fall into these lakes, full seven or eight times as great as that valuable island."
In an article on the "Water Chronology of the City of New-York," published in that valuable repository, the Corporation Manual of Mr. Valentine for 1854, the services of Mr. Colles are duly noticed by the writer, Theodore R. De Forest. Colles, in 1774, proposed the construction of a reservoir and other works, between Pearl and White streets, in this city, and to answer that end, the expense was to be defrayed by issuing redeemable paper money. The war of the revolution arrested the undertaking, yet in 1778 the people petitioned that Colles' plan might be carried out. In 1797, we find his name among the applicants for a contract to convey water through the city by means of pipes. This was about the time that Dr. Brown associated himself with the Manhattan Company, in order to procure for the city a proper supply of pure and wholesome water. Dr. Brown recommended to the Common Council the Bronx river for that purpose; and this, it is affirmed, is the first indication on record that a supply from without the city was to be looked for. I believe that Colles made the original suggestion to Brown.
Through the kindness of a Knickerbocker friend, G. B. Rapelye, I have before me an elaborate pamphlet written by Colles, and published in New-York in 1808, on the interests of the United States of America, extending to all conditions of men, by means of inland navigable communications. He calls his plan, the Timber Canal, readier and more feasible to make, and far cheaper. These several tracts show the devotion and abilities of Colles, at a time when, in our country, few indeed were qualified to enter as competitors in his design.
These several projects of public improvement gave to Colles occupation congenial to his habits of study, though they resulted in but trifling pecuniary returns. His modesty and unassuming character were little calculated to force him within the channels of profitable occupation; yet he filled up what leisure he had with mathematics, hydraulics, and kindred studies. He was among the first, if not the very first individual who commenced itinerant public instruction. He practised land-surveying, and taught it in lectures in different parts of this State and elsewhere. He lectured on elec-
