e, of
indescribable horror. It is impossible to dwell without a shudder on the
monstrous woe and misery of such a contest.

The Lake Posts.

The men of Kentucky and of the infant Northwest would have found their
struggle with the Indians dangerous enough in itself; but there was an
added element of menace in the fact that back of the Indians stood the
British. It was for this reason that the frontiersmen grew to regard as
essential to their well-being the possession of the lake posts; so that
it became with them a prime object to wrest from the British, whether by
force of arms or by diplomacy, the forts they held at Niagara, Detroit,
and Michilimakinac. Detroit was the most important, for it served as the
headquarters of the western Indians, who formed for the time being the
chief bar to American advance. The British held the posts with a strong
grip, in the interest of their traders and merchants. To them the land
derived its chief importance from the fur trade. This was extremely
valuable, and, as it steadily increased in extent and importance, the
consequence of Detroit, the fitting-out town for the fur traders, grew
in like measure. It was the centre of a population of several thousand
Canadians, who lived by the chase and by the rude cultivation of their
long, narrow farms; and it was held by a garrison of three or four
hundred British regulars, with auxiliary bands of American loyalist and
French Canadian rangers, and, above all, with a formidable but
fluctuating reserve force of Indian allies. [Footnote: Haldimand Papers,
1784, 5, 6.]

The British Aid the Indians.

It was to the interest of the British to keep the American settlers out
of the land; and therefore their aims were at one with those of the
Indians. All the tribes between the Ohio and the Missouri were
subsidized by them, and paid them a precarious allegiance. Fickle,
treacherous, and ferocious, the Indians at times committed acts of
outrage even on their allies, so that these allies had to be ever on
their guard; and the tribes were often at war with one another. War
interrupted trade and cut down profits, and the British endeavored to
keep the different tribes at peace among themselves, and even with the
Americans. Moreover they always discouraged barbarities, and showed what
kindness was in their power to any unfortunate prisoners whom the
Indians happened to bring to their posts. But they helped the Indians in
all ways save by open m