One of the new undertakings was the building of a new City Hall, as the old one in Wall Street was no longer large enough.  So the present City Hall was begun on what was then the Common, but it was not finished for a good ten years.  The front and sides were of white marble, and the rear of cheaper red sandstone, as it was thought that it would be many years before anyone would live far enough uptown to notice the difference.  How odd this seems in these days, when the City Hall is quite at the beginning of the city.

Aaron Burr had by this time been elected Vice-President of the United States.  But he soon lost the confidence of the people, and when, in the year 1803, he hoped to be made Governor of the State of New York, he was defeated.

[Illustration:  The Grange, Kingsbridge Road, the Residence of Alexander Hamilton.]

Now at this time Alexander Hamilton was still a leader in the party opposed to Aaron Burr, and did everything possible to defeat him.  And Burr, angered because of this, and believing that Hamilton had sought to bring dishonor upon him, challenged Hamilton to a duel—­the popular way of settling such serious grievances.  So Hamilton accepted the challenge and on a morning in the middle of the summer of 1804, just after sunrise, the duel took place on the heights of the shore of New Jersey, just above Weehawken.  Hamilton fell at the first fire mortally wounded.  The next day he died.

There was great sorrow throughout the entire country, for he was a brave and good man, and had been a leader since the War of the Revolution.  All the citizens followed him to his rest in Trinity Churchyard, and in the churchyard to-day you can see his tomb carefully taken care of and decorated, year by year.

After the death of Hamilton the feeling against Burr in the city was bitter indeed, and he soon went away.

A few years later, when a project was formed for establishing a great empire in the southwest and overthrowing the United States, this same Aaron Burr was thought to be concerned in the plot.  When, after a trial, he was acquitted, he went to live in Europe.  But he returned after a time, and the last years of his life were passed in New York.

CHAPTER XXXV

Robert Fulton builds a steam-boat

There had come to be a great need for schools.  There were private schools and there were school-rooms attached to some of the churches, but it was in this year, 1805, that the first steps were taken to have free schools for all.

A kindly man named De Witt Clinton was Mayor of the city, and he, with some other citizens, organized the Free School Society that was to provide an education for every child.  The following year the first free school was opened.  The society continued in force for forty-eight years, each year the number of its schools increasing, until finally all its property was turned over to the city.