This is one of the smaller towns of Orange County and it is located in the acute angle of the western boundary line of the county formed by the indentation of Sullivan County. The territory of the town is diamond-shaped. The Shawangunk stream, which flows through the town lengthwise toward the northeast, leaves it in the apex of the angle and then forms the boundary line separating Orange from Sullivan, as well as the northwestern bounds of the towns of Wallkill and Crawford. It is bounded on the north by Sullivan County and a very small part of the town of Wallkill, east by that town, south by the towns of Wawayanda and Greenville, and west by the town of Deer Park. The area of the town is now placed at 16,104 acres. The assessed valuation of all the real and personal property, as reported by the assessors in 1906, was $632,075, upon which the tax levy for that year was $3,903.36. In 1880 this land was valued at $673,470, and the annual tax was $5,157.79. But it would be manifestly unfair to assume that the land is less valuable now than it was twenty-five years ago. The average town assessor in the State of New York, under the prevailing political conditions and customs, is largely a creature of circumstance, with strange vagaries in judgment, if indeed he is called upon to exercise any judgment at all under the official limitations of his position. Then, too, standards of value have greatly changed during that time. This Mount Hope territory lies wholly north of the old county line which originally divided Orange from Ulster County. NATURAL FEATURES. The Shawangunk mountain range in the western border of the town is the most important topographical feature. This northern spur of the Alleghenies is known as the Blue Mountains in New Jersey and the Kittatiny Mountains in the State of Pennsylvania. Beginning in the central part of Ulster County the general trend of the range is toward the southwest for some 250 miles. There are few isolated peaks, and the greatest altitude reached is about 1,800 feet above tide. The more notable elevations of this range are Sam's Point, near Ellenville, Sky Top and Eagle's Cliff at Lake Mohonk, all of which are in Ulster County. The Indian word Shawangunk, which has been used to designate this range since the settlement of the region, signifies "great wall" in the aboriginal vernacular, which in fact seems especially appropriate as a descriptive title.