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There is not much bird-trapping in that neighbourhood to-day!

Success breeds enterprise. When we had disposed of these various plots at a good profit, I was ambitious to undertake still larger transactions. The original Rapid Transit Commission was then laying out the routes of the first subway, and I, in search of another One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street, began to prospect for the district in which the Commission would be likely to locate a northerly spur, concluding that if Washington Heights were made accessible, One Hundred and Eighty-first Street would become the important thoroughfare of that neighbourhood.

There were four hundred lots owned by Levi P. Morton, then Vice-President of the United States, and George Bliss, of Morton, Bliss & Company, for which I had practically concluded my negotiations in September, 1890, when the Old World was shocked by the failure of Baring Brothers, the largest banking house of England. All negotiations were stopped. But, in February, 1891, about eighty lots located in this vicinity were successfully disposed of at auction. Peter F. Meyer, who conducted that sale, assured me that less than one half of the bidders had secured lots.