eight canoe loads of provisions, to this place,
where they expected to have met the same number of men, from the forts
on this side of lake Erie, to convoy them and the stores up, who were
not arrived when they ran off.

I inquired into the situation of the French on the Mississippi, their
numbers, and what forts they had built. They informed me, that there
were four small forts between New Orleans and the Black Islands,
garrisoned with about thirty or forty men, and a few small pieces in
each. That at New Orleans, which is near the mouth of the Mississippi,
there are thirty-five companies of forty men each, with a pretty
strong fort mounting eight carriage guns; and at the Black Islands
there are several companies and a fort with six guns. The Black
Islands are about a hundred and thirty leagues above the mouth of the
Ohio, which is about three hundred and fifty above New Orleans. They
also acquainted me, that there was a small pallisadoed fort on the
Ohio, at the mouth of the Obaish, about sixty leagues from the
Mississippi. The Obaish heads near the west end of lake Erie, and
affords the communication between the French on the Mississippi and
those on the lakes. These deserters came up from the lower Shannoah
town with one Brown, an Indian trader, and were going to Philadelphia.

About three o'clock this evening the half king came to town. I went up
and invited him with Davidson, privately, to my tent; and desired him
to relate some of the particulars of his journey to the French
commandant, and of his reception there; also, to give me an account of
the ways and distance. He told me, that the nearest and levelest way
was now impassable, by reason of many large miry savannas; that we
must be obliged to go by Venango, and should not get to the near fort
in less than five or six nights sleep, good travelling. When he went
to the fort, he said he was received in a very stern manner by the
late commander, who asked him very abruptly, what he had come about,
and to declare his business: which he said he did in the following
speech:

"Fathers, I am come to tell you your own speeches; what your own
mouths have declared. Fathers, you, in former days, set a silver basin
before us, wherein there was the leg of a beaver, and desired all the
nations to come and eat of it, to eat in peace and plenty, and not to
be churlish to one another: and that if any such person should be
found to be a disturber, I here lay down by the edg