1673 A.D. An exploring party, composed of six men and furnished with two slight bark canoes, undertook the search. They ascended the Fox River from the point where it enters Lake Michigan; they crossed a narrow isthmus; and launching upon the River Wisconsin, they floated easily downwards till they came out upon the magnificent waters of the Mississippi. Their joy was great: the banks of the river seemed to their gladdened eyes rich and beautiful; the trees were taller than they had ever seen before; wild cattle in vast herds roamed over the flowery meadows of this romantic land. For many days the adventurers followed the course of the river. They came where the Missouri joins its waters to those of the Mississippi. They passed the Ohio and the Arkansas, and looked with wonder upon the vast torrents which reinforced the mighty river. They satisfied themselves that the Mississippi fell into the Gulf of Mexico; and then, mistrusting the good-will of the Spaniards, they turned back and toilsomely reascended the stream.
1680 A.D. Some years later, a young and energetic Frenchman—Sieur de la Salle—completed the work which these explorers had begun. The hope entertained by Columbus, that he would discover a better route to the East, had only now, after two hundred years of disappointment, begun to fade out of the hearts of his followers, and it was still eagerly cherished by La Salle. He traversed the Mississippi from the mouth of the Illinois River to the Gulf. He saw the vast and dreary swamps which lie around the outlet of the Mississippi. He erected a shield bearing the arms of France; he claimed the enormous region from the Alleghany Mountains to the Pacific, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, as the possession of the French King.
For a full half century France took no action to secure the vast possession which she claimed. The later years of Louis XIV. were full of disaster. England, persuaded by King William that French ambition was a standing menace to Europe, waged wars which brought France to the verge of ruin. Her colonial possessions could receive little care when France was fighting for existence in Europe. 1746 A.D. A wise Governor of Canada—the Compte de la Galissonnière—perceived the rapid growth of the English settlements and the growing danger to France which their superior strength involved. He proposed that the line of the Mississippi should be fortified, and that ten thousand peasants should be sent out to form settlements on the banks of the great lakes and rivers. In time, the growing strength of these settlements would give to France secure possession of the valley of the Mississippi; while the English colonists, confined within the narrow region eastward of the Alleghany Mountains, must lie exposed to the damaging assault of their more powerful neighbours. So reasoned the Governor; but his words gained no attention from the pre-occupied Government of France. To the utmost of his means he sought to carry out the policy which would preserve for France her vast American possessions. He endeavoured to exclude English traders, and to persuade the Indians to adopt a similar course. He marked out the confines of French territory by leaden plates bearing the arms of France, sunk in the earth or nailed upon trees. He brought a few settlers from Nova Scotia. But all his efforts were in vain. The Anglo-Saxons were the appointed rulers of the American continent; and the time was near when, brushing aside the obstruction offered by Frenchmen and by Indians, they were to enter into full possession of their magnificent heritage.
CHAPTER V.
THE AMERICAN CONTINENT GAINED BY THE BRITISH.
The first English settlement which became permanent in Virginia was founded in 1606. Seven years later—while the settlement was still struggling for existence—the colonists began to form purposes of aggression against their still feebler neighbours in the far north. It was their custom to send annually to the great banks of Newfoundland a fleet of fishing-boats under convoy of an armed ship. Once the commander of this escort was a warlike person named Samuel Argall, whose lofty aims could not be restricted to the narrow sphere which had been assigned to him. While the boats which were his charge industriously plied their calling, Argall turned his thoughts to the larger pursuit of national aggrandizement. 1613 A.D. He affirmed the right of England to all the lands in his neighbourhood. The French had an armed vessel on the coast: Argall attacked and captured her. The French had formed a very feeble settlement on Penobscot Bay: Argall landed and laid in ruins the few buildings which composed it. He crammed seventeen of his prisoners into an open boat and turned them adrift at sea. The others were carried to Jamestown, where they came near to being hanged as pirates.
Thus early and thus lawlessly opened the strife which was to close, a century and a half later, with the victory of the English on the Heights of Abraham and the expulsion of French rule from the American continent. During the greater portion of that time England and France were at war, and the infant settlements of Acadie and Canada formed a natural prey to English adventurers. 1628 A.D. King James bestowed Acadie upon a countryman whom he befriended, and this new proprietor sent out a fleet to establish his claims. The lawless commander of this expedition did not scruple, in a time of peace, to possess himself of Quebec. Three times the English took Acadie: once they held it jointly with France for eleven years; then they restored it. 1713 A.D. Finally, it became theirs by the Treaty of Utrecht, and was henceforth known as Nova Scotia. As the New England colonies increased in strength they waged independent war with Canada. 1664 A.D. A little farther on the English conquered New York, and gradually extended their occupation northward to the Great Lakes. The Frenchmen of the St. Lawrence were their natural enemies. The English sought to possess themselves of the Canadian fur trade, and to that end made alliance with the Iroquois Indians, who were then a controlling power in the valley of the Hudson. There were perpetual border wars—cruel and wasteful. Often the Englishmen of New York attacked the Frenchmen of Canada; still more frequently they stimulated the Indians to hostility. Always there was strife, which made the colonies weak, and often threatened their extinction. It was not at first that England cared to possess Canada; it was rather that she could not witness the undisturbed possession by France of any territory which France seemed to prize.
As years passed and the enormous value to European Powers of the American continent was more fully discovered, the inevitable conflict awakened fiercer passions and called forth more energetic effort. The English were resolute to frequent the valley of the Ohio for trading purposes; the French were resolute to prevent them. Governors of the English colonies, scorning the authority of France, granted licences to traders; when traders bearing such licences appeared on the banks of the Ohio, they were arrested and their goods were confiscated. The English highly resented these injuries. Attempts were made to reach a pacific adjustment of disputes, and commissioners met for that purpose. But the temper of both nations was adverse to negotiation; the questions which divided them were too momentous. It was the destiny of a continent which the rival powers now debated. Men have not even yet found that the peaceable settlement of such questions is possible.