[Wrapper/docket — outer side of folded letter, text rotated and largely illegible. Legible elements:] [docket, upper right:] 97 [followed by columnar figures] [address panel, center:] [undecipherable] / Col. [undecipherable] / Commanding [undecipherable] [additional endorsements and marginal notations, largely illegible] Philadelphia March 17. 1788 Sir, It being our determination to form an early Settlement on the lands you are [undecipherable: farming?] for us and our associates, we have concluded to offer the following encouragement to such Substantial persons as shall be willing to become Settlers thereon. 1. To the person or persons who will [undertake] to erect a [saw] mill and grist mill in [situations] which shall be [shewn] to us or [our] agent by us appointed [to] appear most [suitable] for the accommodation of the greatest body of the expected Settlers, we will give two hundred acres of land adjoining to and including the requisite mill [seats] for the two mills aforesaid, at the rate of twenty pounds per hundred [acres] to be paid in the manner other Settlers are to pay for their lots as hereinafter mentioned. We will also give to [such] undertaker One hundred and twenty pound in cash, to assist him in erecting these mills. 2. The first fifty Settlers shall be at liberty to chuse in what [survey] they will fix their residence. Such [survey] shall then be divided [strikethrough: the 100 two lots with [halves] — the two more lots with between] [strikethrough: and the 1000 acre lots into [fourths]], [fifty] and the parts to be granted to the Settlers shall be determined by lot, so that they do not take up more than [half] of any one [survey] — that the quantity taken up by each Settler do not exceed two hundred or three hundred acres — and [that] the whole [lie] together in one lot. For the land [to be granted] this company will accept of twenty [pounds] per hundred acres, and make the payments easy, by taking bonds & mortgages to [secure] [such] payments in the course of [five] years, without interest for the first year. 3. To aid the Settlers in opening a communication with our lands we will give Thirty pounds to [such] of them as shall cut a road and [render] it [passable] for loaded waggons, from the second fork of [undecipherable: probable reading Sinnemahoning] creek to the center of the in-tended Settlement. 4. That the Settlers and their children may have the [necessary] instruction in religion and the most necessary learning, we will appropriate [strikethrough: eight hundred] acres of land for the support of these two objects. Two hundred acres thereof shall be given in full right to the first minister [of the] Gospel, whom we will endeavour to procure. [undecipherable] on his lot by the time that fifty [such] Settlers shall have [settled] themselves there; three hundred acres thereof shall remain for a like [benefit] and [successors]; and the other three hundred acres shall be for the use of a school. [strikethrough: [5.] The [Settlers] [shall] [undecipherable] [to a] minister and [Schoolmaster] [separately]] for a minister and [Schoolmaster], [separately], we expect the duties of both offices will be performed by the same person. And we propose to give [such] additional encouragement as will induce a [suitable] [person] to [settle] & perform [these] duties. [Our] provision for a minister [/Schoolmaster] [will] tend to [animate] the Settlement rapidly; so [the] [those] [tenants] who shall have conducted their [im]movements with propriety and economy shall certainly be preferred to all others, and the most favoured as well in the choice of farms as [moderation] of the terms. Timothy Pickering Sam Hodgdon [signature — undecipherable] [signature — undecipherable] NB The company expect that in all [deeds] to those [settling] [herein] with at least 300 acres of land [surrounding] it to be [absolutely] [required] for them. [undecipherable] no [privileges] granted to any [other?] [undecipherable] than [is] in this letter. [signature — undecipherable] To [General?] James Peters[?]