ling
wilderness become a fruitful field which the Lord hath blessed;
and, to complete the scene, I see churches rise and flourish in
every Christian grace where has been the seat of Satan and Indian
idolatry."

Nathaniel Appleton, of Cambridge, hails the dawning of a
new era. "Who can tell what great and glorious things God
is about to bring forward in the world, and in this world of
America in particular? Oh, may the time come when these
deserts, which for ages unknown have been regions of darkness
and habitations of cruelty, shall be illuminated with the
light of the glorious Gospel, and when this part of the world,
which till the later ages was utterly unknown, shall be the
glory and joy of the whole earth!"

On the American continent the war was ended, and the
British colonists breathed for a space, as they drifted unwittingly
towards a deadlier strife. They had learned hard and useful lessons.
Their mutual jealousies and disputes, the quarrels of their governors
and assemblies, the want of any general military organization, and
the absence, in most of them, of military habits, joined to narrow
views of their own interest, had unfitted them to the last degree for
carrying on offensive war. Nor were the British troops sent for their
support remarkable in the beginning for good discipline or
efficient command. When hostilities broke out, the army of
Great Britain was so small as to be hardly worth the name.
A new one had to be created; and thus the inexperienced
Shirley and the incompetent Loudon, with the futile Newcastle
behind them, had, besides their own incapacity, the disadvantage of
raw troops and half-formed officers; while against them stood an
enemy who, though weak in numbers, was strong in a centralized military
organization, skilful leaders armed with untrammelled and absolute
authority, practised soldiers, and a population not only brave, but in
good part inured to war.

The nature of the country was another cause that helped
to protract the contest. "Geography," says Von Moltke, "is
three fourths of military science;" and never was the truth
of his words more fully exemplified. Canada was fortified with
vast outworks of defence in the savage forests, marshes, and
mountains that encompassed her, where the thoroughfares
were streams choked with fallen trees and obstructed by
cataracts. Never was the problem of moving troops, encumbered
with baggage and artillery, a more difficult one. The question