In 1743 there occurred a terrible massacre at Old Saratoga. All of the houses in the village were burned to the ground and only one or two of the inhabitants escaped to tell the tale. For seven years the French and Indian war raged through the valley, proving its importance as a northern gateway. The rattle of arms, the tread of soldiers, the hurrying of street boys were heard in town from morning till night. Indians in war-paint and feathers joined each side, burning with the hate of over a hundred years. Garrets were ransacked for great-grandfather's swords, rusted with the blood of King Philip's war. French officers in gold lace, trappers in doeskin, priests in their black robes, soldiers in the white uniform of the French king, gathered on the banks of the St. Lawrence. English grenadiers in red coats, Scotch Highlanders in plaids and colonial troops in homespun rallied from all the frontiers; and again this great gateway knew the horrors of a long, devastating, and bloody war. "In 1767 Sir William Johnson, who had suffered for years from a wound received in his hip in the war with the Indians, was told of the Great Medicine Waters. The Indians seemed to know of their location many years previous to this, for they were the ones who told Johnson about their great healing qualities. He was carried on stretchers to this mysterious spring. The waters proved so beneficial that he was able to return over the 'carrying place' on foot. The waters he drank were said to have been taken from High Rock spring of Saratoga Springs." The city contains many spacious, imposing hotels and fine tree- bordered streets, which at once suggest that Saratoga was the one time "Queen of Spas." But if the people no longer come here in such great numbers, Nature still reigns over the place, and it possesses that quiet and repose which make it an ideal place in which to spend a vacation. Here are wonderful old elms whose branches intermingle to form a canopy over the streets. So gracefully do their drooping sprays of green descend that we could think of nothing with which to compare them save emerald fountains. These old trees are more stately, more graceful than those at Versailles. Beautiful villas, public halls and handsome churches are scattered about the city. Viewed from the surrounding hills, the buildings seem to nestle in a leafy wilderness. The annual horseraces held here still draw large crowds, but as a summer resort Saratoga, like Trenton Falls, has seen its day. It is not Old Saratoga that contains the most interest for the traveler, but the region around Schuylerville. Here the green carpet covers all the hills, whose smooth, velvety appearance adds greatly to the beauty of the country.