used to start a bank.  So the company dug deep wells not far from the Collect Pond, and pumped water from them into a reservoir which was built close by the Common on Chambers Street, and then sent it through the city by means of curious wooden pipes.  This water was really just as impure as that which had before been taken from the wells, and it was not long before the new water-works were known to be a failure.  Then the company gave all their attention to the bank, which had in the meanwhile been started.

[Illustration:  Reservoir of Manhattan Water-Works in Chambers Street.]

This company of Aaron Burr’s was called the Manhattan Company, and their Manhattan Bank has been kept going ever since and is still in existence in a fine large building in Wall Street.

So you see Aaron Burr this time got the better of Alexander Hamilton and his friends.

If you turn the page you will read more of Hamilton and Burr.

CHAPTER XXXIV

More about Hamilton and Burr

The dawn of the nineteenth century saw 60,000 people in the city of New York and the town extending a mile up the island.  Above the city were farms and orchards and the country homes of the wealthy.  Where Broadway ended there was a patch of country called Lispenard’s Meadow, and about this time a canal was cut through it from the Collect Pond to the Hudson River.  This was the canal which long years afterward was filled in and gave its name to Canal Street.

[Illustration:  The Collect Pond.]

From time to time there were projects for setting out a handsome park about the shores of the Collect Pond, but the townspeople thought it was too far away from the city.  But in a few years the city grew up to the Collect Pond, which was then filled in, and to-day a gloomy prison (The Tombs) is built upon the spot.