ed with prayer, after which Hamilton harangued the
assembled Chippewas, Hurons, Mohawks, and Potawatomi on their "duties"
in the war and congratulated them on the increasing numbers of their
prisoners and scalps, and then urged them to redoubled activity by
holding out the prospect of the complete expulsion of white men from the
great interior hunting-grounds.

Scarcely were the deputations attending this council well on their way
homewards when a courier arrived from the Illinois country bringing
startling news. The story was that a band of three hundred rebels led by
one George Rogers Clark had fallen upon the Kaskaskia settlements, had
thrown the commandant into irons, and had exacted from the populace an
oath of allegiance to the Continental Congress. It was reported, too,
that Cahokia had been taken, and that, even as the messenger was leaving
Kaskaskia, "Gibault, a French priest, had his horse ready saddled to go
to Vincennes to receive the submission of the inhabitants in the name of
the rebels."

George Rogers Clark was a Virginian, born in the foothills of Albemarle
County three years before Braddock's defeat. His family was not of the
landed gentry, but he received some education, and then, like Washington
and many other adventuresome young men of the day, became a surveyor.
At the age of twenty-two he was a member of Governor Dunmore's staff.
During a surveying expedition he visited Kentucky, which so pleased him
that in 1774 he decided to make that part of the back country his home.
He was even then a man of powerful frame, with broad brow, keen blue
eyes, and a dash of red in his hair from a Scottish ancestress--a man,
too, of ardent patriotism, strong common sense, and exceptional
powers of initiative and leadership. Small wonder that in the rapidly
developing commonwealth beyond the mountains he quickly became a
dominating spirit.

With a view to organizing a civil government and impressing upon the
Virginia authorities the need of defending the western settlements, the
men of Kentucky held a convention at Harrodsburg in the spring of 1775
and elected two delegates to present their petition to the Virginia
Assembly. Clark was one of them. The journey to Williamsburg was long
and arduous, and the delegates arrived only to find that the Legislature
had adjourned. The visit, none the less, gave Clark an opportunity
to explain to the new Governor--"a certain Patrick Henry, of
Hanover County," as the royali